Stitch Therapy

New Location

2008-09-13T21:32:00.000-07:00

So I finally figured out the wordpress thing on my site I've been paying for (for years now) and not using. I managed to customize it a bit, and import all my blogger posts. So from now on I'll be posting over there and not here.

New Blog: http://yarnophilia.com/blog

So I invite you all to join me, and update your blog reader, etc.

See you there!

Fiber and Yarn Pr0n

2008-09-11T22:20:00.000-07:00

So I've gotten a few things since the last post. Melissa sent me some goodies in exchange for knitting the shawl for her. One was a skein of yarn I had sent with the shawl. I asked for a custom dye job, even though I could have done it. I haven't had a chance to really pull out the dyes. It's 2500ish yards of merino lace. It's for the Snowflakes in Cedarwoods shawl by Anne Hanson.
She also sent me some roving, it's gorgeous!
I also got the rovings I ordered from Flawful Fibers:
The top one is rambouillet in Woodstock Earthchild, and the bottom is seawool in Ashes of Roses.
I adore them both.

Other than that I finished a little skein of merino/silk/firestar. It's 58 grams, 170 yards of navajo plied yarn. Really pretty! I threw it in the shop, if it doesn't sell, well I won't cry over keeping it!
In other news, we are moving back to NY. It's a big ordeal, surrounded by DRAMA. I won't get into it here, most of my loyal readers know anyway. I'm stressed, and upset, but trying not to freak. I may post about it later, but right now, I've been thinking about it for days and I'd like to just not for a bit.

Fair Entries

2008-09-06T15:45:00.000-07:00

So yesterday I went up to the Post Office, I knew there was a package waiting for me. It was my Loopy Ewe sock club!
There is a skein of kettle dyed Sknitches yarn in the color Muddy Waters. It's a gorgeous merino/bamboo/nylon blend. The pattern is called Zanzibar, and it's by Cookie A. It's the first sock pattern I've wanted to cast on immediately from either of my sock clubs in a while. It's just so pretty. The colored things are sticky notes, SO AWESOME. It's a little book that you open up and has the different sizes and colors.

I also got my targhee roving from MoonlightBaker I ordered, but forgot to take a picture of it. Next time, I'm too lazy right now.

Yesterday was also opening day at the fair. We weren't planning on going, but hubby knew how badly I wanted to go and find out how I did with my entries. So we went for a while. Here is my Spring Things Shawl that I entered in the knitting:
I got a big ribbon! I don't know what it means, there were only 5 other projects with ribbons like that. Either way, I was so excited.

Here are my green Twisted Flower socks, which also got a ribbon. (Pretty much everything gets some kind of ribbon...)
Then I drug him over to the sheep barn where all the handspun stuff was in a little shed. I immediately picked out my skeins of yarn (the orange one in the center, and the reddish one above and to the left). Both had blue ribbons.
Lastly, and best of all, my handspun Swallowtail shawl:
I won the Grand Champion ribbon! I couldn't believe it, but there it is. So all in all I was very pleased, and I'm already planning ideas for what to enter next year.

After that we went and watched the rodeo, it was entertaining. I have pics, but they suck, and photos are not behaving on my computer in general.

Other than that, not much going on, knitting the snow on cedars mitts. So I'll be back with more later, now I have to get the kids up from naptime!

This is how boring I am these days:

2008-09-02T21:04:00.000-07:00

I share with you today, how easily I bruise. See those reddish marks on my arm? They are darker in real life, but those are from carrying grocery bags. Yeah...
I got fun things in the mail, two rovings from Allspunup's last update. I haven't named them yet.
I love them both! I was so excited to get them today.
I have a targhee roving on the way from MoonlightBaker, and two rovings (one rambouillet and one merino/seacell) from Flawful Fibers. I've been bad and I know it...

Other than that, today I dropped off my things to the fairgrounds. I entered my twisted flower socks and my teal colored spring things shawl in the knitting. In the wool I entered two handspun skeins, and my swallowtail knit from handspun. I didn't get the thumb of Alexis' mitten done to enter that. It would NOT behave and I ripped it back out twice.

Well, nothing new elsewise. I'll be around, probably with pictures of the fair and let you all know how my entries did!

Twisted Flowers

2008-08-28T19:29:00.000-07:00

I finished the second Twisted Flower sock a little while ago! They are so pretty and very warm! I took them off though, I want them as un-fuzzed as possible to show at the fair.
I have the other mitten left to knit, which shouldn't take long, and then the two skeins to prepare for the fair. I have to drop things off on Tuesday.

I got two very pretty batts in the mail on Wednesday. They are from Wooly Treasures and I loooove them so much. This first one is called Pansy:
And this one is English Posey. I adore the mix of colors in it.
They are both a mix of different fibers, I think I may spin the Pansy one first. I need a quicker spin in between the lace I've been slaving at.

I finally decided to start a project that I have been putting off for a while. I keep seeing these sock yarn blankets and I have been wanting to do one for ages. Especially this one, which Robyn keeps posting about...

So I started my own. Or rather two. One for each kid. Girl colors, and boy colors. Roughly separated. Some colors work on both. I didn't realize how many scraps I had, and gathered them all up in a canvas bag to keep together, and got to work.

Alexis' so far is mostly pink, but there is that blue square and I've got some blue and the green from the twisted flower socks. There are actually five squares done on hers now.
Nicholas' blankie now has 8 squares. As soon as I finished the socks, I added a green square to his. His is mostly green. Seems I have more green than I thought.
So to any blog readers out there who don't have plans for their own sock yarn blankies, have any scraps to spare? Each square is around 4 grams of yarn, really small. I'm knitting them on size 2's and they aren't taking long to knit. I know this is a long term project, but I would wholly appreciate any help along the way! I am only using superwash sock yarn, fingering weight. I'm not using any self striping, just solids, mostly solids, and handpaints. Colors aren't a big deal. I think pastels (pinks, yellows, blues, greens) would be great for hers, and darker colors (brown, green, blue, etc) for his.

Other than that, I have to go cast on the mitten, I should be able to get a decent amount done tonight. I work tomorrow, Sunday and Monday, so that cuts in on the knitting time before the fair. I know I'll get it done, I just prefer to be done as soon as possible!

Strawberry Wine

2008-08-23T21:58:00.000-07:00

Well, wine with strawberries in it anyway. Beringer White Zinfandel is my new favorite wine. Of course the premier one is better, but I can only find the regular it seems. Add some cut up strawberries, and heaven. This is how I would like to spend all evenings.
You can see in the picture I've started my second twisted flower sock (finally, I knit the first one last august!). I want it to enter in the fair, I've got until September 2nd to get things together. That's the day you bring things in.

I also planned on finishing my fair isle Selbuvotter mittens, but my tension has changed, so I have to start it over. Instead I figured I'd make things easy on myself and instead, get a headstart on winter knitting. Alexis picked the pattern, and two colors, and this is the first mitten done.
It's NHM #5, in black and pink, just like mine. It came out well! Now just to knit one more, but this one took less than 2 days. So I'm not worried.
I also finished the first Rivendell sock. It looks long and funny, but it's the ribbing on the top making it look that way. I had to have the needles from this one to knit the twisted flower, then when that's done, back to the second Rivendell.
Other than that I've just been knitting and spinning. Oh yeah, and my yarn I spun last time, apparently I didn't spin the singles opposite on my yarn, I just underspun one ply, so it didn't look right at first. It's much better now that I set it.

I got a few goodies in the mail yesterday. Look at this!
Isn't it pretty? This was how my fiber from ExclusivelyLindaLee came. I unwrapped it all and it was even better than it was on my computer screen.

Here we have a pretty bit of tencel. This is the chocolates colorway. She also sent a little sample of this color in either bamboo or tencel. It looks identical to the tencel so I think that's what it is.
These are the same color as well, though you can see how differently they took the dyes. Soooo soft! It's tussah silk.
Then I have 2 batts of cashmere silk that are insane. I want a whole pile of it to roll in.
I also got a few things from The Loopy Ewe. A skein of the new Intentions Yarn in the color Hope.
And some Gale's Art roving, which is black bfl dyed, it's the color Proud Peacock.
I can't wait to see how it spins. It's really soft, and the colors are so intense. It's a bit darker in person though. This was the best I could get.

So I'll be busy for the next week, prepping for the fair and stuff. I'll let you know how it goes!

Where did I put my brain?

2008-08-19T14:46:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, I swear, I just don't think!

So yesterday I plyed my Pink Lady singles, which I had finished the day before. I was so excited to be done, and have my first 3 ply sock yarn.Yeah, so two hours later I finished the three ply. There was a bit left on two of the bobbins, so I figured I would just ply those together, and have a little skein of 2ply. Well when I finished the two ply I noticed that they were not "sticking together" the way they should. Yes, I managed to once again ply ONE of my three singles in the opposite direction.

I think my 3 ply will be ok. It's tightly plyed,a nd you can't tell too easily. Plus I'm just gonna knit it into socks. So, I'll set the twist and go from there. I'm determined to use it either way.Isn't it pretty though? I love it.

Today I got a few things in the mail when I went up to the post office. One was a package from Opal. I won a contest on her blog and she sent these cute stitch markers! I adore the little fairie.
Then there was the final club shipment for my funky carolina fiber club. It's 4 ounces of bamboo, it's really interesting feeling! I have been wanting to spin pure bamboo, now I'll get to!
I also got two sets of size 0 needles I swapped some roving for. I don't particularly enjoy knitting on 0's, but they are so tiny, I figured I should have some in case my others break.

Well, I'm still doing all the same stuff otherwise. I'm about to FINALLY start my black merino tencel for the dragon shawl. It's going to be a long time spinning, with almost 10 ounces. I plan on taking my time, and probably spinning smaller bits of other stuff in between. Here goes!

Hellooooo Kitty

2008-08-15T22:24:00.000-07:00

Yes, lame title I know.

So I found this Hello Kitty mousepad at work. We've had them since last christmas, and there were still a few there. I bought one for a friend, and one for me! I needed a new mousepad. Ain't it cute?
This is the other thing I found. A case for my DS. I like it wayyy better than my old one. It's adorable!
In other news, I finished a pair of socks! My sister's Carolina socks. After her visit where she tried them on (and I was sure they fit right) I got to it knitting the second one. She left a few things here when she left so I hurried to knit the sock in order to send them to her with the other things. Right now they are on the way!
I've been knitting like a maniac on the stole. I finished the first half of it! Here we have a picture of it when I was still knitting the arrowhead pattern. I messed with it so you can see the beads. So the color is off but you can see them!
Here we have it when I was knitting on the border. That took me a day and a half on it's own. I had no idea how much work that takes! It's so pretty though.
So I finished that half, and today I picked up for the second after pulling out the provisional cast on. It looks great in the center pattern, but it doesn't quite match on the side. It's no real biggie, but I'm thinking it will bug me, so I'm gonna pull out the small bit I've done to fix it. See, fixing it will change the border rows that go with the center patterning. So instead of following it row by row, I'll have to remember where I'm at on the edging since it won't match what the pattern will say. Easy enough, the edge pattern is really easy.
I also started the Tudor Grace scarf, also from knitspot. I have started knitting it in two different yarns so far! Neither one looks the way I'd like them too, so I am still trying to decide what I will use. I LOVE the pattern though! It's really easy to memorize, and fun to do.

Lastly, I got some yarn in the mail! I traded some stash for these two. The first is some of the 100% superwash Wollmeise in Miss May, one of my FAVORITE colorways.
This one is really different. It's meant to be colored after the picture of that moth on the label I think. It's so cool though, and super soft!
Well, that's about it, it's late, and I'm really tired. I ran a few errands today in the heat and it wiped me out. I got new shoes though, so it was worth it! I'll take pics of them for next time. Later all!

Melanzana

2008-08-12T15:17:00.000-07:00

Thought I would show off the Melanzana stole I'm test knitting. I have to say that as much as I thought it was pretty before, knitting it has made me fall for it even more. It starts with a provisional cast on, and you knit the flowered section. Then the little lacewing section which I love. I'm into the third part now.
Here's a close up shot of the lacewing motif. I think it's perfect.
I'm beading the last section, just because I can't help myself. It's pretty so far, and I might finish it today, and then there's an edging on it. That's the first half! So we'll see how far I get today.

It's been nice weather out lately, just the right temperature. Here's a pic I took the other day of the sun setting.
We had taken the kids out to play, they love the dirt.
Their job was to fill up the black container. They didn't get far before they got bored lol.
They had fun though. Trying to take advantage of the nicer days we have before winter hits and we get cooped up in the house!

Today Chad is home from work. He has a guy he works with over to help him drop the engine back into the Mitsubishi. Hopefully all goes well. He's been driving his parent's truck that sucks up gas like you wouldn't believe!

Now I'm off to knit on the shawl, it's going so fast! Pictures of it maybe tomorrow with the beads. :)

TWO FO's!

2008-08-06T15:22:00.000-07:00

That's right, I said it. TWO. Not only did I finish the swallowtail and block it, I blocked the Jaywalker Scarf too!

Here is the swallowtail all laid out on the couch. You can see how big it is, it's covering 2 cushions! I love how there is no major pooling.
A shot of the points, beaded and oh so pretty!
More beads. It helps if the picture is bigger, so maybe click on it. I can see them pretty good in the big version of it. See what I mean though? They match so well!
Here is the scarf, and of course, as soon as I started taking pictures, the munchkin got in the way.
Here again, she wouldn't budge! Ah well.
I adore this scarf. I also have enough to do another scarf. So maybe I'll make up my own chevron scarf? It's an easy enough pattern.

Right now though, I'm still knitting the knitspot lace stole. I'll have a pic of that next time. It's barely any further, although you can see the pattern, and it's SO pretty. I just have to pin it down so it can be appreciated.

Till next time!

In which I fall (JUMP) off the wagon...as they say.

2008-08-04T16:30:00.000-07:00

You may or may not notice that the ticker is now removed from my blog. Yeah...

It started when I was on the loopy ewe site and saw this roving that I wanted SO BAD. I just couldn't help myself, and everyone on Plurk was encouraging me! This one is called Raspberry Creme Brulee and I adore it.I couldn't bring myself to pay to ship just that though, so I got this one, Whisper:
They are both from Creatively Dyed, 8 ounces each of seawool. Can't wait to spin!

Then, since I was on a roll, I hopped over to Flawful Fibers, which I do on occasion to see if this one roving was still there. I swear it's been there forever and I loved it. So I figured, if it's lasted and no one else is gonna buy it, I should! Villa Capri (superfine merino):
Again, not able to justify shipping just one thing, I got a soysilk wool blend, since I haven't spun soysilk before. Folly:
I got all of this in the mail today. Also there was a set of stitch markers I ordered from my blog buddy Opal's new etsy shop, Opalescence. They are gorgeous!!! I love the little mermaid charm. And NOW, she's got Hello Kitty ones too...
So besides blowing my yarn/fiber diet big time, I've been trying to get back on schedule. The visit with my family still has me off and I'm having a tough time getting back to it. In the meantime I'm knitting lots of lace. Socks in between for a break.

Here is a test knit I'm doing for miss Anne over at Knitspot. It's going to be a stole, and though I'm not far, it's all I want to knit! I haven't forgotten the Swallowtail. I'm SO close to finishing. Only, I screwed up and am missing a bunch of stitches somehow, and I can't figure out what I did. So I can't knit it until I get it worked out. It's bugging the crap out of me!

On Saturday I went and got a sorely needed haircut. I love going where I do, they do massages and aroma therapy and stuff. So my neck and scalp get five star treatment. Here's a pic:
It's not my style at all, though it doesn't exactly look bad, and in fact, I've gotten compliments on it. It's just, a bit too short. I DID tell her I wanted it a little shorter than normal, so when it grows out it will still look good. It's not the overall length, but the length of my bangs. I don't like the top layer that short, but it's not even that they are TOO short. Just shorter than I'm comfortable with. So, until it grows in a bit, I'm stuck with it.

So, now I'm off to find my sweater, and sit on the couch with my knitting and catch up on the last two big brother's I've missed that are on the dvr. :)

Secret Socks

2008-08-01T17:42:00.000-07:00

Well, since these socks are now available to the world, I assume I can blog them now. Remember the super secret project I did a while back? Some of you might. If you go to Twist Collective, they are the Lissajous socks by Cookie A. The grey ones are the ones I knit, and man was it tough! The socks are not complicated really, I found it easy to follow the charts, and the cabling down the leg was not bad to memorize. Still, I had a 2 week deadline to knit them, and I knit pretty much non stop those two weeks! Here are some of my pictures from when I was knitting them. I wish I had a pic of both socks together, but the second I finished it (I was at a coffee shop in the mall...) I shoved it into an envelope and mailed the pair off to be photographed!

They are gorgeous socks, go buy the pattern and knit them! It's totally worth the work, I swear! Now I need to knit me some...I adore the shaping and detail she put into these.

Other than that, I'm hoping to finish the swallowtail tonight. I don't have much left, but those last few rows can take forever!

Oh and I've put up a skein of handspun yarn in my shop. I don't have plans for it and I still have handspun waiting to be knit, might as well let someone else enjoy it!

Lastly, my dad put an offer in on the house we have had our eye on. I'm hoping it will be accepted, but it's going to mean some sacrifices for us, since we'll have to pay rent, and we don't right now. It's going to save us big time on gas though, and in general be more convenient. Plus, it will be MINE for the next 9 years. MY yard, MY kitchen, MINE. I'm off to contemplate the budget while working on the swallowtail.

Shinies!

2008-07-31T15:57:00.000-07:00

Just a quick one to show off the beads on the swallowtail. They match SO well you almost can't see them. But they are silver lined, so when the light hits them right, they shine!
This pic shows the beads a little better, but the flash skewed the colors.
In other news, I am a moron. I mailed two destash packages to the wrong people...sigh. They are very understanding though and it's being fixed thank goodness. That's what I get for not paying attention!

So now I'm off to work on the swallowtail some more. I probably won't knit or spin anything else till it's done, I can taste the end!

Also, this one is gonna be hard to part with...lol, it's just so pretty with the beads! I'll be excited to finish though, cuz it means I can cast on Laminaria with that pretty handspun, the blue/green single. Maybe I'll find a way to add beads to that too...

Good Mail Day! (RSC Spoiler ahead)

2008-07-29T18:31:00.000-07:00

So today I went up to the post office after work. I knew my RSC shipment was waiting for me, and I had some destashing items to mail off. I was not expecting this most wonderful package that arrived also. It is the one for the HHHH swap! I got some great stuff, more than I ever expected, and all of it is awesome!
On the top left is a batt from Loop on etsy. Gorgeous bamboo in the colorway Mint Chocolate Chip. Below that is a knitting keychain, the yarn spun just for me (160ish yards of merino silk!), and soap in the brown wrapping. Then there is a set of knitpicks dpns in size 1, a wpi tool, and a card that has a hat pattern on it! The yellow packet and the ones to the right of it are wool wash samples, then on the left is a little notepad and chicken thingy.

It's an amazing package, and I couldn't ask for more! Thanks so much Elizabeth!

Next up is the RSC package. I had accidentally seen the yarn on someone else's blog, and I knew that I would love it when I got it in my hands. I adore pastels and I love the pattern. Well, it comes with two.
The one in the pic is the Gumdrop pattern. Oh and the yarn is called Goody Goody, and came with sweet tarts! Which also happens to be the name of the other pattern, a simple ankle sock but it's cute in the yarn!

I can't wait to knit both of these socks...I wonder if I'll have enough for both with one skein? Maybe, I have smallish feet. If not I'll do the anklets with something else, I've got some jelly bean colored cherry tree hill. I bet that would work!

Well off to knit now. I'm just about to the beaded bit of the swallowtail! I am in the home stretch now, and the beads will keep me motivated. :)

Where's the knitting?

2008-07-27T21:51:00.001-07:00

So it's been a bit since the last post, which wasn't really all that interesting to most of you I'm sure. I took a few pics to prove that I am still knitting amid the craziness. Not a ton, but doing what I can.

Here's the swallowtail. I know from knitting mine the first time around that it's an itty bitty shawl, and mine had been knit with thicker yarn. So when I got to the required 14 repeats I decided that Melissa might actually want to use the shawl as more than a head scarf...so I am making it bigger.
To make it bigger you have to add increments of 5 repeats. So 19 instead of 14. Here I have it up to 17 repeats, just two more to go! I can't wait to get to the beaded part. That's my favorite. Plus I really want to finish this and get it mailed off.

Here's a pic of my Juno Regina, which I haven't worked on in a few weeks, but I hadn't taken a pic of the progress since the diamond motif. I love how handspun knits up, it's so pretty. I cannot even wait to finish this.
Then yesterday I started the second Carolina sock, I had started the pair in February and knit the first to fit my sister. When she came over here I had her try it on and it was PERFECT. She was excited so I am trying to hurry and finish. She forgot a few small things here so I'd like to mail the socks with them.
She also said that it didn't matter if they matched. I had mostly been putting it off because I wasn't sure if I wanted to try and make them exactly the same. I think they'll be cute either way.

I finished spinning and plying the yarn for my hand spun swap pal. I have to bathe it tomorrow, and then get the rest of the package ready to mail. It's so pretty I don't want to give it away! I really hope she loves it.

I sent the hat and socks for my Aunt Jackie back with Meghan when she flew home. I haven't heard word yet, but I think Meg hasn't been over to see her yet since she got there. I think also she's going to hand them over to my mom to gift for me. My mom visits more often.

Well that's about it for right now. Just working on finishing stuff up, and I'm planning on starting the third bobbin of the superwash bfl for my 3 ply sock. I can't wait to see how it plies up! More pics when I've got something interesting to show.

What a busy week!

2008-07-22T22:13:00.000-07:00

Ok so I don't know what's up with Blogger. Is mine the only one being retarded???

Anyway, haven't had much time to update. I've been so busy for the last week I've done almost no knitting or spinning at all. My dad flew in from Massachusetts on the 14th, and my sister from NY on the 17th, so we packed in all the visiting and fun while we could. My dad got in later on Monday, so Tuesday I took the kids in and we walked to the big park downtown to feed the ducks and ride the carousel they have there. On Thursday when Meg got in I took them in and they swam at the pool at the hotel. Friday Meg and I took Nick to see Wall-E. Oh man was that a cute movie! I loved it and so did he. He also ate half a tub of popcorn...by himself...(This is Meg and Nick)

Saturday was a family gathering, all the "fun" (say that in the most sarcastic voice ever) people who live here that I never see. Some of them aren't so bad, others are annoying. Either way, if the party hadn't been in a backyard with two ponds, balloons and presents the kids couldn't touch, and alcohol, it would have been nicer...(Meg and Alexis)

Sunday I worked,and then my dad, sister, and I went to breakfast. Then we went to look at a house (which I'll talk about in a min) and that night my sister and I went to dinner. We went to Olive Garden, but there was a 45 minute wait. So we went over to Nordstrom to look around and I finally found a decent pair of shoes to wear to work. (These are the ones I got, in black, SO comfy) Then we went back to eat, and I got a glass of wine with dinner. It was SO good. Some of the better wine I've tasted. Beringer White Zinfandel, a Chardonnay version or something. I need to find some...anyway it's a really dark zinfandel, but man it was good!

Monday I worked and my manager let me leave early. I went home and I got ready to go back out. My sister and I met up with my dad to go back to that house and see inside. After that we got food from Sonic, and went up to my dad's sister's house and I got a purse from her. She sells those reproduction ones. It's SO adorable. Then we went to see that new batman movie. Dark Knight something or other. It was AMAZING. A really great movie.

So that brings us to today. My sister flew home at 6am, and I vegged all day, relaxing after the last week of activity. My dad was supposed to be here till Friday but changed his flight to go home tomorrow. So when hubby got home we took the kids in for one last short visit. We walked back to the park and sat in the hotel talking for a bit before heading home.

So it was a good visit. My sister bought me an iPod shuffle, but the dock adapter won't work in my car so I'm returning it and upgrading to the Nano. My dad gave me a bit of money for whatever, so I figure I should get something I've been wanting for a while! I would have been fine with the shuffle, but if I can't use it in the car...and I don't want to bother with the fm transmitters. Why would I when we have a plug just for iPods???

Ok so I'll try to keep this bit short, this is already a long post. My dad grew up here in Spokane, and when he retires in 8 years he wants a place to stay when he visits and stuff. So he decided to buy a cheap house and let us live in it until then. We'd have to pay part of the rent, etc. But since we can't afford our own house, we could stay there, fix it up, and whatnot. The one we were looking at wasn't cooperating so we're going to keep looking. I am excited. Chad's mom, not so much. I think she wants us to stay here forever, and OMG I can't lol. I need my own place. It's been 4 years here, and while it's bearable, I can't handle it for much longer. So we will be searching and let my dad know when something good shows up.

Oh and if you are in need of any yarn...I'm destashing over on Ravelry. See it here.

Broken

2008-07-16T16:32:00.000-07:00

Nope, not the 12 Stones song, my dpn. See exhibit A:
Yes, that would be my size 2 Brittany Birch dpn, broken. I was finishing knitting exhibit B:
the hat for my Aunt Jackie when it broke. At least I still had 4 dpn's to knit with, and finished the hat today. I will be sending the hat off along with the nanner socks. Hopefully she will like them! I know that she is going in for chemo again this next week, and it's going to be 3x as strong as the first time, due to the severity and spreading of the cancer...

Other than that, I'm knitting on my Juno Regina a bit, the Swallowtail, which is slow going at it's current size, and spinning. I have two bobbins done for my 3 ply sock yarn. I stopped after the second to start spinning the fiber for my swap pal.
I am loving the spinning, and I hope to be done really soon! That's it for now. Oh and today is the two month mark of my yarn/fiber diet. Go figure, Crown Mountain Farms is having a sale on the superwash...one day, one day Wish You Were Here, and Born To Be Wild, you will be mine!!!

A fibery gift!

2008-07-10T16:47:00.000-07:00

I guess my whining was too much last week. I had found this fiber on etsy, and pouted all day about wanting it and not getting to buy it b/c of my "diet". Well I had to get up early for work the next day, so I went to bed early as well. After I went to bed hubby went back on my browser history to find it and get it for me.
It's 4.6 ounces of merino, tencel, bamboo, tussah silk, and firestar from Copperpot called Burning Love. It's one of the most gorgeous blends I've seen, so soft, and I cannot wait to spin it!

That's all I've got right now, not much has been happening, though I'm still knitting the hat, and spinning my sock fiber.

An overdue update! (Loopy Ewe Club spoiler!)

2008-07-08T15:35:00.000-07:00

Well, I've had lots of things to post pictures of, and not much time to do it! Ok well I've had bits of time, but I've been so busy listening to my newest audiobook. A few gals on plurk recommended it to me and I have barely taken the ear buds out of my ears to do much of anything that requires thinking. Like writing a blog post. The book is Outlander by Diana Gabaldon, and I'm 3/4 of the way through it already. I see another one of hers in my future after this one...

The other day, Sunday I think, the evening, I finished this little skein of yarn. My first skein of laceweight singles! It's pretty, shiny, soft, and I'm oh so proud of it. It'll be headed for it's bath after this post.
It's not by any means even, but I don't care a bit. I have no idea how much the yardage is, only that it's somewhere between 300-500 yards. I'll count it before I dunk it.
Yesterday I picked up my Loopy Ewe club package that was waiting for me at the post office. I could barely contain the excitement to get home and open it up! Inside was a skein of Dream in Color Smooshy. It's called Spicy Smooches.
The pattern is called Hugs and Chocolate Kisses, by Debbie O'Neill. It's a diamond lace sort of pattern, pretty!
There was a special loopy notebook and pen, and then this little thing. I had to go searching on Ravelry to find out what it was. Apparently it's supposed to decorate your Crocs.
Today I wove in the last end of the second nanner sock. They are done and ready to go. The hat is almost to the point to start decreasing. I hope to have it done and sent off soon to my aunt.
This beauty of a rose was blooming outside. We cut it to bring in, before the heat wilted it. I haven't seen a rose colored this way, though I knew there were some that did. It's sooo pretty!
Here's my little fairy princess, with her "magic wand". Don't worry, it's clean! (In case you can't tell, it's a fly swatter lol)
Well now, I'm off to watch the finale of the Bachelorette, and find out who she picks!

Fiber club is here!

2008-07-04T20:12:00.000-07:00

So yesterday I got my Funky Carolina fiber club. It's the one for may, cuz she's a bit backed up. It's falkland wool, and the color is called Fresh. They are really not my colors, but at the same time, I bet I'll like it when it's spun.
I also got some other things with it. She'd forgotten something in a previous order, which then went missing, so I told her what sorts of things I liked and she picked out some fiber for me.

There are two sparkly batts, which I love. One is superwash merino and sparklies, and one is merino, silk, soysilk, and sparklies. I think the one with the silk in it is this green one. There are shots of white shiny stuff in it. I'm too lazy to weigh them since the silk one is bigger, but I think I'm right. They are both around 2 ounces.
Then there is also 2 ounces of tussah silk. REALLY soft and shiny, a bit fuzzy, but I expected as much. It will be interesting to see how it spins!
Here's what I've been spinning. I finished bobbin one of my 3 ply sock yarn, and wanted to practice spinning a lace single. So that's what this is. It's the leftover 2 ounces or so of merino tencel from FatCatKnits in seaweed. I love it so far. I think this was a good choice for a single, the tencel makes it super strong!
I finished nanner sock number one. I shortened the cuff a lot. I think since it's summer they are better that way. Plus I want to get the hat and socks done asap so I can send them. If things go well, I'll make her another pair for winter. I still don't know much more than before, or how long the cancer will give her.
Today Chad gave Nick a haircut...yeah...I should have done it lol. I did fix it up though, and it's presentable. He looks soooo much older! What a cutie pie though. He was so excited to take a picture of his "new hair".
Ok well that's it for now, I'm off to start the other sock and work my butt off on it!

Pictures

2008-07-02T14:35:00.000-07:00

Just a few pictures I've taken.

This is the turkey that was chilling in the yard yesterday. I don't know what it was doing alone, most often they are all in a big group.
The hail we got during the storm last night. It was the loudest thunderstorm I remember having here ever. The kids were ok till it got really close. Sugar the cat was crying on the porch and we had to let her in the house till it passed by.
Nicholas wearing his Dinosaur tail. We got it at the Walking With the Dinosaurs show that came a while ago. This is the first time he hasn't been scared of it and put it on. He went around the room and hit stuff with it for a while.
The kids worked together to clean up the floor so they could have their little play tent set up. Amazing...

Here they are in the tent, cuddled up, and watching Aladdin.
Nick needs a haircut desperately...

No knitting news. Well not anything new. About 3 inches into the hat, and that's it. I'm also finishing up the bobbin on my wheel. I'd probably get more done if I wasn't playing Mario on my DS so much...

Waterfall Socks!

2008-07-01T15:40:00.000-07:00

So my Loopy Swap partner received her package the other day. I can now show you the socks that I knit for her! They are the Waterfall sock pattern from Anne Hanson and they were so fun to knit!
I used Lorna's Laces in Whitewater. I love how evenly the colors stripe, it's a nice striping.
The pattern was so much fun to knit. It was very simple, but didn't get boring at all.
Anne gives the most detailed sock pattern instructions ever. It's one of the best written patterns I've ever seen. Go buy it and knit some!

I'm almost two inches into the hat. It's going fast, let's hope I don't lose steam! The one by one ribbing kills me.

Also I've decided my nanner socks will be finished and sent to her. She has a slightly larger foot than I, so they should be perfect, as they are just too big for me. :)

Well that's it for today!

Chemo Hat

2008-06-30T21:44:00.004-07:00

So I started a new project yesterday. Yes, I know, another. Well it's a good one. My mom has been best friends with my "aunt" Jackie since they were both little, and we found out a few months ago that Jackie had lung cancer. So I've been meaning to make her a hat since she's lost her hair.

This past week my sister has been updating me on her condition. They opened her up to remove what they thought was a half a golf ball sized bit of the cancer, and discovered that it had spread and was everywhere, including her heart. I am not sure how long she's got to live, and it really doesn't sound promising.

Either way, I decided that my first priority was to knit the hat I have been meaning to, and also a pair of socks. So I will only be knitting on these two items until they are done and sent off.

I was originally going to make another hat, but the yarn I had just wasn't working for it, and since I'm on a yarn diet, I can't buy any. I decided to stick with what I knew and go with another Pismo hat, like the ones I made my brother and BIL. It's in the yarn I previously started knitting into a Rivendell sock. It's a merino bamboo blend, so even though the hat is more tightly knit, it should still be soft and cool for these summer months.I haven't chosen sock yarn or pattern. I am going to work on the hat and my sister is finding out what size shoe Jackie wears so I can knit socks. If they are close to mine I can just finish up one of my in progress pairs to send to her. Either way, that's the agenda right now and there will be no other knitting. I'm one inch into it and have to get to 5 inches before I start decreases.

That's really all the news I've got today. It's been a month and a half since I've bought any fiber or yarn, and it's getting easier every day! I'm thinking if I make it to three months, maybe I'll reward myself with one skein of sock yarn or something. Sort of a celebratory half way mark thing.

Ok well more later when I've got something to show. In the meantime, look at the pretty Peony! It makes me happy. Too bad the heat killed them off so quick...

Hush-Hush Handspun Hootenanny Questionnaire

2008-06-30T21:44:00.002-07:00

1. How long have you been spinning? What skill level do you consider yourself?

I have spinning for a little over a year and I would consider myself intermediate. I am a fast learner!

2. What kinds of yarn do you create (singles/2-ply/3-ply/art yarn)?

I mostly spin 2 ply, my singles aren’t good enough to stand alone yet, and I’m spinning for a 3 ply now. Tried spinning some art yarns, not so good at them, and no real use for them.

3. What do you spin with (spindle/wheel/both)?

I pretty much just use my wheel.

4. What are your favorite fibers to spin with? Anything you don't like?

I love bfl, especially superwash bfl. I have also spun merino, and merino silk. I have some other fibers that I haven’t gotten around to trying yet. Blends are good, anything soft with silk or seacell, etc. I'm picky because my skin is uber sensitive!

5. Who are your favorite crack dealers fiber sources (etsy or otherwise)?

Funky Carolina! Anything sparkly. I love the Creatively Dyed seacell blend I have, and haven’t spun yet. I also love Pigeonroof and Flawful Fibers…

6. What kind of fiber do you want to try?

I would love to try a bamboo, maybe in a blend? I love how shiny it is and wondering how it spins up. I’ve also always wanted to try some batts, like the ones from Loop on etsy, or Terra Bella Spun, or Butterfly Girl Designs. Or some silk would be nice, I've only spun merino silk, so I'd like to try just silk by itself too.

7. Are there any techniques you would like to learn?

I’d like to perfect spinning singles and Navajo plying but that’s about it!

8. Do you dye fiber? If not, would you like to learn?

I do dye. Not as much as I would like, but I have lots of dyes and un-dyed fiber waiting for me to do it!

9. Do you have fiber prep tools (and like to use them) or would you prefer ready to spin fiber?

I would prefer ready to spin, I have hand cards but I’m still learning how to get them to work for me lol.

10. What do you do with your handspun? What projects have you completed?

I mostly spin lace, and some sock weight yarn. So lots of socks and lace! I’ve done a swallowtail and forest canopy shawl from handspun, and a pair of socks. I’m working on a Juno Regina right now, and have yarn spun for an Adamas, and some I’m plying on my spindle for another forest canopy or swallowtail.

11. Are you in need of any spinning gadgets (WPI Gauge, threading hook, etc)?

I don’t need a threading hook, I don’t have a WPI gauge though!

12. What colors "fall into your shopping basket"? Any colors you just can't stand?

I seem to buy a lot of cool colors, but usually the colors that appeal to me are the warm tones, pink and red and orange and yellow. Especially in combinations together.

13. What is on your wheel/spindle right now?

I’m spinning a 3 ply for sock yarn (pinkish superwash bfl from Pigeonroof), and I'm about to start some lace. It is black merino tencel with green and purple shimmery stuff in it from Copperpot.

14. What other crafts/hobbies do you have?

Obviously knitting, I read (or listen to audiobooks quite a bit that I download from audible.com) I play on my Nintendo DS…and my Wii. I paint on occasion.

15. Other than crafts, what are you passionate about?

My kids.

16. Do you have an online wishlist?

Um I have one at the Loopy Ewe, other than that, not really. Here's the link to the Loopy Ewe one.

17. Is there anything that you collect?

I have a big thing for hummingbirds, hence the big tattoo of one I have on my back! Also dragonflies.

18. Any books, yarns, needles or patterns out there you are dying to get your hands on? What magazine subscriptions do you have?

I have Interweave Knits, and Spin Off, those are the only two I really want. Sensual Knits is a book I’ve been meaning to pick up and haven’t. A few patterns I haven’t gotten around to getting:
Giselle by Marnie MacLean
Envy shawl by Brenda Patipa
La Digitessa by Yarnissima
Snowflakes in Cedarwoods by Anne Hanson (square one)
Tangled Faeries by Terry Ross

I'd also love to try some of the knitpicks harmony needles, the wooden ones! I keep meaning to get them and haven't. I knit most of my socks on size 1.5.

19. When is your birthday?

December 17

20. What book or movie character do you most resemble in personality?

I couldn’t tell you!

21. What is the climate like where you live around this time (need to know for careful shipments of anything meltable)?

It’s hot right now, but you never know! I think if it’s packaged it should be fine. As long as it won’t get on anything else if it DOES melt. (In other words, I’m not above licking the inside of a bag if it’s covered in chocolate)

22. Tell us one weird fact about yourself!

Hmmm, I can burp on command. Not weird enough? I think I’m borderline OCD. I have to make things “even” all the time. Like, if I stub the toe of one shoe while walking, I have to purposely do it to the other. Yep. Weird.

Favorites

Favorite painting/picture(link): I’ve always loved this Georgia O’Keefe painting: Red Canna

Candy: Chocolate, esp truffle or hazelnut ones. Haribo gummy bears…lifesaver lollipops which I can NEVER find anymore…sad.

Food: Hard to say but I looooove a good chicken alfredo pasta dish.

Drink: Dr. Pepper, Cream soda.

Movie(s): Princess Bride, Most Angelina Jolie movies

TV Show(s): Grey’s Anatomy and Big Brother when they are on.

Book(s): Tad Williams Otherland and Shadowmarch series’, The Symphony of Ages series by Elizabeth Haydon, fantasy type stuff, fiction.

Guilty Pleasure(s): My video games. I LOVE my Wii and DS.

As a last note, I’m allergic to alpaca and mohair for sure. I’m pretty sensitive to fuzzies, so probably fibers like angora, camel, etc I’d also be allergic. Not sure as I’ve stayed away from them!

My Sock!

2008-06-27T22:07:00.000-07:00

I have uploaded to Ravelry, my first sock pattern for sale!

Here's the link for any of you that are interested: Tendril Embrace

I think my knitting mojo has returned. I've been knitting on the swallowtail shawl all day. Thankfully my arms are in no pain as of yet, and neither are my hands.

Other than that, just working, playing with the kids, normal stuff. Hubby and I actually got to go to dinner the other night. It was nice to just relax for a bit. I got New Super Mario Bros for my DS and it's SO fun. I also went to Game Stop and got Heroes of Mana. I've got the Sword of Mana for the Gameboy Advance, and I love it, so I got the DS one. I haven't really gotten into it yet. The scenes are kinda lengthy to go through in the beginning.

So that's all that's going on. I'm hoping to get through the swallowtail shawl in the next few days, and then I'll be back with pictures!

Loopy swap package!

2008-06-25T17:01:00.000-07:00

Today I mailed off my package to my loopy swap partner, and was thrilled to find that mine had arrived! My pal was amazing and sent the best stuff I think she could have for me. I couldn't love it any more! The scarf is knit in Tempted Glam Grrl, so it's sparkly! There is an extra skein which I think I may knit handwarmers with. I got a book, stitch markers, a heart shaped tape measure, some body wash and scrub, more yarn, a pretty notepad (I go through so many of these, I love how I get some in all my swaps) and a few other things.

Oh man this is a great swap package! I only hope my pal loves hers as much as I do.

Here is a picture of my progress on my Juno Regina. I know I said I'd go back to the swallowtail, but I just couldn't put it down until I got past the diamond pattern. Now that it's straight rows, I'll be able to leave it and finish the other first. I adore it though. I'm thinking I'll knit the two halves so they will be symmetrical, and graft the center. I brought home a new DS game today. New Super Mario Bros. It's good so far, I love me some Mario! I had to have at least one other game besides Zelda. I may also end up with Pokemon but other than that, I have no idea. I'm picky about the games I like. :) I've been playing it a lot though, since my arms hurt so bad still. Stupid arms!

Ok well that's it for now, more later I'm sure!

Hand Cards!

2008-06-23T15:12:00.000-07:00

So at Saturday's knit group I took a look at some hand cards, and a pair came home with me! (Ignore the massive mess on my desk. Yes, it always looks this way.) Here's a picture of them, and my first little rolag, which I started pulling into roving. I think it's going to take me a bit to get the hang of these things, they seem to want to stick together really bad. I like it though, it's fun, and now I have lots of little rolags here on my desk...

I started my Juno Regina out of handspun. I couldn't stop myself. I was feeling a bit depressed yesterday about something, and needed to start something new. Now that I've started it, I'll go back to knitting on the swallowtail until it's done.
Isn't it pretty though? I love it so far. I haven't been knitting or spinning much at all. I really think I have carpal tunnel, or something of the sort, because I'm in serious pains. When I type, or knit, or spin, it just feels like stabbing in my arm. Actually, it's not just then anymore, it's all day at random intervals. So I haven't been doing much. Plus my computer chair is broken and annoying to sit in. So I usually spin in it, and sit on the computer, and now I don't want to.

I did manage to finish the project for my swap, so that's done and will be mailed tomorrow. I still can't show pictures, but I will when she gets it.

Chad bought me a Nintendo DS (a white one). I'm very excited about it. I've been wanting one, and it's fun so far! I have a Zelda game, can't go wrong there! So now I'm off to play it for a bit, because the children are actually napping, and I need to relax while I can.
Here's a picture of a pretty moth we found outside. It's wings were SO cool.

Nanner sock.

2008-06-17T17:22:00.000-07:00

This is the progress I've made on my nanner sock. I need to focus more on my swap project though, only have until Sunday to finish up and send! I am planning the last few things to get for it as well. I've seen a few of the packages others have recieved and man oh man people are going all out!

Here we have growth! We planted flowers a week or two ago, and finally they are sprouting. See all the tiny green specks? Yeah those were seeds. It's funny, they are in all the pots, and they all are bent over to the direction of the sun. I love that.Well I guess that's bout it. No new audio books, though I might buy one tonight...I need something for work tomorrow. Wednesdays are pull days for me. Meaning, we get a huge list of stuff to pull, either cd's or dvd's usually, and we have to go find it and pack it up and send it back to the warehouse or wherever. It's long, tedious, boring work. I really don't mind it, but need to be entertained.

Ok well off to plurk and knit!

Picture Meme

2008-06-16T14:20:00.001-07:00

1. Hattie, 2. Chocolate Bar, 3. In Front Of Shaker High, 4. Night London Eye Green Colors, 5. Angelina Jolie, 6. real_dr_pepper, 7. Ravello , Italy, 8. Raspberry - Swirl Cheesecake, 9. Little Artist, 10. Duck Family Portrait, 11. Emotional sky, 12. sick girl

Ok everyone is doing these, so I might as well. Here's how it works.

Go to flicker and type in your answer to each of the questions below. Using only the first page of results, choose a picture and add it's url to FD's Mosaic Maker. Tada!

1. What is your first name?
2. What is your favorite food?
3. What high school did you go to?
4. What is your favorite color?
5. Who is your celebrity crush?
6. Favorite drink?
7. Dream vacation?
8. Favorite dessert?
9. What do you want to be when you grow up?
10. What do you love most in life?
11. One word to describe you.
12. Your Flickr name.

Easy as pie. Go do it.

I'll be back tomorrow hopefully with some sock progress to show. I'm working on a "nanner" sock. If you want to know what that is, maybe you should plurk me?

OMG it's a FO!!!

2008-06-12T14:47:00.000-07:00

Yes that's correcto. I somehow managed to finish something. Behold:
The Swirls socks are finished. I finished up the toe this morning and had it kitchenered before lunch. I think they are gorgeous and should wear well as they are knit on such small needles. I can't wait to wear them. I think in a few days. I sliced my toe open on something yesterday and it was bleeding pretty bad, so I don't want to risk blood on any hand knit socks until it's healed. Then today I slammed my toe into a piece of wooden furniture, and I really think I broke it. I'm in some serious pain. We'll see how it feels, I have to work tomorrow, 5 hours. I'll have to be gentle.

Not a good thing though, since I'm supposed to be cleaning. Our part of the house is beyond cluttered. We have someone coming on Sunday to install a ceiling fan in our bedroom, and fix a light or something. So things have to be presentable.

I'm knitting on my loopy swap project. It's so easy, but I just can't seem to get far on it! I need to get the rest of the package together in the meantime, it's to be mailed by the 22nd.

Here is a picture of Nicholas with his new kitty Pounce. He got it for going potty today. It seems like we'll have a week of him going a few times a day for a week and then for 4 days he refuses. It's a slow process. So hopefully this reward will help. He loooooves kitties of any kind and was super excited about it.Ok now, off to knit and rest my poor toe. Maybe it's not broken, just still stinging from impact. I can wish right?

ETA: Forgot to ask: Have you plurked today?

Rivendell

2008-06-09T17:29:00.000-07:00

So here is the picture that I promised of my redone Rivendell sock. The yarn I switched to is Claudia Handpainted fingering weight, in Sea Dreams. I bought it at The Loopy Ewe ages ago, and I think it's the perfect color for this.
I love how it looks so far, but I have changed a few things about it, the pattern is seriously lacking in clarity and direction. I hope some of that was fixed since it was published in a book. Regardless, I am enjoying knitting it.

A picture, though blurry, of my recent spinning. It's superwash bfl from Pigeonroof in Pink Lady and very pretty. This one was the best picture of the colors, the non-blurry ones were all destroyed by flash. I'm spinning for a 3 ply sock yarn. This is 2/3 of bobbin one. I can't wait to finish it!
Other than that, not much is going on. I've just finished listening to an audiobook. I signed up for an account at audible.com. There is a discounted rate (7.49 per month) for the first three months. You get one credit, which in most cases is one book. Well now that I've finished my book, I'm aching for another! I do get a discount with my account if I purchase them outright, but it's a good bit more than buying credits (try 15-25 per book!)...so now I have to wait till next month for my next credit...sigh.

So I'm building up my wish list, that way I won't forget all the books I want to get. Ok well off to do some more spinning and knitting, and laundry for work tomorrow. It's my first 8 hour shift in months, so I best be prepared and get to bed early!

Knit So Fine

2008-06-06T19:18:00.000-07:00

So today I went to Borders. I went looking for two books. One was a cookbook, Deceptively Delicious. It seems like a good book for sneaky ways to make your kids eat stuff they wouldn't normally. So they had it, but my other book trumped that one. I only had one coupon you see, and so that one will wait for a week or two until they email me another.

This is the book I got:
I've known since the previews that I wanted to get it and after looking through it in person, I couldn't leave it there. Besides, it was the last copy they had! Here are some pictures of my favorites from the book.

Eyelet Halter:
Dolman Top:
I like this top even though it's not something I'd probably wear. Maybe without the sleeves though, like a short sleeve or vest thing.

Asymmetric Cardigan:
Traveling Stitch Legwarmers:
Lattice Lace Pullover:
Lace Stole:
Fingerless Elbow Mitts:
I think it's neat how these kind of match the legwarmers. Though I wouldn't wear them together, too matchy. I also loooove that they go up past the elbow. Good in white for a winter wedding! Obviously not mine lol, but that's the first thing I thought of.

Cowlneck Pullover:
Cabled Vest:
Kimono Top:
I adore this pattern almost above all others. Look at the fun stitch pattern! I know there was a skirt with this butterfly looking stitch, on Knitty Gritty. I wanted to make it but it was a teeny size. It looks flattering too.
And of course I like the Lace Trimmed Raglan on the cover besides. The book has lots of good information on why knitting with finer yarns is worth the effort, shaping, better fit, durability. I think it's great! I love this barbie doll picture they show, to emphasize the difference in fit and shape between thick and fine yarn garments.
The caption to the left reads:

"Even the fashion doll-with her exaggerated proportions-looks better in the clingy, thin, curve-hugging fine-gauge yarn."

The only thing that is weird, is they didn't really name the garments. They are more just descriptions of the item. I think they could have been a little more creative, but whatever. I like the patterns and I suppose that's what counts.

I caved today and started the Rivendell sock. I couldn't help it. I really just wanted to see how my chosen yarn looked in it, and I'm so close to finishing my swirls socks anyway. So I got a little bit past this point in the picture, and decided that it's not so much the colors I don't like, as the yarn. It's a tencel blend, so not as much give, and I think with the wraps that's essential. I think the yarn is also a tad too bright. So I ripped and went with my second choice which I think I'll be happier with. Pictures of it later when I get further on it. I love the pattern though!

Tomorrow is knit group at Paradise Fibers. Not sure if I'll bring knitting or spinning yet. Either way, it will be great to get out of the house!

New Projects

2008-06-04T18:14:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I started Melissa's swallowtail shawl I'm knitting up for her. I started with size 3's, and it was just small and too tight, and so I switched to size 5's since all my 4's are in use, and I think it's much better. Not too tight or loose. I like how the colors spread out. Not much pooling-wise. I've got 5 of 14 repeats done. I know this will be a quick knit.
In the mail today I got the two NeedleKeeps I ordered. You may remembered I ordered some of these back in like January or so. I love them so much. Last time I got a 6 and a 7 inch. This time I ordered a 5 and a 6. Most of my needles are 6 inches, but a few are shorter or longer. My Brittany size 2 dpns are actually longer than 7 but they still fit into the 7 inch, the cap just sticks up a bit, but it works. These two have cute little charms. A froggie on the left, and a pink sandal with a flower that has little gemstones. Super adorable! Everyone should have these. I like to store my dpns in them too, keeps them safe, and unbroken.
I also got some yarn I traded for. Two and a half balls of Noro Kureyon in color 150. Grey, aqua, and some green. I got them to make a scarf like Melissa is making for her hubby. Chad liked it, so I thought I'd surprise him with one this winter.
I also started spinning my Pink Lady superwash bfl from Pigeonroof for the June Spin along on the Spinner Central board on Ravelry. I am going for a 3 ply sock, my first! It's spinning up so pretty. Pictures of that later!

Ok well that's it for now.

Cherrybomb

2008-06-02T22:44:00.001-07:00

Look look look! Look what I have finished!Ok it needs washing, but it's done being spun and plied!I adore it. It started as about 4 ounces of bfl from the Yarn Wench, and I spun it to a thicker laceweight. If I calculate correctly, there are 830 yards here. Not bad! I had a bit leftover on one bobbin, I spun the first bobbin a little thinner than the second, but it's fine. It wasn't a huge difference. I am about to go put it in a bath, and hope it dries quick. I want to cast it on already! In case you have forgotten, it's been a bit since I've talked about my plans for this, it's for Juno Regina. I think I'll take out one of the diamond repeats, to make it thinner, and make up for having a little less yardage than the pattern calls for. It's going to be so pretty!

Ok well off to soak my lovely yarn. Night!

This one is for Mel

2008-05-31T10:54:00.000-07:00

Who was wondering what the heck I was talking about, when I said Piddle bag. Where she lives, (Australia) piddle means pee!

Anyway, my Piddleloop bags showed up today in the mail! They are so beyond cute, a little smaller than I thought they would be, but still a perfect size. I wanted them for sock knitting, so I don't need a big bag anyway.

Here's my first one. I put in a cake of yarn to show size. It's only a half size cake, since it's a skein of Lorna's Laces. So imagine a full yarn cake would mostly fill the bag up.This one is my favorite. I adore the little piggies, and they are saying Boo. There was a little pig charm attached to the zipper on this one. It's really cute! I'll probably take it off though, I'll be afraid to break it, it's glass I think.
Then my second one. I think this print is so cute too. They called it Jacks or something. Either way I like it.
And there was a little charm on the zipper of this one too. They were from different vendors on etsy. This one was Red Panda Jewelry. The pig was from Dragon Lady Designs.
So Mel, that's what a piddle bag is lol. Anyway I look forward to using them and will probably order more...too bad their custom order page is on hold since they have over 50 orders or I'd put another in now!

Wham Bam

2008-05-30T22:31:00.000-07:00

Quick post.

Got my Rockin Sock Club shipment! The colorway is gorgeous. It's called The Incredible Shrinking Violet. I adore it. The socks are hard to see here, but pretty. They have traveling stitches on the front that look like lacing all the way up. The pattern is called Cleopatra's Stockings, designed by Yarnissima.I love this one! Gonna be fun to knit for sure. :)

Sock club is here!

2008-05-29T16:57:00.001-07:00

My Keegan Lane sock club has arrived! I was so excited to go get it at the post office, and was not disappointed.

Here we have the yarn, which is a gorgeous green, a sort of wine red/pink, and purple, with lighter bits. It's named, Spring Tulips, which is also the name of the sock pattern! It's very pretty, with little tulips going up the side of the sock.Then there was a little pink and green bag with a pin on it. The pin has the logo I designed way back when for Melissa. Inside was a pretty magnet with the club logo on it, some flower seeds, and candies (not shown, ahem, for obvious reasons. As in I obviously ate them...)
All in all a very fun club package. Before I even opened it though I heard this funny sound. Reminded me of sand...so when I opened it I discovered this:
Beads. And yarn. Yep, some of you may remember that I was knitting the Swallowtail shawl a while ago with Melissa. I finished mine, and as you can see from above, Melissa didn't get to it. And every time she started a new project I would hint about her shawl. Anyway I have wanted to knit another, and told her I'd knit hers for her. Most of you probably don't know that that yarn is some that I dyed for Melissa too. And I bought the beads to match it lol. So it will be a fun project to see in person how it turns out.

In other news, here is how far I've gotten on my second Swirls sock. Almost done with the leg. It's going pretty fast, even on size 0's. It will be nice to finish a pair! It's been really hard not to cast on new pairs. Speaking of, I finally decided when I finish these, and the project for my loopy swap pal, I'd start the Rivendell (ravelry link)(to buy pattern go Here)socks I've wanted to knit forever. I have the pattern, it's here somewhere. I got it from an online pal ages ago, and so it's not on my computer like most of my patterns. Yeah, so I can't find it and it's really pissing me off lol. Sigh...

(ETA: I FOUND IT!!!)

Ok well I am pretty sure my Rockin Sock package is on the way, and I was hoping my Piddly bags would be here, but not yet. So maybe I'll have those by next post.

Sunshine...makes me happy

2008-05-27T18:11:00.000-07:00

Anyone know what song that is?

So today I had to work, early as always. I got SO sick, I don't know what was wrong with me. I was sick to my stomach and in pain. So I left early, after getting as much done as I could. I had to run into Wally World, and got a second potty for Nicholas for our floor. I think it will be easier to not have to go all the way upstairs, especially when they are both down here. Alexis is a stinker, and would get into trouble. I had to mail the health insurance so I stopped at the post office as well. Waiting for me were two packages which made my day.

One was from Funky Carolina. This first one is BFL in Rum Kiss, and it's darker than the photo. But it's really pretty in person. I want to spin it now!
Then there are these two little batts, superwash merino and sparklies! They are named Citrine. I really love her batts. She has the most amazing color sense. I know I have said that before, but man I love it.
Secondly, this book. Anyone? Anyone know exactly what this is??? A very highly sought after book that is no longer in print. I don't know how but someone on Ravelry got a hold of some and sent them off to those who wanted one! For those of you who don't know, this is a book of fair isle mitten patterns. It's all in a language I can't read, but I have charts!
Yesterday as Chad was in the garage with his brother working on the car (engine swap) he was startled by this little girl.
She is apparently roosting in a mailbox box on one of the shelves. I thought it was funny.

Today we took the kids outside after lunch. It really wears them out and they nap so well after. It was warm and sunny and I think I got a little bit of a tan. We had a lot of fun!

I took pictures of some flowers my MIL bought to plant.
I love these pink ones. Like colorful daisies.
Here's Nick, contemplating his next move...
Stomping in the dirt...my MIL lets them dig in the pots that have nothing in them.
Letting the water from the hose run over her shoes. They got a lot wetter after that.
The kids got wet and dirty, and had a quick bath. Then nap time. Then mommy time! I watched yesterday's Bachelorette on the dvr, knitted on my second Swirls sock, and ate cake. Alexis is 2 today, so there is cake in the house. Yum!

I finished the first sock for my loopy swap partner. No pics though, not until she gets them! I love the pattern though, and it looks great so far. Hopefully she'll like them too!

Well it's been 11 days I've managed to not buy any yarn or fiber. I know it's a sacrifice, but I'm looking forward to knitting and spinning what I've got. I'm so bad about buying stuff, I'll never be able to use it all up!

Ok well that's it for now. I've got my Keegan Lane sock club shipment that should be on it's way, so I'll be back to show that off when it gets here!

Here, have a flower!

Socks That Rock Overload

2008-05-22T21:14:00.000-07:00

My order from Blue Moon was waiting for me at the post office today! I had to go up there to mail off the bobbin that I'm returning and could hardly wait to get my box home and open it.

I ordered four skeins, all mediumweight, since I like the thickness better than the lightweight.

Dutch Canyon:
Lunasea:
I'm a bit disappointed in the lunasea, it's much brighter, and lighter toned in the blue moon picture. It's darker than it shows in this pic too. The flash lightened it. There are a lot of muddly black parts...sigh. Not sure if I hate it or just don't like it, or if I can live with it...

Turquoise:
Grimm's Willow Wren:
I love the pastels in this one, it's really pretty.

Then there's my Funky Monkey kit, it came in a tube. These are the two skeins that were inside it. Rockstar and Hot Flash. They are kinda similar...not sure if the monkey will look how I want it. We'll see. They are half skeins, which gives you enough for one big monkey and one small. I might just make a few little ones, cuz the kids will obviously fight if they are different.
So that's my goodies for today. I have one more order from Funky Carolina that I'd placed a while ago, before the diet, so that's on the way. I also have two custom ordered piddly bags that are super cute. They should be on the way soon. AND I have a book on the way. So stay tuned.

Sorry there's no knitting, but the project I'm working on is for a swap, and I don't want to show it in case she reads the blog! I really like how it's coming out though. :)

Finished yarn!

2008-05-21T14:39:00.000-07:00

Here we have my finally plyed yarn. 533 yards of light fingering weight. It's a bit more purple in person. There is a lot of black in it, so that really toned down the colors of the roving a lot.
Here's a closeup of the yarn. I had hoped it would be a tighter ply, but it's fine the way it is.
I think my next sock yarn I will aim for a 3 ply. I've got enough bobbins now that I can use for it. I am happy with this yarn though. It was meant to be sock yarn, but now I'm not sure what I'll do with it. Maybe socks still, but maybe not. I still need to wash it and set the twist.

My blue moon order is waiting for me at the post office today, but I can't go get it till tomorrow which is killing me! I have to pack up the bobbin though, so I can mail it back when I do go. I'm just returning it for a refund. They have nothing else that I'd want to exchange it for. I'm sure it's my flyer and not the bobbin that is the problem. So for now I will wait. I might buy the plying set later.

So now it's back to the lace I was spinning. I can't wait to finish that. Especially because once that one is done, I am going to start spinning the sparkly black merino tencel for my Heere be Dragone shawl. I plan on using my high speed whorl for that yarn. I can't wait!

Ok then, that's it for now. Hopefully I can get to the post office tomorrow, and I'll be back to share my goodies!

Bummer

2008-05-20T14:44:00.000-07:00

Well, my bobbin definitely doesn't fit. No matter how I try, it doesn't. The bobbin measures at the widest of it, 4.5 inches. The space in between the bars of my flyer is 4 and 3/8. So it's off by a measly 1/8 of an inch. Isn't that absurd? I don't know what is wrong with my flyer, but a new one is more than 80 dollars, so that's not going to happen. I'm sad. When I called the Woolery, they said I could return it. They even went and took one of the plying bobbins and fit it inside a wild flyer. Theirs fit fine. At least I can return it.

Still, I got a package today, which cheered me up a bunch. It was from a family swap I signed up for on Ravelry. My swap pal is in Switzerland, so I got some neat stuff!

A book on Basel, some Ovaltine chocolate, a chocolate bar, and a little box with these puzzle things in it for the kids.The cheese card is a post card, then there are toblerone chocolates, some tea, and a cd.
There were also some books, and finger puppets and stuff for the kids, they took off with it all before I could take a picture of it all.

Lastly were these gorgeous mitts, Mrs. Beetons I believe. I adore the color, the beads (kinda hard to see, but they are on the wrist, and at the edges), everything. I'm not sure what the yarn is, I may be allergic, I got a little burning sensation when I had them on for a few mins. I've decided either way, if I am, I'll wear them over long sleeves! I love them so much.
So it was a great package, and brightened my day immensely.

You might notice that I have changed my blog look again. I got bored with the other. And now that I've discovered how easy it is to find templates and change them, I will probably do so more often. I also added a counter up top, showing how many days it's been since I started my diet. And behaved...

Other than that, not much is going on. I'll be taking the plied yarn off it's bobbin, I'll take a pic of it before I set it. I'm 3/4 done with my Destiny book, the third of four in the Rhapsody series.

Hmm, oh yeah! And my blue moon order finally shipped, so I should have that hopefully by Friday!

Finally!

2008-05-19T14:55:00.001-07:00

It felt like my plying bobbin and high speed whorl took forever to get here. Really, the wait wasn't so bad. I ordered from the Woolery on the 9th, a friday, it was processed Saturday, and sent on Monday. So I received them today a week later by UPS. Not too bad! Also, I know this because I got impatient and called them today to check on it.So here they are! I can't wait to use them. I still haven't plyed that yarn that I mentioned a few posts back, so this will be a great chance to try it out.

Other than that nothing much exciting still. I have a knitting project I cannot show, in case the recipient should read my blog. I will try to ply my yarn today though (have to pay bills first, blech) and show that off.

Yesterday my brother in law came to fix our upper driveway which had deep ruts in it from winter, and mud, and made it rather annoying to drive on. My husband took 60 pictures of the damned machinery. I deleted half of them lol. Actually, about ten of those were of the cat...Sugar.
And this pretty sky picture.
Ok well off to get the other child in bed. Now that his sister is sleeping, I can risk letting him in to nap. If they go in together they won't sleep. If I put her in first and let her fall asleep there is a better chance at them napping. :)

ETA: For some odd and frustrating reason, the plying bobbin is too big for my flyer...sigh. I plyed on a regular one instead today, but now I'm upset. I don't know if the woolery will let me return it, or have some insight as to why it won't fit! I'll call them tomorrow...

Too much stuff...

2008-05-16T19:36:00.000-07:00

Well today I finally made it to the post office, after probably a week of not going. We use the PO box as our main address to have mail sent to, so it's usually best to go more often, but I just haven't felt like it.

I had five packages waiting for me. Yes, FIVE. Whoo boy. Good thing hubby wasn't home when I got them here. He's already a bit disturbed by the amounts of fiber I've aquired.

I had almost forgotten I'd ordered this. It's from Wooly Booly Cormos and SO SOFT. I swear I would sleep in it if I could. I got this whole pound of it pretty freakin cheap. It took a bit to get to me though, since they asked for a check, and had to wait for it to get there before sending it.

The colors aren't really ME, but I like to do something different every now and then, so I just got it. It was the last dyed batch they had anyway. Now I need to figure out what to do with a whole pound...
Next I got some bobbins I traded roving for on Ravelry. She had found them spring cleaning and didn't need them, since she no longer had a majacraft. Anyway I won't show the bobbins, those just look like bobbins, but look what they were wrapped in! Pretty sparkly batts of, well I don't know what the fiber is, but it's soft enough. How cool is that?
I also got my Loopy Ewe order in. Here is a skein of Yarn Love Scarlett O' Hara, in Sweetheart. It's super pretty in person, shiny and soft.
I also got a keychain sock blocker. I've been wanting one forever and finally got it. I splurged a whole dollar more and got the Cardom, it's a pretty color.
Then there's the roving. They are both from Creatively Dyed. 70% merino and 30% seacell. It feels a bit like a mix of silk and tencel. So it's soft, but seems like it also has a bit of fuzz. Should be fun to spin!

This one is Fairy Dust and I wish I'd gotten another. It's so pretty.
And Chocolate Covered Raspberries. I love the bright raspberry spots.
Then there was my order from Allspunup. I've been eyeing her stuff that others on Ravelry have bought, and I could no longer resist when I saw this one. Again, not my normal colors, but so bright and I love it so. She doesn't name them, so I did. I call this one Bruised Peach. Not sure why. Just looks right.
Then this one I call Violets. It just is.
The last package was my second order from GudonyaToo. I love this stuff it just smells so nice. I got another container of the whipped clean in cotton candy, and two shampoos. One is Spa Fusion, which is a really fresh cool smell. The other, which is my fave just by first sniff, is like vanilla cake or frosting with a bit of spice. I used to buy this lip gloss that smelled like it, and it was my favorite. I think it was actually called vanilla frosting. I can't remember the brand. Some of that sparkly girly stuff they sell at places like walmart and kmart.

Well those are my treasures. I'm still waiting on the order from the Woolery. I think I'll call tomorrow, they are open for a bit. I have had no shipping email and I ordered like a week and a half ago. I'm getting impatient. I also haven't gotten wind of my blue moon order. I figure they have to dye up some of it, so I'm not worried. Plus I think they email when they ship too.

Hmm, so not much knitting or spinning going on. I am mostly reading. My wrists have been needing a little break, and besides, I never realized how much I miss reading! I finished the Shadowmarch book I started this past Saturday. I was done with it by Tuesday, bought the second book in the series, Shadowplay, on Wednesday, and finished it on Thursday morning. The third book in the series, Shadowrise, is still being written so I happily started to re-read another series I had read before. I had read the books out of order not realizing there were four and not three. Sooo I read one, two, and then four. So I found book three when I got Shadowplay. Now I can read them in order. I've already finished the first one called Rhapsody, and started the second one, Prophecy. I've got a thing for fantasy, and some sci-fi books. I guess that whole escaping reality. Anywho, it's a nice change to read.

I've also decided that once again it's time to go on a yarn and fiber diet. I've got way beyond enough, so besides what I've already got, there will be no more. I'm aiming for six months. Think I can make it?

Oh and patterns, and notions, and needles don't count. Though I don't really need much of those either.

So no more tonight, this is a long enough post as is. :) More soon.

Anniversary Weekend

2008-05-14T17:43:00.000-07:00

Beware, this is a picture heavy post!

So this past weekend as I mentioned last post, was my anniversary. 4 years, but man does it go fast or what? We didn't go far from home. The resort is probably only a half hour drive from our house, depending on the roads you take. We decided after the rainy week we had that tenting was out, so we rented one of these:
A covered wagon. Yes. Really. It's so neat looking from the outside, a pretty decent size too. Ours was called the Mallard. We chose that one because it was closest to the water and I think it might have been the largest. Here's the inside with all our stuff in it. The bed is on a platform, about queen sized. We put a full sized air mattress on it to sleep.It looks like it's covered in canvas from the inside, the outside is thankfully covered by a tarp. Only a few buggies got in and Chad took care of those. If we hadn't left the door open most of the time they probably wouldn't have.

I don't know if I'd stay in one again however, at least not in the cold. In summer there wouldn't be a problem. Not like it'd have been much better in a tent...

The forcast for the weekend had said high sixties and sun and boy were they wrong. It was cold and rainy. Technically we only spent Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning there but it felt like much longer. When we got there we unpacked our stuff, and I pretty much immediately wanted a fire. So Chad set to work on the logs with his hatchet and very carefully arranged it all as you can see below.
We managed to even cook with the fire. We took frozen burger patties (which by the way were not that bad) and bacon for the morning. I had a big pot I heated water in and we had hot chocolate. And OH YES, S'mores! I won't say how many I ate...let's just say I felt a bit queasy afterwards.

We did some fishing, mostly Chad. I spent a lot of time reading a book I had bought last year and didn't get past chapter 2 previously. Well I got a lot further. Although the rain and wind made things hard. I kept getting smoke in my eyes and had to move around the fire to avoid it. Regardless it was nice to just sit and read. I haven't done that in years. Pretty much since Nick has been born lol.

I did do some fishing too. This is on Sunday morning. We were both up at 5:30 (who could sleep through the birds and the loons!) and we took out the boat since it was warm and sunny. Here is the biggest one Chad caught, a rainbow trout. We put him back, but had we known that he was going to die the second we put him back we'd have kept it. And he sunk too...
And this little rainbow is mine. He uh...died too. Those two had bad luck. The others we got were fine though.
There wasn't much for great landscape pics since it was cloudy and icky most of the time. In fact, after we woke up to the warm and gorgeous sun shine, and got out on the water of the lake, clouds came in and it started to rain and cold wind blew. Before it did though I got a few pics.
This one I took on Sat I think...this woodpecker just hung around the trees near our wagon all weekend. I finally saw his little hole in one of the birch trees before we left. Here he was trying to find some bugs in the telephone pole, and not having much luck.
So in all even with the sucky weather, it was still a nice weekend. I had fun regardless. I can't wait to go camping sometime this summer, when it's warm and I can relax a little better, and knit. My hands were much to cold to do any knitting even though I brought my swirls sock, and my honeybee stole. (I know, WHAT was I thinking?)

So no knitting to show. And no plied yarn either. The kids have not been napping so I haven't had that 2 hour chunk of time to sit and do it. Especially when the she-child keeps taking her clothes off every five minutes...and yesterday Nicholas had the nerve to bite her and tell me. So I'm constantly refereeing those two.

Well this has been a long post, so here's a pic to leave off. Sugar the cat falling asleep in the most unlikely spot...the edge of the back porch. You should have seen her rocking back and forth...I thought she would fall off!

Sock and Fiber clubs!

2008-05-07T14:56:00.000-07:00

I wasn't expecting anything until tomorrow, so I was so excited when both my Loopy Ewe sock club, and my Funky Carolina fiber club showed up! I went up to the post office to mail off some fiber I'm trading for some bobbins, and there they were! Which is great since that means I don't need to make a second trip tomorrow.

Ok so here are my goodies. First, my sock club.

The yarn is the infamous Wollmeise 100% Superwash. The color is Pillars of Fire. It's a gorgeous color, I love it so! The pattern is called the same, and is by Terry Ross. It looks a lot like the Swirls sock actually. So I was just the tiniest bit disappointed. It only has four of the swirly things though, and a different patterning for the top edge, oh and toe up. I still like it though.

Inside the loopy bag, besides the star mints, was this little tool. It's basically a cut off crochet hook (size C) with a hole in it, and attached to a keychain. Cool though! It's called a stitch saver.
Here's a better pic.
Now, my Funky C. fiber!

This first one is the April fiber, superwash merino and called Melancholy. It's prettier in person, trust me.
This next one is one of two items I ordered, and she shipped with my club fiber. The second thing apparently didn't make it into the bag lol. She's sending it along though. This one though, is one of her batts, a new thing she's doing. It's all superwash bfl, which I can't resist much on it's own. BUT IT HAS SPARKLIES. Yes, white and green sparklies are carded into it. I looooves it.
You can just barely see them there at the top edge. It's so pretty I could just sit here and pet it forever. It's mostly purple with green and pink and plum bits carded into it. It will be a shawl of some kind. I don't know which one, but I know that it will be.

In knitting news, I am finishing the first Swirls sock today. I am doing the toe decreases. I picked up and am working on my honeybee stole again. I'm into the 6th of 10 repeats for the first section. It really would go faster if I didn't have such random amounts of time to work on it. Probably because I'm spending WAY more time spinning than knitting too...

I've finished the second bobbin of the superwash merino. A few days ago actually. I plan on plying it today. I can't wait for it to be done! I'm well into the second bobbin of cherrybomb bfl lace singles. It's going fast now. I'm trying to do one strip per day. So it will be a few more days, maybe a week before I can ply it. I'm debating getting the plying bobbin and lace whorl for my wheel. It's expensive, but I'm starting to feel pressured with as thin as my lace as getting, and afraid that I'm still not putting in enough twist on the smallest whorl that I have. And the plying bobbin, well duh! More room!

This weekend is Chad and I's fourth anniversary (May 10) and we are going camping! Probably for Saturday and Sunday, so just one night. I think it will be nice to do something different. The first year we were gifted a hotel and dinner stay at a hotel by my mom, and the second and third years we just went to dinner. Camping, well I haven't gone in a looong time but I always loved it as a kid. I'm looking forward to it (and planning what knitting to take...).

So, another post in a few days, when I've got a finished sock, and finished yarn!

Oh children...

2008-05-01T16:00:00.000-07:00

They really are a handful...

On Tuesday after working and running to the store, I finally got home around 11 something, and my MIL (Gayleen) was making the kids lunch. I usually go change and check my email when I get home earlier, but since she was busy I though I'd entertain them until they were in their chairs and eating. Well they disappeared into the pantry while we were in the kitchen and suddenly I hear Alexis screaming like a banshee. I ran in to find her standing under the window holding the pair of binoculars that usually sit on the edge above. Now it's a higher than usual window, and it looks out over the backyard, so we often watch the deer eat out of it, or the birds, etc. with the binoculars. Apparently my FIL had been in there using them earlier and set them back on the sill, and left the strap hanging down.

Anyway, I took the binoculars away and picked her up, only to find that I could now see her mouth filled with blood. I started freaking out and called Gayleen to come and see. She grabbed Alexis to bring in the other room where there was more light and I ran to get a cold washcloth. We quickly saw that her lip was split way open and that's where the blood was coming from. Not her teeth which is what I thought at first. So we were calming her down and I brushed her bangs out of her eyes, and happened to see she also had a decent cut and bruise on her forehead. Not bleeding, but icky looking. I ended up getting Alexis' stuff ready and taking her to the ER because the cut in her lip was so bad. Chad met me there, he had been on lunch break when I called him. We spent the next few hours there while they checked her out and decided that yes she needed a few stitches. She got three in all, they used dissolving ones so she wouldn't have to go back in. Here is a picture of the cut on her head, it looks better now than it did...And the stitches on her lip. The purple dots are bruises where they stuck needles full of numby stuff to make it less painful.
So that was just a blast...I'm just glad I was home when it happened. Scared the heck out of me though that's for sure!

So I've been spinning more than knitting still. This is what I've got left to spin of the superwash merino. I can't wait to ply and see how it looks!
I finished my Serendipity socks. The yarn and pattern were the January shipment from the Rockin Sock Club. They need a good blocking though. Since it was a toe I was unfamiliar with, they are a tad short, but should block ok.
Under the socks there is my first issue of Spin Off. I've been reading and re-reading it and I love it. There are more adds than I would like, but the content is good, and there are a few cute patterns.

So other than that, I've been knitting on my swirls sock. I should be done in a day or two I think. The knitting is slow, being on size 0's, but I like how they are looking. I've also been playing Mario Kart on my Wii. Oh boy is it ever fun! I need to get another Wii Wheel though, we were out of them at work by the time I got to buy my game. It's playable without the wheel, but not as easy with the motions.

Ok well that's about it for my update. I'll probably post when my other sock is done, or when I get my yarn plied. Now I'm off to finish some things that are looong overdue.

My pretties...

2008-04-25T17:29:00.000-07:00

I got some things in the mail yesterday. I have been anxiously awaiting them and they finally arrived! Of course it's roving from my favorite dyer, Funky Carolina. If you like what you see, go check her shop, she's having a Mega Sale and I'm having a seriously hard time resisting. Quick, go buy it all so I won't!

There was a little baggie of Scrappies. These were apology scrappies for a delay in shipping. They are cute! Not sure what I'll do with them yet, but I like them.My March Club fiber, 4 ounces of Rambouillet in Hyacinth,
4 ounces of merino in Crazy Light, I love this one,
and 4 ounces of superwash merino tencel in Hydrangea.
Other than that nothing exciting at all is going on. I've been slacking a bit, I feel badly about it. Monday I have to ship out a few things that are a bit late in being sent. I'm using the weekend to pack them up.

I stayed home sick from work today. I have had the worst stomach pains since yesterday. I think the chicken I ate may have been bad or something. It's horrible. Unless I'm laying down it hurts. So I haven't done much. Except take care of the kids. Speaking of which, Nick managed to cut his ear open pretty bad today. He was trying to sit inside one of those big plastic storage tubs, and tipped it sideways. He landed with his ear hitting right on the edge of a big wooden trunk. It didn't bleed immediately, he was laying on me for a minute crying and I lifted his head up to look at it and it was dripping. So that was an adventure. Poor thing. Took him about a half an hour to calm down, and grandma brought him over some juice with tylenol in it to help him, and he saw the juice and goes "Mama I happy!" lol.

So it's been a long day and now I'm going to go sit and watch tv for a bit, and spin. Haven't been knitting much, just haven't felt like it. So spinning it is.

Road Trip!

2008-04-22T15:30:00.000-07:00

So yesterday was my big road trip to Seattle to see the Yarn Harlot. I had arranged to have a friend ride with me who I found on Ravelry, because I knew that I did not want to drive to or brave Seattle alone. So Allison met me at 11am to begin our journey.

About 4 hours later we were in Seattle and our first stop was Weaving Works. Allison had heard good things, so it was natural we wanted to check it out. It's a pretty decent sized store. It was easy to get through the aisles and see everything. There were tags on the shelves near the yarns with prices. I gravitated mostly to the sock yarns obviously. They had Koigu, but what caught my eye were two little skeins above that on a shelf full of Claudia Hand Painted.Strawberry Latte. I had wanted this color when The Loopy Ewe had it, but restrained myself because I would have bought more than that and didn't want to spend a bunch. I immediately grabbed them. Then I wandered around a bit and found Allison. She was very excited about the store but wasn't sure what to get.

So with some advice from the ladies working there (who were the friendliest and nicest I'm pleased to report) we went a block over to a little restaurant called Costa's. Greek I imagine. It was amazing food. I had a fettuccine alfredo with chicken and it was the best I have EVER had. Literally. Allison said the same of her lunch as well.

We made a plan so she would know what to look at and we walked back over to Weaving Works. She got some Cascade for a bag, and some in superwash for mitts. We wound up all her yarn and we were done.

A good haul! We were both pretty happy with the purchases we had made. Myself especially in scoring a color I loved and in my restraint at only buying that. (Of course, I did look but there was nothing else that called to me lol.)

Off to Third Place Books (which by the way is huge and a really cool bookstore!) we went. We were a little over an hour early for it. I went and bought my book to have it for the signing, and we found seats. Both of us settled in for the wait, knitting and chatting. Finally it was time!

She talked for about an hour, and had a question and answer part at the end. I was laughing for 90% of the time that she talked. So much so that I was close to tears! She's a great speaker, the facial expressions, impressions, and everything add so much to what she says.
After that it was book signing time, and I got Allison to take a picture for me. I held the sock! (I also look ridiculous in this picture lol, but the other one she took my eyes were half closed!)
Here is a picture of my Swirls sock, I did about half of that before and during the presentation. I love it so far. It's a great pattern and I will for sure be making it again.
Then we braved the ridiculously long drive home. It took around 4 hours to get to Spokane, and after I dropped off Allison it was about 45 minutes to get home. The suicidal deer were out in full force or I'd have been home earlier. I fell into bed and was out pretty much immediately. I slept until 1pm today. So now that the kids are napping, I'm off to knit on the couch and catch up on the DVR.

Oh happy day!

2008-04-18T17:00:00.000-07:00

Today I finally FINALLY don't have any secret knitting to do. Oh man oh man it feels good. I loved knitting it, but the pressure was a bit more than I could take lol.

So that's done, and now I really don't feel like knitting the slightest bit. AT ALL. I will probably work on my Serendipity sock (though not today cuz god my fingers hurt) since I left off on the heel and it's been sitting here on my desk staring at me. And maybe start a new pair to take with me on Monday. What's Monday you ask?

YARN HARLOT IN SEATTLE!!!

Yes, I get to go. My manager changed up the whole schedule for me so that I could go. So Monday morning I will be driving on over with a ravelry buddy. Should be fun! We are stopping at a yarn store before hand and then heading over to the bookstore. I reserved a copy of the book so I can get it signed.

Yes. So I'm super excited. Hopefully I remember my camera. And my ipod, and knitting...

So now I'm gonna go relax. Maybe spin. I have no pictures sorry, but next time I post I will.

"Here's the mail it never fails..."

2008-04-11T16:49:00.000-07:00

I've been watching too much Blue's Clues...

(those of you who don't will have no idea but there's this little song that goes:

Here's the mail it never fails,
It makes me want to wag my tail
And when it comes I want to wail....
Mail!!!! (complete with happy hands and facial jestures)

Something like that...)

So I have a few goodies to share. Ok more than a few. You know me...

Two batts from Enchanted Knoll. They are black superwash merino with sari silk and glitz in them and OMG gorgeous drool beyond amazing stuff. This first one is Phoenix, which has red and gold silk and glitz.And this one is Araucuna, which is green.
They are a LOT more subtle in person, the flash really doesn't help that. They look more black with a slight sparkle, and I like that. I also thought that it might be rough, or scratchy with the stuff in it but it's SO NOT. I adore it. I think I may ask for a custom order of black with red and pink or something...

I also got a custom order from Pigeonroof. Sort of... She keeps a list of stuff people want, and when she can she dyes it. Well last week she listed three superwash bfl rovings in colors I had asked for. I love them!

This one is Black Magic,
Vintage,
and Calla.
I know the bottom two look similar and they are. The calla has more orange and purple in it. Vintage is more pink and green. It will be very interesting to see them skeined...

Lastly I got my April sock club from Keegan Lane! The pattern is super cute, I love the yarn, and she sent some cute things in the package, including a needle case that she sewed up herself. It's got a little dragonfly! I love dragonflies. (And hummingbirds...)
She also included a set of Pattern Tamers that she had a spare set of for me. They are basically ribbons with magnets inside, and you use them to keep your place on charts and stuff. The two magnets stick together and stay in place which helps you keep your eye on the right line of your chart, etc. Very cool! I think I may need to go buy another set...
Lastly, today I ran up to Michaels after work. I had a 40% off coupon and had been wanting to get some watercolor paper to try some Gouache I found in my art box. Little did I know the brand I usually buy for sketch books was already on sale. I also needed brushes (since all mine have been used for acrylic, and Chad ruined some...) and the Loew Cornell (single brushes) were on sale as well, but I got a little pack instead. I haven't painted in a while (4 years?) and wasn't sure which ones I would want to use. Lastly I looked around and found a pack of 18 gouache colors. They are a different brand than the few I have, and probably cheap, but I think they will be good practice to see if I like it. If I do, then I'll get the better stuff.
With the coupon it was about 26 bucks which isn't too bad. I think I got decent stuff for a good price. I'm excited to try it out though it will have to wait until my test knit is done. I feel guilty even blogging when I could be knitting. I'm only halfway and have obviously determined I won't make the deadline of the 14th, but am hoping that I won't run over that much.

Not much else is happening. I'm trying to go see the Yarn Harlot in Seattle. It would be a five hour drive there, and then 5 back at night...but I missed her last time and I'd really like to go. Chad, knowing how badly I want to go, has offered to take that day off to watch the kids. It means missing two days I normally work, so I won't know until I talk to my boss on Sunday...

Mostly it's because I work Mondays and it's on a Monday. So if I had to get up at my normal 4:30 am to work on Monday, I'd never make it all day to Seattle and home (which I wouldn't get home till 2 or 3 am most likely). Then I normally work on Tues morning, which also means getting up at 4:30. See how much that would suck?

So we'll see what she says. I am basically the only morning person, so I may not be able to...

Ok, off to knit and warm up on the couch. It's warm outside, but man is it freezing in here for some reason!

I'm a bad blogger...

2008-04-05T18:46:00.000-07:00

This is gonna be a quick one. Not much time for anything lately. Just my super secret knit that I'm working on. I did get my Sonne Wollmeise since the last post. It's soooo pretty and I think I might knit the Digitessa (Ravelry link) socks with it.I also got a bunch of TY beanie babies off ebay. 15 of them for just over 15 bucks including shipping. I mostly got them because they had the lamb, the one in this first picture. Alexis has had this one for a long time, and the one she's got is nasty from sucking on it when she was littler, and chewing on the butt tag...

I also got Magic the Dragon there, on the left, which is one I've wanted since I was a kid and it got too popular and I never got it. It's super cute. There are two cats, the one on the right is one I had when I was a kid, I think my mom has it with all my stuffed animals I saved from back in the day. The far right is a Clydesdale horse I believe, it's pretty cute. Besides Magic which is MINE allmine, and the lamb, I'm saving these as gifts for the kids for random times.There are two puppies, a floppy frog, and a bunny, oh and a chameleon hiding on the left there.
A tiger, lobster, sloth?, and a cardinal.
And this cute squirrel who came in a box...
So other than that, I'm just waiting on things to get here. Some club fiber, a sock club kit, and two orders of fiber, one of which is waiting for me at the post office right now...

Now off to feed the kiddies dinner and knit my little fingers off!

Quickie

2008-03-28T22:46:00.000-07:00

Well, as quick as it can be for me...my posts are usually so long.

So I mentioned that I picked up my Serendipity sock again. This is where I had gotten to by last night, just past the heel.
And this is where I am tonight.
A finished sock! It's a bit short, but that's because this is a new toe for me and I wasn't quite sure where to stop at. It should be half an inch longer but I'm too lazy to rip it back and fix. I'll just block it and it'll be fine I think. If not, then they'll go to my tiny footed sister.

Here's a close up of the star toe shaping. It's just like decreasing a hat, and ends the same. I don't know if I like it quite as much as the other kind. I'll have to wait until I wear them.
And a shot of the heel, which I do like. It seemed faster and easier than a heel flap, and is very comfortable. I think I'll be doing many more like this.
I got my February Funky Carolina fiber in the mail yesterday. Yes I DO know it's nearing the end of March. I didn't realize I hadn't received it until about two weeks ago. It apparently got lost in the mail, so she had to hunt down some fiber and dye this up for me. It took a bit since she's moving right now. I got 5.25 (extra fiber for the extra wait and she said I'll get extra next time too) ounces of superwash bfl (my fave!) in the color Grounded. I think it's going to look awesome spun up. I should be getting March's fiber somewhat soon too and am signed up for another three months. This is one club I just can't lose with!

I'll leave you all with pictures I took of the kids at lunch. Alexis eating a cheese filled tortilla...I thought she looked adorable with her little purple bow, although it's barely in the picture. It's funny because she reminds me in this picture of my sister when she was little. My sister has lighter hair where mine is really dark.
And Nicholas...making his "dinosaur/t-rex" face. Another weird thing...he reminds me of my brother here...
I see myself and hubby in them a lot, but every so often I see my sister or brother in their faces and it amuses me.

Well that's it for now. There probably won't be a lot of knitting related posting going on for a bit because I have a super secret test knit to do and it's got to be done in two weeks, and it's going to take every spare moment of these two weeks. I'm confident I can do it, but it will mean not much to talk about here.

So now I'm off to spin for a little bit to wind down, and get my butt in bed. I'm hoping to make it to the spin in tomorrow, and I'll need to get up early since I have other errands as well.

Nighty night!

A week?!? Really???

2008-03-27T14:46:00.000-07:00

I cannot even believe that I haven't posted in a whole week. A ton has happened and man I feel that this is going to be a long post...I'll try to keep it short though.

I have received a few things in the mail. One of which was my March shipment of the RSC. Here is a picture of the yarn and pattern.
It's STR mediumweight and it's called Lucky. I love the color, I'm just surprised that this one AND the loopy ewe are SO similar in colors. Seriously...it's weird.
I adore this pattern though, and think that it fits the yarn. Or the yarn fits the pattern? Either way it's pretty. I picked up my January socks again because I will not allow myself to start these ones until those are done.

I also got the one skein of Wollmeise I traded for. I sent off my Spice Market, and got this Regenbogen in return! I love it SO much. My Sonne is still on the way from New Zealand but I'm sure it won't be long now till I get it.I finished the first part of my tangled yoke. No pic because it looks just like the last one pretty much. I get to start the sleeves now, and then they will attach to this body piece, and then the yoke! I'm very excited. I need my other size five circular to do it though, since I'd like to knit the sleeves 2 at a time on two circs. And the other is attached to my Jaywalker scarf which is honestly just about done. So I'll finish that up today.

I'm on repeat 5 of 10 on my Honeybee stole, and it's going to be so pretty! I'm loving knitting it, and it's going fast enough I think.

In completely unrelated news, hubby's job switched their insurance they provide to employees. Health insurance that is. Great for us because before we could only get dental if we signed up for medical too, and with this one we can pay for just the dental. Good news for me because I broke another tooth...don't ask. It sucks to have horrible teeth and I can't wait to get them fixed.

Alexis is a little monkey and tried climbing out of her bed last week. So we quickly moved her into Nicholas's room and I changed the crib into a bed with rails. It's one of those convertible ones. Since then they don't want to sleep, they only want to play. It's catching up fast though, last night they both were begging to go to bed. Muahahaha. And today they are finally napping! Thank goodness. I knew the novelty would wear off, but in the meantime it's tough. Especially since they tore his room apart every nap time. And they were super cranky from not getting sleep.

We've been getting freak snow showers lately. It's sunny when I wake up, then snows or hails at lunch, and by 3pm it's sunny again. Seriously. And then snows overnight. I hope it doesn't last, we had a few warm days there and I loved it. Plus this weekend there is a spin in thingy going on in the next state which is a whopping half an hour or so from my house...well maybe 45 mins. I want to go but want the weather to be nice!

Today Pigeonroof AND Piddleloop updated, and I got nothing. Pigeonroof didn't list anything I really wanted, so that was ok, but then I MISSED the piddleloop one. I KNEW that it was at 3:27 CENTRAL and for some reason mixed it up. I know that 3:27 central is 2:27 pacific, and didn't realize until 3pm I had spaced it. I was so annoyed. I really wanted this piggy bag...it is so cute and I love the colors...but would have happily settled for the cute fishy bag. Got nothin.

Ah well, I'll just take what I was going to spend with me to the spin in, assuming I go, and I think there are supposed to be vendors. So I'll buy a fun thing there instead. And wait...for the next piddleloop update.

Hmm, well I think that might be all for now. I'm sure I'll be back, whether that's sooner or later...and I will surely have things to show! Now it's time to go finish the laundry (wait, lol, laundry is NEVER finished...), shower, clean, and maybe knit and watch a movie. (Who am I trying to kid here? We all know that the knitting will come first, then probably the shower, and then if the kids aren't awake...cleaning lol)

WOLLMEISE!!!

2008-03-20T14:45:00.000-07:00

I have a winner for the contest, and they've been emailed, so I'll announce that all later.

(p.s.- There are a LOT of pictures in this post...)

Right now, I have WOLLMEISE!!!

It came the other day and I was so excited I opened it in the post office parking lot and kept them on my lap the whole drive home lol. So here they are!

Spice Market, and the second picture is most accurate in color. It's not nearly as bright as the pictures show it. I've already agreed to trade this one for Regenbogen, which is a rainbow colored one.Then there's Tiefer See (which means Deep Lake) and it's SO pretty. Blue, indigo, green, and lime. I love it.
Both pictures are pretty accurate colorwise.
Lastly there is the Sultan. There are a ton of colors in it. Red, fuschia, teal, blue, navy, purple, lime, small parts that are yellow, and some plum. I didn't realize how pretty it was going to be, but I've agreed to trade it. I don't mind though since I'm getting Regenbogen in my other trade which I like more than this one. I will be getting Sonne in this trade. Bright yellow and orange!
So that was my exciting bit of the week. I keep taking them out to pet. They will be sent off to their new homes tomorrow though, except for Tiefer See.

I got a few other things since last post. One was another ACEO from Starr. Lily of the Valley. They really are my favorite flowers. This one is super pretty. I love the blue and purple background.
Then there is this bag I ordered from Messie on etsy. I missed out on the one bag I wanted from the last Piddloop update, so I ordered this as a consolation. It's so cool. Darker than the picture as well, dark greys and burgundy. I love it.
Then there is the yarn I got which I traded for. I do a lot of trading on Ravelry. I sent her some zephyr and louet sock in exchange for these two str lightweights. They are both club colors from last year. This first one is Firebird, and I really love it!
Then there's flower power. I like the combination in this one.
So I've had some fun stuff come this week. I've also been doing some knitting. Look how far I am on my tangled yoke! It's almost 10 inches. I've got 25 rows or so to go before I set the body aside and do the sleeves. Chad keeps glaring at it because I haven't finished his vest I started last year for him to go golfing in. So I'm going to have to pull that out and get my butt in gear working on it. I'm going to do it in secret so he has no idea and then when he asks about it he'll be surprised that it's done! It's not quite golfing weather yet anyway...
I've also been working on my Honeybee stole. It's tough to take pictures of it since it's black. You can see some of the holes there...

Here are the beads, also hard to see. They look pretty good in person though.
I've also started two other lace projects. Bad I know but I couldn't help it. This first one is a lot of fun. It's the Gretchen shawl (from FiberDenn) I bought a while ago. It's a circle and going somewhat fast right now. I can't wait to get it on a circ, the dpns are annoying. I am having so much fun working on it I've barely touched the honeybee. I'm beginning to not worry though. I wanted the honeybee for my anniversary but hubby has it in his head we need to go camping for it. Lol, so I doubt I'll need a lacy beaded stole for that.

I also started the Moroccan Days wrap, but it's slow going because this thing is HUGE. I like it so far but I am not in any hurry with it since it's going to take a while anyway. It's actually a bit further than this picture.
So you can see I've been a busy girl! I'm off to go shower and search for campgrounds nearby...I actually think camping would be fun for a day or two, I haven't gone in a really long time and I always loved it. Plus it will be in May, so it will be warmer. More later!!!

And now the moment...

2008-03-15T22:44:00.000-07:00

...that you all have been waiting for. That's right, my 200th blog post!

I have written up a questionnaire of 15 questions, and all the answers are here on my blog somewhere. It might take a bit of searching, but trust me they are there. The first person to answer all of them correctly will win. If no one gets them all by Monday night, the person who has answered the most right will win.

Now for the prize details. I will be giving the winner a choice of two main things. Either roving or sock yarn. The roving I have is 4 ounces of superwash merino tencel by Funky Carolina in the colorway Lily Pond. It's super pretty, shiny, and fun to spin!For the sock yarn I offer up my Posh Yarn Lucia (merino/cashmere blend) in Raspberry. It's varied shades from a med to dark dark raspberry and would probably work well for defined patterns b/c of the type of base they use.
I've also got some little things that I plan on putting in with the winners choice but haven't gotten pictures of those yet. So stay tuned and here's the questions for those of you playing along!

1. What was the reason I started my blog?

2. How many shawls have I knit and finished? (and that includes wraps)

3. What is the title of the post where I have pictures of my son in his green Sherwood sweater?

4. What was the first spinning wheel that I had before my Little Gem?

5. What hat did I knit for hubby?

6. What was the shawl pattern I knit with my first hand spun yarn?

7. What knitwear item did I give my cousin at her wedding shower?

8. What brand is my drop spindle?

9. Which shawl pattern have I knit three times?

10. What did I knit out of Banana yellow Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece?

11. Who is my favorite roving dyer? (clue: Whose fiber do I have the most of?)

12. Which sock clubs am I currently in?

13. What are my two kiddos named?

14. What color of Dream in Color Classy did I buy for the Loopy DIC sweater kal?

15. What is the name of my first sock design?

Email your answers to chizzlesgirl@aol.com when you think you've got it!

Now I'm off to bed, I have to be up in five hours for work...ugh.

Contest Delay...

2008-03-12T22:21:00.000-07:00

Apparently blogger saved a few entries as drafts while I was composing. So my last post was actually number 198, and this makes 199. I only noticed because after my last post it went from 198 to 200. So the contest will be on the next post instead. I'm still working on it anyway.

Today I finished a pair of socks! My first pair from handspun yarn. I used 60 grams of the 100gm skein, so not a whole lot, but I wasn't sure how much I had so the cuffs are short.
I really love these socks though, they are such a simple pattern, and even though the pattern itself doesn't show up a whole lot I still like it. It was a better knit than stockinette ya know? Anyway they fit great and I'm glad to have a PAIR finished.
Here are some better pictures of my STS. It's being blocked in this one. (Yes those are my new foam floor thingys I got from Lowes for blocking. $15 and they work GREAT. Now if I could keep the kids grubby little paws off them...lol)
And some better shots where you can actually see it. One of it over the railing on the porch...
and a closeup of the stitch details.
I got this awesome yarn from a fellow Raveler. Seems like that's where I get half of my yarn these days. It's Yarn Love, which is my new favorite dyer. The base is the Elizabeth Bennet and it's called Fancy. Seriously pretty.
And here's a picture of the other bobbin of yarn I've been spinning. This is superwash merino from Funky Carolina. The color was Major. Mostly blue, purple, and black, with a bit of white and brown. It will be for socks when it's done.
In other news, I'm maybe four inches in on my tangled yoke and am loving the ease of it so far. It's a good project for times when you can't concentrate a whole lot. At least until I get to the cabled yoke part. ;)

Also I ripped out my honeybee. I didn't like the density of the stitches on the size four needles, so I re-cast it on with some 3's I picked up for it. On the fours the pattern wasn't showing up so well, and half a repeat in on the size three needles and it looks much better. I also happened to pick up new beads for it. When I held up the ones I had to the yarn, they just didn't look right, they have a bluish sheen to them, and I think they'd look best on dark blue or purple. So I'll save those. Instead I found some black ones that are silver lined. I was looking for beads for something else at the time, and got these since I didn't have the yarn for the project and couldn't decide.

One last thing. Today I got my first Loopy Ewe sock club shipment! It's gorgeous colors, and I really love the pattern. There is also the little baggie of loopy kisses, the loopy sock club bag, and a kiss body soap thingy, which I thought was candy at first lol. Good thing I didn't eat it! I know others assumed it was chocolate as well, and one person actually took a bite...The yarn is Cherry Tree Hill by the way. There was no colorway name but it's mostly blue and green with bits of yellow-green and navy.

Well I think that's it for now. It's been a long day and I've got an appointment tomorrow morning that I won't get to if I don't go to bed soon!

Some new things.

2008-03-09T21:44:00.001-07:00

I felt like I was in a slump the other day, and so I decided that I needed to cast on some new projects to feel better. Knitting-wise that is. Finishing that knitter's project shawl was like lifting a weight, but then I felt like I didn't really want to knit anything that was in progress. I figured casting on something new would cure it and I would be able to work on the other stuff too.

So, I cast on the Honeybee stole that I've been itching to make. It's not very far in, and hard to see the detail in black, but I knew that would be the case. I really like the pattern so far, and although it seemed pretty hard at first, it's not that bad once you get the hang of it. If it weren't for the border, I could probably partially memorize it.

I also cast on for my Tangled Yoke cardigan. I've had the yarn for forever and would love to actually wear it before the weather gets too warm. It's easy knitting.
I spent a good two hours on it after a nap. Yes, that's right, nap. I lost an hour of sleep last night and had to work this morning, which meant getting up at 4:30, which of course to my body was 3:30. So I came home and passed out. I woke up as the kids were going down for a nap, and had a headache, so I took some Aleve, and sat on the couch knitting and watching The Illusionist. I thought it was a decent movie. Especially the end, which I SHOULD have suspected, and didn't. Maybe because I was still tired...yeah...that's it. The sweater is slow going on some 200 stitches but I'm enjoying it and like the yarn a bit more now that I'm working with it. I think it should soften significantly after washing. It feels a bit like Classic Elite Classic Silk.

Other than that, I'm still knitting all the usual. I pulled out an old sweater I was working on since I need the needles for my loopy DIC sweater.

Then I've been trying to spin at least a little each day. This is my lace I've been working on and it's taking forever. Pretty though.
Ok well that's it for now. My next post will be number 200, and I'm planning a little blog contest/giveaway. Nothing big, but still, who says no to free stuff? I'll be back in a day or so, when I get it all worked out with what I'm going to do and giveaway!

Until then!

A Reveal

2008-03-06T19:44:00.000-08:00

Well I finally finished the spring things shawl I have been knitting for AGES. I remember the other two going so much faster. Maybe this one seemed to take so long because I wanted to do other things so badly. It needs blocking but it's off the needles and that's the best part.
So now I can finally cast on my honeybee stole which I'm hoping to have done by our anniversary in May, the 10th to be exact. Which is just over 2 months, and not much time to be knitting a whole lace stole, among other things, since you all know by now I'm SO NOT a monogamous knitter...

In other news, I got my first sock club package for the Keegan Lane Yarns Spring Fling Sock Club. First I got a few things that Melissa had been holding on to for me. My half of the few colors of Cherry Tree Hill sock yarn for the Charlotte's Web shawl.

This first one is Grape Razzle,
then Misty Moor,
and Tapestry.
Then there was my Piddloop bag she got two of in the last update, by mistake. So I bought this one off of her. Isn't it cute? It's a pretty big size and very well made. There's a little notions bag inside of it too, an interior pocket, and some elastic sewn to hold needles or hooks.
Lastly there was my club stuff. Since this first month was my sock pattern, she sent me a color of my choice instead of the regular club color, since I'd already gotten that one. I'm so in love with this colorway, it's Northern Lights.
Then there was this absolutely adorable notions bag, I LOVE strawberries.
There was also a little egg with Hershey's kisses inside which were gone immediately, and a little paper pad with pen. I somehow forgot to take pictures of those. I think they were in the bag...

And now for the big reveal you've all been waiting for! Since my pattern was first up, and club members have received it, I can show my sock pattern off! This is the Tendril Embrace sock. I know...crappy pic. And dirty table lol...kids.
Here's the yarn that she sent, and club members are receiving for the sock. It's Toasty Sock in Morning Glories. I love the little purple speckles in it.
Here are some detail shots of the sock, so you can see it up close.
It's a variation of the feather and fan lace pattern. It was one of the first lace stitches I ever used, and I thought it would be a perfect way to show off the yarn and a good first sock pattern. I really love how the cuff scallops gently all on it's own, and there is a bit of ribbing in between the lace, which makes it fit snugly. I adore these socks, and would even if they weren't my own pattern!
I named it Tendril Embrace, partly because I thought it was fitting with the name of the yarn. Morning Glories are climbing vines when they can, and their "tendrils" would "embrace" whatever it was they were climbing. It's also partially a play on the words "tender embrace" because of the way the socks fit. I like it.

So that's my sock pattern. I will release it in June for purchase, after the club is over with and I figure out how to fix my router so I can upload stuff to my website...

Ok well that's all I've got for now, and I think it's plenty. Off to go feed the kids, and myself, dinner!

Had enough yet?

2008-03-04T22:12:00.001-08:00

Eye candy that is. No? Well here is some more. Until my Wollmeise arrives this should be it pretty much. Besides the few trades in progress or being sent soon.

My roving from the last Pigeonroof etsy update finally arrived. It's so much more gorgeous in person. Merino silk in the color Millefiore. I almost had to buy it just because of the name, I love Millefiore anyway. It's seriously beautiful, and sparkly!
I got my loopy ewe order. I decided last minute to join in the Dream in Color knitalong. I got three skeins of Classy in Giant Peach. Not my first choice, but it's really pretty and I'm glad I got it. A very pinky orange, which I love.
I also got two skeins of lorna's laces shepherd sock in Sherbet. I've had this colorway before but I traded it ages ago and wished I hadn't. So when she got the color back in I had to get it. It's much more saturated than the last batch I had. More orange and a darker pink. Still pretty though.
Lastly I got my order from Webs. I went a bit crazy, as I have been lately, but I am planning on doing another yarn diet so it will last me. I did so well on my last diet, I think I can do better this time.

Louet Gems Fingering weight in three colors. This is Ginger, and then Cream for the Endpaper mitts. I couldn't decide what would work from my stash so I gave in and bought it instead. I wanted something classic.
And two skeins in aqua. For socks of course.
Then I got 6 skeins of Jaeger Siena in Meadow which is a gorgeous minty green. This is to try one more time to knit the Josephine top from IK. The last two yarns I tried were bad...this is the same fiber as what they used.
Lastly 2 colors of Debbie Bliss Rialto Aran. Sky Blue for the Central Park Hoodie, and white, for Rogue.
Quick knitting update. Still trying to finish the dang shawl. I'm halfway through the last beading row. Haven't had much time the last few days to work on it...and I've cast on my other handspun sock and am just about done increasing the toe.

Well that's it for now. It's late and b/c of work I haven't gotten much sleep in two days. Bedtime for me!

Fastest sock EVER

2008-03-02T21:09:00.001-08:00

Seriously. I started it like less than 3 days ago. This is the sock I knit out of my handspun. I couldn't decide which shots were the best, so here are all the ones I took. This first pic I lightened in photoshop even, but it looked weird to lighten it a whole bunch, and it looks much more green than it is.
The colors are much closer in these next few up close shots. The pattern detail is very subtle, and hard to get in a pic.
This is the yarn I kool aid dyed today for my Morrocan Days shawl I plan on knitting. It's an orangey red, and I was going for something else but it will have to do. I may keep looking for the colors I see in my head, but so far no one has anything like it. I want a dark burnished red gold color, and I knew I wouldn't get that with the koolaid but I figured I could get orangey red, and I did. It's not as bright as this picture obviously.
Other than that, still no other fo's. I should have finished my shawl but I've been hooked on the sock. It's actually my first toe up sock, completed. I've started a few but never finished them.

So that's about it I think.

My loopy order is waiting for me at the post office. I have a few things I have traded for on Ravelry on the way. AND the big thing I'm waiting on is the Wollmeise I scored at her shop update. None are the colors I wanted, but I figured I was lucky to get ANY at this point. I really just want to see what the fuss is about, and the colors are gorgeous. It's the 80/20 twin yarn. As in 80 wool, 20 nylon. I got the colors Sultan which is rainbowy, Tiefer See which is a blue green, and Spice Market, which is browns and some orange and yellow I think in darker shades. We'll see though because they are the light and medium intensities and I didn't look at them I just bought. Heh.

Pics of those and more when it gets here!

Lace Galore

2008-02-28T15:45:00.000-08:00

After getting the mail today I now have more lace than I can handle. And boy does that feel good! Lol. I love that I have it all planned out and on hand so when I want to start I can.

First up we have more Jaggerspun from Sarah's Yarns. There is my Pewter zephyr wool silk which I adore. I think I will in fact use this for my wing of the moth shawl and use the white for the lily of the valley. It's very silvery and I think that's the perfect color for moth wings. :)
Next up is my Mulberry superfine merino for the Gretchen shawl.
And then Peacock superfine merino for of course a Pretty as a Peacock shawl.
Here we have some more zephyr wool silk I got in a Ravelry trade. It's Turquoise and very pretty. This is the only lace I have no idea what I will do with yet. Not like I don't have plenty in my queue to choose from...
More lace I traded for on Ravelry...Cashwool in a gorrrrgeous lavender color for the Rona lace shawl. This stuff is beyond soft.
Then there is some sock yarn I bought, yes from Ravelry. It's Yarn Love Juliet and the color is Cloud Nine. Mint green, yellow, white, hot pink, and some lighter pinks. Very pretty!The last thing that was in the mail were some ACEO's that I bought from one of my former secret pals. Well she was my spoiler. I LOVE these. They are about baseball card sized and she has put them in a hard plastic casing and into a plastic bag. I can't wait to find the perfect way to display them on the wall.
I have a few more of these I want from her. Especially because she did a lily of the valley one and I'm a bit obsessive about those. I love that this one is a set though.

I'm halfway through the border on my knitter's project shawl, and hope to finish tonight or tomorrow. I've also been spending some time each day knitting on my ms3. It's going fast, I should be done with this first half soon!

No more news today. It's been pretty boring around here but at least the sun is out today! I had the car window down all the way to the post office. I think it's close to 50 degrees, but it's warm enough for the time of year!

Hopefully there will be a FO in my next post...off to knit on it!

CRAP

2008-02-26T15:16:00.000-08:00

Today is turning out to be a suck ass kind of day. I just have to vent here for a min. Back in like, I dunno actually, months ago, we got this satellite internet installed. When I called they said they had two payment options. Pay it all OR pay 1/5th of the fee and have the rest of the equipment cost added onto your monthly service bill so that is wasn't all at once. Well they told me that when the guy came out to install the equipment to tell him which way we were going to do it. I wanted it added on to my bill. So I told him that and he told me they had already set it up to be paid in full and that if I wanted it to be the other way that I'd have to call the service provider and have them switch it to that. They charged me the $100 bucks and that was it.

So I did as he instructed, and the service (Hughesnet) told me that no, they don't do it that way and they couldn't change it and that they weren't going to collect the money for the satellite blah blah, etc etc. among other things. Since then I've only been billed the monthly service charge and haven't been contacted about it. I probably shouldn't have left things at that, but figured if no one wanted me to pay them...who was I to make a fuss?

Today I logged on to my bank account to find that over $400 dollars had been charged to my account from the company that installed my satellite. Freaking out I called them to find that they apparently checked with Hughesnet to make sure I paid and when I hadn't they decided to charge me the full remainder.

STUPID PEOPLE. I had no call about this. The lady I spoke to said she has been calling about this for months and has left dozens of messages. Um, NO....

There were no messages. There wasn't even a number on the caller id. So I don't know what that's about but she had the right number to call...

Either way she's refunding the full amount and I've worked out payments, but it's ruined the day. I am so wound up and stressed now. I swear it's always something...

I was going to go cast on something new to cheer myself up but thought better of it. I'm three rows away from the border on my spring things shawl, and think it's best to work on that instead. Finishing something will feel even better.

On a good note, I got my loopy order yesterday...

Posh Lucia in Raspberry. For being part cashmere it's really not that great, or soft. We'll see if I like it better knit.Shibui Sock in Peony. LOVE this.
And Louet Gems fingering in Lilac and Goldilocks. The yellow is a different color than I thought it would be...not sure if I like it.
And a few kid pics...Alexis being silly.Nicholas in apron and chefs hat.
And this which I found amusing. Chad was sitting with the kids at dinner and he looked over on Nick's tray and saw a mashed potato snowman...
Goofy kid. I thought maybe Chad did it for him, but nope, he did it all on his own! Lol.

Tonight Chad has a "dinner" he has to go to for work, I get to go too. It's not formal but we have to dress nice. Like nice pants, button shirt type of thing. I don't have any "slacks" or dress pants so I picked some up at JcPenny today (on sale!) and got some super cute shoes (also on sale! Originally 70 bucks too...but they are leather). I wonder if they are getting rid of them since they aren't on the website...I might have to get them in brown too then... Anywho the brand is Strictly Comfort and they have a nice squishy bottom and support my instep. I like. I got another pair but I'm taking those back since after wearing them for a few min around the house, they made my foot hurt. They had a short heel on them though, and I have trouble wearing heels anymore. So perhaps I'll just exchange them for another pair of these.

So that's it for today. Hopefully we won't have to stay there forever tonight, and it's not too boring. Chad already told me I can't take my knitting...(should I hide a sock in my purse? lol).

Marilinda halfway there!

2008-02-23T16:07:00.000-08:00

That's right, today I finished the first Marilinda sock. After I got past the leg and heel, it went pretty fast I think. It fits well and I really really love this sock. Out of alllll the Cookie A. patterns, this one is my favorite. Twisted Flower was, until I started this one. It's just gorgeous I think.
I got a few things in the mail since the last post. My lace came from Sarah's Yarns and I've already ordered 3 more colors. I wasn't sure if I'd like the plain merino or not but I do so I got the colors I wanted originally.

Here is some white zephyr wool silk. I will use this either for a Wing o the Moth shawl or the Lily of the Valley. I have some Pewter coming which is a silvery color that might be better for the moth shawl, so I won't decide till it gets here. No hurry anyway.
Ebony wool silk, posing with some beads Melissa sent me ages ago. This is for the Honeybee stole, I'm still debating the beads. This is the shawl I will start first, since I want a black stole for my anniversary in May. I plan to go somewhere nice to eat. Unlike last year which got screwed up and we could only find ONE decent place open to eat at 10 pm. I can't remember what happened...but I didn't get to dress up.
This is the Jaggerspun superfine merino in chamois. I got this for the bee fields. I know I know but I like BOTH bee shawls...
I've got two more colors of this stuff coming in the colors Peacock and Mulberry. The peacock is for the Pretty as a Peacock shawl, which I could resist no longer, and the Mulberry for a circular shawl called Gretchen that I found the pattern for on etsy.

It's funny the lace obsession has hit me again. I realized I had NO lace in sufficient quantities for any of the ones I wanted to make, and sort of freaked out and bought a bunch. I also traded for a lavender skein of Baruffa Cashwool for another shawl...

Besides that I got a pretty new roving. It's superwash bfl which I'm officially in love with. I got it from Pigeonroof and it's called Pink Lady. Can't wait to spin it, but I might save it since it's the only sw bfl I have...
AND my lovely order from Crystal Creek came in. My 10 ounce HUGE batt of rambouillet and silk in Seafoam is just gorgeous. I love love love it and will be buying more...
I also got a pound of rambouillet roving, but it's not much to look at so I won't show it. I added it to my ever growing pile of wool to dye.

I also got two baggies of sample fiber from them. One I have NO idea what it is. It's either angora or doggy. It's just kinda hard to tell since it's white and super soft. It has dog listed on that card in the baggy along with the other stuff they carry so I'm not just crazy.
AND I got this gorgeous silk. I KNOW what that is. It's soooo freaking soft and gorgeous. I just keep opening the bag to pet it.
Anyway I'll be back later. I'm off to try and get to the border on my spring things knitter shawl so I can finish it already.

Tiny Sock!

2008-02-22T00:42:00.000-08:00

Just a drive by blog post here:

Finished the first Carolina sock. It seems teeny tiny b/c my sister has teeny tiny feet! It's really only an inch shorter than mine are usually.I have been lazy about photographing stuff as it comes in lately. I've got a few rovings from the past month that I never took pictures of at all and I thought I should add them to my Ravelry before I forget I have them.

This one is 4.2 ounces of bfl in Glade from Pigeonroof Studios. I have two more of hers on the way as well.
Some Funky Carolina: this one is corriedale and not that soft but I liked the colors. 4 ounces in Peach Cobbler.4 ounces of bfl in Meredith.
4 ounces of gorgeous merino silk in Wonder.
Then I got some targhee awhile back from Spinning Bunny. One in Roses for You,
and one in Hibiscus.
I'm dying to spin one since it feels so much different than other wools. I've got 8 ounces of targhee I got from Paradise Fibers to dye as well, and it feels different than even this targhee. I've also got some superfine merino to dye which is GORGEOUS.

Did I mention that I've got some Rambouillet on the way? No probably not. A pound to try out. Probably will dye it and sell the majority. We'll see depending on what it's like! I've also got a batt of a rambouillet silk blend to try out.

Don't ask what else is on the way. I went a bit nuts with a small tiny portion of the tax return. I really need to go on another diet after all this. Ok well I'll tell you anyway. I got some zephyr wool silk from Sarah's Yarns for a few shawls, and some undyed from Catnip Yarns to dye for a swap and another shawl I want a particular color for.

I bought some art from a friend, they are gorgeous, I'll show those off later.

Now it's off to bed, I'm tired and it's almost 1 am. I haven't been up this late in AGES.

Just a bit of an update.

2008-02-19T22:18:00.000-08:00

So things with Nicholas went fine yesterday. He had a blast in the waiting areas they had. There were a couple of those little cars they can get in and move like Fred Flintstone. They gave him stuff to calm down and after that he was soooo out of it. I took pictures, I was cracking up. His eyes are actually open but it's hard to tell. He had to lean on my MIL because he wasn't strong enough to sit up at that point.
Anyway, it did wonders to calm him down. He didn't even make a peep when they rolled him out of the room.On the way home he was groggy but feeling a bit better. We had our sun glasses on so of course he had to have some too.I did get to knit while he was in the O.R. but not a whole lot. I spent some of it snacking, and some watching stupid tv. I was hoping to have made a bit of progress on the scarf. I did maybe an inch or two...

I almost forgot to mention that I made it to knit group on Saturday. We meet every other week just about at Paradise Fibers. Check out this huge back room they've got!
See all the wheels they moved out of the way for us? They are back behind the ladies to the left. All set up to test, etc. It's hard to not go there and want to buy EVERYTHING.
It was a small group this time but we had a lot of fun. I love that there is enough room for us to bring our wheels.

Other than that the only other new thing is I got my hair done! FINALLY. I feel like it's been forever. I dyed it a dark black, with a purple hue to it which will only show in the sun. I cut it a bit short again. At least, short for me. Anything shoulder length and up is short. I like how it came out and am glad to feel like it's decent looking again lol. My highlights were SO grown out and bad.Well that's about it right now. More when I have it!

Forest Canopy Pictures

2008-02-17T22:49:00.001-08:00

So finally here are pictures of my Forest Canopy shawl. I think it turned out well! It's small, smaller than I think any of my others, but it's still big enough.
I like the striping effect you get with handspun yarn. It's unique and doesn't take any work at all!
I am glad to have this finished, now I can move on to other things!
Nicholas' surgery is in the morning, and I've decided to go after all. I'm taking my Jaywalker scarf for a mindless knit. It needs to be worked on for a good long time anyway. I would like to finish it while I can still wear it! Other than that I plan on dyeing one of these days. We got a new microwave which will go in the kitchen and I'll take the old one to dye stuff with. So now I just need the time to do it. When I do it's going to be a marathon session so I can get some stuff in the shop!

Ok well I'll be back later tomorrow probably to update on how it went....

SPARKLY

2008-02-14T14:35:00.000-08:00

So I still have no real pictures to show. The only pictures I took were of my Tendril Embrace socks and I can't show you those. Not yet anyway. I still have the thumb to finish on the baby mitten. I'm not in a rush because Chad doesn't see Sean often. I will finish it soon though because I need the needles for my gloves. I still haven't ripped the start of the first one out yet. It's too pretty! I don't want to rip it until I know I'm starting it again, and I can't start it over until I finish the baby mitten. Maybe I'll do that tonight.

I've been working on other things though. Melissa and I have been planning to do the Charlotte's Web shawl, and I asked her when she wanted to start it. Her answer was that we should each finish off three WIP's first. And my baby mittens don't count lol. So I set to work on my Forest Canopy and finished it yesterday! I was further than I thought. I was at 10 repeats and was thinking I had to do 15, but I only needed to do 11. So I did that and then on to the border. I have to block it still which means cleaning out the kids play area, since that's the only place I can pin it out. I usually have to block overnight as well, since I obviously can't have them in there while the shawl is, and with all of those pins.

But that's finished. So I'm pretty happy about that. It's my second shawl knit from handspun. Speaking of handspun and this is a tangent real quick...I soaked my superwash bfl that I spun for socks, remember it? Well some of the dye came out and now the white parts of the yarn are dingy. I'm a little disturbed about that. I almost don't even want to knit with it because it looks different...but it smells SO good now since I used soak on it and it's even softer than it was before. It fluffed up a TON and it's still pretty. Just weird that it did that...

Ok back to the shawls thing. So after that one was off the needles I dug out the shawl I'm doing for the knitters project. It's that spring things shawl in sage zephyr. I really don't know why I haven't been knitting it, because I love the pattern and the yarn. I think it's the tags. I like writing them, but they weigh the shawl down and tangle the yarn and are in the way. I'd like to finish it though because it will need to be sent off soon. I can't wait to get to the part when I can put the beads on.

So that is my plan, and it should be the second thing I will finish of the three I have to do before I can knit the other shawl. Then I need to finish one more thing and it will probably be a pair of socks. I don't care which ones, I just want a pair done.

Besides that stuff I plan to dig out my mystery shawl and work on that. I'm close to being halfway. I need to finish it. It's so pretty anyway, I'd love to have it done. That and I have like five more shawls I want to knit...Clapotis...well I'm counting that as a scarf since that's how I wear mine. There's the Juno Regina I'm spinning for. There are so many others as well. I think I finally picked a shawl to knit with my Melon seasilk. And there are countless others I need to buy yarn for. I just realized that I have almost NO lace yarn. And tons of shawls that I want to knit, which need more than the 600 yard balls of several colors of zephyr I have. So I plan to start stocking up on the lace, now that I have PLENTY of sock yarn.

Ok well for not much going on I sure do have a lot to say...I think sometimes I use this blog as a substitute for a journal. I used to write in a journal everyday for years. I don't anymore and I do miss it. It's just that Chad is nosy and wants to read everything I'm writing. And it's not like I'm writing anything major but it's like having someone reading your mind you know? It's personal. And I just like it to stay that way. I used to write when he wasn't home, I might have to start that again lol. It would help me keep track of things I think. I used to refer to my journals a lot about events that had happened.

Nicholas goes for surgery Monday to fix his teeth. I'm a bit nervous since they have to put him under to do it. Chad took the day off to go and I think I'm going to let my mother in law go with them and I will stay home with Alexis. It's not that I don't want to go, but I have a hard time watching them do things to my kids. They will have to run an iv and put a tube down his throat, and I can't handle that. I get sick when they do that stuff to me. I'm a wreck when I think about it. Gayleen my MIL worked at the hospital years ago before her injury and knows what they will be doing and handles it better. Plus I think she wants to go for some reason. I will wait home with Alexis and worry and take care of him when he comes home. Monday is going to be a long day...

Since there are no good pictures I'll leave you with a sparkly. I took my wedding ring set in to size it down half a size and it doesn't seem like they did anything, they are still too loose. BUT they cleaned them and did an acid bath and they are looking brand new. They had a yellowish tint to them from wear before. I can't stop looking at them now! Just like when he first gave them to me...(Man I sure know how to ramble on...)

An unexpected visitor...

2008-02-11T14:38:00.000-08:00

drops in. Unexpected and most UNWELCOME. So last night, I'm sitting here at the computer and knitting on this:
It's the second toddler mitten if you remember. Chad's buddy Sean and his wife Sadie have a son that just turned one. I made them a hat for him ages ago and I guess they loved it to pieces but it no longer fits. They want another, and that made me think of these mittens. So I'm knitting the second one now. They should fit Syler perfectly.

Anywho, back to my story. I'm knitting along and it's almost time for bed, so I'm trying to relax and feel sleepy since I have to be up in FIVE hours. Suddenly I feel something graze my skin. Now, my hair sheds a lot, so I usually assume that's what it is. And I'm wearing a v-neck, so it's entirely possible that it's a hair tickling me. So I lift up the bottom of my shirt and find this:
I know it's hard to see but look in the bottom of the bottle. See that black spider? Yeah. THAT'S what was IN MY SHIRT. I was screaming and freaking out, and Chad's looking at me like WTF? Anyway he did find it on the floor where I had brushed it off me and he caught it in the bottle. FRIGGEN GROSS. I'm assuming it dropped from the ceiling but who knows. Sheesh. I'm still disgusted and my skin crawls when I think about it.

The only ONLY good thing is it is just a little black house spider. OMG if it'd been a Hobo spider, I would have really freaked out. They are at LEAST two or three times that size, and if they bite you get big holes where the skin gets nasty and just like, dies.

So that was really relaxing...NOT.

Either way there hasn't been much other progress. I discovered on my mitten for me, the brown and mint one from the last post, I'm using the wrong size needles and it's too big. So I need to rip and redo in the right size. That's ok though, I didn't get too far, so I'd rather realize it now. I have been knitting on all the other things too at different times. I should finish the mitten tonight, and then I will probably work on the carolina sock. I decided the pair will be for my sister. I owe her big time. And have repeatedly promised socks. They are totally her colors, so they will be hers. I will probably rip out the mitten too since I haven't done that, and rewind the balls or something.

Ok well that's it for my meager update. More when I get something done!

Stalemate?

2008-02-08T10:20:00.000-08:00

I have slowed down a bit on my blogging. Mostly because most of my projects I'm working on are at the point where they don't look any different than they did last time I showed them. I do finally have some progress shots though, so here ya go.

First up is my forest canopy which has grown immensely since my last shot of it. I really like how it's going and it's sooooo easy to knit. I've got a few more repeats of the body to go before I hit the border.
Next we have my Marilinda sock. After a day of knitting I finished the heel and it's gorgeous. I apologize for the cruddy pic but Chad took it and it was night...
Then I have two new projects to show off. First up is my sock that I'm knitting for the Sock Stash Elimination Campaign. This months "orders" were to knit a sock that was designed by Mama Monkey, in honor of her passing. Anyone who knits a pair of her socks will be put in a drawing and I've donated some roving for the prize. It's not yet dyed so I can't show you, but I'll be doing that soon and it will be up on that blog.

Anyway, this is the Carolina sock, but I've made a few modifications. It didn't look good in the self striping yarn and the purl rows, so I omitted those and did a knit row in it's place. I also changed the knit-3-together to a slip 2 as if to knit-knit 1- pass 2 slipped stitches over. It's neater, since in the original version, the k3tog was hidden a bit by the purl row. I really like how this one is coming out, it's super easy to knit, so it's good knitting when you can't concentrate much. Sorry the picture came out so dark...not sure what happened there.
Lastly I started another pair of Selbuvotter mittens. I couldn't help myself after I picked up a few more colors of the Baby Ull. This is mitten pair NHM #7, but I'm using the cuff, and probably the thumb of NHM #9. I think it's going well so far and I love the colors. I also got more black and a baby blue to match my coat, well both coats actually. I still have the red and white too. Oh, and what's that plastic thing you ask? Why that my dears is a NeedleKeep. I got two of them in sizes 6 and 7 inches from Marelle on etsy. I love them to pieces. I was always too afraid to take my socks or things on dpn's with me anywhere since they could break. These are made from PVC pipe so they are really sturdy and I don't have to worry anymore! Now I can take things and throw them in my sock bag, and they are good to go. I definitely recommend getting them if you are worried about that like I was. One cap is fixed on there permanently and the other cap is attached to it with elastic, and that's what keeps it on the end. The removable end has a charm on it so you know which one to pull on. You can't see it in my pic, but I have a kitty on the right side. Either way, now I want the other sizes, since I also have dpns that are 5 and 8 inches. So I'll be buying two more of them eventually.

I'm spinning still, some lace from bfl. I'm hoping to get a good amount to use for the Juno Regina shawl/stole on Knitty.com. That's the main stuff right now. So I'm off to go feed the kids lunch now. And me, I'm craving some salad with chicken and shredded cheese...yum!

Some stuff.

2008-02-04T10:02:00.000-08:00

Couldn't think of a better title.

Annnnyway. I haven't posted in a few so thought I should. I haven't been up to a whole awful lot but I have a few things to share.

I went to knitting group on Saturday, and it was the first time in ten days LITERALLY that I got out of the house. I DID manage to remember to bring my camera. But forgot to take any pictures. Sigh. Maybe next time. It was a blast though. I stayed much longer than I planned and there were so many of us this time! Food, knitting, spinning, and fun conversation. The next one is in two weeks and I cannot wait.

While there I finished spinning the second bobbin of the superwash bfl. Then last night I plied it. I think this is by far my favorite skein of yarn I've spun. It's soft and gorgeous and I'm so in love with it. This is also the thickest I've been able to spin! I thought I'd be stuck spinning lace-weight forever. There are 330 something yards and I'm going to make some socks with it.I've been knitting on other stuff. Mostly socks and my forest canopy. No real visible progress so no other knitting pics.

I will leave you with this picture. I saw these at wally world and thought Nick would loooove them. I got them out and said "Here momma got you some bunny ears, put them on!" and he goes "No, I no put on bunny ears." So I got Alexis to put them on. Love the funny face she's making. And you know of course, now he likes them, since SHE had them on. Lol.

Poetry

2008-02-02T21:11:00.000-08:00

I used to be really big on poetry. I read it constantly and wrote it often. I'm hard pressed to find any of my old stuff these days. It must all be packed up somewhere.

Either way, in participation of the Third Annual Silent Poetry Reading, I leave you with this poem. It was my favorite growing up and I used to have it completely memorized.

Daffodils by William Wordsworth

I wander'd lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the Milky Way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of the bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in a sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced, but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed --- and gazed --- but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

I'm on a finishing streak!

2008-01-31T21:12:00.000-08:00

That's right, I've been finishing stuff up like a good little knitter.

First off, I finished spinning the rest of the Electric Sheep fiber, and plied it. When I finished I noticed that something was wrong. I figured that somehow I forgot to reverse directions when plying and needed to ply the other way. Nope. I managed to spin each single in opposite directions. Yeah, so I'm still deciding what to do with it. In the meantime I started spinning some superwash bfl from Pigeonroof. I'd like socks this time around.

I also finished the other sock for the sock club, but yet again I can't show you that. And I finished the thumb to my mitten. So I'm excited about that, and want to start another pair. For now I'm focusing on finishing some other stuff. Like these socks I started:
This is the yarn from the Socks that Rock club. And in the pattern they sent. It's hard to see it I know. It's doing a spirally thing with the colors, and the pattern looks bunched up b/c there is lace in there. I really like it though, it's fun to knit.

Today I got my January shipment for the Funky Carolina fiber club. It's five ounces of south african fine roving in the color Confetti. She wrote that she used 12 different colors for this one! It looks like it will spin up awesome.
My brother's hat dried and I got Chad to model it. I think it came out a good size. Bigger than I thought, at least it covers his ears. My brother has lots of hair though, so we'll see how it works for him.Ok then, that's it for now, it's almost bedtime for some cranky kids...

The finish line is in sight...

2008-01-29T23:24:00.000-08:00

In sight but not quite there yet. I've got so many things I'm close to being done with that it's not funny. One thing I did finish FINALLY is my brother's hat. Here are a few pics...it's still drying so no modeled shot yet. Here is a picture of it in the water soaking. See how the water is blue? That was about ten seconds after I put the hat in there. Trust me it got darker. Regardless, I think it came out ok and my brother will like it, provided it fits. I ran out of yarn and had to make it a bit smaller than I wanted. We'll see when he gets it.
Seeeee, two mittens! What you don't see, is the right one is still missing a thumb. I could have done it today but I put it off in favor of doing other things. Like going through my Selbuvotter book trying to decide which ones to do next. ;) Either way I absolutely adore these and am thrilled with how they came out.
I'm also almost done with my socks for the Keegan Lane Yarns sock club. It's such an easy, fast and addicting pattern. I'm already planning to make more after this pair. I will be glad though to have these done, I want to wear them!

The other thing is I spun most of the second half of my Electric Sheep November fiber. Remember the blue/black/white/gray wool? Yep that one. I'll probably finish it and ply tomorrow. And then pictures! I'm not sure what I'll do with it, maybe sell it in my etsy shop. I'm needing to put something in there! I need to do some stitch markers too...

Well I never did make it to the Knit Group on Sunday. I didn't make it to work either, or on Monday or today. We got so much snow it's not even funny. My boss sure didn't think it was funny but honestly. I live 20 miles out in the middle of cow country. We got like 3 feet of snow, and I have a Scion xb, and a civic hatchback. Our roads didn't get plowed for two days, and only today they finally did the dirt road. The scion actually did ok yesterday and today but honestly Chad's job is more important than mine, in that he makes more, has been there longer, works full time. So I let him take the car. Yep, boss man was NOT happy. There was nothing I could do though. They haven't fired me but he wants to "talk" about it. When I called in for Monday, he's like well can't your husband drop you off on his way in? I told him that Chad doesn't work for another two hours, and then I only work until ten and would have no way home. He didn't think that was an acceptable answer...

Anyway we are due for more snow tonight, and tomorrow night and Thursday. So it's a good thing I don't work again this week or I'd be really pissing them off. Seriously though, this is the first time in 15 years we've gotten this much snow, schools are closed for the first time in 12 years, they are telling people not to go out unless it's an emergency, and I'm a little pissed that they were mad at me for not making it in! Seriously??? In Idaho they ordered people to stay off the roads. Not just a "try to stay in" thing, just DON'T. Anyway I'm a bit steamed up about that. Especially since I called the night before, both times and told them there was a 95% chance I wouldn't make it. They were completely unconcerned! Ok ok I'm done, I'm sure I'll get the chance to "express myself" about it.

Wanna see what I'm talking about though? Here are some snow pictures. This first one is our truck that doesn't run so well and it's parked on the lawn but still, it shows how much we got!Some neat tree pictures. The snow really weighs on them, we had some break already.
And this is looking down the driveway. Well one of the two driveways. We don't use this one as much in the winter since it's going down a hill and then you have to go back up a hill on the road. Our other one cuts straight through the edge of our property through to the road and is better in the winter.So yep, the last three days have been kinda nice in that I've just mostly sat around knitting and spinning and cuddling/playing/herding the kids. Makes me wish sometimes that I lived back in the day, simpler times. Perhaps not easier, but I think it would be less stressful. I'm one of those women who like being at home with the kids, and wish I never had to get a job. Sure I need to get out of the house. I just think that the more advanced society gets, the more complicated life is. I could deal with just staying home and cooking, sewing, knitting, cleaning. I could deal with the cleaning if I didn't have to worry about school and work and such...

Well I can dream right?

Warning! Rockin Sock Club Spoiler

2008-01-26T15:49:00.000-08:00

Yes that's right, my package came today! Chad was a bit bored waiting on a friend to go up to the mountain snowboarding, so he decided to go to the post office. They are only open until 10am on Saturdays so most of the time we don't bother. Well he got home and tried to pretend it wasn't my package! But then he gave me a sideways look and grinned so I knew it was. I remember squealing and running over to rip it open. I love love love it! Here are pics of the yarn and pattern. The pattern is hard to see, it has a lace pattern to it.

The yarn is called Dragon Dance and is a pretty combination of red, rust, and an orangy peach color. I love it and the name is awesome. I am not thrilled with the pattern but it does show off the yarn nicely which is what I'd want to do anyway. So I will knit the pattern with this yarn anyway.I have found that whenever I have to do something in a certain amount of time, that even if it's something I want to do, I will often put it off. I had a bit of a personal deadline for myself. To try and finish my second selbu spider mitt. Well yesterday I procrastinated all day and didn't finish the thumb of the first one until late last night. Then today I decided I would knit other things...like my forest canopy and my brother's hat. It's not a huge deal but I was like...what the heck???

Anyway the forest canopy makes for fast easy knitting while herding the children, and I really owe my brother this hat. It's almost done though finally! I sucked it up and have been doing it for the last week. Today I found myself finally at 4.5 inches, and realized that that's where I started the decreases on the one I did for my brother-in-law. So I happily found the stitch markers to mark the decreases, and started in! I have barely put it down. The hat as is would fit me now, but I have a small head, so it needs a bit more length. I remember I changed the decreases on the first one as well. I am using this pattern and while I like it, when I knit the first one, it came out kinda pointy at the top by decreasing that long. So I'm trying to decide how to do this one. No matter, it will be done soon and he's excited to get it.I have to wash it tonight so it will dry in time to go out on Monday. Why you ask, must I wash it? This is why:Ok so it's hard to see, but there are blue stained lines around my finger where I wrap the yarn. Yes the dye is coming out a bit. That and the needles are now stained. Sigh...
Today it is snowing and has been for hours now. Ok this picture sucks too, but it's the best I could get. The snow is making it blurry. We've had really cold days here the last week, but sunny. So now we get more snow. At least Chad is happy because it means better snow and mountain conditions for snowboarding...
Well my dears, that is all for today. I'm going to go finish that darn hat and then at least start my second mitt. I'll be taking it with me to the next knit group which is tomorrow. Let's see if I can remember my camera this time! We are meeting at Borders at 10-10:30ish which is great since I work right next to Borders and finish work at 10! Woohoo!

Waiting, and waiting...

2008-01-25T15:28:00.000-08:00

For my sock club package! I know lots of people have gotten theirs so I was hoping today would be the day. No such luck. I did get a few other fun things though.

First off is a pair of Serendipity needles that I won from last month's contest over at the Sock Stash Elimination Campaign. They are super cute, and the paint is sparkly!
Then I got my January Electric Sheep fiber club shipment. It's 4 ounces of bfl in the color London Fog. I love this one, it's super soft and fluffy and should be nice to spin.Lastly I got some yarn I traded for on Ravelry. Two skeins of Cherry Tree Hill. One in Enchantment and one in Jelly Bean Jumble. I know yes, I already have the Enchantment, but it's for the Charlotte's Web Shawl and I just loved this color so much. I hunted down someone else who had it and begged. She also let me have the Jelly Bean one which I really like too. It's fun and bright and I can't wait to see what it's like knit.I finished the hand of my mitten last night so here's a pic. I have to do the thumb and then hurry and start the second one! I only have until tomorrow to finish these if I want to wear them Sunday. Can I do it??? Yes I can!!! Well, hopefully. ;)Just to let everyone know, I'm feeling tons better today and less mopey than yesterday lol. The sunshine and some new intentions/resolutions/plans/goals/ideas have given me a boost. Now I'm off to do some laundry (gag) and knit (yay!).

More mitts!

2008-01-24T14:27:00.000-08:00

Ok so now I'm just a little bit obsessed. I was good and finished the thumb on the little mitten. It barely fits either one of my kids. That's what I get for dropping half a size on the needles. SO now I'll have to make another pair, but I really don't mind. This is so fun! Either way, here in eastern Washington it has been Freezing. So I decided that I'm going to have mittens first, since I'm the one getting up at 4am to get ready and go to work, while they all get to sleep nice and warm in their beds. The kids really don't go out much, and they wear their snow gloves when they play out. So. ME FIRST lol. Here are a few cruddy pics. The flash makes the pink look white so the first pic I took without flash.I'm really liking these so far. They fit perfectly around my wrist, but are a tad tight on the hands. I think that is my fault. I will try blocking/steaming/whatever and see if I can loosen them up a bit. I'm sure they will be fine. I've got another half a star pattern done past that, and am loving it so much.

I'm already trying to decide which design to make with my red and white. Perhaps those ones with the gauntlets? And if I have enough, I'm going to make Alexis some white and pink. And maybe Nick's will be the red and black. Unless I get more yarn before that. I don't know how much I'll have left, but I think it will be enough for their sizes. They sure don't use much. The first mitten only weighs 12 grams total, and I know from weighing the light green before hand that I used 6 grams of it. So the other six is the CTH. I know it will be a bit more in a bigger size, but seriously. That's nothin.

So I've caught the fair isle Norwegian mitten bug, and I seem to be doing ok with it. It's really not so bad. Now if I could only get past my intarsia fear...

I heard that the first shipment for the STR sock club is mailed, and should be here, by Monday I think. They mail Priority. So that's on the way. My January Electric Sheep club fiber is on the way. And I have my Funky Carolina shipment for this month also to look forward to. Very exciting things. Not to mention that I'm also in Melissa's sock club. Which is for March-May. Think I'm in over my head yet? And there are only five spots left on the KLY club. JOIN. I've only seen my yarn and the socks I've designed. But, I loved the yarn and of course I love my socks, and so did the test knitters. Melissa has some fun things planned for the shipments. So go get a spot before they are gone.

I haven't done any dyeing lately. I'm having a tough time even finding knitting time. I've been kinda worn out and I get that seasonal depression so some days are a challenge. I forget a lot, and that can be bad when it comes to school and bills...

Anyway the point is, I really want to stock the etsy shop and have had NO time to do it. Or if I've had time I've spent it knitting or something lazy. I need some motivation and I have none right now. I had to start something new, which is why I dove into these gloves, because I wasn't even wanting to knit. It comes and goes in phases.

Ok well enough with the complaining. Basically I just need a few days I think to get back on track, which is good since I've got today and the next two days off from work. So hopefully I can get things fixed and up to date, and get things in order. (And knit mittens. Think I can finish mine by Sunday??? That's when I work again in the cold.)

So now I'm off to play a little catch up on school and then knit.

(P.S. I happened upon this book {while finding stuff for school I swear} and it's seriously cute. Here's the link: Dainty Undies. I think the little nighties and stuff are adorable.)

Sneak peek...

2008-01-21T22:56:00.000-08:00

I'm off to bed but so proud I had to show off. I couldn't resist trying out a selbuvotter pattern and thought I'd start small (as in toddler sized). This is the first mitt, minus the thumb, which I completed in a lazy afternoon (due to a stiff neck, literally, I could not move or turn it...). Isn't it cute!? (First pic is closest to actual color.)More on the mitt tomorrow!

Temps are dropping

2008-01-20T22:30:00.000-08:00

The weather as of late has been unforgiving icy winds, and colder days than I think we've had in years. At least that's how they feel. Here are a few pics I took today. It snowed last night, not a lot but enough. It is mostly powder but combined with the wind, it made for nastiness.

This is one I took on the way home. The mountains in the distance are pretty.
This is our driveway. See the drifts? At the end there they got so deep I almost got stuck.
Dinner last night didn't go as planned. The place that was holding a table for us gave it away because we were five minutes late. Apparently you have only up to the time given to get there and not a minute later. It took a long while to get a seat anywhere else. There were only 7 of us total but that's enough to be a hassle apparently.

Here is a crappy pic, best I could get. Heather and Mikel are the two in the middle. He seems like a good guy, although I'm still not happy he's stealing her away.I got them presents but forgot to get pictures. For her daughter I got a doll, a really cute one. And for them I got a personalized picture frame with their names and wedding day on it. She was too busy crying and stuff to open them when I left, but I'm sure that she loved it.

I went to two yarn shops yesterday since I had time. One I only went to for the Dale of Norway baby Ull. They sell it cheap enough that I sucked it up and went. I actually got some help this time, and the lady I don't think I've seen there before was really nice. Anyway I got four colors to do two pairs of the Selbuvotter mitts. I'm still not sure what combinations I want but I'm thinking red and white, and black and pink. We'll see.
Then I went up to the other shop to scope out yarn for sweaters. I didn't like the yarn I had picked out online, and realized I wasn't sure at all what I wanted. Soooo I got sock yarn instead. Here we have two skeins of Socks that Rock. One mediumweight and one heavyweight. The first is the med, and it's Love in Idleness. So pretty. I might make some of those mermaid mitts with it, that use the same stitch pattern as pomatomus. Not sure.The heavyweight I adore, especially the base, it's so nice. This is Chapman Springs. I bought it for a certain pattern but who knows. I just like to pet it...
Ok well really I need to get to bed. It's late and I'm up super early as usual. Hopefully I'll make it out of the driveway...

New Knitting

2008-01-19T10:58:00.001-08:00

So that yarn I finished, well the second it was remotely close to dry enough, I wound it up and cast on. Here's the start of my Forest Canopy shawl. I am of course farther now. I like the striping effect that seems to happen with handspun. It's very cool. It's also a very fast knit on size 8 needles!See the leaves?
I got some roving in the mail yesterday that I ordered from the last Pigeonroof update. It's GORGEOUS. I want to spin them now lol. They are both more S. African fine wool. After spinning the cornucopia, it grew on me and the softness is great.

This one is 4 ounces in the color Jester. Love this one so much.
And this one is 3.7 ounces in Hydrangea. Seriously pretty.
I also got some yarn I traded for. It's louet gems sportweight and I have two hanks in this size, of 225 yards each. Then there are two cones of around 500 yards each. So plenty to make a top or two with. I'm still thinking about it.
Well that's all I've got for now. I have things to do today. My one good friend in the area is moving far away and we are going to have dinner later. I still have a gift to get her and something for her daughter, and I had plans to go to a yarn store. So we'll see what I get done, but now I need to go feed the kids and make some tea. I woke up with a sore throat and I'm hoping that I'm not going to get sick.

Future knitter?

2008-01-16T16:43:00.000-08:00

Isn't this a sight? I thought it was super cute so I grabbed the camera. She's been watching!All tangled in the yarn...
My brother's hat I've been working on. It's not as bright as it looks. Apparently he's been complaining about the knit stuff I've sent my sister, and wants the hat already lol. I need to get to 5 inches before I can start the decreases, and it's taking f o r e v e r. Seriously. I'm at almost 4 here.Nothing else going on, just anxiously awaiting to hear if I got a loopy sock club spot although it looks as if we won't know until tomorrow. Until then!

A day full of fun!

2008-01-15T17:11:00.000-08:00

Wow do I feel like I got a lot done today. It wasn't really much but it was enough to make it feel productive. First though, here's a picture of the Lace Mitt that I had finished but didn't get a picture of it with the hems sewn down and the ends woven in. I really like this one!When I got home I grabbed my Retro Rib sock and started working on it. I got up to the toe where you start to decrease last night. So it wasn't long before I finished that up! Here they are! I haven't taken them off since I finished them...oh...4 hours ago lol.
Here's a little shot of my toes!!! Also worth mentioning is the fact that I still have over half a ball left of this yarn. I can get a whole nother pair of socks out of it!
After that I fed the kids and got them in bed for naps and stuff, and set out to work on plying my two bobbins of singles. After an hour, maybe an hour and a half, I finished plying it and wound it off the bobbin. The result was a perfectly balanced skein of about 467 yards. Isn't it pretty???
It's more orange than the pictures are showing but that's ok. I am happy with how it turned out. I'm also glad that it's a little bit thicker than the last roving I spun. I'm getting better! Here's a little closeup, a bit washed out from the lighting, but I like it.
I've decided to knit the Forest Canopy with this. I ripped the seasilk version I was doing after I decided I didn't like it so much after all. I can't wait to knit with it!

Next up will be the Green Ocean superwash bfl, because I love to spin bfl and want superwash for socks. So that's my goal. Then after that I'm going to spin two of my pink rovings up for the Juno Regina stole/shawl on knitty. I think it will be great!

So lots of spinning in my future I think. And knitting too. I have to finish up a pair of mitts seriously, my hands are so cold in the mornings, and I lost the other pair I had...
And my brother would like his hat sometime this winter...
AND now that the Retro Rib socks are done I can cast on for the second Twisted Flower sock!

The last thing I did today was add those nifty Ravelry progress bars that you can see there on the left. Cool huh? I love the little picture of the project and I was able to get them working pretty easy. Thanks to some code from Casey (the Ravelry code monkey as he's affectionately called) and Rachel's help that is.

Ok well I think that's plenty for today. I will update more later when I've got something to report!

If you go out in the woods today...

2008-01-13T15:44:00.000-08:00

So today I had a huge project ahead of me. That is, after I got home from work. I had to be there at 5am today since our quarterly meeting was this morning. Meaning I had to be there earlier and finish earlier. Yep so after that I came home and slept about an hour on the couch until lunch. Then after lunch I started moving things around. I had previously been keeping my computer on this table. Yep, seriously. See the left side where that light is shining. That's where it was. That pile,...yarn. Ok so under it there is a basket and ahem, my printer...but still.
Now I am by no means and organized person but even that was bad for me. It makes it impossible to find anything or think straight. Anyway, we moved my desk from the bedroom, to another corner of the above room and here is where my computer sits now.Much better right? I think so too. I am slowly migrating important things onto this desk and clearing the table over there which will have a new home as well. I love moving furniture...

In other news I finally got pictures of the kids with the little bear hats my secret pal sent for them. They didn't keep them on long so this is the best I could do. I love the little curls sneaking out from Alexis' hat here.
And Nick with his and a balloon I gave him to occupy for a bit last night.
And in knitting news, well spinning anyway...I finished that first bobbin of the Cornucopia, and besides that I'm halfway through the second. If I wasn't cleaning today I could probably finish that one too. I will take another break later to spin a little, but right now when I'm in the mood it's better to keep cleaning.
Aren't the colors pretty? This is more accurate than the other pictures I've posted. I really like it. The S. African fine is growing on me the more I spin it. That and I bought two more from Pigeonroof's etsy shop yesterday when she updated. And they are GORGEOUS. Seriously. I can't wait to get them. I know I know like I need more. I'm getting faster at spinning though, so hopefully I'll be using it up faster. Purchase justified right?

I'm glad everyone liked the pictures I posted of our deer. I wasn't actually that close to them. I was in the upstairs pantry window and zoomed in. There are quite a few of them though that are really friendly. We had a young doe last year who would eat out of our hands. Several follow my MIL around the yard. Like 2 feet behind her the whole time. It's fun, they are pretty to watch. I'll try and get fawn pictures in the spring. It's just the psychotic suicidal ones you gotta watch for when you're driving...

Ok well I think that's a good bit of an update for now. I'm busy lately with working early, and now school. I'm really trying to get back into good habits with that. Hopefully the fact that I've dropped to part time will help. So I'll be back when I can!

Bambi and friends...

2008-01-09T22:03:00.000-08:00

Ok not Bambi but more deer pictures. They were so cute today I couldn't resist. These two are likely siblings. The little one was born this year and the other last year. Often the momma is not far behind, I didn't see her there but I'm sure she was around.Here is what I have spun up from the Cornucopia roving so far. It's gorgeous and fairly nice to spin. It's really soft. I don't know if I like it so much as the bfl, but it's smoother. Then again I like the crimp the bfl often has.
Obviously the colors are a bit off. When I get a full bobbin I'll take pictures during the day to show off the real tones.
I've gotten pretty far on my Marilinda socks. I am to the heel finally! Here's a picture of the length. These are longer than I would normally knit a leg, but I think it's fine.
And here is another picture. I stretched the sock over the foot of my sock blocker to show off the pattern. Isn't it pretty??? I like it so far.Lastly here is a picture of my princess mitt in progress. It's Bernat Cashmere natural blends, which I picked up at Michaels when I got the yarn for my MIL's princess mitts. It matched my coat, so I figured, why not? I really love this pattern though, I think I'll make another pair after this too. This is at the end of the thumb gusset, where I'm about to put those stitches on waste yarn. It's such a fast knit. I can't wait to finish.Well those are my pictures for today. I'm off to bed, I've got work early.

Snow, snow, and oh yea, more snow!

2008-01-08T17:16:00.000-08:00

So, it's been snowing pretty much non-stop here. Crazy amounts. This is the first year in the last 3 or so that I can recall where we've had so much snow. The last few have had snow, but it's the kind that didn't last, like melting the next day. Not this year. I will take a picture of it tomorrow, so you can see exactly how much we've been getting. I did get a picture of one of our does outside though. I attempted to coax her closer to the house (and the lights) with a cookie, but nothin doin. So here's the crappy pic I got. Isn't she cute?Anyway, I worked early again this morning, and got out early as well. Then I headed up to the post office to mail a few things I sold destashing on Ravelry. We haven't gone to get the mail since last week I don't think. The snow makes it a much less desireable drive. I had a few surprises though, that I have been waiting on. I was bad about a week ago when I was going through one of my more depressed moments and I caved. I bought some gorgeous Pigeonroof roving. This first one is super soft, I'm very excited to spin it up. It's called Cornucopia and it's south african fine wool. It's soft like the bfl but seems less fuzzy in a way. It's also darker than this picture. It's got more red and pink in it than anything else. (Here's a link to the shop picture, it's more accurate.)This one is called Green Ocean and is superwash bfl. I would love to know where to get more of that! I don't think you can get better than bfl and then having it be washable as well.
I got one other thing in the mail today. Besides bills and crap that is...
Yep, my selbuvotter book came! I am so excited by it. I've already read most of the intro stuff which is a bit of very interesting history. I just really can't wait to knit something from it too. I took a few pictures of my faves at first glance. Instead of linking to Ravelry so that everyone can see it. I love this one with the longer gauntlet at the wrist. Nothing worse than gloves being too short!Then these mittens which I just love. The pattern is so consistent from the thumb and fingers and the wrist all a variation of the same pattern.
This one I like because it's simple, and this one is probably the one I'll knit first to get my feet wet.
And this one is so unique. I like the patterning that runs up the two sides and up on the fingers. Really cool!
So that's what I got today and it made my day. I've been working so much I've not had time to knit or spin or anything. So I'm excited by these. I'm thinking that with tomorrow off, I'm going to start spinning up that Cornucopia roving. It's just so gorgeous. I know I was spinning the merino tencel lace, but I'm just not in the mood to spin lace. I don't have the patience right now. I didn't have hardly any of it spun anyway. So I'm just gonna put that away and do something simpler. I've got enough to do now.

School opened up yesterday. I was worried b/c I hadn't gotten a welcome email and then they called saying there was an urgent matter to discuss. I tried to access my class and it wouldn't open. So I called today and apparently class only opened up yesterday and I hadn't confirmed my schedule. Which is why I couldn't get into it. So I've only got one class to worry about right now, and I know that it's going to suck having to take fewer classes because it's going to make it a good bit longer until I graduate. But honestly I know I can't handle it all right now if I'm still doing full time school. So I'm sucking it up and just doing it anyway. If I get into a groove so to speak, I can go back to full time. It's better than quitting completely, or staying full time and failing classes like I have been. So overall I feel good about it.

Today when I got home I started another pair of mitts. Remember the ones I made my MIL, in this post? Yeah, so I really wanted some but those were a bit big on me. I had to get size 5 dpns and I picked those up when I got my STR the other day. So I could finally knit them. But I couldn't start until today. I am not sure about the yarn, it's Bernat Cashmere in an icy blue, and really soft, an acrylic/cashmere/nylon blend. It seems to be knitting ok. Hopefully they will be warm enough. So that's really it. I'm almost to the heel on my Marilinda and almost to the decreases on my brother's hat. So I'm slowly making progress on things. It's a good feeling. I'd like to get the hat done especially, so he can wear it before winter is over!!!

Ok well I've rambled long enough. I think I'll go for now and will update tomorrow with more pictures!