For discussion...

I have no pictures, no knitting, no nothing for you as I only seem to be able to sit on my couch and stare off into space these days. Oh and the 10 bloody pages on the passé composé I did last night - trust the french to turn something as simple as talking about an event in the past into a nightmare of exceptions and pronomial pronouns (which you can take and stick where the sun don't...well never mind)...

So I leave with a discussion topic...

Why do I never have enough needles? It seems to me that I need a series for projects on hand, but a whole other set just for playing and swatching and dreaming for the future.

Some please tell me that I am not the only one contributing to buying Kelly Petkun at KnitPicks a huge yacht?

Finally I leave with this: Courtesy of sadly blogless Yvonne here is a great video for a short row heel and a new term to push into the consciousness of all- a fibrenique - anything that combines a technique and fibre.

BTW for the spinning folks - if you link to the video above, the poster also has several videos of the wrap and plying technique that was on the Spin-Off cover a couple of issues ago. Very cool!

Misbehaving...camera (tilt head 90 degrees)

Hey all - long time no write! Summer sucked me in and spit me back out again - I can't believe September is already here - packing lunches and homework again. Neither of these two activities rates high on my list of favourties due to the amount of knitting time lost during a year!

The boy has entered Grade 4, and the girl Grade 6 (eek! that is kind of officially pre-teen country isn't it?). Two days in and neither is particularly impressed with the experience.

What I'm knitting

On the knitting front there has been progress. The Swallowtail Shawl in my handspun is done and I couldn't be more pleased. The colour changes are gorgeous and the repeats were long enough that I got several rows out of each colour even towards the long end of the knitting.






Pattern: Evelyn Clark's Swallowtail Shawl from Interweave Knits, Fall 2006
Yarn: Handspun from 100g of Blue Faced Leicester from Fleece Artist
Needles: KP Options in 3.5 mm

I am still plugging away on the Print O the Wave from Eunny Jang in Handmaiden Sea Silk...no sideways pics of this though. I am more than halfway through the repeats on the main body and will have to contemplate the border - somehow I am NOT keen on picking up 8 gazillion stitches around the edge.

Lastly - I am making some progress on my Susie Hoodie from More Big Girl Knits...granted that it doesn't look like much but the Berroco Ultra Alpaca is terrific to knit...

Colour is darker and more heathery than it looks here...love love love...cross fingers it will fit.

In my mailbox

I participated in the Hush Hush Handspun Hootenany this summer and received this awesome package from my downstream pal...whose email I am looking for right now - I will credit with an actual name and link but my brain has big holes in it!

Anyway - here is the package of goodness:

That's a huge 8oz bit of spinning fiber from Crown Mountain Farms - the blue yarn on the left is my pal's own handspun - pretty pretty blues and greens and very very soft. The sock yarn on the right is her own handdyed (damn I wish I had a link for you to her etsy shop...next time!). There were also two bars of soap (lavender and almond - yum!!!), some lindt chocolates (not shown...um possibly devoured at this point) and a cute little notepad that says "Homespun" on the top.

My own upstream pal was in England, moving to Australia next week so my fingers are crossed she'll get her parcel in time!

Spinning...span...spun!

More Fleece Artist - this is wool-silk in lovely browns, copper and burgundy/pink. I am spinnign thin again and now that I figured out what was going wrong the last time I tried to ply with thread, I'm going to try again.

Dye party

I spent Sunday dyeing my little heart out. A pound and a half of silk and a pound of merino-tencel blend. I am hoping to update the shop in the next few days and then I will be going on hiatus for about three months as I start French language training half days in the hopes of meeting the language requirements for my new position before Christmas. I suspect that blog updates will also be scarce and while I'll be reading other blogs I probably won't be commenting much (not a big change from the summer!) I am hoping to show you the Rambouillet that Chris and I are processing and to confess I had little stumble and am the proud owner of two unbelieveably gorgeous BFL fleeces that need to get cleaned and put away while the weather is still nice.

Here's a little taste of what I dyed up...




These are 3 of the merino-tencel rovings...shininess due to the flash on the first two.

Take care!

Low fibre content...pretty pictures!

I am...well...ridiculously wrecked. See the date? That is the day I uploaded the photos to blogger...as opposed to TODAY which is the 18th of August.

The new job is kicking me in the rear. I can't explain why. It isn't far off what I was doing before...just...more.

Anyway - here is the loveliest of merino I received as part of a fibre swap. This is from woolydaisy. Isn't it pretty! The top on top (heh heh...aren't I the funny one) is garnet and the bottom is topaz (coincidentally my birthstone) - I' m having stripped mitten thoughts...

Thanks woolydaisy!!!



Next...tranquil Canadian summer pictures....

Sigh...I just wanna go back. There was chipmunk (named Chippie...what else!) that would eat from your hand if you were still enough. There was knitting and spinning on the screened in porch. And best of all? There was a guest cabin where the kids hung out. Kind of like the kids table at family dinners but EVEN BETTER.

At some point the knitting/spinning adventures will get updated included, but not limited to:

- a finished Swallowtail shawl out of handspun

- self-striping yarn in four colours - hand dyed and handspun

- the fleece I bought with Chriss - I have learned that when it comes to processing your own fleece, clean is a relative term.

Happyish Monday!

Holidays...dealing with irritating wool...and I'm being stalked!

Quick note before I get into the post: Leanne is out of hospital! She and her gallbladder are officially "over". She is definitely on the mend and happy to be back home. Thanks again for leaving her comments on her blog.

*******

Happy Monday everyone! Why is it happy? Why because I just started my holidays of course. Today I am "sans enfants" (without children) - so I am enjoying a lovely day of sweet sweet quiet and little to bother me...except for my stalker and the construction workers on my roof.

It appears that a local honey bee hive have decided that there might be some good stuff at my house. Here is my theory:

1. At some point last week, a bee (let's call him Bob) came to my house and thought he found something he liked.

2. Bob went back to his hive and told his friends about it (note bee using vector calculus to indicate where I live).

3. I am put on some kind of list where fly-bys become part of regular daily routine.

Every day for the past week I have had at least one bee check out my balcony every fifteen minutes or so. They hover around the balcony, check out the gazebo cover and if the patio door is open, they fly in to check it out. I have used the cup and cardboard technique to facilitate the exit a few times now. I'm trying to figure out how to tag one of these suckers to see if its always the same one (i.e. Bob - which, if it is, means that Bob might need some intervention therapy of some kind - or I need a bee restraining order).

At least its honey bees - a few years ago I had a wasps nest in the box that hangs over my balcony - there is a whole story about a really cute, super muscly exterminator who was also, it turns out, afraid of bees. Kind of emasculating if you ask me.

Stuff I'm up to

Tour de Fleece is on and while I haven't been spinning as much as I would like, I did do something really cool - I almost got all lace!!! This ranges from cobweb in spots to lace to light fingering. I've already cast it on as a Swallowtail Shawl - and I can only say it was probably meant to be because I opted for 3.5 mm needles and it was perfect first try!

The roving is BFL from Fleece Artist that I don't have a picture of - blues, purples and greens. Its overspun in spots, underspun in other and you know what? I don't care! I just love it.

I picked up another Fleece Artist roving at Yarn Forward last week - very oddly dyed - there was red and red-violet, lots of white, patches of blue and pink. When I undid the braids there was no actual pattern to the dyeing which left me in a bit of a pickle about how to spin it up. At first I thought about lashing it all on the hackles but I kind of want a slubby but substantial sock yarn and though I like playing with the hackles, you lose a lot of fibre in the process (the stuff stuck to the hackles after you pull off the top is too short to use).

So I pulled each bit of colour out and ended up with four piles - dark red, light red, violet, and white mixed with blue/pink/yellow/green. I ended up with this:

So I've been taking one of each colour and drafting it out just like this:

Ending up with would bits of pre-drafted top like this:

Which is spinning up like this:

Once I fill the bobbin I will navajo ply it which will hopefully even it all out into predominately shades of red and red-violet with hints of white and specks of the other colours. I promise pics when it is all done.

What I'm knitting

Besides the Swallowtail, there are some socks on the needles I can't show you as this is Christmas knitting although the ravelers can check them out on my projects page - the recipients aren't knitters. Otherwise, a few things are hanging out waiting for me to be interested in them again, and that's about it.

What I Read

...or rather what I threw down in disgust: One Ball. Thankfully I got this from the library and didn't buy it sight unseen ... oh Mr. Bee is back ... My pet peeves were all in this book - sparkly yarn, icky colours and stuff I would never knit. YMMV of course - someone liked it or it wouldn't be a book right? There was a nice enough moebius (but moebius patterns are kind of a dime a dozen) and an okay shrug. That about sums it up. Not a fan. I encourage you to check it out as I wouldn't want to keep you from knitting something that you really might like. I do think the photos left something to be desired. About halfway through they adopt this kind of creepy wire dress form that makes me think about cobwebby attics and serial killers.

Damn bee still outside. I would like to go and rescue some roving from out there but he needs to leave!

The irony is that I don't have any plants in my house, a basil plant with a few flowers out on the balcony (which he doesn't seem interested in at all).

Wierd.

Buzz.

A poem...

I gave it a try

To Navajo ply

Yeah, all right, I'm no poet. I can navajo ply however! At least NOW I can.

At first I got off to a rough start. This was not due to the singles I was plying which was lovely copper coloured superwash merino. It was not due to the teaching at all. It was due to my not being able to set up my wheel properly and so I tried to ply about 50 feet in the same direction that my singles was spun in...which meant I got crap.

Which of course I took a picture of because I wouldn't want to miss an opportunity to humiliate myself...

Once the wheel and I started to get along a bit better (mostly because I stopped being a dumbass and it forgave me) I got a reasonable facsimile of a skein and the beginnings of an idea of how to do this. Here it is...

And last of all - the afternoon was spent in a group silk scarf dyeing activity where the entire group (about 80 or so) split into different groups to try different techniques. Chriss and I ended up in the pole wrapping (no, not dancing...) group.

Basically you wind string around your scarf on a piece of PVC pipe with string, push it up tight and then stick it in dye for a bit.

Chriss' ended up better than mine (yes, I have pole wrapping technique regret) but I don't have a picture so mine will have to do...

Purple isn't really my colour and this design feels "old" to me - I was thinking of overdyeing it - ideas are welcome! Just remember that the colour will interact with the purple.

All in all it was a fun day but I am still tired out! I spent the afternoon back with my hands in the dyepot. I also culled some sock yarn that I dyed in the winter and posted it to the shop. I picked up some absolutely amazing mohair from Diane the spinning teacher that is what is left of her own angora goats - about 1600 meters worth so I'll have to figure out what to do with it - its to much for one project but not quite enough for two.

I hope everyone had a great weekend!

Mail!...what I spun...Q&A

Hi everyone - I have so much in my head I can't possibly get it all down in one post or a) I'll be here forever and b) it will make no sense.

So I'm going to curb my enthusiasm a bit and focus on one thing at a time.

The stuff that's hit my mailbox this week!

As stuff has sold in the shop, it has given me a bit of virtual cash (seriously - with PayPal it doesn't seem like real money at all) to play with and I wanted to find some interesting Canadian sellers on etsy to support.

I got super lucky when Uli hearted me on etsy (I love that...hearted...and the little hearts pulse too!) cause she has some super cool stuff in her shop. I held out in the resistance department until I got to these and then I was hitting "add to cart" and the rest is history. There have been two great side effects of this - I got a terrific sock pattern and a new friend in the process!

I am also coveting this: http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=10876026

I was also after some removeable stitch markers and stumbled onto Crimson Orchid and bought these (I might have a thing for silver and blue).

I also heavily covet the shawl pins in Chris' shop - I have some gorgeous stitch markers by her that Jeanne sent me that are so pretty that if I use them I tend to pause a bit every time I have to slip one from one needle to the next.

And last, but certainly not least...I've got cool labels! One of my older, bestest (see, moi in Vancouver - I didn't say oldest!) friends - who may be familiar to all as wanna-baa in the comments - is my friend Jenna and I wouldn't out her on the blog if I didn't have a fabulous reason. I got these awesome iron-in labels in the mail today - I kind of knew they were coming when I got an email that said "If I was going to buy you labels, what would they say? Not that I'm going to do that or anything!" Anyway - this fantastic "surprise" showed up in the mailbox this afternoon:

Jenna is selling labels for a company called Lovable Labels - if you have kids or know of someone with kids, there is way more there than iron-ons. I am particularly intrigued by shoe labels that don't wear out inside of kids' shoes. With summer camp season nearly here and school starting again (I know, someone had to say it) in two months, these would be terrific for everything from the child's forehead (okay, maybe just mine) to sippy cups at daycare and so much more.

Check it all out at http://www.jenna.lovablelabels.ca/

So its been a great week for my mailbox. I am expecting new dyes next week (navy!) and a huge fiber shipment from the U.S. which means a shop update will be forthcoming too.

And just so you don't think I've been sitting around waiting for the postal worker...

What I spun

Back in the winter I spent an afternoon at Chriss' house and between the hours of conversation I made up about 6 batts with my pile of dye experiments on her drum carder...I finally had a chance to spin up some of the red yesterday. This is merino - bright red with flecks of purple. I didn't realize how much of a difference there is spinning from a batt vs a roving. With the batt there was more friction in the fiber and I was able to control out the amount being drafted and managed a pretty effective bulky weight - there's 1.8 ozs and about 72 yards in there.

Next up was some tussah silk I received as part of the Funky Carolina fiber club last year. I hadn't spun pure silk in a long long time - like two years and then it was only small amounts. I predrafted the top and man, was it static-y! And me without a water bottle. Not annoying-to-the-point-of-not-being-able-to-spin but definitely a bit more difficult to control. It is absolutely gorgeous. There's two ounces there - probably a fingering weight or light sport weight. I need to run it through the meter to get the right count at some point...but for now I am just petting it and calling it George. Not really, but you get the point.

And speaking of Funky Carolina roving - I just undid a braid from her that I got last year too (merino bamboo - awesome!) and it isn't braided! Its a crochet chain! I have got to try that!!!

Answering Qs

moi in vancouver asked if I was going to have yarn too...I actually just posted two handpainted soysilk laceweights and my plan is to offer handspun and handdyed yarns when I have them. I have some fingering weight yarn I have never knit myself that I will probably post when I have a chance to photograph them and figure out my pricing.

Take care and have a great weekend! Tomorrow, Chriss and I and the Hilltop Fibreworker are heading off to Almonte for Saint Distaff Day where I am hoping to learn to navaho ply.

There and back again; up to my ears in wool

The news

So the "dude" and I headed off into the wild blue yonder - ambled down the highway at a leisurely pace of 15 km per hour above the speed limit - to the Big City. Actually we hit surburbia and went to Whitby - about 50-odd (give or take 25 km depending on which part of the city you measure from) kilometres from Toronto.

All I can say is a) thank god for air conditioning and b) theme parks and 40+ degrees humidex don't mix. We lasted at Wonderland a whole 3 1/2 hours before calling it quits and heading back to Wanna-baa's house for a nap, dinner and ice cream.

More stuff I can say...10 month olds? CUTE! Ava checked out Alex thoroughly our first morning:

We also found that the absolutely best place to be on a hot day is a little tiny beach in Port Hope on Lake Ontario where it was about 10 degrees cooler than anywhere else. And the fish and chips totally rocked. No pictures as I was too busy pushing the swing and watching sandcastle making.

The reason for the trip to Port Hope was to go to The Black Lamb and pick up some fibre as I am preparing a bunch of stuff for St. Distaff's Day. Laurie had closed the shop for the day to hawk (hauk?) her wares at the Ontario Handspinning Seminar (next year, please remind me to go to this okay?). She was there on Sunday when I drove back through on my way home and was happy to accept my credit card in exchange for a whack-load of BFL and some Shetland.

This year, St. Distaff is on June 21st and if you have never heard of St. Distaff don't be surprised...she (I think its a she) is the made up saint of spinners and weavers. Every year one of the local guilds hosts a day of spinning, weaving and fibre arts workshops along with a small vendor show. Chriss of Daisy Chains and Buttercups is going to have a table this year and I'm going to put some stuff there to see if anyone wants to help me lighten up my shelves at home. Turns out I have a LOT of fibre.

So...I have been dyeing my heart out over the last two weeks!

Stuff I dyed

So today you get a quick review about dyeing roving. In the last two weeks, I've dyed a whole lot of Blue Faced Leicester (BFL), Corriedale, Merino and Merino/Tencel blend. My favourite is BFL with the Merino Tencel a close second.

As much as I love the soft merino it is hard to handle when dyeing. The fibre is so fine it tends to drift apart and requires careful handling to keep the integrity of the roving intact (now there's a sentence I never thought I would type...integrity of roving...). The worst moment is when I go to pull the bump out of the soaking bowl while trying to avoid the others and keep the merino all in one piece. I seem to finally have my technique down, but I've also learned to lower my standards a bit about how perfect the roving will be when I am done with it.

The other thing about merino is that it seems to resist taking up the dye. If anyone wants to jump in with an explanation about how my technique may be faulty please do so, but it seems like the same concentration of dye yields a much more saturated colour on the same amount of BFL as merino. It seems as thought the merino sucks up the dye so quickly it doesn't have time to spread through the fibre.

The merino/tencel mix seems to solve some of the problems with the merino including the "drifty-ness" - not to mention that the shine on it makes my heart beat a little faster.

Finally Corriedale. Alas, how I want so much to like you! I have to confess however, that I do love my fine wools and while Corriedale has its place in the wool pantheon, it will never be worshipped here. Just too rough for my taste and it seems to suck in light. What can I say...I like me some shiny stuff. I'm surprised I haven't started with the Angelina yet.

So here's a quick fibre fix...and if you want to see it all, go check out my flickr.

Stuff I'm Knitting

Little to report - the Susie Hoodie is proceeding well. I am 22 rows away from my off the needles, around the waist size check and then we will know for sure if all is well. Now I just have to commit absolutely to doing the waist size check thing and not pretend that this type of careful consideration is something that is good and right and not something that is only for other lesser knitters than I.

And finally - for all those who asked...

Vesper the Vibe is fantastic. Fun to drive, goes vroom and generally makes itself welcome everywhere except at the gas pump. Also, I really can't wait to see how many hits I get off a google search for "black vibe". Because I am really 12 years old.

Next time, I will try to tell you about Kniterary* where I got to touch some Camelspin (please don't lick the screen - not good for monitors I hear) and after I regained cousciouness I bought a new book.

*A yarn shop where wise yarn store owner has placed Fleece Artist and Handmaiden in a locked glass cabinet. Bizarre but somehow made me want it even more...

Blog makeover, proud mother moment, more fibre confessions

You know how one day you walk into your house and suddenly realize that the fact that your couch has been against the same wall for YEARS is irritating as hell? Or suddenly your books have to be re-organized - maybe by colour this time instead of height? (except fibre books - they still belong in random piles around the bedroom - its a STYLE people, work with me here).

Well, my blog was pissing me off. It NEVER changed - oh stop laughing back there! I DO realize that for blogs to change one should probably post something on them every now and then.

Time for a spring cleaning. I wanted some of my own fibre in the picture at the top...new colours! A fresh spring feeling. Let me know what you think...I'm not sold on the light green yet but its growing on me.

The other thing I think I need to do is find a direction for the blog and it occurred to me that, given the...um...strong support I have been showing to my local LYSes, bookstore and pretty much any place willing to sell me something to do with sticks and string, the least I could do would be to turn my financial loss into blog gain. So I am going to start subjecting you to my opinion - little reviews - patterns, books (knitting and not), cat breeds, coffee, podcasts, yarn...whatever strikes my fancy.

Knit that: pattern review

Today I give you: the Burridge Lake Aran Afghan by Anna Dalvi.


This pattern originally appeared on the sadly defunct Magknits but has been put up for free download through Ravelry or Anna's site. Anna Dalvi who lives here in Ottawa and was the mind behind the Mystic Waters Shawl (which I started and frogged - beautiful pattern but I was having fidelity issues because I still hadn't finished the Swan Lake stole).

I think this is going to be my grand opus. If I can finish this, I can do ANYTHING - climb Everest, do the side splits again, eat only sugar and fat and never gain weight, become patient, perfect and loved by all. I may be a bit optimistic, but its good to have goals. (OOH! lightening outside!)

The picture is less than a 1/4 of the first of three panels that will make up the afghan. It is absolutely to fascinating to knit. For one thing, the Trinity Stitch (the columns on either side of the big Saxon Braid) is made on the wrong side so purling rows are as interesting as cabling rows on the right side. Also, every one of the three patterns has a different number of rows - remind me to take a picture of my chart where I keep track of all this for you.

The pattern is absolutely perfect. Its fun to knit. If you like BIG projects, cabling (learn to cable without a needle for this one - there is a LOT of cabling going on) and knowing that you are making a family heirloom that you may be knitting for years to come (if you are like me), I recommend it.

The yarn is Patons Classic Merino - I couldn't afford the full 20 balls but I think a basic grey should be safe. (more lightening!)

Pictures from my stash

In the newly purchased department - Cascade 220 Wool Heathers and purse handles for a medium Noni Carpet Bag. Wool purchased at Yarn Forward in Kanata.

Spinning and spun

Right now I have some copper superwash merino I purchased at The Black Lamb when I got my wheel last year. I had spun up the first 50 g right away and it has been sitting on the bobbin for over a year. I am finally spinning up the rest - I am not a fan of spinning superwash because I find it way too slippery but I admit that the singles are really pretty and shiny and will be lovely when I ply it up.

Off the bobbin is an absolutely gorgeous 2-ply silk/merino blend from Fleece Artist. A larger skein has gone to its forever home - and this smaller skein is going to follow it there whenever I see Leanne next (Yes, hon...there's more...I'll trade you for a gallstone!)

Non-knitting news

Alex competed in his very first baseball tournament on Saturday and his team (the Yankees) came in second place in a very close final playoff game! This is his first year doing any kind of organized sport and he got off to a bit of a rocky start. But on Saturday one of the parents did some one-on-one with him to help him get his batting technique down and in the final game he got a run batted in, a triple and eventually got to home plate for his first point! I am so proud of him and really glad he had some success - he was getting very discouraged and nothing we could say was going to be as good as just hitting the ball.

Here he is at bat - just before his very first hit. Sorry for the fuzzies but it was really sunny - I couldn't actually see what I was photographing so I just shot the picture on faith.

Alex is super strong - and built like a 1920's slugger - if he can connect I think he's going to hit them out of the park.

Stuff I'm looking forward to

I have a 1 pm meeting tomorrow with our Director General to "talk about my future". This could be anything from a fun project to a minor career change and no one wants to tell me what its about but everyone seems to think I'm the one for it (whatever it is). Curious huh?

Test drives - my lease is up in mid-July so its time for dreaded car shopping. I'm going to pretend I am looking forward to this the way I look forward to checking out a new yarn shop. I am hoping the power of positive thinking will find me a decent price on a lovely heathered 4-door with cashmere-alpaca-quiviut seat covers and plenty of room for my wheel and knitting friends. Oh and an Ipod docking thingie would be nice too so I can listen to podcasts while driving to yarn shops. Oh, and it should probably have an engine and other car stuff in it. And somewhere to park kids and groceries. Are you thinking that maybe my car salesperson is going to be as confused by me as I am by him/her?

Have a great week - kids are back from dad's for the next three days and I'll line up my next review for the weekend. Let me know what you think of the new look and format!

I fell off my yarn diet...

I was SO good for 3 whole months!!! Seriously good. Didn't even look at other yarn good. But then..I couldn't help myself. It was no big deal really. One lousy skein. The trollop screamed at me from afar (after I routed through the basket for a colour I liked and then stepped back to admire it from a distance...but still...IT seduced on ME).

Yeah...there's no denying Handmaiden Fine Yarn

That's Casbah - a gateway yarn if I ever felt one. It is so soft that it has been living on my computer desk for regulary snuggling.

And this might be some Sea Silk - destined to be one of these (and its all Leanne and Nancy's faults). Plus mine for needing to join everyone on the bandwagon.

There's more - I updated my Ravelry stash if you have access and want all the gory details - I'm too embarrassed to roll it all out here at once. But I went to Knitter's Frolic...and it was an excellent way to part with some of my tax return.

In the done-with-that Department, we have Icarus.

Icarus from Interweave Knits from Summer 2006 - which I knit in about 6 weeks - breaking my all time knitting record.

Last weekend I ended up - through a series of coincidences - do a spinning demonstration at the Canada Agriculture Museum (click for cute cows). In about 6 hours I spun up just under 100 grams of some South African Fine I had dyed last year. I chose really bright colours because I knew there would be tons of little kids. The funnest part was watching the kids get completely mesmerized by the wheel. They would walk in and literally sink to the floor. Had I known the wheel had so much power over toddlers I would have bought one a LONG time ago!!!

And lastly - Madeline and I went to Toronto a few weeks ago (conveniently when Knitter's Frolic was happening) and delivered the Tomten Jacket to its rightful owner.


Miss Ava - 9 months and the best model a knitter could ask for...

With Icarus done I've turned my sights on the Susie Hoodie from More Big Girl Knits. This will be the first sweater I have ever made for myself. I am nervous about my gauge (.25 of a stitch less than the 17 called for) but I think when the waist decreases are done I'll take it off the needles and make sure it isn't too big.

And if it is...I guess I'll have to eat more.

Edited to add: Wanna-Baa reminded me of these great pics...amazing what 9 months can do for a baby (scroll way down)

Blog Post of Reckoning

Today was the day. The day to pull out the knitting basket and find out what the hell is actually IN there. And it wasn't pretty.

But first up - kitchen pics because someone has been asking and who am I to refuse?

The counter is actually a bit more rosy than the picture which makes it warmer than it looks. I absolutely LOVE it and now that it is 99% done I couldn't be happier.

New in the knitting stash

My mom was cleaning out and found a sweater she had started sometime in the 80's. The wool is long since discontinued Laines du Plassard Mousarde - a wool alpaca blend that was probably pretty expensive back then since there was far less alpaca around than there is now. There is a whole lot of this raspberry colour and some lighter pink. There is also a very small amount of shiny pink silk. I had to frog a sleeve and a half - its roughly a worsted weight from what I can tell and I've decided to try a tam from One Skein Wonders.

Next - a lovely package arrived from the most awesomest Secret Pal Angel ever and contained two skeins of SWTC Kara - thanks Lorena!

Some dyed stuff

I also had a few dye days at the end of December -

On the yarn front:

I dyed two skeins ofKnitPicks Bare DK Superwash in coordinating solid and variegated colours.

I also did some coordinating DK in blues and started the Elizabeth Zimmerman Tomten Jacket from Knitting Without Tears - a great and quick knit. Utter genius design.

And another skein of KP Bare Fingering Weight Merino in black and blue stripes.

Dyed rovings

Two 4oz Merino-Tencel rovings

And two 4oz Merino rovings

Lastly - the WIPs in addition to those above...

A couple of second socks

A new homework sweater - EZ EPS sweater for Alex with a cable in the front in a lovely bulky brown wool who's exact name escapes me.

The Mystic Water Shawl KAL - in Infinity Lace Weight from my local LYS. This is supposed to be in blues but I just love the yellows and oranges. The yarn is a bit stiff and shows the stitches just beautifully. I have to confess that I am not entirely in a lace knitting mood - am I the only one who prefers to knit lace in the summer?

Still - I am continuing to plug away at my Mystery Stole 3 - I've finally gotten to the wing and it was a nice change from the rows upon rows of Cat's Paw in the previous section. I do think I will dye the stole another colour when it is complete - I am leaning towards a light turquoise.

There are more FOs but I won't put them all here. Lizard Ridge, the Dale of Norway sweater, felted clogs for my sister's (now past) birthday...

So there it is - the reckoning is done and now I had better sit down and actually knit...after I get over to Ravelry for the all important update there.