A Weekend Away

It has been a busy couple of days in the wonderful world of Teenuh! There was the Scrapbook Expo trip last weekend (Friday to Sunday). While the show was over by Saturday, we just went on Friday and then shopped/scrapped the rest of the weekend. It was tons of fun, I am very happy that I went.

I'm not a scrapbooker (although I think I may become one since I have so much paper), but I was originally planning on taking some card projects but I was tired from working extra hours at my client (to minimize the PTO I would have to use to be able to take Friday off) that I couldn't think straight, so in the end I decided to take nothing except knitting! I bought a few things at the expo and a few things at the craft store we visited so I wasn't empty handed for paper activities but it didn't occupy much of my time.

I started my next sock while I was there. I am using my Posh Yarn from the March club shipment (March Hare) and I am using the Elfine's Leaf-Lace Socks pattern for them. I am loving how they are looking, it is the same leaf pattern that is in my favorite lace dishcloth pattern. Here I am in the room we crafted in in our hotel in Livermore modeling my early progress on the sock:

I am nearly to the point of turning the heel on these socks now. I am going to make the foot a little shorter than I usually do because the sock is a little on the wide size. I am sure it will fit my calf perfectly with the wider leg. What I probably ought to do is frog the entire thing and knit these socks on size 2 needles (I'm using 3's now) but I don't really want to frog them just yet... I think I will wait to see how the foot fits with the heel done. I am SO IN LOVE with the Posh Yarn. This is the first socks I have knit (of the 3 months of yarn I have gotten) and oh man is this stuff nice. I keep feeling the fabric up as I knit them loving how soft they are.

I also worked on my Forest Canopy shawl this weekend. I didn't make a whole lot of progress inch wise because it is getting really broad (oh the fun I have ahead of me!) but it is now a pretty decent amount larger than it was in my March 9th photo. I haven't taken any progress shots of it but I will get to it soon.

Over all, it was a terribly fun weekend and I am very glad that I decided to go. Besides the ladies I went with being really fun, I got a whole weekend with the OCK. I think this photo shows how happy we were to be away for the weekend!

What Kind of Knitter Are You?

What Kind of Knitter Are You?

You appear to be a Knitting Purist. You are an accomplished knitter producing beautiful pieces with a classic feel. You sometimes lament losing half of your local yarn shop to garish novelty yarns. Perhaps you consider fun fur scarves the bane of knitting society and prefer to steer new knitters towards the wool and cotton blends. Some might call you a bit of an elitist but you know that you've been doing this craft long enough to respect the history behind it and honor it with beautiful piece that can last a lifetime. http://marniemaclean.com
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A Finished Object That Isn't Socks!

Look, a brand new finished object that isn't a pair of socks!! This is Fetching in the Filatura di Crossa that I bought at Knitting Arts. These are a gift for a friend's daughter for her 10th birthday. This was my first time knitting cables, knitting with waste yarn and making a thumb so I was pretty excited. I made this 2 cable repeats (10 stitches) smaller than the original pattern because they looked way too big for a 10 year old. I don't think that they are too small but I will see! I am really really happy with how these turned out. With size 6 needles and worsted weight yarn, it is amazing how fast a project can go. I started these Sunday afternoon (and finished the first one plus cast on the second before bed) and finished these Monday night after work.

Cabling close up:


This was a terribly simple pattern. I will probably make more of these for myself and/or for gifts!

Monday Yarn Pr0n, Vol 6

It's late so I won't dilly dally.

First up is the first sock kit from the 2007 Socks That Rock Sock Club. I love this color. This is Monsoon:

Next up, the March sock of the month from Posh Yarn. This is their Lucia sock yarn in the colorway March Hare. I really love these colors. I think this is my favorite colorway so far.


I was hoping there would be more time between when I purchased yarn and Stitches, but sadly that did not happen. The Knitters Studio in Menlo Park continued their sale on clearance yarns that they had at Stitches. And of course I went and bought more yarn. Here is what I got:

First up, Crystal Palace Yarns Splash in a lovely pastel colorway that I think is the Dreamy colorway. This eyelash yarn is destined to become a Dust Bunny I think!

Next up is Ironstone Yarns. The next two pairs of yarn are both from the Infinity Ribbon line. This color is Purple Vinyard:


And this colorway is New Berry:

I think that both of these are destined to become scarves. This yarn is 100% cotton, it should make nice scarves.

That's it for my daylight savings time updatezzzzz.

Finished Object Friday!

I have the best of intentions to update during the week, but life just keeps on interrupting!! My mother-in-law and her Paris socks were the cause of interruption this week, we had to tidy the house up for her to stay one night before she returned to Oregon after attending her friend's funeral. (Her friend was diagnosed with stage 4 large cell lung cancer on March 8th, 2006 and died on February 28, 2007. Her funeral was one year after her diagnosis on March 8, 2007. She held on long enough to get to meet her 2 new granddaughters and have a couple of months with them.) So now my mother-in-law has returned to Oregon and I have some finished objects to show!

As the OCK so kindly pointed out in her most recent post, I have neglected to show off my stitch markers I busted out after day 1 of Stitches. I bought a sack of mixed beads at the booth of the woman that sold some really wonderful bits for necklaces. Except I didn't pick the awesomely cool bag that I found and ultimately gave up to the OCK. But still, I love what I did get.


I am pleased with them, although I may re-design them to incorporate some different pins. I only have t-pins right now so I don't have the ability to do the additional danglies on mine. I need to curl some of my ends a little better too I think but I have used the purple cat marker and was quite pleased with it. The rings that they are on are smallish but I know now that they fit at least up to a size 7 needle because that is what I strung them on to take these pictures. Which is good since I knit my dishcloths on size 7 needles. Hooray.

What did I use my purple cat marker on? Why I used them on my lovely Monkey socks!! I love how these came out. Man is this Lorna's Laces colorway BRIGHT. Still, they are fabulously comfortable and I loved wearing them to work today. They are the same length, I swear. They just slid down a little and I didn't realize it before hubby took the photo.

Hubby's close up photo was totally blurred, so I took one myself!

Hubby didn't quite get the angle on the heels that I was looking for but you can mostly see the neat striping it did on the heels. I wish it worked like this on the whole foot but I don't mind the pooling.
So basically I used the lace chart that Cookie wrote and flipped it over (so the pattern is the same direction as the original version) to make it toe-up using my basic recipe guidelines and with a short row heel.

Another finished object that I have is my beginning of March knit along dishcloth. This pattern is from the same site that I got the pattern for the squirrel cloth from. It is a grandma's favorite dishcloth and I used Peaches 'n Creme in the Gumdrops colorway. I wet this to block it and it's not dry in the photo so it's a bit hard to see. I may try to retake these pics after it dries to see if it photographs better than it is now!!

I may also try taking a photo without flash, though those pics tend to be very blurry with this camera.
I don't normally knit the image dishcloths in ombre yarns but I didn't really like the solid colors I had to choose from when I picked this yarn up on the go last weekend when I wanted something to knit at the last minute over at the OCK's house. The yarn is perfect though if you ask me for this cloth since I think the colors are very Eastery and it does look very cute with the bunny.

Finally now I have photos of my only project I have OTN. This is the Forest Canopy Shawl pattern that I am making out of the Seacoast Handpainted yarn I got at the Full Thread Ahead booth at Stitches. The colorway name is Glacier. I am knitting it on my size 4 KnitPicks Options circular needles (which I do love, yum).

I took a close up photo of one of the repeats because it is hard to see in the big photo.

It's still not too terribly clear here but it's not blocked so I wouldn't expect it to be since it isn't blocked yet.

The pattern is a fairly simple lace pattern and I really like how it looks. I think I like the geometry of the diamonds and how nicely the repeats are framed by the yarn overs. I am excited to be knitting my first shawl. I think it will turn out very nice. I really love the colors in this yarn and can't wait for it to be done! I feel all growed up making a shawl, it's amusing. Not too bad for only having resumed knitting last fall!

Stitches Yarn Pr0n Monday, Vol 2!

Alright, I completely spazzed out this week and didn't finish my dissertation on my Stitches retail consumption. So here's the final pics of my haul.

First up, Lisa Souza sock yarn in Emerald City(left) and South Pacific (right):

I couldn't pick between these two yarns so I bought them both. One will become socks (probably the Emerald City) and one will become a shawl. These are both from their Sock! Merino line, I picked these over just their Sock! yarn because I think it was slightly softer (100% merino wool vs 75% Merino/25% Nylon) and there was a considerable amount more yardage (560 yds vs 450 yds) for the same price. Nice colors in their yarns, I hadn't seen their yarn before this but consider me a fan!

Next up is yarn from a clearance booth called Newtons Yarn Country. They had a ton of yarn of all different varieties for good prices. I got a couple of things from them that were really nice. First up, I got a wool/acrylic/rayon blend (160 yds per hank) that is a mixture of lavender/pink colors. It is very pretty stuff:


Next up is a rayon ribbon that is 100% viscose rayon (again 160 yds). This one is a mixture of rose/green/brown colors:


The OCK and I went in together on some rayon thread, she got the black and I got purple. We plan on using these to do beaded bag projects (like ones we saw at the show):

Very nice stuff, very reasonable prices. The yarns are destined to become scarves of some sort, I haven't quite picked out the patterns yet but that will come in time!

Next up, Seacoast Handpainted sock yarn from the Full Thread Ahead booth. This stuff is beautiful. I actually have balled the yarn and it is being turned into a Forest Canopy Shoulder Shawl. I think it is turning out very pretty from the little bit I have started now, but I am just getting started on it.

The colors are very beautiful in this yarn. It does seem that the color changes are very short, so if I were knitting this yarn up to be a sock, I have a feeling it might be a pooling yarn but with the shawl I think it will be alright. There may actually not be a pooling tendency with this yarn even though the color lengths are short as there are quite a few colors that transition through the yarn.

From the Shelridge Farm booth is their 3 ply fingering weight yarn, 100% superwash wool. These skeins have 175 yds and it is just gorgeous to touch. Mmm. The OCK says that the color of the skeins I bought remind her of Wonka bars... I could see myself buying more of this yarn.

I managed to make it out of the A Star Alpacas booth without any alpaca yarn, but I didn't escape yarnless. This is 700 yds of 50% silk/50% merino yarn. The silk makes the yarn shine beautifully and it is sooo luxurious to touch. It is a handpainted mixture of rose, taupe and turqouise colors. I think this is also going to become a shawl, although with 700 yds I could maybe do a scarf and socks. I will have to see what it inspires me to become!

My final image from Stitches is my purchase from the Tess Designer Yarns booth. So, yes, there were booths that had yards and yards of the finest alpaca yarns you could want. Yes there was some yarn made from ox hairs that was to die for. There was angora too. But then, there was Tess Designer Yarns. Holy man. That booth so needs to fill up a bathtub with their yarn and sell 15 minute slots of time where you can roll around naked in their yarn. They have the most beautiful yarn colors and their different yarns are all so so very nice. I escaped with two skeins of yarn in the same colorways, I got a skein of their Super Socks & Baby yarn (80% wool/20% nylon, 450 yds) and a skein of their Microfiber Ribbon yarn (100% nylon microfiber, 333 yds). These will be socks and a scarf:


It was extremely difficult to escape from their booth without more yarn. I think we groped their yarn several times over our two day visit to stitches and I finally bought this later in the day on Sunday. I am glad I didn't walk away empty handed from their booth, it was far too nice to pass up.

That is it for my yarn purchases! I did sneak out with some other goodies, I got the Fiber Trends felted hedgehog pattern... and a felted fish pattern (I think it might also be Fiber Trends but I am too lazy to get up and look at the pattern in the other room...). I got Cookie's Twisted Flower Sock pattern... I got a bulk sack of beads that I have already turned the big beads in the bag into stitch markers... I got these darling lacquer miniatures that are on a big pin that I can pin on my shawls that I will make in the future:

I got these from the booth that sells that ox yarn that is just to die for. I got some 4" Addi needles that will be great for glove finger/mitten thumb knitting... I didn't get the size 0000 needles that the OCK got but I will probably have to change that in the future since that is what I will need to knit the rayon thread into a beaded bag.

I had such a great time at Stitches. It was my first major event since I returned to knitting and it was a lot of fun. Not that I didn't already have enough sock yarn to make at least two pairs of socks for the entire Duggar family... now I have enough for 3 pairs of socks for everyone in the family! (Well... not quite, but it is getting close I think...) (And that whole "sock yarn doesn't count as stash" spiel to knit from your stash? That so does not fly in the world of Teenuh. I need to not buy any more sock yarn, on a yarn diet I'd have to ration myself to buying non-sock yarns to make something else!!) Best of all, it was two days with my favorite friend so how can I complain?!

There will be some FO's to post soon. I have finished my Monkey socks (I kni I am nearly done with my beginning of March dishcloth KAL.. I also will have my first photos of my shawl just to prove to the OCK that I really was serious about turning the sock yarn into a shawl! And I really need to take a look at my yarns that I have now and decide what I want to make into a branching out scarf because I am completely in love with this pattern!!