Amiss

According to my daughter I need to blog more. I think about it quite often and even compose blog posts in my mind. I just never get further than that. Today I'll just say that I am fighting another cold/cough and show you some FO's.

This is my Lovey Helena. It is a pattern from Knitty.com. It is done in Heavyweight STR in the colorway Love. It is probably a size 18 months. It will be headed to my cousins house this week as her littlest one is having a 1st birthday pretty soon. :) If you can't tell, it has picot cuffs around the sleeves and bottom hem. So cute!


Leyburns that I knit for Kim out of some Zen String Serendipity Sportweight, colorway is Chocolate Cherries. It took me way to long to knit these for her! I try to customize socks to feet and it's more difficult if they aren't my own feet. As you can tell, it's sunny here today. Wonderful, except for the stuffy/runny nose that accompanies nice weather. :)


My second February Lady Sweater. This one in Woobu from Blue Moon Fiber Arts, colorway is Atomic Six. I just need to do some buttonloops and sew on the buttons I bought while we were in downtown in March. With the sun and warmth today, it should dry fairly quickly.


I have one more February Lady Sweater to make and it will be for Kim. It is in a lovely green, like grass. She found the yarn at the Blue Moon Sale in December.

3 in 1

I just posted two of these to two different swap blogs, but decided to post them here as well.



My partner got lost along the way for the last ISE......................


BUT, Dorothy one of our swap moms sent me the best package ever!!! A beautiful green (keyhole?) scarf out of Malabrigo. I've never touched Malabrigo before, but it is so soft! There were all kinds of other little goodies in the package as well, some Forte tea in silk purses, with the little trays to hold them after you take it out of the teacup, a Christmas ornament, some locally made soap and lipgloss, some little samples of creams and soaps, and a collector's spoon with a Canadian Loony on it!! Oh, and a White Chocolate bar with strawberries in it. It was gone shortly!! Thank you Dorothy!!! You need to go check out Dorothy's blog, she has some really great patterns that she has designed!! She sent me the Wrapped in Cables pattern. It is really lovely and I can't wait to make that one for myself.


Second post goes to the Knitter's Tea Swap 4.

We were supposed to have a Halloween Tea Party today at our house, but my daughter is sick, so we had to postpone it. Instead, I received my swap package from Dorene!!

A teapot!! And it is a good size for tea!! Many different kinds of Bentley tea to try, Jasmine, Raspberry, Mint, Pomegranate, Mango, Vanilla, Blueberry, Key Lime and Orange Spice. YUMMY!! Strawberry jam from a local farm, a beautiful needle case and the softest suri/mohair from Rhinebeck!! Thank you so much Dorene. I am off to have some tea on this Saturday morning.

And last but not least, I finished a pair of socks this week!!! I started them in August for the Socktopia Mystery Sock. They are Dream in Color, Smooshy, in Visual Purple, done on US 0's. I am wearing them today!!




Now, off to knit on a test knit!! It's a fun knit. Oh, and to brew up some tea.

Socks Done

My most recent Rockin' Sock Club socks. Summer of Love Lace. Vine lace pattern on the cuff is done on US 1's, and the rest of the sock on 0's. Color is Flower Power. Definitely summer socks as they are fairly short. I haven't taken any other pictures, so the lace pattern doesn't show up very well in these pictures.




I spent the afternoon in a lace class. With Myrna Stahmann. She is cool!! I like her idea of what lace is. It's whatever you want it to look like. I go back tomorrow for an all day class. This is the Fall Knitting Retreat with the Tigard Knitting Guild. Worth the money!! And it's less than 5 minutes from my house, so I am not staying the night at the retreat center.

New Socks

First though, I wanted to thank all of you, who left comments and those who emailed me privately about John's heart. I felt hugged through all of that, Thank You!!

Spoiler alert at the bottom for the most recent Rockin' Sock Club shipment.

But first, I realized that I hadn't posted a picture of my finished Solstice Slip socks from the last club shipment. They are super comfy, and the pattern was easy to follow.



I followed the pattern, but went down to my usual size US 0's and did in between the small and medium size. The pattern had a 5 stitch repeat so I could do that and not mess it up. The heels and toes are garter stitch short rows. I like the garter stitch, but so far they don't fit in my shoes very well, so I may not use it again, I'm not sure yet. The colorway is Firebird, STR of course. The pattern is by J.C. Briar, and is called Solstice Slip.

No other finished socks, but several recently started. Knee High to a Grasshopper, the April Sock Club socks by Chrissy Gardiner. They are also easy to follow. They are toe-up which is a first for me. I went to YouTube and found Cat Bordhi's videos for Judy's Magic Cast-On and followed that. It was great!! Cat has numerous other videos there as well.



This was my knitting area this morning. New books, needles and lots of yarn abound!!





I have finally gotten the ball rolling on something that Kim has wanted to do for at least 3 years now. I told her she could do it once she was done with her piano lessons, and that was in January.


We like this picture the best!! We are able to rent this harp until we know she is really in to playing. They are expensive to buy!!



Now on to spoilers:


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I spent two days early in the week helping get this yarn and pattern to the masses who were chomping at the bit. I think most everybody has it now, even the internationals (theirs went out the week previously). The colorway is Flower Power. It is very pretty!! In the picture above you can see it kind of in a ball.




I test knitted this pattern earlier this year so I know it's not too difficult. I cast on this morning and I now have the cuff done for both socks. They are fold down anklets with this vine lace cuff. It is another pattern by J. C. Briar.

Finished 4th of July Socks

I finished up my 4th of July socks on Sunday evening while we watched "Return of the King." They are a bit slouchy, but I think they are fairly comfortable for being real sock weight. I told dh that I was spoiled by STR, I like the feel of it so much better.



I also finished a test knit for some anklets that are just cute!! Lacy fold-over cuff. Once I got the cuff down, the rest was basic sock.

The flu has visited our house. Robert came home with it on Thursday night in the form of a sore throat. He thought it might be strep at first, the next day it was the fever and chills and feeling like you were hit by a Mack truck. He was sick all weekend and has taken two more days this week. He is still coughing a lot!! Kim came down with it Sunday night and I woke with a sore throat and headache on Monday. We are taking it really easy this week!! Lots of knitting was getting done, then I ripped out 5 inches of two socks. I thought they were just too small. Though I'm on row 63 of MS3. This is the first clue and there are 99 rows total for this clue. The group closes on Friday, July 6 if you still want to join.

Hats

If you've read Yarn Harlot today, you'll see me in the second to the last photo on today's post. I was the "hat lady" for Portland. The hats are going to go to Outside In a local shelter for homeless teens and young adults. We ended up with 29 adult hats and 11 baby/toddler hats. That was a great job!! (see the little orange/black hat on the left side of the picture, Roxie was working on that during the talk and finished it before the talk was done. Thank you Roxie.) Though embarrassing during the moment she called me to come to the front. Thank you to the red hat lady as well. She must have put 6 red hats into the basket as I passed by her. I left the basket and quickly escaped back to my daughter. We got a good spot in line, maybe 20 or so from the front, then we sat to the side to wait until the end to take the hats and photos. It was great watching everyone come up to meet Stephanie. You see all kinds of bloggers that you only recognize from their blog names! We had a great time, though can't imagine how she does it. We were exhausted last night and still today!! She must have a lot of energy. And how does she know I collect spoons? I know it's in my last blog post, so that must tell you something about her, she reads blogs when she can!

If you notice in the photo that Stephanie took, I am not wearing a purple sweater. :( I didn't get it done because I got frustrated with the button bands. It was so close!! I guess I could have worn it with the 1/2 band pinned on. Boy wouldn't that have looked nice. It's kind of funny because when I googled buttonbands, one of Stephanie's posts from 2004 was in the top 5 hits!

Oh, something interesting happened to us after leaving Stephanie and Tina last night as we all headed to our cars. This good looking young man was walking the same direction as Kim and myself, held the door for us to get into the building where the parking garage was and asked if we had been at Powell's? We said, yes (I'm carrying the basket of hats), and he said he had heard all of the noise and come to investigate. He enjoyed listening to Stephanie's worries about hairless sheep and blights and such. He knew we were having a good time. His next comment was, "So, knitting must be a great HOBBY." I almost choked and looked at him a little funny. My reply, "No............" His, "Oh an obsession then?" "Yes, that would work." I didn't remember the really good comeback until we were in the van. "No, it's a lifestyle." I hate that!! I wish I was a quicker thinker on my feet!

So, the only pictures taken last night came out really blurry, except one of Stephanie signing Kim's newspaper. And one long distance one of the guy introducing Stephanie.
















I did finish a pair of socks this week or was it last week? I don't know, my time has all run together lately.

Mystic Sea socks from the Sock Camp wildlife cruise. Pattern by Cass White, yarn by BMFA, in the colorway LunaSea. One mod, that was to go down just a couple of stitches once I got past the heel, so it would fit my foot better. I was able to continue the pattern fairly easy on down the foot.


I have a full week, work, oral surgery for the son after finals are done this week, and who knows what else. Hopefully a done sweater!!