Putting on a little weight

Yarn weight, that is...I'm actually losing the other kind (it's about time, too!).

The Fiber Gallery is my favorite LYS. They had a sale. Things were 40% off. Need I say more? I think not. On to pictures:



My 10 year old sister needs a birthday sweater. Manos cotton was one of the 40% off items. Have you ever held one of those big sets of 5 hanks? Very soft. I did not buy any for me...I was at least a little bit good.



Aren't the colors pretty? I'm thinking a simple stockinette raglan with a deep border in green and pink colorwork flowers. It will be really nice to have a quick sweater after Branden's, even if her arms are almost as long as mine already!




Then there was this. Originally, this was fated to be Hannah's sweater. Then we realized that they had enough for matching sweaters; one for me, one for her. I'm not sure I want to do two sweaters in a row in the same yarn, though. After we'd decided that I'd make just one, I realized that this was just Cascade 220, and not the superwash kind. My mom is not big on hand washing knitted things, and so that eliminated this as a Hannah sweater. Which meant it became a me sweater.

It's funny. All of my life I have been a blues and greens person that wouldn't be caught dead in pink or purple. And now all of a sudden the reds and purples are just impossible to pass up. Wonder why? Maybe there are just a lot of gorgeous colors out there right now?

I did have a few moments of weakness over some very blue Manos sockweight. There were only 3 skeins; not quite enough for much other than socks. But it was a really incredible electric blue. And almost half price! And then I looked at the yarn in the basket, thought about knitting time, and how hard it would be to match it, and the Manos went back. (It also helped that I have a whole list of sockweights that I really want to buy from The Woolen Rabbit that I'm not allowing myself to buy until all sock yarn in my stash is gone.)



And then, finally, I returned to my more natural colors. I love this set. All Cascade 220, and destined to be colorwork. I can't wait! I was thinking of doing this sweater in a slightly finer yarn, but these colors spoke to me, and fingering weight colorwork might be a bit much for a quick project that I want to have done by fall.



You can see the colors a bit better in this one, but Branden arranged the first picture so artfully that I had to include it.

So, those are the newest additions to my list of things to knit. Really, all of them were more or less planned; I knew I needed to make some more "me" sweaters. I'm going to be teaching for real in the fall, and as the actual instructor something more than jeans and a fleece is probably required. Also, the second of my favorite sweaters has begun to fray at the cuffs. I am so horribly sad about that; I have had these two wool sweaters for almost 8 years now (and they came to me second hand), and I absolutely love them. They have definitely done their job well, and held up longer than I could reasonably have expected, but that doesn't stop me from wishing they'd last forever. The first began to fall apart last year and has continued apace. It's still ok for around the house (or at least I tell myself it is, and Branden and the cats are too polite to say anything), but it's getting beyond the point where I'd wear it to lab/work. And now the second one is giving out, too. I will be very sad to see these two go; they're the only elements of my wardrobe that have stayed constant for so long. But, it does give me a reason to spend some good quality time with the needles before the fall, so I guess there's some good in there, too. And look at that yarn! I can't wait for the colorwork!