Rainbow Sunday

If I was good and walked away from yarn once, that counts, right? Even if my helpful husband (cough *yarn pusher* cough) brought me back today to buy some?

We have had several discussions this week about how it's his birthday, not mine, and we should be buying him presents, not me. And besides, I just knit a whole sweater in fingering weight alpaca, and it would be crazy to go start another. And then he says something like "but you'll like it" or "you'll knit it eventually." If all couples could have such "arguments", huh?

It's hard enough to pretend that the booth doesn't exist in the corner of the farmers' market. But then, when dragged right up to it two weeks in a row by someone eager to buy me yarn, I don't feel that I am fully responsible for what happens.

This booth can sneak up on you. It starts out looking like a hat display, but what's that off to the side?



Yup, it's a whole wall of beautifully hand-dyed open skein alpaca. (And mohair, but I appear to be completely immune to mohair...)



Now, I can usually resist skeins of yarn. But open hanks of yarn? Just hanging loose and looking for petting like that? And alpaca?

We all know where this is heading. I consider it fortunate that we only ended up with one sweaters' worth...



But isn't it beautiful?

















Beautiful enough that I will even commit to knitting another sweater in fingering weight alpaca. Someday. Probably not right away, but someday. And, until then, I have a rainbow waiting in my stash, and a husband who is very pleased with himself. (How could you resist that, on his birthday weekend?)

We established long ago that Branden is always right, but that I always make more sense. This continues to hold true, apparently. He is right; I do like it, and I will knit it eventually. And waiting to buy until I am ready to knit would have made more sense. So there you have it.

The lady that sells this yarn is super-friendly and very happy to let you stay and pet as long as you want, whether or not you buy. If you're ever in the Seattle area on a Sunday, check out her booth at the Ballard Market. Or, if you can't drop by for yarn petting in person, there's always her online shop. You know...if you happen to be looking for some alpaca...

A quilted flower

One of my fun projects this weekend was making a pretty flower for my office wall:



Quilting is so nice for getting instant results. This took about 2 hours, start to finish, not including the hand quilting. It actually took almost as long to pick out the fabrics as it did to make the quilt!

The background is machine pieced, and the flower and pot are appliqued on with an iron, using handy-dandy fusible interfacing. Now I just have to quilt and mount, and I will have wall art to bring some color to my office.

Sorry for the horrible picture, but we've entered the dark months here, and sun has been hard to come by.

Quick and painless

What to do after a long project with tiny stitches? How about some mitts in chunky yarn?





I've been meaning to make some mitts for the farmers that we buy from every week at the farmer's market. It gets cold out there in the drizzle at this time of year, and they're good enough to stand around outside all day every Sunday to sell us food.

So, I thought that some mitts would be a quick and practical way to say "thank you."

It also doesn't hurt with the stash busting, and it's been nice having some instant gratification projects. The mitts can't be too long, so that they don't get in the way of working, so they're super fast little projects.

At a mitt a night (or one and a half) it shouldn't take long to get to quota!

Just funny

What to do when the neighbors won't let you have a real sheep...

Too bad this one probably doesn't make much wool.

Too much to post!

Ever have too many things to post about? It's almost worse than too few...it's harder to get started, and easier to put off posting until you're ready to sit down and really just write for a while.

Don't worry. I'll refrain from a 1000-word post.

First off, title of Sharpest Eyes goes to Ellen, who correctly identified the offset in my sweaters' colorwork. I can't believe it's off. It's one thing when I know I forgot to count and it's my own darned fault, but I counted this out 4 times. From different directions. I drew diagrams. And I still mis-centered it. No idea how.

But are 5-10 stitches worth redoing a couple thousand? Probably not. I wove in the ends this morning. If I can live with a bias, I can live with a pattern not being centered. I just wish I knew how it had happened.

This has been a busy weekend. A "domestic" weekend, even.

That's actually a bit of an inside joke for me. I took a Dependable Strengths seminar a few months ago, all about identifying your strengths and selling your talents. The first day of the seminar was on a Friday, and the second day was the following Monday. We came back into the classroom on Monday morning, and I was chatting with the woman next to me about our weekends. I said mine had been great; I'd gotten some gardening done, worked on my knitting (I forget what the current project was), done some cleaning and some cooking...

She gave a suspiciously brief little laugh, and said it sounded like I'd had a very "domestic" weekend, as if domestic was the nicest word she could think to use.

At first, this annoyed me a bit. After all, weren't we in a class to discuss our strengths and accentuate the positive? We had discussed on Friday that one of my biggest strengths is an utter inability to be non-productive. Even if it means that I risk being "domestic."

Then, it amused me. I mean really. I am one of the last people that you would ever call domestic. Suzie homemaker I am not, and if you have any doubts about that, you can ask my husband what proportion of the household chores are his (darned straight it's half and half). And she'd just finished telling me that her weekend was "relaxing"; spent watching movies.

So, when I am having a delightfully productive and homey sort of weekend, it will forever be a "domestic" weekend in my mind. (Don't forget the air quotes...they're very important!).

Such weekends provide lots of blog fodder though, and I'm sure I'm already approaching my 1000 words. So, what have I done this weekend?

- Gone stash diving and come up with a million things to knit that are neither socks nor sweaters.

- Picked up a couple more balls of Cascade 220 for my next colorwork sweater. I think I have a pattern designed, too.

- Discovered that there is a woman at our farmer's market that sells absolutely gorgeous hanks of hand-dyed, fingering weight alpaca for a reasonable price (!!)

- Been sorely tempted, and walked away (I might have said something about next week...)

- Made the front of a quilted wallhanging for my new office (I'll show it to you later)

- Pieced most of a lap quilt I'm working on.

- Begun the fall Washing of the Sweaters

- Figured out how to knit the Mitts of Rovaniemi. I've been toying with the idea for a while, and decided to sit down and just figure it out. It's delightfully simple. I see more colorwork in my future.

- Made a tomato sauce (yes, for an Italian, this is a day-long accomplishment worth writing about)

-Made chili (yay for weeknight dinners!)

I think that's about it for now. I have a few hours left, though. Not a bad "domestic" weekend, I must say.

Oh, and because I promised,



Even though I had to take the sweater off to take the picture. See how much I care?

P.S. (684 words, if anyone was counting.)

P.P.S. That last line didn't count. Neither does this one.

Done!

At least I think it is. There's an error, but I think I'm ok with it. Can you see what it is? (I know, the sweater is dark...I promise, you can see the problem!)



It took me a two tryings-on and a few minutes in front of the mirror wondering why the sweater looked a little off to find it. I'm interested to see if anyone can see it, or if it's just me.

This sweater isn't exactly what I'd planned for the yarn to become, but it took on a life of its own while I was knitting, and who am I to argue? I think I like it much better this way than as the open-front cardigan I'd planned.

I've been wondering since the swatch if there was a tiny, tiny bias in the yarn. I played with it for a few days trying to decide, but couldn't really measure any leaning. I noticed it again in the sleeves, and decided that I wouldn't chance steeking and having a crooked front opening. I tend to like pull over sweaters better anyway, but I was a little afraid that the alpaca would be too warm.

But really? A sweater that's too warm? I've never encountered such a thing. I have been known to go for weeks in the winter without wearing a coat if my sweater's enough (even in Boston), so a warm sweater has never been something to avoid. Isn't that what they're for, anyway?

I do have to say, though, that alpaca is warm. This fingering weight sweater is about as warm as my favorite worsted weight wool.

Did I mention my house is cold? Well, it is. I could just turn on the heat, but that would be giving in way too early. It's only October 10th! So, it's blankets and tea and handwarmers, and sweaters.

I am so excited that this one is done! I had to stay up last night and finish. I just couldn't go to bed with the last few inches unfinished. I wore it all day today, despite the fact that I haven't woven in all the ends yet (I was writing from home, so none of my labmates needed to wonder about the trailing threads). I wanted to give myself some time to decide whether to pull back and fix the mistake, or whether I should just leave it (the bias issue is not the mistake). I don't think it bothers me. And I love the sweater.

I can see the bias a tiny bit in the colorwork; only about a quarter or half an inch of lean for every six inches of knitting, but it's there. The neck decreases seem to accentuate it a little bit.







I think I love it anyway.



I've been too busy wearing the sweater to actually take a picture of the floats. It's cold in here, and I'm not taking off my warmest layer, even for the blog. I will try to remember to post construction details next time.

So of course, this means that I now need to seriously consider the "what next?" question. I've been knitting on this for so long that I forgot it might really end someday...

Colorwork and kittens

No, it's not as bad as the title sounds. Colorwork and kittens are in separate rooms, with at least one door and a cage between them.

The kittens weren't supposed to happen. I'm allergic, and having a bunch of foster kittens in the house when it's closed up for the winter is just not the smartest idea. That is, assuming that I want to breathe.

But...the shelter was full again suddenly with late litters, and they send out these guilt emails saying that they're desperate, and next thing you know we have 4 new cuddly little bundles of fluff and claws.

But how could we resist these faces?















The little black fluffy one is exactly the color of Oblivion...it must be fate. I could put her on the sweater and she'd disappear (I'm not trying...kittens and colorwork stay in separate rooms!).

I am about halfway done with the colorwork now, which feels like it's taking me forever after all that mindless stockinette. But, my stitch count is down by about 40%, and I'm sailing into the neck decreases soon. The house has suddenly gotten cold, so I'm really looking forward to having a new sweater!