It is Finished

As of 9:00 am, the sweater is finished. I have gold medaled in my first Olympics! Well, okay, my first knitting Olympics. I'm very excited but I will post pictures later.

In the meantime, good night and happy knitting.

Addictive Handspun

I can't stop knitting handspun.
I need to get back to my Olympic sweater but:

Tah DAH!

Isn't it cute?! It's so perfect to fit right in my purse and carry my travelling sock. Now I may need to make more and/or write the pattern because it's so cute, I can't stand it! The bag literally hadn't had the ends woven in longer than 2 minutes when I stuffed an in-progress sock into it and it is now awaiting me leaving the house so I can put it in my purse.

*sigh* Okay, back to the Olympic sweater. Then Crochet Night.

Olympic Knitting

I've been stalking the Yarn Harlot's blog and watching for the Knitting Olympics. Finally, the time came and I signed myself up.
Then came the real issue. I had some yarn, that I had already swatched, that I wanted to knit up into a sweater. A pretty black Cardigan.
The yarn was Andean Silk from Knitpicks that I had picked up at our last Fiber Swap for our spinning guild. Someone had purchased it to knit into a sweater for their mother and it wasn't working out so they decided to sell the yarn. I couldn't stop petting it and holding it and I finally decided that I couldn't live without it.
The trouble was, I hadn't found a pattern that would fit me that used the amount of yarn I had, that also used the size needles I had.
Finally, I remembered something way back in my subconscious and I looked up Hey, Teach! I decided that I would knit it up with this beautiful yarn.
I cast on and knit my way up the back. (After a little math because the gauge I was getting was close but not the same as what was called for. I am actually knitting a size smaller than what I would normally choose.)
Today, I blocked the back. Here it is, preblocking.

I was feeling pretty good about my progress until I realized how little time is left and how much is left to be knit.
The good news? I'm knitting the fronts at the same time:

I'm already into the lace pattern. Really, this wouldn't be so much, but I'm altering the sleeves. I want full length, not lace sleeves. Meaning, I have a long way to go yet, in a not very long time.

And, last night, I was having an issue with the dark yarn. I needed some color so, I found this little ball of handspun. In color: Girly Girl, purchased at a friend's etsy shop. Hand over the Wool. It's very pretty but not super soft. It's rambouillet I believe, wouldn't you know it, I can't find the tag right now.

I started with a pattern in 101 Designer One-Skein Wonders for a little knitting bag and completely changed the pattern to something totally different, different stitch, different shape, etc.
To something that is now all mine.

It takes some convincing to not knit on this instead of the sweater, but the sweater must be finished. The Gold is on the line.

Unplugged

I've been trying to write my poor little blog more often and of course, this week I have completely disappeared. I honestly didn't mean to. I went down to my parents last week on Thursday evening to help with the Fish Fry at their church on Friday. Yeah, busy, busy day. 2200 pounds of fish and we ran out at 6:00 pm. Anyway, then I decided to stay a bit longer to get to visit with my grandpa on his 85th Birthday which was on Sunday. Yes, he is a Valentine's Day baby. His name is Valentine as a matter of fact. Val if you know him, he actually hates his name.

Anyway, I had a blast with my mom and the animals and then my brother came out one day and we had some outside winter fun. I usually do nothing outside in the winter so it was a blast. Made me not hate the snow quite as much.

Here's the parental's dog out in the snow. (Actually after I was gone mom said he would go outside, then come in and look all over for me. When I wasn't there anymore, he would go lay in his kennel to sleep.)


My dad on the snowmobile. Making faces at the camera. Of course.


Apparently the snowmobile wasn't enough because my brother brought out the 4-wheeler as well. It was hard work driving it though.

hee hee, obviously.


Look at how the snow flips up too!


And of course, the sunrise behind the trees because I just couldn't resist.

Otherwise, all I've been doing is Olympics Sweater, all the time. More on that later.

Weather whether we like it or not.

So lately, we've had some REALLY interesting weather here. Its been snow, ice, snow, ice, snow, snow, snow. Today (surprise, surprise) we're getting snow. This means that I've been cold pretty much all the time until I get into bed. It also means that I'm pretty sick of it.
So, I started a pair of handwarmers. Fingerless mitts, whatever you want to call them.
Unfortunately, the weather will not cooperate with the idea of taking pictures of these works-in-progress. You will have to just wait and see I guess. I can tell you, it's very pretty purple yarn and it is very, very soft.

In other news, I was given about 30 boxes of easter egg dye so today, I'm dyeing some yarn. Just enough for one pair of socks...for now. I can't wait to show you that too!

Well, I'm off to get some things done. Like check my yarn in the microwave. Ever wonder what people think of us?

Today's Goal: Get caught up.

Yesterday was a kind of crazy day so I didn't get a whole lot of knitting in. I did manage to finish a Crochet project during crochet night but it needs desperately to be washed and blocked before it's ready for its blog debut.
Mostly I knit on my Lace Knee high socks. I still love them and so, it's going fast but right now, it just looks like a slightly longer leg than what you saw before. Oh well.
Today I plan to cast on my Rocky Butte Socks. I'm trying out some new (to me) yarn for my Rocky Butte socks and I am curious to see how it will turn out. I'm keeping it a secret until I know.
My other goal for today is to get my Ravelry projects page updated because it is getting ridiculous. I got a bit behind when we moved and it has only gotten steadily worse. Now I'm not sure I recognize most things on there so I've got to do something.
Well, I'm off to take pictures of knitting and yarn now.

The Bliss of Handspun

About a month ago we had a little spinning gathering, not affiliated with a guild, just so some ladies from knit night could learn to spin. Well, we all got bitten by the spinning bug and a "long-term loan" wheel came home with me. It's also up for sale and I have to say, it's not going home with someone else. It's mine, all mine.

Anyway, then for my birthday, my hubby asked what I would like. I said: ROVING! immediately so I went online and purchased a couple of rovings for myself (from him).

I ended up purchasing 3 from Forest Fiber Works. (ugh! Fair warning, do not click that link unless you want to buy. Some gorgeous stuff there!) They were all somewhat green but different. When they arrived, I LOVE love loved two and the other, I was kinda meh about. I decided, since I was still getting acclimated to the wheel, to spin the one I was meh about. I have to say: "WOWEEEEE" It turned out so different than I imaged and absolutely beautiful. I actually got Sock yarn, which is what I was going for so I was in heaven.

I got about 490 yards out of it and I decided that it should be something special. It is:

This is what I was knitting in front of the fireplace at the mansion yesterday. The pattern is Lace Knee-Highs (Ravelry link) and I'm so excited I just can't stop knitting.

Hopefully I can get them done before the excitement wears off.

I'm trying to get back into the habit of posting, so hopefully you will be hearing from me more often. (Although probably not tomorrow since I have to leave the house early and won't get home until after Crochet Night)