………………………………………………………………..

I stare in horror.

The sleeve is too small. I followed the pattern. I scratch my head and stare. Then I realize that I knit it on smaller needles to make the size small fit my even smaller sister-in-law Si. Drat. I need to make another set of sleeves.

In happier news, I finished a monkey sock for the monkey sock swap 3.

In case, you think this blog has been drained of all color, I have included a lovely pic of Lexi the Slut puppy.

Slut puppy? Yes see the diaper on the butt. The little miss has become a women and though the fact that most of my carpets are red or red brown, I don’t want women making stains on them. So thus the slut pup has come of age and has discovered that she is even more flexible and will sure make the boys wild with her ability to do multiple weird angled moves.

Today was turning out to be a great day. I had finally kicked my butt into gear and was trucking my way through my work project. I was loving it. I took a less than five minute break to let the dogs in from a bathroom break and check my email. Seconds later, I hear a crack. My first thoughts were great she got another thing of churchable’s. So I headed into her favorite space were she destroys razors, soccer balls and basically anything plastic. She never seems to destroy my stuff just Frankie’s and Churchable’s. Not today.

Look below and you will see what damage she has wrought. At least the yarn is safe. I would hate to have to call Tina and explain that my dog ate her yarn. I doubt I would last if all my projects had that result.

That my friends is my only size 7 US Circular in the house. I have DPNs but who wants to knit a sweater on DPNs. I might be desperate. The yarn store is already closed for the day. I hope she has 7s in stock tomorrow or I will be driving to Portland or Vancouver. We will see. The first solution is to have churchable whittle them down and then sand them smooth. It only matters that the needle size is a 7 not the tip. What would you do before shooting the dog?

Let me explain also that I spent most of the day with her. She went walking in the morning, she sat with me at the computer all day and she even shared my knitting chair all afternoon. Every once and a while I would pat her head or scratch an ear. No gratitude.

So I know I have been less than posty this last week, The reason behind this is that I am knitting a mystery project. The blob of blue above. Last week, I did not get to work on the socks till Friday night while I waited for Stephanie Pearl-McPhee speak at Powell’s bookstore in PDX.

I had this event on my calendar for over 2 months. I was planning it and asked my friend who just learn to knit to join me. Things were going without a hitch. Churchable would stay with the doggies while we laughed about yarn. Fast forward to Friday, my friend called to say that Stephanie was on TV. We flipped it on and ate breakfast in front of the TV. When they announced that Stephanie was speaking tonight at Powell’s, churchable looks at me and states “Do you want to go?” Ummmmmm…….. “Yeah, we are leaving at 4.” “Oh cool”. “So do you want to come?” “Yeah I think that Stephanie is funny and I would like to hear her talk.”

Click on the pic to find out what Stephanie did to the pink sock.

Let’s just say I was amazed that my hubby would join us. My poor friend has a husband in the camp of extreme CHOKE (Cultural Humiliation Of Knitters Everywhere), but that caused her to laugh even harder because she was going through it. Let’s just say that she knits rather fast for a beginner but her projects take a while because she can’t knit or crochet when her hubby is home. Poor girl.

I got three of the yarn harlot’s books signed. Yeah. I love having such a great bookstore near me that brings in authors. I have done to a few signings. I typically am more interested in the talk than the signing but it is cool to meet them and ask individual questions.

This weekend was weird. Friday was amazingly hot. I wish that we had worked in the yarn but no we waited to do that on Saturday. Well we awoke to rain and that is all it did for the rest of the weekend. I knit on my mystery project and finished the sock.

I cleaned up my studio so I can knit in it again.

The sock? you ask. Yes I have finished a pair of socks in less than a month. Hmmm … I think this is a Blue Moon conspiracy to have me only knit socks with their yarn. Why knit with anything else if Blue Moon is the fastest.

Aunt Carrie-carrie-bo-berry,
you wanted to see my cute little face in my new sweater. I can’t wait to meet you and kiss you like I am kissing daddy above. You will like me much better than Fred. I am much better behaved and I am not interested in chasing kitties.

Now the knitting:

So I spent the day doing good pursuits but got in a good 5 hours or so of knitting. I know that I listened to about 8 hours of knitting podcasts and started and finished a ball of yarn on Sahara today. I am loving this knit. It is going so fast. I started it on Thursday night and knit on it some on Friday, Sunday and Tuesday. I am an increase away from starting the hem. Churchable is kind enough to be winding up the trim yarn which is the Blue Moon Bling. I am going to swatch it tomorrow so that I can get the right gauge.

The sock above is the one I started at the beginning of the month. I barely worked on them and they are almost done. The yarn is so yummy. It is Blue Moon Sock Candy. The stitch pattern I am using is very tight and best suited to this stretchy yarn. I like the fit, but I don’t like the bind off I did. I need to try a few more. I will do that on the other sock.

WIP Wednesday did not happen because I had a horrible migraine brought on by unknown sources and made worse by a neighbor pressure washing his truck and listening to old eps of Knitty D and the city. I had finished up the baby vest and did not get to have much knitting time. I thought knitting was soothing but it was not as good as pain killers and a nap.

Now I must present the cutest baby item that I have made so far. Remember this goes to the missionaries headed out next month before their baby is born. The yarn I used was yarn that I bought when I was on a trip to Turkey. At that time, I thought I would be heading overseas to help villages establish small textile industries and then export them back to the US and Europe. So since I am not destine to go overseas, my yarn creations can have fun without me.

Pattern: Argyle Vest in Vogue Knitting Baby Knits Two on the go!
Yarn: Nako (100% yun – aka wool in Turkish) 100gr – green & blue. I got this wool back in 2000 when I knew nothing about weight or gauge. I just saw 100% wool CHEAP! It is great wool. I have made several things with it including a color work beret.
Needles: Brittany US 5 circulars and Inox US 3 circulars
Mods: None but I learned to seam with this pattern. Yeah I know how to do it right. I learned by looking up the information in my 2002 Interweave Knits mags. They had a 2 part article on seaming. I wish that I had done a 3 needle bind off at the shoulders but I was not thinking when I finished the back.

I finished the shrug for Bud. I will post about it later when I can get a pic of her wearing it. For now I will leave you with a close up of the stitch pattern.

All in all I had a great birthday weekend hanging out with my husband all weekend. I don’t normally get to spend so much time with him since he either is busy with work or Boy Scouts. This weekend he ditched the scouts to hang out with me. What a special girl I must be.

On Friday we headed out to my fav spot near our home. I am so lucky to live near such beauty. We had fun as the dogs played in the water and snow. The weather was clear and sunny.

On Saturday Churchable took me to the Astoria Crab & Seafood Festival. I was really looking forward to tasting all the yummy seafood. If I am given a choice of meats, then I usually choose the seafood option. The food was good but there was not very much seafood. It was mostly wine. Oh well.

Since we did not have very much at the festival, I made Spicy Steak Tacos from Cook’s Country.
Updated with recipe on Experimentation of Taste.

We have a finished object. I have been knitting along with the Sexy Knitters Club since the beginning of the year. This is my 3rd sweater with them and my 2nd KAL. This is Rusted Root. I really love the fit and enjoy the look I have here. Here are the stats.

Pattern: Rusted Root by Zephyr Style
Yarn: Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece (80% cotton /20% Merino Wool) 3 skeins in Candy Apple.
Needles: US size 6 circular (unknown maker – an original from before I knew about wood) and US size 5 circular (unknown maker) and dpns (clover) for ribbing on arms and waist. G hook (susan bates, of course) for the neckline.
Mods: Ok here goes. I stuck pretty much to the pattern but took out the puffy sleeves. I really am happy with the lack of puff. I decided since I was making the size down from my chest size that I did not want the ribbing to pull in too much and went up to a size 5 needle for the ribbing. Also the photos of the neckline did not jump out at me as being cohesive to the pattern so I skipped the ribbing and did a single crochet around the neck – going into every stitch on the shoulder sides and into every two out of three stitches on the front and back neck. Also I did not like the look of the p3tog on row 9 of the lace pattern and placed a k3tog instead. I felt this caused the lace to flow more smoothly.

More pictures below:

Last time I mentioned that I had a shrug to make for my sister-in-law Bud. I got to start it Tuesday since I had finished Rusted Root on Monday. The I do shrug has a complicated lace pattern that is different every row. I am using Valley Yarns Southwick (52% Pima Cotton / 48% Bamboo) in Onyx. I am not so excited about this yarn as when I ordered it. The yarn is loosely twisted and thus individual strands snag while knitting. I have the 18 line lace pattern memorized and I am halfway up one side. Hopefully I will get a lot done on it this weekend while I am at a retreat where I get to sit, listen and KNIT.

I am off for the weekend to go to a retreat. On the way there, my friend and I will be doing a yarn shop hop. See ya next week.

My father-in-law and my youngest sister-in-law were visiting for a car swap. The boys spent most of the weekend in Portland buying things like this…

It’s an original Datson Z car which was so popular Nissan came out with a Z car recently.

While I hung out with Bud and measured her for such things as the I do shrug to be worn with her formal dress in May, fixing laundry oops and having a generally relaxing time. Me knitting of course and her reading a good book or two.

Saturday did bring an excursion to Portland to join the boys and show Bud the city where her parents met. Well we weren’t that good at it and ended up just showing her Waterfront park and distracting all the pedestrians with our new puppy Lexi.

Last but not least we were offered 4 free tickets to the Mariners game on Sunday afternoon. Now I must say I love baseball because I can A) knit B) knit and C) spend time enjoying sports with my husband. I enjoyed the game immensely considering this is my first game where the Mariners won. They seem to be ramping up for an awesome season. I can’t wait for the Stitch n’Pitch in July. My only complaint was the weather was cold and the coffee was bad. (The Fourbucks had more problems than the usual burnt coffee – they were completely forgetting to put coffee in the lattes for some and others giving you cold coffee.) I tried to knit faster so that I might be able to wear my WIP but by the point I was going to put it on the sun hit our seats during the 8th inning.

Now for truly good knitting news:

I have two works in progress. One is my usual slow plodding sock. This time I have been knitting for my husband who has really long narrow feet. I have the most terrible time fitting him and these fit the best but I think I am going to have to break down and really learn how to make gusseted heels. My point of triumph on this sock was completing one sock and starting on the second sock so that this one won’t be lonely. I did make the comment that from now on my husband will only be receiving mediumweight socks rather than the usual lightweight socks.

My second WIP was started last weekend since I was unsure of the correct size for the shrug and I needed something fast. I was having a moment of boredom from being to dedicated to one project. I am working on Rusted Root from the Zephyr Girls. It is part of the April/May Sexy Knitters KAL. I almost was not going to participate when I found out that it did not take too many skeins of Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece, which I just happen to have the right amount of yarn for. I started the pattern twice because I did not feel like swatching and realized that my gauge was off. Instead of switching needles I went up a size in the pattern and decided that I would just adjust the one point where I needed to make it bigger – the arms and body divide point. After starting twice, I figured out how to depuff the sleeves. I am really not a puffy sleeve person. So far I am really loving this pattern and I am excited to finish and start on the shrug for Bud.