Another scarf finished

My beautiful knit-wear model shows off Patternwork's July scarf club project which I completed last night. This is a very comfy scarf, warm and soft with the 33% angora. And such a pretty scarf, the way the yarn changes color almost every pattern repeat is in a different color. It almost shimmers with the color changes.

This added another 130 yards to my total and I'm ready to cast-on another scarf. I love that my gift stash is growing too. I know that Christmas will be here before we know it, especially now that school will be starting in a week but I'm not afraid! Creating these small projects each month is just another benefit (justification) for joining the clubs.

August mailings

I received very happy mail yesterday, both my club deliveries arrived on the same day. I didn't even have time to get anxious as they arrived before the end of the month.

The clubs include the scarf club from Patternworks and the sock club from Three Irish Girls. The sock club mailing was an extra large skein of 100% superwash merino called Beckon in the colorway Lagoon. The extra goody that came along with the sock club was a group of gift tags with cute labels stating your gift is hand-made. An example, "Yes, I did make it and no, you can't return it" from kniterlla. Very cute package and I can't wait to make Lagoon colored socks but I must finish July's first!

I will detail the scarf club mailing in another post.

Today is school supply shopping day, always a fun day. Happy Saturday!

Random Friday

What a mess! I don't know how this happens so quickly. The table next to my chair that holds my knitting - I clean it off and put one knitting project there that I work on in the evening when I finally get a chance to sit down. All of a sudden its a storage place for a month's worth of knitting magazine subscriptions and catalogs, swatches, three knitting projects, and a pile of books that I haven't read yet. Its a breeding ground for clutter. Its what Flylady would call a Hot Spot.

For awhile I live with it because I know I put each thing there for a reason but pretty soon its no longer each individual item that I touched for some reason but a huge, single mess that must be dealt with. This weekend I will deal with this Hot Spot and cool it down by putting stuff away.

I may even knit a little bit.

Sock on the road

My sock and I drove to Portland yesterday afternoon. I went for a concert with my husband, my sock came along for the ride. I turned the heal and started working down the foot as we drove over the Government Camp pass. It was a very pretty drive, the sun was out and it was a lovely afternoon.







I got a picture of my sock with Mt. Hood in the background.







We went to see The Dead Weather, Jack White's new band, my husband is a big fan. Their opening band, at left, was called Tyvek. My phone camera does not take the best pictures, especially from a distance so you wouldn't be able to pick out the drummer who played standing up the whole set.



At left here, The Dead Weather. Again, very difficult to tell who is who but it was a good show and fortunately for me, my husband played the album several times over the last few weeks so that I recognized the songs and was able to sing along. We drove back to Bend after the show so it was a late night.

Thankfully, no work for me today unless you count taking a 12 year old to the 2nd out of three dentist appointments in the span of a week work.

Project progress

Despite the week away and challenges of getting back to the routine, some progress has been made on a few knitting projects.

I finally cast on for my July sock club socks and am really enjoying working on them. After telling people at knitting group last night about joining a sock club, one woman asked if my goal was really to knit a pair of socks a month. It is my goal, I don't need 12 skeins of socks yarn just piling up to enhance my stash. I want to actually get through these shipments and make some socks. My goal is to knit up every skein of yarn that gets delivered to my door.

I washed and blocked the swatch for mom's sweater. I don't generally do this but I listened to Kelly Petkun's podcast on swatching and learned why its important to wash and block your swatch and I figure this project should be done the right way so I am going to do it step by step.



Work on the July scarf-club scarf continues a-pace and it will certainly be done before the next shipment arrives. Now that I know they don't come until the very last moment of the month, I know I have plenty of time to get this done before the next one comes. Its nice to just work one pattern repeat each night and watch it grow.




I looked far and wide at Sock Summit for the perfect pattern to use for my sock-club socks and finally found the Urban Strollers pattern by Aurora Yarns. It is looking really nice with this colorway and its just what I wanted.





July's colorway - Rhubarb, isn't it pretty?

Vacation pics

This picture of the kids with Mt. Lassen behind them is one of my favorites of the trip.

We had a very geologic trip, seeing two caves - the Oregon Caves and Shasta Caverns at Lake Shasta, two volcanoes - Mt. Lassen and Mt. Shasta, and we threw in the Redwoods and a little bit of beach as well.


It was a great trip but its nice to be back in a routine and look out - school begins in three weeks!

We're back

Had a great time and packed in a lot of fun stuff.

More later after the laundry and I get back into the routine.

On vacation, back in a week

We're heading our for a road trip - three kids across the back seat, camping gear in the back and the roof of the car.

Oregon Caves, Trees of Mystery, the Redwoods, Mt. Lassen National Park, are just some of the planned destinations.

See you in a week.

Sock Summit 2009

Whoa! What an overwhelming experience. I didn't attend any classes, lectures, or social functions and I won't be able to see the Luminary panel that is being held today. All I did was go to the Marketplace, but that was enough to completely over-stimulate me. But oh, the stimulation. It was yarn love!

And to start off the day, the YarnLove booth by Sharon (of Three Irish Girls fame) and her partner, whose name I unfortunately did not catch. They co-own the YarnLove company. They also had Three Irish Girls yarn in the booth and it was the most dazzling display for me as it is completely my aesthetic. There are lots and lots of booths full of yarn in the Marketplace of course, and many of them I was able to walk right by without being drawn in for one reason or another and alot of it has to do with aesthetic. The ladies of YarnLove definitley have my aesthetic. I introduced myself to Sharon and told her how happy I was to be part of her sock club and she was just the nicest Yarnista you could imagine. She cares about her club and making it happy. I also told her how much I adore the photography on her website and she said she's glad to hear that since she works very hard on it. My rock-star moment of the day was talking to Sharon.


Here is the Frog Creek Fibers booth where I also bought a skein of yarn and told the owners how much I like their yarn and how nice it was that they are local. They were very sweet!



The next happy skein I bought came from Miss Babs Hand-dyed yarn from Mountain City, TN.


The photo really does not do their booth justice. They had ALOT of yarn. I bought the sweetest green-y, light blue-y, yellow-ish color called Bluegrass, mostly for the name and in honor of Bluegrass music which I love, but it is also a beautiful colorway. Can you imagine shipping all that yarn from Tennesee to Oregon? Hope they sell most of it so the shipping home is cheaper.


Dye Dreams from the Boston area:

beautiful yarns, fun kits, and fantastic, fabric project-bags with the most fun little beaded zipper pulls. Had to have one! Also got a kit with a skein and a sock pattern from their club. (I wonder if I can get away with joining another sock club? Would I be able to knit two pair a month, or would it just be gratuitous stash enhancement?) The patterns and yarn were beautiful!



Another rock-star moment was when I spied Kathy and Steve from Webs, America's yarn store

at their booth. I listen to these two every week on their podcast and its so cool to see them in the flesh. I did not introduce myself, by that time I was pretty beat but thought I should at least take a photo. Its blurry because Steve was looking right at me and I felt a little like a hay-seed in the big city taking pictures of famous people, although they're probably used to it. I did see the Yarn Harlot walking around the place as well, but restrained myself from taking a photo of her. I bet she'd be immune to cameras by this time.

I stopped myself from buying a circular needle from a man who makes glass needles. His work was gorgeous and I had a really difficult time tearing myself away, I was this close to buying them, but I persevered and will save that purchase for another day. He's from Drain, Oregon which is almost reason in itself to make the purchase!!

I met Wendy from HazelKnits in Seattle who had deals going with her yarn and pottery from a potter here in Bend. He makes 'yarn bowls', a bowl with a little notch in the top edge. Yarn sits in the bowl and as you knit, you pull the yarn through the notch. I REALLY want one, its a decorative way to store your work in progress and functional as well. I will check out her etsy store at a later date, she was a sweet and friendly girl.

There were so many booths worth noting but I could not mention them all here. It was a full, fun, and overwhelming day and I had a lovely time. I'm so glad we, as Oregonians, got to be so close to the excitement and be able to join in. It was worth the drive and a great opportunity to buy directly from the vendors in person. I had lots of great conversations with kniterati and strangers alike and feel like part of the larger community.

I will leave you with the official yarn bootie from the day:


Three Irish Girls Devon on Finley, Frog Creek Fibers Trix are for kids on Ebullient, Miss Babs Hand Dyed Bluegrass on Yummy, and Dye Dreams Wisteria on Twinkle Toes. A pattern called Cables Undone by Dye Dreams, and a pattern called Urban Strollers by Aurora Yarn.

Thank you, Stephanie and Tina, for a fantastic show!

Finished Object

The summer sweater is done and I will proudly wear it to Sock Summit this morning.

I love the construction of the sweater - in the round with sleeves that were knit along with the rest of the sweater and not added on later or picked up seperately. I wish all sweater were this easy to make with no seaming!

The only problem with this sweater is the arm holes are too large underneath and I think the problem is that I don't know how big my body actually is. Somehow when I begin a project I think I am larger than I really am and make a size too big. Every sweater I've completed has turned out too big.

I will just have to work on this by making more sweaters for me.

Tomorrow, Sock Summit pictures!

Its beginning to look a lot like Sock Summit

I'm just about finished with the summer sweater, I have just three more rows of seed stitch edging around the neck and then I can bind off. I may even be able to wear it to Sock Summit tomorrow! Almost done and its still summer, imagine that!

Its beginning to look a lot like Sock Summit - everywhere I read on Ravelry and blogs people are talking about it, traveling to it, or lamenting they are not going. I am so excited to go check out the Marketplace tomorrow. I will leave from Bend early and drive to Portland for a few hours to see what I can see. I have downloaded the map of the vendor booths and highlighted the ones I can't miss: Three Irish Girls, Frog Creek Fibers, A Verb for Keeping Warm, and Lisa Souza. I will stop by to say hello to the Gossamer girls who will be there from Bend as well. And I'll check out Blue Moon Fiber Arts since I've actually never seen any 'Socks that Rock' yarn. I know it will be super stimulating and I'll come home with so many ideas and things I want to do.

Speaking of things I want to do, the fall knitting mags are out:

I like many of the patterns in this issue of IK, way more than I will ever have time to make, and there are a few in the KnitSimple issue as well that were too cute to pass up. And of course the cutest pattern in knitscene that is spreading like wildfire already and is at the top of my list: the heather hoodie vest.

Our hot weather has disappeared and its feeling a lot like fall today so I am more inspired than ever to dig in and start knitting!

New Project

I've swatched for a new project that I plan on working on at the same time as the other current projects: the summer sweater, July's scarf, and shortly July's sock club socks (as soon as I can decide on a pattern.) This new project is one that has been years in my mind. Two years to be exact.

My mom bought yarn for me to make her a sweater two summers ago and its been on my mind ever since. She wants a short-sleeved, short-wasted cardigan in a 'bright' yarn. This yarn is definitely bright - I've never knit with anything quite like it. Its Aura from Trendsetter Yarns in 100% nylon and its crazy. The base yarn is pretty varigated yarn in pink, orange, red, and purple and then it has a shiny, confetti looking aura spun in. Its kind of furry.

I was afraid I would hate knitting with it, but it was actually kind of nice and a good change from the cotton of the summer sweater.





We've picked out a pattern that we're using as a template (Annette from the Summer 09 Knitty) and I think with this yarn, the pattern will work out great. Mom, the furriness of the yarn will counter-act the tight-look in the fishnet pattern that I think you weren't too excited about. Here's a look at how the pattern would look in this yarn. The fuzziness of the yarn will fill in
the holes that are so prominent in the original pattern. I think the yarn will make the sweater drape well and not feel so form fitting as it looked in the picture and turn out to be just what you were looking for.

Journaling

Back on July 22nd here I talked (a little bit) about the book Visual Chronicles by Linda Woods and Karen Dinino, the one that was out of print. I ordered it through Amazon from a book store in Tennessee called Smoky Mountain Books and it came last week.









The book is about journaling your real self, as the authors say 'transferring your essence to the surface' of a page, which appeals to me because I think you can get a lot of soul work done if you journal and get your thoughts and experiences from the day out of your head to a place where you can look at them, I think it helps you learn and grow. And its extra nice if you can use your creative process at the same time.

I love the titles of the chapters in this book, or I should say Fear Busters? Fear Buster #1 I have no time, Fear Buster #2 I can't write, Fear Buster #3 I'm just not Artistic, etc.

I went out and got myself a few supplies to start out with and have been writing each night. Its
much less artistic than the book encourages but I'm taking baby steps and I'm definitely being me.

Sock Club

My first sock club mailing arrived on Saturday from Three Irish Girls. This is a beautiful skein of 80% Merino, 10% Nylon, and 10% Cashmere in the Rhubarb colorway, its so pretty.

This is the July offering and the pattern that comes with it was delivered via email download on Friday. I also got a little extra with the yarn and this month it was a sheep pendant on a chain - what fun!

I love my sock club!

Its August

I can't believe July is over already. If there is one month that flies by for me, its July. I think I'm glad its over now, maybe we'll have some peace. And by the way, did you feel like last week had two Mondays? It felt like it to me.

I did go to knitting group on Wednesday night, we were a small group but it was nice. I have been working a little bit each day on July's scarf. The yarn is revealing itself to have such color variation, its beautiful.

This scarf is going to be very cozy with the halo of mohair around it.

Everything I read in the knitting world lately is geared to the Sock Summit happening next week in Portland. Its exciting and I am making plans to go up on Saturday to check out the marketplace for a few hours.

Have you heard about Sock Summit? Are you going? Use that comment link down there and tell me about it.