one thing always leads to another

In other words, how to justify buying yarn.

It started innocently enough. I've been trying to use up my stash yarn and I have about 650 yards of some really pretty dark grey tweed Queensland Kathmandu worsted. It really wasn't enough to make a sweater so, after I saw Peaknit's gorgeous version, I decided to make Hawthorne. Fast forward to the part where I am trying to cast-on 311 stitches!!! The pattern calls for a 32" circular but I thought I could maybe get away with a 29". Nope. No way.

Of course, that lead me to Knit Picks for a 32" circular needle. I couldn't just order that one thing. I didn't seem very efficient.

Into my cart jumped 11 balls of Swish dk in squirrel heather to make a New York Cardigan.

It has been ages since I have bought yarn for a new sweater! I was so excited when I got it that I immediately cast on and am now almost halfway through the body of the sweater. :)

Birthday Contest

I would say a 30th birthday calls for some celebration and a contest, don't you? I certainly don't feel thirty. There are so many things in my life I am grateful for right now, I feel really blessed!

THE PRIZE

I've been hoarding these gorgeous skeins of Louet Gems Pearl in Crabapple. It's a really happy pink but not too bright. These will make a gorgeous scarf, shawlette or pair of socks!

HOW TO WIN

Okay, it's simple. I need your opinions! I'm thinking about changing my banner for my Etsy shop and I want to know which one you like best.

Current banner:Possible banner #1

Possible banner #2

Possible banner #3

Just leave a comment and let me know what you think. I will draw a winner on Wednesday, Sept 15th at noon CDT.

I hope everyone has a great weekend! Take a moment and remember the 3,000 lives that were lost 9 years ago.

Bluberry Hill Sewing Weekend...

...with HEATHER ROSS!!! and if that wasn't exciting enough, Liesl Gibson of Oliver an S and the great Denyse Schmidt were also there! Needless to say it was beautiful in Vermont! and I can't describe to you how thrilled I was to get away from our streak of 100+ degree days (going on day 19 currently)!Cocktail hour with Liesl, Heather and Denyse.We were frequently joined by the lovable inn dog, Griffin.I was actually able to finish something! Amy Butler's Birdie Sling made with Echino Camera in Citron and Kona Cotton in Medium Gray.Denyse did a little workshop for us to make quilted pouches. Me and Heather. Heather was so fun and generous with her wealth of knowledge!I had some time before my plane left and I stopped by a sweet little yarn shop near Burlington, Kaliedoscope Yarns.

Of course I had to purchase something from their amazing selection of yarns. This is one skein of Madelinetosh dk.

All in all it was the most fun weekend I've had in a long time! All the other ladies in the group were so nice and generous! I thoroughly enjoyed getting to know everyone!

New obsessions

*Warning* Plucky Classics Club spoiler at the end!!!

And, sorry, some non-knitting baby stuff first (I don't mind if you skip to the knitting!).

First of all, I'm a bit embarrased to tell you that in the last few weeks I have become completely obsessed with the idea of cloth diapering! Crazy, I know!When I first became pregnant my mother-in-law mentioned something about cloth diapering and, never having known anyone who has cloth diapered, I remember thinking....that's crazy! and gross! how do you clean the poo off??? Since then, I've done a lot of research and read a lot of how-to's and seen first hand how our friends in South Dakota do it (I didn't realize they cloth diapered until we visited them). So, you know what? it doesn't look that hard!!! plus, the money savings is a very motivating factor for me, not to mention the environmental benefits. Since, I plan on either quitting my job or going down to very minimal part-time, I know this is something I can do! Getting the diaper packages in the mail this past week has been almost as exciting as getting yarn in the mail. I think part of the reason I've been so excited about it is that I feel like I'm doing something for Baby right now. And when I think of putting those diapers on my little baby I can't stop smiling! This must have something to do with that whole nesting thing too.

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Okay, onto the knitting! I started the Anthropologie-Inspired Capelet (Rav link):

I'm using Lamb's Pride Cotton Fleece in black, which is a drastically different gauge than what the pattern calls for but she gives some great instructions on how to modify it for your own gauge. So far it's coming out really well! Although I just noticed that I have it inside out for this picture but you get the idea. :) I think I will make it a bit longer than the pattern calls for but I only have 2 skeins of the Cotton Fleece so I will have to see how far I can get with that.

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And lastly, but not leastly! I finally got my gorgeous skein of Plucky Classics club yarn! This color is right up my alley and it perfectly fits the name of Miss Marianne Dashwood, full of fire and passion! I also think this will be the perfect yarn to use for the Trystero Socks.

Move over stash!

I am in full organizing/cleaning mode right now! I guess it's what they call "nesting". It's crazy!We live in a two bedroom house so the baby's room has been used a storage room/guest room pretty much since we've been here. I'm transferring all my yarn and unfinished projects from the dresser into plastic bins. You know, my sock yarn stash is actually smaller than I thought it was!! This actually isn't everything though. I have a few miscellaneous half started socks here and there but this is everything that is still in its original unwound, unswatched glory! I pretty much just started all of this organizing this weekend. So right now the room is in a state of absolute destruction because I've pulled everything out of the closet and onto the floor. I think it will take me several weekends to get it all organized.

I was able to clear a little patch of floor to take a picutre of the Amy Butler Gumdrop Pillow I made last weekend. I had bought an extra curtain panel so it will match the rest of the bedding and curtains in the room. It's the small size and I love how it came out! I'll show a better picture when the room is in better shape.

All about Baby Contest!

It's finally that time! Tuesday is the BIG DAY! What will we have......boy or girl? I am so excited I can hardly stand it!The bedding I loved on Target.com went on sale a few weeks ago and I didn't want to risk it getting sold out so I went ahead and ordered both the boy and the girl sets. The boy set is called Zoo and the girl set is called Farm Girl...can you get any cuter!? I'm secretly hoping to be able to keep the girl set because I love it so much but of course I would love to have a boy as well.

I'm really 50/50 on the whole gender thing. I just don't have a strong "feeling" either way. Boy or girl, I'm going to be ecstatic!

So, here is a bump picture taken today:
What do you guys think? I know there are loads of old wives tales about cravings, baby's heartrate, carrying low or high, morning sickness or not, etc. to indicated gender but I think y'all should just give it your best guess! This pregnancy has (thankfully) been very uneventful so far.

So, here are the OFFICAL CONTEST RULES:
Just leave a comments saying what you think our little Sprout is AND your prize preference (see below) by 5PM Tuesday, April 29th.

Now, for the PRIZES! I have two different prizes I'd like to give away, 2 skeins of Lorna's Laces Shepard Sport in the Mother Lode colorway OR 4 skeins of Elsbeth Lavold Silky Tweed in a nice rich green (color 17). Just include which one you prefer in your comment and I'll choose ONE winner from the people who guess the correct gender!

And, some knitting content:I'm trying to finish this little sweater for our Sprout before Tuesday. It the Five Fruits (Ravelry link) sweater by Amanda Kerr (originally published on MagKnits) who is working on a link to the pattern on her site. I'm using just two colors instead of 5 and alternating stripes every two rows. I'm hoping it will turn out to be about a 6 months size so it can be worn this winter. I'm not entirely happy with the colors but hey, I got this Knit One Crochet Two Cotonade on clearence at my LYS and I think it will look fine once it's all done.

I can't wait to see all of your guesses! Have a great weekend everyone!

I may have gone a little crazy

Hey, but who wouldn't when everything is 30% off at your favorite LYS that is going temporarily out of business (Passion Knit in Dallas for you locals)!

Kathmandu Aran tweed in a charcoal grey color. I got 6 balls of this and I think it would be perfect for Zephyr Style's 28Thirty.
More Kathmandu Aran tweed in a gorgeous dark cranberry color. I discovered a new pattern from Bitter Purl that she has for free. The Asymetrical Cabled Cardigan. I think I may swatch today and see if this yarn would work for it. I think I would add more buttons at the top instead of just having them on the neck.
I got some other bits of this and that too for smaller projects like the Fuzzyfeet I've been wanting to make hubby.

I have a bit of a secret project I've been working on that I can't tell you about for another few weeks though. Lest you think I've gone and actually designed something, I can tell you that's not it.It's in my all time favorite cotton yarn Blue Sky Dyed Cotton in the Mediterranian color. Sorry to leave you hanging like this but I figured this blog could use a little suspence!

Oh and if you were wondering how my Seeded Cables Cardigan was coming along, I am at a complete standstill on it due to errors in the pattern. Very frustrating.

Catching up

Wow, so sorry for the long absence! I just got so caught up in the holidays that the time just slipped by me. Well, we had a wonderful Christmas, very relaxing. And I actually got a lot of knitting done or should I say, *a lot of knitting, ripping, rekniting, repeat from *. I'm nearly done now with Cavern.....just a sleeve and a half to go. Hopefully, I'll have some FO pics to share soon!

Anyway, I made quite a haul at the LYS 30% off everything sale the other day.

Two skeins of Noro Kureyon, color 207. I want to make a swatch pillow just like Wendy's.

And these two Skeins of Noro Silk Garden, colors 211 and 82 will be for my Lizard Ridge.

Five skeins of Berroco Ultra Alpaca worsted, color 6241 for a sweater. This stuff is quite a deal even without a sale but these 5 skeins cost me $30!! Now that's an affordable sweater!

I have a few candidates that I want to knit with it. I'm really leaning towards the Placed Cable Aran because I love the cowl neckline. But there's also Blouson, Cable-Down Raglan, or Simple Knitted Bodice. Decisions, decisions.

Happy New Years!

Foliage

Well, if you're looking for a stylish and very quick, non-boring hat pattern, look no further! Foliage is the perfect solution! I think this may be my first knit from Knitty that I've actually started and completed while the pattern was still in the current issue. It literally took me three or four evenings of just an hour of two of knitting. Very satisfying!

Pattern: Foliage from Knitty by Emilee Mooney

Yarn: Knit Picks Sierra in Cranberry; less than 1 skein

Needles: #9 dpns (I didn't have 10.5 or 10s so I knit loosely)

Notes: I probably could have knit a tad bit tighter because the hat is actually a bit big on me. Since it was so quick to knit I thought I would just rip and reknit but that was two weeks ago and now I've decided it's just fine! I don't like my hats too tight on my head anyway. I really think that the red color was perfect for this pattern. I love how it turned out!

Okay, I know I said I was on a yarn diet, blah, blah, blah. Well, apparently, I had a lapse of memory last week and before I knew it I had six skeins of Blue Sky Alpacas Silk on my doorstep from kpixie. It was on SALE too! Even though I had already bought the pattern long ago it was cheaper to order the Somewhat Cowl kit than just six skeins by themselves. It's in the Peacock color which is a beautiful teal but my camera refused to pick up any part of the green in it. I'm back on the yarn diet wagon again though. Promise. ;-)

There's been lot of sewing going on here too!

See my cute bedwarmer (thanks to the crafty genius, Ashley, of dogged knits).

Again, lousy picture. Note to self: take more pictures on weekends in real daylight. Super simple to make and boy, does it work! It stays warm for what feels like forever! This one is for myself so I could get the hang of the "pattern" because at least half a dozen people I know will be receiving these for Christmas!

Finished: RPM socks

Here are my lovely RPM socks! I am really happy with how they turned out!Pattern: RPM socks from Knitty
Yarn: Yarn Pirate Merino in Rum Runner (Booty Club exclusive)
Needles: US #1 cirs using magic loop
Notes: I made the larger size since I was using #1 needles and thinner yarn and it really worked out perfectly. They're not too tight nor too loose. I think they may be the most comfortable and best fitting socks I've ever made. The only thing I did change was I just lengthened the leg by several pattern repeats.


The other fun thing I did last week was a little yarn trading. Library Liz saw that I had my Yarn Pirate Booty Club yarn in the Calamity colorway up for trade on Ravelry and offered something up from her stash. It worked out so perfectly! I ended up with her Pure Knits Yarntini club yarn in the Mint Mojito colorway! Ravelry is just so cool like that!

Hope everyone is having a great weekend!

Birthday Treats!

I'm very delinquent in posting about my birthday that was last Tuesday but I HAVE to show you this really cute zippered bag my friend gave me! It's a perfect project bag. I think you could even fit a good sized sweater in it! and best of all, it has a zipper to keep the naughty kitties out.

I had a great birthday but, what with all the friends and family and going out to dinner, I didn't get much knitting done last week! heheh

And I've been doing a little test knitting for The Plucky Knitter. I'm working up a simple chevron scarf using two different yarns she dyed. I think the colors are looking fabulous together, no?

I'll tell you, I'm glad I'm getting to do this knitting for her because I've been admiring her yarn from afar since she started. Now I can offically say that all the good things you've heard about Sarah's yarn are TRUE! so go get you some before everyone else does!

A little indulgence

Warning!!! Yarn Pirate Booty Club spoiler at the end of this post! :)

First of all though. Long, long ago I knit Orangina. Remember? So let's see, that was a year ago. Guess how much I've worn this knit since then. Nada. Zilch. ZERO TIMES! it's pretty sad really. The main reason for this was that it was too small. So.....

My Orangina went from this:

...to this:

You know, I didn't feel bad while ripping out all those hours of knitting one single, itty bitty bit. It was quite nice actually, knowing that I would be giving it a new life where it would have a chance of being worn. So, that beautiful Jaeger Sienna cotton will become a Josephine Top from the latest Interweave Knits issue. I was just so inspired by all the gorgeous ones everyone else was making.

Okay, onto the goodies!!

Love, love, LOVE! This is the first sock club that I have ever signed up for and I was so afraid I would be disappointed. That fear was completely unfounded!! I love everything Georgia dyes so I should have known that this would be no exception. She's got real talent. This exclusive club colorway is called Rum Runner. And she also included a small handmade bar of soap that smells wonderful.

A new summer knit

Thank you all so much for the nice comments on my Tatami!

So, moving on. Since I've completed two projects lately, I had to cast on for a new one (of course!). I guess I've been in the mood for something summery and Lelah caught my eye.The Michaels near me finally got some of the "new" Cotton Ease in and I figured it would be perfect for this project. Even though it's worsted weight I'm going with a little tighter gauge than called for in the pattern so hopefully my math works out.

And, here is my first completed square for Lizard Ridge. This is the #247 color.

I actually did one more pattern repeat than called for in the pattern because I had so much yarn leftover still and I wanted to make the most of each skein. I haven't blocked it yet, that's why it so lumpy looking.

And lastly, the latest addition from my favorite crack stash supplier, The Loopy Ewe.

It's more Interlacements in the Poppy Fields colorway and some Zephyr Style stitch markers "The First Step". Hubby got a real kick out of those!

To all the Moms out there, Happy Mother's Day, hope it's a good one!