Whew!

We came, we saw, we bought yarn. Not the yarn above (too expensive to buy so much!), though both of us did come away with some machine-washable lace yarn from Tess. Now we're back and recovering from our grand adventures. A good time was had by all, and yes I was able to grant my 5 wooly wishes. We managed to keep the spending under control through a supreme effort of will. We did end up spending just a bit over the budget, mainly due to the crazy weather we had. Details and more pictures are definitely forthcoming. For now? Resting is what we're about around here.

On my way to where the air is clear...

Bags packed, ipod filled, car loaded, spindle empty and ready to go. Looks like we're off to see the wizard sheep! See you guys after The Festival!

May Day Mayhem

May is here, and the Maryland Sheep & Wool madness is setting in! I've been running around like a mad woman starting yesterday. Confirming our reservations at The Wilderness, doing laundry, finding time to reblock my shawl, and trying to figure out both
1. What to bring, and more importantly,
2. What I want to buy!
This is tricky--I know it's madness to head out with a list of specifics, but it's also a recipe for budgetary disaster not to have some general idea of what you're hoping to find. So after some careful considering, here's my list of five things to find for the weekend:

laceweight yarn, solid or semi-solid, enough for one of my favourite patterns from my new obsession book, Victorian Lace Today. So anywhere from 500-1800 yards.

Koigu, any colour, any amount, just to finally get to try some. It's really rough to try to buy it online as you have to guess the colour, and you don't get to squish before you buy, which is important with a new kind of yarn that you can only find thumbnails of on web shops.

a skein of STR in a colourway not available on their website. I've seen the pics other knitters have posted in the past of this yarn, and I am jealous.

A fun hand-dyed roving from anywhere.

Some (at least slightly) exotic fiber, also for spinning. Silk, camel, quiviut, mohair, angora, whatever. Just so it doesn't (100%) come from a sheep.

I think it's a good list, and totally attainable, even if I have to stand in line for ages while leaning on a cane to get to the STR.

*This fantabulous depiction of how I've been getting through the day brought to you by the talented Natalie Dee!

When it rains..

When it rains…

I get packages! It's frustrating that way. First you have to suffer through a rather grey, overcast picture of April's Rockin' Sock Club yarn, now I have some similarly overcast pictures of my ISE 4 package. Can you believe it? I got two (TWO!) scarves from the fantastic Kate! The first one here is a gorgeous Backyard Leaves pattern, and knit in some lovely (yet mysterious) super-soft yarn. This one is looong and gorgeous! Leaves are some of my favorite patterns to see knit into things--I have a real weakness for any kind of leaf pattern. And I know that wasn't in the questionnaire. All I told her was that green is my favourite colour.

This second one is made up of handspun handdyed yarn from That Spinning Place and is just the perfect length for tucking into a coat. Let not my terrible inability to take decent pictures under cloudy skies fool you, these scarves, the yarn, everything is much livelier than it seems in my pictures (Especially the yarn).

Speaking of things I'm not sure how she figured out, there is LUSH in my package! I love, love, love Lush! This little cake of love is headed straight for my bathroom tonight. Add to this some delicious handspun yarn, a fun new spinning magazine, and an amazing card featuring a fantastic Australian artist, and you have one super-happy camper! I am so spoiled already, Molly can hardly stand it. Thank you Kate!

It's not Startitis, really!

It’s seventy degrees and sunny outside today—again! Spring seems finally to have arrived here in Virginia, and that’s why I cast on for a new pair of socks despite the 1 mateless Monkey sock and two half-done Inside Out socks. But look at the YARN, people? How was I supposed to not cast on with it when I keep seeing these colours everywhere? This is my skein of Yarn Pirate superwash merino in Apple, which is connected to about an inch of sock #1. Eventually it will become a pair of Mock Wave Cable Socks out of my new favourite knitting book, Favorite Socks. Molly points out that now I have 3 pairs of socks and two shawls I'm working on, and I haven't started the handspun shawl for her (though I did wind the yarn for it this weekend). In my defense, however, there are good reasons for this. I think it's time for a UFO recap week. First up: Rockin Sock Club Inside Out socks in Monsoon mediumweight.

I'm not working on the Monsoon socks because I'm mad at them. I've frogged both socks down just past the heel, and modifying the pattern to use a flap heel. I went with the flow and did the short row heel at first, but following the pattern leads to about 1/4 to 1/2" of extra fabric in the front of the sock right at the bend of the ankle. I thought I had screwed it up until I looked at The Harlot's pair and she had the same thing. Frogged, and waiting for renewed interest in knitting them. The decidedly fallish/wintery colourway is not doing these socks any favors. Spring is popping up all around me, and I'm not really feelin' the grey, black, brown, and dark green at the moment.

Woohoo!

Look what came in the mail today! It's this fantastic? I wish you could feel this yarn. It's squishy, it's soft, and the colours are gorgeous. Notice anything else? Dudes, it's STR with SILK! 81% Superwash Merino, 19% Silk goodness. The picture definitely leaves something to be desired, since it's been overcast all day here, but the colours are actually pretty true. The pattern that came with this yarn includes a instructions for making knee-highs, but for that you need another skein of the yarn. As you can imagine people are already hitting up the KAL blog (which I STILL can't sign into) for a way to purchase said other skein of yarn. I’m on the fence, personally, since I’ve been trying really hard to reign in my yarn acquisition in preparation for our trip to Maryland Sheep and Wool next week.

Speaking of which, Maryland Sheep and Wool is next week! I’m super excited—it’s our anniversary on the 11th, and to celebrate, we’re going to MSW, and staying in a super-cute B&B. (We always stay at B&Bs for our anniversary, not only because we love staying someplace homey with pets, etc., but because we spent our honeymoon at a B&B in Wilmington, NC.) I'm hoping to get to meet lots of fun knitbloggers and not buy all the yarn I can carry. I haven't signed up for any classes, but I will be putting in an appearance at the Spin In. The handknit clothing items I was supposed to wear, on the other hand, are...not done. The date just kind of snuck up on me, and now I have a shawl and tank, but no new socks, and no shawl for for Molly. Oh, and no second sock for Molly, either.

I can finish a shawl and a three socks by the fourth, right?

Picky, picky?

Spot is so happy spring is here. He spends his days either curled up someplace warm (and preferably sunny) or perched in a window "hunting" for bugs, birds, and other cats; his evenings are whiled away either on my lap or in his cat tree. I'm super jealous.

I wish my knitting was as zen as my cat these days. I've frogged a record number of projects, and I'm wondering if I'm being sensible and correcting defects that needed fixing, or if I'm being WAY too fussy about my projects. The only thing I've knit on in the past two weeks and not frogged is the Monet shawl, and even that project is not making me happy. I've been slogging along on the Monet shawl (pics to be delivered when I get some sun back), and after approximately 15,000 stitches, I still can't decide if the yarn is going to turn out a nice or even interesting shawl. The adjective I'm worrying about right now is hideous. The yarn which was shown and descriped as mostly green with blues and a bit of orange has turned out to contain lots and lots of orange, with blue, yellow, and a hint here and there of green. Not exactly what I was looking for, but I wound it and cast on, telling myself the colours would grow on me. They haven't. I'd been planning to wear it to MSW, but I'm not so sure about it. I worry every time I pick it up that it's just going to turn out completely naf. I flirt with the idea of overdyeing it with some green or blue or anything to make it less orange, which is my absolute least favorite colour. I'm not sure that will actually make the thing greener, but it may make it mostly brown. That may not be a bad thing.

Ugh, I never quite remember how hard it is to get back into the grind of work after a particularly lovely weekend. It's rough, people!

So this weekend my Springtime proto-sock visited Richmond to meet The Indigo Girls! Sadly, no pictures as my camera batteries chose that evening to die a cruelly sudden death. Despite this setback, compounded by the realization that I'd worked the prescribed incredibly fussy cast-on on the wrong size needles I'm confident that casting on for a pair of socks while waiting for the Indigo Girls to come onstage guarantees good karma for the duration of the project. How much better can it get, really? And the first thing out of Amy Ray's mouth before they started playing was "Happy Spring!" Perfect.

The concert was fantastic (Did I mention the tickets were FREE? Thanks, Dad!), and we decided to cap off the evening with a burger and fried pickles at the Galaxy.