I can still spin!

I actually went to my spinning group tonight... I have difficulty getting up the energy to drive up for it after a long Friday at work. I don't think I've actually gotten myself to a spinning group meeting since before I started working full-time. That was November. I'm pretty sure I haven't touched my drop spindle since then... bad, bad spinner.

And then tonight, I remembered why I had told myself that I wouldn't bring my Karaoke roving to spinning group ever again. The stuff sheds like mad, and the soy silk means that it sticks to everything. Mostly me. I spun for about 10 minutes, and then had to stop because the fiber was getting everywhere. I was positive that some bright orange fuzz was going to make its way into what the people around me were working on, and I wasn't about to inflict that on them. I got some knitting done instead. Next time: plain ol' wool.

On an unrelated note, can I take a second to tell everyone that I made bagels last weekend? :D

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And, since I was asked, the pattern on the hat from the previous post is just a series of right twists, which is basically a little two-stitch cable. Super easy, nice result... love that combo. :)

A quickie

I did indeed get a chemo cap done over the weekend, and I've been a blogging slacker and haven't posted it until now...





And because my favorite part of a hat is the decreases on the top...


Pattern: my own
Yarn: TLC Cotton Plus, less than one skein
Needles: Two size 7 circulars (knit in the round on 2 circs)

The bottom picture is the closest to the actual color. Considering a) how quickly this went and b) how much Cotton Plus I have in my stash, there will probably be others along the way.

I have started the lace section for sleeve #2 of my SKB. That section took a little while on sleeve 1; something on size 2s isn't going to go that quickly to begin with, and I find that I have to stop periodically because my hands cramp up with needles this small. The good news is that, after that, it's just straight stockinette on size 7s with a few increases here and there, and an inch of seed stitch at the cuff. :)

Another snow day!

I had off yesterday for Weather. It was so serious that the library website had it capitalized. I spent a very lazy day playing lots of WoW and watching TV. I have to admit, when I was watching the opening credits for Lost last night and saw that Drew Goddard had a hand in writing it, I kinda cheered... He wrote a couple of excellent Buffy episodes, and has written a couple of excellent Lost episodes before this. And WOW, did I love last night's Desmond-centric hour (and not just because more Henry Ian Cusick is ALWAYS a good thing).

I cast on for a chemo cap for Jolene's collection for Hopkins pediatric oncology department (which I've been meaning to do for a while). I'm hoping to finish it over the weekend to give to her on Monday. I'm using some lavender Cotton Plus, and doing some traveling twists on it so it's not just a plain stockinette hat. I hope it will look spiffy. :)

And after that, I can get back to my SKB, and finish it, and hopefully wear it before summer arrives. ;D

Happy Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day to all the people in my life that I love. You are each such a blessing, from my family, to my old friends, to my new friends... thank you to all of you for being in my life. :)

And since this is my knitting blog, here's a special shout-out to my Knit Nite ladies, who actually make me look forward to Mondays. I think some of you are even more impatient for me to finish my SKB sweater than I am. :)

Unicorn chaser

If you read Boing Boing, you're familiar with the concept of the unicorn moment. Don't know about you, but I know I certainly need something along those lines...



How's a yarn porn moment? Does that work?

This is some loveliness from Wool in the Woods. It's called "Rayflax", a laceweight rayon/flax blend that caught my eye. It's nice stuff. I have a few various skeins of laceweight yarns... Think someone's trying to tell me to try actual lace?

I've been watching the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show for most of the day (the libraries closed at 1, and since I start at 1 on Tuesdays... snow day!). The Pedigree "shelter dogs" ads are killing me. "I know that I am a good dog, and I just want to go home." *sniffle* They're up there with Hallmark ads, in terms of emotional blackmail.

If you're in the area and are getting the snow/ice/freezing rain combo, be safe. It's a mess out there.

A break from the stash-busting

My first yarn purchase for me since Stitches... that's 3 months!

I have been in love with this yarn for a while, and the Super Bowl Sunday sale at All About Yarn gave me a good enough reason to finally go buy it...



Mountain Colors "Twizzle" in Thunderhead. Merino/silk... OH, so yummy. They don't have a colorway that I don't love, but this one with the teals and purples and greys was the most "me".



This stuff screams "sweater" to me... :D

Norberta

My first stuffed knit toy!



Norberta from Knitty, made for a friend at work who will be out for several weeks recuperating from surgery. She is a fellow WoW geek, and I thought a fearsome dragon/dinosaur beastie would be fitting. :)



Yes, that's Minas Tirith that Norberta is attacking.

Norberta was made with TLC Cotton Plus, done wildly off-gauge on size 6 needles. The pieces all matched up with each other just fine. I got a slightly stumpier head than the "real" one has, but that was the only real difference that I saw.

Blue for PS

Day 1 of Project Spectrum! As it turns out, I'm still working on my Simple Knitted Bodice... which is BLUE, and thus, fits in to the current PS color scheme very nicely. :)

Where are we now?



No, your eyes do not deceive you. That's a finished sleeve, folks. I ended up negotiating a bit with the bell sleeve. I did half the increases called for in the pattern; it flares, but not so much that it'll bother me.

Check out the rolling hem... Hot, eh? No, it's not supposed to be like that. It won't stay flat for anything. Once sleeve 2 is done, I'll go back and rip that out. It'll be replaced with seed stitch, to match the cuffs.