It's a Good Thing

I have a friend who dyes yarn. She's also an amazing knitter and talented designer and a generally fun and interesting person.

But this week my favorite thing about her is that she tends to bring a big pile of yarn to knit night. And I had a long tough week and when she dumped out the pile to show off her week's work (and our Club choices for next month), there was a skein that made Thursday better.



Isn't she pretty? I had to bring her home and love her and pet her and call her George. Thanks Mandie!

Setbacks

Well, here's a thing. I have this orange sweater, and after a week of furious knitting, (see last orange sweater post) I managed to get a second second sleeve that matched the first. I cast on the body and spent a week knitting little ribbed boxes. And then I tried it on.

 

That's the ease around the hem. Yeah, that's more than I wanted. Ripped some more. Current iteration of the body fits better. Now I just have to keep going.

200 Miles

I walked my 200th mile on Sunday. It was the tail bit of a kind of epic week, I walked 17.8 miles over seven days.

It's starting to get really chilly. Wednesday morning last week it was 37. I did fine with a couple layers of sleeve and fingerless gloves. It's better when I do some light stretching to start - which I should have been doing all along, but better late than never, right? (Have I mentioned I grew up in Alabama? I do ok till about 45, but below that it's really too cold.)

I still don't have a full-winter plan, although the weather people are forecasting snow flurries later this week. I'm paying way more attention to the weather people than I used to, as well.

I meant this post to be a little more than "yay, 40% in! Dude, it's getting cold!" but that's all I've got in me tonight. 300 miles and about 200 days to go.

Where's a mathematician when you need one?

Everybody look really close at this picture:


This photo was taken a month and a half ago. Do you see what it took me till last night to figure out?

That sleeve on the DPNs has a full repeat more stitches than the longer blocked one. 6 stitches more. THAT'S AN INCH or more. Without blocking, they look the same size. They're not. One has 54 stitches to start, the second has 60.

This is a major knitting error of the "Janet can't count" variety. I was really hoping to have this sweater knit by the Iron Bowl. We may be moving that goal back to whatever actual bowl game Auburn winds up playing.

Long-term projects

Last November I made a fiber purchase:


I started this yarn in July, with great Tour de Fleece aspirations:


This week it's finally done.


From one pound of fiber, around 1500 yards of 2-ply light fingering weight.

Of course, now I need to knit it. Planning on a Featherweight Cardigan.

Minor update

I've been walking, but not enough. Sinus/ear infection in September sidelined me for a couple weeks, but I'm back at it, baby. If I push it, I can make 200 miles by the end of the month.

Mandie blogged today, with pictures from Knitting Camp (remember that?). There are as many pictures of me as there are of Meg and Amy, which is flattering and a little weird. However, now I must have to have both of those sweaters. With waist shaping on both. For serious.

There's been other fibery stuff happening. Took a day of classes with the amazing Abby Franquemont, which has me spinning like a fiend again. Went to Corydon for the fall fiber festival this past weekend, and got my first taste of cotton spinning. Oh, and yesterday a Cricket came to my house. I'm hoping to get weaving by this weekend.

I'm going to go and ply some more yarn - that's been the story of the past couple of weeks - my Tour de Fleece goals are finally getting spun! And knit some on that pink sock I haven't touched lately.

Yesterday at Trader Joe's

I pulled out my old knitted grocery bag for my few treats and frozen fancies. The cashier says "Oh, cool, did you make this?" and I respond in the affirmative.

"I bet you don't have kids." Um, no, but people I know do this and more and have multiple kids...

"Did you make your mitts too?" Yep, thanks. "Have a good day." You too.

I got out the door and realized that he hadn't mentioned the handknit sweater I was wearing. I'm going to take that as a compliment.