Saturday, January 06, 2007

Poof! The Dust is Settling..

Hi there [cough, cough] Happy [waving arms wildly to clear the air] New [sneeze]Year!

Trust me, I'm not ignoring anyone. It's just that my life is not my own. I'm so behind on blogs that I love to read and it feels overwhelming. Last Saturday I managed a day off, which included parenting. It was blissful [just me, season 4 of Sex and the City and a box of bonbons], yet short lived, but now everything has settled back down into the "routine." So, I shall be slowly but surely catching up on everyone's blog entries.

Christmas day brought me my first skein of hand-painted sock yarn. Socks That Rock by Blue Moon Fiber Arts, no less.

X-mas Rock Colourway


Okay, so I bought it for myself a month before Christmas from Lettuce Knit, but hey, I just figured I'd save Santa the time, him being so busy and all.

I'm glad you believe that one!

I've also been haunting their website and decided to place my first order with them yesterday. Only one skein of medium weight sock yarn in the Fairgrounds colourway and two of their patterns, Rock and Weave and Hippy Crunchy. I'm also lusting after the Scottish Highlands and Fire on the Mountain colourways. Those are about the only colours that have tickled my sock fancy. So, not too much of a fortune will be spent on Socks that Rock and no guilt because I'm totally into keeping my knitting resolutions this year. [wink]

Speaking of resolutions...

I finished the Christmas Gnome. He turned out rather well.


Pattern available at Simply Knitting.

I used Paton's astra in red, medium grey and aran. His beard is white Paton's ChaCha. I really like the look of the Sirdar Foxy for the beard, so I'll be picking up a couple of balls to make more of these little guys for gifts next Christmas.

I've also been diligently knitting the sleeves for my Marble Cardi and on my socks. I'm feeling the groove, man. Totally feeling it.

Spinning news:

I decided to spin up some of this Northern Lights top I had with the specific plan of trying my hand at navajo plying for the first time. I have to admit to really disliking the colours as I was spinning this, but absolutely loving it plied. Is this common? Or am I just...well, weird?

Northern Lights Top - Cactus Flower Colourway - Navajo Plied


Not too shabby for a first effort and since it went well, I decided to do the same with this Wensleydale.

100% Wensleydale Teeswater Sliver Dyed by Fleece Artist


This is destined to become an earflap hat for the husband...I figure we'll get snow eventually.

This next skein was just for fun. I took equal lengths of natural, pink and Fuchsia and spun them up in that order to fill a bobbin. I spun up a second bobbin of charcoal corriedale, then plied them together. It should be self-striping, in a Trekking XXL kinda way. I haven't a clue as to what I'll make with it...maybe Edgar from the Fall '05 issue of Knitty

Natural, Pink, Fuchsia Corridale Top Plied with Charcoal Corriedale Top



Last, but never least, I've been tagged by the lovely Shannon.

The 6 Weird Things Meme!

I needed my husband's help on this one. Hey, just trying to be objective.

1] I have to do certain things in a particular order. For example: when I get up in the morning it's feed the animals, make coffee, feed the child, etc...if I do something out of sync, then so am I for the rest of the day.

2] I hate talking on the phone. Even as a kid. Probably from the multitude of individuals I knew at the time calling me to ask, "Whatcha doing?" and leaving it all up to me to make conversation.

3] I'm an organizational hazard. Everything has it's place. It's a hazard cause when something is out of place, the only person it annoys is me. Not fair.

4] My husband insists that my collection of knitting bags is weird [I only own 5]. What the hell does he know. I would just like to add that he doesn't think my obsession with fibre or knitting is weird. So, he's totally forgiven.

5] I love Coronation Street. I still can't believe Mike Baldwin is gone. [sob] I have watched it for years and will get up early to watch it at eight tomorrow morning. My husband and MIL also love the show. Now that's weird.

6] I'm constantly talking to my dog. I swear she understands me and sympathizes when I'm babbling at her.



Heck, with all this weirdness, wouldn't you?

Tag, you're it if you wanna do the meme.

That is all.

Keep On Knitting...

8 comments:

Carrie said...

Your spinning is beautiful! I very much like the Navajo skein. And your little gnome is great! I can't wait to knit something dollish. Glad to have you back!

gray la gran said...

5 knitting bags? darn, i'm only up to 3!

Marlene said...

With the exception of number 5 (I don't watch much TV at all) I'm right there with you in all your weirdness.

LOVE the gnome. I have a scarf made out of the beard yarn that I've been thinking of frogging anyway. One less yarn to buy.

dragon knitter said...

trust me, you DON'T want the scottishighlands colorway. it stripes & pools in the ODDEST way. i have a friend who is knitting it up, and hates it. the onlyr eason why she's still knitting it is that she is sending the socks to af riend in scotland, lol. i'll see if i can find the link to the specific post, but the blog is www.alcariel.blogspot.com. trust me.

and she made the hippie crunchy socks and enjoyed them, but suggests using metal needles as the p3togtbl stressed her metal ones.

Unknown said...

Oh so cute gnome girl! And your spinning is awesome. Glad to hear that you're feeling better, and how good does that saturday sound!

Unknown said...

The colours of those yarns make me drool!

Janet said...

I just love the Gnome you knitted. Where did you find the pattern? My MIL collects gnomes, and she appreciates my knitting, so want to make her one. BTW, I found you by the "6 weird things" meme.

Anonymous said...

I'm absolutely loving the pinky charcoaly yarn you plied. Gonna be just awesome all knit up. The Gnome is pretty great too, that will definately make a GREAT gift next year. Oh, and I just went ahead and did it already. I bought a Wheel :P