Fasten Your Seatbelts.....

we're in for a long trip post. Go grab your favorite beverage and I'd grab a snack if you're starting to get hungry because this is going to be a long post. I've got my trusty Mac and a ice cold diet cherry pepsi so I think I'm all set for the post. Now to figure out where to begin.

For starters, we found out that the "we're no longer picking up plastics for recycling" was a misquote so I'm very happy. They are still picking up plastics but they are asking us to separate the #1 & #2 plastics into separate bags. No biggie I can do that! I'd be much happier if they picked up some of the other numbered plastics too but beggars can't be choosy so we take what we can get.

On another note, I'm having second thoughts about selling my wheel. Frankly I think trying to sell it right now isn't going to be a good decision. Everyone is buckling down on their spending and cash isn't as readily available. This isn't the reason I've decided to hold off on selling it though. I'm feeling like I didn't give it my "all" and didn't give spinning a chance. So I'm setting at least 15-20 minutes every afternoon for spinning. This will start this Monday (9 March). If by later this summer I haven't found a love for spinning, I will find my Precious a new home.

On a second note, Kaity is taking piano lessons now and is taking to it like a duck to water. She didn't feel like playing baseball so she asked if she could take piano lesson we said sure and she has done really well. She's actually sticking with the practicing every day too. I'm a proud Mama.We even managed to snag a full size Yamaha keyboard from ShopKo for like $79. It retailed everywhere else for almost $200. Don't have a clue why ShopKo had them marked down. Their loss is our gain.

I finished some dishcloths for the Monthly Dishcloth KAL. I'm trying to knit all the cloths for the whole year.

For the 16 Feb KAL there was the Circle Cloth (ravelry)(non ravelry).

You may remember that I knit this the first time in two colors and ended up cutting the dishcloth short because I got sick of the color changing. This time I used only one color and I have to say I enjoyed knitting it a lot more. It does make a very thick squishy cloth. I bet that this would make a great pattern for knit bathmat....hmmmm, must think about that for a few. I might try it.

For the 1 Mar KAL there was the Pot O' Gold Dishcloth (ravelry)(non ravelry).

Cute pattern. I used yellow instead of gold since I had in my stash and I think Shawn would kill me if I bought anymore cotton yarn. I have at least a metric ton. Some of it is from my pure lack of self control. I can't walk past the stuff at Michaels, Joanns or Walmart without through a few skeins in the cart. I can partially blame the enabling of Sue too. ;~)

What else have I been working on? Oh, I finished my sisters scarf a day or so after posting about the progress here on the blog. The Malabrigo was so yummy I couldn't put it down!

It's already happily keeping her neck warm although I don't think it's as cold in Idaho as it's getting here. The yarn is Malabrigo worsted, Oceanos and the pattern is My So Called Scarf (ravelry)(non ravelry).

I'm making great progress on my Baudelaire socks (raverly)(non ravelry).

I'm knitting these for the Makin' Cookies KAL (it's a ravelry link). The heels are turned but I still have several repeats before I can knit the ribbing and bind off. I'm confident that I'll be done with these before the end of March. I'm thinking about increasing the stitches to make sure the legs are big enough. I'm afraid they might turn out to tight. Guess I should try them on to see.

Since I finished my Stripey stripey socks I needed a new on the go project so I started another pair of socks.

Please meet my newest project, Rainbow Toe Ups. Their just a very basic toe up sock using Regia Bamboo, color 1062 that I purchase from the LYS here in town. I'm knitting a stockinette foot, short row heel and I'll probably use k3, p2 ribbing on the leg. I'm actually about 2 inches from starting the heels now. Plain socks work up so quickly.

Lets see, what else.....give me a minute to back track through my photos. Oh, here we go....Kaity's Silly Socks.

Every year the school does holds a sock hop after school with a Dr. Seuss theme. The kids are encouraged to wear silly socks so Kaity and I threw these together. Well actually I threw them together she just came up with the idea. She thought it would be silly if her socks wore socks. I knit 4 mini sock and attached one to each side of a pair of commercial socks and then knit a few rows with some fun fur....shudder! I hate fun fur....see I told you I loved my kids. ;~)

These are a couple of the socks I knit for Woolgirl here recently.

They are samples of a new cotton sock yarn she's getting in by Kollage. It's called Luscious. The rusty colored sock is Mona (ravelry)(non ravelry) and the peach one is a basic cuff down sock with a picot edge, k2, p2 ribbing and a slip stitch heel. I really enjoyed knitting with this sock yarn. I was afraid that the cotton would bother my hands but it didn't. The yarn doesn't feel very springy when you are holding the skein but it has some very nice bounce once it's knit up. I had problems with it being splitty and coming untwisted when working the cast on but after a few rows knit I didn't have any problems at all. I'll be buying some to make summer socks for the kiddo and I. I really miss my handknit socks in the summer so this will be nice to have to make some I can wear.

Alrighty! I finally made it through the WIPs and FOs. Now on to the goodies I've obtained since the last post. I destashed some yarn I wasn't using so of course I needed to replace said yarn with new yarn right. Well, that's my story and I'm stickin' to it!

First up is the second installment of the Yarntini Happy Hour Sock Club.

It's called Blackberry Kiss and is just as yummy as the first shipment. I have one more shipment coming later this month with my bonus skein of self striping Appletini.

Some Crystal Palace Panda Silk.

I picked this up from a Ravelry destash. I'm not sure what I'm going to make with this. I may go ahead and knit it into socks. Who knows!

Some Regia Kaffe Fassett sock yarn, color #4453.

I picked this one up from another Ravelry destash. I've been wanting this color but kept putting off buying it. It was reasonably priced so I picked it up. Plus I'm still going through a self striping sock yarn obsession.

Next up, I finally snagged some Sweetgeorgia sock yarn.

This is the superwash sport and the color is Berry. The exchange rates were in my favor and I had money burning a hole in my PayPal account. She had some very tempting colors.

Some Cascade Heritage Handpainted sock yarn.

I picked this up from 2 Old Divas ebay site. It was on sale for $10 so I picked it up. I'm a sucker for sales. The colorway is Cherry Berry. I know I know, I need more sock yarn like I need another hole in my head.

The piece de resistance, Zen Yarn Garden Cashmere DK.

The colorway is called Truffle. This is for me and only me. It's soon to become a yummy cowl. I can't think of anything better to keep me warm then a yummy cashmere cowl. Now if only I could afford a whole cashmere sweater.

Zeus really enjoyed the sun we had the other day.

This happens to be one content little doggie. If there's sun shining you can bet you'll find him soaking up the warmth. I don't blame him during the winter the sun tends to disappear a lot. We're back to snow, cold and cloudy here. Bree and I enjoyed the morning sun shinning through the living room window too.

Our living room Arctic Rec Room (well it's not really the living room but it's the room we use as the living room) has huge windows on one wall. It's actually several smaller windows put together but all total they are like 7 ft wide...needless to say our living room is almost like a sunroom.

I'm done! Finally!! I just finished up my Woolgirl test knit today so that will be on it's way to her very soon. I have a new test knit coming in from Madelinetosh soon. When I have enough progress I'll share a little with you. I'm hoping to have my Baudelaire socks finished soon so I can pick up my cable lace socks again. They got tossed to the side for the Bauds.

Happy Crafting!