Pick Up Sticks

Summer Evenings

Last night - Saturday - was a perfect summer evening.  We cooked on the grill and had a salad made with lettuce and tomatoes from our garden.  It was cool and breezy which kept the bugs away.  We ate on the patio and stayed out there after dinner...me knitting my upstairs wrap...hubby on the laptop...enjoying a beer...or two.

 

 

We then decided to out together our new tent.  We bought a smaller tent for just the two of us.  We camped often with the boys growing up.  Next weekend will be the first camping for just the two of us.  We are planning a relaxing trip to Ohiopyle State Park for 4 days...with lots of down time...some hiking...a trip to a winery...marshmallows cooked over the fire.

The tent directions said 'goes together in minutes"...well 30 minutes later it was together...the rain canopy is still on a little wonky...

Busy...busy...busy...and a pomegranate martini

Life is busy...lots of home improvement projects going on...once we finished the new room (sunroom...family room....not sure what to call it) it made the kitchen look shabby.  I like the cupboards but the flooring needed to be replaced...so we extended the cork flooring from the family room into the kitchen...which required the removal of a 300 lb radiator and the tearing out of the old wainscoting and putting in new.  So of course then we needed to repaint...the kitchen and down the hall.  It's all done.  But the change in color meant the red jelly cupboard no longer matched...so it has been repainted and will be finished tonight. We still want to replace the countertops...but that is one project that will NOT be finished before Easter.

So needless to say I am tired...two rounds of painting Saturday with a trip to do some birthday shopping for our DIL, a trip to Troeg's Brewery - a weekly event to fill our growler - RyePA - Scratch #18 - yum!!! Then lunch out with the hubby...had a great greek salad...a trip to Tar-get...and back home for the 2nd round of painting.  Today meant more painting, grocery shopping, cooking and yardwork...I am exhausted.  Plus the hubby replaced all the old outlets and light switches...it all looks great.

Saturday night I settled in with my knitting - diminished rib cardigan - one sleeve to go - and a pomegranate martini - so good!  I mentioned last night on Face-book that I was drinking a pomegranate martini...unfortunately my MOTHER is also on face-book and read it and was teasing me about it today - she's keeping tabs on me through face-book...the perfect reason that I have not "friended" my children...they don't need me keeping tabs on them!

Tonight...a little knitting...some really bad TV and off to bed...exhausted.

Garter Stitch Scarf

Over the years I have knit for lots of people – friends, family and myself. One person who has not received very many hand knitted gifts is my husband. He has two scarves that were knitted in the first year of my getting reacquainted with knitting. One is a hunter green ribbed knit scarf – don’t remember the yarn. It has held up over the years and still looks good. Unfortunately this is not the scarf he wears on a regular basis. The scarf he loves to wear because it is so wide is one made with Lion Homespun. Now don’t get me wrong – I am not a yarn snob – but this scarf has not held up well over the years. It is a fuzzy mess – but he loves it.

I never realized how much it bothered me until we were in a yarn shop in St. Michael’s Maryland and the lady working there asked if I had made his scarf. I was so embarrassed because it really is pathetic looking.

He still refuses to give up this scarf -until I replace it. So I knit him a sideways garter stitch scarf using a variety of wool yarns leftover from other projects. It is made with browns, rusts, golds and creams. It has been a simple TV project over the past few days and will look great with his brown suede jacket.

The only problem is that I realized it will not match his black wool top coat – the one with the wide open neck – the one with which he wears the ugly scarf. Now I have to make him a second scarf – nice and wide – so he’ll give up his ugly scarf. Unless somehow the ugly scarf just gets lost in the house…………….hmmmmmm.

Even I am not that evil.

A Yarn Club

One of my goals for 2009 - not a resolution mind you ; ) - was to organize my yarn stash.  I have so much yarn it's ridiculous.  I wanted to wind the skeins into cakes and put them into bags with the tag and a 3 x 5 card with pattern ideas.  Sounds so organized.  As I started this process I thought maybe I should try to not buy yarn for a while and work from my stash.  Sounds like a good idea - right?

So what did I do over the past few days?  That's right - buy lots of yarn...and sign up for my first yarn club.  Shivaya Yarn is having a 2009 Yarn Club with a pattern and a skein of yarn and special stitch markers every other month.  The price was reasonable and it includes two of my favorite designers - Anne Hanson and Miriam Felton. The yarns will vary from month to month and include a heavy worsted wool, each of their lace yarns, a sock yarn, one of their alpaca yarns, their new aran silky merino, and a special end-of-year surprise yarn. 

Some of the other purchases I made were from my LYS - Yarn Love- where I bought some Jo sharp Silkroad DK Tweed in a caramel color and some Berroco Ultra Alpaca Light in a deep purple -  for a sweater and a wrap.

I also bought some yarn from The Loopy Ewe - a skein of Schaefer Anne in a deep forest color and two different colors of Lorna's Laces.

So I should be done with yarn purchases for a long time!  Now to get knitting.

Finished Knitting

I finished the last of my Christmas knitting last night...about 1 day too late to send along with my son to NY and his girlfriend.  While I did finish the hat early enough to wrap and send...the mittens were finished last night.

   

The hat is a free pattern called the Slouchy Copy-Cat Hat  and is a lovely, easy pattern.  The mittens are a combined pattern between a basic mitten pattern and the eyelet mock cable rib from the hat.  They look really narrow in the photo but fit great and look really pretty on your hand.  I kept notes when knitting so maybe I'll write down what I did so I can knit them again.  I hope Jess likes the set.  The mittens will be sent along to college after the holiday break.

 

Now that gift knitting is done - the next big decision is what to knit next?  I want to rip out - again - part of my February Lady sweater and shorten it as the length grew when blocked.  But right now I would like to knit a wrap to keep at work for the chilly mornings in my office.  I just ordered some Shaeffer Anne yarn from the Loopy Ewe and just need to decide what pattern to make.  I have the Ostrich Plumes Stole Pattern from Knitspot that looks easy yet very pretty.  I want to start a pattern that will be easy to knit New Year's Eve when having a glass of wine or two and watching a movie - we are obviously having a low-key night!  Then we are having a Rose Bowl Party on Jan. 1 and an easy pattern will work while still being able to entertain a houseful of people.  But my yarn may not be in yet - so decision....decisions.

Christmas

I can't believe Christmas has come and gone.  This year has just flown by.

We had a lovely Christmas - two actually.  One on Christmas at home with the rest of the day spent at my hubby's brother's house where there was lots of good food, great company and lots to drink.  I never really had a drink of my own other than a glass of wine with dinner...but I did spend the day tasting everyone's microbrews with my favorite being Mad Elf from Troeg's a local brewery.

 

 

Then on Saturday my parents were visiting from NC and we spent the day at our son and DIL's new house where we celebrated Christmas.  It was a fun relaxing day spent in front of the fire.  I knit lots of Christmas presents this year.  My niece Lauren always requests handknits for Christmas.  This year she asked for mittens - which of course I made along with a gathered scarf which turned out so pretty if I do say so myself...no pictures to show totally forgot.  She is coming for a Rose Bowl party on Jan 1 - go PENN STATE - so maybe we'll get pictures then.  My DIL is so fun to knit for - she received a felted bucket hat and matching mittens.  The hat is still a little big so I will refelt it this weekend.  But doesn't she look great in it?  (See their dog Cody in the background of the picture?  their new house has a big picture window and her curls up there in the deep window sill.  He is not a small dog - he's part lab/part beagle but curls up in the window like he's a cat!)

I also knit my mother a wrap in Sterling and Silk - it was so pretty and again I didn't get a picture of it. I so want to make one for me.  The yarn was a dream to knit with.

I also knit my two SIL's neckwarmers - I think they liked them - hard to tell...if not I'd love them back as I thought they turned out so pretty.  I also knit my son's girlfriend a hat and mittens - well I finished the hat and one mitten so the hat will be gifted and the mittens will go back to college with him to give to her later.  More on this present later.

Today is back to work - yuck!  Actually it's not so bad because it's very quiet here - most people take off but since I'm fairly new here I don't have lots of time to use yet.  Guess I should get back to work!

An Extra Day Off

I ended up having a surprise extra day off - well at least half the day.  I had a doctor appointment and ended up having to have some tests done so I ended up with the afternoon off.

I went for my tests and as I drove there the sky got so dark.  I pulled into the parking lot and the sky opened up - with torrential hail/sleet.  Of course my umbrella was at home - it was sunny when I left home.  I pulled my coat up over my head and made a careful dash to the door.  what a mess...there was about an inch of hail on the ground!

Then I headed home and knit on my Simple Yet Effective Shawl.  I cast on for this yesterday and knit last evening while watching TV - Sunday evening TV stinks!  This is an easy pattern and shows off the Noro silk Garden.  I flew through both skeins and think I need a third.  So I'll head to my LYS tomorrow after work.  I should be working on gift knitting - but this one is for me!

Bad Blogger!

Sometimes I wonder why I even bother...I LOVE reading blogs but very rarely post on mine.  I read all the fun, interesting things others are doing on their blogs and I guess I never feel like my life would be interesting to anyone.

I have been knitting...after about 4 weeks with NO KNITTING (I think because of my injured back) I am finally back knitting.  I knit in the car while on the way to North Carolina for vacation.  My February Lady Sweater was easy to knit while chatting away with the hubby.  We had beautiful weather - low 70's no humidity, cool evenings.  It was our first vacation without any kids!  It was weird but fun.  Now granted this vacation was visiting my parents at the beach...but we did some things we wouldn't have done if there were kids along.  I say kids like they are really still kids - all grown up 19 and 24.

We did a wine tasting at Silver Coast Winery...their American Oak Chardonnay - yummy!!!! 

Now my FLS is done...but too big!!!  I started it when I weighed 20 lbs more and it is way too big.  Not sure what my plan for it is yet.  I loved this pattern - so easy to memorize - and I had gotten gauge - so that wasn't the issue.  I just want to cry!

Knitting Class #2

After the fun in my scarf class I decided to sign up for a child’s sweater class. I wanted to learn how to knit a sweater and thought a smaller sweater would be a good start. Again I signed up for a class at my LYS – Yarn Love. The pattern – Junior Knit Jacket - was written by the class instructor and is very easy to follow. It was knit with a bulky yarn – Universal Yarn Classic Chunky in colorway Water - doubled on size 10 needles. After knitting socks and lace it took me a while to get use to the feel of the bulky yarn and bigger needles. It felt so clumsy…but I’ve finished the knitting and just need to do the seaming in class. It is so cute! I started a second one in worsted weight yarn doubled and have that nearly finished as well. I ran out of yarn with one sleeve left to knit. On the second sweater I did the sleeves with DPN which cuts way back on the seaming that needs to be done.  Pictures to follow.

This class gave me the confidence to try a sweater for me. I had Mr. Greenjeans in my Ravelry queue and bit the bullet and cast on over the weekend. I am using a cheaper yarn – Cotton Ease by Lion in a cotton blend. I was afraid to invest too much money in the yarn in case I couldn’t knit it or didn’t finish it for some reason. I am working on the increases for the raglan sleeves – which seems to be taking forever! But once I get on to the cabling it should keep my interest better! 

Knitting Class #1

One of my goals for 2008 was to increase my knowledge in knitting and get past the basic scarf knitting. I ventured out in to world of lace knitting after finding out about a wonderful lace designer named Anne Hanson. Her patterns are so easy to read and offer written instructions – since I wasn’t too sure about reading charts. I finished Hypoteneuse, Gust and Zig Zag Mitts and started her Autumn Throw and Gale. I purchased way too many patterns – but love to knit her patterns!

So when a class came open at my LYS – Yarn Love – called the Silky Leaves Scarf I signed up. Yes it’s another scarf – but the class promised to teach me how to do a provisional cast on as well as read a simple lace chart. The scarf and yarn are from Sheep Shop Three. The yarn is a silk wool blend and so soft and in wonderful variegated colors. The scarf pattern was easy to follow except when it came down to the very tip. The whole class struggled – even the instructor – who by the way was terrific! I also ran out of yarn and had to rip back one side in order to even out the sides. Now I know I am a loose knitter – but I had to take off four lace repeats on each side of the scarf to make it work with the amount of yarn I had left. I would have purchased another skein but there was not one in my color left at the shop. I the end it all worked out. The scarf is beautiful – just needs a light blocking to school off the pattern. Picture to follow...need camera batteries!

Because of the fun I had in this class I signed up for several others. More to follow in other posts.