Diva Knitting

My main concern since I announced I am attending the Maryland Sheep and Wool festival was a question of what to wear.  It must be something knitted of course, but Maryland in May?  Not sweater appropriate weather!  No, I need something that will be appropriate for the likelihood of heat and humidity (and now, it seems, rain).  I also felt a need to do something new to mark the occasion, so before I left for Arizona I culled my stash for an appropriate fiber.  My addiction to wool and alpaca left little choice in the matter…I had some skeins of SWTC Twize left from my store inventory.¹  Now what to make?  After browsing through Ravelry I settled on a pattern I have wanted to make for a while.  Sahara.  Although the gauge wasn’t quite right I cast on right before we left.

Modifications:  Lots.  I stuck with the same size 6 needle throughout (pattern calls for switching between 2 sizes for the edging).  I chose the XS size since my gauge was much bigger than what the pattern called for.  I did more waist shaping and shortened the overall length.  Some how this still came out looking like the pattern, fits perfect and is super cute to boot! 

So now that you know what I’m wearing, I should be easy to spot.  The fact that I’ll be with a gorgeous redhead and an equally gorgeous brunette (my sisters) should make me easy to find too. Please stop and say hello!  We’ll be stopping by the Ravelry meetup on Saturday too (in the rabbit building May 3, from 11:30 - 1:00 pm).

1. I’m not sure why this yarn never really sold well for me because I really like it.  It has great colors and fabulous drape.  I also used it to make my Coachella. [↩]

 I finished the little design project I kept mentioning and I liked it enough that I did submit it for publication.  Keep your fingers crossed for me! 

After that, it has been a flurry of casting on new projects…one for project sanity  (if you’re reading this and you think you might be on my gift list, don’t bother clicking the project sanity link…just move along and nobody gets hurt) and two for travel (since I be on a plane an laying over many hours tomorrow).  It dawned on me that since I am now confirmed for the Maryland Sheep and wool Festival¹ that it might be nice to have a new knitted garment to wear.  Since it’s likely to be warm most of my current knit wardrobe won’t do.  So I cast on for something I’ve been wanting to make for a while…Sahara.  I’m using SWTC Twize which I know from experience is quite drapey so I think it will make a good substitute.  If you’re going I’d love to meet you!  There is a great MS&W group on Ravelry and they have reserved a whole building for a Ravelry fest.

I also cast on for some socks, a travel must in my book.  Doesn’t the swirly toe on the koigu (PPM 113218 on US 1) just make you happy?  And last but not least, Hemlock.  I wasn’t sure about the yarn initially but now that I’m knitting it I really like it.  It still seems very neutral to me despite the orange and yellow.  I’m using Tahki Bunny Print color 74  (great sale at Webs) on US 11 needles.  It goes unbelievably fast at this point.  I know that will not be the case soon enough when I am knitting rounds of hundreds of stitches.  By the way, if you decide to knit the Hemlock Ring afghan, you may want to join the KAL…they have extended charts and a correction to row 35…the row which resulted in my tinking several times and drinking more wine!  I love having my Denise needles at times like this.  There is no way I could have spread that out for the picture without them!

Why I am showing you this again (out of the deep dark past)?  Well, I just frogged it.  The whole dang thing…which took a lot longer than you might think.  It was 29″ wide across the chest.  Yeesh..what was I thinking?!  Jim is tall but thin.  I know I must’ve had him try it on at some point so I’m not sure what went wrong.  I won’t be casting on again until the late summer or fall but I definitely intend to revisit it.  Jim is in love with it…all except for the part where it doesn’t fit him at all. 

If you haven’t already you might want to check out my podcast.  You can listen to it from your PC…no need for an ipod.   Obviously, I have been spending some of my time doing that which is why I have had less frequent updates here.  Hopefully I’ll get in a groove at some point where I can manage to have the complement each other even more.

1. Did I tell y’all that already?  I know I mentioned it on the podcast. [↩]

My stash is really mad at Erica.  She sent the most beautiful colors of Koigu for my birthday and the new skeins are talking up all my attention!  The rest of the stash feels neglected.  Thank you for the fabulous gift seester!!!  She also sent Hannah who is growing at an incredibly slow pace.  I just love silly little things like that.  I’ll be sure to share a picture when she’s all grown up.

I’ve been working (slowly) on the design project I started in Arizona but I also found time to sneak in another little amigurumi and a new podcast.  This week I chatted with Amy and Sheldon of knittinghelp.com.  It was great to get all the details of their endeavor after using the site almost daily for a couple of years.