The Chicago Knitapalooza ’05 was great fun! I’m glad I finally got to meet everyone from KH in person. It WAS a lot of driving and Chicago traffic on White Sox parade night…not so fun. Overall it was worth it. More on the trip later.

For now, I leave you with my many WIP’s. I have been quite the knitting slut this last week! Indiscriminately I have switched back and forth between my many yarns with no regard to safety or pleasure. Hat, scarf, sweater for dog or man…it doesn’t matter what project, I do them all! Broke out the new sewing machine too! Even my dogs are looking at me a little funny this week with all the crafty activity.

I had a minor emergency Sunday while knitting Jim’s cable sweater (see…safety IS important). I bought the Jo Sharp Silk Road Ultra at Knit On! when it was going out of business. I thought 20 balls would be PLENTY for a “Jim Sweater”. Little did I know the chosen project would involve cables and lots of them. Apparently, that takes more yarn. Quite a bit more yarn. Did I mention Jim is 6’ 4”? Even more yarn. I was going along just fine until I began the sleeves. I had about six balls left and that *seemed* like it would be close but no problem. After I ran out of the first ball though and only had about 6” of knitting I realized I had a problem (by the way knit your sleeves at the same time…great knit tip). I didn’t think it was going to be big deal since I bought it on sale not because of “its being discontinued” but rather a “going out of business please clean us out” sale. Little did I know in the short amount of time the yarn has sat in my stash, it really was discontinued! Fortunately it was Fuzzy Mabel to the rescue. In this situation, a girl just can’t afford to be picky about dye lots. I was just lucky they still had some left in my color!

Oh and another problem. My luck with hats…turns out I have none. I wanted to whip up a cute fall hat for my Chicago trip…sort of a cloche style was what I had in mind. So I took out the crochet hook for the first time in a while. While I hadn’t forgotten how to crochet, I didn’t suddenly gain mad hat making skills either. It fits but a cloche it is not. It will soon be frogged…is it still “frogging” if it’s crochet? Good question for Drew. Note to self, ask Drew. Guess I will just have to use a pattern for hats from now on.