Beachy knits - What a surprise!

Jennifer over at Coffee, Puppies, and Knitting had a little contest to help celebrate her 4th anniversary with her husband. Jennifer and I have bonded over our issues with migraines, not the best thing to want to have in common with someone, but at least someone understands what I go through. Anyway, I won! She sent along a great prize package. A see through take along knitting bag, some color coordinated yarns, and a folding ruler. I love the combination of colors, so beachy. What a way to end a summer. Now, just to figure out what to knit with them!
Any beach appropriate ideas would be appreciated!

Stash Yarns

The "perfect sized" stash was a tough question for many of you toanswer. Maybe these stash related questions will be easier:
1) What yarn (that you don't have/haven't used) would make your stash"complete"?
2) What yarn do you never want to be without?

What yarn don't I have that I would love to have in my stash? Well ones that I can think of right now are Noro Silk Garden sock yarn, Wick, Duet Sock yarn, enough Cornucopia for a summer shell, .... ahhh, but there are so many yarns out there that I haven't tried and would love to.

What yarns would I never want to be without? Well, let me think. I'm sure I'll leave something out here. But for starters Malibrigo, Classic Elite Wool Bam Boo, Jitterbug, Dream in Color, and Ty-Dy.

Swapping Questions Post week 3

Well now that Summer has OFFICIALLY begun.. what do you do to beat the heat? A nice tall glass of lemonade? Frozen Coffee? A dip in the pool? What's your favorite way to keep cool this summer as things heat up?

There are lots of good ways to beat the heat in the summer around here. Lots of fluids always helps, whether it be ice cold water, lemonade, iced tea, or an iced coffee. On the hottest days I find that I have a hard time wanting to leave the house and will often spend the day lounging on the couch watching movies or TNT Primetime in the Daytime. A nice walk to the local ice cream shop might also be in order in the evening.



What would you consider the perfect amount of stash?

I'm not really sure what the perfect amount of stash is. While I like having yarn on hand for a spur of the moment cast on, I enjoy the hunt for yarn for a new project too. And while I enjoy splurging on yarn I also feel a little guilty about the current unused yarn that I do have. None of this will of course keep me from continuing to build upon my stash when I see yarns that I love. But I think mostly my stash consists of sock yarns because I don't really have to have a particular pattern in mind when I purchase it. I just know that about 400 yard of beautifully spun colors will one day make a pair of toasty socks for my tootsies. I have a hard time stashing up on other yarns when I don't know what I'll want to do with it and how much I'll need.

Dwelling on 2007 and Plans for 2008

There's been good reason for my absence here, but I'm not sure that I'm ready to share my thoughts just yet. I'm still thinking through it and I don't want to risk putting my thoughts into written words just yet. But I will say that this... dilemma let's call it... has gotten me all twisted up about wanting to blog and what to report on when I do. So I've been avoiding it. This morning I layed in fear that I'm loosing my blogging energy because I'm having trouble getting my thoughts together to get through this. But then I thought about all the wonderful people out there in blog land that I've met and who have commented on how blogging has gotten them through some tough times. So here I am, busting through the walls I'm building around myself to return to the life of a blogger. Rather than spend my time here dwelling on my twisted thoughts, I think I'll just focus on the positive.

First some holiday knifty gifties! Feast your eyes on these beauties! (Chan, don't be too jealous over the polka dots.)

It's a Knitpickers Carry All Traveler from Michael's. While I was home for the holidays I started on the Chevron Fantastic Afghan with the yarn Mom sent me for my birthday. I'm adapting the pattern a little bit by only using three colors and only using the first two chevron patterns instead of all six. So far, I'm enjoying the mindless energy going into a project like this. And best of all it fits perfectly in my new bag! (at least for now it does!) The bag is great! Is has to external large pockets and two internal ones plus lots of room for projects and yarn. To go along with this bag, Mom also got me this:

It's a matching sock bag! And lookie what's inside! Two skeins each of two fabulous colorways of ShiBui sock yarn - Autumn and Stone. Mom's are the best! In another beautifully wrapped package were these to add to the bookshelf:
A trip to the largest JoAnn's that I've ever seen had me walking away with a slight additional build of the yarn stash, including :
for a felted bag project,

for a nice scarf maybe hat project, and some great organic cotton that I'm planning on using to knit up some great spa gifts for friends for next Christmas. (Hoping to get a little jump on things.) To top it all off, my annual tree ornament: Perfect! Don't you think?!

And so now we're on to 2008. Can you believe it already? Crazy, I tell you, just crazy how the time flies!

So I think this year rather than make New Year's Resolutions that I'll never keep, I think I'm going to try to make monthly goals. Take smaller, more manageable steps.

My goals for January include:

1. develop an exercise plan for two to three days a week - and stick to it!

2. reinvest myself in the WW program - actually start following the Flex Plan to a T again.

3. take my vitamins every day.

4. finish (or at least work on) all unfinished knit projects from 2007. Maybe I'll even add a little something to the side bar to help keep track of this one.

Here's to a new year filled with new experiences, new challenges, and hopefully new joys!

Home again...

Going home is always a delight. This trip was different without Buddy around, and a little sad at times... OK, really sad at times. But otherwise good to be home with the family. I was able to avoid most of the holiday travel by heading out of town before lunchtime on Wednesday which also gave me some extra time with Mom and Dad. Dad showed me where my dear Buddy will remain with the family and yesterday before I left we made a garden stone to place in remembrance. It will take a while to fully dry and then Dad will put it out in the yard. Plans are being made as to what flowering bush we'll also plant there in the spring.Mom and I spent our yearly quality time shopping on Friday. But not like most Black Friday shoppers. We really just went out to have some time out together. We casually picked up a few gifts for others, but spent the majority of our time in fabric and yarn shops satisfying our own needs and interests. Surprisingly, those shops weren't nearly as crowded as Best Buy and Circuit City - go figure!!! Here's what I came home with. The black yarn is for a pair of Nicholas's Fingerless Gloves for my god daughter for Christmas. Also my aunt asked me to make a pair of Dashings for my 16 yo. cousin and I plan on using the rest of the black for those. His 13 yo. sister will hopefully get a pair of Snowflake Fingerless Gloves in the Gems pink and grey. The Panda Cotton and Claudia's Handpainted are for me. I couldn't resist. Mom also picked up a few others that I'll get at Christmas. Then I picked up some reading material. There are so many great ideas in here! I'm planning on carrying one of these around with me at all times for when I have a spare moment or two to dream. Nothing from these will be able to worked on until after the holidays as I'm actually realizing how much I have to do between now and then. In fact, my before the holidays knitting list includes:

• finish Mr. Pumpkin Patch (Mr. Greenjeans)
• finish Isabella
• finish my Nicholas's fingerless gloves
• a pair of Nicholas's for Alex
• a pair of Dashings for David
• a pair of Snowflakes for Paige
• my Christmas socks
• Lori's Nori bag

1/2 of my projects are selfishly for me, what can I say? I guess I should really focus on those that are for others first so that I'm sure that they'll be done in time. But I'm having so much fun on the stuff that's for me! Here's Mr. PP so far (as of this morning). I worked on the stockinette while I was home and then realized that I didn't pack the smaller needles for the cabling so I had to wait until I got home for that. But as you can see, working on it last night after driving for so many hours wasn't such a good idea. Take a look at the cabling. It's all wrong. I had to frog it back and work it again. Updated photos later.

Since working on Mr. PP over the holiday was limited, I started a pair of Christmas socks for myself. It's Lorna's Laces in Tuscany colorway and the Socks of Kindness pattern. Again I flaked on following directions and added a 12th row to the repeat. But I'm liking how they're coming out anyway so it's all good.
Now I really need to get back into decorating the house with holidayness. (Yes, I made up that word.) We are hosting a revving up for the holiday season party this weekend and there's a lot to be done.

Animal House

So it's not enough that my house currently looks like a pack of elephants ran through it, but I just had to cast on for a second pair of monkeys in none other than a vibrant yarn in Jitterbug's colorway Parrot. I adore this yarn and had so much fun a few months ago making up a pair of these for my Red Color Swap partner that I just had to take a second go at it and make a pair for myself! The color isn't quite as vibrant in the photo, but what can I say when it's getting dark so much earlier now and I can't get home in time for those great sun lit photo shots. But I think you get the idea.

Speaking of Color Swaps, of course I had to sign up again for this month - the color is ORANGE! And in my case, probably my favorite color is pumpkin (or orangutan) and am tickled pink, I mean orange, that I can surround myself with the colors of my dreams right now, hence my monkeys playing with the pumpkin and leaves (even if they are fake due to the lack of rain this year). Look for the upcoming Color Swap questionnaire coming soon.

Other news at the moment, last night I took some time to tackle a portion of the current mess I call my jungle, oh I mean home. Ya see, Honey is planning on a biking/camping trip down the C&O Canal trail this weekend and it would appear that he needed to get out all of the biking/camping gear we own and spread it around the house so that he could determine what he should pack for the four day trip. And then he went out and picked out some new gear and the packaging from all that is now mixed in with that mess. Enough complaining. I decided to do what I could about the sorts of the house and I took on reorganizing my knitting nook. (For those of you that don't know, I am a bit of an organizational freak and I tend to drive Honey crazy with trying to keep the house clean and organized.) Since I now consider myself to have an actual stash - not just left overs from previous projects, but real yarn waiting to decide what it's going to be - I figured I needed a better way to store it than in the basket. (see previous stash post here.) And now a corner of my dinning room (that never gets used as a dinning room) looks like this:

Ok, so the box of dishes and the MRI scans don't really belong, but it's getting there. If only you could see the items in the bag as well as that bottom drawer way off to the right where items lay in wait to be sent to swap partners and PIF lucky recipients! All in dew time, my dear. All in due time. And what is that I see? Are there two new knitting resource books there on the table? Why, yes! Yes, there are:

I plan on trying the whole knitting two socks at a time on circular needles with an up coming sock I have planned. We'll see how that goes. But for now, I must bid you all ado. The 2nd Episode of House will be coming on soon and I want to be all ready for it. I have my project all ready and waiting for me but dinner will have to come first.

Somebody Loves Me!

Somebody loves me! Somebody loves me! Somebody loves me! (Imagine me dancing around like the goober I am and singing like Sandra Bullock in Miss Congeniality (remember the part where she sings "I think you love me. You wanna kiss me. You wanna hug me." in that annoying little tune?)) I came home from a VERY long first day back to work and this is what I found on my doorstep. Only problem is... I don't know who they're from!?!?!? I am totally tickled pink (well pink isn't really my color but you get my point) but I don't know who to thank.

I'm absolutely in LOVE with so many patterns I don't know where I'll start first! Well, maybe the bag on the front cover! It's totally me!

By the way, head over to Cass's blog for a fun little contest to win yummy yarn and books and be sure to tell her I sent you!!!

Christmas in July!

Oh my... the postman was late yesterday and look at what he brought me when he finally came! Christmas truely does come in July!

Well, actually these are items that I purchased for myself so I'm not sure if that really counts or not... but hey, I'm willin' to pretend if you are! So I know that I just posted a flashing of my stash and stated that I'm not really one to stash up in fear of not getting the right yarn or enough of it. But I read somewhere that sock yarn doesn't really count as stash. So I went a little be-zerk. First off I needed some longer extension needles connectors for my option needles and so while I was on the Knit Picks site I decided that I would like to attempt at dying - with kool-aid no doubt. I haven't attempted dying yarn yet, so this should be fun. I purchased 3 skiens of their Bare Natural to save for a rainy day activity. Also while I was there I went a-strollin' through the sock yarns and picked up these two fine fall beauties. (Have I mentioned that fall is my favorite season and I'm totally in love with fall colors?)The sun has put a glare on them and you don't get the full effect of the oranges and earthy tones. These are Knit Picks Felici yarn in colors Clay and Pebble.

Then as I was reading up on Stacey's blog and seeing her fine Loopy items, I decided to wander into that shop as well. (I heard they have Steeler yarn! Go Pittsburgh!) And now look what I have mingling with my rosemary and sage:

These are Lorna's Laces in colorway Tuscany and ClaudiaHand Painted Yarn in colorway Steelers.
It's going to be a fine football season knitting up with these I tell ya. And to top it all off I added into the excitment two great yarns that I picked up at my LYS to use for some special Christmas gifts I'm planning. One is already started! Yes, that's Tofutsies that you see (don't know the colorway) and some beautiful Malabrigo merino wool that I'm knitting up into a Touch of Whimsy Scarf for my aunt.

Dontcha just love it?!

Stash Flash

Ok y'all, I'm flashing my stash! Those of you who are a little more on the conservative side and are already covering your eyes, don't worry, I won't tell if you peak just a little through your fingers.

Here you will see my basket-o-yarn as well as a shot of the yarn stash all sprawled out and exposed. I'm not quite at the point of stashing up on great yarns without knowing what I might have planned for it. The whole question of how much to get is beyond me. I'm more comfortable searching for a yarn after I already find a pattern. I'm still a bit of a novice at substituting yarns in a pattern and getting it to work out. And quite frankly I'm horrible at determining the weight of a yarn and determining if yarns are of equal weight and can be substituted successfully. (One of the many reasons why Jasmine is such a great knitting buddy to have - she's much better at this than I am.) And I'm even worse at figuring out how to adjust a pattern to a different yarn. So actually my entire stash at this moment consistes of left overs from projects and a few yarns that I planned on useing but for whatever reason just didn't work out.

Yarns included in my stash range from Loin brand superwash (baby sweaters and booties) and furry things from some beginner scarves to Rowan All Seasons Cotton, and some newer sock yarns. There's also this great yarn that's really hard to see in this photo (top left) that Jaz gave me. (Sorry, but I know know the name of it nor the colorway.) I love it but haven't figured out what I want to do with it yet. And of course there's the Rowan Big Wool that Maddie included in my color swap package. I'm hoping this fall to make a hat with it.

Here are my needles in the nude. I started off with bamboo needles (Clover) and loved that they gave me some grab during my beginner stage and all those foo-foo scarves I cranked out. But now that I'm venturing into more sophisticated knits, I'm really enjoying my KnitPicks Options needles. I really like working on circulars. I didn't bother to open all the pages of bed they snuggle in. There's also a page betweenthe sheets that the DP sock needles use to bond together when they're not cuddling with some comfey yarn. The retro antique needles and case were given to me by a co-worker. And I've undressed my notions bag. The scissors aren't what I would call "on the cutting edge" but they do for now.

The tease of the bookshelf. Most of the patterns I use are found while I'm slinking along on-line or are passed over as not-so-sloppy-seconds from knitting friends. These books have been picked up or given to me (mostly because they were on sale - call 'em cheap and easy). One book that I am looking to add to my collection is Knit2Together. There are a few items in there that I would be interested in knitting. The slippers in there would be great for winters slinking around the house and maybe even a few Christmas gifts.

While we're on the subject of flashing things, I thought I might just flash the works in progress. There's the Lizard Ridge squares that are begging to be sewn together and I just can't bring myself it do it just yet, a pair of socks, a Steeler fashioned scarf, and a baby sweater that needs to be stitched up as well. Oh, and then there's the knit picks shawl that I've had to frog at least 10 times and I'm starting to think I might have to just put it aside for a few years or so.

Well, that's it for now. I hope you all enjoyed the little peep show. The curtain is now closed.