Sunday, March 21, 2010

I know, it's been a while! I had a surgical procedure and just wasn't up to much of anything, although I have gotten some knitting done. I finished a number of UFO's started before Christmas, three of which were gifts for Christmas. Mostly Cedar Leaves Shawlettes, and modified versions of the pattern. One was a lovely green for my friend Lori, in Mirasol Tupa. I gave it to her unfinished and brought it back home with me to complete when I finally was able to get another skein of yarn to finish it. I gave it to her a couple of weeks ago and she loved it! Pics to follow. Another is a modified Cedar Leaves in Malabrigo Worsted in Stonechat. This is probably going to be given to my friend Lisa as a belated Christmas gift. I had to keep buying additional yarn to finish it, I wanted it longer than the original shawlette and I also did y/o increases instead of using short rows for shaping. And another shawl done in the same method for my sister for Christmas in Lobster Pot's Worsted Wool and Mohair in Shoreline Heather, also ran out of yarn, but was lucky that Flying Fingers had just gotten a new shipment of 2 skeins. I ordered them both and now have 1.5 skeins left, so I may make some fingerless gloves to match for Sis. No rush though, since the weather is warming and she won't be needing them at this point. And last, but certainly not least, I was finally able to finish my Cedar Leaves Shawlette for myself done in Madelinetosh's Pastoral in Blackcurrrant. I ran out of yarn just a few leaves away from the finish. Although I had ordered and received a skein directly from Madelinetosh , they were kind enough to dye a skein just for me, it was a completely different color and I wasn't happy with how it looked when used to complete my shawlette. Misodiva from Ravelry was nice enough to send me the last few yards of her Pastoral Blackcurrant from a project she finished, so I have finished it, finally! I just need to weave in the ends and block it and it's ready to go! Yay!

I started a Cosette in Madelinetosh's Merino in Windowpane and Eyre Norway Spruce. I've had to put it down temporarily, though, into hibernation because my family has been invited to a friend's 85th birthday party and I decided to make her a modified Cedar Leaves shawl. She's in a wheelchair and it will be easy for her to slip on and off. I'm doing short row shaping, so it will be a modification of the Cosette shawl by Alana Dakos and the Cedar Leaves by Alana Dakos. I'm knitting it in Madelinetosh Merino in Moorland. The Moorland is a lot darker than I anticipated, but it's still pretty and there's enough color variation to make it interesting. Our friend, Sylvia, has strawberry blonde hair, so green was an obvious choice. I would have liked Jade, but there wasn't any available and I also wanted to get yarn from Eat, Sleep, Knit to contribute to the Yarnathon. I've reached the 5 mile mark! Very cool!

So much yarn to buy and not enough money! Eat, Sleep, Knit is having a sale and when I totaled up the yarn I wanted it came to nearly $1000!!!!! Just don't have that kind of money, so going to have to do some serious thinning.

I'm also hoping to find the perfect spinning wheel. I've been looking at the various different wheels available and have asked advice of several people trying to figure out which will be best for me in the price range I can afford. It will be a birthday present from my parents. Then all I have to do is practice spinning, but with the warmer weather approaching I have the feeling that I will be doing more spinning than knitting. As much as I like to knit, I just can't stand having wool in my lap when it's hot!

Off to continue my Cedar leaves/Cosette shawl. I have to finish it in time for the party, which is April 17. It will need to be blocked and packed by then. I also found a very pretty shell and bead shawl pin to accompany the shawl. This way Sylvia doesn't have to be clutching onto the shawl to hold it place. I hope she likes it. I think it's so very pretty and if I received it as a gift I would be over the moon!

February 18, 2010

It's been a while since I've posted last. Not been feeling well and just trying to keep my head above water.

Knitting-wise I picked up the shawl I knitted for my friend Lisa again. I need to do an edging and I'm experimenting with putting a leaf edging on it like the one on the CedarLeaves shawlette. It's tedious picking up all the stitches so that I can knit a few rows of garter stitch before I am able to start the leaves, though. I'm not sure I'm going to be able to pull it off, either, I'm afraid of what may happen with the point of the triangle. Remains to be seen what will happen. I'm not really experienced enough to be able to fudge it.

Never Not Knitting has another shawlette pattern. Very pretty and I would really like to make it, but of course I can't find the Madelinetosh yarns to make it. The body of the shawlette should be lighter, but I can't find a color I like that's available that has a corresponding darker yarn that will complement it. I snagged some Madtosh Pastoral in Norway Spruce from the Etsy shop, but it's hard to tell what will go with it, plus it's dark in color and I'm not going to be able to find a complementary darker yarn. I'm not fond of the look of using a lighter yarn, Eyre kelp would probably work, but I don't like the look. I'm thinking of just getting Norway Spruce in Eyre. It's a little bit lighter than the pics of the Pastoral, but I think it will be OK. I'm afraid to wait for the shipment of the Pastoral since the Eyre will probably be sold by the time I get the shipment. Plus I really wanted to use Fig, it's so pretty, but I can't find the Merino in Fig anywhere, just the Eyre. I even tried to find a different manufacturer's yarn for the body, but without success. It's very frustrating. I'm also waiting for my shipment of Madtosh from the Yarn Club. They are running behind and I think I'll be lucky if I get it the first week of March. There may have been something in there that I could use.

Found a cool yarn called "Sunapee" today in a pretty pale yellow. Think I need to add this yarn to my stash, especially since it's Margaret's fav color. There's only one skein in each of two dye lots, though. They are pretty different, it would mean alternating every row. Oh bother!

We've had a fair amount of snow the past few days. The dogs are loving it! I took them to meet up with my friends Joe and Sandy so that they could play with their dogs. They didn't play together, but they did get the chance to run around the park and they had such a great time! I stupidly forgot to take the camera into the dog park with me, so no great pics of them playing in the snow and having a blast! Boo hoo!

Finally the one skein of Mirasol Tupa I've been waiting for has arrived at the LYS. Going to pick it up tomorrow so I can finally finish it and gift it to Lori. I want her to have it before it's summer!

Well, off to see about downloading the Tea Leaves Pattern. I have the Lichen in Vintage just waiting to get started, but I need to download the pattern.

February 1, 2010

It's hard to believe it's February already! Wow, time really does fly!

So I've been working on a Cedar Leaves Shawlette, this time I think I'll keep this one for myself. The yarn I'm using is Madelinetosh Pastoral, a beautiful yarn that I was very sad to discover is now discontinued. *sigh* Whenever I find something I truly love it seems it gets discontinued. Seems Madelinetosh said that there wasn't enough of a market for the yarn and so she's discontinuing it. I love the Blackcurrant colorway, it's so pretty. I bought 2 skeins from Eat, Sleep, Knit in November during their Black Friday sale. Four hundred yards should have been enough to complete this shawlette, but I have the feeling I'm going to come up short. Madelinetosh was wonderful and dyed a skein just for me, but the dye lot is completely off and this is not a pattern you can easily alternate skeins, especially in the leaves. My original two skeins had a substantial amount of pink and lavender throughout it, and the 2nd skein I am using now has some teal, too. The 3rd skein has nearly no pink and is not as blue and doesn't have the same depth of color. So what to do? There is a Ravelry person with a stash of 2 skeins, she's willing to sell them to me. She got them from ESK, so they will probably be similar. Just didn't want to spend another $64 so that I could complete this project. So I'm knitting in hopes that it'll be enough, but I'm pretty sure I'm going to come up short.

This morning I was awakened by the doorbell at 9:30a.m. Who could be ringing the bell at that hour? Julie and Gable, my Leos, were going crazy and barking up a storm. I dragged myself downstairs and opened the door only to discover a package from the post office between the doors. Wow, my order from ESK had already arrived! I placed the order on line very late on Friday night. I never expected it to have arrived already! So my first order of Madelinetosh Vintage in Lichen arrived. I'm hoping to do a tea leaves cardigan with it, something to do while I'm recuperating from surgery #32 which takes place 2/9. I just have to re-load the software for my printer so that I can print the pattern out. It's very pretty, but I really wanted the Tannehill. Still waiting for The Backwards Loop to get their order of Madelinetosh Merino in. Guess maybe I'll have 2 tea leaves cardis! In my order with my Lichen was my Yarnathon Welcome package, really great to have samples of all the yarns they carry. Also scratched off my Yarn Lotto card and got a $5 discount on my next purchase, yay!!!!

Been wanting to take pics of my projects only to discover that my camera battery is dead and the new charger I bought on vacation in August is not working. Arghhhh!!!! So now I need to find another charger, I can't find the original one that came with the camera for the life of me-I was certain I packed it when leaving for Sunapee last summer, but it is nowhere to be found. Very frustrating! I also wanted to take a pic of my square for the Leos in Need afghan made from Julie's fur, but can't without a functioning battery. This doesn't make me happy!

Well, off to find out about a new charger!

My first blog entry-1/30/10

So this is my first blog entry. My name is Susan and I own 2 Leonberger dogs and enjoy knitting and crocheting.

I am currently working on the Cedar Leaves Shawlette in Madelinetosh Pastoral Blackcurrent. I was halfway through the body when I realized I was not going to have enough yarn. In a panic I tried nearly in vain to locate anothe skein. I was just about to give up when I was thrilled to discover that Madtosh had one undyed skein of Pastoral and they were so wonderful because they dyed that one skein just for me. Unfortunately it's not close in color to the original 2 skeins, but I'm making it work.

Tomorrow I'll post pics of Julie and Gable, my two Leos, for those of you who don't know what a Leonberger looks like.