Secret Pal: The Reveal

Well friends, it's over, that wonderful thing we call Secret Pal 10. While the ending is bittersweet (in that it's over, and there won't be any more fun packages to look forward to), I found out that Fawn was my wonderful spoiler! Go now (I'll wait) and check out the adorable octopus she just designed - this is heading straight to the top of the must-knit queue! Whilst designing and knitting George of the eight legs, she managed to put together this great final package for me, with a rainbow theme: Check out these chopsticks - so cute! There is also all I need to try some more Kool-Aid dyeing (and I suspect some Kool-Aid to drink, since I have quite the sweet tooth), a pleasantly scented but not overpowering eucalyptus candle, mini colored pencils (how did she know I love to color?), lip gloss (quite tasty), and a Taurus measuring tape. Until recently I'd never really believed what knitters say about the need for multiple measuring tapes, but lately mine have been running off, so it's great to have another one!

She also included a catnip-stuffed knit toy for Oliver, who is becoming very spoiled. I think I forgot to mention that Amie, my Knitters Tea Swap pal, sent Oliver a felted mouse that she made and stuffed with catnip from her garden (!), so he's been one lucky kitty these last couple of weeks! He was quite interested in his new toy, which reminds me of a manta ray. He helped with the opening: And took a shine to the ray right away:

Thanks for being a great swap pal, and let's keep in touch!

Tomorrow is the kick-off of the Mystery Stole Along, and I'm pretty excited to get started. We'll see how long I can keep up...I don't have a busy weekend planned, so I have hopes for staying with the group at least for this week. Next Friday I will be visiting my family in PA, so I might not have much time to knit. I always take a ton of knitting home but never get much accomplished. I'm sure that I'll overpack the projects again this time - old habits die hard!

Tomorrow I'll try to update you on my progress with the $1.50 cardigan, and wax rhapsodic (or not) about the mystery stole...

A package, and, as promised, a new sweater

Today I got another early birthday surprise, this time from my secret pal! I had a premonition there might be a package waiting for me today, so I made sure to get home before the building office closed, and there it was, a package!

The wrapping was so nice I had to take a photo - inside the box each item was individually wrapped with little tags describing each item. For instance, the note with the hand cream said "For your hard-working hands."In the box were all the goodies you see above. A nice journal (one can never have too many notebooks and journals), a pen, birthday candles (so cool!), chocolate, the aforementioned hand cream (lemongrass and cedar), a cool ring (Which fits! This is amazing because I have really small hands.), and Knitting Without Tears, by Elizabeth Zimmermann. And, check out the cute card! Now, I must admit that despite the widespread adoration of EZ, I've never read any of her books, nor even really looked at them. So, I'm really happy to have this one, and I must say that I read about half of it as soon as I opened it! The writing is great - very witty and quite to the point, which I really enjoy. I've seen some lovely examples of her Seamless Hybrid sweater, and I bet there is one in my future sometime. The lotion is great, I used some this evening and I really like the scent - lemongrass is one of my favorites. My secret pal is very shifty - I know she lives in Raleigh, NC, but I've noticed (because I watch way too much Columbo) that she's mailed my two packages from different addresses! And she has really neat handwriting, the kind I'm always jealous of, because although I have neat handwriting, it pales in comparison to some people's. Alas...Anyway, thank you secret pal! I love my package and I can't wait to find out who you are! The suspense is killing me!!!

In my last post I eluded to having started a new sweater, so without further ado, I present the humble beginnings of my Dollar and a Half Cardigan, from the Spring 2007 Interweave Knits. I'm knitting this using Cascade Sierra, which is a 80% cotton/20% wool blend. This is a new yarn for me, and basically I think it's the Cascade version of Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece, although I've never used that before either so I can't make any sort of informed comparison. I think my photo is a bit dark, but if you click here, you can see the red I'm using, which is the dark one on the lower left. I sense this is going to be a tough project to photograph, due to the color and the fact that the lace bits want to pull in and the reverse stockinette panel wants to puff out. We'll see. I'm a bit concerned about my gauge, but I took a good stab at getting it right. The reason I'm worried is that the gauge was measured over the lace pattern, not the stockinette portion, which made it a bit tough to measure. If anything I think my gauge is a bit small, just a tad, and that would be okay because I'm making the 36.5" size, which gives me some wiggle room. We'll see. I mostly suspect that my row gauge may be off, just looking at the height of that first lace panel to the stockinette bit above it, but it's really too early to tell. When I block it the lace will stretch more than the stockinette (I suspect), so I imagine it might even itself out. Fingers crossed!

Oh, and how beautiful is this Hanami stole? I really really really want to make one of these! I found this pattern a few weeks ago and kept forgetting to mention it...I especially like the cherry blossom part (bottom in the photo). Simply stunning!

Organizing the stash

My Secret Pal 10 hostess, Shelby, is having a contest for her group, and wants us to show off our stashes, and how we organize them. Of course I am happy to oblige, because I love my yarn stash (Mom, please don't kill me. I know it's excessive, but there could be stuff for you in there.) and reorganizing it a bit for a photo shoot is always fun!I have a gigantic walk-through closet, and the yarn has a prominent place under my skirts and pants (pardon the mess on top - it tends to be a catch-all space for clothes that need to be rehung). The stash lived mostly in boxes until I bought these wire organizing things at Target last summer. I like it much better this way. The wire bins allow the yarn to "breathe," plus I can see it all, and it's lovely and makes me happy every time I look at it. There is quite a bit more in a box to the right, but although it's organized in the box, it's not photogenic. There is a fair bit of organization to the stash, at least in that the upper right bin is almost all sock yarn, and the left two bins are all sweater yarns and assorted Cascade 220 for felting projects. The upper middle bin is meant to be lace and scarf yarn, but there are interlopers a plenty in there, including the Manos stash (bottom of upper bin - there is also some red Manos hiding in the upper left bin, on the top). The lower middle bin contains a bunch of cotton blends and Cascade Jewel (the lovely purple), as well as some grey Cascade Pastaza (scarf for Dave), dark blue Malabrigo (not sure, but it's for me. No way I'm giving it up.). The pretty jewel tone skein on the top right of the bin is Schaefer Marjaana, which I had completely forgotten about. While these bins are great and the yarn looks pretty, they're also quite deep, so there is a lot of pretty yarn hiding in the back, which occasionally slips my mind. I keep towels covering the bottom bins because Oliver tends to get curious about the yarn, and he's already had one trip to the vet for a yarn-related emergency (when he was a wee kitten), and we don't care to repeat that. Better safe than sorry, but he is a good guard cat for the stash. Lest you think I acquired a ton of yarn since last summer, trust that that is not entirely the case. Oliver laid down here during a previous reorganization of the stash, when most of the yarn was spread all over out of camera range...That said, I see some yarn here (almost everything in the lower right bin) that I know I haven't used yet, and that I didn't see yesterday evening. Wonder where it's run off to?

The hunt through the stash inspired me to start a pair of plain stockinette socks, so I cast on a pair last night. I'm making them toe-up, using Wendy's new toe method, described here (on April 25th). I'm using some of the Monarch sock yarn I bought at Madrona (second from the right, Purdy Plum), and it's going quite well so far. I'm not generally so big on the toe-up socks, but I decided I wanted to use all the yarn and make long socks, so I figured I'd give it a go. Just so you're not concerned, I have NOT abandoned the Jewel cardigan. I finished the second sleeve last night, but I want to block it before I do the button bands, so that's where we are. I'll post some photos of it this weekend. I am also still entranced by my Fair Isle mitts, and will probably start the second one this weekend as well. The stockinette sock is to fulfill the requirement for a totally mindless project (and to get through some of the sock yarn, which is overwhelming when I see it all together in the closet).
To my Secret Pal, I got your card yesterday, thank you! I do not in any way feel neglected, so you needn't worry! I hope things are going better for you, and I'm happy to hear you're also having a lovely spring. Duke was my second choice for graduate school, and I remember people saying during my interview how lovely it was there in the spring!

Easter Treats!

This post is seriously late, and I apologize, but things have been chaotic. Why overdue? I got a package from my Secret Pal on Saturday, and I'm just now posting! This box was a really nice Easter surprise!

My secret pal sent me lovely Lorna's Laces sock yarn, in Purple Iris (beautiful color choice!), along with some Easter goodies. I will admit that my breakfast on Saturday consisted of those sour gummy worms and a diet pepsi while I got ready for Rembrandt's wedding. The chocolate bar is so cute, I almost don't want to open it up. I'm going to try to save the wrapper if possible, and it looks like it might have a card or bookmark inside (that butterfly is on a string, and it moves). There were also some Easter shortbread cookies, which I've been enjoying one per evening. Thank you Secret Pal, and I'm SO sorry it took me so long to post about my package!!!

About Rembrandt's wedding, I know you're all eagerly awaiting the photos, so here is a sneak peak until I can write up a proper post. I'm giving a talk on Friday so I've been really busy getting ready for that, but I will TRY to post more tomorrow.

This dress was SO fun!

Green and pink and yellow oh my!

First off, I want to say thank you to everyone who said such nice things about my asymmetrical tank top/vest! I'm so glad that you all liked it, and that you think it's flattering (you're not just saying that, are you?). As I said Monday, I have finished another long-languishing project, but I'm going to postpone showing that to you since it hasn't yet had its photo shoot.

April and May bring a new set of colors for Project Spectrum: Green, pink, and yellow. Lolly posted some lovely photos of her pink and green yarns, and I thought I would do the same. The pink and green is all I have; I discovered no yellow yarns anywhere in the stash, except hiding a bit in some of the green yarns.

I'll take you on a brief tour of the box. Standing in the back is the sock yarn stash - STR in Apple Valley Road and Tide Pool, Monarch sock yarn in Ivy, and STR in Nodding Violet. The pink skein on the right is Knit Picks Gossamer in Sweet Pea (laceweight). The thin green skein leaning on the sock yarn is some Rowan 4-ply that I purchased from my favorite Ebay seller, Cucumberpatch UK. When I ordered this I had NO concept of how thin it would be, but I'm actually using it for a project now and it's quite nice. There is also some Cashmerino Aran, Jo Sharp Silkroad Aran Tweed (enough for a sweater! Not in the box, but in the stash), and some Karabella Aurora 8. There is also some green banana silk (under the blob in the front) and some green Cascade Cotton (next to the banana silk). The bright blob in the front is about 600 yards of Kona superwash fingering weight that I dyed last spring. I think there is enough for knee-socks, so that is the plan. The cake on the front left is Zephyr merino/silk laceweight in Bottle Green, purchased this year at Madrona. The chartruese skeins under the Zephyr are a prize I won in Scout's Dye-O-Rama swap last year, and they're a bit bright for my tastes but I do have something in mind for them.

So, what am I going to do with all this green? I have three green projects on the needles, one of which is very old, one which I started a few weeks back but haven't blogged about yet, and another which is brand spankin' new and not yet blogworthy. Here we go:

The old project is the Elfine socks, which I started last May, during the green month of the first Project Spectrum.

I realize this is a horrible photo, but this yarn (also dyed by moi) is very difficult to photograph. I might have better luck in real light, but this is what we have so we're going with it. These socks have been a saga. I started them last May, as I mentioned, and they are well-traveled. They went to Chicago when I visited Heidi and attended my college reunion, and then they went to England. While en route the stitches got a bit antsy and some jumped off the needle, and they were put down for the duration of that trip, and indeed until about August when I finally fixed them and promptly put them back to rest. I picked them up again this weekend, and I quickly finished the foot and completed (with Rachel's help) my first short-row heel. Now I'm on my way up the leg, but I'm a bit worried about the distance between the heel and the instep, which seems awfully small. I'm going to knit a bit further so I can try them on and then see what I have. These are my first toe-up socks so it's all an experiment at this point!

The other green project is Eunny's Endpaper Mitts, which I started a few weeks ago. This is my first Fair-isle, and I'm enjoying it but it's slow-going for me as I haven't really figured out how to hold my yarns properly. I don't wrap the yarn around my fingers when I knit, which isn't usually a problem, but for this it's slow because I have to keep picking up the correct yarn, and they're always getting twisted. But, I will prevail, and maybe if I'm nice Rachel will teach me to knit continental and then I can hold yarn in each hand and fly through these! The green here is the Rowan 4-ply I mentioned earlier, and the ivory is something else Rowan that I can't be bothered with finding the band for right now. This project is living in an adorable green metal lunchbox that Heidi sent me for Christmas, which is ALSO Project Spectrum appropriate!

I'm hoping to get at least one of these projects finished by the end of May, and hopefully both. I must admit I forgot I had that Aurora 8, so I might also do something with that. I intended it for the Ruffles scarf from Scarf Style, but my first attempt was much too tight and I ripped it out. The Silkroad Aran Tweed is intended for Demi, from Vintage Knits, but it doesn't seem like the right time of year to be starting a wool cabled sweater (To me. Rachel just started one and it's lovely so far, and let's face it, you can wear wool sweaters all year in Seattle, but I'm in spring/summer mode now). My three current projects are probably all the green I need anyway, at least this year - I can only knit so fast, right?

Oh, I got a lovely card from my Secret Pal yesterday - thank you!

Secret Pal 10 Questionnaire!!!

I'm very excited to be participating in Secret Pal 10! This is my second go at this, having also done SP8, where I met some very nice people. I'm posting my questionnaire a bit late because I wasn't really sure if I was signed up or not, but I figure it's fine since the matches aren't going out until next week anyway! Without further ado:

1. What is/are your favorite yarn/s to knit with? What fibers do you absolutely *not* like?
I'll knit with almost anything natural. I like wool (who doesn't?!?), and alpaca is lovely to knit with as well. For summery things bamboo, cotton, silk, etc. Blends are nice. I'm not big on novelty yarns or the fake stuff...

2. What do you use to store your needles/hooks in?
A drawer in my side table! I have a lovely DPN case made for me by a previous swap pal, but otherwise I keep my needles in their original packaging in my drawer, and this is just fine with me - many of the size labels have worn off, so keeping them in their packaging is quite useful...

3. How long have you been knitting & how did you learn? Would you consider your skill level to be beginner, intermediate or advanced?
I've been knitting for about 3.5 years, and was inspired by my cousin but taught by my mother and many good friends. I would consider myself intermediate.

4. Do you have an Amazon or other online wish list?
Yes, Amazon. I'm the one in Seattle; I think I have many counterparts across the country, so be careful!

5. What's your favorite scent?
Vanilla, or citrus. Fresh scents in general. I don't like lavender (I know, I'm weird) or anything strong/musky/incensey (is that a word?).

6. Do you have a sweet tooth? Favorite candy?
Yes - I've been putting my dentists' children through college for many years! Milk chocolate (unadulterated), or anything sweet/sour like Lemonheads and Sour Patch Kids.

7. What other crafts or Do-It-Yourself things do you like to do? Do you spin?
I used to do a bit of needlepoint, but not so much lately. I make my own paper and I sometimes mean to scrapbook. I have two spindles and a slew of roving but the spinning bug never quite caught me as I'm way too impatient for something with that kind of learning curve.

8. What kind of music do you like? Can your computer/stereo play MP3s? (if your buddy wants to make you a CD)
I listen to mostly British rock music, or I guess what could be considered alternative rock. I can tolerate anything but jazz and hard-core country and have been known to listen to rap more than occasionally...

9. What's your favorite color(s)? Any colors you just can't stand?
I love teal, turquoise, purple, blue, green, and red (but not with the others). I'm not that big on neons or pastels, but I love a good jewel tone.

10. What isa your family situation? Do you have any pets?
I live with my boyfriend and a fiesty orange tabby named Oliver, who makes frequent appearances on the blog.

11. Do you wear scarves, hats, mittens or ponchos?
Anything but ponchos. Me and ponchos don't get along. When they were in fashion a few years back I made a valiant effort at pulling one off, but I honestly couldn't figure out where my purse was supposed to go and I like to have the full use of my arms...Of the above scarves are my favorite, then hats, then fingerless gloves, which are quite useful in Seattle and in my lab, which alternates rapidly between boiling and Antarctic.

12. What is/are your favorite item/s to knit?
I love knitting hats, and scarves, and pretty much anything in the round. Socks are fun too. I have a lot of sock yarn, so I should really get on knitting some more socks...

13. What are you knitting right now?
What am I NOT knitting right now? Actually, it's not so bad at the moment. I'm knitting a pair of socks, fair-isle mitts (my first fair-isle!), a Koigu scarf, and a lace stole that I really just started so I'm not sure it counts. I just finished a bulky tank/vest that is in need of its crochet edging, and I have a sweater that is in need of seaming and finishing, but I prefer not to talk about that...

14. Do you like to receive handmade gifts?
Depends. I'm not crafty in my decor, but if it's something fun and useful, or an accessory, maybe.

15. Do you prefer straight or circular needles? Bamboo, aluminum, plastic?
I much prefer straight needles and only use circulars when absolutely necessary. I do my best to avoid knitting straight items on circular needles. I love DPNs. I prefer bamboo but I have some metal needles I like for socks and for hats, since the slick metal really seems to be faster. That said, I'm rarely in a hurry with my knitting (Nov/Dec not withstanding), so I prefer bamboo on the whole.

16. Do you own a yarn winder and/or swift?
I have a ball winder (two, if we count the boyfriend), and I use my knees (or his) as my swift :)

17. How old is your oldest UFO?
About 1.5 years, the sweater that shall not be named.

18. What is your favorite holiday?
Halloween, although Christmas isn't bad!

19. Is there anything that you collect?
Aside from yarn? Not really. Shoes maybe, and handbags...

20. Any books, yarns, needles or patterns out there you are dying to get your hands on? What knitting magazine subscriptions do you have?
None spring to mind at the moment, aside from the Barbara Walker Treasury's, which would be great to have. I subscribe to Interweave Knits. As for yarns, I covet Manos, and other handpainted yarns of any nature. I love washable sock yarn, and I'm just trying to get into knitting lace so solidish sockweight yarn that could be used for lace would be lovely.

21. Are there any new techniques you'd like to learn?
I would like to learn proper fair-isle, as opposed to the crazy thing I'm making up at the moment...And I totally need to teach myself some good finishing techniques so I can finish the sweater I keep mentioning (that I'm not talking about).

22. Are you a sock knitter? What are your foot measurements?
Yes. I wear a 6.5 (small feet = quick socks!).

23. When is your birthday?
5.11.79. But, I still get carded at movies (seriously).

I hope this is helpful! There is plenty of other random info about me on the blog, and I'll try to get back to posting more frequently. I've been so busy - until last night I hadn't knit a stitch in 6 days!