First, activities - we did not go to NYC on New Years Day as we had planned. It was very cold and just didn't seem worth the drive. It was actually much warmer than it is today - I feel for the people who have decided to try to get a glimpse of our new President.
Karen and I have been doing much better with our commitment to walk regularly. We did have schedule conflicts and illness/injury (mild, but enough to get in the way) to deal with but after walking only twice in two weeks we made a commitment to "be better". Today will be a real test. It is 5 degrees outside. We will be walking in the afternoon, so it will be somewhat warmed, but still, it is cold outside. When we walked last night (I think it was about 15 degrees) we went numb pretty quickly. Maybe that will make the hills on the trail hurt less?
I went to Atlanta for an investigator meeting for a new study that I will be working on in the next few months. I was only there for 1.5 days and the hotel was near the airport, so I didn't even get to check out a yarn store while I was there. Bummer. And I missed the Needle Exchange at the LYS in order to go!
We had planned (Karen, Nancy and I) to go into Baltimore today to browse a bead shop - Beadazzled - but changed our minds when Nancy pointed out that the Obama train would be causing all kinds of traffic tie ups and road closures in the city. We'll try again another weekend. Thank you, Nancy for being thorough. You saved us a lot of trouble, I think.
Knitting progress has been good. I finished my Lace ribbon scarf.
It still needs to be blocked, but the knitting is complete. I am very pleased with the results.I finished and blocked the Leaf lace scarf made with Silk and Ivory yarn. I *love* it.
I finished my Trekking travel socks and wore them yesterday. I tried to take pictures this morning but it's too cold to go out and I couldn't get a good shot inside.
I started and finished a neck warmer for my brother. He asked for a scarf that would keep his neck warm and no wool - it itches. I don't think he'll be able to tell that this one is Shelridge Farms superwash wool. There will be no ends dangling and that will be much safer while he works. I am pretty certain that he'll throw it into the washer and dryer, too, so alpaca was not a possibility. The photo isn't very good, but it is a nice red color and has seed stitch bands across/around the neck. It is long enough that he can pull it up over his nose if he needs to but soft enough that he can keep it bunched around his neck and it will be warm and soft. I hope he likes it.
I am on the second sleeve of Bob's white cotton sweater - the short row sleeve cap is almost complete, then it will be round and round for a while. No pictures - too boring.
The double knitting scarf that I started while in southern Maryland (my last post) makes slow progress. I have to work on it when undistracted and alone so I can count. I thought that skill was much better established than it appears, at least when I work on this scarf. Still, you can see the pattern developing. Second side -
And first side. I can't call them right or wrong sides in double knitting. It just doesn't make sense to me.
I frogged the fingerless mitts that I started oh, so many months ago. I was trying to adapt the pattern to avoid having stockinette on the inner arm side - I wanted patterning all around. I was able to do that but was never able to come up with a graceful way to transition back to either ribbing or stockinette for the palm. Continuing the stitch pattern with lace and cables wasn't comfortable, and I couldn't figure a way to continue just the lace pattern with a graceful transition either. So, frog pond time. Maybe I'll just knit them as written. What a concept.
I just started a pair of socks for my son in MD Terrapins colors (red, black, white). I found out that I need some gold color yarn and don't have the right color. I think I will try to over-dye some yellow rather than purchase a skein for as little as I need. That will be a fun thing to do this weekend. Since it's too cold outside to even think about doing the dyeing outside, I will take myself to the grocery store to look for some Koolaide in a color that might work.
Once my sock knitting project was put on hold until the gold color yarn is located or created, I needed another project to work on. I didn't want a huge project, I wanted something that I could complete in weeks rather than months. I started looking for a pattern to make a cowl or neck warmer with the yarn I purchased at Crazy For Ewe. It is called Ellyn Coopers Yarn Sonnets Gemini, and the color is Khaki Blues. It is 50/50 wool/silk.
I chose one pattern, knitted my swatch, cast on and knitted about 20 rows, then decided that it didn't look as good as I had hoped. It was OK but I wanted more than OK. Today will be spent (partially) finding just the right thing. It is beautiful yarn, in addition to feeling so yummy that I could almost not knit it and lie naked upon it instead. almost.
Well, I am off to look for a good pattern for my yummy yarn, and to start some laundry. Karen and I will walk this afternoon, once the temperature has gotten into the double digits. Later today I hope to have photos of a prize I won. Yes, I won a prize. That is so rare, and I am very excited about this one - it's all lace weight yarn! I plan to go outside and get daylight photos, since the flash photos I took the other night did not show the colors correctly. Have a great day.
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