Once upon a Super Bowl

Last Sunday I was talked into attending a Super Bowl party. Knowing that I lack the "enthusiasm for televised sports" gene, I decided to start a new project that would give me my own little dose of the fun. Enter the Tulip Baby Cardigan.

It's perfect. Fast, easy, pretty, lots of colour, and nice yarn. I've had this kit in my stash since last spring. Now that I have more than a few close friends expecting it seems like a great time to knit it up.

Before falling off the metaphorical goal bandwagon, I managed to accomplish some long forgotten spinning.

The yarn is just over 140 yards of worsted 3-ply, made with 2 plies of Superwash merino top (these singles) and one ply of a merino tencel blend. There should be about a sweater's worth of yarn if I ever get finished. I'm not too sure about the colour since it is darker than I had originally anticipated. We'll see what happens after a bit of swatching before I make a firm decision either way.

Lucy is almost finished. I have about 16 more rows and a bit of neckband knitting to do. Then it's on to weaving in the dozens of ends, buying buttons, and grafting the underarm join shut.

I tried it on over the weekend and it seems a bit small. I think that a good blocking will give me a bit more room, especially since the yarn is superwash. Failing that, I suppose I'll have to cut back on the Mini Eggs.

Kusha Kusha also featured prominently this weekend and a fair amount of progress was made. I have just over a hundred more rows of stainless silk left to knit and it will be finished.

Love the way that this is turning out even if the slippery stainless silk rows are a bit of a pain to knit.

A week and some ago Nicole tagged me for the book MEME. Funny thing was that I had grabbed the book I was reading to see what my answer would before I realized that she had tagged me. Thanks Nicole!

The rules are as follows:

Go to the current book you are reading, on page 161, and copy down the 5th sentence:

“I can almost hear it.”

From Sweetness in the Belly by Camilla Gibb, otherwise known as my book club book for February.

Thank you for your comments on my last post. They made for a perfect re-entry.

Absentee Blogger Reporting for Duty

I can't believe that it's been nearly two months since my last post. Hopefully a few of you still stop by here from time to time. December and January have been a total blur. Between working 15 hour days, the holidays, and the constant game of catch-up that seems to be my life at the moment I've had limited time and energy to do much of anything.

Perhaps the most shocking part of being unreasonably busy is that it has sucked almost every creative thought from my brain, leaving me with absolutely no desire to knit.

I have managed to accomplish a few things since the last update. Instead of trying to break everything up into a series of posts I decided it would be easier to just dump everything off the camera into one post so that I can start fresh.

November was a month of rampant startitis.

There was the Flower Basket Shawl (since frogged with plans to make some sort of lace scarf).

The Ice Cream version of a pair of Cat Bordhi's socks knit in some Vesper sock yarn that's been waiting to be called into action.

And, the Endpaper Mitts that were finished over the holidays.

These were knit using some Sweet Georgia sock yarn I had in the stash. I am still amazed by the fact that these only used about half of a 50g skein in each colour. Do you think I could get away with making a pair of Anemoi Mitts with the leftovers?

December was all about partially complete emergency gift knitting.

A Garter Stitch Scarf, made with some Berroco Ultra Alpaca for the significant other's sister.

The Mason-Dixon Washcloth from some really nice cotton for my mom who is always searching for the softest washcloth known to man.

And a pair of Broadripple Socks for my Great Aunt who taught me to knit, still not finished. I'm using some Cascade Fixation that was hand dyed by Laura Chau of Cosmicpluto Knits! love the colours but I'm still not used to knitting with the Fixation. Luckily the recipient understands the pressures of deadline knitting.

January has been a month of resolutions.

With just under a sleeve and a yoke to go, I'm nearly finished the Lucy cardigan I started sometime last year (updated pics to come). I like it but I am ready to be finished now that the end is in sight.

I finally got around to sewing the buttons I bought in October on my Tilted Duster (still no FO photos).

A close-up of the button prettiness. I think it's swell.

Happily, I managed to swatch for the Central Park Hoodie I started thinking about a ways back.

My very first Nancy Bush socks finally jumped on the needles. I love easy-peasy stripey socks. These are such a great knit that I was halfway through the heel flap of the first sock before I acknowledged that they were never going to fit me. They are headed to the frog pond for a do-over in the not-so-distant future.

And I decided to frog the Autumn Rose sleeve I plan to reknit it using a different technique to change colours since all the ends that need weaving are already getting me down.

So what's new with you?

Diamonds

Boy are these little diamonds ever addictive! The pattern is pretty and very easy to memorize. I'm loving the worsted weight yarn and the lack of YOs. It's nice to have something completely different from Icarus for a little while.

Hopefully I'll make it through the rest of the body later this week so I can get a move on the sleeves. For now, however, I'm off to rekindle a relationship with my neglected wheel.

Blobfest

Surprise, surprise the blob is growing. One (and a bit) more chart done, and another one and (just under) a half repeats to go before I can move on to chart two.

As I'm sure you know, I love, love, love the colours in this yarn. The above colours are not entirely true. In actuality the colour shifts are a little more subtle since the lighter tones are richer than I can capture with the camera.

Every now and then as things start to pool here and there, I start to worry that once everything has been blocked the colours will fight against the lace pattern too much and obscure the elegant details of Miriam's beautiful design. Any thoughts?

Although it's been all Icarus all the time over here for the last week or so, I haven't yet turned into a project monogamist. Meet my Lucy in the Sky Cardigan. I started this beaut waaay back in early March. After some minor gauge issues, I decided that it was best to shove this on the backburner until the exam chaos had passed.

I really haven't touched this project at all since then, and am very much looking forward to something other than lace after I write on Thursday.

And lastly, here's a requisite photo of the pooch who is infatuated with his new toy. It has these octopus-type tails on it that he loves to shake by tossing his head around so that they slap him in the face. It amuses me to no end.