The Green Monster and some Spinning

The big greenie is done!!! Two shots of it unblocked, proper blocked shots tomorrow.

A closeup, the lumpy bottom edge will look like lovely leafy lace once it's all sorted.

And a bigger shot, you can see we're still unpacking, please excuse the half empty boxes in the background.

And this year I decided to participate in the Tour De Fleece, where you set a challenging spinning goal and spin every day that the Tour De France rides. My goal is simple, to spin every day. I've been neglecting it.

So here goes, day one. A little bit of roving from Lorna's Laces. I forget the name of the colorway.

A Hat, A Plan, A Canal, Panama!

I have designed matching reversible hats for Sandy and I to wear at the Shamrock Shuffle this year (held in April of course).

The hat is designed in thirds with three simple celtic knots forming the bulk of the hat, with two shamrocks and the year in between the knots. The shamrocks and knots are regular double knitting where you have the mirror image on the reverse. The year is fancy double knitting where you can have different designs on each side.



Here you can see the bottom half of two of the knots, the year, and the chart.

Feast

This is what happens when I have an extra day at home.

Chopped veggies.

Blanched brussels sprouts.

All the veggies ready to roast.

Roasted.

The turkey breast, it fell over in the oven, still tasted great.

I also made cornbread stuffing and gravy, but they weren't very photogenic.

Updates

Because I've been lax.

I knit up these cute little garter stitch elephants for a coworker's new nephew.

And the edge of another shawl/wrap/scarf that I knit for myself. It's the Bitteroot pattern from Knitty out of some lovely alpaca yarn that Sandy and Derrick brought me from upstate NY.

The alpaca is all warm and soft, the beads aren't as noticeable in the finished product as they look here. They're subtle. It's a little sheddy, but I'm hoping it will stop at some point soon.

Guacamole & Empanadas

The spread, three kinds of guacamole, and two types of empanada (the third type of empanada was still in the oven when this photo was taken).

That's Sandy's arm, she couldn't wait.

Ham and cheese empanadas.

Black bean empanadas.

I didn't get a good shot of the chicken and green olive empanadas, they looked pretty much the same as the black bean ones, only they didn't all explode while baking. They're actually the empanadas on the blue plate in the top picture.

And, of course, the guacamole. We had a sort of cook-off, even though you don't cook guacamole. The guacamole cook-off inspired the empanadas.

There was knitting too, I just didn't take any pictures of it.

Secret Knitting

I have been doing a little secret knitting.

I designed a little cozy for the teapot that Sandy & Derrick wanted. Sandy liked a teapot with a little leaf detail that Derrick wasn't so into. They opted for a simpler teapot, I put leaves on the cozy.

Great little fabric buttons.

And their tea tray. You can barely see the tray because our table is almost as dark as the tray. That scone mix is my all time favorite, super easy and always delicious. I like to add things like dried cranberries or almonds, but it's great plain too.

Beauty Shots

The hand painted sock yarn that I took with me to knit a wrap while on vacation.  

The two colors of tweed yarn that I bought at This Is Knit in Dublin.  

The roving and drop spindle from the Handweavers Studio in London.  

Silk top also from Handweavers Studio.  

Eggplant colored wenslydale wool from I Knit in Waterloo.  

Hand painted roving, also from I Knit.  

Silk lace weight (yes it's from Habu, but I never see Habu here in Chicago), also from I Knit.  

Lovely soft merino cashmere blend that I bought at Loop in Islington.  

And lambswool, also from Loop, that I have now seen all over Chicago!  Oh well.  

One of my yarn buying goals was to try for things that I can't get here in the states.  

Aeolian Shawl for Me!

All lumpy, as yet un-blocked.  

First go round of blocking.  Center of each flower pinned out.  

Each flower with five points pinned out.  The shawl gets stretched further and further as I work my way around and around.  

Flower close up.  

Stephanie's Socks

I finally finished Steph's socks!  Just in time for the event that they were intended to celebrate.    

We work together, and I enjoy sending odd things through inter-office envelopes.  So I inter-officed her present to her.  The next thing I see is Steph, coming down the hall towards me, 'modeling' the socks!

I'm pretty happy with how they worked out.  My own split rib pattern in Knit Pick's Essential Peacock Multi.  I was a little annoyed that the yarn striped, Knit Picks sells a striping yarn, so you'd think that the 'multi' wouldn't stripe... anyway, they came out really well.  

Succulent Garden

My new little succulent garden.
In a cereal bowl from JoAnn's Fabrics.


Not sure what this one is, maybe a sedum.


I'm pretty sure this one is a sedum.


Some sort of echiveria.


Not sure about this one.


Another echiveria, probably of the same variety as the first.
This one is going to flower soon. It has a long stem with two little buds on the end.


The buds (resting on the probable sedum).

I couldn't stop buying these guys at $2 a pop.

Ta Da!

The birthday girl, in mom's lap with dead fish hat.  

Dad, with the catch of the day.

And the birthday girl again, with mom holding up the tail for effect.  

Tee Heee

Done!  The dead fish hat from Knitty.com.  I'll try for modeled shots later today.  I love it.  

Damp Wool

The hat, now blocked, on our bathroom counter drying.

Click on the image to view full sized!

And a Hat

When I used up the second ball of yarn for Stephanie's scarf I checked the length.  It was longer than I am tall, and will probably stretch more when I block it.  Usually you make a scarf as long as the wearer is tall and I am a bit taller than Stephanie.  I sent her a quick email to see if she would prefer a very long scarf or a ridiculously long scarf.  She chose very long, and I offered to knit a hat with the remaining yarn.  This is the hat, as yet un-blocked.  

Blocking is a process where you wet down the knitted object and stretch it to it's final dimensions.  Depending on the type of object/garment you are blocking you will stretch it more or less vigorously, using one of many stretching/wetting techniques.  This guy was supposed to be wet down and stretched over a dinner plate.  The hat seemed smaller than a plate while dry, but once soaked, it grew on it's own.  The hat is now larger than a dinner plate, so I didn't bother with it.  I simply shaped it by hand on a towel.  Blocking smoothes out all the bumps and wrinkles you see in these pictures.  

The bottom of the hat, I'll weave in that loose strand of yarn.  The ribbing won't fold over on itself after blocking.