Racing to Finish

I am working like crazy to finish a baby blanket that needs to be done by Saturday. I started it late last week because the yarn I ordered took extra long to get here. So now I'm hoping I can manage to finish it in time. It took much struggle to figure out what I was going to make (which seems a bit silly since I ended up using my go-to ripple), but I really like it and I hope the parents will too.


It's crocheted from Lion Brand Cotton Ease yarn, which is a cotton-acrylic blend, so it's lightweight but sturdy and it feels like cotton. I know they are unusual colors for a baby blanket, but I wanted something modern looking because I think that's what the baby's parents would want. I love it and I'm thinking of making something in these colors for me.

I also recently finished a small hand towel for Towel Day which was Sunday.


I am a huge Douglas Adams fan (especially the Hitchhiker's Guide), but I am ashamed to admit that I only heard of Towel Day for the first time a month or so ago. So I joined a towel KAL/CAL to make a towel for my very first Towel Day. It's knit from dishcloth cotton and I'm not in love with it (in large part because of the ugly pooling), but it came out okay. I hope everyone can see the 42.

Yarny Shopping

I've been buying a lot of yarn (and yarn related items) lately. I just got a giant box of yarn from Smiley's last week--which included tons of Red Heart Bright and Lofty for $0.77 a skein (love it for kid's blankets) and some Jaeger Roma (currently becoming a tank--more about that later) plus some. And yesterday I got my very first order from Webs and my stuff from the Ravelry Mini-Mart.


Webs is having their annual sale right now so I decided to get some yarn for sweaters since I really want to start making wearables. I also bought a few skeins of yarns I want to try and some cotton/tencel for another tank. I'm super happy with my yarns--the pea green is going to be a cardigan and the burgundy a v-neck pullover (unless I change my mind before I make them, that is).


My pint glasses from Ravelry are wonderful--Chris and I used them last night. I thought I would fortify myself by having a beer in the "frogged" glass before I had to frog a couple of inches of my new tank. (I also ordered a "disagree" shirt, but received a "love" shirt instead, so I will show you that once I get it worked out.)

My newest project is Interweave Knit's Summertime Tunic in sage Jaeger Roma. I love this yarn even though I'm not madly in love with the color. I'm just sorry I didn't order more.


My knitting is still way more uneven than I'd like, but I'm trying to get past that and just make something already. I hope I will succeed and actually finish it, but you can never be sure at what point my perfectionism will take over and I will be forced to frog. Keep your fingers crossed for me.

New Colorway - Boat Drinks

I listed a new colorway called Boat Drinks in my Etsy shop over the weekend.


Most of my sale yarn is gone now--I had quite a run on it. I do have a few more skeins of sale yarn to list still. And I may have a few undyed skeins around that I could dye up and sell--when I get a chance. I'm working hard to fill up the shop with new yarn, so I will try to fit that in when I can.

Wyatt's Blanket

I have finished Wyatt's baby blanket (a while ago, actually), but have not yet gotten the chance to give it to him. It's based on a block pattern from the book 200 Crochet Blocks by Jan Eaton. I just basically expanded everything to make it baby sized instead of block sized. The colors are the same colors that are in Wyatt's bedding.


I'm not in love with it. It's okay, but I guess not what I would have chosen. And I'm concerned it didn't come out the way Emily (Wyatt's mom) expected. I hope she likes it.

As promised, here is a picture of how the blanket was originally turning out.


Chris and I both thought it looked like a hideously ugly flag. So I had to frog and start again at the brown.

Books and More Books

My birthday was last Saturday (not this past Saturday, but the one before that--April 26th) so Chris and I went used book shopping to buy me lots of birthday books. We already have piles of books that have no where to live, but you can aways find room for more, right? We seem to think so anyway.

First we went to our local library which was having a bag sale--all the books you could fit in a paper grocery bag for $3. (We insanely overfilled ours and gave them $6.)


These are some of the more entertaining ones:
The New Complete Hoyle--published in 1956,
The Wonderful World of Science - Book Five--an elementary school textbook published in 1941,
Polly's Homemaking Pointers--1965--love these hilarious/scary old homemaking manuals,
Stitch By Stitch--published 1986
and Creative Needlework--published 1974.
(There were about 15-20 that I didn't take a picture of.)

Creative Needlework has some really fun projects and what Chris and I agree is the pretty much the best picture ever taken. (You might want to click the photo for the larger size to really get the full effect.)


Then we went to several used books stores and got probably 20 more books. Mostly fairly old sci fi paperbacks, as evidenced in the photo. (Including a couple that I believe are out of print.)


All in all it was quite a gratifying haul of books and it made for a happy birthday for me. And after all of the wonderful book buying, we went out for dinner with some friends for the best Indian food ever.