The Tangled Arts

We packed Bunny & Monkey off to the Island to visit friends this long weekend and boy, did we have fun!! Can you guess where we went? I’ll give you some hints…

First we went to the harbour and watched the boats come in…

Then we went to Undersea Gardens and touched a starfish and some anemones…

And, we spent some time playing on the grass in front of the Fairmont Empress…

Danced up a storm on Fisherman’s Wharf…

and finally did some shopping with good friends…

p.s. I even managed to hit a yarn store and picked up some Fleece Artist…. pictures to come soon…

No time for knitting in this house. The animals kids are keeping me uber busy. I haven’t had a spare minute to knit the last few days and therefore, have nothing to show for it.

However, I did get a great package from my Loopy Ewe/ Ravelry swap pal, who coincidentally owns Keegan Lane Yarns. Score!! She really went all out and spoiled me with a skein of her own laceweight yarn in Drama Club (man, this stuff is so amazingly soft), some of one of my fave Indie dyers, Chewy Spaghetti, and a bunch of yummy things to tide me over between Loopy Ewe sneaks. Lucky Me! 

But red socks are for me.

 According to Ravelry, I cast on for the Serendipity socks on April 22. Let me just say, for the record, that I am totally and completely in love with these socks. Truly, madly, deeply in love with these socks. I finished the first one in record time and am now crusing along with the second sock. I am not normally a red sock gal, but the pattern is amazing and when combined with the slightly verigated yarn, it makes me one happy gal.

And, Bunny’s clogs are done and ready to felt. There is something so strange about a pair of clogs that start out fitting my feet and shrink down to fit her little feet. I think we are going to have time to felt them tomorrow night, so pictures should be forthcoming.

Also, I picked up some Oceanwinds Knits in Truffle from my long absent and rarely seen friend Lucy and stole scored a couple of skeins of Vancouver Island from one of my newer friends and have some plans to make a chevron scarf out of them. I will let you know if this goes anywhere anytime soon. I will admit, I often am posessed by the urge to cast on for something and then some other shiny thing speeds past my sightline and I quickly forget about any previous projects. What can I say? I am easily distracted.  

p.s. Have you seen Yarn Love yet? If not, be prepared to be blown away. These are Yarn Love in Bayfield Apple on the Juliette base (superwash merino and nylon blend) and Plum Cake on the Elizabeth Bennett base (Silk, Bamboo, Merino blend). Scrummy.

Seriously! What the heck is going on with our weather? On Thursday, Bunny was out riding her bike and we were contemplating taking off the training wheels this weekend. On Friday, the bike looked like this.

I have also been knitting. However, since going back to work, I have much less time to myself. So, this means that I can either blog or knit. Lately, I have been choosing to knit. And, since the weather has decided to be very uncooperative, pics have been hard to take.

I began teaching a new class at my LYSlast Monday. This is a KAL Monkeysock class. I think I am going to call these my “A Tiger Ate My Monkey Socks”. I really like them. The yarn is Artyarns Ultramerino 4 and I think it’s one of my favorite yarns. It has such a sproingy texture and a subtle sheen. Yum.

Last week, I also cast on for a pair of Noro socks. I can’t say I love this yarn. Actually, I have to confess, I am a bit disappointed in the yarn as it seems very fragile in spots. In some places, it is a bit underspun and since I tend to knit my socks fairly tightly, it has broken while knitting more than once. This means a ton of ends to weave in and potentially weaker socks. Bummer. It is a bit moderated by the fact that the colors are amazing. But, still frusterating overall. This is probably the last pair of Noro socks that I will be making.

I also cast on and nearly finished a pair of clogs for Bunny. But, I ran out of yarn just before the last sole was completed. Thankfully, I found someone on Ravelry willing to part with their partial skein of matching yarn and so as soon as it arrives, I will be off and running.

So, the socks in question are not Monkeys. I will be making a new pair of Monkey socks next week for my Monkey sock class ( I think that there are still spots avaliable if you are in the Calgary area). But, I digress. The socks pattern is actually Nutkin. And, I am not sure if I love or hate them.

Pattern: Nutkin

Yarn: J. Knits (Happy Anniversary to Ewe)

Needles: US 1.5

Mods: I did my own short row heel and I didn’t do the three needle bind off on the toe.

Notes: There appear to be two different versions of this sock - those that spiral and those that don’t. The reason for the spiraling is how you pick up the fold over cuff. If you jog the picked up stitches by even one stitch, the sock will spiral and you will get a more bias knit. If this doesn’t make sense, please let me know in the comments and I will try to explain in more detail in my next post.

Otherwise, I cast on for my YOL shawl yesterday. I have only had a chance to knit about an inch so far though, so you will have to be patient and wait for some pics.

This is the conversation that Bunny and I had on the way home last night from my sister’s baby shower.

 Bunny: Why did she (my sister) have to have all those people we didn’t know at her shower?

Me: They were her friends and other family

Bunny: Well, at least no one laid a hand on me.

Me: Well, I don’t think that she would invite anyone that was mean.

Bunny: She would if she was a bank robber.

Me: Well, I am pretty sure she isn’t a bank robber.

Bunny: Well, you never know.

I guess you never really do know, but given that she is 8 months pregnant, she probably won’t be robbing any banks for a while. My kid says the craziest things. And, I don’t know if I should be more concerned that she was thinking someone might “lay a hand on her” or that my 8 month pregnant sister might be a bank robber. Hmmm….

Finally, some knitting content. I did finish the baby spiral jacket that I was working on for Monkey. However, because I am back at work, I often miss taking her out of the house (and some decent daylight to take photos in) and so I promise to try and get some photos of this amazing little sweater jacket right away.

I do have photos of my newest SIP (sock in progress). Funny story about this yarn - I hatedit when I got it in the mail. See, this is the one problem with ordering things online; you can’t touch them. I really prefer my sock yarn to be super soft and smooshy. This yarn is the exact opposite and the colors feel very busy to me. However, I have found that these types of yarns really make the socks that I find myself wearing most and so I have persevered with these socks.

I have come to the conclusion that this yarn will not be tamed. It will not knit nicely into a perfect little sock. No. This yarn has been frogged a total of 4 times already. If you know me at all, you will know that I rarely ever frog anything. But, the first two patterns I choose looked like bum with the variegation’s in the yarn. The next attempt was too small and this one is not working out as I would have liked. But, it fits and it will remain. Can you guess what pattern this is? How about the yarn?

Yes, I have been away for a while. No, I have not stopped knitting.

 See, it’s really, very tough to take photos for the blog when there is no daylight to take the photos in. Since I have gone back to work, I often have to be up very early and work hard during the day. This seriously cuts into my “me time” (of which I had very little before). So, the question is knit or blog? I have been choosing to knit. This works out though because without knitting, there would be no blogging. 

 I can’t wait for this little sweater to be done. Just in time for spring right?

This pattern is a super easy knit.

However, the sleeve directions are a little fiddly and so instead of using the spare needle, I simply knitted across the required stitches with scrap yarn and once I was ready to do my sleeves, I unpicked the scrap yarn and picked up the stitches for my sleeves. I am also finding the ribbing to be a bit tedious, but I am so close to being done and I can see that it will make for sleeves that will fit either Monkey as she grows.

I also wanted to share a skein of handspun that I picked up from Ravelry. This fingering weight yarn is so incredibly soft and vibrant. I can’t wait to see how it will knit up.

I Can’t Resist A Good Meme. So, since I went back to work last week and all the good daylight photography hours have been stolen from me, this is what you get. Enjoy.

Three Things That Scare Me:

• Something happening to my family
• Being alone
• Birds

Three People Who Make Me Laugh:

• Terry
• Bunny
• Franki 

Three Things I Love:

• My family & friends
• Knitting
• Sushi

Three Things I Hate:

• Smoking
• Stupidity
• Aggressiveness

Three Things I Don’t Understand:

• How people can be so narrow minded
• Why people can’t follow directions or think for themselves
• How anyone can be interested in the lives of celebrities

Three Things On My Desk:

• A pencil holder that Bunny made me
• A bottle of Ostrich oil hand lotion
• A bottle of soak wool wash

Three Things I’m Doing Right Now:

• Listening to an audio book
• Chewing my nails
• Surfing knitting blogs

Three Things I Want To Do Before I Die:

• Climb Mount Kilamanjaro
• Get back to my pre-pregnancy weight
• Live to see my children grow up and have children of their own

Three Things I Can Do:

• Knit
• Spin
• Rockclimb

Three Things I Can’t Do:

• Whistle
• Sing
• Play a musical instrument

-Three Things I Think You Should Listen To:

• Puscifer
• Your Mother
• Your Best Friend

Three Things You Should Never Listen To:

• Republicans
• Country Music
• People Who are Full of Crap

Three Things I’d Like To Learn:

• How to Whistle
• How to Make Great Indian Food
• How to Scuba Dive

Three Favorite Foods:

• Sushi
• Curry
• Naan

Three Shows I Watched As A Kid:

• Gummi Bears
• Rocket Robin Hood
• The Littlest Hobo

Three Things I Regret:

• Not having something better to blog about
• Not listening more to my Mother when I was younger
• Not buying more Sweet Georgia yarn when I had the chance

I know that normally Tuesdays are reserved for Bunny, but in lieu of anything interestingly Bunny-ish, will you accept some mitten pr*n instead?

Again, poor photo; great mitten. Almost there on the first mitt. Lookin’ good.

And, just for kicks, how about some yarn pr*n too?