Black Friday

Actually, it's more like a deep, dark midnight blue and steel gray Friday.



I'm loving this Madelinetosh Sock in Crow I'm using for Damson. It's a fairly squishy yarn, and the little bits of brighter blue and gray remind me of denim. So far it's a great pattern and pretty much a zone-out project



I also realized I adore garter stitch at this gauge. I'm not normally a fan of that bumpy look, but when it's wee, it looks like a pretty little stitch pattern. Love!

So Swell

Last evening I was privy to some good music and fantastic knitwear.

The Swell Season -- the pair who starred in the movie 'Once' a few years back -- were in town promoting their new album. They opened the show with a song from that movie, 'Fallen From the Sky,' and cheekily sat together on the floor to perform the song, just like they did in the movie. Marketa played a silly little keyboard and Glen played guitar and wore a knit beanie with a pompom on top. Fabulous.

Crap phone photo and video, etc. above, taken by me.



A much better photo, borrowed from Victor Palagano/NeW TImes


My cousin's husband also was wearing a lovely knitted earflap hat (that he had bought, ugh) at the concert, but I wasn't able to get a photo of it. But now I have an idea for future presents for him ...

I'm finishing up the back of the Superchunky Cables cardigan for the DH. Thank goodness for superchunky yarn, otherwise this thing would have little chance of being finished.



In addition to the Adult Surprise Jacket I'm making for the LYS, I'm also knitting a Quickie Cowl in a new 100% alpaca yarn we're getting into the shop, Country Comfy Yarns from Mona, Utah. It's the first time I've workerd with 100% alpaca and it's got a really interesting twist and thick, soft hand.

Fate

I'm stalled out on the sweater for my LYS, so I've picked up a new project. I don't know why, but I'm just not interested in the sweater projects that are sitting in the WIP pile, so I wanted to start something new.

While the DH and HD are out of town, I've done some cleaning. My yarnoire was packed to the gills with yarn, so I decided to make use of some of those clear comforter bags and stuffed a few of them with sweater amounts of yarn and threw them on top of the yarnoire, freeing up a shelf or two for future yarn overbuying (probably my Stitches West haul, yahoo!).

I noticed that I still had some Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Superchunky in a lovely chocolate color that I had bought about 4 years ago, and I decided that I had to get rid of it already. I'd tried a number of patterns with it -- the Drops 103-1 cardigan, a few patterns from the Rowan New Shapes book, and a few patterns from Twinkle's Big City Knits, none of which worked out.



Then I realized that a cabled cardigan in the new Erika Knight book, Men's Knits, calls for Cashmerino Superchunky. It was meant to be.



The cabled pattern is very easy and fun, and all the different pattern textures make it quite interesting to knit. And the bulky yarn is going fast, so I'm in love.

The yarn is soooooo soft, though pilly and has an incredible number of knots (I encountered 2 or 3 in a ball that only has about 75 yards). But that doesn't matter, I'm gonna use it up.

I do, however, have to buy more b/c I only have 14 balls, and I need at least 21 balls. Unfortunately, Little Knits (which has the discontinued yarn on sale) was out of the chocolate color, and I was able to find two other Web sites that are selling it at the original price, which is kind of hefty. But that's what I get for not buying enough yarn in the first place.

The owner of the LYS where I sometimes work wants me to do a cowl pattern with some chunky alpaca she's bought for the shop. Now I've gotta hunt for a good pattern ...

Planning

Still working on the project for my LYS. I don't think I've been this monogamous, like, ever. But I'm going to keep plugging away at it until it's done and I can get back to my regularly scheduled knitting.

And I may have to put Redhook from Jared Flood's Made in Brooklyn in my queue. I saw a lovely one here and I'm hooked. It's the perfect sweater vest/tunic I've found this season, and I adore the tiny little shawl collar.

It was nice to read about the author of Homemade, a new crafting book (at least in the UK) on Mooncalf's blog. It seems that Ros Badger also designed hats for the Edge on U2's Zooropa tour, which is endlessly cool, and has gotten me into a U2 mood -- I'm seeing them for the first time on Tuesday! Woooo hooo! Oh, note to self: pack some Toast fingerless mitts to sneak into the concert ...

Other knitting news: I'm registered to attend a few classes at Stitches West in Santa Clara, Calif., in February. I'm still ironing out the details, weighing how much time I want to spend at Stitches and how much time I want to spend running around San Francisco with my friend who lives up there. Decisions, decisions.

EZ does it

I've not been blogging much lately because I'm working on a project for the LYS that I sometimes work at. Because it's not a project for me, I didn't really want to blog about it.



It's an Adult Surprise Jacket in Mission Falls 1824 Wool. Nice and soft. Since this is pretty much the only thing I've been working on for the past week, I started to get bored and thought I might want to try making my own Baby Surprise in some sock yarn (might as well do something with the sock yarn, since I've not been knitting socks this year). I can't decide beteween the dark, dark Casbahhhh or the totally autumnal Painted Skeins sock yarn I got from the Knit Purl sock club. Hmmmmm ....

And again with the starting over ...

I worked all weekend on the Mondo Cable Cardi and have come to realize my stitch count is off by a bit. What to do? Frog it, of course.



It's depressing that I'm deciding to frog again instead of trying to salvage hours of work, but that just shows you how lazy/crazy/stupid I am.

So, enough with that. Here's my final shipment of the Madelinetosh Magnolia Society. First is intense:



Eyre in Brothers' Grimm



Pastoral in Bosphoros

and pale:



Eyre in Hosta



Pastoral in Estuary.

I think I'm yarn-clubbed out for now. Since I'm focusing on sweater projects, these smaller amounts of yarn aren't as interesting to me. But they're definitely gorgeous, especially the Eyres. Lord, they're sooooooft, so soft that it almost doesn't feel like anything when you're touching it, if that makes sense (probaby doesn't).

Starting over again, naturally

So I've picked up the Silken Scabbard out of the WIP pile. Actually, I'm not really picking it up out of the WIP pile -- I'm casting on for it again. Even though I have this much done already:



Am I the only person who does this -- puts down a project, only to pick it up later and not know where I am in the pattern, and, rather than use a little brain power to try to figure it out, I just say, oh well, I'll just start over. I must have too much time on my hands since I'm knitting and reknitting things, right? Oh, so wrong.

I decided to try this one again because I've been craving working with a shiny, silky, scrunchy yarn after using the Malabrigo for the Vine Yoke Cardi. I need some sproing, dang it.

Speaking of sproing, I got my Dream in Color Classy yesterday and need to swatch for the Mondo Cable Cardi. Oh my is this yarn soft and sproingy. And the color -- Cloud Jungle is heavenly. Amazing how many different colors are in there, yet they combine to give a very muted look. Love it.