A Bunting we will go!

And here we have one finished bunting! I finished sewing up the seams at 1 a.m. and put the zipper in at 7 a.m. on Saturday morning but it was done in time for the shower at noon. I think it turned out quite well.




I enjoyed the oohs it got when she opened it. Annie, her mom, and 3 sisters all can knit so they appreciate the time and effort that went into the bunting. Her youngest sister, Alyssa, knit her a cute roll brim hat. I found out on the way to the shower that the sonogram showed she is having a boy. I'm so glad I went with the rainbow colors. Ariane and I also stopped at a local gift shop on the way to the shower and bought a cute Gund stuffed animal blanket and a puppet set. We had the store clerk wrap it and we were on our way. We made the wise choice of the blue puppy blanket and a purple puppet set. Mission accomplished!

This is another set of charity mittens. I used Red Heart Kids yarn in bikini (I think). I am working on a garter stitch scarf to match. Now that the bunting is finished, I can make a couple more pairs of mittens before the November 1st deadline.




I think next I need to cast on for a pair of short leg warmers for me. They actually only have to be ankle warmers. It is very cold under my desk at work. I have a small radiant heater but it's most meant to put your feet on to warm. If left on long enough, it will sort of warm the space under the desk but by that time, my ankles are freezing. Even if I wear wool socks, my ankles are cold. I thought an extra layer of wool in the form of leg warmers might help. I also need to make a pair of fingerless gloves so I can type and keep my hands warm.

Time to go. I need to get ready for church. Until the next installment...

How many skeins?!

There has been a little thread over at the yarn yoga list about how many skeins of yarn some people have in their stash. I've been saying for a long time that I have way too many skeins, hanks, balls, etc. of yarn but I never counted them. Well, this morning I did. I counted all the full and mostly full skeins, balls, etc. of yarn that I found stashed around the house. I did not count the yarn that is on needles waiting to be finished. That's another paragraph entirely! And I think I have a box of sport weight yarn in the attic that is over 20 years old and that didn't get counted because I didn't find it. But the actual number that I counted today was 629!! And if I remember correctly there must be another 20 skeins in that uncounted box in the attic.

Here are two pictures of the contents of one of my yarn boxes. This is what I call my baby yarn. It's mostly pastel colors and sport, dk or baby weight but there are some skeins of worsted in there, too.



That is enough yarn to keep me busy for a year and that's only a small fraction of what I have! It's an obsession and I need to go on a yarn diet immediately!!

In addition to my yarn stash, I have a UFO stash. I made a partial list of UFOs the other day and it totals 30 projects languishing on the needles in various places around the house. And I didn't count that yarn in my stash totals. And it doesn't account for all the UFOs either. I need to also get a rotation schedule going so I can finish up some of these projects. That or frog them so I can use the yarn for something else.

The present project that needs to be finished by next Saturday (Oct. 22) is a baby bunting. I found the pattern in an old Workbasket magazine and I'm doing it in Patons Candiana "Rainbow" worsted weight. Since I don't know the sex of the baby, I thought the bright primary colors would be suitable for either a girl or a boy. I'm not taking a picture of it until it's done. Every time I take a pic of a work in progress, all progress stops on it. So when it's finished, I'll post it. It works from bottom up and I'm on the raglan decreases for the sleeves on the back. Then I have to do the front, sleeves, neckband, and sew in a zipper. I hope I can get it done in time for the shower. I could get a Precious Layettes sweater done much faster but I want to do the bunting to get the "Oooh" factor. It's a blatant cry for attention but I don't care. I like to hear that I have some talent however small. LOL!

Now I need to clean my poor house. We've been gone so many weekends this summer that it's pretty neglected. And I think a couple friends are coming over this afternoon to knit or cross stitch so I need to get it done now. Then I can knit this afternoon!!

Behold the absent blogger!

So let's see - since I posted last I've finished the multidirectional scarf and the charity mittens and scarf as show in the next two pictures.


And while in Lake Placid I bought some Art Yarns "Supermerino" #117 yarn in a gray, cream colorway shown here:


The Lake Placid trip went as expected except we had a little less rain than we thought. Scott ran a personal best for the race coming in at 1 hour 45 minutes. Not bad for a 51 year old man running for 13.1 miles, eh? By the time I got to Adirondack Yarns it was 5:10 p.m. and she closes at 5 p.m. Luckily for me she was still there running the vacuum cleaner. And she's the type of store owner I like - she doesn't mind keeping the place open for a customer. So I bought 2 skeins of Art Yarns "Supermerino" and the book "Knit Hats" edited by Gwen Steege. It's the book that's shaped like a hat. I really should have bought 3 skeins of the merino but I was hurrying so I didn't keep her too long and I just didn't think.

The Saturday after we got back from Lake Placid, we packed up and headed to Cape Cod for a week. The trailer stayed home this time and we rented a house in North Truro with Scott's oldest sister and her husband, and his middle brother and his wife. We had a very nice week out there. My only complaint is that I only made it to one yarn shop and one craft store. There are three yarn shops I like out there. Danalee, Vicki and I did a trip to The Ladybug Shop in Dennis. Danalee (Scott's sister) knits a little but got bored very quickly. Vicki and I spent quite a bit of time in the store. I ended up buying 3 skeins of Noro "Kureyon" #163 (blues and purples), 2 skeins of Elsebeth Lavold's "Silky Wool" in #12 (rose), and 3 skeins of Art Yarns "Supermerino" #123 (blues, greens, teal). The Silky Wool was on sale which made me happy. And they had just received their supply of Art Yarn so I got first choice. Then on the way back to Truro (which is about 40 minutes from Dennis), we stopped in Brewster at the Brewster Bookstore and right across the street is a small shopping plaza that has a small craft store. A couple of years ago I bought a hank of Manukau Yarns "Charisma" #954 (shades of blue and purple) 100% New Zealand wool for half price there. This hank has 387 yards of wool and I paid $14.95 for it. Not bad! So we went in and while the yarn selection was very, very limited (mostly Patons and Lion Brand novelty yarn), she did have some Strompegarn "Silja" sock yarn on sale. I bought 3 skeins in #329 (rust, copper, gray). I'll post pictures of the yarn when I can get a good picture. It's raining and gray right now.

I didn't buy any pattern books but a few days later Vicki and I went to a used bookstore in Wellfleet and I found an issue of Vogue Knitting from 1993 that is all kids' things. I was a little disappointed that I didn't find more knitting books since last year I found a copy of Alice Starmore's "Book of Fair Isle Knitting" there for $6.00. But I was very excited when I found an Emily Loring book that I have been searching for for a few years now. This book was published in 1947 so it's kind of hard to find. Emily Loring wrote quite a few romantic suspense books back around the time of World War II. My mother had most of them and I read them all. This one was the first one I read and my favorite but Mom's copy disappeared sometime ago and I've been searching ever since then. I was very happy to find it.

That's my quick update for now. I have some pictures I'll post soon of Cape Cod and other knitting stuff. Now that we aren't dashing off too soon, I hope to keep a little more up to date here. Although we are going back to the Cape the end of October so Scott can run the Cape Cod Marathon in Falmouth. I'm not sure if anyone else is going with us but I hope to hit a few yarn shops while I'm there!!