Persistent Knitter

Hardangervidda is coming along GREAT! I tried it on my husband yesterday and it FITS! *insert happy dance here* I’m still not sure how the measurements are coming out slightly smaller than his body (operator error?), but I have faith it will be all right, because when it’s ON him, it fits fine, with enough ease. I’ve made it past the really interesting parts on the hem, and am churning through the endless stockinette of the body. I promised a picture for when it was past that part, so here it is:

And a brag-photo, me holding a sleeping Alex (artfully taken in the mirror. Self photography is tricky :)

For those of you interested in beautiful colors mixed together in beautiful ways, check out this website:
http://home.earthlink.net/~lauraisrael

I loooooooooooooove TiVo. We just got one and it’s the best thing EVER. (We don’t even have fancy sattelite tv, just extra-enhanced basic cable). I’m still figuring out the ‘best’ way to use it, but when you’ve got little kids it’s totally great for being able to keep up with stuff you really want to watch on tv, and fast forwarding through commercials. I just pitched my dead, broken, pathetic VCR into the trash (with the tape it ate still firmly embedded in its teeth) and replaced it with a TiVo box. You can setup “Wish Lists” on it that search for keywords and will automatically record anything with the particular keyword. I need to setup one with “knitting” in it and see what crap comes up :)

Hardangervidda
Makin’ progress. No pictures this time, sorry. I’ll take one after I get past the 2nd pattern section (since I’m almost done with that) and into the boring stockinette body. I’ve figured out how to add knitting back into my life, at least in small bursts. Alex is doing much better hanging out for a period of time in the bouncy seat if I sit next to him on the floor and make faces at him while I knit. It’s not quite knitting-and-reading, but my version of it anyway.

What is a day without acquiring some fiber-related goodies? I got these at my LYS this past weekend:

The maggie spindle is a dream to spin on, I’ve had my eye on this one for a while, but they just recently started carrying them in my LYS. The tape measure is so cute, who could resist taking measurements with a tape measure that comes out of a sheep’s butt? (Thanks to Jenny for sharing her purchase with us, so I could copy her and get one of my own)

As I promised, I’m sharing some pictures my friend Rebecca took. (or actually her camera took - I’m not sure who the actual photographer was)

The winning shawl & team:

Me spinning, Alex behind me held by my nanny (aka Katie):

One of my favorite pictures, Rebecca doing the ‘vamp’ pose with our shawl:

I just have to say WOOOOOOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I’m knitting hardangervidda’s body for the THIRD time (which might not seem like a lot, but at 300+ stitches, it takes a while to knit even 3 inches on it) and I finally got the right number of stitches and right ‘gauge’ to make it come out the size I want. Look, here’s PROOF (sorry for all the yelling, but I’m SO excited):

You might not be able to see the actual measurement on it, so here’s a closeup:

I tried it on DH, and it fits perfectly with enough ease to make it comfortable, but not so much that it’s a tent. Maybe I’ll get adventuresome and measure my gauge. Not until I’m done with the sweater though :)

I was so enthused about it coming out right finally, that I made a TON of progress:

What else have I been up to? I only have 4 more weeks of maternity leave left, and I’m trying to make the best of them. Spending time with my beautiful son, Alex, and getting some projects done around the house. I managed to get the workshop cleaned out, bought and installed shelves & and workbench for it. I’ve organized my scrapbook supplies and am slowly getting my pictures into it. It’s not something I go ga-ga over, but I really like the "journal" entries that tell who is in the pictures (without writing on the pictures themselves) and what was going on. Here’s a page I finished just recently:

Cute huh? I’m trying to do a few pages each week. So far so good. we’ll see how well I keep up with it when I go back to work.

Last week this time I was coming home from Estes park; I got some pictures from my friend Rebecca to share, but not until tomorrow!

No pictures, it’s not very exciting yet. But I wanted to post an update, since that makes me feel like I’m doing more than I really am on it. :) I had ripped the body out (I think I posted about that already, but I’m too lazy to go look) and I’m knitting it for the second time. I’m making the size Medium and am using the needles called for in the pattern. I have NO idea if I’m getting gauge or not, but when I measured it during the first needle size change (from the hem to the first patterned area) It was 50″ around, which should be just right. I’m at the point where I’m knitting the provisional cast on together with the live stitches. When I’m done with that, I’ll measure again. I think no matter what size it comes out, this is IT. I’m NOT ripping it again. I think. I hope. Aigh!

[[ side note - I just read back and realized I ripped the body a 2nd time already. So this makes the THIRD time I've knit the body. Third time is the charm? It better be! Wish me luck and good-gauge-vibes. ]]

You wonder what people are thinking when they decide to not spell-check before the final printing. Check this out (Seen on my way home from knitting group this past weekend. I barely managed to pull my camera out of my purse and snap the picture before the truck was out of sight. It was raining, which attributes for the blurry spots - no way was I going to edit the picture to protect any supposed “innocents”)

Yesterday I went to the Estes Park Wool Market. WOW. I’d never been before and was there as a participant in the Sheep to Shawl contest (Our team won first place, thank you very much! Pictures of the winning and other shawls are available on the Yahoo DenverKnits group).

The Sheep to Shawl contest was so much fun, but I was exhausted at the end of the day. We worked really hard to get that shawl done. The team I was on (Team Chutzpah) was incredible and really knew their stuff. This was the first year I was involved, I’m so glad they asked me to be one of their members! We had a weaver (Debbie), three spinners (myself, Judy, Rebecca) and a ply-er (Dianne). We navajo plied the yarn we spun, for both the warp and the weft. The warp was done ahead of time and already on the loom (Thank goodness!). One other team was plying as well (I think just a two ply) and the third team used singles, but they also had a drop spindler as one of their spinners.

Next year I’m going up on Saturday just so I can look around and enjoy all the other things to see and do. My daughter should be old enough by that time to appreciate some of the demonstrations they setup just for kids. Despite that I only had 30 minutes in the vendor barn I managed to spend quite a bit of money. What did I get? Oooh let me show you the joy:

The one thing I did want to get, some fabulous mini wool combs. I also picked up the mounting unit for them:

I couldn’t resist this beautiful drop spindle (my first drop spindle):

I own a wheel - but hadn’t managed to get a drop spindle yet. How’s that for backwards?

And finally, some gorgeous gorgeous rayon yarn (Rick Rack) from Interlacements:

This picture does NOT do the colors justice. I bought 2 skeins worth - which should be enough for a sweater or whatever I decide to make with it. They had a beautiful shawl sample at the booth, and they also let me fondle a beautiful woven scarf made with it where this yarn is both the warp and the weft. The color interplay is just amazing. Ooooh yummy. Thinking about all the possibilities makes me just so happy!

Stay tuned for a funny non-knitting related picture tomorrow.