Packing Decisions

We are going on a trip.

This is not unusual for us.

What is unusual is that we are taking nine high school students with us. Or is it they are taking us with them?

Anyway, it's a ten day educational (snicker) tour covering London, Paris, Florence, and Rome.

Now, you know I've already been to Paris. And I spent a weekend in London when I was in England for my Junior Year Abroad. I've never been to any part of Italy.

Don't get me wrong. I don't at all mind going back to London and Paris. But I'm really looking forward to Italy.

And the Chunnel.

What does all this have to do with knitting?

Why, I have to pack projects, of course!

Now a normal knitter would tell you that a 10 day trip needs an ungodly number of projects.

But, as we've established, I'm not a normal knitter.

My plan is to take my active project--Lucy Neatby's Sea Lettuce Scarf in her Cat's Pajama Yarn in Honey Pot that I've had for ages--and one back up project.

For reference, when we took a 10 day trip to California last summer I took four projects and basically only worked on one. Although I finished it and started a new one on the trip home.

The point is, two projects will probably be rather adequate based on past behavior.

The second project will, not surprisingly, be a sock. They are still tops for travel projects because of their portability.

But as I pawed through the dining room credenza trying to decide on which sock yarn to bring, a little voice said, "There are plenty of stockinette stitch sweaters you want to make. Why not bring one?" However I dismissed it since I wouldn't want to track multiple skeins of yarn.

That is another advantage of socks, generally a single ball is required.

As I was making my decision I first reviewed my Ravelry stash and was reminded I have a staggering amount of sock yarn.

Then I pulled it all out and put it on the dining room table, confirming how much there was, and confounding the situation because it's all so pretty!

There was a moment of panic when I realized I couldn't find one of the yarns I bought at Rhinebeck last year, which led to me realizing I couldn't find any of the sock yarns I bought at Rhinebeck last year.

After a few minutes of turning storage places over I realized they were in a bag next to the china cabinet. phew! Nine skeins of sock yarn would have been a big investment to go missing.

With them all laid out before me decision making could begin in earnest. I was debating taking a known quantity, like Jitterbug or Indulgence, that I could just cast on and go since I'd used it before. I also wouldn't need to carry multiple sets of needles.

But I also thought taking an older yarn that's been waiting for a while would be good.

After sorting my Ravelry stash half a dozen ways, I settled on the Dream in Color Smooshy Sock Yarn that I bought back in 2009(!).

It was a pinch battle between that and the Seacoast Sock Yarn I bought in 2010 that is so soft and pretty.

Basically, the Smooshy won because it was already balled.

To solve the needle dilemma, I paused the Sea Lettuce Scarf this afternoon and went ahead and swatched. My US 1.5 Darned Pretty Needles seem to be doing the trick.

With my projects settled, I just have to worry about packing clothes now.

The irony of all this is that I'll probably just work on the Sea Lettuce Scarf the entire trip and won't have to pull out the back up project at all!

If you love it so much, why don't you knit it?

This is something I've been wondering lately as the new year has arrived.

It's not really a stash-busting impulse, but I suppose it can be viewed that way.

I've just been thinking of all the lovely yarn in my hoard.

I go to local yarn stores and I go to fiber festivals and I see yarn that I just can't live without.
That yarn comes home with me and then proceeds to languish in the dining room credenza.

Feeling alone and unloved. Well, alone except for the all the other languishing yarn.

Lucy Neatby uses the slogan "make your yarn happy, knit it." And I remember my mom saying about various things as I was growing up that it was "their life's ambition" to be used in the way they meant. (This could apply to anything from a doughnut wanting to be eaten to nice shoes wanting to be worn).

 Love and UFOs

There is supposed to be a coorelation.

You hear knitters and crocheters all the time talking about getting bored with their current WIP and wanting to start something new and they don't know why.

The consensus is that if you really love the yarn and the pattern this won't happen. And when it does happen, people usually say you must have learned what you need to from that pattern and are ready to move on.

This phenomenon is partly behind my impulse to knit small projects this year so I can finish them. But, really, I just want to finish things.

But then I thought if I use some of these yarns in my hoard that I'm so in love with maybe that boredome won't set in.

On the other hand maybe what I need to be doing is sticking with mindless projects I don't have to focus on.

After all, look how quickly I finished the Electric Bunny Sweater.

Drawing the Line
This was all going through my head as I was finishing the Electric Bunny Sweater and beginning to contemplate my next project.

Should I try to finsh on of my WIPs that was approaching UFO status? Or should I use one of my "precious" yarns that I just had to have at the time? If those yarns were so compelling, why was I avoiding them?

And I decided to go for it.

The first weekend in December Hubby and I went to Portland, Maine.

He was taking a wine appreciation class so was locked away all day. I was along for the ride and ran loose in the Old Port area of the city. I was able to track down three yarn stores to visit.

Including Tess' Designer Yarns. Now back in, oh, 2005, Cynthia gave me a hank of Tess' hand painted silk...which I haven't knit up yet. Just terrible. See what I'm talking about? These poor neglected yarns.

Anyway.

She does lovely stuff and I came home with a hank of Kitten, a 65% Cashmere, 35% Silk blend that is just to die for and cost a pretty penny to boot.

I brought it home and tossed it in the dining room credenza to join all the other precious, expensive yarn I don't actually use.

But when the Electric Bunny Sweater was finished I said, "Enough!" and I got out the Kitten. And I told myself I would not complicate things. I would not find a pattern with lace or cables or something else that would slow down my progress.

I would just knit the damn yarn. And then I would wear it. And the ownership of it would be justified.

Random Scarf
So I present to you the Random Scarf. Eleven days from start to finish. It would have been less if I didn't have a couple false starts.

First I cast on 100 sts and decided it didn't look good and was too short. That was fairly annoying because I'd done a knitted cast on, which took forever, because I didn't want to guess for a long tail.

Then I accidentally cast on 50 sts and decided that was too wide and would get annoying.

Finally I cast on 400 sts (I was aiming for 300, but decided to use the entire tail because I wasn't doing another dang knitted cast on).

Then I just knit. I alternated stockinette with reverse stockinette and drop stitches and I didn't sweat it.

It also would have been finished sooner if the cast off hadn't taken two or three days.

The end of the yarn was approaching as I was working a double wrap row. I decided to listen to the frantic little voice that kept saying, "You aren't going to make it!" and picked it out.

I knit a regular row and started casting off. The frantic little voice came back and got all smug when I ran out of yarn half way through.

Do you know how much of a pain picking out a cast off is? Then I had to unpick the last row to have enough yarn.

Finally I cast off using one size larger needles, but it still came out a little tight. All the ladies in Library knitting said to blow it off, so I did. Since I was supposed to be relaxed about it.

I ended up with more leftover yarn than I expected since I'd run out before. I couldn't bring myself to clip it off so I worked a crab stitch with it along the cast off end. Only made it about half way, but noone whould be close enough to my scarf to know that but me!

Anyway. It was pretty cool to not only use up some precious yarn so quickly but to actually finish a scarf. (Scarves usually bore me to tears.)

I'm on to my next precious yarn. I was thinking of using the Maple Creek Farm Fredricksburg that I'd bought at Rhinebeck in 2010 and have actually used to cast on a sweater. But the Merino/Silk blend I bought at Ellen's Half Pint Farm during the 2011 New Hampshire Sheep and Wool Festival has been calling my name since it joined the family.

So I'm going to go for the Spring Pansy. My reasoning is that the NHSW is in May, which is right around the corner, while Rhinebeck is in October.

After all, I'll have to prioritize these lovely yarns somehow.

Cheating

The industrial revolution has arrived!

I asked Hubby if the people opposed to the Industrial Revolution were called "frame breakers." I don't know where I got that from, which is why I asked.

He said they were called "Luddites," but that they went after the mechanized weaving looms.

So I should be safe.

Yarn Everywhere

I bought the knitting machine on Sunday.

And, contrary to the weaving loom I acquired at the beginning of the month, the knitting machine did come out of left field.

But it is a logical step.

You see, since I have the best job ever, I recently received three big boxes of sample yarns.

Once again, it's a lot of single balls. Which is to say if I have multiple balls of one type it won't be 10 balls of blue, it will be ten different colors.

So the options are just knitting and crocheting random swatch squares or trying to come up with striped projects.

I told myself that this time I won't fall into the striped project trap like I did last year.

Two Hands vs Two Tons of Yarn

Since I only have two hands and there are only 24 hours in the day all I would ever knit would be swatches.

As nice as all this yarn is that prospect is unacceptable. I am both a process AND project knitter.

How can I be both? Well, I like the finished project, but I also enjoy the knitting process that gets me there. Although I enjoy having a mindless stockinette stitch project to work on when I'm tired or watching good TV, I like to know there is a goal in sight other than keeping my hands busy.

Hence the knitting machine.

If my cunning plan works I'll be able to zip out squares, crochet off a few rows, then get back to my projects.

Stumbling Along

The first square I did on Sunday was an ordeal. But it was a fun ordeal since the machine was new and shiny.

Also, I had figured the first square would be a train wreck since I'd never used a knitting machine before.

I didn't watch the instructional DVD because the booklet had very nice clear pictures allowing me to just plunge in.

Monday morning I got up and zipped out another square of the same smooth, worsted weight yarn (in a different color) in about an hour. I was feeling pretty good about my plan.

Then Monday night I tried a bulky boucle yarn.

And I tried.

And I tried.

And then I tried another bulky singles sort of yarn.

And it was just as frustrating.

And I found it necessary to pack the machine back in it's box because I was so uptight I was either going to crack a tooth from clenching my jaw or throw the machine out the window.

This was disappointing because the bulky yarns are the ones I was really looking forward to doing on the machine. Turns out I don't like knitting with big needles. US7 or US8 is about as big as I generally go.

Then on Tuesday I reassembled it and tried another smooth worsted yarn and everything was sunshine and light again.

Today it is also playing nicely. The square on the machine in the picture is Louisa Harding Grace Silk and Wool. It knit up very easily. I'm back to thinking my plan might work.

I think I'll give each yarn a go and if it doesn't work in the first couple rows I won't fight it. I'll just redirect to hand-knitting the swatch. It won't be a big deal since there are other yarns I've already eliminated from machine possibility for being either too thin, too thick, or too novel.

One way or another I'll show all this yarn who's boss!

Calif Trip: Yarns on First

We took a trip to California from July 15 through July 25 to celebrate our 10th wedding anniversary.

There was also a party for my uncle & aunt's 40th wedding anniversary and we used that as the excuse for our trip.

The focus of our activities was wine tasting, which is Hubby's passion so I was his driver. Because of this we spent four days in Napa and three days in the Sonoma area.

I was having a little trouble getting to the yarn store because its hours coincided with the winery hours. Since we were wandering the countryside it wasn't like I could just drop in. (Ah, I was just on their website and see they now have later evening hours than when I was there.) By our third day I was starting to get a little stressed out about the situation. Hubby was buying souvenir wine; I wanted souvenir yarn to balance it.

Hubby reviewed the schedule for Tuesday morning and saw his first appointment was in town so it would be an easy matter for me to drop him off and scoot over to the store for a half hour or so.

Yarns on First
The store in Napa is Yarns on First and it is right down town, which made parking a little tricky.

Hubby's appointment was at 10 am, so I dropped him off, raced back to town, and bounded up to the store...only to see she didn't open for another 20 minutes.

Woe was mine, but she saw me outside the door and came over to tell me she wasn't open yet. Which, of course, was a major tactical error when dealing with a knitter who needs a yarn fix.

I looked as pathetic as possible and said in a small voice, "Oh, well, we're here on vacation and it's our last day in town. This is my only opportunity to stop by." And I turned to walk sadly away.

As you've already realized, she took pity on me and let me in, "as long as I didn't mind she hadn't vacuumed."

Well, as soon as the door opened I raced to the back corner of the store before she could change her mind. I did feel a little wicked. Having worked in a LYS myself I understand how important those first few minutes are for getting yourself organized before the store opens. I told her that as well.

I would also like to point out that in the brief time I was in the store two other people wandered in. So in the end it wasn't just me she opened for. :-)

Sock Yarn!
It is a nice store. Long and narrow with high ceilings, but well lit.

The stock was arranged by colors, which I've heard of but never seen in person. It looked very nice. But I still have to wonder how easy it is to browse. I mean, if you find a yarn you like and want to see all the color you have to run all over the store. Still, plenty of places do it that way so it must work.

Since I was working on a tight time frame there wasn't really time to browse. I had to be focused.

Although I always try to make a token purchase when I visit a LYS in this case I knew I definitely had to buy something since she opened early for me.

I was relieved to find that she had Collinette Jitterbug, which is one of my favorite sock yarns. Couldn't tell you why. I just love the stuff.

There were a couple colors available, but I snatched up with magenta one. It is much more of a neon hot pink than the picture indicates.

(There was also a skein in white, tan, and pale blue that was very nice, but I had to control myself. However I keep thinking about it...I wonder if it's still in the store....)

Anyway.

Local Yarn
Having secured at least one purchase I was able to calm down and ask if she had anything unique to the store or area. Yarn I can get at my LYS here in NH would hardly be adequate as a souvenir, right?

She pointed me to the Chasing Rainbows Dyeworks yarn you see at the top of the post. It is dyed in Willits, Calif, which sounded local enough to me.

Sadly, she didn't have any of their sock yarn in stock, which is always an easy purchse.

The labels on the two skeins I bought are a little incomplete, so I'm not really sure what I have here.

They say "Kid Merino. 180 yards. Juniper Berry." No gauge info or line name.

I'm thinking Juniper Berry is the color name. The yarn looks worsted weight, singles, just a wee bit thick and thin.

I was able to find the brand name on Ravelry, but nothing that really matched my yarn because none of them have the same yardage.

Oh well. Using it will be an adventure. I'll just swatch a little to get gauge and go from there. I bought the two skeins because I figured that would be enough to make a scarf, small shawl, or shrug like thing.

Whatever it ends up being it will remind me of our trip.

Hoard Enhancement

Hubby and I had a busy day on Saturday.

We had to take the car for an oil change. Since the dealership is in the southern part of the state near Hubby's new Karate Dojo he decided we should get an early start so he could go to the Saturday morning class.

Then we developed a laundry list of things to get at the mall since we'd been in civilization.

But I'm not here to talk about boring mall shopping. I'm here to talk about yarn!

After I dropped Hubby off I scooted over to The Yarn and Fiber Company over in Derry. This store was recommended to me by Pam's sister Nancy. I'd seen their booth at the NH fiber festivals I've attended but hadn't been to the store yet.

It's a big place, with big windows, so it's well lit and has aisles you can actually walk down. They also have a wide variety of yarns. I could hear laughter and chatting from a class, which I discovered at a big table in one corner. Another corner had big couches and chairs. Probably where the knitting group meets.

I didn't go with the intention of buying anything, I was just looking to kill an hour while waiting for Hubby. (True, I could have sat in the dojo lobby watching the training and knitting, but why do that when there is a yarn store within striking distance)

Then I stumbled on the book section. I was reminded of my quest for the Lucy Neatby finishing book (no dice) and the other Elsebeth Lavold viking knits books (also no).

They did, however, have a number of other Lavold books, which I flipped through. This led me to decide that although I like all her designs it's really her winter patterns that make my heart pound.

This led me to flip through The Embraceable You Collection a couple times.

The pattern that forced my hand was Worf. How can I resist a pattern named after an awesome Star Trek character? It is described as a sweater with detached sleeves, but it looks like a tunic vest with matching armwarmers to me. Although the sweater is neat, it's not really my style. But I'm all about the armwarmers.

Also, as you may recall, I'm currently obsessed with her hoods after seeing them at the museum. The ones at the museum just had ribbed necks. The Niella hood in the book flairs out to a cowl reminicent of my beloved Solo Cropped Poncho.

Although the armwarmers and the hood aren't a pair, they have the same feel, so I figure I can totally wear them as a set.

So I decided to get the book and take my chances on finding yarn that would work since I knew it was an older book. Until I came around a corner and found a display of EL's Designer Choice Angora right there at my eye level.

How very convenient to find the actual yarn for the patterns I as about to buy! No worries about yardage, or drape, or texture substitutions. Obviously I had to get enough for the two patterns I wanted to make. Especially since I knew the yarn was discountined. I might not have the opportunity again, at least not as easily.

The color selection was, admittidely, limited, which made it an easy decision to go with my tried and true blue. Logically, I got the same color for both projects since I'm going to call them a set.

The Worf pattern calls for 2 skeins for the sleeves. I wonder if these means each one will take one skein. I haven't read the hood pattern through, but suspect it starts at the cowl. Still, I'm thinking I'll make Worf first so I can put any extra yarn toward making the cowl longer.

Of course another option would be to make the hood first and use any spare yarn to make the armwarmers longer.

But, who am I kidding, it's going to be a while before I actually make either of these projects.

Summer of Socks!

Ready, set, go!

Yeah! Summer of Socks is here once again.

Another summer dedicated to at least the idea of knitting socks, socks, socks from now until Sept. 21.

I did not do very well last year, what with the move and all, so I'm determined to do better this year.

Good thing there aren't actual quotas to meet!

This is another low key, go at your own pace year. phew! Although there are three featured patterns this time. One for each month. We aren't required to knit them, but it gives the whole period a KAL kind of feel.

Solidarity in stitching!

Anyway, the first pattern is Summer Spirals by Jersey Knitter (as in New Jersey). It's a cotton anklet, but the pattern says it will work with blends.

But cotton she wants, so cotton I'll use. Specifically the Panda Cotton pictured at the top of the blog.

Thanks to the wonders of Ravelry I can see that I bought this yarn all the way back in 2008 (gasp) and had peg it to at least two other patterns that I obviously haven't knit.

Maybe it's finally this yarn's time.

Still Hoard Wrangling
This fits in nicely with my current stash control idea, since the Year of the Sweater thing is working out so well.

Anyway, the current idea is to have one new-yarn and one old-yarn project on the go at any given time. Eventually consumption will meet in the middle and the hoard will be depleted.

Or the new yarn will be replaced as rapidly as it is used (or faster). Nature abhors a vacuum, after all.

So do the puppies and I, for that matter, which is why I try not to use mine much.

Anyway. Although Summer of Socks 2011 only officially kicked off at 10 am ET I've already seen people posting about finishing the first sock of the pair.

Either they are really fast knitters or it's a really fast pattern.

In any event, I haven't knit a stitch on any project today so I better at least get the sock caught up.

Thanks, Jelli!

I have an online friend named JelliDonut.

I started following her on twitter, because she is another knitter.

Then, since most people link their blog to their twitter account, I started reading her blog and subscribed to her RSS feed.

Once I did that I had to track her down on Ravelry to find out more about her projects.

This is all fairly normal for the way social media connections progress. At some point I added her as a Flickr contact as well, which is weird since I haven't grown that network at all. Flickr is just a place I post photos so I can get them into Ravelry.

Anyway.

JelliDonut likes to do giveaways on her blog. She gave away a digital scale once.

It was her birthday recently and she had another giveaway...and I won!

Honestly, I felt a little guilty when I first saw my name on her blog since most of the time I'm just driving by sassing her. But she seems a little sarcasitc too, so she probably appreciates the sass.

Then, of course, I came to my senses because it's sock yarn! And I shook that guilt right off and sent her my mailing address. :-) hehehe

The picture is of the awesome goodies she sent me (yes! even the project bag!). She even printed the errata from the book. How organized is that?

It's not the best picture because it's been raining for days and days here.

So there is a skein of Socks That Rock lightweit in "The skein with no name" colorway, sort of oranges and browns. A skein of Mountian Colors in "Evergreen," dark blues, greens, and purples. And a skein of Classic Elite Alpaca Sox in Color #1858, red, orange, purple and green.

As you know red and blue are two of my favorite colors. And I do need more dark socks in my wardrobe, so everything it just spot on. It was meant to be. sigh.

The women in the Library Knitting group were rather impressed with everything. Especially the spiffy knitting bag. It has lots of zippered pockets for organizing things and it big enough for a large amount of yarn. (Sorry, no tag so I can't tell you the brand.)

You should stop by and check out her blog. It's a fun read. And you never know when she's going to start tossing stuff around again.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go pet my new yarn.

NH Sheep & Wool Festival, Part 2

Yarn nibbles!

Sock hors d'oeuvers!

Wee skeins of beauty.

Call them what you will, but during the NH Sheep and Wool Festival they made success mine.

You see, back in 2009 Mom bought me the set of landscape sock patterns from Borealis Sweaterscapes. You might be most familiar with the lighthouse pattern. There is also an autumn road, pine trees, and cows in an apple orchard.

They sell kits that include the pattern and the yarn, but at the time I was working at Knitting Central and thought it wouldn't be a problem getting the yarn on my own.

Then the patterns arrived and I was stopped cold because I found out I would need small quantities of a large number of yarns (especially for the autumn road socks). I was facing a situation where I might use 25 yards out of a 400 yard skein. This would not only be expensive but would also lead to me knitting striped socks for the rest of my life to get rid of the leftovers.

Also, even if we'd had all the colors I needed in stock, which we didn't, I would have been brand hoping with unknown results.

So I made myself a spreadsheet of the colors and quantities needed, then put the patterns aside to bide my time.

In the past I've come home from Rhinebeck and kicked myself for forgetting to bring the spreadsheet, but really I just would have been in the same large skein situation I was in at the store.

Victory!
But then on Saturday Nancy and I were walking by the Holiday Yarns booth and saw a bin full of wee skeins of yarn. There was a sign about blah blah and at the bottom big red letters that said "A handful = $20."

Well, who can pass up an offer like that? We made jokes about needing bigger hands. I confirmed we could select colors rather than acting like a prize claw and taking whatever handful we came up with.

As we picked through my landscape socks suddenly came to mind. It wasn't a coherent enough thought to regret not having the spreadsheet, but it was enough to guide me toward autumnal colors that could be in the tree leaves.

My first "handful" was the top picture. I knew I needed blue for the sky. I knew I needed brown for the tree trunks. I basically did my best.

Then mom and I headed home. We discussed what a nice manageable fair it was and how we sort of conquered it one day.

Filling the Gaps
However we quickly realized this "one day" stuff was nonsense. I, of course, immediately fished out the patterns and spreadsheet and spread my precious wee skeins out on the dining room table. More colors were needed. I was so close. At the same time Mom realized she didn't buy any handmade soap. The book signing was Sunday. Then the final straw came when Hubby announced he had too much school work to hang out with us Sunday.

Obviously we needed to go back.

This time I took my patterns, spreadsheet, and the colors I bought Saturday.

I got to the booth in a slight lull with gave me the opportunity to show Jennifer the patterns and explain to what I needed. She was smitten. We spread out my stuff and she helped me select the missing colors. I ended up purchasing three full size skeins a well mainly for the foot portions but also because of cross over between patterns.

She was very helpful and supportive of the cause. She said she will knit vicariously through me. I'll have to do a good job so I can send her pretty pictures.


Divide and Conquer
I have decided to start with the Autumn Road socks. You can see the pattern picture peeking out from under the yarn in the bottom right of this corner.

I matched up the colors I bought with the colors in the pattern with a slight amount of fudging.

Then I put them in Ziplock baggies with their pattern color names being careful to keep similar colors separate, i.e., poppy, garnet, and Chianti are in different bags.

Now all I need to do is ball all the skeins and I can get started.

It's so exciting.

NH Sheep & Wool Festival, Part 1

You had to expect me to drag a weekend wool festival out over multiple posts.

This was my first time attending the NH Sheep and Wool Festival. The first time around living in the state I had not yet realized the glory that is wool festivals, but after attending Rhinbeck two years in a row I had to check the local one out.

My hope was that it would be smaller and more manageable than Rhinebeck, and indeed it was. It was busy and there were many vendors, but it wasn't overwhelming. One thing I liked about it was all the vendors seemed to be from the NH, VT, ME area with a few from farther afield. It's not that I was really pulling a "support local" attitude (which was nice), but rather I figure if I want more of their products they'll be easy to get to.

People
Mom came up for it. We'd planned it before her little heart attack at the beginnig of the month and the doctors said there was no reason she shouldn't. Once there we met up with Pam's sister Nancy (who does not have a blog).

We also ran into Marcia and Patty from the Library Knitting group, several of Nancy's friends, and Pat who I worked with briefly at Patternworks my first time around.

Now that I work from home full-time I often feel that I never see other humans aside from Hubby. It made me happy that I already know enough people to encounter them out and about despite only being in the state since the summer and never leaving the house.

On Sunday I also got to meet Vicki Stiefel, who I follow on Twitter. I saw on Ravelry that she'd be a the festival doing a book signing and thought she looked familar. Her book is 10 Secrets of the LaidBack Knitters. I had a chance to flip through it on Saturday and determine it was worth owning. She was so very excited that I'm a Twitter follower that at first I thought she was yanking my chain. But she really was excited (and of course I was excited too, not often you actually meet your social media friends). She was also very sweet and we had a nice chat. She even had Mom take our picture so she could tweet about meeting me!

Speaking of pictures. Of course I can't go near a fiber festival without my Felted Ravelry ID Bag. Trust other knitters and crocheters to appreciate the insantiy of it. I do enjoy basking in the compliments. hehehe.

Yaaarnn!
Of course I go to these festivals for the wool part, not the sheep part. Although I do try to swing by the stalls and thank them for their contribution to my happiness.

The first thing I fell in love with was this beautiful bundle from Ellen's Half Pint Farm. It is 1,375 yards of 50% Silk 50% Merino goodness. As you can see in the opening picture, it was love at first sight. I bought it in the "Spring Pansy" colorway, but there were many other lovely colors. I was briefly distracted by some of the other colors (there was one that would have matched the Flashy Socks I recently started) but I decided to stick with the first one that caught my eye. I plan, of course, to make a Schleppy Sweater with it.

Listen, that raglan I designed for myself fits well and works fine with colorful yarn, so I'm just going to stick with it. At this rate, if I actually knit all the Schleppys I plan too, I'll be able spend the entire winter wearing just them!

While Mom and Nancy both stopped at Leslie Wind's booth to have some pins made while they watched (website has sound effects) I wandered through the Ball and Skein booth right next to it.

The Ball and Skein booth was well organized and well lit. She had sample shawls displayed around the booth and I became enamored of the Ceder Leaf Shawlette from Never Not Knitting.

Ball and Skein was selling the pattern as a kit with her Sophia yarn for $30, which struck me as a very reasonable price since the yarn is a Merino/Nylon/Cashmere blend.

The sample was in orange, which was nice, but not really me. I decided green would be too easy, because of the leaves. So I went with this nice shade of red called "Rusty Nail."

Imagine my surprise when I discovered this pattern is similar to one I already have queued on Ravelry. Between this and my Trellis Leaf Mitts, I guess I'm totally on a leaf kick for some reason.

Needles
That is not the end of my yarn purchases at the festival, as you might imagine, but I'll leave the rest for tomorrow.

I'll wrap up today's post with the needles I bought. Well, I suppose the Denise companion set isn't actually needles, but they are close enough.

Oh.my.goodness, are they not beautiful?!

Really, I need more Denise cables about as much as I need more yarn, but how could I pass them up? As you might know, I have a set and a half as I bought a set when I learned to knit then acquired Pam's cast off set before I left CT. But those all have the traditional blue cables. These, these are colored cables!

The booth I bought them in had the range of colors and it was hard to select, so I defaulted to happy yellow. A woman watching me dither suggested I get a color that will contrast with the colors I normally work with. That was a good idea and reaffirmed the yellow since I tend to knit with red and blue.

The other needles I bought are a set of US 1.5 "Darn Pretty Needles" double points. They were out of US 1, but I figure these are close enough. You can't really tell in that bad picture, but they are multicolored wood needles.

Now I just need an excuse to use them because goodness knows I have the yarn.

KFI: Findley! Yummy new yarn

This blog post is mean on so many levels.

First this yarn I'm in love with won't be in stores until the Fall 2011.

Second none of the colors I have are going to be available in stores. However, the 12 colors that will be available are just as stunning.

Best.Job.Ever.
Perhaps you have heard of Juniper Moon Farm. Susan Gibbs did what many knitters and crocheters dream about. She quite her desk job and started raising sheep.

Instead of the resulting wool being spun and sold to yarn stores for years she sold it directly to people. You can buy a CSA which entitles you to a portion of the wool production while Susan and her team takes care of all the messy, hands on business.

Pretty exclusive stuff.

Now a different door to her creative sensibilities has been opened. She has teamed with Knitting Fever Inc. to design a new yarn line that is spun and dyed in Italy. Her little flock of sheep could not grown enough wool to meet the demand of nationwide distribution, so they had to call in reinforcements.

The new line is also called Juniper Moon Farm and is starting with three yarns: Willa is a bulky 60% Merino, 40% Super Fine Kid Mohair blend, Chadwick is a worsted weight 60% Merino Wool/40% Baby Alpaca blend, and Findley is a lace weight 50% Silk, 50% merino blend.

Tanis Grey, formerly of Vogue Knitting, has designed patterns for all the yarns. I did not get a pattern book to go along with my yarn, and I suspect it's because they aren't finished yet! There is a sneak peak of some of the sweaters on the farm blog (scroll down). They look very interesting.

Oh, Findley.
This yarn is so soft and lovely. As soft and lovely as you would expect a silk merino blend to be.

And the colors are just lovely. I especially like the yellows and the blues, but the green is lovely too and well, I could just list them all as my favorite, but that would be silly. Really, they all deserve to be worked up into some fabulous project.

Considering I have four balls of each color (well, two of white) and each ball is a whopping 800 yards, I can make multiple fabulous projects.

Which means I'm totally spoiled for choice and was just a wee bit paralyzed when I first opened the box.

But I'm pretty sure I have it sorted now.

I was considering the Abotanicity sweater from Knitty. To that end I started swatching with the yarn held single on a US 1. That was kind of insane. It occured to me after several rows that people don't usually try to get a dense fabric with lace weight yarn. Also, since that pattern calls for fingering/sock weight yarn I don't think it will work out.

Since I'm not really a lace shawl knitter, I decided to expand my options by holding the yarn doubled on a US 4, which is this blue swatch.

That made me think of my friend Pam's Lacy V-Neck sweater that is in the Holiday 2009 issue of Vogue Knitting. (It's the middle one of the second row of the "A Softer Shade of Pale" patterns.) Those lacy bits you see in the blue swatch is the stitch pattern. I'm pretty sure it's going to work, which is very exciting.

The trick is deciding which color to use. I might stick with this robin's egg blue one. Although I'm debating the silver grey one, which I know is the influence of the magazine picture.

The next sweater I'm considering making is from the 2004 issue of Simply Creative Crochet magazine. I don't see a picture of it online. The sweater had a plain body and lace sleeves made with wee square flower motifs that are connected as you go along. I've had that pattern in my library for quite a while. The pattern calls for crochet thread, so I think this lace weight yarn will work. I crocheted a little swatch but it calls for a D hook and I only had a C available. My B, D, and E hooks have all evaporated!

Again, I'm not sure which color to go with. I'm debating between the burnt red and the pale yellow.

The last of the published patterns I have my eye on is the Jade Sweater from Elsebeth Lavold's "Book Two: The Sentimental Journey Collection." This book is very possibly out of print so if you see a copy grab it. This is another pattern I've had my eye on for a while. No hesitation on color here, I'm totaly using that royal blue. The trick with this one is the pattern calls for 5 sts/inch and I'm getting 6 sts/inch so I'm probably going to have to rewrite it for my gauge. Considering the small would have been big on me I would have been fussing with it anyway.

The final color I have plans for is the deep yellow goldenrod one. I want to knit something fabulous that will take lots of buttons because I think that yarn is a fabulous match for the tartan buttons I made. For this sweater I'd like to do something clever with a non-traditional neck line that goes diagonally across the sweater. You know, from the center neck down to one armpit.

The question is whether my knitting math skills are up to the challenge.

I'm also tossing around several shawl patterns that would use the yarn held single. And, of course, I'll have to reserve some for when the pattern books are available so I can make an official pattern.

2011: The Year of the Sweater

My resolution this year is to be more organized.

Might as well set my sights high!

Part of my new organized lifestyle will be blogging regularly again. One could say the year is off to a bad start since it's already Jan 3, however I don't usually blog on the weekends so I gave myself a pass.

At the end of last year my grand plan was to blog in the morning as a way to get the creative juices flowing. We all know how well that worked out. Now my plan is to blog after lunch, like I used to. We'll see how that goes.

Enough babble, on to the yarn and knitting content!

Needs Must as the Needles Drive
I own a lot of yarn.

Not as much as some people. My yarn collection doesn't take up an entire room in the house, but it is getting a bit tight in the dining room credenza.

This would not have been an issue when we lived in Connecticut, since that was a three bedroom house with a 1/2 finished basement and a walk up attic. It is an issue here in New Hampshire since we're in a spacious one bedroom apartment.

I've owned some of this yarn for a while now and feel bad that it's being ignored. I also own some very lovely stuff that I'd like to knit already.

In this hoard of mine I have yarn to make several sweaters. These quantities of yarn were generally bought with a project in mind.

Since sweaters take quite a bit of yarn, I figure if I set myself the task of knitting some of these long coveted sweaters I'll make a serious dent in my hoard.

Based on previous sweaters it takes me between one and two months to knit a sweater if I stay focused. If I work through my list it should carry me through the year nicely.

In no order the sweaters I have on tap are:

1. My Celtic Critter Cardigan
2. Hubby's Vertical Box Stitch Sweater
3. Finishing my Bias-V Neck Sweater
   
4. Aunt Kim's Vines and Lace Sweater
5. Brother's Ruben
6. My Cap Sleeve Cabled Sweater
7. My Rainbow Schleppy Sweater
8. My Sherbert Schleppy Sweater
9. Red Top-Down Cardigan from KFI samples
   

Not Sweaters Exclusively
When I like a yarn I won't randomly buy several thousand yarns for a patternless sweater I might make someday, instead I'll try to buy a sock yarn equivalent. The result being that I have quite a hoard of sock yarn in addition to my sweater hoard.

So although I say this is The Year of the Sweater I'll be knitting other things as well. Primarily I have a number of UFO WIPs I have to finish. Some socks, a pair of fingerless mitts, a scarf. It would be nice to finish those things up.

Also, I got a hot water bottle for Christmas. I asked for one so I could knit it a cover. This morning I finally cast on for one.

I know I usually advocate project monogamy, but I'll have to be good about having a project rotation this year if I'm going to accomplish everything I want to.

The important thing to remember in all this is to be relaxed about the situation. Knitting should be fun and should not add stress to my life. I have a goal, and a list, but it's all for guidance. None of it is required.

What goals are you setting yourself?

Rhinebeck 2010: Sweater Yarn

What I should have done was blog about the yarn I bought at Rhinebeck in the days after Rhinebeck. Then I would have benefited from the extra traffic of people looking for news from the festival.

That, however, would have required organization and I had other things on my mind when I got home.

In fact, I didn't even enter the yarn into my Ravelry stash until this weekend.

Since October my haul has been sitting on the dining room table. Hubby straightened up the dining room a few weeks ago and asked if I could please get my yarn of the the table now? His follow up question was if the was room for me to put it away.

I assured him there was, I just hadn't cataloged it yet. Of course when I did go to put it away things got a little dicey, but it all fit.

Fun With A Purpose
I went in with some goals. More to avoid disappointment than to prevent overspending. I figure if I'm going to make impulse purchases I should at least have projects in mind so I could buy an adequate amount of yarn.

A top goal was to correct an oversight from the previous year. Last year I saw a skein of yellow and orange yarn in the Brooks Farm booth that I really liked but didn't buy. I told myself that this year I would go straight there and buy one to make a second cropped poncho.

Well, as you probably guessed, they didn't have any. Nothing even resembling it. Since I still have all those Solo I bought in 2009 for my Celtic Critter Cardigan, I did want to buy more. I started looking for yarn that might make a good sweater for Hubby, but nothing was really catching my eye.

Finally, Mom asked something along the lines of, "Why are you so determined to buy some of this yarn?" And I said, "I don't know." After which we moved on.

However, the orange and yellow theme kept recurring during the show.

I had fallen in love with the Odette sweater from Verena Knitting Magazine and decided it getting yarn for it would be a Rhinebeck goal. It's a hip length, long sleeve pullover, slightly flared at the bottom, with interesting cables at the waist and yolk. We left the Brooks Farm booth and went into the booth that sells Aussie Wool. I'd bought some of their sock yarn last year in a wonderfully eye popping color (which I still haven't knit up).

As soon as we hit the booth we saw the great golden yarn pictured at the top of the post. It was the right gauge, right quantity, and a good price. Sold!

I also saw a skein of black and gold sock yarn, which are the school colors for Hubby's new school. Of course I just had to get it to make him a pair of socks.

Orange and Yellow and Pink!
We made and effort to target the booths up by the 4-H structures this year. We missed most of them last year because we didn't realize they were there.

As we wandered through them I encountered a booth with lovely hand dyed yarn that was super soft. It turned out to be Maple Creek Farm, where I had bought some lovely red/black/white sock yarn in 2009 (which I still haven't knit).

I started out by once again looking for yarn for a Hubby sweater. Plenty of stuff was catching my eye, but nothing that seemed appropriate for him. Then I stubmled across this fabulous color of Fredricksburg which took my yellow and orange obsession a step further by throwing pink in the mix.

Oh my goodness, it is soooo soft and snuggly. Each skein is 660 yards and it's about 5.5 stitchs to the inch. Which makes it a prime candidate for a Schleppy Sweater! So I snatched up two skeins.

Hubby Yarn
My last sweater quantity purchase was for Hubby.

He had requested a vertically striped sweater, which would be sold colors. I knew that if I could find a nice varigated yarn I could get away with knitting a simple sweater and letting the yarn do the work. I was on the prowl for jewel tones because Hubby likes strong colors.

I finally found what I was looking for in the Creatively Dyed Yarn booth. I follow her on Twitter and when I saw her tweeting about attending Rhinebeck I made a note of her booth number so I could be sure to swing by. So in this case her social media efforts paid off!

She had all these cool, cyberpunk colors that were varigated but also had splatters on them. They were enchanting. They were also a little too much for a Hubby sweater without him there to approve. Then I found some solid and semisolids in the corner. The colors were nice, the yarn was soft, and it had a good weight to it so I knew Hubby would like it. I did attempt to select one wild yarn to surround with solid colors, but the booth was crowded so it was hard to really poke around for such an involved project.

I settled on her Woodbrook yarn, which is 100% superwash wool. There was a nice silk/wool blend that I kept picking up based on colors, but I didn't want to mix fibers by having one color wool and the next color a blend.

I got two skeins each of five colors in these lovely jewel tones. Of course by the time I got home I started worrying I should have bought one color heavy. I'm sure it will work out fine. I'll just have to make sure all the colors appear with the same frequency.

Since I ended up liking the yarn, and buying quite a bit of it, I told her I follow her on twitter, which was fun. (Of course, if I'd been disappointed she never would have known I was there!)

Friends
In addition to yarn we saw a few friends. Mainly we kept running into Pam and her friend on a regular basis. This was good because we could scout out different things and suggest places to check out. We also got to each lunch with them one day and breakfast on another. So it was pretty cool.

We saw other people too, but I don't remember now.

If you think this is the only yarn I bought you don't know me very well. You have to realize I bought more sock yarn than that single skein for Hubby. But that is a post for another day.

Post In Which I Confirm My (Knitting) Insanity

As though you still have any doubt regarding that matter.

I'm going knit an Elizabeth Zimmermann Adult Surprise Jacket.

I don't know anyone in person who has knit one, but I'm not going to let that stop me.

I do know people who have knit a Baby Surprise Jacket, but I've never knit one myself.

The pattern booklet I have that includes directions for the Adult, Baby, and Child versions suggests you knit a BSJ first to get the hang of it. But that seems awfully sensible and smacks of swatching, so I'm not going to.

Since May
This is not a decision I've come to lightly, and I don't think it should be approached on a whim.

For those people not surprised with the pattern...you cast on and knit it in one piece. As you work, it is an amorphous, amoeba-like blob that doesn't remotely resemble a sweater. Not until you are done and do a little "origami magic" does the sweater appear. It's a leap of faith pattern because you can't really try it on as you go along.

No, I didn't think of this idea last night. I've had this idea in mind since I received that massive box of KFI sample yarn back in May.

Once I realized it was mostly single balls I thought, "What the heck am I going to do with it all?" Because, really, I was only fooling myself with that whole swatch blanket idea. I don't make afghans. And I don't like working single sampler blocks. Which is why that project has died a horrible death.

Really, don't we all prefer to be actually making something? To have a finished item as the goal? I thought so.

It seems to me the ASJ is the ultimate Hoard busting project. Indeed, the pattern booklet even says, "As true knitters you may have boxes of leftover wools of about the same weight."

Prep Work
Hubby was shocked to see me vacuuming last night. However, it was a necessary first step before I could sort my yarn out on the floor.

I spent a couple hours last night sorting all my yarn by weight according to the recommended gauge on the ball band.

Then I made myself a little spread sheet of gauge, yardage, and how many balls I had. I've entered most, but not all, of this yarn into my Ravelry stash, but didn't think I'd be able to get the info I needed easily because I forgot about the export feature until just this very moment.
sigh.

Oh well, I would have had to clean it up and delete stuff to get to what I wanted.

Anyway.

I discovered that I can make several crazy colored sweaters in DK, worsted, and chunky weight. And by that I mean, I can probably make at least two sweaters in each weight.

wowza.

I decided to go with the chunky yarn for the ASJ, which required sorting the pile of chunky yarn by color to see if I can really pull this off.

The pile in the top picture is composed of purple, blue, and green yarn that seemed to harmonize. I have a second pile of red and orange yarn. That might become just a top down cardigan in the traditional try it on as you go style. A third, much, much smaller pile is browns and greys. Not sure what I'll do with those. Maybe the swatch blanket will be revived after all.

If things go well with the ASJ I'm thinking I might sort the DK yarns and make myself and crazy striped Schleppy Sweater.

I've organized the yarn into the color sequence I want. I think I'll just work through each ball and not try to do stripes by using part of it and saving part of it for further in the jacket.

Charged Up
For some reason I am so excited about this project that I couldn't sleep last night!

I spent time this morning adding suggested needle sizes to my spreadsheet, because I didn't think of it last night. Then I had to fuss with the order I'll use the yarn.

It's going to be Epic!

Now I have to wind the hanks that need to be wound. I should probably also swatch. grr. Then I can do the math and get started.

Storage Update: It Fit! (Mostly)

Don't you just want to dive in?

Well, don't. It's not deep enough. Much better for wading and wallowing.

ha!

Of course if you combined all the yarn together you might be able to doggy paddle.

Samples On The Side
This pile of yarn was the wild card in fitting stuff into the credenza. I had been keeping it in the box it all came it, which was pretty big, so I didn't have a feel for how much room it really needed.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that it all fit into one side cabinet.

As you can see it isn't very organized at the moment. I was able to bag a few by brand, but the rest I just piled in there neatly.

This situation shouldn't last long. We had to buy new curtains for the dining room and I've got my eye on the clear plastic zippered bags they come in.

And can I just ask why is it every time you move you have to buy new curtains? Why can't windows be a standard size? It's just not right. Not right at all.

Front And Center
I think my credenza must have TARDIS technology. Not only did that pile of yarn fit easily in the side cabinet, but the gobs of yarn in my last post fit nicely into the big center cabinet.

Unless it's just an indication of how poorly I was using the space before.

I had started the process by putting my sock yarn and such in the side cabinet as it was when we were in CT.

Then I started putting the sweater yarn in the center cabinet. The Rainbow Schleppy, the green cabled one I was swatching recently, Rowan Calmer for a shrug, the green yarn for the sweater Hubby rejected that my brother claimed, the Celtic Critter Cardigan, and on and on. I have enough yarn for at least six sweaters.

There was still space. I realized I could move the sock yarn oven. Then I was home free.

I must admit I'm a little surprised it all fit. It seemed like such a large quantity when it was all spread out. I'm not sure if having it all contained is good or bad. I mean, if it all fit in the credenza that must mean I don't own an excessive amount and can buy more, right? Although there is still enough that it was a pain to move, which means I probably do have enough.

Now, I did have to put some cone yarn into the China Cabinet cabinet. Also, some small active projects are in one of the drawers. And there is still a bunch of miscellaneous balls in a plastic tub floating around the dining room. I think I'm going to have to shift that out to the barn with the other tub of acrylic. But all the luxury yarn I'll be using soon is in the credenza.

Books
I think it helped that I'm not storing books in the credenza this time around.

I wasn't able to put any yarn in the pantry, but the shelf between the cabinets is fairly useless because it's shallow and closed in. It is, however, a good size for back issues of crochet and knitting magazines and books. hehehe.

I haven't tried to put my Rowan Magazines on it yet. I think they'll be too tall and will have to lay down. They are the other thing filling up the last plastic tub.

So many patterns, so little time.

Storage Issues

Or the potential for it.
The problem is that all of that yarn on the left including most of the stuff on the table and the two boxes in the living room you can't see all has to fit in that dining room credenza on the right.

Now, granted, a great deal of this yarn came out of the dining room credenza in the first place. And at the time it wasn't the best well organized storage system because it was my "active" yarn so I was pawing through it on a regular basis. But it still seems like a pretty tall order.

(If you look at the credenza picture, over there on the left at the bottom of the front door...you can see Samson's butt. snicker)

I also kept a number of books in the credenza when we lived in Connecticut and storage wasn't an issue. I've transferred the books to the little shelf in the pantry along with my magazine library that I used to keep in the attic.

Pantry Out
Did I mention that Hubby scoffed when I told him my idea of storing yarn in the pantry? It wasn't that he didn't want yarn stored there. He just didn't think there would be room.

Turns out he's pretty much correct. We've filled it with linens and paper products and cleaning supplies and I don't remember what else.

I think there might be one cabinet on the bottom that is still available. I should stuff yarn into it before I wind up filling it as well.

Cost Free Solution
Yes, yes, I can hear you now. "Space Bags" are great for storing yarn. Squishes it right down and it puffs back up when you need it.

I'd really like to squeeze all my yarn into the apartment without having to spend money to do it.
Besides that would mean every time you want to get some yarn you also have to haul out the vacuum to reseal the bag as well. What a pain.

(Oh, and mom, don't bother running out and buying me any as a gift. I'd really like to work on a more traditional solution first.)

Other Room Potential
Hubby had suggested that I might be able to store yarn in the book shelf in the living room. The top is open shelves but the bottom is a closed cabinet. This is important for keeping the dogs out of my yarn.

However, despite purging many VHS tapes, we still filled that little cabinet up. I'll have to take another look, but I don't think it has much space available.

The China cabinet has a closed cabinet I didn't think we used much, but then I found myself putting serving items in it that I remembered taking out of it, and that filled up too.

There are some built in drawers in the dining room that pass through to the kitchen. We haven't utilized the bottom one very much yet. I might have to claim it.

I'm also eying the bottom of my half of the closet. I'm thinking I could put a plastic storage tub in there and put my shoes on top. That would have to be the yarn that I know I'm not going to use for a while since it would be a pain to access.

Break Time
The boxes I packed my yarn in were very large. The ended up rather heavy because not only did I put books in the bottom but when you get that much yarn in one place the weight adds up. They were so heavy that every time Hubby went to move one he was like, "What the hell is in here?!"

Because of this I wound up ferrying everything in by the armload. It took me between 15 minutes and half an hour.

Told you I had a lot of yarn and books.

But I was sick and tired of not having ready access to my yarn and notions so I did what I had to.

This, of course, means I'm kind of tired now. I think it's time to have a glass of iced tea while I stare in disbelief at the pile of yarn I have to stow away.

Wish me luck.

Hoard Enhancement!

Of the very best kind because it was all gifts. Yippee!

On the Friday before our move I went to Westport Yarns to say good-bye one last time before we skipped town.

They surprised me with a gift certificate to the store so I could treat myself before starting my yarn diet. How awesome is that?

Special Edition
Also in the gift bag was a special Traveling Ann edition project bag from my friend Laura. The fabric is a cartoon map, complete with predatory animals, which goes nicely with my habit of saying “I know enough to be dangerous.” And the red liner is, of course, one of my favorite colors.

You already know that I love these project bags. So to have one made specially for me is just the icing on the cake. I’ve already put it to good use transporting my new yarn.

Decisions, Decisions
Since I hadn’t been to the store since sometime in July there were lots of new yarns to tempt me.

I debated trying to get yarn to make a sweater. And I debated books. But in the end I decided to splurge and buy the most expensive, luxurious yarns I could that I wouldn’t normally buy for myself.

Cashmere
This led me to Lobster Pot Cashmere in the East Sandwich Beach color. Now I have a little scarf out of Lobster Pot already. My first year working at Knitting Central at our annual holiday dinner Cynthia gave everyone a cream skein and a set of US 8 Colonia Rosewood needles to make ourselves a one-skein scarf. I traded mine in for ice blue.

Since it’s absolutely delicious yarn I’ve always eyed the colors, but a second scarf seemed extravagant. Well, now I’ve got two skeins so I can make myself a longer version.

I know this raspberry pink color is a little unusual for me, but for some reason it grabbed my attention the day it came in.

Silk & Camel
I still had money left and tons of sock yarn seemed overkills even for me, so I made another pass of the store. The second yarn I decided to get was this Camelspin from Hand Maiden. This is new to Westport Yarns for the fall. It is 70% Silk and 30% Camel and all kinds of soft. I kept petting it as I roamed the store and decided it should come home with me. The one skein is 300 meters. I’m going to make Danni’s beginner lace scarf which calls for 400 meters. Mine will just be a little shorter.

Sock yarn, of course
Surprisingly, despite splashing out in style, I still had money left on my gift certificate. This time I went for the sock yarn selecting the OnLine Supersocke 100 in the Canadian-Color # 1290. It’s a standard 75% superwash, 25% nylon blend. It’s a self-patterning yarn. I went with this black/grey/tan/white color because I haven’t knit myself many pairs of dark socks. We must balance the wardrobe.

I topped my purchase off with a new set of US1 Brittany Birch DPNs and a pack of stitch markers.

Thank You!
As you can see my friends sent me off in high style. Of course we’ll all keep in touch online, but now I’ll be able to knit myself snuggly scarves and think of them as I stitch and when I wear them this winter. (hahaha. Did I really just imply I’d finish these in time to wear this winter? Boy howdy, I crack myself up.)

Speaking of thinking of them…I finally unpacked my stationary the other day; I really should send a card already.

Still Life With Boxes

I had such big plans. I was going to blog every day. There was nothing to stop me.

Except the boxes. Tons and tons of boxes.

If I'd blogged earlier in the week, like I'd planned, my post title was going to be "Moving Mayhem." But that probably would have been too easy.

Goodness knows moving isn't easy.

72 Hours
If you count packing and unpacking, moving takes several months. However, Hubby figured out our actual physical move took about 72 hours.

My mom came up last Thursday night with my niece Bre and my nephew CJ. Friday morning at 11 mom and Hubby went to get the moving truck. We got the 26 foot truck, which is apparently the largest one you can drive with a private liscense.

Everyone we had lined up to help us suddenly flaked, which meant we were totally up a creek, but then our handy-man randomly called. He was able to find a helper for us. phew! Frantic loading of the truck commenced since the helper was only available until 3 pm so all the heavy furniture had to be done before then. The kids very much enjoyed using the handtrucks to ferry boxes out to the truck.

While the helper was at the house we had the dogs locked in the bathroom. They weren't very happy about that at all. After he left we let them out. Samson spent the rest of the day supervising our activities. Baru spent the rest of the day cowering in the bottom of Hubby's closet since we'd dismantled the Puppy Fort (aka our bed).

Loading continued until around 8 pm. We wisely left out the full size mattresses for us and mom to sleep on Friday night. Baru wasn't very happy about his Fort being gone. On the other hand the mattress was on the floor so I was able to just reach out and put my hand on him for snuggles.

Saturday morning we got up and finished loading the truck. That took longer than expected, just as the loading Friday did. Then we saw with horror that all our stuff wouldn't fit in the truck. Resigned to the fact that we'd have to come back for a second load we tossed the dogs in the SUV and began the four hour drive to our new home.

On this end Hubby's brother Doug came over from NY to help. Phew! We unloaded late into the night taking one little break to take everyone out to dinner to thank them for their labor. If you've ever moved you know that unloading goes faster because you don't have to carefully position things. You just yank them off the truck and put them in the assigned room.

Samson again supervised the process and Baru went and hid in the one closet in the bedroom. Oh, did I say the bedroom? I meant the one closet in the entire apartment.

Still, we didn't finish before everyone was falling down from exhaustion. Mom ended up choosing a random dorm room since no students have checked in. The neice and nephew slept on the couches. Doug slept on one of the full size mattresses in the dining room. Hubby and I slept on our own mattress on the floor. I swear to you that at bedtime Samson was scratching around next to the bed trying to figure out how to get into the Puppy Fort. I was like, "Samson, we haven't built it yet," and he flopped down and grunted at me in disgust.

Sunday morning we got up, finished unloading, swept the truck, and Hubby exchanged it for the second, smaller one. Then we took everyone out to breakfast. CJ got to ride on the back of Doug's motorcycle, which he said was very exciting. Then we headed out for the four hour drive back to the house.

phew!

Mom and the kids hung out for an hour helping us clean up a little. The kids had totally lost interest by then. I was getting annoyed, but then I realized I couldn't really blame them. After all, I'd totally lost interest and it was my stuff being moved!

Primarily we had to get our patio furniture. There was also a small table and chairs set, some other miscellanius furniture, all of Hubby's tools, and various other boxes and sundries. Seriously, there is nothing like moving to make you realize just how much stuff you own.

I know, I know. We should have sorted it and thrown stuff out before we moved. I swear to you we tried, but until we were loading the truck it all seemed very valuable and necessary to have. Actually, I really think that most of our stuff is stuff we use on a fairly regular basis, expect in a few cases like the bread machine and the second juice machine, so I don't feel too bad about having drug it all up here with us.

Anyway.

Hubby and I were at the house until 11 pm! We had to finish loading the truck, take a ton of garbage up to the curb, vaccum, sweep, and mop. It was exhausting. Samson had been supervising us, but got bored. Baru very happily hid in the bottom of Hubby's closet. I suggested we stay at the house and sleep on the floor, but we couldn't because the truck had to be returned by 11:15 on Monday.

It was insane, but we hit the road. Without the SUV, we put Samson in the moving truck cab with Hubby and Baru in the front seat of the sedan with me. The back seat of the sedan was filled with one of our big mirrors and a big painting. (The trunk of the sedan was also full, not that we would have put one of the dogs in it.) While we were corraling Baru, Samson decided he didn't like it in the truck by himself--and jumped out the driver side window! OMG! Do you realize how high that was?! Hubby didn't even remember the window was open. He said Samson did a faceplant. Samson seemed ok with his only injury being a skinned nose. Still, although he's rather fearless, he balked a little when we tried to put him back in the truck.

The drive up when without incident, thankfully. We called each other every half hour to make sure we stayed awake. Still, we realize it wasn't the safest course of action and I wouldn't recommend it. We ended up arriving home at 3 am.

Of course we woke up the next morning at 8 when the maintence men came by doing lawn work. Buzzzz, bruuummm. bleh, It was just as well as we had to unload and return the truck.

There you have it, 72 hours of hard labor.

It's Not Over
We've spent every day since working on unpacking. That's not true. We flopped on Monday and lounged around a bit. We needed it. It's not like we were very functional after all the hard work and late nights over the weekend. But most of every day this week has been devoted to unpacking and arranging.

We started with the kitchen. You have to have the kitchen sorted out if you are going to cook your own meals. Then I put my foot down and demanded we do the bedroom because I was tired of tripping over boxes and suit cases (Hubby wanted to do the dining room). Then we did the living room. Today we did the dining room, which included sorting out the entry foyer and organizing the stuff in the barn so we could finally get the mattress off the dining room floor.

Yeah, it's just crazy. Aside from the kitchen we haven't really unpacked much yet. Really, you need the furniture in position so you have places to unpack into. No point in putting your clothes in the dresser if you are then going to have to drag it across the room.

Yarn? Yarn?
All this hard work unpacking during the day and working on my freelance projects in the evenings means I haven't gotten a lick of knitting down. Last night was the first night in a week that I was able to touch my needles and I managed a whole four rows. Whoop-di-do. We've just been that busy, working that late into the night, and that tired that I haven't had a chance.

Actually, I should wrap this damn post up so I can knit some tonight!

I also haven't unpacked any yarn. The dining room credenza isn't ready. I told Hubby my idea of storing yarn in the pantry and he scoffed. He thinks we'll be storing enough supplies and such that there won't be room. He's suggested reassessing what we keep in the book shelf in the living room and maybe keeping some yarn there. This shows that he doesn't fully understand the extent of my hoard. He's got an inkling now because he's seen the two huge boxes marked "yarn" and at least one of the plastic storage tubs. Still, I think it will be another week or two before I can actually unpack and properly store my yarn.

Yeah, moving sucks.

Speaking of Yarn Diets

The other thing I haven't told you that has been causing me anxiety since, oh, May, is that we're moving to New Hampshire....this Saturday...for Hubby's new job.

gasp.

We're loading the truck Friday and rolling out Saturday morning.

Much time has been spent in cleaning the house and stuffing things in boxes.

It's all very exciting.

People keep either telling Hubby what a great wife he has for supporting this OR asking him if I'm really ok with it. He says it's like people don't think we talk to each other.

When people ask me about it I say, "Well, the alternative wouldn't be good for my marriage, and I'm rather fond of Hubby." Which usually gets a good laugh.

I've also noticed that all questions are erased when we point out this is a career advancement for Hubby. No, we aren't uprooting our lives on a whim.

As for me...well, I'm not unemployed, I'm self-employed! wheeee!

You already know about my one project. As for my magazine...well, they couldn't get the tax regulations sorted out for me to be able to telecommute. Instead I'm freelancing for them, too. It seems the idea is I'm supposed to still do my job and just bill them for everything. Hmmm, well, it's income coming in so I'm running with it.

People also ask, "What about your dogs?" Which just shows how alien boarding school life is to most people. I respond, "Oh, it's no problem, pets are allowed." But what I want to say is, "They're puppies, not accessories! We wouldn't be going if our dogs weren't allowed."

Quality of Life
Is expected to sky rocket.

We won't have a commute to speak of. We're moving to a boarding school, so Hubby's commute will be walking across campus. Mine will be walking across the bedroom to the computer. How awesome is that? The puppies are thrilled.

I don't mean to rub it in, but we are soooo looking forward to that. For the last five years we've had horrible commutes because of the bad traffic. On the weekends it took me maybe 20 minutes to get to Westport Yarns but on a weekday it could take me an hour or more to get the the magazine office the next town over. Crazy, I tell you, just crazy. Hubby used to call on his way home from school around 3 o'clock just livid about traffic and calculating how many days he'd spent sitting in traffic during the year. "Yes, dear," as though I didn't sit in it, too.

But those days are over! wheeee!

Downsizing
The school is providing housing. A cute one bedroom apartment with a dining room. As you can see in that picture we're even going to have a fire place in the living room. And it works. And we're allowed to use it! (At our last boarding school we had a fireplace but weren't allowed to use it because the chimney needed repairs.)

If it all looks a little grungy in that picture it's because they were in the process of cleaning and painting before we could move in.

There are bay windows in the bedroom and dining room. Why is it that every time you move you have to buy new curtains?

What's that? Oh, currently we live in a three bedroom house. For five years. Yeah, we have a lot of stuff. Happily, there is a two store barn attached to our new place that we are going to share with another couple. Ahhh, free storage space. My pack-rat heart rejoices.

Oh, right, boarding school. You realize that means we're in a dorm, right? We're the first floor, there are six students on the second floor, and another faculty apartment on the third floor. He's the dorm parent. This does not phase me. For the first three years of our marriage we were in a 20 student dorm. Now, when I want to bake cookies, I won't have to cut the recipe in half anymore because teenage boys are like vacuum cleaners when it comes to baked goods.

I hope Samson and Baru adjust quickly to having other people in "their house." It's going to be a real pain if Samson starts barking every time he hears one of the students walking around, or sees one outside. He's a smart dog, he'll adjust. Right?

About That Yarn Diet
Of course, the blow in all this excitement is that I had to give up my job at Westport Yarns.

sniffle.

That would have been a hell of a commute for a weekend job.

sigh.

I'll miss all my yarn friends, seeing their projects, and having instant access to advice on my projects.

I'm sure I'll find new yarn friends in New Hampshire, but it won't be the same.

Last month Hubby kindly asked where I'll be buying yarn going forward. I think he drugged my pancakes because I found myself saying that I could probably work from my yarn hoard for a year without a problem. And then there is the sample box from KFI.

"I see," Hubby said, and I could practically see the budget funds marked "yarn" moving to the column marked "wine."

Of course, I immediately tried to back track and explain how every season new yarns and patterns come out and the yarn I have might not work for the new patterns, etc. He nodded pleasantly, but I'm not sure he was buying it.

And don't worry about my hoard being exiled to the old, stinky barn. Noooo, what do you take me for?

Between the kitchen and the bathroom is this odd little pantry area. On the left are the hook-ups for the fridge, washer and dryer. On the right are cabinets above and below a shelf.

We've already agreed we probably won't keep food out there, mainly because we have tons of cabinets in the kitchen. I'm thinking the pantry will be combination linen closet and yarn storage.

Oh, it will be so nice to just walk across the apartment and rummage through some cupboards to get what I need.

However, I'm not forfeiting my right to store yarn in the dining room credenza.