Cashew Finally Has a Sweater

My Mom knit me this sweater. Ho hum.

I want to eat it, not wear it. it's only going to fit me for about 2 more weeks, anyway!

Child's Placket-Neck Pullover from Last-Minute Knitted Gifts by Joelle Hoverson. Knit with Manos Cotton Stria in colorway number...uh, pink. Size made is 6-12 months, no modifications and pretty much spot on with the sizing in the pattern. Wood beads were found on Etsy at Jingjingdesign. I have made this sweater 3 times, it's a good one! Made in cotton, machine wash and dry, what's not to love?

Pity Party

Friday morning I woke up feeling like hell. No sleep, a head filled with fog. I had been in denial for 2 days. I couldn't possibly have a cold, I have a power immune system! But considering that for the last couple of weeks the words "lacking", "in need of" and "sleep" found their way into every other sentence coming out of my mouth, I finally crumbled. Just in time for Rhinebeck.

Hotty Hubby, Cashew and I made our way up to Rhinebeck late Friday afternoon. After getting Cashew settled, I crawled into bed, downed whatever homeopathic remedies were considered safe for a breastfeeding mum and used up every tissue available to me. Somehow I managed to work 2 lace repeats for Juliet. But that's it.

We have hardly traveled with Cashew. And where as we know things are different, and we need to plan and be incredibly organized, the words "lacking", "in need of" and "sleep" once again took their toll. We were running late for everything! We were spending the weekend in Rhinebeck to attend a friend's wedding, so we figured we'd spend the morning at the Sheep & Wool Festival and then make our way back to the hotel to get ready for the wedding.

Ha ha.

We did make it to the Festival, but not until about noon, which left me an hour and a half to yarn shop, meet fellow Ravelers and play Blogger Bingo. Stuffing my pockets with tissues and doing my best not to get anyone else sick (People whom I recognized tended to hug in glee, I am really, really sorry if you caught my cold.) I just started walking up to random groups of people and saying "I'm Annie Knits!" Knit Bloggers looked at me, looked at their Bingo cards and shrugged. They all had the other Annie Knits. I didn't meet one person who had me on their card!


Desperate to walk away from Rhinebeck with at least something other than a pocket full of snot rags, I decided to splurge on this Qiviuk blend lace weight. It is just lovely. Expensive. Lovely. It was my only purchase on day one. Feeling pressed for time and stressed, I frantically shopped a few other booths and I pushed into crowds of people and grabbed and searched in desperation but I felt nothing. (TRY, Morales, all alone!)

Hotty Hubby however, had an excellent time! The cheeses, lamb barbecue, cider doughnuts, venison... When we met up to make our way out of the fairgrounds, he says to me "We are SO coming back tomorrow!"

Ok. Twist my arm.

Since I was so depressed and disappointed after day one, I decided day two has to be better. So I dug right down to the bottom of my soul, and I tried...to shop!


With Hotty Hubby and Cashew as my collective muse, I found the best medicine for my sniffles. I knew I wanted mostly solids, and I paid more attention to fiber content. Oh, I am so happy! There's yarn for sweaters for Cashew, socks for Hotty Hubby, socks for me, yarns to weave with, yarns to pet, delightful! (If you really want to know specifically what all those yarns are and what vendors I visited, I summed it up here.)


And even though Cashew may never enjoy knitting the way I do, and I don't expect her to, I couldn't help but giggle as she smiled in glee as she squished yarn at her first Sheep & Wool Festival!

Despite "lacking", "in need of" and "sleep", we had a great time.

Rhinebeck

I'm trying, I'm trying! I am sneaking in as much knitting time as possible, but yee gads, if I get this done it will be by the skin of my teeth. We are leaving Friday morning for Rhinebeck. Maybe if Hotty Hubby drives, I can knit. Maybe at lunch I can knit. And maybe Friday night I can hole up in our room and knit. And then maybe, just maybe I can sew on the buttons Saturday morning. And maybe I will show up at the NYS Sheep and Wool Festival wearing Juliet.

Maybe.


One thing I know for sure is that Cashew will not be wearing her sweater. I can't finish both sweaters, and this one is being sacrificed because it is too big. Cashew may be growing (2 teeth!) but she's still a tiny thing. So I've slowed down on her sweater.


One thing I will definitely be wearing is my pin. So catch me if you can, I'll be there Saturday morning!

Gah - Part III

The Zephyr Gals totally pulled through! They answered my email and helped me get my hands on that pattern. Juliet has begun. Hooray! Yarn is Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Superchunky in color 16023.

So why the Gah - Part III?


See those 2 threads hanging there? There are supposed to be 26 of them hanging there. I am missing 24 threads.

Go ahead, say it out loud. I did. GAH.

Gah - Part II

It's not like I don't have raglan decreases to do.

Or a scarf to finish.

Or heck, heddles to thread.

No, I decided that it would be more fun to spend this rainy, gloomy day bucking my head against a brick wall. Last night while trying on new jeans (hooray!), I decided to try on Blouson. It just doesn't fit right. The bottom pleats are really bothering me and the neckline is too high. It just bugs me. So after seeing a cute sweater in a store the other day, I thought, hey, that looks a lot like Juliet! Hey, I could knit that! Hey, I could knit that and wear it to Rhinebeck!

So today I virtually hopped on over to Zephyr Style and clicked on the pattern and hit that button which says "Buy Now". Yes, please! And up pops Paypal.

Add curse word here: _______

After the lesson with the beads, I thought, note to self - keep a low balance in Paypal account so you don't have to wait for checks to clear. Especially checks written for ridiculously low amounts like $7. When did I remember this note? After I bought my pattern for $5.50. Guess when the check is scheduled to clear? OCTOBER 16.

Sometimes despite waiting for a check to clear, the merchant will send you your item. I have yet to receive my pattern via PDF. I have emailed them asking for an alternative way to send payment so that I can get my pattern like, today. I have yarn! I have needles! Will knit! But I haven't heard back from them yet.

Gah.

Gah.

I know, this project is not part of my Holiday Plan. But it is a New Year's Knitting Resolution so I've added it to my growing pile of WIP's. (What happened to the discipline gained with my June Plan? It got rewarded with more yarn which resulted in more WIP's which proved that I have a lot of work to do in the focus department.)

Anyhoo, there is this thing that I'm sure you all have heard about called Secret of the Stole. I jumped right in because it sounded like fun. I have been wanting to knit serious lace and made it a New Year's Knitting Resolution for 2007. Yes, "serious" lace. Not lacey socks, or a kinda lacey scarf. Lace lace. Choosing a pattern and yarn has proven difficult and I couldn't move forward on my resolution. Until Shameka told me about Secret of the Stole. Suddenly I found myself shopping for yarn and beads. BEADS. I don't DO beads, people. I don't DO stoles. I don't DO purple...but I saw this Aubergine by The Plucky Knitter and I emailed Sarah about it and bada bing, bada boom, she dyed two skeins for me and I started shopping for beads. BEADS.

My knitting group had a Sit 'n' Knit in Secret to kick off the knitalong. And my yarn arrived just in time. As in, on my way out the door I chatted up my mailman to check his mail bag for a soft package and he said "No, I don't think there's anything here...." THAT one. That looks like yarn, Mr. Mailman! So he grabbed the last package and sure enough it was my yarn.

Puhleeze. I am an experienced knitter. I know when a package has yarn in it.

But my beads? I love Paypal. It has been my enabler on many occasions. But when you've used up your yarn money stash and it has to link to your checking account, it can take many days to clear a check. A check for $7. I have been practically harassing Sarah about my yarn for two weeks and in the end it's the BLEEPIN' BEADS holding me back.

I hope my serious lace is seriously beautiful because this is seriously coo coo.

I'm Funny! Really!

I'm guessing that by the lack of comments on my last post no one got my joke. Or, eh hem. Maybe I just wasn't that funny. Or interesting. Chante laughed though. She knows I am the worst spinner ever, evidence in the photo posted the other day. Heck, you should see the photo she posted on her blog. That horrible blob on the left side of the bobbin was spun by ME. With my own little hands and feet and it was a MESS. It was fun though. But it will take a lot of practice before I can spin anything worth keeping. So I'll stick to knitting, crochet and weaving at my loom for now. I see you all nodding in agreement, except Chante. I can almost hear her saying "No! No! You just need a little more practice....get a wheel, you'll love it!"

Heh heh.

So knitting. Things have been busy here, and I haven't had much time to knit. But with Rhinebeck coming up soon, I need to get crackin'! Today I will work on the sleeves for Cashew's Rhinebeck sweater. And perhaps finishing that project will lead to an interesting and witty post. Maybe not.