Ready to roll

Ta-da! My new swift. She ain't pretty but she works like a dream. Ooh, I'm just racing up that technology ladder.

Now the yarn is all in balls and I've picked my pattern: the Diminishing Rib cardi from the latest Interweave Knits.

After reading all the project comments on Ravelry, I'm sort of wondering how my experience will be. Others report varying degrees of elation and/or disappointment. And, I think, everybody fiddled with the pattern.

My turn - soon!

Wooly yellow

Yesterday was a wool day. I had been waiting for some sunshine so I could dry the yarn outside - so much easier that way.

I have a lot of natural yarn that I found at a thrift shop and I wanted to make a cardigan for myself. That takes a lot of yarn.

Natural is not a very interesting color and I knew it would need to be dyed. I spent yesterday morning skeining the yarn. Thank goodness for my niddy noddy. Then, while it soaked, I tried to decide on a color that was more interesting. I've actually been trying to decide on this for days without much success. I picked up each dye color and put it down again. I was so tired of the blues, greens, and even the reds and purples. Orange was a non-starter even for me.

What was left but yellow? This really is my favorite color but I'm a bit wary of a whole sweater of yellow. As you can see, though, I did do it. I threw in a touch of blue to take some of the glare out but it's still pretty bright. There are a lot of shadings, too, as it's hard to get the color evenly distributed. Now I'm just waiting for it to dry.

Lazy Sunday

An invitation to share a birthday dinner with my son led us to a gentle afternoon adventure.

We collected up our books for trade and headed off to Characters to trade them in. This is a wonderful used book store in Marpole area of Vancouver. We visit about twice a year and always come away with another armful of books to enjoy. The owner took in our trades and we spent an hour happily browsing the shelves for treasures. They also have a good coffee bar if the browse becomes too thirsty.

Then we headed out to Steveston because I wanted to buy that purple sock yarn for Becky. We also wanted to reconnoitre a 'greasy spoon' cafe that had been reviewed in the paper. We'll have to leave The Fisherman's Boot for another day because it's located inside the Harbor Authority and access is restricted on a Sunday. But thinking of food made us a little hungry as we set out down off down the docks. We decided to try the Blue Canoe restaurant which is new to us in Steveston. My calamari were crispy and light and Anne's burger was declared one of the best she'd ever eaten. A lot of seafood on the menu which is what you'd expect in a fishing village. The energetic service was excellent: courteous and professional. With a lovely window seat to watch the boats go by, what better way to enjoy a meal?

But I still didn't have that yarn, so off we went to Wool and Wicker which is one of my favorite yarn shops. Since I was there last, they've opened a new room for social knitting and lessons. This is bigger than the room given to this purpose before and there's room for more yarn to be displayed and more room to browse. I didn't find solid purple but I chose two that had purple in so Becky could choose. You can see which one she chose as I cast on right away so she could see what it would look like.

Then we walked past Steveston Crafts which had clearance yarns in a basket outside. I found the two Summer Cotton yarns (they are slightly different) and then went inside to pay. I fell in love with the blue mix. It looks like fireworks or the Northern Lights. It will be fun to see it knit up.


Now we're ready to head off for the birthday dinner. Since it was still light we took the kids off to the playground - Mom, too. Dinner was from the local Mexican restaurant and was very tasty. Sing 'Happy Birthday', eat some yummy chocolate cake and ice cream and we're ready to drive home. I'm tired from all the walking on my gimpy knee (really slow) but we've had such a lovely day.

Woolly find

Look what we found at the thrift store! This is all wool and there's 2200 grams of it. Each of the 'balls' is quite elongated - about 15 inches - and wound with a center pull. I've never seen yarn wound like this before. I did have to do a wool content test because the yarn seemed a bit hard and I just wasn't sure what it was. And there are several different shades of white here. Some are kind of off the white scale altogether.

Because I'm getting out the dye pots today for some rug wool, I thought I'd see how this yarn takes dye and whether that process will soften the yarn a bit. So I skeined one of the balls - about 100 yards - and I can play with it to see what it does. If it softens up significantly, then I'll probably make some fingerless mitts as a gift. Here's hoping for change.

The other thing I'll be testing, soon, is how well it felts. I sure wish my hands could produce things as fast as my mind. I have a number of felted projects sitting in the back of my imagination. Along with all the rug designs, a few quilt ideas and not so many, sewing projects. Oh, well, one step at a time.

Investment

No, this isn't about the financial meltdown or recession or whatever the heck is goin' on. This is the kind of investment that makes my frugal soul sing.

Yesterday, I chanced upon two complete balls of gray sock yarn. Socken Wolle is made by Max Grundl in Germany and is very nice for socks. I have knit with it before and I know it retails for about $6 a ball. That would have been enough for a soulful tune. But, wait -

One of the balls had been used and rewound. And stuck right in the middle were 5 bamboo dp's in the exact size I use for sock knitting. And...they were Clover/Takumi which retails for more than the two balls of yarn together. My own C/T set has reduced to 4 because one had an accident. I've only been able to make up a 5-needle pattern by adapting to four or using metal dp's. I really love my bamboo needles but haven't felt justified in buying a whole new set just for one needle. Now, I'm really singing at the top of my lungs.

With a few days knitting, I can have a pair of plain socks. A couple more days and I can have something a bit more adventurous. And all for 50 cents. See why I'm happy?

Stash trick

You know how when you have a stash of knitting yarn - or anything else - it can grow beyond the one basket you were planning to keep all your yarn in? Well, I passed that stage about 30 years ago but...I had this great idea. The order-out-of-chaos part of my brain thought that maybe Ravelry had potential as a yarn inventory manager. What if I took photos of my stash yarns (probably grouped by type or fiber) and the quantities of each yarn in the group. Then I could put them away in their various hiding places. Before closing the lid, I would indicate in the Ravelry notes where I had put this group of yarns, ie. in the ginger jar or under the bed.

Could it work? Or would it just jam up the stash lists for everyone else?