Another Knitting Kick - Lots of Pictures

Maybe it's the weather, I don't know (finally feels like winter here in Mass.) I'm on another knitting kick, fun-fun!

We had Bella's birthday celebration a little early yesterday... It's the big 3 for Ms. B. Here's the birthday girl...

I only wish I could knit a sweater that pretty! Ha! But, I did knit this hat for my Mum (it's her birthday today! Happy Birthday, Mum!)

That's the back of her head. :) Not too bad for my first real attempt at Fair Isle knitting, right? Got the yarn from knitpicks (www.knitpicks.com for reasonably priced knitting yarn) and the pattern is from the book Knitted Tams by Mary Rowe - I borrowed it from my library (hooray for the library!), but liked it enough to actually think about buying a copy for myself.

I also made this doo-hingy for myself from a pattern from knitty.com:

It still needs a button - it's kind of a knitted headscarf, great for people like me who tend to wear their hair up. [The critter on the right in the picture is Iko the Curious Cat - watcha doin', Mum? Does it involve something to eat? Sweet kitty.] It was really fast and easy to knit, a fun little project. Check out the pattern here:

http://www.knitty.com/ISSUEwinter06/PATTcalorimetry.html

(If you are a knitter, by the way, and haven't been to knitty, go now! Lots of wonderful, creative, funky patterns, for free.)

And yet one more project! I just started a top-down sweater for Bella (and chose colors that Conall will be able to wear eventually too) - it's in a cotton/lycra yarn so it will be nice for spring, too (assuming I finish it - though the fact that the pattern involves no seams makes that much more likely; I detest sewing seams, I have two other sweaters I made for her sitting around waiting for me to finish them, sigh).

I've never knitted with a boingy yarn before, it's fun so far!

That is, quite possibly, the ugliest kitchen counter on earth...

I have been doing some weaving-type work, but it's been sloooow. Hopefully I'll get back on the stick in that regard very soon. I've been hanging out on the etsy forums instead of working in my free time lately. Bad girl. Tch tch. Must get priorities back in order.

Bella is skiing!

I love snowdays.

For anyone who doesn't live in the Northeast - Mother Nature decided to grace us with the first snowstorm of the year (in the Boston area at least) for Valentine's Day. It's wicked cold out there, and for a while it was sleeting. Lovely.

But Carlos and Bella went outside before it got dark and cross-country skied all around the yard, even set up a good system of tracks - and Bella was doing it all by herself! Hooray! I tried videotaping them but every time I picked up the camera, Conall would start to cry. I swear he's psychic. :) So, we have some shaky footage of Bella skiing with her Papi (and Papi actually having to kick to keep up) with Mr. Conall's preferred soundtrack in the background.

Proud of my girl, though, she done good.

Carlos was home for the day and I actually got quite a bit of weaving type stuff accomplished - started to warp my big loom for a silk/wool throw with an 8-shaft shadow weave pattern and wove some of the scarf that I have on my little loom using the lovely hand-dyed cashmere yarn I bought on etsy paired with a silvery Tencel for a little sheen.

Ugh. Conall is hollering again, time to scoot.

A sale!

Hooray, hooray, I'm hopping up and down in excitement - well, at least I was yesterday afternoon... I sold another scarf through my etsy shop! I'm enough of a newbie at the selling thing that I still get really excited and I tend to channel Sally Field ("You really like me!").

This is the one that sold:


See what I mean about needing practice on the photography part of things? Bless my customer's heart for buying it despite my lousy photo...

On other fronts, I'm ->this<- close to finishing the silk chenille scarf that's been on my little loom for a while now. Just need to find the time to weave another five inches or so. Making a sale generally lights a fire under me, so hopefully I'll get it done, the fringe twisted, washed and posted before the weekend is over.

Hooray! A sale!

Blue Bamboo/Zephyr!

Finally - I finished twisting the fringe, washed and pressed this scarf...



And actually got outside today (in the *freezing* wind) to take a couple photos of it. Amazing what sort-of fresh snow and sunshine do for the quality of your photos! Who needs a light box when mother nature is in the mood to cooperate? Hooray! Finally some decent photos! (An ongoing struggle for me...)


I like them so much, here's another. :)


It's the same weave structure as the purple bamboo/zephyr scarf I posted earlier, but the colors really pop on this one... More of a contrast between the light and dark blues, maybe. And I adjusted the stripe proportion/positioning, too. I like them both, but this one is better, I think.

Wow! A fiber-related post! About time!

Fun with Horoscopes

OK, so I'm not a huge believer in horoscopes, but they can be fun. Since I just had a birthday, I'm an Aquarius, and there's lots of random info about my sign floating around right now. How about this, for people who know me?

"100% original Aquarians, lovers of freedom and progress and speakers of truth. Aquarius people will always surprise us with their honesty, even if they are sometimes off-putting in their approach. But it's their electric nature to shake things up, and with an Aquarius around, life will never, ever be dull."

Once upon a time Carlos (hubby) said he married me precisely because life would never be dull with me. What's that ancient Chinese curse....? Brave man.

He's a Taurus. For some reason, I thought Aquarius folks and Taurus folks are not supposed to get along, but, hey, this little quiz proved me wrong:

You Should Be With an Earth Sign!

Your best match is a Taurus, Virgo, or Capricorn Why? You like your guys to pamper, wine, and dine you Not that you're a gold digger, you just like the finer things An Earth Sign will go all out to woo you - and enjoy doing it And you'll never find a more trustworthy or loyal match!

What Sign Should You Date?


Another blurb about Aquarians:

"To some degree, every Aquarius must walk the journey to authenticity and that decision can mark him with a feeling of being very different or alienated from the mainstream. But making the decision to be different is a defining moment in Aquarius' life, truly a heroic one."

Interesting. I like the idea of this, but I don't know if it's just plain hubris to think it applies to my own life yet. I have started the journey in some ways (leaving a hellish career, for example, instead making tons of money, which most people I know thought I was insane for doing - not lovely Carlos, though, hooray for a supportive husband) and I sure as heck have lots of ideas of how continue to step away from the mainstream... But it's definitely easier said than done. Funny how everyone else's expectations tend to drag you kicking and screaming back towards normality. I'm trying, hard, to get there, or at least to start getting there, but it's not easy.

And this was meant to be a light-hearted post. Goodness.