Many Happy Returns

Bet most of my (three?  four?) blog readers don’t know that MOI really stands for My Own Igloo.  And here, a toast to my favorite (*cough* only) Comment-er:

THANKS!!

I’ve solved the striped sweater problem from a few posts ago. I decided to knit the sweater in just one of the colors of yarn, and chose Custard:

Anne, the owner of my favorite LYS, the Hillsborough Yarn Shop graciously allowed me to exchange the unopened balls of yarn for enough to make the sweater in one color.  Onward!

I’m about ready to send my July package to my yarn swap pal.  I’ve really lucked out in that I expect to meet both of my yarn swap partners in person.  I’ll keep you posted.

More on the trip to Bellingham.
First, without getting too dramatic, it was a much-needed visit. Our family Christmas was – not so good. Since then, I’ve thought/read a lot about the adjustments and changes required on all sides, if parents and adult children are to have a good relationship. It was delightful to find her more grown up on this visit! A nice, *appropriate* boyfriend, working hard, hanging with friends, healthy and happy.
Here are a few
Pictures of Nora and her new beau and her/my new matching tattoos!

While I was there I offered to buy her some yarn, since we both knit. She didn’t want any, saying “I’m not going to be done the scarf for Josh for awhile, and I don’t know what I’ll be in the mood to knit then.” Well, of course. She “likes to knit one thing at a time.” This has given me more to reflect on . . . why do I acquire so much yarn just because I like it, with no actual plan for what I might do with one or two skeins of this or that?
Thoughts?

I had a wonderful time out west, found something for my yarn swap partner, walked miles and miles, knitted several miles, drank gallons of fancy coffee, bought a book of lace knitting patterns, and bonded anew with my daughter.  We even got matching mother-daughter tattoos!

1. Baby Sweater – all the pieces are finished.  I’ve decided to wait until the next time I’m at my LYS on a Sunday before I sew the pieces together.  I made this as part of a class and, even though I fell hopelessly behind the official schedule, I’m hoping the teacher (who works there on Sundays) will kindly advise me on the finishing.

2. Striped Lousia Harding sweater – Stripes?? WHAT WAS I THINKING?? But, I’ve spent a lot on the yarn in four different colors . . . I’ve started it, but to my eye the “carrying the yarn up the side till the next time you use it” looks ragged.  What to do?
Should I  –
a. Ditch the whole thing and not throw good time/money after bad?
b. Carry on and see how it looks after six inches?
c. Frog the two inches I’ve done so far and start over, this time being more careful about the carrying?
The yarns are pretty, the colors are pretty, I just don’t usually wear stripes . . . something came over me in the yarn store, like maybe if I bought this I’d become the kind of person who is on a sailboat, blonde hair blowing in the wind, pastel striped sweater gracefully over my shoulders . . . except I’ve never had blonde hair, get seasick on boats, and don’t wear pastels or stripes.  I don’t know.  Is it stubborn to continue, wasteful to abandon it, or too soon to tell?

3. Nora’s socks.  I’m taking them on the plane and won’t leave Bellingham till they’re done!

Hey!  The list of UFO’s is shrinking!  Maybe I’m forgetting something . . .

Just in time for a trip out west, a finished object.  Photos to follow . . .

My Yarn Swap secret spoiler was so attentive to my answers to the questions that everything was perfect!  I gave my camera to my son for the summer, so imagine photos of two summer tank tops, a (very silly) magazine that I’d confessed to liking, yarn, knitting needles, candle, sachets, a pretty card, and even bubble bath!!

Christmas in July!

I’ve now finished all the big pieces of the baby sweater. This weekend I’m going to block the sleeve pieces and then — finally! – I can start putting it together.

In the meantime, a scarf snuck in line ahead of everything else. I’m not sure how it did this, but I’ll post photos as soon as I once again have a computer at home.

Just in case anyone is interested —

My Website

My Other Blog

I’ve gotten my Secret Summer of Love Yarn Swap Pal. Now I get to secretly spoil this person with yarn and other goodies over the summer. Someone else will secretly spoil me by sending yarn.
There is one thing that is so improbable it reminds me of the scene in Casablanca where Bogart wonders how, “of all the gin joints in the world” Bergman ended up at Rick’s.

Of all the small towns in the world, my secret pal and I are from the same one. What are the chances of two people from Pottstown, PA being randomly matched in an international yarn swap?

So – in order to upload photos to Ravelry, do the pictures first have to be uploaded to Flickr? I just upgraded my Flickr, so here’s hoping it turns out to be a fun photo experience.

Comments welcome.   About knitting, cats, or anything at all.

13. Do you collect anything?
You mean besides yarn? No, but I could start – what’s a good thing to collect?  next day: wait!  I do collect a few things.  I collect Laurel Burch cat things, and pottery, and baskets.  I didn’t realize they were “collections” until I looked around my house.

14. Do you have a yarn winder and/or swift?
No, no I don’t.

15. Do you love sweets? What are your favorites?
I can’t eat sweets, or really any carbohydrates. It’s okay though, by following a strict diet and walking around my neighborhood I’ve successfully lost 65 pounds and lowered my blood sugar from 500 to normal.

16. What are your favorite scents?
What a great question!! I like the smells of gardenia, grapefruit, lemon, patchouli, rose, honey, olive oil, and cats sleeping in the sun.

17. Where do you keep your needles/hooks?
I have most of my circulars in a bulgingly overflowing needle holder, and then a few straight needles are in a mug.

18. Do you have a wishlist (Amazon, Etsy, etc?)
I wish for world peace. More on this later.  Later: I wish for shirts that fit.  I’ve dropped from a size 18 to 10, and I’m going broke replacing my entire wardrobe.  I have basic neutral stuff, but no bright summery tees or other shirts – my heart cries out for red! orange! hotmama colors!

19. Having a birthday this summer?
Not till September.

20. Are you allergic to anything??? Please let your pal know!
codeine, asprin, tequila, and rudeness.

9.   What is your oldest UFO?
A pair of socks that I started over a year ago.
10.  Are there any techniques that you want to learn?
Lace!!
11.  Are you on Ravlery? What’s your ID?
My Ravelry name is Tamsie
12.  Are you a sock knitter? What are your foot measurements?
That depends on the meaning of “are.”  I “am” a sock knitter, in the sense that I have about ten balls of sock yarn and have started no fewer than four pairs of socks.  Two were abandoned (temporarily!!) when I discovered how much I preferred Magic Loop to dpns.  One was abandoned to start a pair for my daughter.  And the fourth pair may actually get done this summer – I’m almost done the first sock and it looks extremely socklike!
So, yeah goshdarnit, I’m a sock knitter.  I just haven’t technically finished any socks yet . . .

My foot measurements?  I’ll get back to you on that.  I wear a size nine and a half, and I have “duck feet” – narrow heels and wide in the front.  Numbers to follow.

9.   What is your oldest UFO?
A pair of socks that I started over a year ago.
10.  Are there any techniques that you want to learn?
Lace!!
11.  Are you on Ravlery? What’s your ID?
My Ravelry name is Tamsie
12.  Are you a sock knitter? What are your foot measurements?
That depends on the meaning of “are.”  I “am” a sock knitter, in the sense that I have about ten balls of sock yarn and have started no fewer than four pairs of socks.  Two were abandoned (temporarily!!) when I discovered how much I preferred Magic Loop to dpns.  One was abandoned to start a pair for my daughter.  And the fourth pair may actually get done this summer – I’m almost done the first sock and it looks extremely socklike!
So, yeah goshdarnit, I’m a sock knitter.  I just haven’t technically finished any socks yet . . .

My foot measurements?  I’ll get back to you on that.  I wear a size nine and a half, and I have “duck feet” – narrow heels and wide in the front.  Numbers to follow.

5.   Are there any yarns/brands that you are dying to work with but never have?
Not that I’ve identified – I’ll think about it.

6.  What is/are your favorite types of projects to knit/crochet?
Sweaters, lace bookmarks, hats, scarves, socks – okay, anything that is the right level of challenge and is made with pretty yarn.

7.  What are you currently working on? Anything you plan to work on this summer?
Glad you asked! I’m just finishing a baby sweater. On the list for this summer are: finishing my first pair of socks, a sweater for ME!, and if I work up the nerve a gorgeous lace shawl.

8.  What is your favorite FO? (Post a pic if you would like.)
I’ve posted photos of the recent FO’s on this blog. I like the hat because my son picked out those colors and because it looks just like the picture in the book. I like the grey scarf because I actually finished all those little cables. I like the Noro scarves because (even though it’s scratchy) that Noro yarn is so pretty.

1. Do you knit or crochet? How long have you been at your craft?
I knit. I’d like to learn crocheting well enough to add crochet edgings to things. I was taught to knit by my “Aunt” Gudrun. She grew up in Germany, and she & her husband and kids were like our ‘other family’ when I was a kid. I was maybe ten years old when I first learned to knit.

2. Do you spin? What type of spinning?
Nope, I’ve never spun. My mom once spun some yarn out of wool from our very own sheep, which I considered a pretty neat trick!

3. What are your favorite yarns/fibers? What are your least favorite yarns/fibers?

My favorite yarns – natural fibers that are soft or shiny, a little stretchy, fat or thin, and definitely soft.

Lovely yarns I can hardly every afford include

* alpaca, softer-than-soft merino, cashmere (who doesn’t?), bamboo, and soft blends of silk and another soft yarn, like bamboo, cashmere, alpaca, or supersoft merino.
* sock yarns in gorgeous colors
* Yarn that is sleek and shiny and therefore shows off cables nicely.
* My favorite weights are Lace weight, DK, and Worsted weight.

I don’t knit with super-chunky yarn.
* I like Glamorous yarns, homebody yarns, big skeins, little skeins, plys from one to a dozen (I don’t actually know what a “ply” is, time to look that up.)

Note to self: Think more seriously about this “favorite yarn” business, because “all of them” isn’t a very good answer.

Yarns I don’t like are – anything the least wee bit scratchy; yarns with a more than 40% synthetic fiber; and yarns that look like they’d be a big hit with a 4 year old girl in that purple-magenta-sequin-my-little-pony phase.

Y’know what? Every one of these “rules” that I write, I can think of a dozen exceptions, some of which are in the other room. I guess I just like yarn that’s “pretty” and “soft.”

4. What are your favorite colors? What are your least favorite colors?

Like most people, my favorite colors are the ones I look good in! Many years ago, my sister-in-law insisted that I “have my colors done” and I learned that I’m an “autumn.” I have brown hair and eyes, and pale skin with a few freckles. I’m in my 50’s, so pale colors wash me out and super-dark colors sometimes also wash me out.
It’s almost supper time and I keep thinking of food colors. I like lettuce green, blue-green turquoise, creamy yellow, tomato red, brown, mocha, chocolate, oyster, tangerine, sunny yellow, aubergine (brownish burgundy), eggplant, periwinkle, teal and forest green and olive green but only if they’re pretty and not drab, coral, peach, bright cream, wheat, and mixtures of colors. I like self-striping sock yarn better than color-pooling yarn.
The colors I never ever look good in and don’t like are:
white, black, navy, grey, pink, mauve, kelly green, royal blue, baby blue, bright blue turquoise, grapey purple, and anything too bright and neon, too drab and muddy, or otherwise un-pretty.

I’ve joined my first Official Yarn Swap. The first step is for me to answer these questions, so that my Top Secret New Best Friend can find out a little about me and my knitting habits. Here are the questions – I’ll post answers later tonight!

Oh, here’s a link to the swap, if anyone is interested:

Summer of Love Yarn Swap

The Questions –

1. Do you knit or crochet? How long have you been at your craft?
2. Do you spin? What type of spinning?
3. What are your favorite yarns/fibers? What are your least favorite yarns/fibers?
4. What are your favorite colors? What are your least favorite colors?
5. Are there any yarns/brands that you are dying to work with but never have?
6. What is/are your favorite types of projects to knit/crochet?
7. What are you currently working on? Anything you plan to work on this summer?
8. What is your favorite FO? (Post a pic if you would like.)
9. What is your oldest UFO?
10. Are there any techniques that you want to learn?
11. Are you on Ravlery? What’s your ID?
12. Are you a sock knitter? What are your foot measurements?
13. Do you collect anything?
14. Do you have a yarn winder and/or swift?
15. Do you love sweets? What are your favorites?
16. What are your favorite scents?
17. Where do you keep your needles/hooks?
18. Do you have a wishlist (Amazon, Etsy, etc?)
19. Having a birthday this summer?
20. Are you allergic to anything??? Please let your pal know!

Dream Vacation!

This is the coolest thing since the other side of the pillow –