I spun this gorgeous Cormo x 3 ply and it seems to be thicker than I thought.  I originally planned to make the Tasha Shawl out of this one, but now I’m thinking it’s too thick for the shawl.  This is on a size 10.5 needle and it’s a struggle to get the stitch off the needle.  I’m re-evaluating my options and going to knit a swatch, but Raveneli has caught my eye and I think I may have enough to make the vest.

Hopefully done soon.

This was going to be a hat for a friends mom, but it got sent to the frog pond.  It’s ok though because I found out her favorite colors and now will re-knit on smaller needles in those colors.  I seem to have quite the stash of cotton.

The combination of knitting cotton in the round seriously throws my gauge off.  Obviously it could fit the Jolly Green Giant. 

Well wouldn’t you know it too itchy for him – poor thing. He can’t help his sensitive skin. At least I found out in the collar. We tested cormo on him – too itchy. Say it ain’t so… he’s so, so sensitive on especially in the neck area,  he’s telling me it has to be cashmerino, which is fine, but there is a boat load of wool in the basement destined to be sweaters. Oh well. Right? Cheer me up folks.

This is the lemons – felted bit. I could barely pull bits apart.

Well at least it appears to be felted and I probably would’ve tossed it into the oops pile if Beverly didn’t say to me in passing, maybe you can put it on your carder?

So this weekend while I was fixing up another pot for her Slytherin colorway, I decided I would give it a go, what the heck – there is nothing to loose right. Well to my surprise lemons to lemonade… whohoo!

This is the new dye pot full and I did a hot pour method this time – so the colors strike quicker and are more distinct and vibrant.

It’s still not quite dry in this picture, but will be soon.

The specs on this fiber: This is a special blend of 75% Merino 25% mohair that I had specially made at Spinderellas, whom I can whole heartedly recommend as they have done a fabulous job on all my fleeces. I’ve sent them a few lemons over the last few years and they’ve made beautiful lemonade for me.

I got it in my head I was going to do some felted slippers for my husband for Christmas. Well, it sounded really good in theory. There is an awful lot of wool to use in my basement and wet felting seems very fun. I read through several books and decided that yes, wet felting was the way to go. Ok – so I really wanted to do wet felting around a mold, but that seemed rather difficult, so why not just make a few pieces of flat felt cut them out and sew them together. Again – great in theory. Well, after the initial craziness of the wet felting – nearly threw my arm out in the hardening stage and sending into the washer, which I read online you can do – I failed to get to the part where you’re supposed to wrap it in an old sheet to stablize it. Again whoops…I probably should’ve went back to the drawing board. Did that happen, well no. Not even when I did have to make more than a few pieces of felt to get it right, but hey… again thought nothing of it. After the felt was done – I proceeded to cut out and attempt a slipper. The initial results didn’t look so bad, but then when I had him try it on it was a reverse flip-flop. Hmm… that wouldn’t work. So I tried to take the stitches out and shorten it a bit – but that got even uglier. So now this is what I have and some very lousy cut up felt I made… oh yeah and a decent laugh. However, felt I’m not done with you… back to the drawing board on this one and more practice in wet felting.

So that’s my tale this fine Christmas Eve… I really should stick to knitting and spinning the stuff, but I won’t. I’m hard headed that way. So have a egg nog for me and wish my friend Mishap well on his way home… hopefully I won’t see him again for a long while, but you never know. Stay tuned it’s just one fiber adventure after another around here. (lol)

I slid into the booth at our local family diner tonight and must’ve did something just right because they popped out of the bag on the side here

and stabbed me here.

One size 3 US right in the finger. Monsieur Purl was worried and said I may have severed a tendon, but really it was just a flesh wound puncture and since I had my tentous shot in the last 3 years and it didn’t bleed badly, we went on with dinner and headed home. It hasn’t stopped my knitting and spinning – at least for now. I’m going to have to find a patch for that bag.

Now I’m trying to decide which needles to use. Buy more Addi Lace or move off to the Knitpicks. I was using the Addi Lace on the Peacock and noticed the drag. It was nice for lace, but I had to keep seperating my stitches. I can see the good and bad in that. At SnB last week I had a good look at the Addi set and I don’t know, the join seems pretty smooth to me when I ran my nail over it. I’m tempted, very tempted. I would need 2 more addi lace for at least $35 with tax. Now that is about 1/2 the price of the whole set of the Knit Picks. Hmmm.. more to think on while the kit gets here.

Since I frogged the lace, I started back on the sweater. I have knit part of one sleeve. I’m going to have a lot of joins as I’m attempting to keep the colors matching up to at least the elbow. The sleeve will be bell like still, just not quite as long so that I don’t look frumpy, since I’m so short.

Unfortunately while I’m classifying this under mishaps, I’m not really counting it as real mishap though because I like it and it looks nice. I was about 3 inches away from finishing the cuff when I saw it. If you notice… I can’t seem to read far enough in the directions and just knit the back in plain stockinette instead of continuing the pattern.

Whoops. Fits great though.