Today there has not been any knitting as of yet. There will be. I just have some more minor chores to take care of such as blogging this on time and filling the dishwasher and moving the laundry along. (Ok, we have an extra hour today....why does it feel like I've lost about 6 hours?!)
This morning at the start of breakfast the power went out, which lead us to leave the house for sustanance. We live in an area of "unimportance" when it comes to restoring power if there is a large outage, so it could have been out for hours. After breakfast we went to our favorite used book store. They were having a 30% off sale and I behaved really well. I only picked out ONE book. Don was lucky and found a few he wanted. Usually he has to leave emptly handed and I'm loaded down with books, so this trip was better for him. I was looking for a specific diet book that they did not have this time, so I ended up in the craft area as usual. I'm always looking for something useful there and today I found a whopper of a useful book. I think I've already admitted that I'm fighting the weaving bug. I know so little about weaving that it's helping me not get involved actually. lol. Anyway, I'm determined not to get "into" weaving without knowing what I want to end up with and what I need to get there. This is a totally new way for me to approach any craft....so I'm not sure how it's going to work out. lol. The book I found was Weaving. A Handbook for Fiber Craftsmen- by Shirley E Held. This book holds so much information and covers so many things touching on the history of weaving right on over to spinning, dying of yarn, ect. After I'm done reading it, I'll offer up a review and let you know if it was any help. I'm hoping it will answer some of my questions about weaving so that I can talk myself out of another rewarding craft.
I have been knitting this week and completed the Felted Fuzzy Slippers. This is what they looked like before felting. I laid a previously knitted sock (that fits perfectly!) on top of the slipper sock just to give you an idea how ridiculously large the slipper is before felting. I looked at that and thought there was NO WAY this was going to felt down to the size of my feet!
I've never felted anything before (I know...I've said it a hundred times!) so whilst they were in the the washer I used the timer and checked them every 3 minutes as suggested in the pattern. I'm pretty sure she meant that figuratively...but with the way things have been working for me lately......I wasn't taking any chances! So as the first 4 or 5 inspections showed no change in size of the slippers, I was pretty sure that I goofed in some spectacular way. However the next time I checked them they were suddenly smaller.....then the next time they were a more realistic size....then finally they looked done. To be honest with you...they need a bit more felting. I managed to increase the number of stitches in the slipper that's now the right foot and it's a tad looser than the left foot. Both need a bit of shrinkage...one needs more than the other. I'm terribly pleased with them though and they are toasty warm... but not too much so. ( I was worried about them being too hot. Not a problem at all.) I am going to use puffy fabric paint to put some grip on them though as they are a bit slippery on the lino.The pattern for the Felted Clog slippers arrived on Saturday in the mail and now I can figure out how much yarn I need to finish spinning for Melissa's slippers. Don's undecided on which he wants so he's waiting to see the felted clog ones first. I will, of course, have to make me a pair first to test the pattern out. (insert evil laugh... mwahahahahah!)
In the mean time....I've decided I really need this sweater. Sorry for the poor quality pic...but I only had the black and white photocopy to scan in to show you. As you can see it's a zipper front hooded sweater in the most basic of stitches. I saw this completed on the lady that shared the pattern with me and it was all I could do not to take the sweater off her! This looks so comfortable! The great part is that it's mostly basic knit or purl stitches and I'm pretty confident I can actually knit it. It's the largest project in knitting I've ever taken on, so we'll see if I have the stamina or not. It may end up in the UFO pile with the others...but I kinda doubt it. See, I can't wait to wear this thing! And the yarn I picked is so very soft. I chose the Lion Brand Homespun in #302 Colonial. I know, I know, it's acrylic and polyester....but still....it's beautiful, soft (unbelieveably soft) and more important....if I need to wash this baby every night so I can wear it again the next day...NOT A PROBLEM! I plan on wearing this at work and work is a very dirty place most the time so that was a huge factor in the yarn choice.
Abbie decided to help me take the pictures of the newly started sweater today. She normally stays away from the action but today could not help herself. We installed a new lamp last night and the "natural light" bulb really makes a difference. (She really is as soft and silky as she looks.) Don calls it Abbies tanning lamp as she loves to lay under it and soak up the heat.
Here is the start of the new sweater. It doesn't look like much but I just started it on Thursday. This is the back piece with the ribbing completed and working my way up the back. I am adjusting to working with metal straight needles again after using bamboo circulars for the slippers. I'm thinking I'll end up on a circular on this before too long as the weight of this is going to probably be too much for me to handle. We'll see though as I may be suprised by it.Ok, I'm off to complete the earlier stated chores so I can knit. This hour and a half of blogging is silly...aargh! I still need to post to the SSK group too!. lol I WILL KNIT TONIGHT!
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