Tonight's the Night

Last night I was once again thwarted in my attempts to finish my sweater by a nonsleeping toddler, but I can say with all certainty that it will be finished tonight. I managed to squeeze in some time on it this morning while I finished my tea and now have just half a row to finish binding off.

Once the binding off is finished, all that's left to do is weave in three ends and sew on six buttons. I predict that it will take me no more than about 45 minutes, which means there should still be time to pop it in the tub to block tonight. Hooray!

All but Bands

I am so close to a finished sweater I can taste it.

The Mister is traveling for work for a couple of days, so my knitting time in the evening is determined strictly by when Rainbow falls asleep (because most nights I have to sit with her until she does). On Sunday, she passed out at 8 on the dot, which was perfect because it allowed me to see the Call the Midwife finale in real time and get in a solid two hours of knitting. Last night, however, she tossed and turned until 9, which meant I didn't make as much progress as I'd hoped. Still, I'm in a good place. I bound off the neckline, grafted the underarms, and wove in all the ends except for the one from the neck (which I'll bury in the button band on that side). Before shoving it in its project bag for the night, I tried it on, and it looks like it'll fit perfectly once it's blocked. Given that my gauge was off and I knit a smaller size to compensate, that's a big relief.

Tonight, the mission is to finish at least one button band. If she cooperates and goes to sleep earlier than last night, I might even get started on the second. If all goes well, I could have a finished sweater by tomorrow night, which would be just fabulous.

I'm also making some steady progress on my socks. I finished the heel turn and short-row section at lunch yesterday and am cruising down through the foot.

I'm anxious to get this one done not because I want to wear it (it feels like the middle of July here right now!) but because I have a sock design idea percolating and I want to get to swatching. And it goes without saying that I'd like to knit something in a color that isn't green for a change!

A Return

I've been very diligent about working on my Mad May Sweater, but now that the end is in sight (I should finish this week), I thought it was permissible to take some time to do a little spinning. I've been staring longingly at my wheel for much of the week, so it was a real treat to get back to it. My in-laws came over earlier this afternoon to see Rainbow and took her to the playground for a while, so I was able to finish up the third bobbin of singles for my cabled yarn.

Although I'm still enjoying the experience of spinning this fiber (Crown Mountain Farms Corriedale pencil roving), I'm really ready for a new color. Once I finish up the fourth bobbin of this, I'll have spun 8 ounces of this colorway -- and I suppose it doesn't help that the socks I'm knitting are out of the yarn spun from the first half of the fiber.

Because I don't have a whole lot of spinning to share with you today, I thought I'd share my most recent stash acquisitions. I think I mentioned last week that I signed up for the Through the Loops mystery shawl, so my task when I was at my LYS yesterday was to find appropriate yarn. I needed sport weight in three colors, and I knew I wanted a solid or a nearly solid. I finally settled on this Louet Gems.

I picked (in order, from left to right) Caribbean Blue, Pewter, and Linen Gray. These are colors I wear on a regular basis, so the finished shawl should coordinate well with my wardrobe.

I also picked up this beauty:

This is Done Roving Yarns' Frolicking Feet in the colorway Cloverleaf. This 100% superwash merino is new to my LYS. I managed to resist it for several weeks but couldn't turn away from its siren song any longer. I'll be using this for a lace shawlette -- hopefully the one I started designing in my Kirsten Kapur class from about a month ago.

The week ahead looks to be even crazier than the last, but I am pushing on with my sweater as I must finish it before the end of the month. Keep your fingers crossed that I pick up some speed and have a finished item to show you before this time next week!

Slogging

I had thought that once I got the sleeves and body of my Mad May sweater joined together it would go a lot faster, but it appears I was kidding myself. When you have rows that are nearly 300 stitches long, they take a while. I have been working on the yoke all week (I joined the pieces on Monday night) and now have the rest of the current row and one wrong side row to do before I can actually start the cable pattern.

I think that once I do start the cabling, things will go a little faster -- both because there are decreases in the pattern and because working cables serves as a great motivation to do "just one more row." There are 29 rows in the chart and then about six rows of garter stitch at the very top. I'm hoping that I can get all that done this weekend so that all that will be left to do is the button bands (and weaving in a whole lot of ends, but that's inevitable). Ideally, I'd like to have this off the needles sometime next week. I've signed up for this year's Through the Loops mystery shawl, and as the first clue is sent out June 1, I'd like to clear off some space in my WIPs before then. (I also need to do some stash digging and/or yarn shopping, but that will be a discussion for another day.)

My sock is moving somewhat slowly as well, as I've only been working on it for about 40 minutes each day during my lunch break. I finished the cuff -- with some mock cable twists in it so I can tell it apart from the other sock -- earlier in the week and have been doing nothing but plain stockinette since. I'm finding the fabric in this sock to be curiously lighter than the other, and I'm wondering if it's because of the opposing ply in the yarn or if I just happened to get the lighter spots in the fiber more in this section of yarn. The striping pattern that happened in the first sock is happening in this one, too, but it's a lot more subtle.

On top of all this, I've really been itching to sit at my wheel and get the rest of my singles done for my cabled yarn, but I've been focusing too much on my sweater. Perhaps I will sneak in some time this weekend -- after the craziness of last weekend and the running around I've been doing this week, I really need that meditative time.

The Time Trap

I know it may seem like I've fallen off the face of the earth, but let me assure you I have not. I've just been insanely busy, and life has kept me away from my knitting, my spinning, and my blog.

My brother (I nearly typed "baby brother," but I don't think I can call him that anymore) graduated from law school on Friday. Several relatives came in from out of town for the event, including an aunt and uncle who I haven't seen in about two and a half years, so much of our time this weekend was spent with family. We had a big family dinner on Friday night that kept us all up late -- and that meant Rainbow was up super early on Saturday morning (for some reason, if she goes to bed late, she gets up early). After a family brunch, she lost her cool and actually took a nap, which gave me just enough time to run to Target for some needed stuff and get back just as her new bedroom furniture was being delivered. By the time we got her bed made and had transferred her needed items to the new room, it was time to get her dinner. Then her babysitter arrived and we left for another family dinner, from which we didn't return until after 10. Then, yesterday, we had both our families over for a Mother's Day lunch.

Between all the visiting and eating (plus the usual cleaning and errands that have to be done over the weekend), I hardly touched my needles and only glanced at my wheel all weekend. I started the second sleeve of my Mad May sweater on Saturday night and got the cuff and about eight rows beyond that done by bedtime. Yesterday afternoon, the Mister very nicely allowed me to have some time to myself, so I was able to catch up on the DVR and get a good portion of sleeve done. By the time I had to put it down for the night, I had only 20 rounds left to do. That means tonight (provided a certain toddler goes to sleep easily), I will be able to start the yoke!

I did take my sock bag with me in the car over the weekend, and as a result I was able to finish the first of the pair. This is the one knit from the traditional three ply, and it's a plain vanilla sock with the exception of the heel. I'm not sure what this heel is called (it may be a Cat Bordhi sock architecture), but basically I worked the heel flap and gusset simultaneously while continuing to work in the round and then worked a flap back and forth on the bottom of the heel. I figured that because the socks I've been wearing out have all developed holes in the heel area, a little bit of extra reinforcement is not a bad idea.

While I was at it, I cast on for the second sock and did a little bit of the cuff. I'm doing some mock cable twists in the ribbing so that I can easily tell the two socks apart; otherwise, they'll be identical. I had a fair amount of yarn leftover from the first sock, so I'm hopeful that the yardage I have for sock #2 is sufficient. If not, I can always use the leftovers for the toe.

I'm hoping that I can have both of these projects done before the end of the month, though things in the next two weeks are likely to be just as busy. I just have to remind myself that knitting is my stress relief, so sometimes I need to do it to keep myself sane!

Color Matching

Over the weekend, I came to a realization about my knitting. Though it was unintentional, it seems I have been color-coordinating all my projects. If you recall, the last two things off the needles (my Vitamin D and my Rubus suberectus Socks) were both gray. Now, it seems, everything must be green.

For starters, there's my Mad May sweater -- Alana Dakos's Gnarled Oak Cardigan -- which I'm knitting in tosh DK in Forestry, a deep, glowing green with a hint of blue.

I made very good progress on this over the weekend, as I was able to work on it in the car and in the hotel room both Friday and Saturday evening. I finished the body on Monday and started on the first sleeve, which is moving along a little slower than I was expecting (but I guess having two skeins of yarn attached and having to move them around regularly does slow one down).

Then, there are the socks, which are being knit out of my own handspun -- also in shades of green.

These saw some action over the weekend as well (I took them to the festival to work on while waiting in line or sitting and taking a break). I turned the heel on Saturday evening and now they are well on their way down the foot. I expect I'll have the first sock finished soon.

As if that wasn't enough green, there's my spinning.

If this looks familiar, it's because I'm spinning up the rest of the fiber that I used for the sock yarn. It's Corriedale pencil roving from Crown Mountain Farms in the colorway Eire. This batch is being spun into a 2x2 cabled yarn; this bobbin is number three of four, each holding about an ounce of fiber.

So it seems spring has arrived everywhere, even in my yarn and fiber choices. I wonder what next month's color theme will be!

MDSW 2013: The Wrap-up

The festival this year was, in a word, fantastic. The weather was absolutely perfect -- sunny, clear skies, low humidity, and even cool enough to wear a shawl and be completely comfortable. We got to the fairgrounds at about 8:25 and headed right to the main exhibition hall, where most of the vendors we wanted to visit were located. The lines were rather unbelievable at some vendors, but throughout the course of the day, we were able to stop at every booth on our list, I think. We went back for just a bit on Sunday morning to stop at a few booths that were much too crowded all day on Saturday before we headed home.

But enough about our schedule. You want to see the haul, right?

I had a list of several things I was looking for and managed to find all of them. Chief among these was some natural Jacob fiber (already washed and processed, as I'm still working through last year's fleeces). I found an 8 oz. bundle of two shades of fiber at one of the Jacob-specific vendors:

This actually looks to be two strips held together, so I can spin them separately or ply them together as I wish.

I was also hoping to get another Into the Whirled batt and got there early enough on Saturday to snag one of the Firefly-themed batts. This is Falkland in a colorway called Captain Tightpants.

The colors are a little more vibrant in real life; the sun seems to have washed them out a bit.

I had to head back to one of my favorite fiber vendors, Gale's Art. Her colors are always pretty, her prep is always excellent, and her prices are always a good value. Her booth was calm enough when we got there that we were able to chat with her (and I showed her a picture of my Velvet Elvis from last year, which she told me I had to knit up and bring next year to show her!). This year, I bought two braids of fiber from her. The first was 4 oz. of BFL in bright, cheerful colors (the colorway is called Crayon Box) that will be spun and knit into a hat for Rainbow:

Then, for me, I found 4 oz. of 85% Polwarth/15% silk in a colorway called Winter Is Coming (I've only seen one season of Game of Thrones, but it's enough to get the reference):

Usually MDSW for me is about buying fiber, but this year I did have some yarn on my list and was able to find exactly what I wanted. I braved the enormous crowd at Miss Babs for some of her Yowza -- Whatta Skein! in Indigo Bunting. This will become a Cabletta Cardigan.

My one other yarn purchase was a bit of an impulse buy. I happened to walk by the Fold's booth and it was not at all crowded, so I picked up this skein of Socks That Rock lightweight in Twitterpated (I felt the need for some superbright socks).

The last thing on my list was a gradient braid of fiber from Fiber Optic, because last year the booth was too packed to get in. I scored this 80% merino/20% silk braid in Thunder & Lightning.

My only other fiber purchase was not planned. When we went back on Sunday, we were able to get into the Spirit Trail Fiberworks booth. They're known for their luxury blend yarns, but what I discovered along the floor was a huge bag of natural CVM fiber. I'd loved spinning this breed in the Crown Mountain Farms fiber club last year, so I immediately bought 4 oz. of it in a dark brown.

Finally, the tools. Although I technically didn't have more spindles on the list, I was interested in looking at them and was open to buying more if some called to me and planning to visit the Bosworth and Golding booths. I especially wanted to check out the Spanish Peacock's booth, but the line there was absolutely insane on Saturday, so I didn't get to go look until Sunday morning. Fortunately, there was still some merchandise left (though the proprietors told us that there was one woman there the previous day who'd bought 14 spindles!). I came home with two:

On the right is a Bosworth Mini with a Bloodwood whorl; it's 26 g/0.91 oz. and will be perfect for spinning laceweight spindles. On the left is a Spanish Peacock Russian in Bolivian rosewood that weighs 32 g -- my first support spindle! I even got a quick spinning lesson from the owner's wife (something that couldn't have happened if I'd tried to fight my way in on Saturday). I'm very excited about expanding my spinning repertoire and hope to at least get proficient in support spindling during the Tour de Fleece.

So there you have it. I'm taking the day off from work to recover from a whirlwind weekend and do some knitting and spinning before I have to back to the craziness of my day job. I'm doing my best to remember how relaxed I was all weekend and trying not to think about what'll be waiting for me tomorrow morning!