An Unexpected Development

The long holiday weekend that has just passed was a good one, filled with a lot of crafting time and an exciting development in my plans for the fall. I'll get to that in a minute, but first I have an FO!

I finished up these quick socks for Rainbow on Sunday evening and left them by her bedside so she would see them when she woke up on Monday. I was very pleased to find that she had put them on almost as soon as she got up -- clearly she likes them! I used the Fish Lips Kiss Heel pattern and worked them toe up using the foot template process described in the pattern. I did make them a little bit big (maybe a quarter of an inch longer than her actual foot length) so that she won't outgrow them too quickly; she's planning to wear them mainly around the house, so a bit of room isn't an issue. The yarn is the My First Regia that I picked up when we were on vacation last month, and I used US 1/2.25 mm needles. Amazingly, Rainbow's feet are only an inch less in circumference than mine and only two inches shorter in length, so it almost felt like I was knitting socks for me! I'm usually not a fan of toe-up socks, but it worked well in this case to use up almost every bit of the yarn. I ended up with about 2 g left from both of the original skeins, and it felt good to be so efficient without playing yarn chicken. I didn't do anything special to get the colors to end up like they did -- I just started with the yarn on the outside of the ball regardless of where it fell in the color sequence -- but I'm tickled that the two socks ended up like complete opposites.

Though I spent a lot of the holiday weekend spinning, I did take the opportunity to cast on a new project. And I've got a deadline for that project. Why? Because, dear readers, I AM GOING TO RHINEBECK! Attending the New York Sheep and Wool Festival has long been on my knitting bucket list, and I honestly thought it would likely be several years before it was a possibility. But on Saturday evening I got a text from Amy at the Ross Farm asking me if there was any way she could convince me to come with her and Scooter Pie to the festival and help out in their booth. Honestly, it didn't take much convincing! As soon as I knew it would work as far as my family's calendar and my available time off from work, I was in! But of course going to Rhinebeck means that I really must take part in the annual Rhinebeck tradition: knitting a Rhinebeck sweater. I started mine last night.

The pattern I'm knitting is Copperplate by Elizabeth Doherty, for which I'd swatched (and gotten gauge) months ago but never gotten around to casting on. To give you a sense of how long I've been planning this sweater, I bought the yarn at my former LYS, Natural Stitches, long before they announced they were closing but when I found out they were no longer going to be carrying that particular vendor. The yarn is Yarn Hollow Tango, an absolutely luminous blend of Polwarth and silk, in a deep red shade called Garnet. As you can see, I haven't done that much yet, but that's mainly because I screwed up at the beginning and had to do a do-over pretty much right away (I blame the headache I had last night). I'm sure this small piece will be growing much more quickly now that I've read the pattern correctly and know what I'm doing, and the deadline to get it done is surely going to keep me on track.

I unconsciously made a smiley face with my yarn and sweater!

I'm very excited about my first Rhinebeck, though I'm sure I'll be just as overwhelmed as I was for my first Maryland (this time I'll know to bring extra allergy meds just in case my body decides to have the same reaction as well). If you're a Rhinebeck veteran, please feel free to share any bits of wisdom you'd like with this newbie!