A Whole Bunch of Bag

It is sad to me that this will felt down to just about 14" tall, but it was still a pretty quick knit. Just the strap left to go!

Knitting Machine

No, I don't own a knitting machine, but I feel like one when I'm getting ready for craft fairs. This weekend, I finished five hats:


All of them are wool-blends and chunky: Paton's Shetland Chunky, Plymouth Encore Chunky, or two strands of Wool-Ease knitted together. I knitted while hanging out at Paula's, and while watching movies. The hat in the middle of the bottom row was finished during Finding Nemo, and the blue/natural striped during Ocean's Eleven. Maybe I'll start naming my finished products after the movies that I watch while completing them.

...Corrientes, Nueve de Julio...

So I went to the Folk Art Studio in Bowie last night with Paula and picked up a bunch of Rio de La Plata yarn. First of all, I think it's cool that the random link above that I found via google lists the yarn's wool content (Material: 100% Uruguayan Wool. Composition: 27 1/2 microns corriedale and 19 1/2 microns merino). Second, it's great to knit with! It's very soft, especially after working almost exclusively with LP Bulky. The colors are nice -- I'm using a variegated, and it created an interesting stripe pattern on the hat that I just finished. Kathy at Folk Art Studio likens it to Manos, but I've never knitted with Manos, so I can't provide reference there, but I do recommend it, for those of you who can get to Bowie or otherwise find it. One skein was 140 yards and $13, which seemed reasonable for a soft, hand-spun, variegated-dye wool.

Oh yeah, and it makes me sing the song "Buenos Aires" from Evita. Hence the title of the post.

time to kill

I'm at work, waiting for an email merge to finish (Word has merged 1099 records so far!) and hoping that typing up an entry doesn't crash the whole system. I've been getting the Blue Screen of Death a lot lately at work, and I don't even have that much of interest on this computer, since it belongs to the school and all.

I missed the knitting meetup last night because a) I'm getting over a cold; b) it was rainy and nasty outside; and c) the West Wing premiere was on. Happily, the show wasn't awful -- I have high hopes that it'll get better before it's taken off the air (which I imagine will be soon) -- season five just wasn't very good, overall, but I will remain optimistic for six.

I am knitting for another craft fair. Sigh. My poor, neglected Top Secret sweater. I've also been doing a little bit of the holiday knitting, but not at the rate that I should. I had a little misadventure in felting the other night. I finished three projects, a hat, a small bag, and a wine tote, all ready for felting. Threw 'em in the washer, and didn't pay enough attention to them, apparently. The hat was supposed to be grown-up sized, and instead may fit a 6 year old, and the wine tote will only hold a bottle of Reisling. I knitted the bag with DK weight and novely yarn held together, and it didn't felt as tightly as I was expecting, so it's a little bigger and floppier than planned. Hm. Hopefully, prospective buyers will like these qualities in my slightly dysfunctional felted items.

I am the only person on livejournal who lists felted knits as an interest.

an update and a quiz

Looks like I'm craft fair knitting again -- I've finished two bags and a hat this week, all of them inspired by tweaking patterns from Felted Knits. A couple more wine cozies and I'll at least feel like I have a bit of inventory. I'm also going to knit and felt a bag to hold my Scrabble tiles for an upcoming Scrabble tournament. I've been longing for a bag with a flat bottom, and it shouldn't take too long. I may even do the drawstring rows in a non-felting wool, so that the bag will close snugly, but we'll see if I get that motivated.


You appear to be a Knitting Guru. You love knitting
and do it all the time. While finishing a piece
is the plan, you still love the process, and
can't imagine a day going by without giving
some time to your yarn. Packing for vacation
involves leaving ample space for the stash and
supplies. It can be hard to tell where the yarn
ends and you begin.


What Kind of Knitter Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

success!

I had a lot of fun at the craft fair, and lots of positive reinforcement for my knitting. I really love it, and definitely knit too much to just gift all of my friends, so making a bit of cash on the side is a welcome opportunity. I think the wheel even managed to pay for itself a bit. We were invited to a gala event in a month or so, and are considering doing it, although I'm not sure how well that'll mesh with holiday knitting. Lots of fast and fluffy scarves in my future, I think, and I want to do some stocking caps.

It's nice to be back on my sweater again. I finished the body while sitting and knitting at the fair, and am working my way up one sleeve, in the round. I cast on 54 stitches, and will decrease down to the called-for 48, because I decided that I wanted bell sleeves. These things are huge. Fun, though, I hope, once they're done.

Off to a conference in Cincinnati tomorrow, which means lots of time to knit in the airport!