Thank God for Cropping!

I know, you all didn’t actually believe that my brain melted. Or that I drooled unattractively on the couch for two days straight.

Well, I have photographic PROOF.

Well, fine, I told Kevin to take a picture of me pretending to be passed out on the couch. But, he had far too much fun spilling yarn all over me. No wonder he’s always eyeing the stash closet. Oh, and that T-shirt? Totally stolen from Kevin. His brother gave it to him as a Christmas present, and like all his t-shirts, I nicked it.

On to the spoils! I really did spend far too much money this year. That problem with Americans spending more than they save? I totally made the problem worse this year. Sorry about that.

Jo Sharp DK from Webs.   Two bags full.  It was 28.00 a bag, how could one resist?  The color is Viola	I got this kit from Cheryl Oberle’s booth - its the Celtic Roses cardigan.   I tried it on, and it looks really good on me.  Yes, that’s my excuse.

This is some lovely lovely Kid Mohair laceweight yarn from Brooks Fiber Farm.   It was even on sale!	I also endedup with 20, 25 gram balls of Jamieson DK in Coffee.   It was on sale!  Very big sale!  I couldn’t resist!

I also took classes.

On the left is the sampler shawl I created for my Estonian Lace class, which was taught by Nancy Bush. Estonian Lace, as a tradition, is actually only about 150 years old. It probably started after the local women saw the Russian shawls that the tourists were wearing, and they set out to copy them in an attempt to make a little extra money. Estonian lace is generally worked on a Stockinette ground, and has “nups” - those are the big ball like things in the middle of my sampler. I suppose you could call them bobbles, but they aren’t really the same.

On the right is one of the wristers from my Latvian Wristers class taught by Beth Brown-Reinsel. Latvian Wristers don’t actually exist - they actually make mittens. But, it’d be hard to do a whole mitten in 3 hours. We got to learn how to make braids and how to work three colors in a row. I personally discovered that working with double points is much easier if you are using short double points. At least, there is much less risk of injury.

Both classes were very good, and I had a ball on Sunday morning. I’d take a class from either of them again.

Finally, I have a work in progress to show you. I actually ended up buying 3 skeins of Brooks Fiber Farm “Four Play”, which is a 50% wool/50% silk mix in order to make the Corset Tank Pullover by Annie Modesitt. I picked one skein of mostly solid dark blue, and two skeins of a great variegated blue/brown color. And, Sunday afternoon, I set right to work.

One problem with using a variegated yarn - you can’t see the delicate twisted stitches on the body. Also, I’m getting a bit of flashing despite alternating balls of yarn. But I’ve decided to embrace the flashing. It’ll be fine. I’m actually almost done with the waist and ready to start the hip shaping. I am the most short waisted person ever, I swear. It’s also a good thing that this baby stretches - the wool is springing the ribbing right back up.

Also, I’m going to be adding sleeves. Annie’s instructions say to loosely cast off at the sleeve openings and then cast back on, but I’m feeling all daring. So I put the top stitches on some cotton yarn, and then used a provisional cast on for the bottom stitches.