I've been busy

I have been trying to finish up some projects before moving into the New Year. This project was put on hold because I was so enthralled with spinning. Now it's done !!!

Luna Moth Shawl

I had so much fun finishing the last shawl, I decided to begin another. This is the Luna Moth Shawl and I'm using some mystery yarn that I got at a second hand store for $1. It's a beautiful pale yellow.

I added multiple pictures, some aren't very "yellow"

My first Shawl: Finally Finished

Bad Knitting Day

Okay, so usually a bad knitting day would consist of "no knitting". Not today.

I'm am so extremely frustrated. I picked out the cutest mitten pattern, did all my research, purchased the yarn, and then started.

The problem? I cannot get DK weight yarn to the gauge recommended with the pattern (27.5 stitches for 4 inches). I even went down to size 2.0mm needles (what a pain) and no way will I ever get this many stitches in 4 inches.

The recommendation for DK weight yarn is 4 inches in 21-24 stitches. This....I can do.

So I looked again at the pattern - there are some discrepancies. She has two gauges listed: 22 stitches in 4" and 27.5 stitches in 4". Not sure why two gauges. I did knit up about 3 inches of the mittens. Boy oh boy are they too large. So at least this was predictable.

To top it all off, the page on Ravelry for this pattern says it used DK weight yarn, and then below it says the gauge of the yarn was fingering weight.

Thanks for listening to my vent. Guess I'll need to find another project for this yarn.

The Big Read - Top 100 Books

Bolded are the ones I've read.

1. The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien
2. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
3. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman
4. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, JK Rowling
6. To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
7. Winnie the Pooh, AA Milne
8. Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell
9. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis
10. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë
11. Catch-22, Joseph Heller
12. Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë
13. Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks
14. Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
15. The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger
16. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame
17. Great Expectations, Charles Dickens
18. Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
19. Captain Corelli's Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres
20. War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy
21. Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell
22. Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone, JK Rowling
23. Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets, JK Rowling
24. Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban, JK Rowling
25. The Hobbit, JRR Tolkien
26. Tess Of The D'Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy (only half was read - bad me!)
27. Middlemarch, George Eliot (only got through the first two chapters)
28. A Prayer For Owen Meany, John Irving
29. The Grapes Of Wrath, John Steinbeck
30. Alice's Adventures In Wonderland, Lewis Carroll
31. The Story Of Tracy Beaker, Jacqueline Wilson
32. One Hundred Years Of Solitude, Gabriel García Márquez
33. The Pillars Of The Earth, Ken Follett
34. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens
35. Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl
36. Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson
37. A Town Like Alice, Nevil Shute
38. Persuasion, Jane Austen
39. Dune, Frank Herbert
40. Emma, Jane Austen
41. Anne Of Green Gables, LM Montgomery
42. Watership Down, Richard Adams
43. The Great Gatsby, F Scott Fitzgerald
44. The Count Of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas
45. Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
46. Animal Farm, George Orwell
47. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
48. Far From The Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy
49. Goodnight Mister Tom, Michelle Magorian
50. The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher
51. The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett
52. Of Mice And Men, John Steinbeck
53. The Stand, Stephen King
54. Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy
55. A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth
56. The BFG, Roald Dahl
57. Swallows And Amazons, Arthur Ransome
58. Black Beauty, Anna Sewell
59. Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer
60. Crime And Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky
61. Noughts And Crosses, Malorie Blackman
62. Memoirs Of A Geisha, Arthur Golden
63. A Tale Of Two Cities, Charles Dickens
64. The Thorn Birds, Colleen McCollough
65. Mort, Terry Pratchett
66. The Magic Faraway Tree, Enid Blyton
67. The Magus, John Fowles
68. Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
69. Guards! Guards!, Terry Pratchett
70. Lord Of The Flies, William Golding
71. Perfume, Patrick Süskind
72. The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, Robert Tressell
73. Night Watch, Terry Pratchett
74. Matilda, Roald Dahl
75. Bridget Jones's Diary, Helen Fielding
76. The Secret History, Donna Tartt
77. The Woman In White, Wilkie Collins
78. Ulysses, James Joyce
79. Bleak House, Charles Dickens
80. Double Act, Jacqueline Wilson
81. The Twits, Roald Dahl
82. I Capture The Castle, Dodie Smith
83. Holes, Louis Sachar
84. Gormenghast, Mervyn Peake
85. The God Of Small Things, Arundhati Roy
86. Vicky Angel, Jacqueline Wilson
87. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
88. Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons
89. Magician, Raymond E Feist
90. On The Road, Jack Kerouac
91. The Godfather, Mario Puzo
92. The Clan Of The Cave Bear, Jean M Auel
93. The Colour Of Magic, Terry Pratchett
94. The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho
95. Katherine, Anya Seton
96. Kane And Abel, Jeffrey Archer
97. Love In The Time Of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez
98. Girls In Love, Jacqueline Wilson
99. The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot
100. Midnight's Children, Salman Rushdie

http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/bigread/top100.shtml

Chat Room

Latest Navajo Ply - Rambouillet

Mystery Yarn/Fiber

Can you guess what fiber this yarn was made from? Click here to find out.

First Lace Project-Finished !!!

Handspun alpaca....became.......This !!

Can you guess what it really is?

This is my new knitting project bag. The top cinches up to keep my yarn from spilling out, there is a small pocket on the back that holds my pattern, and one handle that can hang on my wrist or on my belt. I love the colors and the fact that it sits upright all by itself.

Can you guess it's original use?

I just love it !

My husband calls it the Zebra Gum yarn. I think that's a fitting name. It's about 18 wpi and spun from 100% Merino.

Koolaid Dyeing

My plan is to spin thin and two ply the two colors together into a stripey yarn.

Thuja Sock - One down.....

I'm done with one of the socks from the Thuja Sock pattern. I fell in love with metal dp's during this project. Casting on the second one, later today.

Yummmmmmm

My husband made me cookies this week....