Vacation!

Hello everyone! Today is my first day of vacation! We are heading up to our cottage - and I am declaring July - UFO month. I am going to use this week off to work on all UFO's hanging around this house! That should keep me from buying any yarn this month - I am saving my money for a Road Trip to Lansing with some Michigan Bloggers and Lynne - who will be visiting Michigan! I have some socks from the very first sock class I took - I never finished them - they were not my best effort, which I frogged trying to fix beginner errors that I am going to cast on to knit Grumperina's Jaywalker socks! It is really lovely Mountain Colors Barefoot yarn that deserves to be knit into something lovely - rather than the first try toe up socks that I was learning. Sunshine and knitting sound like a great combination to me - heck, rain and knitting are not too bad either!

Hope you all have a great 4th of July! I shall try and check in next week if I can find an internet connection!

Can you catch a cold from your SP?

Hello everyone! Ugh, this summer cold is gettin' me down! I had an email from my SP from SP8, she let me know she had a cold which was laying her low - and yesterday I was certainly on the path of getting the cold. Must be a sympathy cold because misery loves company. :-) She is such a nice SP, I did not want her to suffer alone.

I stayed in my office all afternoon yesterday so I would not infect anyone else - in the words of Garrison Keillor - I am feelin' pretty puny!

Hope you all have a great Wednesday - hopefully it is all down hill from here!

Gray Monday

Hello everyone! Well, it is Monday and I cannot believe that next week is the 4th of July! This month has just flown by! The weather has been lovely, but today we are supposed to get some scattered showers here in West Michigan.

I spent the weekend doing housework (yuck!!) and laundry (double yuck!!) and frogging the lace socks - okay, so maybe the third time is the charm. I am through the heel flap and have turned the heel also - they look so much better than the last two attempts. Lacework is fun - but challenging. Also, knitting with dpns is not something I am used to doing. I am not thinking about the "kitchner toe" that I will have to figure out. On this last cast on, I did incorporate a new technique I read about online - I did a 3-needle join on my last round of the picot edge - it looks so awesome! One less step on the completion of sock - I will not have to stitch that down! When my son gets up, I will have him help me post a picture of my sock.

Hope you all have a great week!

Friday again!!

Okay, there is a definate pattern here with Friday posts! I will work on trying to update the other days as well. I am working on those lovely lace socks from the spring IK - I cast on and then took them out and re-cast on. This time looks much nicer - no mistakes in the lace pattern!! I am almost to the heel flap on sock 1 - so I am working on them! My SP and I are doing a KAL with these socks! I bet she is farther them me!! I am enjoying teaching classes - but I want to knit for me!!

Have any of you seen the scarves from the latest Rowan book - the ones knit with denim and then you add adornments with bleach - ?? We are all (the ladies from Lizzie Ann's) knitting scarves right now - then we are having a "bleaching" party! We will all get together with our scarves and bleach them. They are going to be the window dressing for August! I have to have my scarf done after the 4th of July - and I only have about 3" knit thus far! I really like how the denim is knitting up though - it feels so nice to knit with it.

We are taking off for the cottage starting next Friday - so I can sit in the sun with my daughter and knit!! (She will just be laying in the sun - I cannot seem to infect her with my enthusiasm for knitting!!)

Then - before I know it Lynne - http://iwasknittogetherinmymotherswomb.typepad.com/ - is coming to West Michigan and we are going to get together to knit!! I am so excited to meet her - I read her blog and she is such a great knitter, blogger, person - I am excited to spend some time knitting with her!

Well - I better get moving off to work - have a great weekend everyone!

Friday again

Wow, I cannot believe that it is Friday already - this week has just sped by! I had another sock class last night with 4 lovely ladies who wanted to learn how to knit 2 socks on one circular, toe up. They were a great group, I am excited to see how their socks look in two weeks. We are heading to the cottage this weekend - and 90 degree weather!

I have been working on some ideas for my secret pal - I am working on the cable footies from the 1 Skein book for her! This has been fun - thinking about what goodies I can send her!

Hope you all had a great week - and enjoy the beautiful weekend!

Frogging Friday

Hello everyone! Well it is a frogging Friday here at my house. I started to knit the Watercolor top from the spring IK and as I was working the top (after knitting about 17") I discovered I had made a mistake in a couple of the rows, skipped my row of knit on the "odd" rows. I now know I cannot knit and watch TV and read a pattern AND talk to my husband (who by the way did not notice the new yarn, hmmmmmm). AARRGGHHHH. I like knitting with the ribbon yarn, but it is difficult to tear out a couple of rows and then pick up again in the round. I am taking it to my LYS this morning to rewind the yarn.

Hope you all have a great weekend - we have some rain coming here in Michigan.

We are heading north to our cottage to finish up the painting, see you all on Monday.

Monday - Monday

How can it be Monday again? The weekend just flew by way too fast. We are down to the last 4 days of school for my kids and, like the beginning of the year, the end of the year crunch is on!

I just finished the most boring conference call in history! Fannie Mae ARM products - now I ask you, with rising interest rates who on earth is going to do an ARM? Ahh, the joys of a new job!

I did manage to knit a bit this weekend though! I worked on finishing the cable clutch for class next week, all I am waiting for are the handles!

I broke my pact to not buy any yarn though! AARRGGHHHH! I have had my eye on some beautiful Colinette Giatto and I bought it on Saturday! My stash is an ever growing thing!

Have a great week everyone!

Summer has arrived!

Hello Everyone! At long last, summer arrived over the Memorial Day weekend! The weather was sunny and a hot 90 + degrees out. There was some rain, but it all came during the night. Almost a perfect weekend. My husband painted the living room at our cottage - not maybe the funnest thing to do on a holiday weekend, but it sure looks nice! We had some friends over on Monday and had a little cook out. I even did some knitting over the weekend! Yeah!!! I worked on the cabled clutch pattern that I saw on Lynne's site http://iwasknittogetherinmymotherswomb.typepad.com/ - it is a fun little bag to knit. I have one done - just waiting to get the handles at my LYS. I started another one for my LYS out of two strands of Rowan Soft Lux. Mmmmm, does it feel wonderful! I am teaching this as a class this month at Lizzie Ann's! I went down a needle size to a 13 and it really is knitting up nicely. My goal is to finish it tomorrow, as today is my husband's birthday! Happy Birthday, Kyle! We are having dinner out tonight to celebrate!

Have a great Wednesday everyone!