Happy Birthday to me

I am fortunate to have people who love me enough to spoil me on my birthday. My knitting related gifts:

I'll let you guess which one was from my husband. The others were from my fantabulous sister.
Unfortunately I had to work today and the atmosphere isn't too great there these days. I plan on making up for my poor day with some leftover lasagna my mom made yesterday (she is the best cook EVER) and some knitting on my print o'the wave stole during Heroes. I figure on your birthday you are allowed to put aside the gift knitting and work on something for yourself :-)

The lasagna awaits...

Sick day

So I feel pretty icky today and decided to stay home. My husband was kind enough to give me the cold he picked up last week. But sick days are great for knitting, I cast on for the minimalist cardigan and joined the knit-a-long. I think I got a good amount accomplished.

I think this will be a fairly quick knit, I'm enjoying it so far. The ultra alpaca is a nice yarn to work with.

I've finished up a pair of fetchings, sorry for the crappy pic but Penny has no thumbs and can't help me take a picture.

These were knit in Berroco pure merino on size 6 dpns, a little over 2 balls. Should make a nice gift. Now back to the cardigan or another gift...?

I've been really bad...

My latest acquisitions from the Fabric Place store closing sale. To be fair they are for gifts and were 25% off. Stuff is pretty picked over there, all but the giant size addis are gone so I think this may have been my last stop there. Perhaps in a few weeks I may see if stuff is 50% off but I doubt there will be anything left. I have 4 skeins of Berroco Ultra Alpaca (love that stuff) and two black Berroco pure merino. The red is beautifully deeper than this picture and will be for the Minimalist Cardigan from the fall interweave knits. If it is done in time and I can bear to part with it the sweater will be a Christmas gift.

I had bought one skein of the black merino in a previous visit and thought it would make lovely fetchings. I was right but check out what happened when I weighed the yarn to see if I had enough for the second glove.

That's 27 grams without the thumb. I decided to soldier on and have an excuse to go back to the Fabric Place and get more. This is how far I am so far. I should finish tonight.

Just the top cable and thumbs to go. Good thing I went back today, I bought the last two skeins of black. The extra will go towards a hat I hope to design. Should be neat if it works. I just now realized I may not have enough ultra alpaca. Damn! I'm always one skein short. We'll see how it goes, I can always shorten the sleeves a bit. I wonder how much others have left over. I'll have to check the blogs and my gauge, maybe the knitting gods will smile down on me this once.

Shadows

Check out the neat shadows we saw today, looks like a painting on the wall :)

I've been bad lately

First the yarn, then the needles, then shopping with my sister, then this followed me home from Stop and Shop on Sunday:

To be fair this is sold out online and in the yarn shops I've visited lately so I got a bit nervous and made a deal with myself that if S+S had it I would get it. They did :-) it made my day. That's what happens when I grocery shop alone, I wander into aisles usually passed over. I desperately want to make the tilted duster on the cover, I can't tell you how many times I've almost bought yarn for it. Almost stopped on the way home, even now I want to place a knitpicks order. But I'm being good. I need to do some more knitting for others and wait to see what I get for my birthday in a week or so. It's so cool though. There are a bunch of things in this issue I want to make like the tangled yoke cardigan and the minimalist cardigan. I want to try the snowflake socks too and get my fair isle on. If I thought I could finish in time I'd make these all Christmas gifts but who am I kidding? Two sweaters and a bunch of other knits? No way. I have to admit the motivation for gift knitting is dwindling. Some I feel will really appreciate the gifts but others I'm not so sure about. It's hard, I want to make everyone gifts but part of me doesn't want to waste time on something that will never be worn. Is that awful of me?

Anyway, I have been knitting and the pink/purple yarn I bought last week has become a gift :-)
I'm not entirely sure who will get it yet so I'm not posting a picture but I'm pleased with it. The Berroco pure merino is really nice stuff. The black I think will become a pair of fetching gloves if I have enough. If they aren't gifted I've been wanting a pair of black fetchings for myself. I made a pink pair over the winter and I love the pattern. I need to find time to make some fingerless gloves for hubby before the winter chill sets in. So many projects so little time.

I've also started this gift, a bag in modea cache

I'm making it up as I go but so far it has a seed stitch bottom and stockinette sided. I'm thinking a seed stitch band around the top and a zipper close but we'll see. I'm using US9 20 something inch needles and it's really tight. If I get the needle set I want for my Bday I'll make the length shorter and hopefully it'll be easier on my hands. I got the yarn for $1 a skein at ocean state job lot over the winter. I knew it would be a future gift but it took a while before I got an idea and got started.

I'm working with the Lane Borgosesia on my new addis and I must say I love them! Best. Needles. Ever. No kinks, sharp tips, and smooth enough that the lace slips nicely off them. The swearing has stopped and I'm making good progress on that item. If only every needle was an addi...

Last but certainly not least is my Print O'the Wave stole.

I'm at the tenth repeat of the pattern. I'm going to make it in one piece to avoid the grafting line so that's about 24 repeats to go. I love knitting this but I only get to it in small doses once I've done enough gift knitting a knight that I don't feel guilty switching. Just think how slow this would go if I started that duster...

Addis!

Well I managed to leave work on time and made it to a lovely yarn shop in Warwick, RI yarns at lace wings to get myself a little gift. If it's to make a Christmas gift it's ok right... The owner is a very nice lady and the shop has some nice stuff. Thankfully they had size 3 addis to hopefully remove the anger from my knitting :) it is supposed to be a relaxing hobby after all. I will be sure to follow up on how the new spiffy needles are working. Sadly though no yarn followed me home this time. I'm still feeling a little bad for spending money this week and nothing jumped out at me today. I guess that's a good thing, I have a bunch of projects going now. I'm off to eat and try out my new needles!

I just needed some needles...

And this is what happened.

Penny approves.

So I've been having some problems with my #3 bamboo circular needles. They hate lace weight yarn and slow me down to the point of swearing. Doesn't make for a pleasant evening for me or those around me. So I decided that to make all these Xmas gifts I'd buy myself a present and try some fancy addi needles. Now apparently every yarn store in RI is closed on Monday and I just wanted to stop on the way home from work. I decided to try the fabric place, I was hoping they'd have Inox needles at least, my shawl is progressing very well on the Inox needles and I can't take this aggravation much longer. I arrive to find everything in the store is 20% off and they have Addis! I was elated. I puttsed around for awhile looking at the yarn selection, should have gotten some malbrigio for a scarf for my aunt but that didn't occur to me while in the store, just on the way home of course. Anyway I grabbed (for no real reason) some Berrocco Jasper in the most beautiful greens, and some pink and black Berrocco pure merino. The merino I have plans for, they will soon be Christmas gifts the Jasper I don't, I actually feel bad for getting all but the pink. Oh well. So I then go over to the needle selection and guess what size they don't have. Yep. #3s. Not fair, not fair at all. They didn't even have 3s in straight or susan bates! Is everyone in RI making stuff on that one size needle! So that was a huge bummer. The aggravation will continue until I decide what to do. I don't particularly feel like stopping again and the shops that are further close by 5. I'll never make it. So I think I may work on a non Christmas gift tonight just to make myself feel better. If anyone ever reads this blog and has a suggestion for my Jasper please let me know. Good smells are coming from the kitchen so I'm off, I like being the second one home :-)