I can't believe I am trying this again!

I am a brute for punishment. Then again I would like to celebrate all the weight I have lost. What better way than knitting a lace dress? Lily Chin's Lace Dress is going to be attempted AGAIN.
Like a fool I ordered the pattern from the Vogue website and, yes people, they took my $6 and gave me the privileged of downloading the same pattern they published in fall of 2007. The graph is the same but the written instructions attempt to clarify. Mea Culpa, at first glance I thought they had screwed up again but after careful perusal I think they have explained it.
I will knit the sleeves flat, seaming has no terrors for me. (edited)
I have one full wedge finished on the Traveling sweater. It is good for TV watching in the evening. Speaking of, I am in the middle of watching the Vicar of Dibley. Dawn French is a scream. Can you imagine being in the same room with her and her husband Lenny Henry ("Chef")? She wears the most fascinating "jumpers" on the show. She was the operatic painting in the Harry Potter movies. I digress as usual.

Lastest report

I am getting ready to set up Susan Pandorf's Evanstar shawl. My silk arrived and frankly I have been putting off winding it into a ball. Love silk but it can be a bitch when it tangles.

The Evanstar KAL group on Ravelry has all kinds of wonderful threads not just about the actual knitting but techniques and ideas. That's where I found how this ( see above) can be considered as my new favourite knitting notion. Many thanks to "NutmegOwl" (Ravelry name) for her tremendous idea! How you may ask? All shall be revealed right now. I wound the silk on the ball winder and then slipped it off the ball winder onto the spindle of the empty CD box. The lid fastens the ball in place so there is no rolling snarling and tangling as there would be in a zip lock bag.Next fantastic idea from Tech Knitting. A circular belly button cast on using an umbilical cord this is my first try. I plan on taking it out and doing it again. I didn't leave a long enough tail to draw up the center.
The Evanstar Shawl warranted a trip to Little Red Mitten for an Addi Lace needle. Purchase of tools and notions is allowed under the "yarn fast rules." Also gave me an opportunity to take my new car on an outing.

I have started the Traveling Sweater with BlueMoon Fiber Arts, WooBoo. This is a treat to knit with. So far I only have half of one wedge completed and I have to knit it 8 wedges around and then block it out . The sleeves are ribbed as well. Lordy that is going to be a lot of K2P2. I will be glad of this sweater come fall.
This weekend I hope to get the Adamas Shawl blocked, ready for the cool weather.

I actually managed to resist some beautiful pinky orange silk when I was at Red Mitten. Time to go polish my halo.

Knitting my brains out.

Today will be guilt free knitting day.
The roofers are here and have been hammering since 7 am. Much concern, I am sure, to my miserable neighbour to the west. (insert evil laugh here) Ominous thumpings and banging are shaking the whole house. More on that progress on the other blog.
It is with great regret I must inform all my yarn retailers that a self imposed moratorium has been declared. I must follow Jean's sterling example and declare a yarn fast. The cedar chest is bursting, the 5 clear plastic yarn boxes I purchased are full, there are zip lock bags in the closet of my den and the overflow has invaded the floor of my bedroom closet.
My name is Susan and I am a Yarn-a-holic!...sigh... but we already knew that.
This morning I hand wound a huge ball ( one of four hanks) of WooBoo from Blue Moon Fibers, for the Traveling Sweater. Wool and Bamboo the colourway is "chestnutty" and is a richer colour than shown here. the flash kind of washed it out. My fall/winter work sweater is worn out so this will be the replacement. I need a break from the Adamas Shawl which I am pleased to report is into row 5 of the beaded edging. I know you are all waiting with bated breath.
At present I have the Legolas Kerchief on the needles as well. At one of the knitters fairs I purchased a hank of Blue Heron's yarns, "marshgrass," It is a blend with a gold thread through it. Very yummy.
To keep myself on the straight and narrow I am posting a progress bar. Good luck to me.

The Nantyglo Knitters

The post swim knitting session. Coin purse, lace scarf, sweater and shawl in progress.

New Knitter in the blogsphere!

Nant-y-glo Needles welcomes, Ryleigh, a fourth generation knitter, to our sphere. "IttyBitty11" is her Ravelry name and we are all as proud as punch that she has joined us in promoting knitting.

She will be featured in the sidebar and down the line we hope she will post a message to all the junior knitters. When she is not knitting Ryleigh prefers soccer and gymnastics. I expect her to master knitting whilst hanging upside down next. Nothing would surprise me.
~Proud Grami

The mail finally arrived.

Yarn-a-lish-ous Minstrel Muse from twisted fibers for the Rivendell Cowl.
Cash Silk for the heirloom shawl I am dying to knit.. A-hem looks a little fine. That is a Canadian dime. This stuff is two ply!
Just so you don't think I am swanning around the Internet doing nothing but buying wool. This lump is the Adamas Stole. This project creeps along at a mind numbing pace. I have two more repeats and the edging to go. There are so many other things I would rather be working on right now.
My progress bars seem to be locked in place. My plan was to have the Adamas out of the way by July 1st. That's two days away. This working full time is really getting in the way of my knitting. The push is on to finish. Julia has almost finished her Mulberry and silk sweater and I have only 1 inch knit on mine. I think I shall attack that next alternating with a lace scarf. I have found the perfect pattern for one of the hand dyes I purchased from Colin. Not too impressive. Yet!
Colin strikes again! I snapped this up out of the Knitman's Kitchen before it was dry. Yesss! Perfect Parrot coloured yarn destined to become the Parrot Wing Scarf. Stay tuned. I am hunting for the right beads.
Just to give you some perspective on the Cash Silk from heirloom knitting. That's 9 balls there folks. Each one smaller than my mouse.
When I hefted the parcel I thought they must have made a mistake. There couldn't possibly be 9 balls in here. OMG what have I got myself in for now? This is going to require some serious swatching.
As usual click on the picture for a better look.

World Wide Knit in Public Day 2010

Springbank Park, London, Canada. 2 knitter's, one observer
We parked our picnic lunch, chairs and accoutrement in the shadow of a huge fir tree and hauled out the knitting.
Julia finished the sleeve of her sweater and I worked on the Adamas Shawl.
It was about 85 F in the shade, the birds were singing and the squirrels were running around the grass. All in all a beautiful afternoon. We missed you Corinne!

Knitting Time

The subtle and not so subtle ways of accomplishing same. Bribery works every time. (only joking)
I just downloaded a new pattern I found in Ravelry. No wait, I didn't say I was going to start it now only that I had downloaded the pattern, I am a sucker for freebies. In my stash I have an obscene amount of pink Rowan Haze. Gorgeous stuff. I am earmarking it for this pattern.
Dancing Cranes Stole from Elan. You have to log in to the web site to get the pattern. My apologies to Elan for not ordering their wool for this project but as I live and breath I will order something at some point.
The Adamas Stole marches on. With every pattern repeat it gets larger. I am on the 11th and I have to go to 16!! then comes the fun part, the edging and the beads. I want this finished before the Summer Swatch program starts on the 21st. Should be no problem. I may have to make another coffee cake.
I gave up on looking for the "Worlds Most Boring Socks Ever" they are gone. I do have my eye on making a fair isle pair as a Christmas gift. They will have to be refereed to as the "December Socks" cause the recipient lurks here. No hurry to cast them on right now. That is a fall project.
Not that I am wishing away the summer! It has hardly arrived. I think we are expecting about 25 today. That's Celsius. After all these years I still have to do the math to figure out what that means...double it and add 30 = 80 degrees Fahrenheit.
Work beckons, TTYL

It is time to take stock.....

~Amethyst beads for the Adamas shawl~
Inspiration for this spate of organization lands squarely at the door of the "Faculty Meeting Knitter." Her plan of action, so to speak, over the next 12 weeks has given me a boost. We knitter's can be a little impulsive, OK, maybe not so much "little" and I speak from personal experience. I prefer to call it, enthusiastic appreciation of the finer things in life.

Every once in a while I really have to take stock of what I "have on the needles," "plan to put on the needles" and what should be "taken off the needles." It is a hard thing to admit but not everything turns out is as wonderful as we expect.
Guidelines for the next 12 weeks will be as follows for yours truly:
No new sweaters on the needles. I have a royal blue jacket on the go now which was supposed to be for the spring but will be very nice for the fall, thank you very much.
No new socks on the needles until the WMBSE are finished and then no more than 2 pair at a time. You remember the grey socks....never again....so boring it sucks the life right out of me. Now, I just have to find where I put them..lol edit: I have looked in the likely places and then the unlikely places ( my Mother's advice). They are no where to be found. I am beginning to think I may have left them at the hospital when I visited Mom back in the fall. No great loss.
No more new beaded lace projects. I have the Adamas Shawl to finish.
The Snow Queen Pi Shawl wool and beads are at hand...
... and lace weight from the Knitman for a beaded scarf is due to arrive anytime. O.K. that takes care of beaded lace.
No more new lace knitting projects... except what is on order..wool for Susan Pandorf's Rivendell Cowl is due to arrive anytime. Oh, and I almost forgot, I signed up for Bad Cat's Summer Swatch Shawl - paid my money for that too BUT I am using stash lace weight. That should count for something.

O.K. that means one sweater, up to two pairs of socks, two full sized lace shawls, one lace scarf, one lace cowl and the Summer Swatch Shawl.
Some projects have been deliberately left out of the list . After all, this is supposed to be just the summer list.

All this and working full time.....Uproarious laughter, crescendo with a hint of hysteria.

To nupp or not too...

Nupp/soup or nupp/cup I really don't care how you pronounce these little b#$%*ds. These beggars are the bane of my existence. It is with great humiliation I report I am unable to make them perfectly. Therefore I will desist.
Not being an athletic person my sole claim to fame is my ability to "pick up" fine needle techniques. I hereby throw in the towel on this one.

Franklin put it right when he referred to them as Devil Rabbit Droppings. Delicately put.
I admire them from afar and I bow to the the creators of them I will be moving on to BEADS. I downloaded the Snow Queen Pi Shawl. (ravelry link) A vision of delight and enough to make me reconsider the whole "nupp" fiasco again. I wasted my valuable time yesterday and millions of brain cells, neither of which I could afford, trying to master this stitch. Enough of that.
The Saturday trip to visit 2 of the Grands was made all the more perfect with a prezzie for Grami/Mum/me of a gift certificate to Spun, Burlington's coolest wool shop and recipient of my daughters retirement income. I blew the bundle on Malabrigo lace weight in the yummiest Cactus Flower coral/pink. Wonders of wonders a bead shop has opened in the same mini mall. How fortuitous for me that they stock the very rainbow crystal pink lined bead I needed. Japanese size 8's yet, oh frabjuous day.

Not hard to detect what movie I watched yesterday.

Helen was deliciously evil. Not suitable for children, in my opinion,

dark and scary. I enjoyed it. Says a lot about me...lol