Saturday, November 29, 2008

Mitts and Sweater and Koigu, Oh My!

"Man, it Pours!"
Wednesday was another rain day, even heavier than Tuesday night. Here's a photo of the downpour in our back patio. We laid the bricks on a bed of sand, so there aren't any puddles. All the plants look so clean and fresh. With as little rain as we get, the leaves get really dirty in between feedings, which is about the only time we 'wash' the plants, lol!


Knitting and Knitting
I finished another pair of Maine Morning Mitts, this time in Paton's SWS Natural Pink. I used this colorway last year for a hat for our DGD, and if I don't finish another project for her, one that's been a UFO for too long, at least she'll have a warm gift under the tree.


I've started and made good progress on the pullover for DH. This is the Woven Bands Pullover from the Winter 2008 IWK that I posted about last time. DH wasn't too excited about the DB Merino Aran - he likes more subtle, interesting colors - so I'm using Elann's Sierra Aran in the Fiddlehead Green color. Sierra Aran comes in lovely heathery colors, and the 20% alpaca content makes it soft. I bought this last year to make the Arwen hoodie, but that can wait a while longer. It will look really good on DH. I have huge problems with my row gauge, though my stitch gauge is right, so I've been making lots of calculations to get the right size. I'm nearly to the end of the 4th skein, and it's going well. Of course, being mostly stockinette with linen stitch bands, it curls up a lot, so it's not showing up well in the photo. The color in this photo is washed out. Check the Elann link for the ferny green shade.

Koigu Attack!!
I hadn't planned any 'Black Friday' shopping, but my LYS emailed about a just-arrived (after a year's waiting!) shipment of Koigu. You never saw such fast toothbrushing, hair brushing, etc. I arrived while most of the shipment was still in its packages. ;D So I had my choice of 2 dozen or so colorways. Yeah, Koigu is pricy, a little more so here, but I had saved up my 'loyal customer' card, and this was the best use of my $30 discount I could have wanted. There's enough here for a couple of shawls and a scarf. Early Christmas? Oh, yeah.

OK, off to knit on DH's sweater, and listen to some more audiobooks. In the last 2 days I've gotten all the way through 'Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone' (HP #1) and J D Robb's novella 'Midnight in Death'. Not only has my library had a good selection of audiobooks lately, but both Audible.com and AudioBookStand.com have had sales and specials.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

"Seems it never rains in southern California..." Now you've got that song going in my head too! Beautiful photo of the rain. Lovely mitts, too.

Cindy G said...

Wow, looks like really fast progress on the DH sweater.

And it looks like the Koigu was well worth waiting for. Looking forward to seeing it take shape.

Sarah Laurenson said...

We need another good rain to complete the cleaning of the plant leaves.

smariek said...

Wow, you made lots of progress on the sweater in just a few days!

Oooh, pretty colors in the Koigu. Envy (1)

Love being able to check out audiobooks from my library, but I have to wonder what people are doing with the CDs. I hate running into scratches and then missing any part of the book because of it. How hard is it really to transfer a CD from case to player without damaging it?