In Which I Have Very Little Recovery Time

Hey everybody, did you miss me? I missed you. I haven't had Internet for 11 days and it's nearly driven me crazy. I plan to do a full post on my fabulous adventure, but I'm leaving for camp tomorrow and I still have a ton of stuff to do today, so I don't think I'll have time right now. So just a quick update to let you know I'm back safe and sound.

In Which I Stick my Knitting in the Bushes

As it is a fine (if blistering hot) day outside, I succumbed to the find knitterly tradition of posing my work among the flora. Here we have two fine specimens, one of which is not completely knitting-related.

This was the last week of school for me, and Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday were half days. We got out at 11:45 on those days, and Mom took me out to lunch on Wednesday.

After we ate, we took a look around the Goodwill Emporium near the restaurant. In the back, amongst the boxes and baskets, I spied a hatbox. I was immediately enthralled, owing to a slight obsession with hatboxes since childhood. I picked it up and thought, 'My, what a heavy hatbox. I wonder if there's a hat in it!' There wasn't. Instead, there was another box, slightly smaller but of the same design. I took out the second box and opened it up, to find yet another box. I was positively giddy as I separated the succession of boxes (yes, marvel at my large vocabulary). It was like a set of Russian nesting dolls, which I have also always liked.

In the end, I got a set of four boxes for -get this- Fifteen dollars and one cent. Yes, the price tag actually said $15.01. I have no idea why. But what a score! I will, of course, be using them for yarn storage.
The yarn in there now is KnitPicks Shine Sport in Hollyberry, 14 balls of it. This I have purchased for a cardigan called Rusty. It's pretty obscure, but you can find it on Ravelry.
Another thing I have succumbed to: Monkey socks! I wish I had broken down long ago, this pattern is enchanting, and so is the finished object.

The changes I made were to add a picot hem at the top, knit one less repeat of the lace pattern for the legs, and do a slip stitch heel to make them last longer.
Yarn is Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock, colorway "Huron."

Here we have a skein of merino that I dyed in the wool with food coloring, then spun up into a sport-ish 2ply. It's pretty well balanced, though it is rather loosely plied (this yarn was a pain in the ass to ply, and I think it's not my best work because I was so frustrated with it pretty much from the get-go).
Blankie pix! I've been working on it a lot lately, and it shows. Seen here lounging on the grass in our backyard:
(I feel morally obligated to tell you that not all of our grass is this pretty.)

What is this? A strange growth in the bush?

No, it's just my spindle, and some lovely roving from Shunklies, an Etsy store. Colorway is called "Monsters Inc." except for the pink which is from another batch of her roving.
I've really got a lot more single, but I've taken to winding it off onto the swift when the spindle starts getting too heavy with it.

Yet more succumbing: Magic loop and KnitPicks Harmony needles! What I've got here is a 40'' fixed circular in US size 0 that I got specifically to try out magic loop. The yarn is Trekking XXL in color 145, which I have been stalking since Christmas. I finally found it in a very nice shop called Charlotte Yarn, naturally located in Charlotte, NC.

My Forest Path Stole is coming along nicely after a brief hiatus, but you can't see it now since it's packed away for me to take on my trip. Me, the small ones, and my dad are leaving on Tuesday for a train trip along the northern border of the US. We'll be withing spitting distance of Canada most of the time, and the cool weather will be a nice relief from the depths of Hades (aka South Carolina).

We're taking the train from Chicago to Seattle, then renting a car and driving northwest a couple hours until we get to the very corner of the country, where my dad's parents live. We'll spend a few days visiting with them, sightseeing, and maybe pop into Canada for a day.

I really hope we'll get to Canada, so I can get some All Dressed chips. If you haven't had these, try them! There a type of potato chips from the Ruffles brand, and they have all the chip flavors (barbecue, salt and vinegar, etc) on one chip. It sounds disgusting, but it's actually really good, and you can only get them in Canada. Well you could have them shipped, but it would cost you and arm and a leg.

So now I have something kind of gross to show you. Last weekend (keep that date in mind) I was at my dad's house, where me and Thing 1 have bunk beds. I, being to oldest, get the top bunk. It's pretty nice, except when you fall out of it and hit the hard floor like I did on Friday night. I'm sure it hurt, but I didn't notice because I somehow managed to bang my elbow very hard on something on the way down. It left a mark. Look away now if your are the queasy type!

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This is what it looks like a week after the fact. And yes, it still hurts like hell.

So I'm going on a 10-day trip starting Tuesday, and when I get back I'll have a whopping day and a half to recover before hauling myself off to camp for a week.