Introducing Jesse the Wonder Knitter and her Amazing Expanding Stash!

I have been hopping all over the country lately, and doing a lot of knitting. I've also been listening to a lot of podcasts, and knitting while doing that. The Blankie of Wonder and Magic had become my official zoning-out-watching-tv-or-listening-to-limenviolet project, and it shows!
I had to stand on a deck chair to get the whole width in the frame. It's quite wide. I was a little worried back when I first joined up the base row of squares and saw how much it stretched, but I've gotten over that. I want this to be about as large as a twin bed blanket.

I took the Forest Path Stole on both of my big trips, and got a lot of work done on it.
Last time you saw it all I had was the bottom triangles! I must confess that I didn't make all of this progress on my trips, but still the majority of it. I'm going to the beach next week and that would be a wonderful opportunity for some more progress, but I already have my projects planned out. One of those projects is this,
the Seascape Stole from the spring Knitty. The pattern calls for laceweight yarn, but you know how I like to buck the system. I'm using sport weight, Louet Gems in colorway Carribean Blue to be exact. It's perfect for my mom. She loves all things beachy.

I didn't buy any yarn on my Vermont trip, but I did buy this roving. It's 4 oz. of Louet Gems merino/silk, and the color is even more gorgeous in person. I'm going to be spinning this up and selling it on Etsy, because as much as I would love to have this yarn, I want a spinning wheel more.

It is kinda hard being spindle-dependent, but I can make some pretty neat things:

Roving from http://shunklies.etsy.com, colorway Monsters Inc., with some hot pink from another batch of her roving, Raspberry Soda.

The absolute most awesome thing I did in Vermont was to have a private spinning lesson from a friend of a friend who sells her handspun at a local market. I already knew most of the process in theory, so it was just a matter of getting my hands and feet to work together to make it happen. The spinning wheel I used is the exact kind I'm saving for, an Ashford Traveller. It was everything I'd hoped for, though I've decided to get a double-treadle instead of single, which was rather hard to get going and keep going.

Behold, aroundabout 25 yards of 2-ply, shetland/mohair goodness! I'm so happy with this yarn.

I'm really sensetive to fibers on my neck. Even a baby alpaca which feel soft to the hand will prickle and itch a bit on my neck. The only fiber I've found that never does that is angora, which happens to be quite expensive. Mohair sometimes works, but it's really a crapshoot. This yarn? A cloud. Not a single itch. Not one. Sooo happy.

What we have here is a skein of handpainted sock yarn that Tita brought me from Alaska, where she and Mom went while me and the Small Ones went to Washington with our dad.

It's really soft and though I'm not much of a pastel girl, I really like this yarn.

Compared to most knitters, I have a tiny stash. And not by choice, it's just that I have very little money to work with. I make pretty good money at my job, but 90% of that is going into my life savings. The other 10% is going into my spinning wheel fund. That leaves only my $10 per week allowance for all my personal stuff that my mom won't buy. In truth almost all of what I buy is yarn, but still.

I am pleased to say that I am finally starting to acquire a nice little stash, which is divided into 5 main categories:

1: Handspun. Very fulfilling but a rather slow means of stash enhancement.

2: Sock yarn. Doesn't take as long to get but I use this up much faster.

3: Sock yarn leftovers. These are all going to the Blankie of Wonder and Magic.

4: Crap. Stuff that I bought before I developed some taste, that I know I'm never going to use but just never get around to throwing away.

5: Other stuff. Non-sock leftovers, a few balls with a project already attatched, and 6 skeins of undyed wool.

I don't think I'll run out of yarn any time soon, but still, it's nice to have a backup plan.

Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.

Can you hear it? It's the sound of the clock, tick-tocking away the seconds until I go see the Yarn Harlot in Charlotte!!! I am so incredibly psyched!!

Remember that mass of wool that I promised would be a bag someday? Well, that day is today!! Well, I actually felted it a couple days ago, but that's not important.
I was a little worried it would turn out really wide and shallow, but It's pretty darn near perfect. I threw it in the wash and hopped on Ravelry, intending to go check on it in about 5 minutes, but you know the hypnotic time-sucking powers of Ravelry, and I completely forgot about it until the end of the wash cycle.
A closeup of the stripes at the botton. Note to self: no more 2-row stripes for felted things.

I finished the waffle rib sock I was working on at Steeplechase, and I'm quite pleased with it.
The waffle rib is incredibly simple; all you do is alternate 2 rows of stockinette and 2 rows of 2x2 rib.
I haven't started the other one yet, it's going to come with me to Charlotte.

After a brief hiatus, I picked up the Forest Path Stole again and finished the lower border and all 5 lower triangles. I found stockinette entrelac quite easy, but seed stitch entrelac can be rather tricky.
I did a lot of spinning this weekend, too (no, that up there is not what I consider "a lot." I've got a whole other single sitting on my swift). This merino is a little tougher to spin than my brown Romney, since it's so slippery. My single keeps breaking, though part of that is the weight of the spindle. I think for yarn this fine and fiber this slippery, I really need a smaller, lighter spindle. Or a wheel, but I'm not getting one of those any time soon.

I am once again forced to face the fact that I live in South Carolina, where it is not uncommon to reach 100 degrees Farenheight in the summer (though on those days, instead of putting on socks, I think I might just lay naked on the floor praying for a lightning strike). I only have one or two pairs of socks with less than 50% wool in them, but this yarn that my mom got me is only 40%. It's Marks & Kattens Clown, 45% cotton, 40% superwash wool, 15% nylon. The colorway is #1908, and I'm just tickled with the way it's striping and speckling. Sorta rough in the skein, but I reckon it'll soften in the wash.
I threw in a 4-stitch cable on either side of the foot, to make it take longer to knit than my usual stockinette. That's one method of stretching a yarn budget: knit slowly.

I added a couple of squares to the Blankie, but nothing worth taking a picture of.

An end, and a few beginnings

I'm not completely sure, but I think that Friday was the first day in over a year and a half that I have not knitted. chirp chirp. Yes, really. It kind of jolted me when I realised. But considering the circumstances, one can hardly blame me.



My Dearest Love and I had planned to go to a concert on Friday afternoon/evening, and he was going to pick me up from school. At least, that's what I thought. I waited for him for almost an hour before Tita came and got me. On the way back to the house, DL called and said that there had been a mix-up, he thought that he was supposed to come get me at my house, not school. I had been kinda freaking out before, but I calmed down and he came and got me in about 15 minutes.



The concert was over an hour away from us, and it lasted until 10:00 at night. We were smart and hopped out during the last song, so as to beat the traffic and avoid being out until 1:00 in the morning or later. As it was, we got back to my house shortly after 11:00 and bid our goodbyes (yes, I am using fancy words to peak your interest and keep you awake). I was exhausted, and went right to bed, not realising until the next morning that I had not knitted a single stitch the previous day. For the absolute most ironic part, read a little further.



Another end, this time a completely welcome one:

An end to this dresser's occupancy of my room.



I've known this house since before the lot was cleared. We were living just 2 doors down at the time, and my mom's parents had this house built so they could be closer to us. My room used to be a guest room, and it has always had this same stinking dresser. But not anymore.



No more, because me and Mom went to IKEA on Saturday and got a bunch of stuff, among which was,

My fabulous new dresser/bookshelf. Clothes are along the bottom, and the rest is mostly books and space for future stash storage. Go to my flickr page (KnitWize there too) for full details.

Another beginning,

My first entrelac! I made this using a tutorial I found via Ravelry. I don't remember exactly where, but just go to Patterns and search for "entrelac tutorial" and you'll find it. The steps are accompanied by pictures, and it's all in very simple terms. If you're a little nervous about trying entrelac, this is the way to go. It's really very easy, even if there are kind of a lot of steps.

Socks for Thing 1, toe-up in TOFUtsies.

More socks for Thing 1, this time for her birthday. She had full knowledge of the other pair, but this is secret. She's seen these, loves them to death actually, but I told her they were for me. I don't know how much longer I'll be able to keep doing that, but for now it's a wonderful system.

I knit these socks top-down, in KnitPicks Bare Essentials that I dyed with food coloring. I knit them top-down because I did a picot hem, and didn't want to have to sew it down. Still did a short-row heel, though.

These socks actually are for me, once again it KnitPicks Bare essentials. I am so tickled by the stripes!

Yet another beginning, and an end too, I guess.

All the spinning I've done so far had been using the drop spindle and light brown Romney top wool I got for Christmas. Well apparently my spindle came with a little packet of colorful fiber and a cool pin, but my mom misplaced them and didn't discover them until a few days ago. I spun up the fiber immediately, of course, and I'm thrilled. It's only a tiny amount, and I'm itching for more. The end being the end of my being content with my plain brown Romney.

Being no longer interestd in my plain brown wool, and