a few days later...

Wow, what a holiday! The lovelies all got better from the stomach bug, then it cycled through Middle Sister and Middle Brother again! Despite the fact that our fridge died and we had to throw out all of our Christmas food, Christmas was a wonderful day. Aren't they cute? I like the way that Eric's portrait of Christ looks like He's sitting there in the group photo.





Nice, huh!

Shameless plug: By the way, if anyone would like a copy of this painting, we had it reproduced as a giclee (archival-quality inks on canvas) so that we could give copies to our parents for Christmas. The image is 16x20 inches and mounted on acid-free board, ready for framing. We have extra copies and one could be yours for a mere $160. :)



Okay now, KNITTING!

I am a hopeless knitalong zealot. I learned years ago that I have a yarn addiction; I'm at peace with it. This new, but related obsession with knitting along is perhaps a little scary. I think that the group mentality (the energy, the camaraderie, the peer pressure...) is sucking me in. I'd better take a break from it...in a week or two. For now, another knit-along! This time we have the knitalong/wrapalong/travelalong! This is a fun idea for using stash yarns to make a cape. Would I wear this item? Maybe, maybe not. I'll have to actually finish knitting it and see.


I am completely enamored of the yarn combination possibilities. The requested/suggested yarns are A) some handspun, B) a variegated worsted-ish, and C) some alpaca. Now we all know that I am replete with alpaca, and I have a fair amount of variegated yarns, but handspun? Do I have any? Well, though I am not yet a spinner (it will happen someday...) I do, indeed, have a tiny bit of handspun. I have squirreled away in my stash a hank of Angora Cottage sport-ish weight angora/silk/wool!!! It's lovely-soft and a lustrous creamy color (seen here with some Noro Silk Garden and a bit of tan Plymouth alpaca). I started knitting the wrap with it and I hated the stripey look. The contrast between the Silk Garden and the cream handspun was terrible.

I frogged it and stuck the bit of handspun that I had used at the top of the pattern in a pot of steamy Kool-Aid (tamarind, strawberry, some berry blue and a sprinkle of arctic green apple). It just occurred to me that I should have dyed a little more of the handspun for the bottom of the pattern. Hmmm. Oh well. I'm sure that I can replicate my entirely scientific method of measuring Kool-Aid for another batch of yarn. Heh.

In the mean time, I've got a purple and brown fixation (I have a vast collection of purple and brown yarn that are intended for an afghan) that is coming to life as a wrap-along-thing. I adore this Mountain Colors merino ribbon yarn (it's the variegated one). The colorway is called Red-tail Hawk and it is everything that I love in a mixture of colors. It even makes me like the blasted bulky lavender stuff that I felted (whoops!) when I dyed it.

So there we are. I haven't done any more stranding since the green Center Square hat from Knitty. I still plan on making myself those lovely Anemoi mittens from Eunny Jang. I've just got to take care of this wrap first!