Merry Christmas to All

I'm spending the next two days with my kids and wonderful Hubby. You can bet this new sweater will be seeing a lot of wear this holiday season.


Oh, by the way, those swirly designs on my t-shirt aren't really there. They were the early snowflakes of the lovely Christmas Snowstorm we're enjoying. Eight inches so far, with at least that much more on the way. So happy we're NOT traveling this year.

Off to build snowmen with the kids . . . Merry Christmas!

Another Drive By Posting

I'm on my way out the door in 15 minutes to start the now normal craziness of our daily existence - namely, running kids to and fro, whilst knitting frantically in the spare minutes of waiting for them at one location or another.

So, rather than wait until I have #11 all finished, with tails woven in, buttons sewn on and blocked into lofty loveliness, it seemed prudent to share it with you now. I plan on doing all the weaving and button attaching on the road today. However, since it will be dark long before I get home again and my night time photography skills leave a lot to be desired, I figured you all would enjoy the unfinished version.


The yarn is Aslan Trends Del Cerro, purchased from Coldwater Collaborative on sale last spring. The buttons are also from Coldwater. The pattern is my own cardigan version of Amused by Jordana Paige. It was a super easy rewrite, in that I just didn't join the cables and kept knitting downward to make it a cardigan. I also lost the deep ribbed waistband and cuffs because that design feature just doesn't work on my rather buxom torso. I split the cuff so I'd have an excuse to add yet more lovely buttons to the sweater.


I love how the cables just pop in this yarn. However, it was not an easy yarn to use. It was a fairly loosely plied, 10-ply yarn. So it was super easy to split the yarn while manipulating the reversible cable stitches. I almost (ALMOST) abandoned cabling without a cable needle on this project because of the splittiness of the yarn.

I am debating the placement of the buttons on the collar. I am thinking that the collar might be wearable as a turtleneck, as well as in an open collar style.

Sweater Number 12 is in the knitting bag and nearing completion as well. I am working on the sleeves at the moment. After that, I have the hood to knit and then the cable band that will run up the front, over the hood and down the other side left. More fun cables to look forward to!

I do love cables but I'm in the mood for a change.

Fair Isle, anyone?

Wednesday Night Bullet Points

Not to be a thief or anything, but after several weeks of insanity (schedule-wise) and a total absence from the blog sphere, Sheepish Annie's weekly wacky random-osity seems to be the best way to catch up on all the bloggable tidbits that have been bouncing around this nutty noggin of mine. So here goes . . .

• Hockey tryouts are over and Hockeyman made JV-A. He's also been guaranteed some playing time on the Varsity squad by the head coach. Hooray!

• Speech Team tryouts are over and Dancing Diva did not make the team. Boohoo!

• I cooked Thanksgiving dinner for my family this year for the first time in a decade. It was delicious, if I don't say so myself.

• Did I mention that I put a halt to all traveling over the holiday season this year?

• I DID! I decided that we have 2 Christmas left with Hockeyman before he's off to college and I wanted these holidays to be spent in my own home . . . making my own memories.
  

• Does that sound too selfish?
  

• I don't care if it does.
  

• It's cold outside. Really cold. Bitter cold. It was bad enough that everything was cancelled today for "Stormaggeddon" but this epic drop in temperature after the mildest November in decades is just pouring salt on the wound. Really!
  

• I'm still knitting away on sweater 11 and 12.
  

• Sweater/wrap 13 is in time out while I decide whether it is worth all the effort of knitting a complicated cable pattern in dark green tweedy yarn where it hardly shows.
  

• I'm all in love with some new projects that are clamoring for my attention. I've spent hours researching Fair Isle mittens and hat patterns on Ravelry.
  

• My car needed emergency servicing this week.
  

• Have I mentioned that the dealership is across the street from my LYS?
  

• When the serviceman asked if I was okay waiting for a couple hours for my car to be repaired, do you think he suspected my intention to yarn shop from the gleeful twinkle in my eye and sudden flushing of my cheeks?
  

• I shopped for a couple hours.
  

• Yeah, I bought yarn for hats and mittens for myself and Dancing Diva. And a couple books. And buttons for Sweater #11. And a couple more buttons just because they were pretty.
  

• Hence, the sudden urge to spend hours researching Fair Isle mittens and hats.
  

• Our garage door broke last night. It was scary.
  

• The big axel that has the massive spring on it and the pulleys with the wires that lift the door just snapped.
  

• For an hour, we couldn't get it open or closed. It just hung, drunkenly crooked, defying all efforts to make it move up or down.
  

• We finally got it closed but our cars were trapped in the garage, with no way to get out.
  

• Hubby stayed home from work today to call a repairman to fix it.
  

• And because his car was trapped by the stupid broken door.
  

• It's now fixed, thank goodness.

Well, that's about all for now. Everyone is gone from home tonight and I'm going to spend the next hour and a half of solitude doing what I do best - knitting. And watching whatever I want on T.V.

Let's hear it for total remote domination! Woot!