Odd(ball) October

It's been a wierd and crazy summer and fall. Things seem to be quieter now, I'm exercising regularly and maybe my schedule will calm down a bit as well.

Looking around the living room I decided that October is for knitting up oddballs. Hats are my perfect answer to oddball knitting. I love wearing them, they make wonderful presents and it's been darn cold outside recently!

I've knit 2 Odessa hats (one red, one grey) for a friend who liked the blue one I did last year. Sandnesgarn Smart, no beads, pretty boring, but just what Leeann wanted.



The wonderful Foliage hat from Knitty using 5mm needles and Rio de la Plata in Honey Mustard (this is the limiest honey mustard I have ever seen). This was so much fun to knit. I think I'll have to knit another one in a more subdued green for me.


One of Judy Gibson's Braid-Edged hats using Lopi from Custom Woolen Mills. The 5mm needles and bulky yarn make for a lovely, squishy hat. I hope the recipient likes it. I'm very tempted to knit another with slightly fewer stitches so that the hat sits just a little bit higher on my head.

The lovely photos are, of course, courtesy of Venus! Thank you sweetie!

Me-Me-Menus

The Flame's away this week and I'm eating my way through an odd assortment of leftovers and leftover ingredients.

My food for the week will involve :

a lot of carrots
roasted chicken
braised beef from mum (just need to find some rice noodles to go with this)
tortillas
3 slices of bacon (never did make that bacon/green onion corn bread to go with the chili)
ginger
green onions (see above)
tomatoes

Thankfully I am going for dinner with my parents on Tuesday and I have a BBQ to plan for Saturday.

Knitting? Ha! It's all stealth knitting at this point and I'm having stealthy gauge issues. Wait, I did finish some things.

Project specs : Kiera's bonnet, Dale Book No.142 pattern #8

Yarn : Dale Stork, Pastel Pink #8

Needles : Very, very old UK 13 Aeros (2.25mm)

Started : I bought the yarn when I went to Portland in December and I started the bonnet fairly soon thereafter.
Finished : May 13, 2007 (Just in time!)



This next project is an old UFO. I bought the yarn at Madrona last year and promptly cast on. The sock languished until I decided that they would look better on Lara's feet. Zoom, zoom, zoom. Mazda has nothing on socks knit with thicker yarn.

Project specs : Lara socks, standard top-down sock on 48 stitches

Yarn : Fancy Image Yarn, Spring Garden

Needles : 3.25mm Brittany Birch dpns

Started : February 2006
Finished : May 18, 2007

I don't think I could wear these socks inside of shoes but they would be wonderful around the house.

Sitting and Knitting and Winding

There was a lot of sitting in the car and knitting last weekend. Vancouver - Grand Forks - Trail - Grandforks - Vancouver, Vancouver - Seattle - Vancouver looks like this.

A Little Sit-ster from The Natural Knitter for Tricia.


Joanne's new hat design using Jessica's hand-spun. The details are blurry but this photo does capture the transition from dark purple at the crown to purpley-blue at the brim. It's a very subtle change and I love the way it looks.


No pictures yet, but Flame Socks v.2 are finished and I made some good progress on the Garden Path Shawl.

The trip to Seattle was for the first fair-isle
winding party. I still have 24 skeins to split up and wind (25 bobbins/skein) and I think Denise's present will come in handy. Surely I will be able to achieve a sense of Zen as I meditatively wind yarn and contemplate my potato.