Tuesday, May 15, 2007

I’m a swinger!

(I wonder what kind of search engine hits I’ll get with that title?)

When I began Morrigan, I had every intention to be monogamous to her. For better, for worse, until finished object do us part. Just before I started Morrigan I had begun a Flower Basket Shawl. FBS has joined Lotus in the “who? what?” pile in the yarn room because of my undying love for Morrigan.

But then something happened to cause me to be unfaithful to Morrigan. It’s nothing bad—Morrigan understands and is being patient. She’s not angry with me for doing a little wife- project-swapping.

Rah! Rah! Sis Boom Bah!Months before I met Morrigan, I had promised the delightful Kristen that I would do some knitting for her. The knitting is somewhat time-sensitive and well, it’s a job of sorts, so work before play for me. I’ve finished one of my projects for Kristen—both are super-secret so I can’t show you very much. But I will say this much about the first project: It involved pompoms.

I have started the second project and hopefully it will go as fast as the first. And then it’s back to blissful harmony and cable crossings on every row. I miss you Morrigan!

Meanwhile:

Yarn happened.

JacPrize.JPGI won—or rather Scout won—a contest over at This Kitten Knits and Jacque sent me the most delicious prizes. RED yarn and PINK stitch markers. How in the world did she know that those were my favorite colors? Is it obvious? Do I use those colors a lot? The yarn is from HandpaintedYarn.com and is wonderfully soft. It should make a good hat for someone who likes red. Hmmm...I wonder who that could be? Thanks Jacque! I love the yarn and the pretty markers.

YarnPalace.jpgI bought some interesting laceweight when I was in Austin last month. It's Yarn Palace Graceful. Check it out! Self-striping laceweight! I was quite excited when I bought the yarn. But now I'm having conniptions over what to make. My feeling is that the self-striping nature of the yarn will be a feature of a shawl but could possibly be distracting as well. Triangular, circular, and square shawls are all out because the number of stitches increases, which would make the stripes irregular (more narrow as you go along). A long, rectangular sampler shawl (such as the Song of Hiawatha shawl) wouldn't work because the stripes will interrupt the beauty of the differing horizontal lace patterns. A rectangular shawl with a knitted-on border will be problematic because the stripes in the border will not match up with the stripes in the center. *sigh* I do have one candidate, but am still looking for other options.

Then Kristen sent me three hanks of Fleece Artist Bluefaced Leciester yarn in Raspberry. It’s my payment for the super-secret knitting. Each hank is as big as Scout. Yes it’s extremely pink. I didn’t think it would be so…well…bright. But hey, I still love it and will still revel in its softness. (Note to self: Laptop monitor makes colors appear less bright. Always check colors on desktop monitor.)

BFL.JPG

And finally, because blog entries sometimes need a good animal photo: I always thought that opossums were some of the ugliest creatures known to man. But OMG! CUTE! Baby opossums are pretty adorable. Even Scout thinks so.

BabyOpossum

15 comments:

Unknown said...

Oooh, I saw some of the Graceful that monkee bought last year. I think that stuff is gorgeous.

As far as what to make: the forest path stole, of course. You know you want to. (Seriously, I would figure out entrelac for this yarn.)

Amy said...

Wow, gorgeous yarn!!!

I'm not sure about stripes and the Forest Path Stole. I'd suggest the Shoalwater Shawl, which really requires color change to make it beautiful, but you said no triangles. So maybe an improvised rectangle of feather and fan?

Jennifer said...

That laceweight is gorgeous, and the BFL... just lovely. It'll be interesting to see what you knit with them.

Sarah said...

Oooooohahoaoo! Baby possum kitty pic! Love it.

And the Kristen knitting looks cute!

Anonymous said...

I love the lace.
I love the pink BFL yarn. It spoke to me right away.
I love the photo of Scout with the pink yarn.
I really really love the photo of the back of the kittyhead looking out the window at the baby possum. The back of a kitty's head is too adorable for words. :)

I think Cindy at Knitting Park is knitting the Shoalwater Shawl, in a variegated blue yarn, if you wanted to see it.

Meredith said...

I have no shawl suggestions, but I love the yarn!

Anonymous said...

That's so nice of Morrigan to understand your infidelity. :)

I saw an opossum cross the street in front of me the other day! I was thoroughly creeped out! It wasn't a cute baby. It was UGLY.

Anonymous said...

yay! I love it all! And thank you for your super-secret knitting... it's wonderful.

Who doesn't love a baby possum??

Amanda said...

Wow! That is some big and bright yarn. I think it will be beautiful!

Unknown said...

Tease! yes, google loved your title!
xoxo, Danni and B
http://danni654.blogspot.com

Amanda said...

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complainr said...

Scout looks so baffled in that shot. It's adorable.

Possums used to come visit my parent's backyard to eat the food they left out for the cats. They decided that they should probably stop leaving the food out when the entire possum family started to sit at the sliding glass door, staring into the house, wanting more cat food!

Terby said...

You won me over with the red. And I'm very intrigued by the laceweight, and curious as to who the contenders are. Have you considered anything from Pink Lemon Twist? I think the pattern I'm thinking of is called Hanami, and it might work.

I like your possum. He needs hand knits. Hee hee.

Anonymous said...

How long is each color segment? If it's longish, it could look awesome (if each color is long enough to make up the bulk of a FPS rectangle). Fortunately it's really easy to knit a meaningful swatch for the FPS.

Scout's reaction to your giant scout-sized ball of yarn is priceless. She sort of looks like, "Are you replacing me with this pink Scout??" all plaintively.

~Kristie said...

I bought the same exact shade of Graceful yarn and the color variations were gradual except in one spot. My project is now in time-out. If you'd like to see how the yarn stripes, check out my "Cherry Leaf Shoulder Shawl" project page on Ravelry. My user name is Guilty Pleasures.