There has been quite a bit of fiber activity lately, even if I didn't have the batteries to post pictures. However, new rechargeables have been purchased, and I have set of regular old batteries that will last me until the rechargeables are ready, so here we go...


I have another set of hat and baby socks ready for the pregnancy resource center. I have heard via the pastors wife that the director is just thrilled with the things I have already sent. I was worried she might need blankets or something else, but since the hat and socks fit the bill, I'm going to get back on track with knitting one set at least a week. I really like this set that I have just finished, I think the brown and baby blue go so well together. I think next I am going to make a striped set.

I have finished the first set of increases on the first sleeve of the cabled sweater. Now instead of increasing every 6 rows, I am increasing every 4. I am really eager to get to the top of the sleeve and see if I can get the saddle to work. I'm a little worried about it, but I think it's going to be fine. Other than that, I am spinning. I am plying some singles, and spinning the stuff I want to get done to sale. There is so much going on around here it is taking a lot longer than I had thought it would.

DH is off today, (His first day off from both school and work since the new school year started) and is spending this morning working on our stupid car. We are supposed to go out to dinner this evening while his dad watches the kids. I really hope that happens, we really need the time alone to decompress. Then, next week, he will have Thursday and Friday off and we are planning on doing something with the kids. I have no idea what.

Reagan had her birthday and I didn't post a picture of her and her cake. Better late than never, right?

All my kids are growing up so fast.

I did make a new blog to write about my weight watchers adventure. If you are interested in that, it is over here .

Recycling sweaters...

If you check the inside of a sweater, you can tell if it has been cut from a big peice of knitted material and the edges serged to keep it from unraveling, or if it was first knit as peices and then sewn together. If it was knit as peices, it is a candidate for unraveling. My other requirement is that it be made from natural fibers, although I probably wouldn't unravel a cotton sweater. I just don't like knitting with cotton that much.

So, I found four sweaters: the one I felted and three others...

The "picture" sweater was knit from two strands of shetland wool yarn held together. You can't see it in this picture, but it has blue and red and other fibers blended together in the dark yarn. So far, I have unraveled both sleeves. Just from the sleeves I got 80 yards of double stranded white, and 240 yards of the dark. This sweater is very slow going because before it can be unraveled, you have to pick out all the embroidery that was done on top of the knitting. I probably will not be unraveling the front, which has so much embroidery I would probably lose my mind trying to get it all off. Plans right now are to cut it into a square, back it with blue jean material, and make a holiday pillow out of the front and to unravel the back.

The cream colored yarn on the right is a combination of 55% silk, 33% nylon, 10%angora and 3% lambswool. It is absolutely the softest yarn! It has a lovely nubbly texture, the angora halo, and I am pretty sure if I decide to dye it, it will take dye beautifully. I have no idea how many yards I have, but I got over 200 yards on the first sleeve alone. I think this is what I am going to knit that smoke ring that I have been wanting to knit out of.

The red yarn has no sweater with it because I completely unraveled it on Wednesday night. It was just a plain knit pullover sweater, made from lambswool and angora. I got roughly 110 yards from each sleeve, and I forget how much from the back and front, I'll have to check later. This is probably going to be over dyed, the red is a little much for me. All in all, a good haul for sweaters that cost me 2 dollars each. It was really a lot of fun to "unknit" something for a change.

In other news, I finished the fronts for the aran cardigan last night!! Yeah! Then, after laying out the fronts, I discovered that I had made a huge mistake. I shaped the wrong sides of the fronts, so the cables were not going to meet up at the shoulders. For a moment, I debated cutting up the whole sweater into teeny tiny peices of fluff. Then I decided that instead, I will just knit saddles for the top of each arm, and hopefully the break at the top of the arm will trick the eye into not noticing the mistake. I am just too sick of this sweater to consider ripping the fronts back and starting again. Besides, I've always wanted to knit a sweater with saddles at the top of the shoulder, it'll be fun, right?

After receiving the latest issure of SpinOff in the mail, I had to drag out the knitting machine and try my hand at knitting up blanks and dyeing them. Let me tell you, it is much easier to dye a knitted blank than to wind yarn into a huge skein and then dye it for self striping yarn. I was really pleased with the colors in this, but I need a much bigger workspace to really get into this. A large peice of foam insulation would be great, I think. Anyway, I am planning on doing more of this in the future, in better colors, and hope to have some for sale, as soon as the programmer extroidenaire finishes her website or I figure out Etsy, whichever comes first, LOL.

Okay, I don't know if these pictures of baby hats and booties are boring, but there is such a drought of finished objects on this blog that I plan to continue posting them until someone says, "Hey, Jan, enough of the baby stuff already."

It is such a great feeling to actually get something done around here, you just can't imagine. I mean let's face it, there is not much of my life that is ever going to be finished. Laundry? Always going to be there. Dishes? Someone is always eating something. Sweeping and mopping. Nothing about three kids and two dogs suggests in anyway I am ever going to finish sweeping and mopping. Homeschooling? Well, someday it will be done, but not for at least another 10 or 11 years. Until I reach Heaven, I won't be done trying to live a life more pleasing to Christ since I fail so miserably at that every day.

So while a baby hat and socks set isn't much, it's finished! Let's enjoy it, okay?

Weekend Wrap Up

I tried something a little different with the knitting for the Pregnancy Resource Center this week. This is the shell scallop edging from Knitting on the Edge, on 66 stitches. (Again, using Baby Bee Delight) I think if I did it again, I would not do the ribbing, just the scalloped edge and then straight on to the stockinette stitch. I made the socks to match, and you will have to trust me that they look okay on a little foot. I used Reagan's newborn sized baby doll to test them on and they're pretty cute.

Next up is the swatch from the batt I talked about in the last post.

and finally,

I'm almost finished with the fronts of the Aran Cardigan!! Yeah! I'll finish them tonight and then start the sleeves.