Tangled Yoke Finally

I finally finished! I have never been so happy to have something off the needles. But, I like it. I spent part of Saturday blocking. First here it is before.





And here it is soaking in the sink. I think it enjoyed the bath.



Then I laid it out on the dining room table, good thing we eat in the kitchen. I think the cables look so much better blocked.







Later that day I took it to the fabric store (yes slightly damp) to pick out buttons. This seems to be such a project every time. So many buttons. Here's some of my choices.



With some help from another button shopper (she was going for little pink buttons of a certain pinkness)I ended up going with the plain ones on the far right. Tuesday night I'll sew them on and I'm wearing it to work on Wednesday. I am so done with this!



Final thoughts. I like it, I was wearing it over my jammies this morning and I think it looks pretty good even without buttons. Ten skeins plus another half was more than I expected. The chart was hard for me, I have no idea why, I've knit countless things from charts. I think the cables with the five increases and decreases were very clever now that they're done and I quite like the faux seams. And I think I'll be getting a lot of use of it, but I'm never making another one. THE END.

Next

Last summer one of my co-workers told me about a really nice LYS close by. So I went, and they were closed that day. Figures. I never got back again till February. Lovely shop Knit-a-bit in Westfield, New Jersey. But when I went to pay for my yarn, they asked me my name and when I told them my last name, they said Susan? Now how did they know that. It freaked me out a little. But it turned out that my wonderful boss had been there just before me to get me a wonderful birthday present: a gift certificate! So I went back last Saturday to pet all the yarn. And this is what I bought.




Cascade Sierra
80% pima cotton
20% merino wool

And this is what I'm going to make.



Flutter Sleeve Cardigan
Pam Allen
Interweave Knits Spring 2008



I think it will be just perfect for the spring and summer in the air conditioning at work.

How The Flood Changed My Life

It wasn't my flood. DDIL left her washing machine running while she
went out for the day.(Can you see it coming?) The mechanical thingy
that tells the washing machine that it's full didn't. She came home
to a foot of water in the basement. I personally don't trust my
appliances on their own and now I never will. Anyway, DS & DDIL, after
cleaning up the flood, went shopping for a new washer & dryer. This
entailed going to every appliance store in a ten mile radius, some
more than once, while calling us on the cell phone. At one point, I
heard Mr. Truck say, "well, if you can get a better deal by buying
three appliances, just order us a new washing machine. Whatever you
decide is fine." Now, we didn't really need a new washing machine and
I don't know if saving the kids' money by spending a lot of ours is
part of the parenthood oath that I took. And our washing machine was OK.
All right, it didn't run on the delicate cycle and some sort of ooze was
coming out of the bottom (I believe from the transmission which may be why the delicate cycle didn't work) and we bought it at least 12 years ago, but there's only the two of us. And what did that mean: whatever you decide is OK? Did I not get some sort of say in this? Apparently not.

A week or so later, my new washer arrived, a totally efficient, energy star front loader.




And I actually read the book. It does wool! It won't felt wool, at least
not on the wool cycle. Do I trust this book? Do I trust this machine? I spent quite a while in the knitlist archives and it seemed that it would actually work.
Other knitters said it would. So I tried it with my precious, irreplaceable, hand knit by me, spent hours knitting these things, sweaters. I couldn't watch. But it worked and now I wash my knitted things all the time, they've never been cleaner. And that's how the flood changed my life.

And here they are all drying nicely on the dining room table.

Look What's Up

Daffodils



Crocus



and Scilla

Happy Easter!

My Tags Are Done

and I love them! Thank you, BDE!

The Bane of my Existence

Row 12 of the 18 rows of the cable pattern of the tangled yoke cardigan. It has gone like this: knit, tink, knit, frog, curse, count, knit, tink.....AND I'M RUNNING OUT OF YARN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Our Weekend Getaway

This weekend we drove down to Delaware to our vacation home. We got there late Friday and it was dark. The first thing we noticed in the morning was that spring had sprung! Everything was green and the Bradford pears outide the door were in bloom.


Mr. Truck started tiling the foyer


while I went shopping in Lewes



Ginger Moon yarns is a lovely little yarn shop in the back of an antique store. The owner is so nice and she has some beautiful yarn.



I got to pet all the yarn.



This is what I bought.



Later, some of us took a nap, on the couch,



on the floor,



and on the bed.



I sat on the love seat knitting.



After nap time was over, we went to the bay, the dogs were still afraid of the water.



We watched the ferry come in until the horn blew and scared some of us.



I found some sea glass



to add to my collection.



Then we got take out.



On the drive home it was my job to watch for cops because we might have been speeding a bit, but I still got this done on my new socks.



It was such a nice weekend.

Don't You Just Love

a good pattern, one you can always fall back on? This one is just perfect for that.


Gretel by Penny Straker
or you can find it on Ravelry


I first bought this pattern in the 90's I think, and have made it a whole bunch of times. But after the first one, I realized this pattern is so adaptable you can make it into anything. And it is a very easy knit with almost no finishing. You start at the bottom, knit in the round to the armholes, back & forth to the shoulders, 3 needle bind off. Pick up stitches for the sleeve and knit around down to the cuffs. A little finish on the neck and you're done. Almost no weaving in, a beautiful thing.

The last time I knit it was in 2005 when DDIL asked me to knit the kids Christmas sweaters. Now, since they were pretty small and messy, we went to AC Moore to pick out a nice acrylic, washable being very important. DDIL picked a maroon/cranberry and cream and I found a basic snowflake chart, tweaked it a little, popped it into the perfect pattern, and here they are:






The sweaters are still around, nothing like acrylic for staying power, and now the grand dog George apparently wears one of them. I think I showed you this picture before, but it still makes me laugh.





You know this sweater comes in adult sizes too, I think I may just get one for myself.

A Change of Opinion

The last time I talked about my Tangled Yoke Cardigan, I wasn't too happy with it. But, slowly, I'm changing my opinion. It seems to be growing on me, although I may just be in denial about the cable part. I hear that's a tough one. But I've just finished one sleeve and I'm almost done with the other one and it seems just like a big sock to me. I love, love, love making socks. It never ceases to amaze me when I turn that heel and it starts looking like a foot. I always wonder who thought of this marvelous invention? Look Mr. Truck, look what I did. Oh, you turned a heel again, mmmm hmmmm.

Here's some of my socks from last year.



Love socks. On dpn's. The old fashioned way. But I digress. Back to the sleeves,they are on dpn's and I go round and round and there comes a rhythm to it. Round and round, increase, round and round. So even though Miss Tangled yoke isn't singing to me yet,I think I hear a faint humming sound somewhere.

Thank you

Well, I never thought little gift tags would make such a stir! And this didn't start out as promoting BDE, I already did that. But I did tell her that she should do something like this on etsy or her little website. I told her knitters like this stuff and did she listen to me? No. But if you want to see her pretty things or contact her: The Scrap Paper Shop or there's a link on the side. And you can read about it here. As for my tags, I have no idea which one she's doing for me, mom's apparently don't get a choice, I've been asking for these for months; but I agree with your choices. Thanks so much!

Look What's Up!

I love knitting but another thing I really love, well besides Mr. Truck, the grandchildren, the dogs, the kids, the cat, my family...where was I? Oh, it's gardening. This makes winter so hard. I hate being a prisoner inside, I want to go out and play. So every morning recently I've been making the rounds outside, while the dogs are out, inspecting the garden. And look what I found, Snowdrops!


The very first flowers. So ephemeral but so nice to see their little heads.


And crocus!


These are the snow crocus and maybe they'll be open tomorrow. And look, the dafodils are letting me know they'll be here soon.


Oh, and I saw a robin today. I think spring is on its way.

Decision

So after many promises, Best Daughter Ever (hey, that's what she calls herself) has come up with the designs for my knitting gift tags. And now I have to decide which one I want. But the problem is I like the font of one, the picture of another, and the wording of another. We have been going back and forth with the emails and I'm not sure we're talking about the same thing. So even though I think I've made a decision, I'm not sure which one I'm getting. But I do like them all.