Radical knit/crochet

A friendly waiter at Flying Star told me about this video yesterday. You can fast-forward a minute into it to skip ahead to the crocheter.

The Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Nailed 'Em - Radical Knitting

Colbert at Christmas
Colbert Christmas DVD

Green Screen
Bill O'Reilly Interview

Turkey report

I finally moved the Turkey Day photos off the camera. We spent 5 days in Madison with Hubber's parents. As you can see, his dad is recovering quite well form surgery and was eager to dig into the turkey. You can always see more photos on Flickr.
Getting to Madison is at least a 20-hour drive. So we started it off by heading north on I-25, stopping in Colorado Springs to buy ski passes, and then having lunch in Denver at Hubber's grandma's house. We spent the night somewhere in Nebraska and finished off the drive the next day.

On the trip back, we took a more southerly route, picking up I-35 in Iowa. That took us straight south to Oklahoma City, where we spent the night with friends (actually, in Norman). I was rather brain-dead after the 13.5 hour drive, but we had a great dinner and settled down for an evening of football. The next day's drive would have been an easy 8-hour tour of the high plains, if it weren't for the nasty winds fighting against us. But we did make it back to NM in time to enjoy green chile cheeseburgers for dinner last Sunday.

Checking in

Just a note to say that I am alive. I've been so busy lately that I haven't had much time at all for blogging. When I do have time to relax, I get far away from a computer screen.

I'm in Wisconsin for Thanksgiving. It's rather chilly here, so I've stayed inside a lot. Except that I've gone for a 3-mile run in the afternoon on most days here. Tomorrow, we start the long drive back home.

Like I don't have enough to do already

It seems that whenever I have too much to get done, I find something else that suddenly becomes urgent. Like last weekend when I made several pints of salsa. This weekend, I suddenly found it necessary to cook wool yarn in hot Kool-aid. I blame SavingNine and KBomb for this. They always give me knitting advice that I don't want to follow... but eventually I do. I used the microwave instructions given here and was amazed when I was done with the whole process in less than an hour (except that it's still hanging to dry). I didn't check the time at all, but I was afraid that yarn dyeing could take up half a day. For those who want to know these colors are grape and ice blue raspberry lemonade. My camera really didn't know what to make of that ice blue color.

This week

It's been a rather overwhelming week... but not much to take pictures of. So enjoy a few shots of dogs. First, the very photogenic Vixen showing off her colors. Then Wiley, who is now officially retired from running, jumping, and climbing mountains. It's very sad, but the vet says his spine is degenerating and he already has lost some control of his hind leg. Last, is Kiko who was visiting for the weekend, and provided some entertainment for the other dogs.

On Wednesday I had one of the worst cold/flus ever. It hurt just to get out of bed. Fortunately, I've gotten over that (mostly).

This weekend, I finally admitted that gardening season is over. I rolled up the hoses, pulled out the dying plants and harvested the last of the tomatoes. Now I'm canning 11 pints of salsa.

I also went to the Weems ArtFest today, which is always fun. Although, I didn't buy any art. It's great to live in a place with so many artists.

The big C

Cancer is always such an unwelcome surprise. I'm sick of cancer already, and I've never had it.

This gift I made for my father-in-law as he goes into surgery tomorrow to remove a tumor from his liver. Hopefully he'll enjoy watching lots of movies for the next few weeks while recuperating, and then he'll be back to normal.

I also want to encourage all female readers to join the Army of Women to support breast cancer research. The idea is to recruit one million volunteers for various research trials. I don't have one million readers, so you also have to ask your friends!

Here are some close-ups and details about the cross-stitch. The lettering was all stitched using fancy hand-dyed embroidery floss from A Different Drummer's going out of business sale. The purple/green stuff is made of silk as is the darker blue stuff on the first two lines. The turquoise floss in the middle is made of wool, and it was terrible to work with. It fuzzed up and pulled apart... how is it supposed to be used?



The bear came from a little pattern that I had, but I modified it a bit. Mostly the colors for the butterfly and the blanket thing he's sitting on.

School update

This is the middle of the semester... the time when I realize that there isn't much time left, but there is so much to get done. I took a few midterms last week. I've been studying lots of disparate things for the comprehensive exams and finding some time to learn about Chinese restaurant processes.

Of course, I still find time to do some hiking with the dogs, racquetball, running, yoga, etc... I also went to the climbing gym last week for the first time in over a year. And I've had a little bit of time left over for knitting and cross-stitch. I'll post pictures of my latest project soon.

But I haven't found much time for blogging.

Frost

Sadly, tomato season ended suddenly this week thanks to very cold night temperatures. Here's some photos of frostbitten plants with bajillions of green tomatoes languishing on them.

Fortunately, I harvested this 3 1/2 pound pile of tomatoes (and one jalapeno) on Wednesday before the frost hit. Combined with what I already had, it's enough to make another batch of salsa!

Random meme

I got this one from GutsyMom.

Six random things about me:

1. I used to pronounce "meme" like "mimi" until I looked up the word last week. I used to think it simply reflected how bloggers (including me) always write about themselves, as in "me, me, me..." I still think that my first impression of the word meme is more correct than this definition.
2. I never earned a medal for any sport until I was in my 20's. Now I have several.
   
3. My ape-index is 0.
4. I'm addicted to coffee, diet coke and chocolate and do not intend to do anything about these addictions.
5. I'm not afraid to call myself a feminist.
6. I like doing meme's when I can't think of things to write... but this "write 6 random things" is like telling somebody with writer's block, "Just write something random". Where's the inspiration??
   

If at this point you're saying "I'm so inspired to write 6 random things about myself" then you're tagged. Go to your blog and write those things, and you can leave a comment here that you did so.

Fall colors

We do get fall colors in New Mexico. The cottonwoods all along the valley turn bright gold, as do the aspen in the mountains. Red leaves are a little harder to find. Fortunately, the Fourth of July Canyon in the Manzano mountains was spared the forest fires this summer. On Saturday, Hubbers, Kristal and three dogs went for a hike to enjoy the chilly, wet, red forest.

Amazing... I always thought that black dogs (like Wiley) never show up well in photos. But now we have a dog that is nearly perfectly camouflaged in the forest.

Special Shapes

If you get to the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta early in the morning, this is what you get to see:
A little later, all the cool shapes start inflating, and then eventually they take off and fly away. Here are some of our favorite shapes from this morning.




And this scene of the normal-shaped balloons convinced us that next year we really need to go to a mass-ascension to see the entire field filled with these balloons.

Taos Wool Festival

I went to the Taos Wool Festival last weekend and this is all I have to show for it:
I didn't take any photos during the weekend, so all you get to see is the stuff that I brought back with me. It was a beautiful fall weekend in Taos. It was chilly. It was wet. The leaves were turning golden. The sky was gray. Absolutely perfect!

Hubbers and I drove up with the two dogs and camped out on Saturday with a friend and her son. We went for a couple of short hikes and spent the rest of the time at the festival and the park.

The festival is really all about the wool... You can get beautifully dyed wool yarn, or wool for felting, or undyed yarn, or a whole fleece or even a living, breathing angora rabbit. I already had enough yarn at home to keep me busy for another year. So I bought yarn for the three months after that. Which means I won't need to buy any more until next year's festival.

Cosmos

Behind me are the monster cosmos that I grew from seed this year... and in front of me is a monster basil. What's my gardening secret? Brag about the one good gardening year I've ever had and don't tell you about the previous years :)

Okay, I put 2 cubic feet of compost in this little garden in the spring. Plus, if you look closely at the lower-left corner of the photo, you'll see the timer for my watering system. The timer is much better at watering than I am. And to make it even better, this particular spot in my yard gets plenty of extra water that drips off the roof and plenty of afternoon shade. I tripled the size of this flower bed when I noticed that the weeds and grass do so well in this spot.

Vixen

After watching all her shenanigans yesterday, I had to name her Vixen. It came down to a decision between Cherry and Vixen. I also realized that nearly every dog in the neighborhood has a 2-syllable name ending in "y": Wiley, Daisy, Sparky, Rocky, Baby, Candy, Holly... and Boo (I said Nearly every dog). Enough's enough! So she's Vixen. Besides, I have a fondness for reindeer names since one of my best dog-friends ever, Dasher, had a reindeer name.

Honestly, I call Wiley "Doggers" more often than I call him Wiley. So once Vixen learns her real name, I can also give her a nickname... maybe Cherry :)

Next week I'll have to think of something other than dogs to write about. That shouldn't be too hard since I'm headed up to the Taos Wool Festival this weekend, yay!

The naming continues...

I forgot to include these two names which are also top contenders:
Ginger - ala Ginger Rogers
Vixen - she looks very much like a fox and according to Hubbers a vixen is a female fox (I didn't know that). It's also a reindeer name like the name Dancer which the shelter gave her.

I just discovered that she can hop over a 4-ft adobe wall like it's not there. She looked rather cat-like while doing it. And she had a great time rolling around in our neighbor's yarrow, which makes her smell like she just had an herbal treatment at the spa. We're working on training her to stay in the yard, just like Wiley, since the walls won't keep her in. Fortunately, our neighbors are quite friendly about that sort of thing.

Wiley seems to be smiling more often now that he has a playmate. She's actually quite mellow and she's smaller than Wiley so he's not intimidated by her. She doesn't disturb him while he's napping and she never invades his space. But she is tearing apart his toys which he no longer plays with. She's still getting over her shyness with us (she is a few years old and has had at least two previous homes), so I don't think we've seen her full personality yet.

Top name ideas

In response to everyone's comments from the previous post: Her color is best described like a light dusting of snow on a red sandstone desert. If you've been fortunate enough to be in the 4-corners area during a winter snow... you have the right picture. Of course, these deserts always have a hint of green sage, cacti or junipers, so I'm getting her all green accessories (collar, bed, etc...)

Here are the top name ideas we have (in no particular order):

Autumn - for her color and the time of year of the adoption
Pumpkin
Cherry Bomb - or just Cherry because she's sweet
Cayenne - the first name I thought of that I really liked... but Troy doesn't like it.
Pepper
Sedona - for her red dirt coloring
Sequoia
Lucy - after the famous redhead Lucille Ball

There's more, but I can't think of them now. As you can see, nearly every name has something to do with her orange-red color. We could consider non-color names. But so far I haven't thought of many that I like.

New Pup

We just added a 3-year-old red heeler to the family today. Feel free to leave name suggestions in the comments. She doesn't respond any better to the shelter's name, "Dancer", than she does to "Girly Girl".


We have more photos and stuff on Troy's webpage.

For Knitting Geeks

I'm trying to finish up my Sorta Secret Sweater* and couldn't decide whether to follow the instructions in the pattern or do something different. In the pattern, I'm supposed to pick-up stitches all around the front edges of the cardigan, neck and bottom, then bind off. However, this will require a circular needle which I do not have. That problem was easily solved by ordering KnitPicks' interchangeable circular needle set.

The other problem is that the bottom edge of the sweater rolls up and doesn't look very nice. I tried to get the Tuesday Ladies to tell me how to deal with this, but SavingNine would just insist that I should try out the alternatives on my gauge sample. Of course, my gauge sample no longer exists. So I read a knitting book which recommends two rows of single-crochet along the cast-on or bind-off edge. I finally knit up a new swatch and tried out the options:The top edge is what the pattern recommends: pick up stitches and bind-off. Clearly, this edge insists on rolling. So I'm going with the bottom edge: two rows of single-crochet for the bottom of the sweater. For the sides, I like the picked-up stitches (left edge). Binding off there looks like a much neater column of stockinette stitches. The right edge is single-crochet which looks messy to me. The problem with single-crochet on a selvedge is that it creates sideways v's (they're perpendicular to the stockinette v's).

*I was going to call it a Super Secret Sweater, but then realized that anything posted to a public blog is not really secret, so I needed a new aliteration.

Speaking of home improvement...

Next on my list of big ideas for the house is to install solar water heating. We have radiant floor heat, so solar hot water would heat the whole house with far less gas than we're using now. I'm not so excited about photovoltaics, because they are not cost effective. However, heating water with sunlight is much more direct. Sunlight naturally provides heat and light in abundance but not electricity.

This Saturday, I'll be going to the Solar Fiesta to attend a workshop on solar hot water. Hopefully, I'll find out how to buy and install a system that will pay for itself within 5 years. I think that's reasonable, but I'm not sure.

And if I can pull that off, my next environmentally-minded home project will be composting to reduce our amount of trash. I tried composting when we first moved in, but gave it up because it didn't seem to be working. At the State Fair, I saw a brochure on composting that might help this time around.

5 years

On September 15, 2003 we closed on and moved into our house. These pictures were probably taken the next day, as there was no daylight left by the time we got to our house on the 15th. It takes hours and hours to close on a house.
A few days after moving in, while there will still boxes to be unpacked, Troy painted a wall in the office. He didn't like the dark wood paneling, and immediately wanted it painted to a bright, cheerful yellow. We did manage to unpack the rest of the boxes relatively soon after, but we haven't stopped working on the house. Here's a list of some of the work done:

• Painted 5 rooms and outside trim
  
• New flooring in half the house
• New roof
• Repaired wall damaged from leaking roof
  
• New windows
• Repaired and stuccoed retaining wall that holds up the entire property
• Plenty of little electrical repairs
• Renovated one bathroom, and put a new toilet in the other
• Planted 10 trees
• Leveled front yard
• Replaced in-ground sprinklers with in-ground drip
  
• Demolished old shed and put in a new one
• Expanded back patio and replaced broken brick walkway
  

So a house is a lot of work. But I really appreciate not having to pack everything up and move every time I sign a new lease :) Plus, we have more equity in our house than debt... which is pretty cool.

Productive Weekend

I feel like I got a lot done this weekend:

• Walked in the State Fair parade for the Re-elect Jason Marks Campaign.
  
• 19 new plants in the ground (Plants of the SW had a great sale), and requisite drippers put into place.
  
• 7 pounds of tomatoes harvested and turned into 6 pints of salsa. I can't believe how frustrating it is to can stuff, and I keep trying it again thinking MAYBE this time I actually have enough tomatoes to make a worthwhile amount of salsa... but no. At least it tastes good.
• Ran 3 miles.

If you're really paying attention, you may be asking "Hey, weren't you supposed to run a 10k today?" The answer is that I had been training for a 10k, but I had to abandon it two weeks ago due to allergies, and then couldn't get back into it because my left leg became incredibly sore. It's all better now, so the next running goal is the Duke City Marathon Relay in October where I'll do a 6.2-mile leg.

Hello from Wisconsin

Actually, I'm back home from Wisconsin now, but that's a picture from our 6-day weekend in Madison. While there, we visited people, fed mosquitoes in the park, toured Old World Wisconsin (pictured below), shopped at the farmer's market and ate a lot of good food.


I also found plenty of time to knit. I'm not going to say anything more about this project because it will be a gift... if you want to know more, you'll have to see the details in ravelry. Flying is so much nicer now that I knit while listening to a book on MP3 (if you're in Abq, you can download them from the library) with noise-canceling headphones. When they make me take my headphones off for landing, I can never believe how loud the plane is.

A Year

A year ago, on August 24 to be exact, I went to the doctor because something seemed wrong in my abdomen. After many more appointments and a surgery, it was determined that I had a rather large, benign, uterine tumor which was removed. I bring this up today because very recently, I received and paid the final bill for this illness. Why did it take a full year to pay for this? It had nothing to do with me paying installments, I simply never received this bill until now. That's apparently how long it can take a hospital and an insurance company to muddle through all their paperwork. I'm glad I'm not an accountant for a hospital.

During this past year, I've managed to recover completely from the surgery. In yoga class yesterday, I discovered that I'm more flexible than the average UNM student that signs up for Intermediate Yoga. And I haven't had any problems running, even doing speedwork. It may be time to start rock climbing again.

Ravelympics is done

The Olympics is over, so Ravelympics is over. I finished knitting two items and received two medals. The first is a cabled scarf made from the aran yarn I bought in Ireland. I started this on the first day of the Olympics and had 1/4 of it done by the end of the day. It took 12 days to finish the other 3/4.

At that point, I was running low on time so I started the second project right away (on Aug 20). It took four days to knit up the purse. Then I felted it on Sunday. The knitting part is done, so I claimed my medal. But I still need to add the zipper and liner before I can really use the purse. Hopefully, I'll get that done tonight (I had to wait for it to dry).

More New Mexico

A couple more New Mexican things that I forgot to put in the last post:

While gardening last weekend, I looked up to see a roadrunner standing about 2 feet from me. He walked around the yard a bit before hopping over the adobe wall that separates us from the neighbors.

While driving to the local high school to run around their track, I saw a guy riding his horse down Arenal. Is horse feed cheaper than gas? You could say that this would only happen in the South Valley, but I've also seen goats crossing Central in the middle of downtown. They were accompanied by people, but I'm not sure if they were simply out for a walk or if there is some business downtown that a goat would want to visit.

And finally... allergies. It is a common myth that you can cure allergies by moving to the desert. Every year, this is proven incorrect. My "fall" allergies start in August and continue right through October. The over-the-counter drugs stopped working at the beginning of this week so I made an appointment to see a doctor. The earliest I could get an appointment is today. In the meantime, it's really been a waste of a week. I can't sleep... or stay awake. After an hour of work, I need a nap. My eyes and throat feel like they're on fire, and so I've stopped running. Hopefully, later today I'll be back to normal.

New Mexico

I am feeling very New Mexican this week as I sit in my home-office smelling the pungent roasting of green chiles. At first, I thought this was left over from peeling green chiles last night. However, the smell of burnt chile skins is so strong and seems to be coming in from the window. It must be coming from Nelson's grocery a block away.

Some more New Mexico moments:

• I had to talk to an overly friendly customer service person in a far away state recently. She asked about the weather, I told her it might rain. She said "I hope your day isn't ruined by any raindrops." I was blown away... my day would be ruined by NOT getting any drops! When clouds come in, we always get our hopes up and then we can see it raining a mile away and it may not hit our house.
• I've spent this summer fighting with a yard where it is both impossible to grow anything and impossible to control the weeds. The most paradoxical fight has been against unwanted thirsty grass. We don't water it enough to have a nice lawn, but it invades the garden and rock areas. We'd like to put in drought-tolerant native grass, but the thirsty grass which looks pathetic will choke out the new grass.
• We've been eating a lot of stuff grown in the backyard, including purslane which grows like a weed. I have neighbors that get arugula as a weed.
• On Friday, when we wanted to get something to eat at 9pm, the only thing open in our neighborhood was a tacqueria where no English is spoken.

Loveland

Chapter 3 of the Colorado trip: Wedding in Loveland. It seems I attend a wedding a year. This year it was time for Troy's college roommate to get married. Coincidentally the friend now teaches at the very same school they attended as undergrads. On Saturday morning, I got up early enough to do my running workout on a high school track in Denver, then got ready for the wedding and drove on up to Loveland.

Thanks to my knitting group, I was told that there is a great yarn shop in Loveland called Woolen Treasures that I just had to go to. Only problem: the shop is open 10am - 5pm on Saturday and not at all on Sunday. The wedding was at 10:30 am and the reception was scheduled to end at 5pm. Well, it turns out that the yarn shop was nearly across the street from the wedding, so I did find time to go to it.
Of course, I don't actually need any new yarn, but I wanted to see what was so cool about this shop. They really manage to pack a lot of fun yarn and inspiring sample projects in a cute little house. I got some half-price sock yarn. And then I searched for anything I could justify as "local" yarn. I found some gorgeous hand-painted stuff from Lonesome Stone. Most of the yarn cost far more than I could justify spending without a project in mind. So I got a reasonably-priced skein of mohair in this fiery colorway which they call Aztec Mountain. I have a couple of ideas for how to use it, and I'm eager to get started... but I have other things to finish first.
Oh yeah, the wedding was nice. There were plenty of friendly people there and it's good see a couple that knows not to get all stressed out over little wedding details. We also enjoyed the Sunday picnic by Loveland Lake.

Visiting Gramma

This is chapter 2 of the Colorado trip (see previous post). Gramma is actually my grandmother-in-law, but I have no other living grandparents so it should be clear to whom I am referring. After climbing Mt. Yale on Thursday, we continued the drive on into Denver to Gramma's house. At 91 years old, Gramma has limited activities that she can do. Her favorite is telling stories and talking. So I spend a lot of time sitting in the living room knitting and talking (listening, mostly).

On this trip, she made an odd comment about how she always sees me starting projects but never finishing them. It's odd because she sees me in the middle of projects... she almost never sees me "start" a new project, and she actually has seen some of the finished products. Anyway, it was Thursday evening... the night before the start of Ravelympics. Which of course meant that on Friday I would be starting a new project. Therefore on Thursday I was working on a sock that I knew I wouldn't finish before starting my Ravelympics scarf. So on Friday, for once, her comment was actually true.

On Friday, I took a badly needed rest day from running and hiking. By the end of the day, I had used up most of my first skein of Irish yarn on this scarf:

Colorado mountains

I just got back from a 6-day trip to Colorado, which included hiking mountains, visiting Grandma and attending a wedding. I'll post in chapters. The first chapter is Mountains.

Why climb mountains? It's for the view, of course! Okay, that's a quick answer, and obviously it's not always true. The top photo shows the best view we got during a lot of steep hiking up Mt Yale. We still went all the way to the top to get the great family portrait below... that could have been on any old rock pile. Despite the clouds, the weather was pretty good for being 14,000 feet up. This was last Thursday.

On Monday, we did a quick hike up Mt Evans where Wiley enjoyed the view below. We actually started lower down than this parking lot. We hiked about a mile to reach the summit, although most people simply drive the whole way. Clearly, we didn't hike this one for the wilderness experience.

Finally, on Tuesday we got a great view and a mountain to ourselves. Getting to the top of Mt Columbia was a tough 4000-foot elevation gain in 5 miles (one way). This certainly isn't the toughest 14-er in Colorado, but it kicked my butt. Actually, I've done 16 of these 14,000+ peaks and all but two of them have kicked my butt (those two weren't easier, I was just in incredibly good shape that year). Even that short one mile hike up Mt Evans, required many breaks to catch my breath and convince myself that there was some reason to keep going.

I still can't explain what reason I find for pushing myself up these mountains. It's the same reason I train to run 10k's, knit challenging projects, and go to school for another degree.

(There are a few more photos from the trip on Flickr).

The color, not the pants

A quick little meme before I head off to Colorado. I got this from SavingNine.

you are khaki

Your dominant hues are red and green, so you're definately not afraid to get in and stir things up. You have no time for most people's concerns, you'd rather analyze with your head than be held back by some random "gut feeling". Your saturation level is lower than average - You don't stress out over things and don't understand people who do. Finishing projects may sometimes be a challenge, but you schedule time as you see fit and the important things all happen in the end, even if not everyone sees your grand master plan. Your outlook on life is bright. You see good things in situations where others may not be able to, and it frustrates you to see them get down on everything.

the spacefem.com html color quiz

Pesto

A few weeks back, I mentioned that basil is taking over my garden. Well, it still is, despite giving away several plants. I've made plenty of basil-based dishes over the past few weeks. Today I decided to pick as much basil as I could and make however much pesto that turned out to be. I managed to pick 4 cups of basil and 2 cups of parsley before giving up... there's at least 4 times as much basil still out there. With my little mini food processor, I can only turn one cup of basil (and all the other ingredients) into a batch of pesto at a time. Now I have a batch of regular basil pesto, spicy pest, sun-dried tomato pesto and garlic-artichoke pesto. The last one was experimental and it turned out rather creamy, more like a spread. Invite me over for a potluck, and you're likely to get a pesto dish!

I'll be heading up to Colorado later this week. The primary reason for the trip is a wedding on Saturday in Loveland. But then, we also have to visit Gramma in Denver and climb some mountains on the way. The plan is to drive to an as-yet-undetermined mountain in southern Colorado on Wednesday evening. Climb that mountain Thursday morning. Climb Mt Evans on Friday morning the continue on in to Denver. Attend wedding and related activities on Saturday and Sunday. Return to Denver and hang out there on Monday. Climb another mountain on Tuesday and head home. Somehow this long weekend turned into a week-long trip.

Neither the mountains nor Gramma's house are conducive to blogging... so it may be a while before the next post. Unless I find time to say something before I leave.

Swatches

It's August 1, and that means that I can upload more photos to Flickr. So, here's the rest of the Ireland photos.

This is also a landmark post because I'm actually at home enjoying high speed internet... YAY, it's about time! No more need to cart the laptop around in search of bandwidth.

We have formed Team Albuquerque for the Ravelympics. This just means that a bunch of us knitters/crocheters have signed up to start a new project on the first day of the Olympics and finish by the last day (it's about 17 days). This sounded like a good challenge, but for me it also means that I'm trying really hard to finish my pair of socks before the Olympics start, so I can then work on the other projects.

Of course, I learned my lesson with those socks which came out too small. So, in preparation for my Ravelympics projects, I made test swatches. This first is using my Irish aran yarn, which will become a reversible cable scarf. Can't you just picture this yarn with cables? The gauge came out just right, so no adjustments needed. Now, I just need to learn to make cables, and buy the correct needles. I used my size 8 double points to make the swatch, because I don' have size 8 straight needles.

The next swatch is Magallanes hand-dyed yarn. It's variable-width and it could make a cool felted purse. Although I was getting tired of felted purses, they are quick to knit, so I'm hopefully going to produce a purse that I actually want to use. Getting the dimensions right is critical because I'm rather picky about purse sizes... must be big enough to carry the essentials, but no bigger. And it needs to have a zipper to keep it all in.