Found on the web

I was surfing around the blogs the other day and stumbled on these


Aren't these awesome??? I can't wait to make them. The pattern is available for sale at Laurie's blog Issues with Knitting. She also just finished some gorgeous cabled mittens too.

I was also happy to find a Swallowtail Shawl KAL. I found this just in time. I was getting ready to have a knitting breakdown about this shawl. There is an evil, evil stitch in the chart. An evil stitch called P5Tog. FIVE. TOGETHER. Even with my fancy new Knitpicks Options needles, I could NOT deal with this stupid stitch. I couldn't seem to get the needles through all five stitches. And there are tons of them in this pattern. Well, while looking at the KAL page, I read that someone else was having the exact same problem. And ingeniously, she changed it to slip three, purl 2 tog, and then pass the slipped three over the p2tog. Perfect! Now I am back in business and sailing along.

I had some help taking a progress picture.


She just laid down and made herself comfortable... on top of my knitting.

Even without the Poodle's help, I wasn't having the best luck getting a good picture, so this will have to do.



I've got about 20 rows left to knit. I really want to get this finished by Monday so I can enter it in the State Fair And I don't have much knitting time between now and then. Hopefully, after I get through the last few rows of the charts from hell - with the P5tog's taunting me at every turn, it will go faster. I really can't wait to see what this looks like blocked out. I love my yarn, but the color changes kind of obliterate the stitch patterns.

I had a great afternoon yesterday hanging out with Erin, the Cowboy, Jolene and her girls. We sat on Jolene's deck in the sun while the kids played in the yard. Sadly, bad blogger, I forgot my camera. Erin brought her wheel, lots of fiber, and some spindles and taught us how to spin. Amie had taught me once before, but I still have issues with it. Even with Erin, I was having trouble. Erin gave Jolene and I some of her gorgeous hand dyed fiber to play with.
Go check out her shop! She has many beautiful yarns and fiber that she had dyed herself. Love them!

So, last night, in one of my insomniac moments, I stayed up till 3:00 a.m. making this

It may not be perfect, it may not be pretty, but I spun it!

I have a very busy weekend planned. Saturday, Lolly and I are going to the Innovative Beads Expo. Then I am going to have lunch with my best friend from college who I have not seen in about 15 years. I am SO EXCITED! Tom moved to California soon after college, and I haven't seen him in way too long. After lunch I have plans to hang out with S. for the evening. I have no idea what we are doing yet. I think it will probably involve mini-golf and dinner.

I have two shows on Sunday and then I will be headed to Baltimore next week to open our next show there. Tech week hell. Just what I love.

Have a great weekend everyone!