Fiber Fool

Goodbye 2013, can’t say I’ll really miss you! But, 2014 - so far so good! In hopes of keeping it that way I’m going to try to greet every week with gratitude! Perhaps that will help me ease back into the routine of blogging as well as lift my spirits.

So, for this first week of 2014, I’m grateful for:

1. New adventures with DH! This last week we ventured to the NoCo Ice Center for a two hour Learn to Curl class and it was a blast. I have two really, really bruised knees - it is much harder to glide in a lunge position with a broom in one hand and a 42 pound stone in the other than I imagines. But, by the end of the two hours I was much more consistent in staying upright and starting to put more energy towards speed and aim on the stone during the release. Early on I spent a lot of time down on the ice though. I even made the local paper (see picture 6).



2. DH for braving the cold temps and walking to the grocery store to make sure I had food for SnB at our house tonight when the temps were too cold for the car to start.
3. Snowy Saturdays when I don’t have to go anywhere and can curl up with books, coffee and tea in comfy and warm flannel PJs covered in knitting sock monkeys.
4. Baked breakfasts! I banished cereals a few years ago which means breakfast is not the quick and easy meal that it once had been. In the winter I especially want a hot breakfast. Yogurt and fruit just won’t do. So we’ve taken lately to making baked egg stratas and baked oatmeals. It is so slick as we throw everything together before bed, pop stuff in the oven while we shower and boom it’s time to eat when we’re all dressed. We get a hot, filling breakfast with less stress than something that requires full morning prep!



5. I was so lucky this holiday season and got many of the items on my wishlist. One of which I’ve been enjoying a lot lately is Green Gables Knits. I cast on Diana’s Hat on Christmas Eve. I ended up using one size larger needle because it was handy and I had a lot of reasons to justify it (I tend to knit tight, my head is on the larger end of the spectrum for women, etc. etc.) and it is a tad too big after blocking. So, I took the time to locate the proper needle size and cast on another right away. Both are in Plain & Fancy Wool Co’s sportweight. The first was in Primary and Navy and the second is as written in one color, avocado. I’m loving the project as it is such easy knitting for all the holiday visiting and movie watching. Plus, I have a few bosom friends in mind I might like to surprise :-)

How is 2014 treating you so far? What are you grateful for this week?

I’m taking a break from fit Friday this week. Not because I haven’t been doing stuff this week, but there isn’t much to report and I have no photos. So, today I’m going to share with you what I gave you a glimpse of in Tuesday’s post - a finished knit object! Yes, I finished knitting something. It is a minor miracle!

I received a somewhat last minute invitation to a birthday party for a one year old. I had limited funds and limited time, but wanted to bring something to mark the occasion. I happened to have three balls of Austermann Bambou Soft in the stash in boy-appropriate colors - one ball of camo-inspired variegated and one ball of coordinating tan. At first I thought I’d do an inverted version of Amanda’s riff on my Sundog pattern, Sunpup. But with it being May, she pointed out it was likely to get forgotten by the time the weather was appropriate. Plus I had no clue what size this boy was for his age as I hadn’t seen him since Halloween. So a softie seemed like a better option.

I’m so glad I went that route as most all of the presents given were hard plastic toys and several made lots of noise. The softie stood out amongst the crowd of gifts and was well received by the birthday boy, his parents, and several of the party goers too!

Pattern: Knit Hedgehogs by Purl Soho
Yarn: Austermann Bambou Soft, 65% superwash wool, 35% bamboo - I used a single strand of the tan for the face, ears and belly and doubled the variegated for the body/back portion.
Needles: The called for US 4 and US 8

The pattern was pretty straight forward, especially since Purl Soho always includes a lot of step-out photos along the way. I think it took me about 3-4 hours total of knitting. I suspect if I knit another one in the semi-near future it would go even faster. I did like doubling the variegated yarn for the body as I knew the face and body were compatible and since I drew the yarn from different ends of each ball and made sure colors didn’t line up when I started I had no pooling. I think the result is adorable, even though I was a little dubious about the camo colors in the softie in the beginning.

I’ll definitely keep this pattern in mind for any future children’s gift knitting I’m wishing to do. It isn’t a huge investment of time or yarn and is a fun knit.

While living through one natural disaster is never the same as another, I know some things are universal whether you survived a devastating flood that covered more than 3/4 of a town like I did, a hurricane or a tornado like that the hit Moore, OK yesterday:

• It is upsetting to not know how friends and loved ones are faring
• It is stressful not knowing where your next meal is going to come from
• Or where you are going to sleep and when you might get sleep again
• While help may be coming it never seems like quite enough or fast enough or last long enough to find some sort of new normalcy

I am not in a position right now to make the kind of difference I’d like, but every little bit helps. Especially a lot of little bits. I’ve experienced it. And while it won’t be super timely, I know the citizens of Moore will need help for a while. I’d like you to help me help the tornado victims. I’ll be donating 10% of my Ravelry pattern profits through June 20th to the American Red Cross Oklahoma Tornado Relief Fund.

I’ve you’ve been procrastinating on buying Nourishing Knits now would be a great time! I also have a lot of really great patterns for summer knitting, some as economic as $3 - Towel Trio, Stellar Facecloth, Cirrus Shrug, Ganache Shawl, Kate Shawl and of course tons of sock patterns.

On a personal note, I’m slowly finding my new normal while DH is gone and things are improving now that I have some part time work, my hands are out in the garden, and I’m back to the gym thanks to Christmas and birthday money from my parents and grandparents. Thank you to those who took the time to send me e-mail or Rav mail. I really appreciate it and will get back to you soon. I’ll update you all on what I’ve been up to over the coming days and weeks I’m sure.

Well, the forecast for the weekend - both weather and activity-wise did not pan out as expected. I didn’t even finish the Longmire book let alone start something else. We only got maybe 3″ of snow and it is pretty much all gone already. We did hibernate and watched a handful of movies and enjoyed some yummy, leisurely breakfasts.

I did get about three 24-row repeats in on my current DIP which means I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. I am getting more excited about sourcing a better yarn for it and I have some other ideas spinning off from this one. Perhaps a collection? I’m also working on reformatting some of the more popular older patterns as well as some of the ones I did for My Sister Knits that are not currently up on their web site.

How about you? What did you do this weekend? What are you grateful for as we start out the week?

This week, I’m thankful for:

• The plethora of locally owned coffee shops around town so I can support the local economy while getting a much needed change of scenery to spark my creativity and boost my productivity. So many of them are also roasters or buy from regional/local roasters who buy fair trade and shade grown beans too! I’m lucky!
• My coffee press! When I feel like being a homebody and not in need of a change of scenery my French press gets a lot of love and is essential to my day. Of course, it is filled with locally roasted beans :-)
• Moisture! While the snow was less than forecasted and hoped for, I think we got a bit more moisture in the form of rain than they were predicting and moisture is a good thing in whatever form it falls.
• High speed Internet which makes work so much easier, but also entertainment in the form of streaming movies and television shows. Much of the weekend was filled with streaming and surprisingly we enjoyed much of what we watched. If you’d ask my sister I have a horrible track record for choosing movies and DH and I don’t always agree on movie genres or time periods.

Yes, there is a small amount of knitting going on around these parts. This week it has mostly just been at knit night, sadly. But the project is moving forward, if at a tad slower pace than I’d like. It has also sparked some other ideas that are bouncing around in my head now. I love it when that happens!

What are you knitting (or crocheting or spinning) these days? Something seasonal? Getting a jump start on gifts (or finishing up belated ones)?

I’m hoping to get a bit of knitting done over the weekend, though my back/neck will dictate how much. Last week’s cold snap triggered a stubborn spasm that I haven’t been able to fully kick yet. I also have an upcycled sewing project in the works that I’d like to wrap up. Partly to finish something but also because once completed it should help with my back/neck :-)

Tonight though, the weekend will start with birthday celebrations to kick off DH’s next trip around the sun with after work drinks with friends at a swanky local bar followed by dinner at DH’s favorite Italian restaurant (I’m hoping to pre-burn those carbs with a run over lunch today, though I ran after work last night so I’m not sure how that will go with less than 24 hours between runs).

So, in addition to some knitting and sewing this weekend I’m also hoping to sneak in more lefse making, bottling the current batch of kombucha and starting the next, a nap or two, some reading and perhaps a movie. If the weather holds perhaps a trail run or a bike ride too (or some form of physical activity anyway)! I’m sure I’m way overestimating, but it is good to have options on what to do, right? Of course, some of those things can be multi-tasked.

What do you hope to do this weekend? Something fun I hope!