Mid-Life Crisis?

I was at Zellers the other day for something totally unrelated to yarn, but I usually stop off in the craft section and see if they have any ribbon yarn. For my stash you know? I love to use the ribbon yarns in my mixed warp scarves. I wish that I had know that I loved ribbon yarn so much a few years ago when it was so popular. Now I have a hard time finding it anywhere. On line perhaps, but I'm not an online shopper.

So back to the pathetic craft isle. They had a lot of dishrag cotton.

A lot.

And for some reason, for the first time, it spoke to me.

And not only dishrag cotton, but PINK dishrag cotton!

Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against dishrag cotton, nor anything against pink, but they are just not me. Think rich, dark silk and we'll talk. Pink cotton? Hmmm.

But this one little skein had to come home with me. I dug out the required needles and started. Never mind that pair of socks on which I have one toe to kitchener and one toe to to finish knitting. And that pesky mitten thumb. That's not being worked on either. I started to knit them for Christmas but didn't get them finished. That was Christmas 2007. Oops.
And the pattern that I chose was "feather and fan". A lace pattern. My story is that I am practicing lace before I start on my shawl again. I decided that I don't like the hand spun that I am using. I'm not sure what I am going to substitute. When I figure it out, I'll let you know.
So hopefully soon, I will be the proud owner of a pink lace dishcloth. And a rather large one from the look of it so far.

And I am not sure what the progress of things is at the farm. I called today, but there was no answer. No surprise really. I can only assume that they are both very busy. But I will be seeing mom tomorrow and let you all know.

All fixed

I ripped back my lace to the ( thank heavens and all of the powers that be) a straight simple knit row just before my ..... mistake. I considered trying to weave in a life line. I decided that that would be like thinking of buying a PFD after you fell into the water. Just a little to late to be of much help. I abandoned that idea. I considered tinking back for the 5 rows and thought that I would rather just go for it and rip it back to the row before my mistake. Which I did. Carefully. Very carefully.

I was able to put all of my stitches back on my needles. After which I went through and corrected the few that I put on the wrong way. I counted my stitches and miracles of miracles had the right amount in the right places. I found my row on the chart and knit the next row just to make sure that I had done it all right. Once that was finished and I found that everything was alright, I put it all away and cracked open a beer and here I am telling you all how I saved myself from having to knit that %@#$*&^ neck chart again.

Did I mention that I made the mistake while knitting when I was a bit tired. Knowing myself, I set out conditions under which I could not, or at least should not knit lace. And of those was being tired. Lace and fatigue are not a good combination. But I was getting cocky. "This is easy now. I know the stitches. So what if I am a little tired, I can follow the pattern". Famous last words.

As they say "Hoisted by my own petard". I always wondered what a petard was. Now I know.

On Closer Inspection

I noticed that my lace had a dropped stitch about 4-6-8 rows back. So much for my progress. Sigh.

Look! Lace!

I told you I was going to work on it! I have finished the neck chart and have started on the body chart. And it is actually starting to make sense.

A Touch of Frost

Jack Frost paid a tiny visit last night. Bill and Liam went out this evening to investigate the damage of a few hours at 0 C and came back with a rather positive report. Jack kindly left the tomatoes alone and touched his frost brush on the tips of the squash plants and a few of the pepper plants. But only on one side of the garden. I guess that when the weather man says "patchy frost" he really means it. So they picked all of the tomatoes, yet more broccoli, a few cucumbers, and heavens, could it be? Crimson hot peppers that were actually starting to become crimson!

Every year in January, the Stokes seed catalogue comes. January in my neck of the woods is bitterly cold and outdoors everything is frozen and covered in snow and ice. It will remain that way until usually the end of March. At which point we will have a few teasing weeks of spring like weather before getting hit by yet another snow storm. In January, spring seems a long ways away. But there is the catalogue of all the vegetables spread out like..... well.... only a northern gardener could really know what I am talking about... but .... I call it Garden Pr0n. You know what I mean. Some people take the Lee Valley catalogue to the bathroom. I take the seed catalogue. So there you are looking at page after page of plants. And variety! The last year that I counted there were 76 different types of tomatoes! 76! Sigh. And they also have a good number of peppers of both the hot and the sweet variety. The hot ones even have the Scoville rating so that you know what you are getting yourself in for!

But I digress.

So one January, a number of years ago, I was drooling over the various plants and came across the pepper section. "I want to try something new this year" was the thought that popped into my head (we are, after all, experimental eaters. At least we older ones are). So I started to check different pepper types and their Scoville rating and found that the crimson hot offered a fairly decent rating without my fearing the punch that some hot peppers can have. And lets face it, we have all had one of those experiences where something that went into our mouth was just a little too much to handle. The crimson hots were a respectable 1250-2500 on the Scoville scale, well bellow habenero's and well above some of the, ahem, wimpy peppers.

To make a long story longer, they were ordered, planted, tended, harvested, and then processed in to the most wonderful hot sauce that could be imagined. Go look. I know you want to. There is even a picture of the sexy little beauties. Sigh.

Wow! Was that ever a tangent! I think I need to go knit a few rows on my much neglected lace shawl. Remember that? I have almost finished the first 20 rows of the neck chart and will soon proceed to the body chart. Pathetic. I know. But I have a finish deadline for this thing of December 2013. I think that I will make it.

I love achievable goals.

No! What? Really????

STOP THE PRESSES!!!!!!
I don't know quite how to say this, but, I started knitting LACE last night! Me! And Lace. In the same room, at the same time! Working together. Knitting a few rows. Lace! Can you believe it!?! It still looks like something the cat chewed up and spit out, but apparently with lace, that is OK at this stage.
A couple of weeks ago, my friend Sarah gave me a quick lace tutorial. She looked at my possible patterns and declared them sound and easy. Then she showed me the proper way to yo and ssk. I took a few days to digest the info and last night started with some of my hand spun. Wow!
And, of course, being me and it being lace, I have decided to give a few different yarns a try. The one that I knit with last night is my finely spun Mermaids Dream. It may be a little thick. I plied and washed some of my white merino singles that has been sitting on the bobbin for weeks and I am going to give that a try. And I also have some fine white alpaca that I may try.
I am also using Addi Turbos for the first time. I find that they are not pointy enough for my tastes. Do you want sharp points when knitting lace, or is it just me in my naivety who wants my points to be lethal weapons?
And while I am on the subject, when you spinners measure WPI how closely is you yarn squashed? I know when I measure WPI for weaving, I leave a little space between each wrap, just enough so that they are barely touching. This is to leave room for the weft. Even still I sometimes have to adjust my sett. So do you jam as much yarn as you can into that inch? Or are things a little more relaxed? Thanks!