November first means more space on Flickr!

Which means more post for you!!!

Where to start? At the beginning! The weekend of the 21st was Rhinebeck, so I jumped into a car with blogless Ruth (who's a pretty good driver I must say!) and we worked our way up to the beautiful land of upstate New York. The trees were extremely pretty!


I didn't do a lot of picture taking on Saturday because I was too busy spending money on yarn and navigating the THRONG OF PEOPLE that suddenly all decided to go to Rhinebeck on Saturday. It was a gorgeous day! Warm, sunny, and the lines for lamb made me really glad that I had brought my own turkey sandwich. The line for the hot cider was waaay shorter!

I'm told that at Rhinebeck there were tons of celebrities. I only ran into Stitchy McYarn Pants. She looked pretty much the way I'd expect her to look. The only other celebrity I ran into was the lovely Nicole Forrester, of Guiding Light fame and most importantly, the cover of Greetings from Knit Cafe. She's in the front left of this photo.



That night found us at Jill's (she's the redhead in the above pic) parents' place in some town up north there. I was amazed when I stepped out of the car and found that I was surrounded by stars! Gorgeous stars could be see so brightly! You could pick out the milky way and all that! I've always been fascinated with astronomy. Oooh! That just gave me a great idea for a sweater. It would be navy blue with sparkles, like that RYC Soft Luxe stuff and then the yoke would feature a string of stars all the way around. That might be my next design venture!

Anyway...enough about stars...

We had a great night, woke up the next morning and went back at it. I followed a few people around, like Heather, who convinced me (so, fine she didn't actually say anything, just helped me along in line) to get some Mountain Colors sock yarn with great greens, yellows, blues, purples and *gasp* pinks! But that's ok, because I got this great picture of her trying to eat the yummy lime green mohair:



Having totally spent all the money I wanted to (and a bit more too!), I decided that some damage control was in order. It was time for me to get friendly with the sheep.


And friendly we got. This one in particular was quite photogenic. But there were others as well. One had the most sproingey fleece. He was fortunately wearing it so I didn't disturb him too much. Just petted him A LOT. This one had horns that reminded me of Rhody the Ram. Actually, the fact that it's a profile is also very Rhody like. Yes, I've some pride for my alma mater.


And then there was the fuzzy cute odd dwarfy looking sheep. I just thought it was too cute. And with the bandana it almost looks like it wants me to take it home with me and keep it as a pet!



After all was said and done, this is what I have to say for myself:


Some Morehouse merino Bulky weight yarn for the Weekend Pullover from Weekend Knitting by Melanie Falick.


A bit of Maple Creek Farm Superwash Merino that's destined to be an Hourglass Sweater from Last Minute Knitted Gifts, some Mountain Colors Barefoot in Mountain Tango colorway that's destined to be a sock of unknown pattern, and a bit of Springtide Cashmere that will end up being part of some intarsia piratey cuffs. I cleaned up pretty good. Spent a bit more than I wanted to on account of the Morehouse Merino booth being there. I've wanted to knit that one sweater for forever. I just can't imagine knitting it with anything other than this yarn. It's just too sproingey, too weekendy to not knit with.


So that was Rhinebeck weekend. Last weekend I went to my friend's baby shower. I was very nervous giving her the Baby Bobbi Bear because its eyes and especially its nose weren't quite up to my standards (my standards tend to be pretty high though). But it was a hit! My buddy John seemed to really like it a lot (he mentioned something about bringing it to bed with him that night!), and I think he named it Molly. In all her glory, I introduce you to Molly. Molly, the world, World, Molly:



Molly was knit with size nine needles (though I probably should have knit her on 8s) with Blue Sky Alpacas Cotton yarn. It was quite easy to knit, though if you're going to knit this, I strongly suggest that you read the errata along with the pattern. Otherwise the pattern doesn't make a smidge of sense.

On the needles right now is the Brother's sweater. I've done most of the math...I just hope I did it correctly. I have to rip back about four rows of the back (not a big deal at all) because I think I misjudged the ribbing in the middle. I'm also working on a pair of Jaywalkers in Mountain Colors Barefoot but in a different color way than the hank I got at Rhinebeck. I thought I should use up that yarn before I use the new hank. To be honest, I'm having a hard time getting gauge. I think I'm on a size zero and I'm pretty sure that the smallest size is still going to be a bit big. I really love the yarn, and am afraid that if I use a different stitch pattern that's a bit more intense that either the color or the stitch pattern will get lost. So I'm in the hunt for another decent sock pattern. If you find one that looks hot with a bit thicker variegated yarn, pass it on over!

So, I hope that satiated all your needs for pictures and color and words! :)