Progressing despite myself

Still here, and with knitting content to boot. Despite the craziness of the week, despite having to deal with renovations and unforeseen appliance malfunction (more on that later), despite the crazy heat wave we've been having, my knitting mojo is BACK, and I'll have a some FOs to share with you in the next few posts.

First things first though: I finished painting our bedroom today. It's looking great, we're both really happy with it, but if anyone mentions paint or even THINKS about it in my vicinity, I will hunt them down and strangle them with acrylic macrame. Now if we could just get the new furniture delivered, that would be swell.

We also had our new washing machine delivered this week. Our old one had been giving us grief, and a few weeks ago it actually burst into heavy smoke after I'd put in a load. Despite our initial hopes that it would be an easy fix, Phil officially declared it to be deceased last Friday. I've been doing my laundry at Kate-the-Enabler's for the past 2 weeks, and while I'm sure she didn't mind, I was becoming slightly uncomfortable lugging our dirty underwear across the street every few days, heh.

Enter our new Mr. Washie, and dudes, it's like the washing machine of the Future. I'm pretty confident that this is what aliens from an advanced civilization must use to wash their space suits. We must have sat there watching it do it's thing for 15 minutes when we got it, it was THAT cool.

Meantime, this week I blocked a stole, knit a hat and started a NEW project: the Aestlight shawl by Gudrun Johnson, using Malabrigo Sock (Mmmmmm, Malabrigo). Because even though it's friggin' HOT now, Fall is just around the corner. And who doesn't need a lovely, drapey shawl on a crisp Fall day?

Lori likes it too.

Pics of recent FOs next time. Here's a preview until then.


Happy Knitting Everyone!

ps: that first picture was WAY cuter before Lori chewed through the working yarn a few minutes ago! Redrum, REDRUM!!!

Ask and ye shall receive, eh?

I'm back from my (too) short visit with my Dad and step-mum Margot, and I've got STUFF to share with you! And some of it is knit-related too! I KNOW, right? Actual knitting content on a knitting blog! Weird...

After Dad and Margot picked me up at Toronto's Union Station, we settled in for the leisurely 2-hour drive up to their house (I can't even begin to tell you how much I'm NOT going to miss them living so far away!), and stopped in the lovely little town of Belfountain to do a little shopping and all-important beer purchasing.

I'm really trying to keep an eye on my spending habits (no - REALLY!), but this stuff was just too good to pass up. Besides, they were having a sale!


First up, I picked up this awesome market/knitting bag, 30% off. As soon as I saw it, I pictured it overflowing with yummy yarn and cozy works-in-progress. *Sigh*

I also picked up a couple of novelty ice-cube trays. The first one makes ice shaped like brains (you can sort of see it in the first picture), and this is the second one:

Space Invaders ice cubes!!! How friggin' COOL is that (no pun intended)? My inner geek and spaz just could not resist these beauties.

And finally, just as my purchases were being rung up, I noticed this cute sheep key-chain.

As you can see, not ONLY is it cute and sheep-y, it's also multi-functional! It doubles as a mini (OK, very mini) flashlight AND it Baaaaahs! So I can blind potential muggers while simultaneously disorienting them with farm animal sounds. Sweet!

OK, to knitting. I knew I was nearing the finish-line on both my active WIPs this weekend (which I'll share in a later post), and I was wondering what to cast on for next, especially since I knew I had a nice, long train-ride ahead of me (un-interrupted knitting time during the day!!! Unheard of!!!). I was craving lace, but I didn't have a clear idea what to cast on for: Les Abeilles? Merope? What? I was drifting amongst too many possibilities.

That's when the Knitting Fates intervened and my Summer Year of Lace package arrived. And who am I to argue with Fate?


I didn't touch the Spring package, so I decided to take this package as a sign and wound up the yarn (BMFA Geisha) the night before I left for Toronto, and it's going swimmingly. Not really looking forward to knitting the edging though (664 stitches on the needles!!! Aaaaaaack!), but that's another story!

Happy Knitting Everyone! Hopefully I'll have some FO pictures to share my next post.