Did I mention I like scarves?

I have been working on a pattern, yes I am designing a pattern.  I got a little bogged down in the process and had to put it down to clear my mind.  I cast around and with a little stash diving and a wonderful new knitting book I found just the thing.  If you remember I went to the Midwest Fiberfest last summer ( http://tempestinapot.blogspot.com/2010/07/midwest-fiber-folk-art-fair.html ).  I bought some crazy thick and thin merino yarn from some sweet ladies hailing from Minnesota. It was in fact taking a lot of space up in my pie safe o' yarn.  I knew from fairly early on I wanted to make a scarf out of the yarn.

Flash forward to my new book. Sock Yarn One-Skein Wonders by Judith Durant.  The book is brilliant, packed with patterns for gloves, bags, scarves, shawls, lamp shades, and of course socks.  There is a Noro scarf that I am so going to knit.  Anyway, the "19th-Century Honeycomb Stitch Scarf" caused my little felted heart to go pitter-pat.  It was exactly the pattern I wanted for my thick and thin yarn.

My first cast on was on 9 straight needles and it was just to tight.  I frogged my first attempt and pulled out the big guns, a set of 11s.  I also decreased the cast on by 7 stitches.  In four short nights I had a new, wildly garish scarf.  I am in love with the silly thing.  Trust me you can't miss me flying my new green scarf, I love scarves.

Smitten by Fingerless Mitts

One mitt from each of Bob and Greg's pair

I learned to knit because I wanted to make myself a pair of fingerless mitts.  I bought the yarn and the pattern for the mitts, but I have yet to actually use that yarn to make those mitts.  However, I have knitted lots of fingerless mitts over the last three years. 

My beautiful wife modeling Barb's pair

This year our household has been the fingerless mitts knitting factory.  Using a pattern from a ballband of Artful Yarns I have made five pairs that I have given away.  My wife however is dropping pairs off her needles, like leaves from a tree.

Mom's Pair

She has tweaked the pattern and worked it into her own.  She actually gave me pointers on how to attach the gusset to the rest of the mitt.  Yesterday I nearly tripped over a big bag of mitts in her living room.  Sometimes it is good to share a home with another knitter.

Kim's Pair

The Letter

Dear Friends,

My fortune cookie tonight read, "You have a charming way with words.  Write a letter this week."  The advice of a cookie seemed like a reason to write a small missive to you.  I feel cookies don't lie.  I say that to you and then I remember that I did have a cookie lie to me once.

A sad tale of losing cookie confidence that has marked me as a person who will in fact spit out a cookie in front of a room full of people.  So let me begin with once upon a knit night I showed up at my usual tardy, last half hour.  Now the women and men I knit with are some awesome bakers.  If I see a plastic container on a table with napkins, I know goodness is to be had.  On the table was just such a container and some of the most perfect looking snicker doodles I have ever seen.  My inner cookie monster was about to put her face into the container and eat some cookies.  I waited, was polite, and took only one.  Cookie conversation swirled around me as a generous bite settled on my tongue.

Okay, there is something you should know, I really don't like most tropical fruits.  The most heinous of the bunch is bananas followed closely by pineapples.  I don't even like the smell of either of those fruits.  It may be a character flaw, but I will not deny my abhorrence of these things.  This truth revealed, I sat there with a mouth full of pineapple flavored cookie growing in my mouth.  Talking around the cookie, I asked the room, "Whaa kinda cooookie is this?"

"Pineapple cake batter," the proud baker said.

The group must have registered the complete look of disgust on my face, because a chorus of, "Just spit it out." went around the room. 

I felt bad,  but I just could not bring myself to swallow.  With a mumbled "Esqoose me," I spit the cookie into the napkin and ran from the room to get a drink of something to wash the horrid taste of pineapple out of my mouth.

The moral of this story is always ask before biting into any cookie, pineapple cake batter could be hidden in even the most delicious looking morsel.  The moral could also be forget the fortune, this letter is not charming. Or maybe the moral is skip the fortune and stick with the lottery numbers on the back (2 7 22 33 46 47).

Sincerely,

Tempesttea