Love Is...

Finding Dave’s scraped the ice off my car windows when I get ready to leave for work in the morning. It was 17 degrees.






A couple of weeks ago I placed an Internet order for Dave’s Valentine’s Day gift. I specified that the package should be delivered to me at my office. I had it all planned out. I’d wrap it and present it to him tonight before we go to dinner. Then I made reservations at a sea food restaurant he really likes.

Last week he called me at work to ask if I’d ordered something from West Marine. Turns out the package was delivered to the house instead of my office. RATS.

Then Dave’s weekend went to hell. We went to visit his family in Toledo, but his cell phone rang constantly. Two of his staff came down with the flu and there was wind damage at one of their facilities. Poor Dave. To cheer him up I told him about the dinner reservations. That leaves me with no real surprises for tonight – other than what’s in the big box from West Marine.



To torture him a little I left it in front of the fireplace.



Meanwhile in keeping with the holiday I’m knitting something pink.

The yarn is Peace Fleece worsted weight. I’m using my own tried and true pattern. I swatched in woven stitch (see above) but did not think that did anything to enhance the yarn, which has slubs.



So I’m knitting this cardi in seed stitch, which can be pretty stretchy. I was careful to swatch in seed stitch, too.



So far I’ve finished the back.



Right now I’m working on the first front panel. I’m counting on making some serious progress over the coming 3 day weekend. However, my son Brian is coming home from college for the week. That means my time will be up for grabs.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Getting My Bearings

The flu struck last week out of nowhere. I only missed 1 day of work but it feels as though I lost a week of my life. How does that happen? Something about the time warp continuum I’m sure.

The flu left me terribly achy. Even the palms of my hands hurt. Precious little knitting got done. The upshot is that I didn’t finish Brian’s hat until last night.



Pattern: Skip
Book: Hit Knit Hats
Yarns: Peace Fleece worsted weight, colorway: Zarya Fog; Malabrigo merino lace weight, colorway: Oceanos; and some black dk weight merino from my stash
Amounts: Unknown
Needles: Size 9 DPN

I'm not wild about knitting from multiple skeins at the same time, but I'm pleased with the result I hope Brian likes it.

Still working on a cardi I started the week before last. I’ll fill you in soon.

Cardi Interrupted

Dayton is a strange place. The banner headline story on the cover of this morning's Dayton Daily News was not about the Superbowl upset or the Super Tuesday primaries, as one would expect. Nope. Instead the story was about pending legislation to classify alpacas as livestock in Ohio. Maybe there are more knitters and alpaca farmers in Dayton than I thought.

It was another nice weekend. I finished a mystery and read another one, worked out both days (20 minutes at level 2 on the LifeCycle - still working on that), and knitted some. We saw Juno on Saturday - a hillarious movie. Yesterday we drove down to UC and had dinner with my son John.


I started a cardi/jacket last week and had planned to blog about it today. Then I got an email from my son Brian asking for a hat. He's at school in Boston and, knowing Brian, he's probably freezing his tuchus off. So of course, I dropped everything and cast on a hat.

Brian said his winter coat is a light blue. (I haven't seen it. His father bought it.)

I wasn't sure how to make a "manly" hat that would match a light blue jacket. After some stash diving and experimentation, I mixed Peace Fleece worsted in the Zarya Fog colorway, black dk weight merino, and lace weight merino Malabrigo in the Oceanos colorway. I'm hoping the merino yarns will soften the fabric some. The Peace Fleece is a bit scratchy. The overall effect is really warm and heavy, though. I've got to finish this baby up and get it in the mail before the next onslaught of winter.