Spinning Wheel go round

I have been patiently waiting to purchase my first spinning wheel. My wheel of choice this week is a Lendrum. I think. Maybe a Fricke. I dunno. Anyway, if you are looking for a wheel check this out.

The mosaic has been de-sleeved. I thought I would adjust the shoulders a little to tweak the fit.


I tried it on and was disappointed to find that it is unflatteringly long. I had deferred to the opinions of others and lengthened it. This was a good lesson - now maybe I will have more confidence in my vision and design. I will probably finish the armholes and use it as a vest for around the house. (The wonky bit down the middle is where it will be cut to have a zipper sewn in). I am ready to finish this and move on to other projects.

I have been organizing the stack of magazines I bought last weekend at the garage sale, and today I found this .....


I have dreamed of having this magazine but thought it was a remote possibility. I did not know it was in the huge stack of Knitter's that I bought.

Now to work on Rogue, finish Mosaic, and fix my son's saddle-shoulder pullover. I also want to swatch the Bee Fields shawl and start a casual pullover for me using some KnitPicks Shine I bought last year that turned out to be an odd color.

Time to put down the magazines and start knitting.

Friends and books and magazines and knitting

I received an early birthday present from a special friend. I despaired of finding "The Knitter's Guide to Sweater Design" when I learned that it was out of print and the only used copy on Amazon at that time was about $80 (not to mention that our library had closed its doors indefinitely). My friend called me Saturday morning to tell me she had found this book at a garage sale not far from my house. I almost hyperventilated while she was telling me.

She not only bought me the book, but she told me how to find the garage sale so I could run down and find more treasures. Isn't she great!! I bought some books and magazines. Two of the books that I bought that I really like are "Knitting Counterpanes" and "The Green Mountain Spinnery Knitting Book". I was pressed for time and had to grab and run, so I bought a few other books that are also inspiring but not my favorites, such as Alice Starmore's "Sweaters for Men" and "The Original Annabel Fox" and some others.
Almost as exciting as the sweater design book were the Interweave Knits magazines. I found 8 back issues that I did not have. I am trying to collect them for my library.

The 2 Rowan magazines were a bonus.

There were also a few international knitter magazines that I had not seen before and a collection of Knitter's magazine that was impressive.

I can't even tell you how little I spent. Lets just say I borrowed $20 from my son as I ran out the door, and I was able to give him change back when I got home.

Here is the Clapotis 'live'....

That is about as good as I get at self portraits.
Recap-
Pattern: Clapotis from Knitty.com
Yarn: Mountain Colors, sport weight.
Yardage: Approximately 600 yards (the yarn was gifted to me and I don't have the tags)
Needles: Size US 8.

An updated picture of Florenz with the re-knit heel in solid green. Much better ....

Ahhhh, autumn. Loving the cooler temperatures.

Florenz

This is my current 'desk' project. It keeps me company while I work. The design is called 'Florenz' (a pattern from the Yahoo group Socken-Kreativ-Liste). I can see the arches of Florence in this pattern. I am intimidated by short row heels and so I tried to do a heel flap instead. The stripes on the heel flap take away from design, so I am going to rip it back and knit a green heel flap using the eye of partridge. The yummy peach colored yarn is from La Petite Knitterie (a prize from Twisted Knitster's blog contest), and the green is Wildfoote.

Blocking the Clap

I finished the Clapotis last night. It had a bath and is blocking. A 'finished' picture will be coming soon. There are so many things that want to jump on the needles, but I would like to finish one WIP first. The startitis is fading a bit.