Plowing Along

According to my original plan, I am halfway through the row count for Kristin's blanket.  The pattern had each color repeat 6 times.  I've completed 3 sequences.  It is measuring 18 inches from the center.  I seriously doubt I have enough yarn to get me through another 3 sequences.  If I can get another 8 inches or so out of the yarn I have left it should be big enough for my daughter to curl up under.  If she wants she could have it diagonally over herself, which would provide more head to toe coverage.  Fortunately, she isn't very tall.

I don't want to have to buy more yarn, which is why I don't think I'll make it through the entire 6 sequences.  Some of the balls are getting noticeably lean.  I will make one exception to my 'no buying' rule.  I will get more orange to do an I-cord edge. 

If I were to do this over again, I would resequence the colors so that the blue and the orange weren't following the same pattern.  These two accent colors are only going to have a single round near the edge.  Hmmm....maybe I'll buy an extra blue also and do something 'special' for a border and edge.  Stay tuned.

Illusion of Progress

Here's how far I've gotten on Kristin's blanket.  

I am now up to 80 stitches on each side. I figure it will take about 220 stitches per side to get it to a nice throw size. This project feels like it is moving along nicely, thus the illusion of progress.  My progress will slow significantly because I am adding 8 stitches every other round.  Each pair of rounds gets longer to do. I am glad that I decided to use the Fibanocci pattern.The rounds where I switch colors after only 1, 2 or 3 rounds keeps it interesting. It is only until I get to the 5-row or 8-row colors when it gets a little tedious.  Halfway through the 8-row section, I'm looking forward to the 1, 1, 2 and 3 sections.

Here's a little money saving tip.  Last year I bought one of those foaming hand soaps from a retail chain that specializes in fragrant soaps and body sprays.  I liked the foaming soap because I wasn't using as much each time I washed my hands but still getting my hands clean.  After the bottle ran out, I filled it with hand soap from the local grocery store.  But this didn't work out as well because the thick soap didn't come out nicely.  Then I had an idea.   I remembered noticing that the foaming hand soap wasn't as thick as the kind from the grocery store.  Maybe cutting it with water would help. Here's what I do now each time the dispenser needs refilling.

Fill the dispenser no more than 1/3 full with liquid hand soap.

Add water until almost the top.  You need to leave al little room because the pump takes up volume in the bottle.

Screw on the cap and shake vigorously to mix the water and soap.  It will stay as a nice homogeneous mixture in the bottle.

And there you have it!  The $4 refill bottle of liquid hand soap is lasting almost a year.  The original foaming hand soap retails for over twice as much.

Long Weekend At Home

The summer is essentially over with the arrival of Labor Day weekend.  The equinox isn't for a few more weeks, but most everyone considers summer over with the start of football season and Labor Day weekend.   Kristin came home for the weekend.  I drove over after work on Thursday to pick her up.  She spent about 15 minutes in the house and then left to see her boyfriend.  Today we will be celebrating her birthday.  Her actually birthday is later in the week while she is at school.  I'm going to make her a cake for dessert tonight, but then also bake cupcakes to take back to school to share with her friends.

I finally settled on a pattern for Kristin's college blanket. She loves the color green. I had a stash of Cascade 220 in greens and browns left from a buying binge last year. I thought I'd use those colors for her blanket. After many stops and starts I settled on a simple stockinette square. Using 11 different colors, it will be striped with a Fibonacci sequence. She chose an orange and a blue to contrast with the greens and browns I had picked. I showed her how far I've gotten. I hope she likes it. She had a puzzled look on her face, but I think it was due to my explanation of Fibonacci sequence. At least, that is what I hoped it was about. I'm at the point where I need to move up to circular needles.

Since I finished the mystery shawl, I've adopted the Pi Shawl as my 'take-along' project.  This project goes with me to work every day.  When I have time over my lunch hour, I'll knit a round or so.  I've wound another ball of the yarn.  This particular ball is going a lot farther than I thought it would.  There is still a substantial amount of yarn left in this first ball.  I'm curious to see if this project takes the yardage that the pattern states.

 Two weekends ago, a couple friends and I went out to the Mid-Ohio Fiber Fair.  It was a nice gathering with a lot of yarn and fiber that I hadn't seen before.  My only disappointment was not getting to see many spinning wheels.  Every other booth had roving or fleece, but there was only one spinning wheel dealer.  I'm not quite ready to purchase a wheel but I would like to get more familiar with the various brands.  I did, however, find something for which I have been searching.  No vendor at Stitches South had a Turkish spindle, but I found one at this fair.  Ironically, the vendor who had it was the lady from whom I took a spinning lesson back in February.  I guess like Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz, I should have looked first in my own backyard.  I love this little thing.  It is so pretty.  It is 26 grams and made of Blood wood.  I forget what wood the center dowel is.  I'm spinning some alpaca I bought a few months ago.  This was probably a bad choice since this alpaca is very smooth.  I'm have a bit of trouble with it breaking when I get too thin.  It is a learning experience.  I just wish I could spin faster because I'm loving how the fiber looks on the spindle.