Sunday Knitting Group

As you know, I loved my old knitting group: I loved the women I shared it with; it's location; the way we laughed and sang, vented and gossiped, and shared our lives with each other along with our knitting (and crocheting!). I miss it, but I've finally reached a place where I'm ready to move on and start a new group, understanding that it will be different than my first.

If you are in the Olympia area, I would love for more knitters to join. Here are the specs:

Sundays, 2:00 to 5:00 at the downtown B&B.

I've had two so far, and hope they will continue to grow. My sister took some photos last week, and, looking through them, I started to contemplate the differences and similarities between the two groups.

First Difference: More dinosaurs.

Second Difference: The possibility of indoctrinating children.



Third Difference: Instead of just discussing uteruses, one of us is knitting them (it's a Knitty pattern!).


We'll see what next week will be like...

Fashion forward

To be honest, I didn’t realize that headbands are in again, but I’ve had three requests for them, in some form or another, over the past few months. Another clue is that I’ve gotten quite a few complements on one I made for my self out of a delicious bit of scrap yarn (there’s a picture of me wearing it way back here).

My “ah ha” moment came when my littlest brother, Cody, marked his entry into teenagehood by requesting a headband for his 13th birthday. Headbands were certainly not in vogue when I turned 13 in the early-nineties. They had unsavory associations with 80s styles, and I was a teenager in the grunge era. Now things are different. Today’s burgeoning trendsetters, such as my brother, are heavily influence by manga and anime, where headbands have different connotations.


Cody asked for "forest colors" and I felt this Trekking sock yarn qualifies. I asked Cody how he will use the headband, and he answered, “Sometimes I’ll wear it when I practice Taekwondo, or maybe when it gets cold.” So, I tried to take some pictures of him practicing kicks, but it was challenging because he moves so fast. Sometimes it seems like he’s flying.

Details

The sweater is coming along nicely. I finished the back (happy with my decision to frog and reknit part), and have moved on to the left front. The comments on my last post included some questions about the pattern, so I will address those today. It's the Ribby Cardi from Chic Knits. The pattern is available to purchase online, but I picked it up at Stitches in San Jose last spring. The website even has a Gallery of pictures from people who already knit the sweater. I spent quite some time pursuing it before I bought the pattern, contemplating how it will handle my, well, feminine curves. Time will tell.


I'm not yet sure what form of collar I'll make. The pattern gives options for a shorter one or a shawl collar. The yarn is Uruguay DK, also procured at Stitches, with green for the body and purple for the sleeves. It's very soft (70% merino, 20% alpaca, 10% silk) and easy to work with, but I'm already anticipating using something machine washable for my next sweater.

Yes, of course I'm already considering my next sweater. It has taken quite a bit of self control—and my sweetie's reminders of other unfinished projects—to refrain from buying the yarn for Rogue. I'm waiting with baited breath for some of my blog friends to finish theirs. Scarybez seems to have finished hers but hasn't posted a picture modeling it, and dear Kelly (who was with me at Stitches, so long ago) has been slowly but surely working on hers for months. Very exciting.