You'd think my head would be covered every day of the year!

I didn't really think I made that many hats until I looked over my Ravelry projects one day and realized how hat heavy it was!  I'm not claiming to be any Cosy or anything - now that girl makes some hats!  However, I've got a lot of hats for a girl who doesn't wear hats all that much.  I like the idea of wearing hats, but I just generally don't.  I picture myself strolling down the street, window shopping, wearing a cute hat, but in reality I apparently don't do as much strolling and window shopping as I think I do, or think I ought to do.  Anyway, that being said - I finished what may be my favorite hat to date!  It's the Amelia Earhart aviator hat and man do I love it!  I love it with the little pointy flaps up, and with the little pointy flaps down, I love it in the morning, I love it in the evening!                    

This might be the only thing I own that's even remotely blue.  I'm not a blue person, but I've kind of got a yen for it all the sudden.  It's that damn BSA skinny cotton that started it - have you seen the mallard colorway?  I love it.  This hat - it's ingeniously made.  It's all short rows and nearly all K2P2, but the staggering of the rib makes a fantastic pattern and after one little seam up the back, it all comes together.  I kind of think it looks like one of those old timey bathing caps!  and that pleases me :)  

Crap, now I have no excuse but to keep working on the Tree Jacket.  ooooor, I could cast on again for the Bird in Hands, right?  Did I mention that I cast on for those, but decided that my yellow and white color scheme just didn't contrast enough?  Dharma gifted me a ball of Valley Yarns Amherst in a great squash orange color because she thought it seemed like a "me" kind of color - and I love it!  I so wanted to use it for my mittens, but it's not enough yardage.  It IS however, probably plenty for a hat! 'cause that's what I need - another hat!  need-schmeed!  who really needs anything?  I love making hats!

Oh, how long has it been since I uttered the word...

..FO!  

Whoa!  Look at that - it's a pair of Jaywalkers!  I know, I  know - you've seen 'em a million times, but admit it - they still make you giddy, don't they?  Well they make me giddy, ok?  According to Ravelry, it's been like 2 1/2 months since I started these and that's just stupid.  I guess there was an awful lot of starting and stopping.  Apparently mostly stopping.  Anyhoo, they're finally off the needles and on my feet!  Now I can feel not at all guilty about casting on my bird in hand mittens!  Actually I cast on last weekend, but ripped 'em out (not out of guilt!  knitta please!)  I really wanted to make them yellow and white, but after the first colorwork chart I decided that the contrast just wasn't enough to keep going.  I've been working off the slump of disappointment this week - I could so picture them in my mind and they were spectacular.  sooo, now I'm trying to content myself with some other color combination from my stash, but nothing is quite what I want.   oh hell, how much does a skein of cascade 220 cost - nothing compared to my knitterly satisfaction, right?  but the real question is, how do I walk into the LYS and come out with only one skein of wool?  

Yeah, well my knitting's always the winner!

I know I promised to show my loot from the Milford antique shops, and while I'm still excited about doing that, it's occurred to me that I haven't really talked much about knitting.  I don't think I've talked about knitting at all.  I mean I've talked about buying yarn which kind of implies that I probably make something with the stuff, but that's about it.  Granted, my intake of supplies, both for knitting and sewing, often exceeds my output (definitely the case for sewing!) but dammit, I do knit every day and it's high time I make this knitting blog a knitting blog!  As much as I love the crazy old lady earrings I scored, my knitting is the winner! 

 So I've got a couple things going that don't seem to want to ever get off my needles, but that's probably because I abandoned them to make this:  It's the heart pillow from last February's Knit.1 but I used fingering weight wool (Jojoland - only $3 a ball at my LYS -  it's a steal!) instead of worsted because I really didn't want a 14" heart.  I mean crap, what do you do with something like that?  This is for the BF for valentine's day.  I'm thinking of making some kind of shrine out of a cardboard box and various scraps and baubles, just cause that'd be fun.  

Back to the stuff that won't get off my needles and let me move on (I've got my sights set on the Bird in Hand mittens, but in yellow and white instead of red and white.)  I've been working on my Tree Jacket, from the Zypher Girls, for what feels like forever, despite the fact that it's not at all difficult.  I tried it on the other day and it's about right at waist length - I'm going for a hip length, so there's not that much more to go.  I plan to do the sleeves on dpns and because everyone has commented on how big the sleeves are coming out, I plan to mod them to take advantage of that.  I'm not going to do any decreases and I'm going to make them 3/4 length, or elbow length (is that the same thing?) and add some 1x1 ribbing to draw them in and hopefully end up with a cute little puffed sleeve.  I'm using KnitPicks Andean Silk and it's totally the right stuff for this sweater - drapey, but not heavy and apt to pull out of shape.  I'm really anxious to have this finished - not only because it seems to not be getting any bigger despite my clacking needles, but also because I really want to wear it!  I'm also working on a pair of Jaywalkers.  Yeah, yeah, I know everyone in the world has made a pair or 12 of these, but I really do like them.  And they're pink.  and stripey.  It took me a while to cast on for the second sock, but I finally did just to say it was on the needles.  Last night I finally picked it up again made some significant progress so I feel like I can say I'm actually working on these again.   Alright, so that's it - only two projects on the needles, but I've vowed to not cast on for anything else until I get something finished.  In fact, I feel like wrapping this up so I can go move in that direction right now!  

Superbowl weekend is for shoppin'!

Every Superbowl weekend there's a huge bag sale at Fiberge, a cute and fantastic yarn shop in Terrace Park (that's Cincinnati-ish) and for the past couple years, a bunch of us have made the hour-long drive down there from Dayton.  It's totally worth it!  I mean there are quite a few yarn shops in Dayton, but Fiberge has yarn that I don't see around her - they stock Rowan yarns and Collinette - things I can get online, but not really hold in my hand 'round these here parts. Plus it's someplace new and different!  They're moving soon and I'm hoping it's not to some sterile stripmall-ish spot, because the little building they're in right now is super charming.  I didn't bring my camera for some reason, but I knew I could pretty much count on my friend Jeanette to have hers - and she did!  Now the question is whether she can take those pictures and send them to me - techonolgy isn't exactly her forte, but if I can walk her through it, I'll post pictures of the group!  Anyway, after some surprisingly polite elbowing and jostling to see all the yarn (which often involved Twister-ish moves to put left foot blue, left hand yellow, and right hand to the bottom of a thigh-high cardboard box full of bags of yarn!) This is what I came out with:  My splurge-y-est purchase, 7 balls of Classic Elite Princess, which was about $7 a ball, but originally $11 or $12, I think.  It's an amazing color - kind of orange-red, and made of everything splendid - Merino, angora, cashmere, etc.  Somehow they packed a little bit of it all in there!  Hopefully it'll be enough for a short sleeved sweater.  

Then I got 3 balls of Karabella Aurora 8 - about 300 yards, which is a weird amount, but it's such amazing stuff I couldn't turn it down.  I think it'd be great for a cowl or gloves - I've looked at all the Ravelry projects using Aurora 8, and it shows stitch definition fantastically - maybe it's calling for some cables!  

Then, because I just can't turn down Manos del Uruguay - especially when it's 40% off!  I got one hank of this brick red:  Delicious!  

Just outside of Terrace Park is the cutest little town called Milford and it's half the fun of making the trek to Fiberge.  We stopped for some coffee when we passed through the first time - our sly plans to arrive early and beat out all the other knitters was slightly miscalculated and we decided that getting coffee sounded better than standing outside the door of Fiberge for an hour!  Then on the way back through we got some quiche and tomato soup for lunch before hitting the wacky antique stores.  I got some great stuff, of course - it's about impossible for me to drive out of Milford empty handed!  Stay tuned for pictures of my old lady earrings, plaster birds, and more - I'll show them all in my next post!