Such A Quitter...

So, one of the things I have neglected to really discuss on this blog is the fact that I recently quit smoking. I had my last cigarette on the morning of April 26th, vowing to let that be the only nicotine fix of my 23rd year of life. So far, it has been a success. It hasn't been easy, obviously, but one of the things that really got me through the whole ordeal was spinning.

I am very proud to say that May 26th, while on vacation, I picked up 4 oz of roving and began to spin in celebration, though I wasn't aware of it because I had totally forgotten at the time. It's a good sign when you forget to count how long it's been since you quit, right? Right!

I bought the roving from Lazy Pi Farm. I have spun her fiber before and it is absolutely great and my experience with this Corriedale was no different. It is not as soft as the merino I had been spinning, but that's the nature of the wool. The color is fantastic (hello purple!) and I loved every minute of it.

I went ahead and wound it into a ball and plied from the outside and center, though I think I will try the Andean bracelet or "handy" form of plying next time because I was very frustrated when the two singles would twist around each other as I unwound them from the ball. I think part of that was overspinning, though.  I'm not sure. It's worth a shot, though. The only problem I see with it is you have to finish plying before you can really go anywhere, as you are sort of tied to the spinning wheel at that point.

Anyway, it plied up into 330 yards of 2-ply in a fingering weight yarn, finally! I mostly use sock yarn so finally getting sockweight yarn was just... awesome. I'm so happy! Some of it was actually finer, I'd call it a laceweight, but it plumped up a bit with thwacking so it's all good. I'll probably knit up a tiny shawl with it! Squee! I'm very well aware that I have simply swapped one addiction for another. Don't judge me!

Weekend Meetups

Well, I have had quite the busy weekend regarding fiber!

Saturday

Saturday was a really great day. I met up with the San Antonio Handweavers Guild. They have a meetup every third Saturday of the month starting at noon at Yarnivore. There were quite a few people there, I was very surprised! It was nice to meet new people and learn from them a little. My little spinning wheel was quite a hit and a lot of people thought it was cute and had questions.  I also got quite a bit done, as well! I spun up some of the dyed merino I bought from WishFox Dyeworks. It's probably the only merino I have done well with thus far and I think the spinning is coming up great! I will probably navajo ply it to keep the color changes nice and consistent, since the roving is a bit wild. I would hate to lose the gorgeous colors in the business of plying it. I'd rather try to keep it consistent. Anyway, I bought 5 oz so I'm hoping it will turn out lovely with quite a bit of yardage.

Another great thing is that this particular fiber seller is part of the Phat Fiber group. Apparently, this month each purchase made from the etsy shops of any of the sellers listed gives you a chance in a drawing for a fiber box. Wooo! If you are interested in the details, please check out the thread on the ravelry group. These fiber artists do amazing work so being the nasty enabler that I am gives me warm, fuzzy feeling inside.

Oh! Pssst... speaking of enabling! Yarnivore is now carrying Tosh sock and DK weight, and waiting on the worsted. I would hate to be alone in this dangerous place, you know. :)

Sunday

Today was a local LSG meetup at 2 Rivers Coffee in New Braunfels, TX. It took me forever to get there, and not just because I underestimated the time... but because I got lost. Yes. I, even with the superpowers of a GPS and iPhone, got lost. Horribly. I will say, though, that New Braunfels is hardly the worst place to get lost. The scenery is quite wonderful and it's nice to drive around there, lost or not. Also, I will mention that it is not a horribly big place, so getting lost there is kind of... special. I did eventually figure it out and we met up and had quite a bit of fun! I gave away some fiber to the daughter of one of our local hoars and also traded her some sock yarn for her blankie, which I totally convinced her to do in the first place! She had some great sock yarn for me to add.

Please ignore that purple ball toward the bottom, there. I had meant to add it to her bag and had a brain fart and dropped it into mine on accident, even though I have an entire ball of it. I'll keep it and give it to her when I see her next. When I came home, I totally ignored my sock (the almighty last few inches of it!) and worked on four squares. The blanket is looking less and less scarf-like by the day, it seems.

I took a picture cutting off the area I haven't worked on all month, so that blue square in the top left is where I started off this month. I'm submitting my blankie squares to BSGFPB this month, so I'll probably doctor a picture up at the end to outline the squares from May. I love that big red one. You can't see it too well, but it's actually a lovely gradient yarn starting at a deep fuschia color and going to a red-orange at the top. I like it.

I'm really hating the yellow light in the house. I'm going to have to definitely take pictures outside, probably on the picnic table in the yard. Everything looks so muted and jaundiced it's not even funny.

Update on the Yarny Things

Well, I did not mean to be away from blogging for quite so long. Oops! I should have been updating this entire time.

I have been doing quite a bit of knitting these days.  Maybe even to the point of being ridiculous? I'm not sure. It has occurred to me that I did not ever post pictures of the gray Hermione's Everyday Socks I was working on. That is because there currently aren't any of the finished pair, as I am lazy and have not taken any and I haven't even woven in the ends for them yet! However, I do have a picture of the first one right before I began the toe.  That particular pair of socks was rather amusing, as I found out after knitting most of the first one... that I have been doing the knit stitch incorrectly for a number of years. Purl, also.  It's rather sad and I am not happy about it, but I have corrected the issue and the second sock was knit very differently. The difference in how the eye of partridge heel looks between the two is astounding! It also fits much better. I have a number of beautifully done things since, and I will shamelessly flaunt them before you as they come up.

Anyway, nearly immediately after I finished these socks, I started another pair. Surprising, I know! I decided to use the pattern BFF out of Cookie A's book, Knit. Sock. Love. This apparently used to be a free pattern, like Monkey, but I had it in the book and it fit the Sock Knitters Anonymous prompt (cables!) for March... so why not?  I have not quite finished, but I have gotten to the heel flap of the second sock and am really enjoying the knitting. Really.  I have a picture of the first one completed:

And another of the yarn in more natural lighting to show off the color:

I absolutely love this yarn! It's Tosh Sock by madelinetosh and now I understand why people rant and rave about it. Really.  The color is beautiful, the yarn is soft and workable, and the stitch definition is good. All around, a great yarn. 
Another thing I have been getting into recently... is the sock yarn blanket. I know, I'm so shameful! I resisted temptation for over two years before I caved. I couldn't help it. Mine is just now starting out. I don't have a ludicrous number of squares yet, but I do have one picture so far:

I have not been taking any pictures of it, as it is significantly larger than that now, because I have not been weaving in my ends like a good girl and it is spiraling out of control.  It's an off and on project, so hopefully I will remember to take and post pictures as I go along. Hopefully. My grand plan is to knit it large enough to fit a king sized bed. I figure it'll be a wedding present to myself or something... which is nothing to worry about. It's going to take me forever and I'm not even dating anyone right now so I'm right on track!

I also feel like I have been very blessed with the people on Ravelry being so awesome.  I posted the need for sock yarn scraps for this blanket in Random Acts of Kindness, as I have not been a sock knitting fiend until quite recently, and received two packages so far. I only have a picture of the contents of the first, but I will put it here:

I was so happy upon receiving this, that I skipped around the house saying "yay, yarn!" for several minutes.  I'm sure my family thinks I'm absolutely  nuts. Really.

Aside from that, I have a few other little things going on here and there.  I will be sure to post about them as I see fit. This is a horrendously long blog post with tons of pictures, as is. I will say, though, that I went to Yarnivore with Chirp in a fit of madness quite recently and came home with this:

Yes, it is orange malabrigo sock yarn. Yes, I am aware that there is something painfully wrong with me and I do.not.care. I am enjoying this particular fit of insanity, thankyouverymuch. We will see what this becomes. I am also looking forward to the Yellow Rose Fiber Fiesta coming up this month. It just so happens it's the weekend before my birthday and I do most certainly plan to attend and blow every bit of birthday money I may have. :)

Approaching 10%

Well, I know it's been a long time since I have posted. Things are a little funky with the Internet connection at my house. We are in the process of replacing our router and crossing our fingers that that was the problem.

A lot has been going on, but the biggest thing is my weigh-in on Saturday. I stopped by the meetings location on the way out to knit night because I was terrible and slept in too late to make it to the meeting. The lady there was very nice and was very encouraging and celebrated because... I lost 3.8 lbs last week. Yep. Scary thing, isn't it? I think whatever was making them stick finally just gave in. It makes me very hopeful.

I am only 0.2 lbs from my 10% goal. So, next week I will be 90% of the person I was in July 2011. One tenth of me just gone. That's crazy! I had been very good and on-track and I remember how frustrating it was to fall off the wagon. This is the first time I've been below the weight I was at in October before my knee surgery. Finally on track and feeling great. So, wish me luck for the rest of this week. I've got to lose at least 0.2!

Socks Part 2

Well, last night at knit night I started a new pair of socks. I am knitting them out of an awesome yarn I got from Yarnorama in Paige, TX. I bought it on Yarn Crawl. It's a handdyed sock yarn called FiberObsessions. It's an excellent yarn and I am enjoying working with it so far. The pattern is Hermione's Everyday Socks by Erica Lueder.  She is the designer of the month for Sock Knitters Anonymous,  and I have worked with her patterns before and quite enjoyed them so I thought I'd go ahead and knit another. This pattern is also available as a pdf download on ravelry.

As far as changes done to the pattern, I have a gauge of 8 stitches/inch instead of 9. Since the Monkey socks fit me so well and have the same gauge, I just went ahead and cast on 80 stitches instead of 64 as the pattern suggested. They should turn out very well.

I really love the color of the yarn, but haven't been able to capture it in a picture yet. We will see if I can get it later. It's a very slate or dusk color with a lot of gray and some hints of blue here and there. I think it's gorgous. These will probably take me a lot longer since I have a few other things to wrap up and weave in the ends, so these will be on a backburner periodically. They will be done by the end of February for Sock Knitters Anonymous, though. If you want to follow my progress, here is my ravelry projects page.

Finished Socks

Well, I am happy to say that I have finished the socks I've been working on. They look amazing and are very toasty warm as I sit here typing this in my pajamas. As I said before, these are the Monkey socks by Cookie A in her book Knit. Sock.Love. It is a great book and I would definitely suggest it. She has some amazing sock patterns!

I can honestly say that this is the first project for myself that I have done in a very long time and, well, selfish knitting does have its appeal. The only change I would have made is adding another pattern repeat to the foot before decreasing for the toe. I really hate toe decreases and I had to decrease from 40 stitches per side to 12 and so they are kind of pointy, which I don't love so much. Oh well. Next pair.