Hoppy Easter

Happy Easter!!

All is good here in Florida...sun in shining, the pool is sparkling (and warming up!), the house is clean and ready for Mary Lou and Al's visit on Tuesday. Yeah!! The Easter Egg Hunt is on hold while Mike and Veronica wash my car (God love them.). Mike and I stuffed, oh um...the Easter Bunny stuffed 124 eggs last night with candy. One egg had three dollars in it, we're curious to see who finds it and if they decide to share a dollar each with their siblings. Hummm...

The vegetable garden is thriving, many blooms in anticipation of veggies to come. We have 4 different pepper plants, two tomatoes, green beans and one crooked neck squash (a nod to Nana-Reba). I would love to say the green beans are contender beans, and make a double-nod to Nana-Reba, but they're just normal bush beans bought from the store, not imported from the great state of Texas. Veronica insisted we plant green beans (she always does), because she loves to pick them right off the plant and eat them. And all the kids love to stick the beans to their shirts, too (the little "hairs" on the beans work like Velcro and stick to your shirt...very fun).

Gotta go and hide eggs...

Hope your Easter is a hoppy one!

Going Camping

As usual, I fell in love with a sweater pattern and am using yarn from the stash that was originally intended for another pattern. My new love is Corinne. Knit from side to side all in garter with short rows (no wrapping) for shaping. I couldn't resist the interesting construction, cute style and come on, it's all in garter stitch! I'm trying to channel my inner Jared Flood so my garter stitch is awesome like his. He's a big-time knit designer and I just love his patterns and style...check him out on Ravelry as Brooklyntweed.

I'm making Corinne out of Knitpicks Shine Sport in a deep royal blue, it's a cotton/nylon blend so should be good for Florida weather. I've just finished one front and am about an inch into the first sleeve. This picture is the one from Knitty (free pattern btw) and is knit with Madeline Tosh DK. WAY, WAY out of my price range, unfortunately. MadTosh is one of my favorite yarns...the ToshSock is to die for...and the DK is gorgeous, colors that make you drool. Sigh...someday.

Here's a sock pic I promised. It's Shur'tugal by Alice Yu. I knit it with ToshSock in the color way called Espadrilles...kinda pinky-salmony color. Mike bought it for me for Valentine's Day. Does that man know how to shop for yarn or what?! It was a great pattern to knit, easy enough but interesting...check out that heel! The pattern has a great fit, nice and stretchy. I am so grateful to Ravelry and designers like Alice who offer such quality patterns at no cost.

Here's my Alaskan Honey Bee! I do tend to think of this yarn as the "watermelon" yarn, but it is indeed from Alaska. Imported by my mom on one of her cruises. It is amazingly soft, a blend of merino and silk. I tried three other patterns before finding Honeybee Cardigan by Laura Chau. Why so many patterns? Because of the darn pooling of the colors! This pattern is working out great...I just finished the body portion last night and as you can see from the pic, the colors pool rather nicely. It's a seamless knit, casting on at the lower edge, knitting the body in one piece. Then you make the sleeves (next for me...there may be some interesting pooling because they're knit in stockinette, but with the small circumference, I'm hoping it won't look weird). You join all three pieces (one body, two sleeves) and knit the bodice with set-in sleeves to the neck. Fun construction!

I'm knitting this on my Addi Lace size 4 needle. The grip of the lace needle helps so much with the slickness of the merino/silk blend. Last week at knitting I got a couple of "Oooo...it's so soft!" comments. Thanks again mom for the yarn!

Can you see how the pattern resembles the shape of bees? It looks difficult and hard to do, but truthfully, it's SO easy...I even have it memorized, which I usually never do with even the simplest of patterns.

So there's a knitting update for ya'll. I have socks I'm working on too. Like four pairs. I'm nuts, I know. I really need to finish my Bridgewater shawl...OH! Want to see my Pi shawl?

I love how it turned out! Yarn is Pagewood Farms Willow, a lace weight wool in pretty fall colors. Another yarny gift from my wonderful mom (she's got good taste, huh?). One skein is all it took to make this beauty...ok, one BIG skein of 1350 yards!

There's another Pi shawl I'm thinking about next...it's called Pi Shawl: Camping. It's one of six free Pi Shawl patterns that Mwaa Knit released in honor of Elizabeth Zimmerman's 100th Anniversary. The pattern I did was one of them...Gull Wings (I love this pattern.). You can find all six here.

There's something about knitting a circular shawl the EZ way. It's simple yet the "wow" factor is off the charts. You have to pay attention (or use tons of markers), but usually the patterns are simple enough that it's hard to get lost. Elizabeth does recommend doing a pi shawl in July in her book The Knitters Almanac. It's self contained (just throw your ball of yarn into the pouch the shawl creates) and easy to travel with, too. A group of gals on Ravelry are going to start up a Pi Camping Trip KAL in July and knit this lovely shawl:

I have yarn in the stash for this, too. It's Shadow by Knitpicks (merino wool) in a colorway called Deep Waters Tonal. Deep to mid tones of blues and purples. Yummy!

I may just join them.

Click!

I took a few pictures on our outing today...
The lions are here! The lions are here!
The Lions Bridge in St. Augustine is looking better and better...especially now that the lions are here! We drove to St. Augustine to check them out and to see some Spinners at the Visitor's Center, but it was just too darn crowded to find parking. So we drove through town, saw what we wanted and high-tailed it out of there.

The park areas on either side of the bridge are still under construction, but you can see tons of progress. We noticed some new palm trees around the American Legion building and it looks like more are going to go around the Ponce de Leon statue, too.

Then on the way home we spotted the Weinermobile!!

Totally awesome!

Cheap Chicks

While checking out the fliers that come with my daily paper, I ran across this one from Tractor Supply. Never in my life have I seen advertisements for chickens (well, chicks not chickens, I guess)! And they're dirt cheap! There's no denying that I'm a "city girl", I thought this was so funny (Carol...stop laughing!). But it was the cheap price that got my wheels turning. There was a starter kit you could buy if you wanted to start raising your own chicks, and it was only $19.99. I was really tempted...but we have enough darn animals around this farm as it is!

So if you want fresh eggs, this is how you get started...

Eiki

This gorgeous shawl is called Eiki (strength). The talented designer is donating all the proceeds to relief efforts in Japan. I bought it yesterday and cast on...and thinking/praying with every stitch for those poor people in Japan while they work though this catastrophe. Join me!

Hey!

This is the winter drumline...Velocity! Guess you probably figured that out by their t-shirts, huh? Can you spot my two? Veronica is on the bottom row, second from left and Joey middle row far right.

Not too much to report around here...I'm still working (taking it one day at a time while things are crazy at work), busy with kids, knitting a ton, knees hurting so not alot of running, but some biking...same old, same old.

I'm so glad today is Thursday. Tomorrow is my day off and I'm doing the usual...laundry, catching up on recorded shows (CSI, Survivor and Hawaii Five-O, if it's a new one). I really tried to resist Survivor this time, but with Boston Rob coming back, how could I possibly?!

So yesterday was Ash Wednesday. Did you go to church for your yearly reminder that we are all but dust. Not butt-dust! Ok, that's a funny joke around the office, maybe not so much if you don't work at a church. Oh well. Don't quit my day job, right? Are you giving up something for Lent? I remember one time in church, the priest talking about "giving up" for Lent, and he suggested maybe doing something that was difficult or a struggle, instead of just giving something up. I thought that made much more sense and would probably be harder to do. I'm not doing either. I don't go to church at all these days, so I've taken myself out of the loop, so to speak.

On the knitting front, I just finished a pair of socks (pics to come, promise) and have a couple pair in the works for b-days coming up for friends. I'm working on a new sweater, too. Trying VERY hard to resist casting on another shawl (Girasole by Jared Flood), I really should finish by Bridgewater before I cast on another biggie. I may start a pair of mitts though...starteritis, I got it bad!

Have a great weekend...I maybe back before then to post knit pics.

The Lastest

This platform is for Justine...she wanted a place to hang out "in the trees" to read, draw, whatever. Mike has made it extremely sturdy, and after a coat of sealer, it'll be ready for any "decorations" she wants to add. I'll post more photos as things progress. This is right outside her bedroom window, under HER tree...a sycamore tree named Andrew. Lyra likes to sit on the window sill and watch all the activity.
Blackrose socks...Pagewood Farms yarn...toasty, purple-ie toes.

This is a Ribbon Lace Scarf out of some hand dyed fingering weight Knitpicks yarn...Imagination, I think. I might be alittle late on this...our weather is starting to warm up.

The weather here is perfect...highs in the high-70s and lows in the 50s (I call it San Diego weather). Mike and I went on a 20 mile bike ride yesterday. We stayed in town and went down 17 to Governor's Creek. 17 is a busy, busy road...I was alittle nervous with all the cars zooming past. I didn't crash or fall (always a good thing).

You might now know, but I have been having trouble with my knee lately, well since November really. After seeing an orthopedist and having it MRI'd, the good news is I don't need surgery but I do have ITBS...Iliotibial Band Syndrome. It's a fiberous band that runs from the hip, down the outside of the leg and can cause trouble for runners. The cure is stretching and not pushing too hard (ice, too). So I'm going to take it easy, build slowly, stretch that band like a crazy woman and start moving!

I think I might start a new sweater today and go for a run.

What are you up to?