So Close

 

I haven't given up on that mess on the loom yet. If I get up out of this chair and walk over there I'll be finished with all the re-threading. If all goes well there should be some weaving going on next week. Fingers crossed. 

Friday Fluff: Catching Up

 

There hasn't been any tours to watch this week but before the Women's Tour was over on Sunday I finished spinning the rest of the fiber I had leftover from the drop spindles. 

Then I had to join and transfer what I had on another bobbin and off the drop spindles themselves. Now I've got a lot of singles to ply during the Vuelta de Espana that starts next Saturday.

I ran out of yarn for the Wonky Thermal Mitts and had to ply the singles I had on the Ashford Traditional. I'm hoping the colors will work because these singles came from a different little carded nest of Merino than the other ball I was using.

The Unicorn Barf Pi Shawl is in its never ending orange era it seems. I could use a color change right about now. It's getting a bit monotonous. 

Car Knitting

We were on the road again bright and early to do some Grand sitting yesterday. MIL is off on a week long quilting retreat so we filled in for a day. The new Hummingbird cast ons got a good start.

On the two hour trip up there I got the toes finished on the second pair of "snow socks" for the big Grand. I couldn't believe how much bigger his feet have gotten since I measured them. These will never fit him by the time the snows come so I'll be casting on some bigger ones in the near future.  He said he wants red socks this time. 

Baby Grand is in his Elmo Era. They've got Elmos all over the place. This one does the chicken dance.

Baby Grand also got a coloring session. The last time I tried this he colored all over the rug. This time he put all his efforts into coloring...Elmo. 

This time next week Big Grand will be in school for the first time. He starts Pre-K on Wednesday. We spent the day reading all the words on the bottom of his huge collection of Match Box cars and looking the models up online. We found a 20 year old Lamborgini that sold for $625,000. Then we had to decide where on his map/rug the cars would find themselves. Where do you put a $625,000 automobile? He put it in the parking lot of the coffee shop. Where else?

 

Wednesday WIPs:

 

I had convinced myself that the body of Chestnut was finished. I had even packed it up and got ready to work on the sleeves but then I measured it against Bon Amie and I see I still have a ways to go. One more pattern repeat should do it. I hope. 

The cowl's August doodle is already finished I didn't plan on repeating myself when I picked the patterns but I did with the pine cone. Oh, well. Maybe I'll repeat it again on the end so it will look like I planned it. 

I started a new row and a new color on the Hue Shift. There was a lot of ripping again this week. I'm not sure how I'm always getting the count wrong but I am. Now I am counting every darn row which honestly takes a lot of the fun out of it. 

The sock basket I keep by the TV was empty after I finished the Uneek socks and that can't happen so I wound up this Stroll Handpaint in hopes of casting some new socks on. I bought this Hummingbird colorway hoping it would work for the Stroll Pi Shawl but it didn't. Like many of us, I'm pretty meh about life right now thanks to this never ending horrible heat wave so something that didn't involve matching was just what I needed. This miserable last gasp of summer needs to be as uncomplicated as possible.

TNT: A Good Match

 

Kitty is sitting on its green cushion but I haven't finished its tail yet. I'm close.

I finished the third block of the needlepoint project and started the fourth. 

I was worried about running out of certain colors and was very happy when this order turned out to work perfectly with the old vintage yarn in the kit. 

Dear Jane didn't see any action this week because of all the quilting drama going on in the sewing room with the Zig Zag quilt but I did finish another block on the Patchwork quilt and will start this one this week. Five more to go. As long as I don't run out of Datelines, I don't care how long it takes to finish. On most days, it's the best part of my day. 

Thinking Ahead

 

My plan for surviving the remainder of these horribly hot muggy, buggy days is to get ready for fall. I see two cabled hats and two pairs of socks in fall colors coming my way-with project bags to match. 

Sunday Sewing

 

I had a lot of decisions to make this week. I needed to start thinking about backing for the Zig Zag quilt. I hate thinking about backing. Even a small quilt like this one takes a lot of fabric and fabric isn't cheap anymore. 

The designer's quilt calls for giant orange rick rack. I wanted to skip that so I bought some orange yardage to add a skinny border before I add the last yellow floral panels. 

The binding material that was included with the kit is gold so I went with a yellow backing. It all arrived within days of ordering so I'll be at work today assembling all this. I doubt I'll get to putting together the sandwich mainly because The Mister still has a puzzle on the big dining room table that I need to lay it all out on. He's almost done but I'm really not in a hurry. That's always my least favorite part of the process.