Holiday Weekend: Update

My 4th of July weekend started out quiet with planning for two knitting classes next week. Then I went early to farmer's market on Saturday to buy corn and cherries.

I found a patriotic duck in a window. That brought to mind a song about how much is that ducky in the window....okay, so I was making up the words as I went along.

Then the market had lovely mixed veggies baskets. That is a great marketing technique if you do not know exactly what you want.

By Saturday afternoon the rain had moved in and by the end of the day we were bbq-ing indoors and making national news by getting an inch of rain in a very short amount of time. Needless to say, it made for very soggy fireworks watching.

And while it rained, Pedro did a lot of this on his dream curl. It is his favorite place to take a nap now that the weather is warmer.

In knitting news: I finished my first BSJ (baby surprise jacket). I have to say that just following the pattern without question worked just fine (thanks for the tip, CatWithCats).

And I finished my first pair of Fiber Trends felted clogs. They are all ready to felt. I will felt one and leave the other alone for display purposes. I think it is very fun to compare the size of what you have to knit to get a certain size when it is felted.

I moved on to knitting a trumpet flower from the Nicky Epstein Knitted Flowers book to make sure I understood the pattern before I try to teach it next week. And I will be practicing the cast on for the Inside Outside Scarf pattern, the other class on for this week.

And the SS09 countdown is at 30 days-ish, I am knitting wee tiny socks for TheCraft'sMeow booth during all my other available time. It is lots of fun to see the baggie filling up with colorful sample socks.

I hope everyone had a fabulous holiday weekend!

SS09 Mini Socks: Progress Report

I am making good progress on knitting mini sample socks for The Crafts Meow, a vendor at the upcoming, now world known, and much anticipated, Sock Summit 2009.

I am using my wee tiny sock pattern on size 2s and trying a size 1 with more stitches on to get a large enough mini sock to make nice samples the can be seen and touched in her booth.

The needles I am using in these pictures are Harmony woods from Knit Picks in a size 1, 4-inch length. They are interesting to knit with, you have to keep your hands on them because they are so lightweight that if one slips away they are difficult to find. You may also want to sandpaper the ends of the occasionally.

The size 2s that I use are Bryspun double points that will be accepted on the plane. Unfortunately they do not make them in any smaller sizes and the ones I really like (Kollage square DPNS in 5-inch length) are metal and I don't dare test the TSA folks at security with those. So they will go in the checked bag and I will use the others for the plane.


She has lovely yarn both in feel and in colors. I am enjoying knitting with it and can hardly wait to see what new dye lots she brings to the show.

I hope you all have lots of color and softness in your lives!

SS09 Mini Socks: From This

Today in the mail I received a package of sock yarn from The Craft's Meow, one of the Sock Summit 2009 vendors.

I will be knitting mini sock samples for her booth between now and August. The yarn is yummy and it will be fun to see how they knit up for display. The plan is to make them big enough to be seen in the booth and touchable so folks know how fabulous this yarn feels.

She sent me a variety of fun colors in mini skeins and I think I will be able to do a couple of them with different color heels and toes for the fun, value-added look.

So, from this picture of "sock parts" to a finished product, I will update the progress once I get some knit up.

You should go over to her Etsy shop and see the wonderful colors she creates. After I visited there again I realized that she has named all her yarn colors after ice cream flavors. How fun is that?! I can hardly wait to them live at the "Big Show." :-)

I hope everyone is planning a great weekend!