July Goals:
1. Finish the Rivendell socks
2. Start and finish the Phildar cropped sweater (the yarn I just bought in France).
3. Finish first Ornette sock.
4. Finish chart 7 on Peacock Feathers.

Pattern: Mrs. Darcy by Mary Weaver
Modifications: I had to wing some stuff - the pattern isn’t error free, so follow the designer’s advice and go with your instinct. One thing I should have done was twist the purl stitches on the wrong side of the twisted rib. As written, only right side rows are twisted (the knit stitch).
Needles: US 9 Addi Turbos
Yarn: 3 skeins of Foxfiber and Designs Cormo and Alpaca Classic
Date Started: January 6, 2008
Date Completed: February 16, 2008
Time: 3.75 hours for the back, 3.25 hours for the right front, 1.5 hours for the left front, 3 hours for the first sleeve, 2.5 hours for the second sleeve, and 2.75 hours of finishing for a total of 16.75 hours.

Yesterday, I headed to WEBS with Carol and Sara to the book signing by Carol Sulcoski for Knit So Fine: Designs with Skinny Yarn.

I managed to behave somewhat and only get sock yarn, but that was just because I lost my head at Little Knits on Thursday. I’ve got some of the new cotton Noro Matsuri headed my way, and I’m excited. I plan to make the cover sweater of Noro Joy, just without the pattern, since once I totaled up all of the changes I would make to it, it went from not making any sense to buy the book for $18 to being just kind of dumb.

Anyway, back at home, we settled in for some fun with the borrowed PS2 and Guitar Hero game that is on loan from a co-worker.

(Ed and Michele came over, though Michele opted to nap since she had just ridden really really far on a bike, after all.)

Oh, and I finished up Salina (on Friday night). I haven’t had the heart to block it yet, though:

I wish them a happy and safe ride today.

Pattern: Alphabet Blanket from Debbie Bliss’s Baby Knits Book
Needle: Addi Turbo US 3
Yarn: Mondial Cotton Soft Speciale Baby Solid, 5 skeins of 920, 3 skeins each of 915 and 916 (I had about half balls left of each color)
Modifications: Knit individual blocks and seamed, rather than knit the whole thing as one piece. I added eyelets around each block, so there are double eyelets once seamed. Also, I added 12 rows of plain knitting (6 above and 6 below) each letter, as the blocks looked too squat. That might have been a result of our row gauge, but I never double checked.
Started: November 23, 2007
Finished: June 14, 2008
Time: Knitting the blocks took 33.75 hours, seaming was 7 hours, and the knitting of the border was 16 hours, for a total of 57.25 hours (this doesn’t include the knitting or seaming of the last two rows of blocks).

Pattern: Marilinda by Cookie A. (Ravelry link)
Yarn: Less than two skeins of Shibui Knits in color 220
Needles: US 1 Knitpicks nickel plated
Modifications: none
Date Started: June 2, 2008
Date Completed: June 15, 2008
Time: 8.5 hours for the first sock, 8 for the second for a total of 16.5 hours

Pattern: Gothic Spire by Cookie A. (Ravelry link)
Yarn: A little more than one skeins of STR Lightweight in Korppi (thank goodness for Ravelry - a very nice knitter sent me her leftovers so I could finish these socks)
Needles: US 1 Knitpicks nickel plated
Modifications: knit one fewer repeats on the leg
Date Started: April 28, 2008
Date Completed: June 22, 2008
Time: 10.25 hours for the each sock for a total of 20.5 hours

I normally would link directly to the patterns, but I can’t get on the Cookie A. site right now. I hope that means Ornette (Rav link) has been released!

Bonus Lani picture, just because:

Then I had a week that basically sucked, with the exception of seeing some friends. Made some knitting progress but am behind on pictures and stuff (which I’ll fix this week). So that brings us to today.

Brad and I got tired of looking at this:

and this:

(Those are fake and quite worn, came with the house.) We went to Lowe’s today with Lani in tow (she loves tagging along), and hit the garden center. The hanging planters were easy to fix:

The planter took a little more work:

It took the two of us a few hours to make the change. Now the real test comes - do the flowers grow and spread, or do we end up managing to kill them? Only time will tell.

I managed to make it to Knitsmiths for the first time in ages. Lani came too (she had quite a day!), and Gayle was excited to see her:

Lani is passed out cold now - it’s such a tough life, being so popular!

ETA: Catching up on blog posts, and I love this one by Crazy Aunt Purl.

Today we’re celebrating six years of marriage. We’re going the low-key route - we did all of the fancy dinners overseas, and our last dinner in France was our official anniversary dinner. We’re going to spend a quiet day home together, complete with cooking from Brad.

This last year has had it’s share of ups and downs (like Lani’s health), but we’ve dealt with them together as a team. I think this might have been our best year of marriage yet, because we’re traveling through life together, not just alongside each other.

The traditional 6th anniversary gift is candy/iron, modern is wood. Coincidentally the 5th year traditional gift is wood, and that’s what we called the house last year (our “wood” anniversary gift to each other). I went with wood again because I liked it better than candy or iron (but the gift is substantially smaller than a house. ) The 7th anniversary is wool. I am all over that one.

The purple laceweight was dyed local to the UK, and is absolutely beautiful and soft (cashmere!) Sometime after I regain my love of lace (I go through phases, and I am so clearly in a Cookie A sock phase at the moment), I’ll break into this stuff.

I also got some Phildar magazines that I loved, and yarn to make this top. I found it a little funny - the sweater that I jumped through hoops for, finally ordering it from Breiweb and translating the pattern from Dutch, was in a best of book. There were some other lovely cabled goodies so I bought that as well, including a sweater that Brad liked.

Since then, I’ve finished the first sock, and started on the second. I’m loving the pattern and the yarn - I had to talk myself out of ordering more Shibui yarn! I also need to get off the Cookie A. kick. I’m allowing myself Ornette (Ravelry link), when it gets released, and that’s it!

I have to say, though, with it being SO DARNED HOT around here, I’m not feeling much like knitting. I can’t wait for this heat wave to be over.