Bichons In Berry Sauce

Important packing for a weeklong cruise,

Plus a little Caribbean beach,

Makes Odessa twins! (Fraternal, of course.)

Pattern: Odessa by Kathy
Yarn: Rowan Cashsoft DK in Navy and Ballad Blue, and some size 6 clearish-sparkly colored beads from Joann's for the light blue hat.
Needles: Inox 16" circulars, sizes 5 and 6, size 6 dpns
Modifications: As before, I added a few more rows for length, but that's about it. It's a great pattern!

These are for my boyfriend's parents. They live up in Maine, so even though spring is approaching, hats are always appreciated!

Before I left on the trip, I strung all my beads. No point in bringing along a tube of beads and a beading needle if it's not necessary, right? Right. On the plane headed into Miami, I encountered a knot. EEEEK! I am not a good yarn splicer, and it took me about 30 minutes to painstakingly transfer 40 beads. One. bead. at. a. time. to the rest of the skein. I have learned my lesson. I will anticipate knots. I will bring my big eye needle with me.

The kicker: not one single knot in the Navy skein. Figures.

I missed little Abby while I was gone. Cruises would be much better if they let bichons roam the decks. This is Abby when she was truly a baby, back in August with a fat little puppy belly.

Posted by Nancy at 04:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (24)

I came back from vacation yesterday and was a little puzzled. All these comments to my blog, all these people subscribed on bloglines. What happened??? While catching up on my blog reading, I discovered Miss Grumperina mentioned me in a meme. It must be that if you get the Grumpster seal of approval, it's worth a visit!

I went to the Caribbean for a week with my family; it was loads of fun and I got a few knitted things done. More on that tomorrow. Before I left I got a good deal done on the Noro bag for my coworker. I really like how the stripes are working out. I opted not to bring the bag on vacation with me-- too bulky for beach knitting.

Little Abby went to live with my boyfriend for a week. Really, I'm not sure she knows where she lives. Whenever I'm at work she's at his house, and she's quite accustomed to living in his kitchen while we're out. Her latest project is the yellow-pages.. we'd been keeping it in one of the bottom kitchen cupboards. She broke in, and is in the process of shredding it. Working backward, she's up to the letter v.

Posted by Nancy at 11:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The Elizabeth Bag is officially started! I swatched like a good girl, and even practiced felting. It came out looking pretty sharp, doesn't even look knitted! I suppose that is the point.. Abby thinks my swatch is pretty great too. I've found it quite a few places now-- among her toys, in the spare bedroom, on my bed. Apparently it's her new toy. My little bichon has good (and expensive!) taste. Noro yarn is not cheap. I will probably have 3ish skeins of extra-- any ideas what to do with it?

So far I have finished the bottom. I'm at the point now where I need to go around my rectangle and pick up stitches for the sides. My little miss likes to snuggle with my knitting when I'm not around.. and put my yarn in knots when I'm not around. A few days ago I woke up to about 1/3 a skein of Noro in a tangled mess, and an innocent looking bichon looking at me like she didn't have the faintest idea what happened.

Posted by Nancy at 01:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (24)

Not a lot of knitting has been going on lately. I've made about a foot of progress on the Midwest Moonlight, but nothing really worth showing yet. Abby and I just finished the second to last increase row on the ribbon scarf. 1,600 stitches on the needles! Craziness.

I'm thinking about putting some beads on the last row (the edge) so that it better matches it's pink partner, Odessa. This morning, Abby has been my knitting buddy. I had some friends over last nite and we kept her up late, so she was more than willing to nap in my lap during our knitting time. She was briefly disturbed by the beeping of my new coffeemaker. It's super high tech-- timers and cleaning settings, and beeping when the coffee is ready. And barking when the coffee is ready.

Posted by Nancy at 03:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)