My birthday present from Rob arrived today - a swift and ball winder to help me with my knitting. I had lots of fun opening the box and setting everything up on the table. The picture below shows my singles of autumn coloured merino (I finished spinning last weekend - more details coming soon) being wound into a centre-pull ball for me to ply from. It looked so nice when I was finished I almost knit it up instead.


I also got some Blue Faced Leicester fibre in the mail today but I was having so much fun with the swift and the ball winder that it didn’t get opened until almost ten o’clock.  The fibre is beautifully soft and just a bit shiny. It still smells a lot like sheep and reminded me of trips to the petting zoo in Stanley Park, Vancouver. Zeke found it fascinating.

 

 

These represent two future projects to keep us warm next winter. My sweater will be the light coffee (with lots of milk) colour and Rob’s will be forest green.
 
One of my favourite online shops, Dream Weaver Yarns , announced a sale on Rowan yarns on Easter weekend. One of the things I like best about this site is that when you look at a book or magazine from their catalogue they always show you some of the pictures from inside - not just the cover. Because of this I knew that the Bigger Picture pattern book from Rowan had a nice cozy men’s sweater in it that I thought might look good on Rob. I looked up the sale and discovered that the yarns were about 20% off - which is quite a bit when you are buying six or nine balls - and that there was a women’s sweater pattern I liked in the same book. I looked through the colours available and found one for and asked Rob to take a look at the pattern when he had a free moment and to pick a colour if he liked it.
 
The yarn arrived last week and it is so soft and squashy. I can’t wait to knit it up. Its super bulky weight so the knitting will go quickly - I only have to cast-on 28 stitches for the front of my sweater. I’m am planning to wait until after the wedding to start knitting though - I need to get needles and I know I will be too busy with other things to get a bunch of extra knitting done. Besides, it is unlikely to be cool enough for us to wear them in July.

 

This is my vacation shopping yarn stash! I went down to Edmonton with a bunch of patterns and some vague ideas for colours and walked into River City Yarns , which had been particularly recommended to me by somefriends. The ladies at the shop were very nice and helped me find appropriate yarns for all my projects. I had three of the skeins I bought wound into balls at the shop so I can use them right away. I’m a little proud of myself for buying only one skein that is not designated for a specific project but actually true stash yarn for some future idea. There were so many wonderful yarns that it was difficult to pick only a few. My only disappointment was not to find any spindles but, as Rob said yesterday on our flight back, there is no way I’d have managed to fit a spindle into out bags anyway.

Here are my yarns:

First, Rob helped me pick out two nearly solid shades of Socks that Rock - Lightweight for the Endpaper Mitts pattern by Eunny Jang. The top colour is “Beryl” and the bottom is “Jasper”.

Sticking with Socks that Rock I chose a mediumweight in “Rolling Stone” for the Purl Beret .

And then a heavyweight in “Rose Quartz” for the Cabled Fingerless pattern. The blue skein in behind the pink is “Midsummer Night” and was just to pretty to pass up - my official stash yarn.

I got one ball of Rowan Calmer in “Powder Puff” (Shade 482) to make up Twinkletoes from the last issue of Knitty.


Three balls of Noro Kureyon are for the Booga Bag Pattern which I printed off ages ago but didn’t have yarn for.

Finally, there are three skeins of Manos del Uruguay in “Mallard” to become a scarf for Rob.

I had to get needles for several of my new projects too so I now have a slightly fuller needle collection.