Yarn Garage

On my trip home to Minneapolis my mother and I decided that the time had come to visit the yarn garage.

Located on 35th and Chicago, a mere four blocks away from my parents house it is exactly what it's name implies. A garage sized space FILLED with yarn.

It's literally wall to wall, floor to ceiling. Almost what yarn dreams are made of.

There are knit items EVERYWHERE. Tons of sweaters, sample projects, knit art projects. All kinds of crazy stuff.

My favorite was this knit wedding cake (!!!) Madness of knitting!

I also loved this alpaca, adorned in knit wear, welcoming you when you walk in. There was a class/meet going on when we were there. I got to meet Steven Be. Everyone there was so friendly and so helpful. Definitely one of the most inviting yarn shop/workshops I've ever been to. If your around Minneapolis be sure to stop in sometime, it's a yarn adventure!

Fiona's Two Boyfriends

I just got back tonight from nice little jaunt to Minneapolis to visit my family. It was great to see everyone and I was able to hand out some very very belated holiday gifts.

For my sister Fiona I knit up the Two Boyfriends Cardigan by Allyson, over at The Sweatshop of Love. One of her original designs it is a simple and easy to knit top down over sized cardigan but she keeps it fresh and fun by having each side a different color. A favorite color for each of your boyfriends. get it?

The stripes and color combo look like they were designed for Fiona. Just her style! I love the pockets and the buttons. I found the button's at Steven B's Yarn Garage which I visited with my mom and will post about next time. It was really fun, just like those buttons!

I've never made something that was so perfectly fit for the person. I wasn't so sure about it as I was packing it up to take but the moment she put it on it fit her perfectly and was so her style. She even loved that I had used blue and orange stripes on the pockets (I had run out of brown yarn).

I also gave my dad his "turtle" as he calls them. Essentially a cowl. A nice neck warmer for those Minnesotan winters.

Seflish Knitting

It's been a busy month around here without any internet access. Luckily my frown is getting turned upside down by my new internet connection! It took AT&T 10 days longer than they should have and I spent a combined total of two hours on the phone but it is finally working.

The good news about being on hold is that you can get lots of knitting done with your phone on speaker.
This week I started and finished my sleeves for my beatnik sweater.

I'm using Allyson's method of knitting two sleeves at once. It helps them fly by faster and keeps the mistakes the same on both. I am notoriously bad at counting rows so knitting them together means they are always the same exact size.

 I'm trying to keep on with the body of my sweater but I've gotten a little discouraged, I've got the shoulder shaping on the back to finish and then the entire front.

I'm taking the beloved mega bus up to Minnesota this weekend so I'm going to have lots of time to finish up my body and seem my sleeves into my sweater. After that I just have the collar to do. There is a slim chance I might finish in time with everyone else!! But I'm not holding my breath, it's more important to finish than to finish it in time with everyone else.

I've got a few more projects sitting around on my needles that I'll try to get up here in the next few weeks and once my (very belated) Christmas gifts for my family once I've finally distributed them.

The Beatnik Continues

The Selfish Knit Along is rolling right along and despite my best efforts I'm still about two weeks behind. It's been a crazy week around here complete with an ER trip for a very very sick husband. Thankfully David is doing ok and there was a lot of waiting around in the ER so I did get quite a bit of knitting done.

This sweater has cabled charts which I had never done before, its really no different than following any other kind of chart but there are small variations between them that I took Allyson's advice and color coded the different cables so that I could identify the variation quickly and find the description. 

I had a really good time of calling out "GREEN" or "RED" when I got to the right cable, although I'm sure it was a less endearing quality to my surrounding human beings. None the less, it gave me a little chuckle and kept me entertained. 

I'm really enjoying this pattern so far and I've pretty much go the charts down so that I really only need to double check stitches a few times. The trouble becomes in remembering where I am in the chart and in all of my increases. The little post it note up there comes in handy to mark where I am before I put it down and don't have a complete brain fart the next time I pick it up. So, the plan is to just keep plugging along and hoping that I can pick up some time along the way. Either way, I know I'll finish and that's what's important.

Snowpacolypse

Here in Chicago we were treated to a truly epic blizzard last night. THUNDERSNOW is new to my vocabulary but it truely was a sight to see. A thunder storm INSIDE a blizzard. I felt like an arctic adventurer braving the snow this morning to make it to breakfast. After a quick (and by that I mean a few blocks through knee deep or waist deep snow drifts) jaunt to our local breakfast place david and I holed ourselves up inside most of the day.

I had the very rare adult treat of a snow day from work! Unheard of! But considering that the side streets were impassable at most points much of Chicago was shut down today. Tomorrow I'll be hitting the slopes bright and early to make it out to the mall that I work in. But today I got to relax and luckily get a lot of knitting done.

I'm still plugging away on my Beatnik Sweater as part of The Sweatshop of Love Selfish Knit Along. It's going pretty well for just starting it a few days ago, I've gotten through to the waist decreases and am just getting ready to knit up most of the body before the waist increases. Super exciting stuff all around.

Looking good!

I'm very excited to have Friday off of work as well so I'll just be drinking lots of tea, firing up some movies and knitting my little heart out. I also have some new projects I'm working on and hopefully will have some more information about in the next few weeks. Until then I'll be glad that this isn't my car:

There are two cars under there! Promise!

Knit Along!

While my lovely friend Allyson over at The Sweatshop of Love has been staycation-ing in Minneapolis for three months my Chicago knitting sceen has been a little lonely. That's why I was super pshcyed to get on board with a knit along. I've never done one before but I am drooling over The Beatnik sweater in the deep fall issue Knitty that I just couldn't help myself.

The Knit Picks gift card my lovely mother in law gave me for Christmas was a nice little bonus as well. Unfortunatly I waited so long in my deicion and ordered my yarn late so I'm THREE whole weeks behind schedule.

The idea is to turn this:

into this: 

I'm working with the Knit Picks DK City Tweed. It's a slightly thiner yarn than what the pattern calls for but I think that I'm going to be ok as far as size goes. I half heartedly knit up a gauge swatch, eyeballed it once or twice with a ruller and just dug in. It kind of just feels like I need a little blind faith in my life right now. So here's jumping in head first. I ordered a few extra skeins so I should be alright in the end. 

I'm really loving how soft and buttery it is. The yellow is a little more mustardy in real life than it appears on the web site which I love. We've got a crazy snow storm forecasted in the next two days here in Chicago so I plan on enjoying my days off and getting some serious knitting in!

cha-cha changes

Even with the end of the holiday season and the end of school (forever!) things have still been really crazy around here. I've got lots of projects to look forward to and set up to get shaking on my needles but its all been set back by my transition to MY NEW APARTMENT.

I'm pretty physced about all of it but its been a whirl wind of activity. I've officially been there a little over a week and tomorrow on my to do list is setting up my very own CRAFT ROOM!

I'll be sure to post some pictures up once I get it all arranged. I also was lucky enough to add a sewing machine to my repertoire (thanks to the hubs for a fabulous Christmas gift!) So we can also look forward to some sewing projects in the future.

I'll wrap this all up with a little finished Christmas project.

Crocheted Washcloths

These were gifts that went to all of my lovely sister in laws along with a cute bar of soap to round it out. 

Such a quick and easy gift these were perfect to whip up for a crowd. 

I also am going to be participating in the Sweat Shop of Love Selfish Knit-a-long. It officially started last week so I'm getting a little late start but once my yarn arrives in the mail I'll be off and running.