WiP Wednesday

Am I in under the wire? YES!

OK, so the rep weave mug mats came off the loom last week. The next warp is chained and ready to go on the loom. I’m cautiously optimistic that might happen before April.


I think I told you last week that I was waiting for some replacement carpet warp to finish that warp. I eeked out Color B by the hair of my chinny chin chin.


Yeah. I’ll be using the yellow as my skinny warp, thankyouverymuch. I am now somewhat skeptical of weaving kits. Harrumph.

So I worked the Pittsburgh Knit & Crochet Festival on Friday and Sunday last week. In between, our crochet teacher, Sandy, worked the store with me on Saturday. So I busted out my long-snoozing crochet afghan and got Sandy to get my back on the right track. My edges are still wonky, but they’re improving and that’s what this project is all about.


The Miss Babs socks are making progress and are still on my Signature DPNs. They may go back to my Hiya Hiya circs for Tuesday’s plane trip. I haven’t decided yet.


And, finally, Cristi has left me in the dust in our Distelfink KAL, but hopefully I’ll catch up soon. Here’s where I am. Yeah, it’s just a row or two different from last week’s pic. I’ll get there. Eventually.


Hope you’re having a great week!

WiP Wednesday

I’m quite sure it doesn’t look like it, but I have been making progress on the mug rugs.


Yeah. One mug rug looks just like the other mug rugs. But the big news is on the back of the loom.


I’m running out of warp. Finally! HOORAY!!!

If you read my good friend Cristi over at Turtlegirl’s Bloggy Thing, you know that she and I are doing a KAL with one of the patterns from the January Rockin’ Sock Club. My favorite thing about the RSC is the Dyer’s Notes, and the notes this time around really did bring me to tears, since a lot of it was about best friends. Of course, Cristi was pestering me the the whole way through my reading of the notes trying to convince me that we should do a KAL. So I caved!


I cast on at Hurricanes last Wednesday and got some good knitting done during that game on Sunday.

However, I needed something that I could take with me when Hubster and I went to the Penguins game with my parents on Friday night. So I busted out a skein from the stash and was off to the races.


It’s Miss Babs, purchased at Maryland Sheep & Wool last May. The dyer herself helped me pick out the base yarn. I love it so far, and you can’t see it from the pics, but it’s on my Signature DPNs. A very enjoyable experience all around. Let’s just hope they don’t take as long as my previous pair of plan vanilla socks!

Life, in a Nutshell

OK, so the freelance gig is great. I have no complaints.

But the workload is tremendous, and will be until about April 5. I have four sports in season, so that’s eight deadlines a week. Again -- this is a great opportunity for me and I’m making it work. But it’s really killing my crafting time.

I wake up in the morning, make breakfast, have a cup of tea and work until bedtime with side-trips to the gym or other obligations. My knitting/sewing/weaving time is shoeboxed between when I get home from the LYS on Saturday nights and when I go to bed on Sunday night. That’s it. That’s the list.

So I ask that you, my loyal readers, bear with me for the next 2+ months. I promise I’ll catch as many WiP Wednesdays as I can. And when I have finished stuff, I’ll be happy to take a bunch of pictures and tell you all about them. But in between? There may be a bunch of radio silence.

Meanwhile, I woke up this morning to this:


I thought we were supposed to get 1-2”. We got a little more than that, but it was manageable. I shoveled the Incredible Shrinking Driveway …


Why is it shrinking? Because at this time of year the hardest part of shoveling is getting the new snow up-and-over the barrier of old snow. Ugh. But it’s done, and the Big Ball of Fire in the Sky had it completely clear and dry in no time.

And before you ask, yes, I still prefer shoveling snow to raking leaves. No contest. Yes, I am the freak that loves winter. Why do you ask?

I’m nearly finished with the mug rugs. With a little luck, they’ll come off the loom some time this week. Which means I’m winding my next warp. This time? Rep weave placemats!


Looks great, right? Well, I’m not quite done winding the warp. Why?


Yeah. I need 30 more yards (ish) from that nekkid core. (and another 30 yds from that skinny middle cone, but we're not going to borrow trouble on that one.) Obviously, that’s not going to happen, so I’m eagerly awaiting a make-good cone from the vendor. Since this was sold as a kit, running drastically short of one of the three colors is kind of a problem. At least it wasn't my project-planning error?

Oh well. These things happen. Fortunately, I am not on a deadline!