Poof!

There went autumn. It rained most of the weekend but on Monday morning while we were getting ready to go to work, it began to snow. And, is it cold! I've already gotten out the turtleneck sweaters and put away the t-shirts for the season, and I don't feel even slightly ridiculous wearing that lovely tweed jacket any more.

Saturday I headed over to a friend's house to do some group spinning, finally. As one of my goals for Socktoberfest, I want to spin a yarn small, even and long enough to knit into a pair of socks for the Emperor. Now, if I can just stick with it... the wool is a Targhee/Corriedale mix that another spinner de-stashed earlier this year. To prep it, I have to shake out lots of loose dirt and vegetable matter (VM) and then card it. When I've spun and plied about 450 yards, I'll dye it (don't know what color yet, but it will be a Koolaid dye) and then knit it up. The wool has lots of crimp, and the resulting yarn is very soft and sproingy, even though it's small and probably overspun.

The first Ombre Hombre sock is about half an inch away from being ready for Toe Decreases. I'm almost to the armhole shaping for the first sleeve on Pellew's Pelisse. The French Market Bag gets a row or two every now and then. And then I'm trying very hard to not cast on for anything else until I finish the sweater or the bag.

Did you see this? Nancy Bush created the "Truly Tasha Shawl" and when I saw it worked up at our LYS, I couldn't resist digging up the pattern. Even though it's a sturdy bit of knitting, the lacy edge and the way you can give it a turned-down collar makes it a lovely, delicate-looking accessory. I want to cast on for it right now but at the same time, I want to find just the right yarn for it. Something soft and bright and beautiful like a tweedy rainbow or oh, who knows. That's all I need, another Holy Grail of knitting to look for. And no, I don't have enough of anything in the stash that will do.

I do have some laceweight yarn and I'm oh, soooooo tempted to cast on a Pi shawl ala Elizabeth Zimmermann (in her book Knitter's Almanac). One of the flashes of brilliance in the Yarn Harlot's book Knitting Rules is an explanation for math dopes like me of how the Pi Shawl works. Don't ask me to repeat it, go get the books and look this up. But now that I understand it, it's everything I can do to not dig up those skeins of Knitpicks "Shadow" and start a circular lace shawl.

Me and lace knitting, hmmmm. I tried lace knitting over a year ago with the Leaf Lace pattern and sport weight alpaca and kept botching it up around row 19. Lace knitting takes concentration I didn't have at the time, and still didn't have earlier this year when I tried to do a Liesl scarf in worsted weight for the Knitting Olympics. I'm a lot more mellow now than I was a year ago or six months ago so I could try lace knitting again, but if I fail it will be difficult to come up with a new excuse for my shortcoming.

One thing at a time! For October, I will finish the Ombre Hombre socks, and spin up enough sockweight yarn to make a pair of socks for the Emperor. You read it right here. Three weeks from now, what tune will I be singing?