Well, it's time to update my Project Table. The Christmas shutdown has been very sick in my household with both Mike and Kelly very sick. Luckily, I'm staying healthy enough to nurse them although it's starting to wear me out. Mike's been better but Kelly is still having an unsettled stomach although her fever has gone away thankfully.

I decided I didn't like the crocheted Ship's Project hat so it's frogged. The Ship's Project Dorm Boots are finished and ready to send out, however. Mike's Regia socks are almost finished...I'm just finishing up the toe on the second sock. Wendy's sock yarn was finished and mailed off although she's decided it's too dense for socks and is thinking about knitting some fingerless gloves with it instead. My sewing projects are languishing, but I'm trying to get back on track with those today, if Kelly is feeling better. I have a ton of laundry to get caught up on since it was all I could do to keep the beds stripped and changed, etc.

I'm supposed to be also doing some data analysis for work (like everything decided to hit right before shutdown!). I've not gotten that analysis done and it can sit until Kelly is well enough to not need my constant attention. I've got my hands full enough here without worrying about someone else's emergency that they should have taken care of through proper project management to start with months ago! So they can just wait for me to help bail them out when we go back to work on Jan 2.

I've been contemplating which stash project I am going to work on starting in January. On the Yahoo Group Productive Spinners, we are starting a Stashalong project which requires shopping solely from your stash and doing a larger scale project like a sweater or more. I have an afghan kit that I've never started so that one may call me. The yarn and pattern are already put together and I don't have to do any thinking or designing since it's all right there waiting on me. I'm also thinking that I will start getting out a UFO to place in my Project Table and try and get those finished. I don't have an awful lot of UFO's by some people's standards...only about 10 or so. And some of those I'm thinking that I will frog and just recycle the yarn. So starting soon, I will try and keep a Stash project and a UFO project going.

Santa brought me a lot of sock yarn and I'm anxious to get some more socks made. I've decided that I only want to knit on one pair of socks at a time, so as soon as I finish up Mike's socks (hopefully today), I can start on a new pair. I really love my knitted socks and have started wearing those to work almost exclusively over my store-bought socks. If you have never knitted a pair, I would highly recommend it.

Hope everyone is having a good holiday!

Work has been CRAZY this week...it always seems to hit right before shutdown (we are off starting Monday until Jan 2). Anyway, here's the picture of Wendy's sock yarn...


And just for kicks, here's Kelly and I out building a snowman this past weekend! I'm wearing my felted hat and Kelly's wearing a hat with tassels I made for her last year.


Probably won't get much blogging done until next week so have a good weekend!

I was a busy bee this weekend! Just look at all the red entries in my Project Table! Wendy's yarn is ready to go in the mail today. I have a picture on the digital camera that I haven't gotten downloaded yet. I'll do that tonight and you can check it out tomorrow. I also got some more knitting done on Mike's socks and the Ship's Project dorm boots. My Rowan polar scarf is almost finished...just a little more eyelash yarn knitting to trim out one end. I'll post a picture of it for tomorrow as well. I even crocheted some more on the Ship's Project hat, but WOW! does crocheting ever cramp up my hand now. In my previous life, I crocheted a LOT, but haven't done hardly any in the past 8 to 10 years. I don't know how I did so much crocheting before, but I don't really remember my hand cramping like it does now either.

Thanks to all the spinners out there who gave me some feedback on the dense sock yarn. It all makes very logical sense (appealing to my engineering side!). I've really been thinking that it might be time for me to get some fiber prep tools. I've been thinking about a drum carder or hand cards. I think that I would rather have a drum carder (yeah...I WOULD go for the more expensive alternative!). I just haven't brought myself to making that investment yet. Maybe next year (of course, next year isn't that far away!)

Not much time to blog today...work calls. However, Wendy's yarn is drying on a hanger as we speak. I'll take a picture of it this weekend after it's finished drying. I knitted a little bit on Mike's socks last night, but that was about it. I crashed early. Looking forward to a relaxing weekend of knitting, sewing, and just laying around in general. Hope your weekend is nice too!

Last night, I got the clock skeiner out, put it together, and skeined up Wendy's sock yarn. According to my skeiner instructions regarding the number of turns vs. yardage, the 100grams I have measures roughly 250 yards or so. This bothers me a bit, because that works out to only approx 1130 yards per pound if all my calculations are correct. While my wraps per inch are fingering weight (around 17wpi), my ypp are around worsted weight yarn. That basically means that in 100 grams of MY sock yarn, I'm getting just slightly more yardage that a commercial 50 gram skein of sock yarn.

For all you spinners out there, how have you gotten your yarn density down? It seems that from what I've read, many spinners come out with denser yarn than a commercial equivalent. What is it that we do differently? If you have any ideas about this, I would love to hear them.

Anyway, I washed the yarn and I have it soaking in a rinse with some softener in it. I always like to do this with my yarn. Tonight I will hang it to dry and it will be ready to mail by the weekend! Woo Hoo! So Wendy, be forewarned...you may not want to plan on making very tall socks with this yarn.

Not much else got done last night, but I'm looking forward to really hitting some of my other projects tonight.

As you can see from last night's post, the plying of Wendy's sock yarn is finished! I have a clock skeiner for my Majacraft wheel that I've never used and I'm planning on getting that out tonight and skeining up the yarn. Then I'll wash it and set the twist in it and let it dry. It should be ready to package up and send out in the mail by the weekend!

I'm sending off an earwarmer to The Ship's Project today and am just over halfway finished with the crocheted hat. The sole is finished on the second dorm boot and I'm hoping that they will be ready to go in the mail by the weekend as well. I think for the rest of the month I'm going to switch to making some baby hats for the local chapter of Newborns in Need. I'll pick up again for The Ship's Project in January.

Looking at my Project Table, I think I'll concentrate on getting Mike's Regia socks finished by Christmas. There's also a secret sewing project that I need to have finished by Christmas (can't list it here right now just in case the recipient reads my blog!). I'll just say that it's a sewing project and I've pre-washed the fabrics. I plan to cut out the fabric by the weekend.

I took an initial flip through the new Vogue Knitting mag last night. I have to say that I really like this issue (but I generally like most of the VK issues.) You can always depend on them to do something different. I liked a lot of the designs just because they were put together a little differently or combined things that aren't normally combined. I like to look at VK as a general fashion statement. It's not that I would necessarily sit down and knit an exact replica from one of the patterns, but I like to see what design elements are being used and what strikes my fancy. It's the search for a new or unique technique that I haven't tried before that interests me. In my mind, VK has a certain personality that you can always depend on. It may not be a personality you like, but it's there all the same. They seem to have a sense of what they want to be. I like that in a mag. If you want to be crazy and trendy, then by all means *be crazy and trendy* and don't make any apologies.

I have a sweater design starting to float around in my head. I'm thinking that I may make that my stash project after the first of the year. If it pans out like I think, I plan to submit it to Knitty. I had purchased the Knitty Messenger Bag after the release of the first issue, so I think that I will carry my secret Knitty project around in that bag for inspiration! I am *definitely* going to get the Knitty clock for my craft room when we get it put together!

The plying is FINISHED! WooHoo! Now I'm ready to skein it up and wash/set the skein.

I'm getting ever so close to finishing Wendy's sock yarn. I plied some more last night on it and I now only have 2 color sequences to go...basically that means that I'm 83% finished with the plying. I will plan to ply again on it tonight...here's hoping that I will be able to get all the plying finished.

I've also added a crocheted project under my Knitting column in the Project Table. I'm crocheting a hat for The Ship's Project. I don't crochet much any more, but this hat pattern, which was distributed by Ellen to the group, just seemed like a great quick project. During the breaks in my plying session last night, I worked on this crochet hat and also knitted on the second dorm boot for The Ship's Project as well.

Yesterday, I mentioned a stash project that I'm going to start after the first of the year. This was mentioned on a mailing list I'm on called Productive Spinners. We list up to 3 projects which we officially report on every 2 weeks. We have email discussions about what might be sidetracking us or problems we might be having which might otherwise cause us to set projects down and not finish them. One of the members suggested doing a stash project so that we can "shop from our stash wealth", so to speak. I haven't decided yet what my stash project is going to be, but I'm looking forward to going through my stash after Christmas and seeing what strikes my fancy.

I stopped by my LYS, Stitches and Scones, yesterday on my way to pick up my daughter. I knew that I wasn't going to buy any fiber or yarn on this trip, so I picked up the latest issue of Vogue Knitting and couldn't resist getting 2 other books...Domino Knitting and The Twisted Sister's Sock Book. I wanted to look through those SO BADLY last night, but I think they are best wrapped up for Christmas. About a month ago, I also purchased the newest revision of Vogue Knitting which is going under the tree as well.

Have you checked out the latest issue of Knitty yet? I love the cover sweater, Marc, designed by Melissa Lim. Red IS my favorite color and I love the stripes she used in the design. I also like the fringed version of A capella (further down the pattern page) by Kristi Porter. The looped version doesn't do much for me but the collar-turned-down, fringed version does! C3 by Annie Modesitt is very nice (there's that red color again!) and Fuzzyfeet by Theresa Vinson Stenersen really appeals to my felting kick I've been on! Tangled Garden by Robyn Gallimore is just FAB! I love fair isle socks! Don't forget to check out Jenanne Hassler's Straight-laced socks and her method of knitting both socks at the same time on 2 circular needles.

I haven't had time to read through the articles yet, just look at the patterns. All in all, a very well put together issue. Great job!