Still Here and Knitting

Yikes, I was hoping to be back sooner than this, but at least it is twice in a month, right? I actually have a finished object photo for this post too. I mentioned in my last post that I finished Lutea Lace Shoulder Shell.
I really love the finished result and have worn it a few times already. Since I covered it in the last post, I won't go over all of it again. Here are the pics:

I didn't get M to take a photo, but one of my knitting girls helped me out. Thanks Terrie!

Project Details:

Yarn: Lion Brand Cotton-Ease

Needles Used: US 7 (4.5 mm) needles used

Project length: a month or so. It really didn't take me very long to knit this top up. The tank knits up so quickly. I ripped out my Hey Teach earlier this summer as I could not face the task of figuring out where I was in the lace pattern. I had found some errors and I had to rip back anyway and when you dread a project, it's not an auspicious start to begin working on it again after I'd put the project down last summer. I decided if I had that much dread, perhaps I should just rip it out. I did and then worked up this bottom-up tank in no time and actually have 3 skeins of the Raspberry colorway. This project has made me fine-tune my short-rowing skills. I have found that I am not dreading short rows like I used to. The V-neck is worked by short-rowing, which is quite unusual. Again, very satisfactory knit.

Until next time . .  .

P.S. And today is my birthday. I have had a great day with lots of fun birthday greetings on Twitter and FaceBook. M cooked me breakfast and dinner and I took the day off from work today. Went to see a matinee of Julie & Julia today and just enjoyed it. We also had to go to Back to School Night for M2. Tomorrow we will go out for dinner.

Has It Really Been This long?

I can't believe it's been 2 months since I last blogged

First, thank you to all of you were able to contribute to my cousin's Scleroderma walk. That really meant a lot to me, especially as it at the last minute. Anything that we were able to raise was helpful.

Since my last blog post, so much has happened. I don't think I mentioned it previously, but in May I went to Atlanta to visit my with my mom and sister. And I got to see my favorite nephew, Chason. I flew in on his birthday and got to attend his 4th birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese. And yes, I did volunteer to go this party. Mad props to my sister because she planned it at 10:30 a.m., so there were no other children there. We had the whole place to ourselves, which was perfect for the 4 year-olds who wanted to get on rides too big for them or play games where their feet or arms didn't reach and required adult assistance. I had a ball and it was wonderful to spend a birthday with my nephew. We also took a short weekend jaunt to Tybee Island and Savannah, GA. I had such a great time staying on the beach and touring downtown Savannah, I didn't want to come back.

After that, I decided to take off the summer from school and it was the best thing I did for myself. I really needed a break as I was starting to get burnt out. And there is no deadline to completing school. Better to take a rest than to take a permanent break from school. Now the fall term is upon us and I am refreshed and ready to start anew.

In knitting news, I have been knitting in fits and starts. I decided recently to take the pressure of NaKniSweMoDo off and just knit what I want to knit. I'm a NaKniSweMoDo dropout and I'm ok with that. Our knitting group recently had its annual Camp Retreat weekend and this year we decided to make or contribute items to the goody bag rather than have it assembled for us. My contribution to the goody bags were face/washcloths.

I am posting a couple of pics here:

However, you may look at the rest of the photos on Ravelry at my Camp facecloth collection.

Also, I have completed the Lutea Lace Shoulder Shell and I love how it turned out. I have already worn it three or four times, but I really need to get a modeled pic.

I have another summer top, Pintuck, on the needles and it is coming along. Please excuse the horrible picture. I wasn't able to get a progress pic in natural lighting.

I also have a pair of socks on the needles. Actually two pairs that I just started and I will be ripping out one pair, as I don't like how it's knitting up.

As what seems to be my habit now, every summer I am inspired to knit dischloths/face cloths, etc. After I had to knit 10 wash cloths in about 17 days, one would think that I might be a bit burnt out on cotton cloth knitting. Not so, I am still knitting face cloths, with the leftovers for myself. After three of them and I still have enough yarn to knit 2-3 more, I am moving on to dish cloth knitting. It's time to refresh my kitchen with new dishcloths and perhaps purge some older ones. It's always fun for me to knit up some new patterns and see which cloths are the best to use for my kitchen. I have found that overly lace patterns do not work well for the kitchen. Perhaps those are better suited to the face. I have about 7 skeins of dishcloth cotton hanging around my house. I would be very happy if I could use up what I have and get rid of it. Then when I am ready to buy new cotton yarn, I can just do so.

I'll post some pics of the dish and face cloth pics next time. I'm sorry for the length of this post. Hopefully I'll be back to post again in a shorter time frame.

Till next time . . .