Rav Games Shawl

As most of you probably know, this year for the Ravellenic Games I hosted a team in my group over on Ravelry. The rules? Knit one of my patterns during the Olympics.

Pretty easy, accept I didn't really want to knit one of my patterns again. Don't get me wrong, I love love love my designs while I am knitting them initially, but I am pretty unlikely to knit them a second time. So, I decided that I should work on a new design during the Olympics instead. I'm still finishing up writing the pattern, but here is the finished shawl, which I finished a couple days before the end of the Olympics.

I'm hoping to have the pattern finished up in the next week or so, then it's off to the tech editor for checking!

Want to see what everyone else in the group knit? You can see them here on Ravelry.

Happy knitting!

Artfibers

So, like I said yesterday, while in San Francisco, I made the trip to Artfibers. I had gotten the recommendation to check it out on Twitter, and I wasn't disappointed.

It's located on the third floor of a building, and I loved that when you step off the elevator you step right into the studio. It was set up like no other shop I have ever seen.

Artfibers makes all its own yarns, so you are truely getting something unique there. Talk about the perfect vacation yarn!

The yarns are all swatched out for you to see. You can also take yarn and swatch it yourself to see what you like. I wondered around for awhile, and then finally decided on 500 yards of Camuse yarn, a camel down/cashmere blend.

I really liked it there. If I ever make it back to San Francisco, you can bet I will be stopping in again.

Happy knitting!

A Last-Minute Trip

Alex and I had a trip to go campling with his parents planned for months. Unfortunately, Alex's parents had to cancel last minute due to work conflicts, and we were left with a week of already approved vacation time from work. We decided to skip the camping and hit the west coast. I had never been to California before, so we picked San Francisco for our trip. It was most excellent.

We of course had to ride on a cable car...

We took that baby all the way to Fishermans Wharf where we saw some sea lions and rode on a boat under the Golden Gate Bridge.

We walked around in Chinatown and the Haight/Ashbury area.

We also went to Artfibers, but I am going to save that for tomorrow's post. Took too many pics and petted too much yarn. It deserves it's own post. :)

Such a good time. If you haven't been to San Francisco...go! And if you live there, I am completely jealous of you.

Happy knitting!

Catching up. . . .

I can't believe how the month of August has flown by! There is so much to blog about. So, look for many new posts in the next couple of weeks. I have lots to tell ya.

First up, I wanted to draw some winners for a couple of books I reviewed. First up, it's the Scandinavian Slippers and Socks book.

And the winner is....schwip! Congrats! Check your Rav message please.

And then there was Knitting the Chill Away.

The winner of that book is....greyowl. Hooray! Check your Rav messages too.

Thanks everyone for continuing to read the blog. Lots of good things coming up. Can't wait to share them all.

Happy knitting!

New Yarn

Chris from the yarn shop went to TNNA in Columbus back in June. Due to work conflicts I was unable to go (which is a bummer because I got into TNNA as a designer earlier this year), but Chris hooked me up and shared gave me some of the new yarn she got there to try. I am thinking a shawl design will definitely be coming out of these beauties:

It's four skeins of sock yarn, each 100 yards. The colors are just beautiful:

Blue Ridge Yarns is new to me. Looking on Ravelry, I see they have lots of yarn, and this one, Footlights, is the newest one added to their website.

Can't wait to try it!