The Van, Cookies, and Spinning

This weekend was suppose to be a camping adventure, however fate was a fickle mistress.

Ben and I packed up the car in record time on Thursday and headed out for some camping and dirt biking goodness (I feel so cool now that I'm learning how to ride a motorcycle). We were about 40 miles from the campsite when we blew out a tire on the van. We pulled over but because there was so little space on the side of the freeway Ben backed up the on ramp that we pulled over in and parked us next to a lettuce field.

Well we had a spare tire, granted it was a slightly smaller spare then the rest of the tires, but we had a spare. Then after a search of the car we find we don't have a jack or a tire iron. Epic fail. Ben and I were both in the scouts for years and one of the mottos is be prepared. I have my nice spare, jack and tire iron in my Honda's hidey-hole and Ben, who tinkers with cars, has tons of them in the garage, so I found it kind of ironic that we did not have one in the van. Luckily I found out that we were about a mile from an auto parts store and Ben took one of the motorcycles to get what we needed to change the tire.

My only complaint the entire time was that there were a number of cars that passed us and no one stopped. I was taught as a child that if you see someone on the side of the road you stop and offer any assistance they might need. It ranks up there with helping little old ladies with heavy groceries and lost children. This will be the end of the rant, but please, next time you see someone broken down on the side of the road please help them. Sometimes they just might need help changing a tire, or they might need a cell phone to call a tow truck.

Okay, lets get back on track. Ben and I changed the tire, loaded back up the van, but because the tire was not the right size Ben did not want to go camping since the last 5 miles to the campsite was unpaved and he was worried about blowing another tire. We headed home and proceeded to completely waste the weekend.

Friday kind of disappeared in a frenzy of cleaning up the house and knitting (I can't even tell you what I knit). Saturday I spent hours working on my reunion cowl thinking I was nearing the end to only check the directions and find that there was 1 more repeat of 25 rows. (25 rows for another repeat + 10 more rows to finish the current repeat + 12 rows for the edging) x 430 stitches per row = 20,210 stitches to finish it or a quick trip to the project closet to get something else to work on. I came out of the project closet with my vine yoke cardi (which I'm not even sure if can still be called that as I've messed with the stitch count so much its something completely different now) and the rest of some batting I needed to finish to spin for a Christmas gift.

But to take the edge off of it all I ended up baking Ben and me cookies. He found me poking around in the cupboards checking to see if I had the things for Healthy Peanut Butter Freezer Cookies and found that I needed dried fruit and I was nearly out of peanut butter.  We got to thinking and he funded a trip to the store for cookie dough for him and the supplies I needed for my cookies.

I added a fruit bits mix, 1/4 of mini chocolate chips and cut
them in to bars

Then today I decided to try and make chocolate chip cookies while watching Hot Fuzz, which is something I have not done in years. I usually add too much vanilla, or the cookies came out as hard as rocks.

I love mini chips

Turns out that I still can't make the thick, gooey chocolate chip cookies I strive for. Though they have a soft chewy center, they're as thin as pancakes and crunch on the outside. 

Wonderful kits and yummy cookies with milk!

But at least I made a sale today and I got the rest of my spinning done witch is part of a larger project soon to be unveiled! 

And I give you...

Baby Hallows

Giants yarn and Candy Corn

The front of the sock

Side view of the socks

I loved knitting these as the 50 yard skeins of each colorway are self striping, the patterns are quick to knit and baby stuff is the cutest!

You can find the kits in the shop and it comes with a code to download the pattern on Ravelry, or you can click on the button below to buy just the pattern!

Muhahaha.....

Just ignore the flashes of light coming from the lab today... I'm taking photos for the store all day.

Sneak Peak

The next couple days will be very fun and busy, so today's post is more of a peak at whats going on in the lab rather then a real post.

I have more yarns to put up in the shop, my cowl pattern is complete all I need to do is get pictures before it goes up for sale, and I've caught a cowl bug so I'm making one for my grandmother out of my hand spun from last month's phat fiber box.

New Coffee colorway and the new cowl

My grandmother's cowl and my mug that says "Chaos Panic and
Disorder. My work here is done"

Interweave Knits Holiday Gifts 2011

This year I'm finding the Interweave Knits Holiday Gifts issue to be useful in filling in the holes of my gift list. Best part about it is that I can make most of the items from yarns I carry and therefore I might have been dipping a little bit into the store stash. Its one of the perks of being a dyer.

My favorite so far has been the Midtown Cowl by Jenny Williams which can be made with one skein of any of my lace weight yarns, as I plan on making for myself. Or you can make the French Quarter Shawl, the Taverna Shawl or Delancey Scarf.

For a friend you might think of the Novel Sleeve by Kathy Zimmerman or Oak Barrel Socks by Sarah Fama with any sock yarn. There is also the Ashbury Mitts, Watercolor Beret, Chivalry Mitts, Friendship Socks, Flipper Mittens, Roisin, or the Jet Gloves. The list goes on and on what you can do with sock weight yarns, so grab your Christmas list and start knitting!

Getting Old

I know I'm technically not that old (that is till you ask an 11 year old what old is and suddenly you should be planning your own funeral arrangements).

But this morning as I rose a little before 4:30am again I realized that not only am I actively trying to get up early, but that I've noticed that I feel really lazy if I get up past 8am. I feel rather accomplished by 7am if I get up before the sun and it helps me tackle my to do list which looks something like this:

Make pasta sauce
Make the honey walnut cake
Make at least one thrummed mitten to check the pattern I wrote (ETA Release 10/10)
Finish the Baby Hallows Pattern (ETA Release 10/15)
Put 15 more skeins up into the shop
Untangle a skein
Visit my Grandmother
Tag all the things with new tags that should be arriving today

I have all this and an itch to write a cowl pattern, so who knows what will happen.

Till then I give you a picture of the thrummed mitten and later today the Interweave Knits Holiday Gifts special!

Sugar High

Yesterday I got up at 4am and started work on the Phat Fiber samples.

I did not stop till about 7:30pm when I sealed the box with all the samples and the full size skein for the superbox giveaway and this is what I have to show for it

I sent 50 mini skeins for the box and coupons for a new baby sock pattern that I plan on completing tomorrow.

Today is all about getting the house to rights and updating the shop!