Ta da !

Finally! The Sahara is finished! I still have to wet block it, but the knitting is done and the ends are all woven in! Once it's blocked, I'll model it!

Here are the details:
Yarn: 3 1/4 skeins of Handmaiden Great Big Sea Silk in Pumpkin
Beads: Miyuki 5/0 triangle seed beads in crystal with burnt orange core
Needles: Size 6 and size 4 Addi turbos; size 6 and size 4 KnitPicks options
Modifications: Hip increases were done every 6 rows instead of every 8 rows.

As they say--necessity is the mother of invention and that old adage held true while working on the Sahara. I found the lace difficult to do on my Addis because the points are a little too blunt. I switched to my KnitPicks options needles which worked well. The sleeves, however had too small of a circumference to do this. I thought that I could just knit the difficult row--the one with the knit 3 togs--with my options needles letting the extra length just hang. Then I planned on switching back to the Addis which were 12 inch in length. This didn't work because the needle part of the options set was too long. I stopped in the middle of the row and did a google search for "Magic Loop." I found a couple of good sites and lo, and behold, I finally learned how to do the Magic Loop which I used to finish the lace portion of my second sleeve! I had always wanted to learn that technique, but never took the time to do so!

Now I'm on to two more projects. I've cast on Rusted Root and done 6 rows so far. I like the way the pattern is designed. One thing that is confusing, however, is the fact that the number of stitches in the lace pattern changes on different rows and this is not noted in the pattern. Other bloggers have written that they found this confusing and they ended up frogging because they thought they had made a mistake. After studying the lace pattern, I figured this out before doing something stupid. I also hope to begin my Lily of the Valley Shawl as well. I think it will be easy to manage these projects because of the number of repeats in the patterns. The lace pattern in Rusted Root has 10 rows. If I can knock off 10 rows every other night or so, I will finish in a few weeks. Likewise, the shawl lace pattern has 28 rows. I won't know if I can knock off one pattern repeat in an evening until I start the thing, but that is the plan. I figure I can work on them alternate evenings.

I am knitting Rusted Root in Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece. People seem to love this stuff, but I'm not terribly impressed. It looks nice, but it splits badly when knitting it. I think I would have liked this in Touche' by Berroco or Premier by Classic Elite. Both are incredibly soft and easy to knit! The shawl will be knit in Jaeggerspun Super Fine Merino. I found it at Sarah's Yarns for an incredible price.

I mentioned in an earlier post that Judy at Fabulous Yarn had special ordered some Artyarn Silk Rhapsody Glitter for me. It came on Friday and it is gorgeous!

It is variegated beiges with gold metallic running through it. I hope to make the Stitch Diva Cardi Wrap with this yarn. I think it will be really elegant!

Speaking of glitz--I found a fabulous pair of shoes earlier in the week. I decided to browse through DSW for a lark and found these beaded, open toe pumps in the clearance section.




These shoes are also comfortable! I couldn't help but think how fly they would look with this lace remnant that I bought at G-Street.

I've had that in my fabric stash for at least a year. It is 3/4 of a yard and the remnant cost me about $30. This lace sells for about $200 a yard. There is enough to make a bustier which is what I have planned. There was an article in Threads about corset and bustier construction which showed how the premium ones are made. I know that some of you may think that bustiers and stilleto heels amount to skanky attire, but I would argue that at least it is attire of the high class skank variety and not that of the two bit street ho variety, so that is more than okay!

It felt so good to sleep in today. However after my shower I encountered a minor frustration. From the WTF department--why do lotion manufacturers insist on using pump dispensers that cannot be opened on their products? I got a new bottle of Aveeno lotion and I kept turning and turning the top in the direction indicated by the arrows and the pump just wouldn't work! I tried turning it the other way and still it wouldn't work! I probably wasted 10 minutes trying to get that blasted thing open. Geez! WTF! Who would think this to be rocket science! Fortunately the empty bottle was still in the trash so I fished it out and took the pump from that one! Go Figure!

Kitty items: I know I've mentioned that Mikey is a polydactyl kitty. For those who don't know what that means--It means he has extra toes! Here is a photo of one of his paws so you can see that he is literally all thumbs!


Kitty Cam:
Greg patiently waiting for mom to get dressed!

"Hurry Mommy! How can you resist my cuteness!"