A new addiction

Alright, before I start, I want to show you that I have been dutifully working on my Cozy Cardi...

See? And for those of you following along at home, you'll immediately notice that I've strayed from the pattern in that I've significantly lengthened the, er, length. The pattern wanted this thing to barely cover my belly button, and I'm of the mind that tummy-baring sweaters kind of defeat the purpose of wearing a sweater. But, I am a bit worried about the placing of the waist-shaping...I think I should have made it closer to the armholes. But it seems to work when I hold it up to me, so we'll just go by that. And block the living hell out of it if it doesn't work out.

Now that I've got this thing up to my under-arms, I'm going to start knitting the sleeves; well, one at a time. I'm still pretty confident that I can join the sleeves to the body and then saddle-sleeve this thing a'la Meg Swansen in the Aran Coat video of "Knitting Around" fame. Yes, yes, and I'll come up with a border. Eventually.

Okay, I also did some experimenting with silk and wool and dyes:

Let me explain. I was trying to go for a "fall foliage" kind of look, and bolstered by my success with my first dyeing foray, I approached this with a very cavalier attitude, thinking that I couldn't go wrong. I don't know about you, but methinks I was not very successful. I'm really not thrilled with this, it looks kind of like an oil slick, but it is still wet in this photo, so hopefully it'll look different when it dries. Or maybe it'll look nice spun, or it'll look great knitted. I'll let you all know.

And now, I must announce that I am addicted to the Yarn Harlot. Of course, I had "heard" her mentioned on the various knitting lists I subscribe to, but I never thought I'd be interested in reading another knitter's stories about knitting. Then a couple of weeks ago, I'm not sure why, I visited her site. And I'll never be the same.

Of course, I now have her first book, and will shortly be ordering her other two. Did you know she has new one that was just released? But since I left the book at work over the weekend, I've been feeding my addiction by reading her archives. I'm on March 2004, so I still have quite a bit of material to get through. Yay!!

But she's so inspiring, her knitting and spinning are amazing, and she comes up with the most outrageous stuff. I've laughed out loud several times while reading her blog. Really, really great stuff. My next blog project is to put a button on my sidebar to link to her. Yes, I'm star-struck, but she's great. Check it out if you don't believe me.

Well, the whole point of this is that I've had less time to pursue my fibery interests because of my obsession with the Harlot, and I'm going to try and get a handle on it. Just as soon as I catch up on her archives. And finish reading her books.