my treat

thank you to everyone who emailed me about yesterday’s post. i just want to clarify that my procedure was pretty much a routine check on a condition that i’ve had for years—we really don’t expect anything to be seriously wrong. and the doctor who did it looked me straight in the eye and told me—and i can hardly repeat this with a straight face—never mind, i actually CAN’T repeat it.

anyway, like i said when i got home, i had a lovely package waiting from Fearless Fibers and i couldn’t open it right away, but when i did—shaZAAM!

everything was just what i wanted! well, actually, not exactly—once i opened the box, i wanted everything i hadn’t ordered. but i know that’s hoggish and silly, so i dived in to what i DID get.

first there was cashmere—enough for a stole and a shawl (can you say new designs??). this midnight passion is one i’ve had my eye on for months

i promised myself that when my first cashmere purchase was used, then, and only then, could i get more. and since the spades shawl is getting close to completion, and i had a little cashola from moth shawl sales, i thought i would go ahead. the colors in the photo are off a bit. in actuality the colorway is more subtle and more plummy than it looks here. this will be a square shawl some day. i also bought a couple of hanks of the deep sea colorway

which looks exactly like this picture—teals, greens, and blues with a little tan interspersed in.
i hadn’t tried deb’s new sock yarn yet, the merino superwash, so i purchased a few hanks.

the purple hank is a gift for my co-worker at the LYS. and, since i’m zeroing in on the completion of two pairs of socks, i’ll need to start another pair or two, right? i love the bit of pink that is in the gray yarn (color smoke) as well as in the brown (thoroughbred).
i don’t know if i have mentioned this before, but deb’s merino is the real thing. what i mean is that good merino yarn is like cashmere or alpaca for me—as soon as my hand touches it, i can identify its buttery softness which goes beyond the surface feeling of the yarn. now, lately a lot of merino yarns i touch are lacking this quality, particularly the sock yarns. but deb’s yarn totally has it.

i can’t wait to cast on with it!

meanwhile, i stayed up knitting til 5:30 this morning (i’m all whacked-out still from yesterday). i got lots of knitting done on the spades shawl, which i am loving, still. even though it’s really a one-stitch item, plus edging, i am not getting tired of it. i wonder if the yarn has anything to do with it . . .

ok, that’s the progress shot, but look at this—look at the fantastic draping of the fabric. and it’s not even blocked yet—why, it’s not even off the needles yet!

seriously, i could knit on this shawl just about forever. my only reason for wanting to finish it is that i now have a Very Important shawl Scarf project i need to embark on post-haste. more about that tomorrow.

i know i only showed you one sock pair yesterday that was nearing completion, but the camoSox are suddenly near that stage too

a couple of nights when i was too tired to knit lace, i settled for putting some inches on these. and now look—they are almost done! well, ok, i still really have half a sock to do, but one good day of classes, or one night in front of the TV should be plenty to bring those to closure.

and, i’m not exactly sure how many pair this makes since january, but it’s definitely more than 12!