Non-knitting post (well partly anyway)

We got a new consignment store in town and look what I found! I love vintage dresses. I'm wearing the white one for the 4th of July. Its actually not a dress, its more of a smock. It is shorter in the back than the front, so you have to wear something under it. The gold one, I tried on and it fit perfectly (except for the girls - way too small to fill it, but nothing a little padding won't fix). I figure, buy it and something will come up that I can wear it to. Do you wear vintage dresses, or are you too self-conscious? Should I wear my gold dress out to dinner?
I did finish a knitting project. A lace tank made from Louisa Harding Cotton. Its a little too wide on top, but I really don't want to figure out how to make decreases in the lace pattern, so we are calling it good. I have to wear it over a camisole anyway.

Forgot to add

Finished this sweater over the weekend. My picture is kinda washed out but you get the idea.......it turned out very cute and the little owl was fun to make.

Some Etsy finds

Have you been over to Etsy.com to buy any fabulous handmade things? You should. It should come with a warning label however...........here are some things I found:

The green gadget pouch by Blissful - I use it to hold my cell phone and I can snap the handle around a loop inside my bag from
Moop below. Can you see the fabric is Little Red riding hood? How cute is that! I also have a little pouch from Moop (matching as you see), that normally hangs on the inside of the bag to hold little things I don't want to get lost in the bottom of the the bag.
I got this bag because it is large enough to hold my laptop, but it is still very cute just as a handbag.
Of course I bought yarn as well! This is handspun and hand-dyed by Pancake and Lulu (isn't that a cute name). If you haven't experienced handspun, its hard to describe because its feels so nice!

Done and begun

This is the Good stripe dress from Spring Ik "08. It was an easy knit and Maggie loves it. I'm not sure the wool/silk blend was a good idea for a dress, but she really wanted this yarn because of the colors. This was a hand dyed yarn from Posh yarn.





I started the Owl sweater from Crochet for Kids - its amazing how single crochet just looks so different in small gauge yarn and hook. Yarn is dk weight cotton. Now that school is out - lots and lots of knitting and crochet to come.

New books

New books I have - Lucinda Guy Crochet Designs for Kids. A really cute book with boys and girls sweater, caps, toys, and blankets for kids 2-5. Here are a few of my favorites. I am having a rash of kid knitting now. That's good because the projects are smaller. The problem I'm running into is the patterns all call for dk weight yarn which I don't have a lot of in my stash. I really am trying to use my stash so this is not good for the pocket book! I do think I will try some Berroco Comfort DK for this pinafore above. Its not too expensive and its machine washable.
I also love this sweater
its a free one from Classic Elite. I actually do have the yarn for this because I bid on some Classic Elite Provence on ebay and I won 4 skeins for $5 plus shipping. Gotta love a good deal!

I also ordered the Classic Elite "Make it Modern" booklet
look here www.classiceliteyarns.com/pattern_detail.php?patternID=45
and I am going to try to make the little leaf scarf for teacher gifts. Its really cute and looks pretty easy.
Only 5 more weeks of school left and then 2 months of knitting!

There has been knitting

Here's another project I've been working on. Its a baby blanket made with organic cotton yarn. Its really simple, just knitting in the round with evenly spaced yarn overs to make the spiral increases. The only tricky part is getting started with 5 sts on the needles. It goes really fast and I can do it while watching t.v. - my favorite kind of knitting.

I fell off the no buying new yarn wagon - partly because I sold 6 skeins from my stash on ravelry, and partly because I ran across this. I bought one skein and I am tempted to get another because its a limited run of hand-dyed sock yarn. I mean, look! What could I do?

Another sweater

I finished this recently - and I really like it. This sweater is simple, but the design in the front makes us rather smallish women look like we got something going on. My daughter took this picture - pretty good for a 6 year old. The pattern is the Gathered sweater from winter IK and the yarn is handpaintedyarn.com, dk weight. Its hard to photograph because it has subtle color variation that you can't really see.

Louisa Harding

I am in the midst of a Louisa Harding love affair. I mean her work of course! I have a few of her books, just got these two and I have one of the Miss Bea's series on the way. Those are really cute kids patterns and are now being sold pretty cheap. I guess I like her designs because they are pretty, not too weird or fussy but very nice. I am making the Belle scarf from Knitting Little luxuries - its a cool pattern. I also like her yarn. You can often find it for a really good price on Ebay. Her Kimona Angora is really soft. I have some Fauve but haven't knitted it up yet. I won some Impression the other day so I can see how that will knit up. Her Grace (wool & silk) is gorgeous, but I don't have any of that yet. Grace is new, so its still a little pricey and doesn't have much yardage. I will wait a while before buying any of it. I really need to start a yarn and book diet because I've been a little out of control. Its the way I cope with stress of graduate school, kids, teaching and all that. My stash is really sufficient- I am going on a 6 month no buying diet and just use stash. (Right after this next auction ends)!