Happy Knitting New Year

Well it’s been awhile . . .

I gave the “Sockoberfest” socks to my stepdaughter as an X-mas gift.

I finished my spiral beret. I really enjoyed working with the Alpaca yarn that it is made from. My only concern is that it feels a bit itchy on my head after a few minutes.My daughter doesn’t feel the scratching, as you can see she loves to try it out.

A lot of good things have happened in my knitting life though since I last blogged. I started to blog as a way to reach out and find fellow knitters when all I really needed to do was look next-door. (Isn’t this a theme from the Wizard of OZ)? I found out that my neighbor of eight years is a knitter. And she organized our neighborhood to start a knitting group. What – fun!

She also invited me to join a regional knitting group:
The Nashoba Valley Knitters' Guild
http://www.nashobavalleyknitters.org/

It’s been fun to get back into knitting again. It’s like falling off a bike and getting back up again.

For the groups’ January meeting there was a mitten contest. Alas, I only finished one in time so I missed out on the contest. I modified the pattern, Embossed Leaves Socks by Mona Schmidt that I found in the Interweave Knits Winter 2005 magazine. Here is what I came up with. After many starts and pullouts I got the thumb working how I wanted. I think for the left mitten I will try again to straighten the single leaf on the palm.


The fun part of this project was that I found out my neighbor Ellen also creates fun “tweed” yarn skeins from recycled cashmere. These mittens are from some recycled Donna Karan sweater. It is wonderful to work with cashmere. I found a treasure in my neighbor. Thanks!

Happy Knitting New Year Bloggers!