Friday wrap up

Sorry for the lack of posts this week. Been kinda bummed about some crap I'm having to deal with at work and just haven't been in the mood. But I had some things I did want to post, so better late than never.

So this is my current project:

As I mentioned previously, I found a local knitting group, the Renton Stitchers, who get together weekly to knit. They've all been a great bunch of gals and I've been having fun listening to their funny stories and looking at all the cool stuff they're knitting, spinning and dyeing. It just so happened that one of the knitters in the group is none other than Angi of A Swell Yarn Shop fame. I've had a few skeins of her yarn that I've purchased through my LYS but had not yet knit with them, because I wanted to "practice" knitting socks with other yarn so that I'd be ready to knit a nice pair once I knew what the hell I was doing.

Well Angi recently asked the knitting group to help her out knitting various items using her Duet yarn to use as samples, as she'll be having a booth at the Oregon Flock & Fiber Festival selling her yarn. As a reward, she would let us have the samples back, so I was all down for it. I got a skein of her XXL Duet sock yarn in the Army Boy colourway (she's got the feminine version in the Army Girl colourway which has pink in place of the green which I have in my stash), so I thought I could tackle a simple men's sock pattern. As I began, I started to feel like I bit off more than I could chew because this was after all, only my 2nd pair of socks ever, but I wanted to challenge myself and see if I could do it. I found a relatively quick knit men's sock pattern, which is the Thuja sock pattern from Knitty. I'm using #6 US dpn's, started the sock last Wednesday and am just about done with the first sock, so I've got 2 more weeks left to finish the pair, so I'm right on schedule.

Before I started going to the knitting group, I had signed up for Angi's Lucky Lurker Sock Club and we just received our welcome package earlier this week. This is my first sock club, so I'm really excited. So as a welcome to the sock club, this is what I received:

A basic toe-up using magic loop pattern (which I plan to learn very soon), a cute lucky lurker sock club magnet, a tape measure, a mini handy-dandy kitchener stitch how-to card, some scrap yarn for the afterthought heel for our upcoming sock yarn, and a cute notions bag to put all our stuff in so that we're all set to knit our socks. The one thing that was funny (but a little disturbing for me) was that my mailing address was incorrect, but it was delivered to my correct address without any delays or problems. Does this mean the local PO knows me and my packages??? hehehe I don't think I've been ordering THAT many things online..... have I?

Speaking of which... there was just ONE more thing I did buy online because it was just too damn cute and I couldn't pass it up. I saw an ad for it in the Fall issue of Interweave and I had to get this.

But no more purchases for awhile (with the exception for my swaps that I'm signed up for). I've gotten a little carried away and need to lay off the spending for a little bit.

Well that's about it folks. Have a great weekend!