Pilgrimage to WEBS Annual Tent Sale!

This past weekend WEBS held its annual tent sale, and there was no way I'd miss that! Neither could any other knitter in New England, apparently! It was definitely crowded with lots of happy knitters and crocheters, and I saw more than a few great things I was tempted to load into my shopping bag!

First though, we stopped in town to get breakfast at Bruegger's Bagels (I had smoked salmon and cream cheese on a skinny bagel!), and I saw this knitted graffiti on a parking meter. It says "YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL", with a little red heart underneath, which is very cute. This is the kind of graffiti we should see more of!

This is going to knit up really comfy!

At WEBS, I bought a bag of this pleasant light blue (kind of a cornflower blue) cotton yarn for only $2.60 per ball. I'm using it to make this tunic, which I'm calling the Morse Tunic because of the random lines and dashes in it made up of knits and purls, from Fitted Knits by Stefanie Japel. It'll be a nice warmer-weather top. 

For REAL do-it-yourselfers, these two cute Alpacas were on sale out front! I'm not sure I'll ever get into spinning my own yarn, but these two are adorable! 

Pining for the Highlands

A friend of mine was recently in Scotland, and at my request, she found some nice local Shetland wool for me! I wanted to make something classically Scottish with my undyed cream-colored wool, so I chose a cabled beret. I couldn't bring myself to go all the way with a pompom on top like a traditional Tam O'Shanter; it's a little too much for me. The beret is very reminiscent of handmade Aran sweaters worn by fishermen in Scotland.

Scappa Aran: 100% Scottish Shetland Wool

Work in progress

It's blocking over a dinner plate to get its shape. It's a brighter white in this photo, but it's more ivory in reality

The Finished Product!

Wow, what would I give to be able to trek all over Great Britain in my tweeds and argyle and cable knits! Someday!

A Great Picture-Board Website

I recently came across this great website where you can save all of those great images you come across online. It's like an online art board. Group things however you want , write notes about them, and "pin" them to your board. It's called pinterest.com, and it's really easy to use. You can even "follow" other users (like Twitter) and see what they're pinning, and you can pin anything you like from anyone's board to your own board. It's great for artists, designers, crafters, and basically anyone even slightly inclined to any visual aesthetics. I used to just save images to a file folder on my computer, but this is way more fun! You never know where you'll find inspiration for your next project! They even have a "Pin It" bookmarklet to let you quickly and easily pin things you come across to your board. For the super-organized, create custom boards, like "All Things Plaid" or "Scandinavian Needlework"... whatever your interest.

FannyPod

This was a rather impromptu project, born of the fact that I was running around doing laundry and wanted to listen to my iPod, but didn't have any pockets in my sweatpants, and I needed free hands. I found some scraps of denim from the skirt I made last summer and made this sash belt/fanny-pack/iPod holder. Kind of a cute hip-slung sort of thing, since I didn't want it to resemble a body-builder's back brace. Hence the FannyPod was born. I promise I'll try to come up with a better name. It'll be good for the gym too, which is where I'm off to next.

I knew those plastic rings would come in handy someday!

Added a button just to make sure the iPod doesn't fall out while in use

Finally, the Finished Shrug

OK, so the shrug has been finished over a week now, but I was just too lazy to take a picture of myself in it! Enough is enough... here it is (of course Casper found his way into this picture too!)