Pixie Purls

Well so here are the last of the photos from day 3 at The Mountain:

That above is the view from our room, at the very wee hours of the morning. Below is a little lake with loads of snow and ice on it. That's all the snow this southern girl will get to see this year. Temps have gone back up into the 60's here and I have to say I'm not sad about it! I am so ready for spring!

So today my husband and I got into a very silly fight because I reminded him for the second time not to use our leather ottoman as a table (he likes to use it while he plays Gears of War on XBOX 360) and I suppose in his job stressed state he decided to be a butt-head (enough said!) so I left the house and decided to finally spend the $50 credit I had at Joann's. I had on a whim a few months ago purchase a bunch of Lion Wool for a crochet sweater, and then promptly realized I would not ever finish a full size crochet sweater, so I returned it a few weeks later for a store credit. I also felt $50 was way to much for a Lions Wool sweater.

I wanted to make a kids quilt, preferably unisex. Normally however Joann's doesn't do it for me as far as fabric goes, and while I did find something very cute, it was clearly meant for a girl.

So I have a pregnant friend at work and if hers turns out to be a girl she will get this quilt (if I ever finish it!).

I got loads of toys at Joann's, I sorta splurged and went well over the $50 credit I had. The coolest thing I got was a blocking board! It's something I can use for knitting and quilting which to me is just double the fun. It's technically for blocking and ironing quilt blocks but it also doubles if I need to pin block sweater pieces. I got a basting gun, it's a a lot like those tag guns if you ever worked at a clothing store. It was a true splurge and looks like lots of fun to use. I got a block tool to make those Qbert-ish looking quilts, a new rotary cutter (the original purpose of the trip), a neat chalk tool with loads of colors, a nifty 1/4 inch marking tool and some super fun variegated thread in some of my favorite colors (blue, green, yellow) and then lastly I got the fabric, some quilting magazines and I ran by Barnes & Noble on the way back home and got an Australia book. I am hoping to plan at-least a 1 day excursion to someplace weird and fun, possibly a banana farm!

Posted by pixie at 08:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

My copy of Wild Fibers magazine came in the mail. if your a spinner I highly recommend it, not very many ads and loads of good articles about different fiber baring animals. This issue has a camel on the cover. Camel hair sure is soft!

So I am getting extremely excited about Australia. I have to finish my presentation materials in the next few weeks. It's just so terribly exciting and I'm nervous too. It turns out I am the only female speaker which i find terribly amusing. I have gone to many conferences with my husband over the years and I always feel like the token wife (and most times the people don't realize I am in the industry too). So it's going to be really nice to be "Official" and I'm going to totally geek out on getting a badge that says "speaker" on it. Would you make fun of me if I framed it?

Two years ago when we went it was like beautiful late spring weather. I could wear jeans and tank tops and not be too hot or too cold. The average temperature is 62 to 75 degrees and it's very sunny so it feels even warmer. That is perfect weather as far as I am concerned. I am extremely determined this time to find some sort of mom-and-pop yarn or fabric store. I also want to go shopping more then last time to get some stuff for the house for memories. It's not a long trip because my husband and I aren’t huge fans of being gone very long but we will be there about 7 days total. We plan on stayed at Bondi Beach after the conference. After this trip we really need to invest more money into improving the house so I am thinking we may not go out of the country for a while. I am so happy though that I got to keep my goal of going out once a year after we got married. Now I can cross that life long dream off of my list!

Okay I'll stop ranting and day dreaming. I owe you guys a day 3 AKG Retreat post. We got snow and I have a few picks taken in the wee hours of the morning. I'll post once I get them off my camera.

Posted by pixie at 11:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

It's snowing today, a lovely steady flow of light flurries, not sure if it will stick or not.

It was a bit hard to sleep the first night but I always have trouble in a new place. The rooms are very cute and ours is just 30 or so feet from the great room that we all get to sit in. Nearly 50 knitters with lots of food, drinks and yarn!

So last night and today I knit about 4inches of ribbing to finish out the collar on Noro Fitzgerald. Looks like I have worked on two UFO's this month!

Now this sweater is very old, I actually started it in my first knitting class and the measurments the teacher took didn't really work. The sleeve I did finish is about 3 inches short so here in the photo you can see the little green stitch marker that marks the place I just started from.

After this sleeve is finished (hopefully in a few hours) then I'll pick up the second sleeve I started long ago which is about 4 inches along. Wish me luck, I'm going to try to get as far on this sweater as I can!

Posted by pixie at 01:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)

Here is Claudia and Karen up to no good! (Karen promises to update her blog soon!) We arrived at 11:30am, the first people here. We got a good room and got a comfy spot by the fire. I am blogging from the couch right now!

Here is Doug with his yarn matching his shirt (he is a fab knitter and helped me learn some really great ways to seam up arm holes and hoods!).

Here I am working on my HP scarf, I think I just knit about 4 inches today sitting here. It's actually touching the floor in this photo:

More to come later!

Update: I just realized from looking at this photo that I SCREWED up the scarf, can you spot the error? DOH!

Posted by pixie at 05:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

I don't know about you, but I am *so* ready for Harry Potter Madness to start up again! The last book is due out this summer, and hopefully the next movie is due out later in the year. I have already decided my UFO of this month will be my HP scarf that I still havn't finished (I think it was 5 feet long last I checked).

So check out how fantastic this is! I have followed Alison of the Blue Blog for years, she's a magknits contributer and knits the most adorable things for her kids. She has written a knitting book, and not just *any* knitting book but an HP knitting book!

Here is my UFO scarf the last time I worked on it;

Wow that's Nov 2005 people, man I guess I have been knitting like 3 years now!

Let's all pre-order and send this book to one of those amazon.com top ordered book lists haha! In other news, the husband flys back home tonight after a job interview in San Fran, wish us luck will you?!

Posted by pixie at 12:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (15)

Yarn: Mano Cotton Stria
Content: 100% Peruvian Cotton. Hand dyed and hand spun.
Needle Size: US 6 / Denise circs knit flat
SPI: 4 (16sts over 4 inches gauge)
Lenght per ball: 50 gram skeins, approximately 116 yards
Notes: Looks best in a garter-rib type stitch, not in stockinette

Posted by pixie at 08:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)