Sunday Shenanigans

We have a heat wave – and sunshine!  I just made a quick trip to the grocery store and it’s 40 degrees outside – pretty darn balmy for mid January.  It’s not going to last and snow is possible later in the week but it was nice to get out in the fresh air and not have wind chills below zero.

I’ve been busy in the sewing room today but not sewing.  The sweater pieces I was blocking were dry so took those off the blocking boards and put that stuff away.  Haven’t started seaming yet but rewatched part of the Craftsy Seaming class of Chris Bylsma (which I totally recommend – I think it is excellent) so I remember how to do stair step shoulders versus side seams, so I may get to some seaming later this afternoon.

As I had hoped, I was able to finish the back to my Luau vest (named for the color of the yarn – not because I’m planning a Luau anytime soon to wear it to. 🙂  I cast on the front and have the garter hem done so on to the stockinette.

Plus I just finished winding another hank of Miss Babs Yowza for my Winter KAL sweater.  I do love knitting sweaters with the Yowza since it has such great yardage on a hank (560 yards) so not as many ends to bury or as many color discrepancies among hanks.  The hanks I got all look very much the same so I’m not alternating hanks all the way through the project, but am alternating for several rows as I’m adding in the new hank.  Good thing there’s no more yardage than that or my yarn winder would not be able to handle it – it’s a big cake when it’s wound.

I also updated the Fabric Stash report – see the button in the sidebar for that page.  I’m going to update all info on that on one specific page.  But added in the fabric used for the wedding quilt top – so 15.5 yards used and none added to the stash this year.  Next week I should be able to add in the backing fabric – which I just tossed in the washer.  I normally don’t wash it first but this feels so stiff and I’m afraid it might bleed, so since it’s from a backing shop I haven’t purchased from before, I’ll give it a test run through the washer to see how color fast it is.  But good that I can get those “stash used” numbers up a little bit before next week’s report – yes I did order a little fabric this morning.

I finally decided what I wanted to do with the Cat in the Hat precut squares – some shown here – I have more of them but I think they are duplicates of these prints.

Anyway, I didn’t want to cut them up much for the baby quilt I want to make with them – and I have a plan –  but that plan needed plain colors to go with these.

So I have a whole bunch of Kona Solid FQs coming from TLE — you know how much I love TLE for their yarn but they are also a full service fabric store too and their customer service is great.  My LQS and other places I’ve ordered from on-line in the past do not cut FQs – so you always had to order a quarter yard cut or if that was the wrong shape, a half yard even if you only needed a fat quarter.  TLE cuts FQs.  Now I feel a little bad for the Loopy Elf who gets my order to fill on Monday – I had somewhere between 35 and 40 FQs for them to cut – not all for the baby quilt of course – I have a couple other projects in the works to use them in also.