Here There Be Dragons

Well it's eyeless but ready to be seen. Here's the Dragon Scarf. Elder Celting was happy enough to model it. He decided that he liked the red so he keeps this one. Younger Celting liked the green on the pattern so I'll be ordering stuff for that one. I'm hoping Morehouse Farm will allow me to get the kit at a discount since I've already bought one kit and don't need the pattern. With my luck, I'm going to be making the eyes myself and ordering elsewhere. So now I'm working on my Rockin' Sock Club pattern Grasshopper. Not sure how much I like it but I do love the yarn. And I'm waiting on my delivery of Vesper sock yarn to do my Socks in Socks. I think it's really a slump for me right now so perhaps I should be kicking to get the spinning done. Just working being motivated which is hard to do when you're attempting to keep up with soccer, baseball, and general Celting schedules. Not to mention trying to keep the coworkers functional to the point where I don't have to cleanup their messes. Perhaps I should just write a pattern or dye some yarn to get out of this funk.

I Can't Believe I Walked the Whole Thing....

I made it back from the Festival and boy am I tired. I spent two days walking around trying to find beautiful stuff. I'm a couch potato and my legs are now reminding me. It was beautiful weather there. Cool not cold, beautiful skies. But on to the booty....
I got a ton of stuff see? My goal was to find some fun stuff to spin that I couldn't get locally. I was also wanting to get some fun yarns to play with. I think I got some good deals and some fun stuff. We started by going to The Fold for Socks that Rock. There was a line to get in just to look and a line to pay for your purchases. They were both long. Check out Laurie's page, she snapped some pics. I managed to get two yummy colorways and a pattern I've been liking. I showed great restraint. Then we were off to Little Barn for bargains. I found some yummy fibers to spin. That purple one and the stripey one. I spent about $20 for both. Laurie bought a ton of stuff to custom dye. From there, I went to buy stuff for myself, Julia, and Heather at the Festival counter. LONG LINE. But interesting people to talk to.

After that, we went over to Tess Yarns to see what she has. Always beautiful colorways and I'm weak. I was originally going to just grab a skein of ribbon and maybe some of her baby/sock yarn. See that bag of blue yarn? That's what I bought. I can't get the beautiful color to show right but it sang a siren song. Saw it and couldn't put it back. Was tempted with a sideways tank but when I went back on Sunday she didn't have enough ribbon in the color I wanted to do it in.

The rest of the weekend was spent trolling through all the booths finding yummy things. Laurie saw the Dragon Scarf and dragged me over. The Celtings adore dragons. Guess what they're getting. :) Found that burgundy/green/brown sock yarn twice. Once on Saturday and once on Sunday. It was meant to be as it's name is "Dirty Girl", go figure.

The most interesting person I saw though was the 6'4" man with a shaved head, Harley shirt, and a KILT. Snapped some pictures with the film camera and will post when developed along with his interesting story. Oh and there was this lady with purple hair to match her purple jacket. No she wasn't a 20 something. Try more like 50 or 60 something. Like that bright pastel purple you see in all the little girl clothes. Not sure what that was.

Well I'll post more as I wrap things up. Just wanted to share my stash expansion.

Rainy Weekend

So what did the Celtic Clan do this weekend? Well we spent most of our Saturday running around in the rain. Early on we ran to soccer. Never let it be said that Elder Celting doesn't take his soccer seriously. This was his shirt afterwards. He was also playing "Iron Goalie" and stopped two goals back to back so just imagine the front. It was so rainy I couldn't get any knitting done at the game. I was too busy holding the umbrella and making sure Younger Celting was staying dry enough. I took the same mudcovered child home after for a quick shower, blowdry and uniform change to go to baseball pics.

From there we rushed off to McD's to grab some food before heading directly to the baseball game.... in the rain. But while we were in the drive thru I saw these lovely flowers and snapped a shot for Heather. The colors were beautiful and made me think of sunny days and my favorite new socks.

All day I was seeing colors I would love to include as part of a colorway in some handdyed yarn. I tried to get a shot of Younger Celting's eye with all these beautiful greens and hazels but none did it justice. So where's the knitting? Here. I made it out into the sunshine and got a shot of the finished product. I can't wait to wear it in MD, I just hope it's sunny. If you're there and you see me say hello. Should I be too distracted by yarn or fiber, funnel cake should help grab my attention. :)

So here's the funny thing about the latest project. I had remembered a mesh market bag pattern from my knitting calendar two years ago and had some hemp to start it with. I started working the pattern and realized that it was the same stitch I'd been using on the shawl. At least I'm in the rhythm right?

BTW, spoke to the principal today and I'm still mulling over Laurie's idea for an email campaign. At this point it's a he said she said game of EXACTLY what was said ("Lesbians hug each other." vs. "They're hugging which means they're lesbians.") One is a statement of fact not referring to the girls involved as lesbians. The other is saying that they are. Fine distinction but big difference in the cult of conformity called elementary school.

Let Me Get Out the Soapbox

Today's post was going to be about how I finished my shawl and how pretty it was. This was until I came home to find the Celtic Consort seething and was asked to talk to Elder Celting about what he said in school. So I asked. I was promptly told the story of how two girls in his class had been startled yesterday and jumped together hugging. Elder Celting rather matter of factly that "Lesbians hug each other." He knows this because we have several friends who are gay or lesbian. We teach both Celtings to accept people for who they are and respect the fact that they pick the things which are right for them and may not be something you like. This means that both boys understand that to be a lesbian is to be a girl who loves another girl. So imagine my surprise to hear him tell me that using the word lesbian is bad.

The story gets worse. I talk to Celtic Consort about how this fell out with school. The principal said that this was not like calling someone four-eyes because this is a choice these people make. This is a lifestyle that people choose to live. Ummmm, okay, so does that mean if I call this woman a witch that I'll have to write an apology? After all, it was my choice to be wiccan. Celtic Consort pointed out to the principal that Elder Celting's godmother is a lesbian. This woman would not be swayed away from the idea that my child must be assimilated to the conformity of what seems to be passing as "acceptable" school behavior. What happened to love thy neighbor? It's not love they neighbor if they happen to be like you. Monday out comes the can of "Whoop-Ass" for the principal. I'm not backing down on this one because part of the reason that kids get upset when called gay or lesbian is due to the reactions of people like her.

In The Groove

Well as you can see, I've made a lot of progress on my shawl. I would say I worked on it enough that 1/2 an evening of knitting will finish it off. This includes the likely frogging to get a couple rows of garter as the finishing edge. I was just in the groove yesterday. So much so that when it was time to put it down and go to bed, this is what I saw.

That's right, Dear Reader, that's a groove in my index finger. Before you think that color is bruising, it's just rub off from the yarn. It all happens due to the fact that I'm a "picker" and wrap my yarn in my left hand. Why I've started causing this groove due to tension these days, I don't know. You would think I'd have tight knitting but I'm a loose knitter. I have to go down 2 needles sizes on average to get gauge. Oh well, at least I'm enjoying myself.

No Pics Today

Well I don't have any pics today as I've been in a holding pattern with the knitting and spinning. Not sure why except all the running I've been doing over the weekend. I plan on watching some spinning videos that Laurie loaned me. (I know I'm so wild and crazy, go ahead ask me about my body art.)

So did anyone else catch Yarn Harlot on Knitty Gritty today? I TIVOed it and thought it was good. Didn't pick up anything that I didn't already do but loved how she shared the demystification of the sock. I also LOVED the yarn when I saw it all over again. It was a beautiful green with some variegation in it. See Heather? No one likes GREEN. :)

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday to the Elder Celting! He's 9 on this lucky Friday the 13th. Before you think I'm cheap just getting one cupcake, I made two dozen and the big bash is tomorrow. We're cosmic bowling. As you can see, the cupcakes are tasty and made quite the mess. What do you expect with double chocolate.

Now on to the knitting! I know I've been promising pics of my latest project and I keep forgetting. So here it is. See this yarn? This is the sparkly stuff I fell in love with and then Laurie and Heather helped me pick a color. I've turned into this so far. Do you like? The plan is to keep knitting until I run out of yarn. I think it should work out perfectly. The sparklies just don't show well in either of these shots. It's like looking at sunshine glinting off tropical waters. I so need to finish in time to wear to MD.

I also stopped over to Julia's blog today and saw her Bohus stuff. Why am I not surprised that the colorway I've been leaning towards is the one she picked? Lucky girl. :)