You're So Damn Hot

Oh yea, you know its hot. Its Artyarns Royal Silk in color 126. I ordered it during the massive sale that was at knithappens.com a couple weeks ago. It seems to take forever for them to send it out, but I heard they had over 5,000 orders so that's understandable. This little bit of goodness and joy arrived on Friday and I did the swatch this afternoon. It dried pretty quickly after I blocked it, and this is the result. The gauge is 4 1/2 stitches per inch (18 over 4ins) on 4.5 mm bamboo needles.

It arrived in a very pretty skein that with a bit of time and patience I was able to turn into a cute little ball. The picture of the ball probably represents the color the best, though the swatch shows off the variations in the color very nicely. Its wonderfully soft and delicate. I'm planning on making a shrug for my graduation with it. possibly the one skein wonder, though I would have to adjust the pattern for my gauge. I feel that the fabric would be too loose if I do the recommended gauge of 16sts/4ins. Though I might look around a bit more to see if I find something a bit more gauge apporiabte before I purschase the pattern just to make sure I can't find something else.

In other news I'm almost done with the body of my SKB. Painfully almost done, like just one more purl ridge almost done. Pictures of that some other time though since I'm feeling a wee bit lazy. I also tired it on. It was a bit tighter than what I was expecting, but I think with blocking I can stretch it out a bit and it'll be fine.

Tiny Little Fractures

What do you get when you buy really cheap needles off of ebay? Needles that break in the middle of the project, like this...Fortunately I won't be needing them much longer. The lace section of my SKB is complete. I've managed to salvage the needles by using packing tape to connect the severed needle and tube, but this is kind of annoying since the yarn keeps getting caught on the tape. I blame the tight gauge on this one, it makes the knitting rougher on me, the yarn, and the needles. I bent the needle a little bit too while doing this.

And well of course I'm going to include a little more UConn goodness. I might just start doing this for every post. This is the goody folder that I got at admitted students day.

On The Table

So I finally have some progress shots of what I've been knitting recently so without further ado I present to you... the Simple Knitted Bodice!
Isn't it pretty? The one on the left is when I tired it on after finishing the increases. I picked the XS so I was terrified that it would be too small, but I was equally afaird of the S being too big, but it fit perfectly when I tired it on. The trying on was about a week ago and since then I've joined it and started the lace section. I've finished the first repeat of it and it looks pretty, though I don't particularly like knitting with size 3mm needles and a worsted weight yarn.
I didn't even realize how tight I was knitting though until I was watching House last night and picked up my brother's socks. For the first time ever I actually enjoyed knitting with size 0 needles. I was able to get a couple inches of them done, so they're just under 4 ins now, and hopefully while I'm in the newspaper office tonight I can get some more done in between editing sections.

And finally for some recent statsh enhancing purchases. There have been a few good sales going on recently and I just couldn't resist stocking up. However, I do projects in mind for everything that I ordered. This is some Cotton Fleece I got from yarnware.com a couple weeks ago. The color is Praire Lupine and I'm imaging either a Rusted Root or Green Gable from zephyr would be lovely, but I'm currently using the needles I need for the SKB so I have some time to make this decision. I also took part in the massive sale that was going at knithappens.com, but more about that when the order gets here. Suffice to say its pretty, really, really pretty.