Wandering Wildflower

Introducing Wandering Wildflower

Introductory price of $3.50 until July 1 on Ravelry

Wandering Wildflower is a very versatile pattern and can be worn as a scarf or a cowl.  If you make the version in the pattern it will use close to 450 yards of fingering weight yarn.  The pattern can easily be modified to accommodate a skein with less yardage by casting on fewer stitches.  Shannon who test knit for me used an alternating color for the eyelet section. It's really quite striking.  Just waiting for her to upload pictures.  We are giving her slack though. I think she is still unpacking boxes from her move last weekend.  If that won't put a delay into things, I don't know what will!

Yes, the pattern name was changed :)  A friend suggested that Kracken might not be the best choice for something that is wrapped around ones neck.  Lindr came up with the name and will receive a copy of the pattern (Lindr please contact me via Ravelry and I will send you a copy right away).  JudyH also will be receiving a copy from our random drawing.  Thank you to everyone who participated!

I'm packing today to leave for TNNA tomorrow.  It's exciting to go and get to see friends that we don't see that often.  I can't believe it's been over a year since Ive seen Anne and Erica!  Im really ecstatic about getting to meet Carrie aka IrishGirlieKnits this year!  Ive always loved knitting her patterns and have done some test knitting for her in the past.  

If you are going to TNNA this weekend, please stop by the Shalimar Yarns booth and say hi.  I will be working all day on Saturday and Sunday morning.  Ive finished my Tempest sweater and will be wearing it.  It's hot pink - Love Potion and gray - Ore so I should be easy to spot. 

Moving Along

http://www.ravelry.com/projects/SpinningLara/tempesthttp://www.ravelry.com/groups/shalimar-yarnsAfter months of searching our friend Shannon and Rob found the perfect house.  They closed on it yesterday and  I went over to help them move out of their apartment.  They had planned on taking a couple of  days to move since the apartment lease wasn't up until the end of the month.  While we were loading the first boxes we ran into Young, one of our friends from knit group who lives in the same complex.  Young's husband is an exchange student at one of the local colleges and they have only lived in the US for about six months.  While we do sometimes stumble along with the language barrier, we all have a lot of fun together.  Young said hi and asked if it was moving day and then left and came rushing back with her husband, son and daughter.  They helped all day and even made room in their mini van to accommodate some of the smaller boxes and things.  We managed to get everything moved yesterday which was really exciting!  The only picture I have is the one Shannon took of Rob yesterday morning right after closing:

The porch stays shaded all day and I love all the different peaks of the roof.  I hope they have many years of happiness there!

Aside from helping with moving Andy and I had started our patio project.  The rail road ties were finally delivered this week.  We have the area laid out and hopefully will start laying the ties down this weekend.

Like most homes in this area, our yard is sloped (we live in what is known as the Hill City).  The slope makes it hard to have a place to sit outside comfortably.  The patio will be about 24' x 24' and three sides will be built up with the rail road ties.  We are going to fill it it in with dirt and then top it off with pretty stone.  There will be a landscape fabric barrier to hopefully prevent weeds from growing.

Tempest is coming along nicely.  I'm on the second sleeve and hope to have that done by the end of the weekend so I can block it and start seaming.  I think it's going to be calling it close to get it finished in time for TNNA next weekend.  I have nightmares about trying to seam it together in the car while Andy is driving though the winding mountains of West Virginia.  To top it all off, I don't have buttons for it yet.  The pattern calls for 14 buttons!  The only place in town with buttons is JoAnn's. I wish I had the foresight to shop for them at Maryland Sheep & Wool, but it's too late now!

Wentletrap is being test knitted by a group of wonderful knitters in The Testing Pool  on Ravelry.   Jan, Lyz, Bhama, Lydia, Tamsyn, Jenna, Margi and Ann have all offered to to test knit.  I'm really ecstatic to have such a talented bunch of ladies helping out!  The pattern will be released in the first part of July.

If you are wondering about the name, a Wentletrap is a type of sea snail that has a high spiraling shell. 

The stitch pattern I used reminded me of spiraling sea shells.  After searching for hours online I finally went to Wiki and searched for spiral sea shell and Wentletrap came up.  Wentletrap also means spiral staircase in Dutch which would work for this as well.

I had better get back to work.  I still have somethings that need to be finished up (besides Tempest) for TNNA.  Making mini-skeins for the Shalimar Yarns booth and putting together a few other goodies.  If you are going to be at TNNA in Columbus next weekend, be sure to stop by the Shalimar booth #130, 132 & 134.  I will be there all day on Saturday and Sunday morning.  I will also be at Sample It on Friday night. 

Rain, rain, go away.

It's been abnormally cooler here so far this June.  I actually contemplated turning the heat on for a bit yesterday.  I managed to restrain myself and opted for adding a sweatshirt over my long sleeve shirt.  The rail road ties for our new patio project were going to be delivered yesterday.  It was raining so hard from Tropical Storm Andrea that the delivery was rescheduled until next week.  At least the ground will be easy to dig where we are adding the patio! Our soil here is red clay and when it is dry it seems almost as hard at concrete to dig.  It's going to be a wet weekend here so I think we will be working on some inside projects.  After seeing a larger-than-a-small-dog spider in the basement, I'm hoping we can do a bit of organizing down there.  We still have a few things that need to be sorted from when we remodeled the kitchen last year.  Andy is going to help which is great because I think the spider is now under the dryer.  I sprayed it with wasp spray but it took off so quickly that I think it may have survived. 

I finished the back of the Tempest sweater.  It's such a cute pattern and very easy to follow.  I'm hoping to start the front's this weekend.  We picked up Warm Bodies and The Guilt Trip from Redbox.  It's going to be a perfect night to curl up and watch movies. 

If you are working on a striped project and having trouble carrying your yarns, I put a little tutorial up on Ravelry.  It's in post #253 in this thread.


Kristi sent me one of the new Another Way Kit's from the last Shalimar Etsy update.  I just love these colors, this grouping is called Vero Beach. 

It's not like I didn't have anything else on the needles that I should be working on, but I just had to cast on as soon as the kit arrived!  The Another Way pattern is so much fun and really quite easy.  The colors are really happy and cheerful. 

Needle felting therapy is still going on.  I think my arm muscles are getting into great shape from it. I think I need to work on the mushroom house a bit more.  The top looks a bit flopper than what I had planned.

Ive coerced Beth into felting too.  She came over last week and made the cutest gnome.  I wish I had taken a picture of him to show you.