Tuesday, February 06, 2007

St. Paul Trip

Paula wrote: "I'm interested in the Red Heart Soft and Sweet booklet you mentioned."

The ID #s are "Art. J14 Book 1443." I found it at a thrift shop but the copyright date is 2000, so it should still be available in some shops. I googled using this search (with quotes): "Red Heart" "Soft and Sweet" and found it for sale on this site:
http://www.craftdesigns4you.com/croknitbklets.htm

The booklet has patterns for five sets: three crochet (Mother's Shawl, Little Cherub Set, Fairytale Set), one set has patterns for both knit and crochet (Elfin Stripes), and one is knit only (Pixie Cables). I don't like anything else in the booklet but $3.99 is a decent price for the Pixie set (cardigan, blanket, hat). Another positive thing about the Pixie cardigan, aside from looking cute, is that it uses sport weight yarn instead of worsted, and I think most baby knits look better in fingering or sport weight yarn. The one downside is that the cardigan only goes up to 12 months so you'll have to adjust the pattern if you want something bigger.

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I went to St. Paul last month to meet my niece (bliss!) and my brother offered to shuttle me to some yarn shops -- he didn't have to ask twice -- so we went to Borealis Yarns and the Yarnery. You can read my shop reviews from last year here [link].




The Wool Gathering was purchased from The Yarnery (this happens to be the vest version of the cardigan I'm planning to make for my mother) and the celtic charts from Half Price Books in St. Paul. The shop had a few Wool Gatherings for sale and they were all #54 from March 1996. Odd. Maybe they once offered a class for this vest.

I'd planned to splurge on special sock yarn but none of the colors in the pricier brands appealed to me so I settled on some cheerful commercial yarn that I hadn't seen before. If I'm going to buy yarn on vacation I might as well make it something I can't get at home.





I'll knit myself a pair of socks and then use the leftovers to make toddler socks for my niece to grow into. I won't bore you with ramblings about my niece but I will say that I am madly in love with her and she's the most precious human I've ever encountered. She greeted me with a bright smile and I said yes sweetheart, you may have whatever you want.

Here is Kate (at 3.75 months) with a book I gave her:




As for knitting, I haven't been doing much of it since my birthday on January 7th. I received a Nintendo DS, a handheld gaming system like the Gameboy, and I've spent way too much time playing with it since then. I started a 4x2 ribbed dark green sock on the St. Paul trip (took the train, fun!) but I'm still working on the first sock in that pair. It doesn't help that the yarn is boring and I'm wondering why I bought it in the first place. Once I beat Final Fantasy IV GBA I'll quit the DS cold turkey ... for a couple weeks. ;) I miss knitting but those games are sooo addictive. Now it's one more level or one more quest instead of one more row. But that'll slow down once I finish all my games because they're expensive and I can't justify buying more right now.