The closer I get....

I don't know about you, but the closer I get to finishing a project, the more I want to work on something, anything other than the almost-finished project. I'm not sure why... I'm just not one of those people who see the finish line and get a burst of energy. I see the finish line and think "Crap.... I still have to go that much further, I want to be done NOW"

I did end up with a fair amount of knitting time over the last couple of days. My back decided it didn't want to work anymore, so I spent most of Saturday night, Sunday and today stretched out on the couch or sleeping (pain meds can really knock you on your butt). In between naps there wasn't much to do other than knit, so I should have been able to get at least one project completed... but nope, in my true A.D.D. fashion, I worked on several projects, finishing none.

I completed the sixth row on the fan shawlThere are only seven more fans to complete (one row), then eight half fans (last row), then the border. If I had worked steady on this, it would probably be blocking right now, but instead, I also worked on this:
I switched it over to my new harmony DPNS (nice points) and so far I like them a lot.

The sock is about halfway down the foot, and had I worked steady on it, it would probably be done.

But of course I was working on the shawl too. And, I added a few more squares to the sockghan, which I hadn't touched almost all month in an effort to make UFO August count... I don't have any pictures of it, because three more squares doesn't really make it look much different than it did. When I complete a few more rows, I'll show it to you again.

For some reason, I've also been itching to cast on something new with the Fiddlestick Country Wool mom bought me several months ago. I can't seem to find the perfect pattern for it... but that's probably just as well, because I really want to get at least three more things off the needles before I cast something else on.... maybe I should do a UFO September too...

Falling Behind

Well I've been back to work for most of the week and I just want to say.... Can I go back on vacation???

Actually it hasn't been that bad, just a really long short week. I picked up some extra shifts at Job# 2, so it feel like I've done nothing but work since Tuesday night. I got off Job # 1 early today and I don't have to work at Job #2 tonight, but I've been using most of the day to catch up on housework and Wandering Cat business, so it's not like I've been relaxing.. or knitting.

And speaking of knitting... UFO August is kind of a bust for me. I only got one project off the needles. I know August isn't over yet, but I'm working tomorrow, and Monday I picked up another shift at job #2, so both those days are a bust. If Dave absolutely leaves me alone Saturday night and all of Sunday (highly unlikely, the boy can't sit still for five minutes) I might be able to finish my fan shawl. But I doubt that will happen.

Also, I kinda negated the whole casting off one project by casting on for this:
It's the long version of the Wollmeise ankle sock. I was going to have Mom test knit it (so I wouldn't have to make a full length sock), but Julie has her on a deadline so it was wait or do it myself. Since I really want to get this pattern out I decided to suck it up and do it myself.

I did get a nice little present today, thanks to my wonderful MomA set of Knit Picks Harmony DPNS, and some much needed stitch markers. Technically it's not really a present, it's a trade for the Addi Click cords I bought her, but I like presents better than trades... so it's a present.

So now that cleaning and business and blogging are done, I'm off to knit until Dave shows up and spoils it all.

The Great Staycation: Day 6

Well this is it, the last day of vacation... and it's not even a full day. In about 20 minutes I have to leave for Job 2. With all the vacations going on there, I wasn't able to get anyone to cover tonight's shift... c'est la vie.

I can't believe how fast the last six days have gone and I seriously could use six more, but I won't be getting it... maybe in October I can swing a little more time off.

Anyway, here's what I was up to today.

This is pretty much what I've looked like for the last year or so.
I'd gotten my hair permed about a year ago, and once again in March. I loved the curls, but now it was getting to the point where it was falling and dried out and my options were perm it again, or...... cut it off! So I did. I've actually been humming and hawing over what to do with it for weeks, but the other day, coupons for the hair salon came in the mail, so I figured it must be a sign. I headed out this morning and got it chopped.

Other than that, I've done a little knitting, but nothing too exciting so I'll save it for another post.

So, so long vacation... it's been a slice!

The Great Staycation: Day 5

I wanted today to be a productive day, so I got up at 9 a.m. with Dave and saw him off to work.

Before he left, he told me it was too nice out to stay inside, so I should find something to do outside. When I told him I planned on sewing, he told me to take my sewing machine up to Mom's and sew on her back porch.

I had no intention of doing that, but I did the next best thing... I opened every window that didn't have an air conditioner in it, threw back the curtains and let the sun shine in. Now that the rain has taken away all that yucky humidity, it's so nice.

Rocky thought so too, and checked out each open window in turn.

In the morning I puttered around the house, doing a little cleaning and waiting for the phone to ring (Dave finally gave up on Mom's laptop and handed it over to some experts.)

Then I figured the best way to make the phone ring, was to get involved in the project I was putting off because I didn't want to be involved in it when the phone rang.

So I set to finishing my quilt.

Now, the only place I have large enough to layout and cut is my living room floor. Which meant dealing with a lot of this:
and this:
Despite the suspect "help" I chugged along

Size check one:
Not quite there.
Size check two:
Wide enough, but need more length
Size check three:
Perfect!

Now I just need to add the binding, lay out the layers, pin it all and get quilting. I don't know what it is, but I always seem to underestimate how long my sewing projects will take... I guess it's a good thing I don't sew very often. I'd be eternally annoyed.

I also whipped up some catnip bags for the kids:And whipped off this little number:This will be put away as a Christmas for a special little girl who loves Barbies as much as I do. I'll probably whip up a few more before then.

That phone call finally did come (and interrupted my sewing) so Mom and I headed down to pick up her laptop (all fixed!) and went out for dinner.

Now I think the rest of the evening will be spend knitting... nothing but knitting

Tomorrow... stay tuned for whining... lots of whining

The Great Staycation: Day 4

It's hard to believe Day 4 has come and gone already.

Not much excitement today, but really a good vacation day. Dave finally let me sleep in, and we got up around 11:30 a.m. We ran some errands then came home and I did pretty much nothing but knit and watch movies. And, in honour of UFO August... I got one project off the needles!The Wollmeise ankle socks are done, and I even have some left over for a few sockghan squares! I was also pleased that the second sock pooled/swirled the same as the first, if not quite in the same place. I want to have Mom test knit this pattern, and then I will make it available.

Oh, in between all the knitting and sitting, I baked some cookiesPeanutbutter for Dave who was not having fun with mom's laptop.

Now I'm off to make his lunch for tomorrow (tuna fish sandwiches... yum!) and then off to snuggle down beside him for the night.

Tomorrow stay tuned for a day in pieces!

The Great Staycation: Day 3

I must really love that boy... because he had me up at 7 a.m. this morning.

And it was all about this:
Both Dave and his uncle are classic car guys. The '69 Mustang is his uncles, the '67 Bonneville is Dave's. Today was all about classic cars and showing support for our troops with a fundraising cruise from Port Credit to Oakville and back, with a nice lunch at the legion. The idea is to raise enough money to erect a memorial along the Highway of Heroes.

They didn't get the turn out they were hoping for, likely because it was threatening to storm. But it was fun none-the-less.

Here are some highlights:I didn't get much knitting done because somebody locked my knitting in the trunk when I wasn't looking on the grounds that knitting "wasn't cool enough" to do in a classic car on parade. Looks like he just screwed himself out of a new pair of socks! I did manage some before it went MIAIt's the second ankle sock in Wollmeise. I'm about halfway done the heel.

After lunch, we took a jaunt into Toronto to pick up mom's motherboard and then headed back to Dave's to relax and give some love to Mopar:Now we're back home, I'm pouring a glass of wine and putting my feet up, and Dave is reassembling Mom's laptop.

Tune in tomorrow for... I don't know yet, we don't have any plans.... except sleeping in!

The Great Staycation: Day 2

Today started at a much better hour, when I crawled out of bed at 10 a.m. to greet a damp (it must have rained over night) but sunny morning.

After handling the morning's business (feeding the cats and fish, reading email, catching up on the day's news, etc.) I headed out to St. Catharines for a little shopping. Dave needed a new pair of shoes... and like any good man, he won't go shopping himself... it's much less painful for both of us if I just do it.

Payless was having a BOGO sale, and surprisingly I didn't buy anything.. I don't know about you but I haven't been impressed with any of their shoes lately... and their men's selection is terrible. But Reitmans was having a BOGO too... and I kinda bought some stuff there, even though I promised myself I wasn't going to buy any more clothes. ( I just gave a whole garbage bag full to my best friend)

You see the problem is this: It's back to school season. Even though I hated school, I always loved back to school, because it meant new clothes. I used to scour the flyers in the weeks leading up to school, picking out outfits and imagining how much better they were going to make my life.

But now I'm pushing 30, and I have no school to go back to, so when I see the flyers... I feel left out. Anyway that's my story and I'm sticking to it, because it justifies the purchase of five more tops and a pair of pants.

After that bit of self indulgence, I headed on into Walmart to get Dave's shoes. I did that and managed not to do any back-to-school shopping for myself there... though I was tempted.

I did hit Giant Tiger on my way home though. In their back-to-school flyer they advertised a collapsible foot stool, and well... my foot stool looks like this:
You see, Tux has a thing for wicker... it's like catnip too him and he has to scratch the hell out of it. The faux leather top was destroyed by Rocky (as pictured) because he decided it would make a good launch pad when he's stalking Peno (or just running around like an idiot).

When I got to Giant Tiger, I discovered I had a choice of faux leather or faux suede. It was a really hard decision because the leather could get ripped up, but the suede would collect cat hair like a magnet. In the end I went with the leather, as you can see to the left.

(Yes Tux we know you're the king of the castle, you don't need to yell it in our ear)

As soon as I took the picture, I dumped Tux on the couch, and put a blanket over it. It should keep it looking new for at least a week or two.

But the best thing about it, is that it's hollow. The top comes off and it's a great place to hide... I mean... store yarn. The old one was the same and when I transferred its contents over, I found a whole bunch of yarn I forgot I had. It's almost as good as finding money in the pockets of the coat you haven't worn all year.

Once home, I set to work on the studio (as I'd planned to do yesterday before my efforts were thwarted). The studio was bad.

Really bad.

This is months (at least since May) of just throwing things in and shutting the door.

I have a whole stack of ironing to do that has piled up because I couldn't even get to my ironing board. And seriously... would you want to turn and iron on in there... I'd probably set the place on fire!

I've been meaning to get to this over and over, but I just kept putting it off. So today I opened the door and under the supervision of the dastardly duo:

I went to work.

It's not quite finished now. There are a lot of bead purchases that need to be put away properly, tonnes of documents that need to filed or shredded, and shelves that need attention, but at least I can get in there again. And iron with out the risk of a four alarm blaze.

After the great studio cleanup, I had a bath, read for an hour, wrote a letter. No knitting today, but I might get some done a little later on.

And now I'm about to head out to Dave's. I'm spending the night there because we have another early morning tomorrow, and another day full of events I didn't plan on.

So, tune in tomorrow for Classic Cars and War Heroes.

(PS Some wanted to know about Mopar's diabetes. The vet said it was most likely his age and the fact that he was overweight that contributed to it, not that he was a large breed cat)

The Great Staycation - Day 1

As I mentioned a few days ago, I'm finally taking some much needed vacation time. This is the first vacation I've had in two years. I had some time off last December, but that was only because I was laid out with my back... and I ended up in the hospital so it doesn't count. I'm not going anywhere because I don't have the cash, but I'm looking forward to some time at home. Since I have the time, I figured I'd chronicle my staycation adventures.

Day 1.

While I don't have a set schedule, I have a lot of things I want to accomplish during my time off. Things I'm just too tired to do when I get home from work. While I know I probably won't even get half of them done, I think it's still a good idea to have a tentative list.

Slated for today was cleaning out the studio and then getting in some good knitting time.

But that plan got thrown right out the window thanks to the love of my life.

A few weeks ago, Mom's laptop went down. Dave's been scouring the internet and Southern Ontario for a new motherboard at a reasonable price (we could replace her laptop for what they want for a new motherboard.) He finally found a guy on the far side of Toronto who is willing to repair it for a reasonable price.

And of course, since we were both off, he decided it was the perfect day for a road trip ... 114 km one way across some of the worst highway in Southern Ontario with a spaz of a driver who gets edgy if his speedometre drops below 110 km. Fun!

So, after keeping me up until almost 2:30 a.m. Wednesday night, he pulled me out of bed at 8 a.m. to head on down the road. I don't get out of bed at 8 a.m. on the days I actually go to work. I start around 11 a.m... I'm not usually up before 10 a.m. I also don't function well on anything less than nine hours sleep. Ask my Mom, I was always a cranky child if I didn't get my beauty sleep.

See that pic to the left. That's Dave heading out (and telling me to quit whining and hurry up)... notice how the light is predominately on the right... that's East... way too freakin' early.

We had to make a pit stop at his place in Mississauga to tend to Mopar.
Mopar has made appearances on the blog before. He's Dave's cat - half Maine Coon and half Siamese... you'd never know about the Siamese except for the yelling.

He is a lovely boy though. When I first met Dave, Mopar was pretty fat. Being Maine Coon, he was already large, but being a little hefty too he was about 25 lbs. About a year ago he was diagnosed as diabetic and now gets insulin shots twice a day. It's taken all the weight off him, but I guarantee you he's still close to 20lbs... he's just a big boy. He's about 15 years old, and it's starting to show, but he's still a great happy, healthy (except for the diabetes) cat.

After giving Mopar some food, some insulin and some lovin' we got back on the highway and continued to our destination. I did bring my fan shawl (despite Dave's protestations that I was going to get "fluffies" all over the interior of his car) but I didn't even take it out of the bag to work on it while we were driving.... one of us had to keep our eyes on the road (yay 401!).

Eventually we made it to the computer shop (amazingly alive) dropped off the motherboard and headed back (more highway... fun!)

Once back in Mississauga, Dave got off the highway and we meandered our way back through Oakville, Burlington, Hamilton, Stoney Creek and Grimsby, stopping at every computer place we found, looking for parts for Dave's computer. (If I never hear another word about CPUs, processors, RAM and video cards, I will be a very happy girl).

I did manage to scam a stop at Lens Mills in Stoney Creek where Dave bought me some fabric for our quilt (one of the projects I want to complete while I'm off)
The top piece is the part I've already pieced, and the two other fabrics are the ones he bought for the border. I didn't take a look at any of the yarn while I was there because there was no A/C in the store and Dave was beginning to melt.

We also made a stop at a pet store (it was beside one of the computer stores) and Dave bought Rocky a new catnip toy.
Which he promptly took upstairs to the bedroom to play with. It's his favourite place to play with his toys and it's not uncommon for me to wake up with a mouse up my butt! Once a week I have to clean all the toys out from under my pillow - it's where I stash them when he wake's me up at 6 a.m., shooting them across the floor in the bedroom.

Once Rocky settled back down - I went for a much needed nap. Rocky joined me.

When I surfaced again, I did manage to do some of the knitting I was hoping to do in the car. I finished up the fifth row of the Fan Shawl.
Two more rows to go then I start the half squares, then the border. As you can see it's pretty lumpy right now, so it's going to need a good blocking. The yarn is Regia Silk 6ply and it is lovely! So soft and silky! Makes me want to buy more, but I must resist!

Tomorrow: Stay tuned for (hopefully) studio cleaning, a trip to the post office and more

About Our Yarns

Now that things in the yarn studio are up and running I thought now would be a good time to share a little information about our yarns.

After some experimentation, we've settled on some beautiful base yarns.

They are:

Alley Cat Sock: This is our basic sock yarn - but it's anything but basic. It's a 75/25 blend of superwash merino and nylon for strength. I'd say it has a nice medium twist (just enough squoosh) but the thing that really got us was how it feels. This stuff is nice and soft. Perfect for cozy socks and shawls.

Slinky Cat Lace: Another beautiful base yarn. An 80/20 blend of extra fine merino (no itch) and silk. Soft, with just a hint of sheen from the silk. Perfect for shawls, scarves and other fine lace projects.

Fluffy Cat Fingering: I was insistent on getting this for the shop (it's not up yet but it will be soon). If you've been reading the blog, you'll know how I feel about touch. I like soft, silky things and this yarn is pretty much the epitome of soft and silky. It's 70/20/10 blend of baby alpaca (that's the soft), silk (we all know how I feel about silk) and cashmere (even MORE soft). I can't keep my hand off this stuff! Use it for shawls, lighter projects, and yes.. even socks... very luxurious socks.

We also have some DK Superwash Merino, and a line on some Merino/Cashmere/Nylon sock yarn. I'll have details on them in the future.

The yarns will be obviously labeled in the shop... but there are some other yarns there. They are what I'd call Limited Editions - different base yarns we've tried, and some stuff we just can't get our hands on any more. The Cashmere lace and Alpaca/Merino that are up there now are an example. We can't get those yarns anymore, so once they are gone - they are gone.

You can also become a fan of us on Facebook (pleeeeeeeeeeeease be our fan.. it makes me feel good - see sidebar and clicky) and our yarns are now on ravelry, so if you make a project you can link to us!

Uh-oh

I'm going to have to keep her on a tighter leash...

Mom got into the dyes without me last weekend.... 

You can see what she did here

Curse of the Boyfriend Sweater

No, it hasn't hit me that way... we're still together (though it's debatable for how much longer if he keeps lippin' off about my knitting skills)

True to my non-conformist ways, the "curse of the boyfriend sweater" has affected me in an entirely different manner... a really annoying stretchy one.

You may remember that, while it took me almost two years, I managed to finish Leo (from Knitty) in Debbie Bliss Alpaca Silk. It looked like this:After a few months Dave kept saying "is the neckhole getting bigger?" A little self conscious about my knitting skills, I kept denying it. I denied it until I could deny it no more... if I had put the sweater on, you'd be able to see the top of my cleavage. It had stretched... apparently alpaca and silk have no memory and are best used in things that don't need shape or tension...

He still goes on about it.. how the neckhole was getting bigger and I kept saying no, and he knew it was getting bigger and how he was right and blah, blah, blah....

So, anyway... he shows up this weekend and he's wearing the lovely socks I made him for Christmas.
As the evening wore on, I noticed something.... they looked like like the slouch socks I was famous for wearing from 1990-1994 (and the colour always matched my shirt). THEY STRETCHED TOO!!! (They are cotton... and apparently cotton stretches too... thanks for telling me that before I knit them mom. I'm not knitting with anything but merino from now on!)

So of course, he started going on about sweater again, and how everything I make him stretches.... and how it's not his fault, it must be my knitting skills... blah blah blah.

I'd like to make him a new pair, but if his attitude doesn't change he ain't gettin' squat. (Plus knitting up a new pair will really throw a wrench into my UFO August.)

UFO sightings

A few weeks ago, Jeanne announced she was starting a UFO August, and asked all those who wanted to join to do so.

I thought it was a great idea to get something off the needles, so I thought I would participate. August is the perfect time for UFOs too as there is a meteor shower that comes very close to earth this time of year, and it's not unusual to see lots of shooting stars.

In fact, the height of it passed just the other night. So though it's already halfway through August, I thought I better post about it. On the needles:

1) One button cardi
2) Ankle Sock design #1
3) Ankle Sock design # 2
4) Dave's Sock design
5) Fan Shawl
6) Sockghan
7) 10 stitch blanket
8) Dave's toy design
9) Shrug design
10) Pinwheel cat blanket (wow ... is that it? I thought I had more)

So. We all know there is no way in hell I'm finishing the sockghan anytime in the next 10 years (just for because of how slow it grows, not any lack of enthusiasm on my part.. I love the damn thing)

Ankle Sock Design # 2, and Dave's Sock design will most likely get frogged.. I've kind of fallen out of love with them.

The 10 stitch blanket is probably going to get turned into a cat blanket, as I'm not that keen on it now. The pattern is cool, but the yarn is itchy, and I don't like itchy.

The pinwheel cat blanket I generally only drag out when I'm too drunk to knit anything else... or have no other mindless projects on the needles and want to watch a movie with subtitles.

Dave's toy is something very special, I'd like to get done by Christmas, but I have to get some new 2.75 mm needles becuase the ones I have are crap and I don't like knitting with them.

So, that leaves my Fan shawl, Ankle Sock Design #1 and my One Button Cardi. Two weeks left.... lets see if I can get them all finished.

And, since I have no pictures to go with this post, I'll leave you with a pic of my handsome fat cat, who has been much neglected on the blog as of late (maybe that's why he's not letting me sleep)

My little corner of chaos

I have some vacation days coming up, and my intention, in addition to turning a few UFOs in to FOs, is to do a serious clean on the house.

But I got a little jump start on it today when I came home, looked at my couch and saw this:
Plus, my back's been on the fritz again, and Dave gets cranky when I stretch out on his/Tux's love seat and says really mean things like, "Well you could stretch out on the couch if you'd only clean up your mess."

I swear sometimes I'm dating my mother - it's weird.

Anyway, I got ambitious and now it looks like this:Actually, right now it's covered in cats, but they only came out after I put the vacuum away. (Please excuse the yucky, stained couch.. it was free and I needed furniture)

And after all that cleaning (and an emergency trip up to Mom and Dad's to help them eat the crap load of Chinese food Dad bought) I even managed to finish my Wollmeise sock. (Of course it's now 1 a.m. and I really should be in bed I have to be up in six hours)
Do you have any idea how hard it is to take a picture of your own foot? I managed but you should see the outtakes.

I really wish you could see the true colour of these socks. The blue isn't so blue... it's an incredible mix of dark ultra-marine, and a rich deep aqua. When I get the other sock done I'm going to try taking some pics in natural light.. maybe then I'll be able to show you because this picture really doesn't do it justice.
A few notes about the design.

I really love this stitch pattern. It's a simple two row repeat, nice and easy to memorize.

I do, however, think it would be better served in a longer sock. Now I don't have enough of this yarn to do that... but I am working on Mom to test knit the pattern (she has a whole Wollmeise stash... though of course it can be knit in any sock yarn) so with any luck, I'll be releasing a long and short version in one.

This has nothing to do with the pattern itself, but one of little things that kind of irked me was the yarn. It's a nice yarn the colours are gorgeous, but all around the cuff, and the heel, it has a nice thin stripey pattern, but as I finished the decreasing for the instep, it started to pool. At first it was pooling with the purple/red on the underside and the aqua on top, but then it started this weird pooling swirl.

Now I know that's just the nature of hand-dyed yarn and there's not much you can do about it. My only worry is the second sock.... what if it pools completely different? I don't mind a little difference, I'm not all about crazy symmetry and matchy-pooness, (the stripes on my red ankles socks don't quite match and it doesn't bug me) but what if it's all crazy different. Mom made me a pair of socks, and one was striped and the other was pooled.. it was weird. Has anyone else had that happen?

Sticky

Well after weeks of cooler temperatures, we are finally getting some real summer weather... it's hot, sticky and I hate it! I was quite enjoying the cooler days... but it is August after all, so I guess I just have to suck it up.

One of the good things about this sticky weather is it's perfect for making awesome thunder storms.

We had an incredible one last night. It knocked the power out for about five hours, but no fear.... when a girl is well equipped with lots of candles, a bottle of wine and a gorgeous boyfriend, it's easy to weather the storm ;)

The cats have their own way of waiting out the heat wave...Of course the house is air conditioned so it's not so much cooling off as it is laying around fatting out.

There's not a whole lot of action on the knitting front. I've completed the fifth row of the sockghan and started on the six (up to a whole nine inches long!). I did one more square on my on my fan shawl. But what's really taken my attention when I've had the time to knit is this:
A new ankle sock.

Many of the balls that Jeanne (thank you again!) sent me for my sockghan were quite large. This one was the largest... and I couldn't resist measuring it up to see how much was there. It was 230 yards... enough for a pair of ankle socks (I have small feet) and a couple of sockghan squares! If you follow Jeanne's blog you'll recognize this as the Wollmeise she knit her Ishbel shawl in. The colours are nice and rich and even prettier in person!

I have tentatively named the pattern "Blueberry Hill" and will post it on Ravelry as soon as the socks are done (probably within a couple of weeks.)

And finally, Mom and I have a whole shipment of undyed yarn sitting in her dining room, so keep your eye on the blog and the shop... new yarns are coming soon!

Is it my birthday???

No it's not.. but it feels like it.
I got another present in the mail. And this one is a real present... not something I bought myself on ebay!
Dear, sweet Jeanne sent me a whole box of her sock yarn leftovers for my sockghan. This is a HUGE shot in the arm for the project. Even better, there are lots of red and purple tones, which the blanket sadly needs, as most of the yarn my grandma gave me were blue tones. Even MORE better is.. if any of you follow Jeanne's blog, you'll know she has exquisite taste in yarn. Not just in quality (and there are some scrumptious yarns here... even some coveted Wollmeise) but in colour. There are very few of her projects that I don't fall in love with just for the colour. This batch of yarn is proof of incredible taste.

As soon as I pulled it out of the box, Peno had to come check it out:
Then she laid claim to it:Yes that look means "Back off get your own wool"

Then she even tried to eat it:And then Rocky ran off with the box:Thank you Jeanne! I really can't thank you enough! (but I'm going to try)

Oh, and as promised, here's what I'm doing with the Regia Silk (which is just gorgeous yarn and yummy to knit with. I love silk!):It's the Panda Silk Dk Fan Shawl (free pattern), Like the sockghan, it's a modular knit... which I love. Each module knits up quick, and there are only 28. Here are my first two squares. ( I love silk)
This colour is call "Linen" and I'm having a really hard time deciding if it's off-white, beige, or light grey. Really, it's just kind of a dirty white, but that doesn't sound as pretty as Linen, does it? What ever it is, it feel heavenly. I love silk. Have I mentioned that before?