knitspinob: Smooth sailing

This will be my third attempt at completing this posting. The program crashes every time I try to add a pic. Of course, this is usually after a bit of typing, so I lose the typing every time. I am therefore going to add the pic first:

This is the yarn I drew at the last Whorling Spinster's meeting on Tues night. I am to make something from it, to be exchanged at the December meeting. The cream yarn underneath is from my stash. I have been poring through books this am looking for ideas. The yarn is a springy, 2-ply yarn, about 8-9 WPI. I will likely make a hat or mittens out of it--WARM for the Minnesota winter.

Another interesting thing that came out of the meeting is that I met a woman who was looking for a triangle loom. After emailing pics of my loom to her, she and her partner picked it up today, leaving me with a check and a smug feeling. I no longer feel guilty every time I go to my yarn closet as the unused loom is GONE!

I also posted some of my stash yarn 0n E-bay and within 24 hours made my first sale! A box of Noro Cash Iroha in a disgusting grey was mailed out this am! Hurray! I bought this yarn years ago on sale and was disappointed when the box arrived. I thought of overdying the yarn, but I have had this thought for over a year now and was still sitting there in all of its disgusting greyness. Two other items on E-bay haven't seen much action.

I have been knitting along on the baby sweater and have finally gotten back to the part where I discovered my original mistake and had to rip back. Here is the progress:

I still have my doubts about this sweater, and am putting all of my faith into the blocking. We shall see.

Now that the nights are getting cooler, I am getting excited about large wooly items that will provide lots of warmth and comfort this winter. I have pulled out another WIP, my Noro version of the Mason-Dixon Moderne Log Cabin Blanket. This is a project that is hard to love up close but I fell in love with it after taking the picture and getting a distance view. Here it is draped over the couch in my bedroom:

I am working on panel 7 (ten panels in all) and figure I am maybe 1/2 way through. It should keep me busy through much of the winter.

I also decided that it was time for me to establish a schedule and work through the samples for the Master Knitting Program through The Knitters Guild of America. I started, and then abandoned, this program years ago because it was tedious to knit the samples. I have since realized that it is the idea of being a 'master knitter' that I like and if I work through this in a scheduled fashion, perhaps it won't seem too tedious. Here is my first sample, my assignment for this week.

The second sample is started, but I intend to do the paperwork stuff as I go along, not leaving it all for the end. My "Papa" socks are rolling right along, as is Papa. I have turned the second heel and working down the length of the foot. Unfortunately, when I started the heel flap, I used the stitches originally designated for the instep, so the rib pattern over the instep of the foot doesn't quite match the other sock, but I don't think it will be very noticable. I happen to be a knitter who thinks that mistakes are a part of the charm of a handknit item (this may just be because I am LAZY!). The second sock looks like this: