Swaps

I am loving the swaps I've been in on Ravelry.

This is what I sent to my partner in the "Dyed Sock Blank Swap". I dyed my sock blank yellow with purple stripes (using Kool Aid). I called the end result "Grape Limoncello" hence the lemon themed items I included with the blank. Unfortunately my partner is having "computer problems" or something, so I haven't heard a peep from her. It's a bummer because a lot of the fun that comes from the swaps is hearing what the recipient thinks about your package.

This is the package I received in the swap. I love the shade of blue and all the colorful dabs of color she added to it. I'm about half done with my first pair of "2 At a Time Socks" and I'm loving the resulting socks.

Here is the package I received from my "Swap on a Budget" partner - a really thoughtful person from the East coast. It was cool that she has a lot of the same thoughts about the environment and being "green". She did a fantastic job picking out yarn with complimentary buttons and lots of great extra goodies too - even an organic dark chocolate bar :-) She even knit me a needle and scissors cozy too!
This one I just got two days ago - from my "Starbucks and Yarn Swap" partner who lives in Korea. She and I got along great and I feel really lucky to have a new friend in knitting half way around the world. Her box included a very neat Starbucks cup with Korean characters on it, a giftcard to Sbux, tons of cotton yarn (I'm thinking market bags!) a measuring tape, really neat little sewing scissors and my favorite:

The Quinn bag (pattern on Ravelry). Isn't it amazing?? I absolutely love it!

Contest

I'm entering a stitch marker contest on Ravelry - I would love to have those little caterpillar and worm markers!

Hmmmmm, what did I think the first time I saw mkvral 's ravatar (which I now know is a caterpillar with a butterfly). Honestly, the first couple of times I saw it it creeped me out - OMG, I just looked at it again and realized it's an eye with a butterfly next to it, not a caterpillar!! I'm sitting here speechless - I can't believe I missed that for months...

OK, back to what I thought when I thought it was a caterpillar and not an eye. I thought of that weird guy from "Silence of the Lambs" - the one that was killing women and then skinning them. He had a ritual where he put a cocoon in their mouths or something to that effect. And the poster advertising the movie had Jodie Foster with a butterfly over her mouth. So, unfortunately it reminded me of that which further creeped me out.

Anyways, while I was originally rather disturbed by the ravatar I'm used to it now and I know mkvral is a very nice Raveler so I actually kind of like it.

The Pink Ribbon Hat

My latest, and currently my most favorite, FO - the Pink Ribbon Hat.

Read more about where it is going here.

Swaps on Ravelry

In the past month I have become a complete Ravelryaholic. It's bad, very bad! But I love it!!! What a great community of people and knitting resources - I can easily lose myself there for hours, much to my husband's chagrin.

Anyway, I also discovered "swaps" - didn't know exactly what that meant but have since figured it out and promptly signed up for three. The first one was "Swap On A Budget" - $20 budget, you must include one handmade item (not necessarily knit) and one skein of yarn plus whatever "extras" to bring you to the budget. This swap is an impressive feat - and testament to the organizational abilities of the SOAB "founder", Miss Becca, as well as all the supporting players - the moderators. A really fun group of knitters and ultra organized - I think there are over 100 people participating in this swap. I just finished up my swap box and mailed it off on Saturday - here is a picture. This is a secret swap so I'm not going to post any info about why I put what I put into the box until I know my "spoilee" has received it.

The next one is "Starbucks and Yarn Swap" - I actually signed up for this one before SOAB and it's a smaller group, a little less excitement and camraderie but the moderator for my group, Neila, has done a great job keeping us informed and everything organized. I'm in the process of finishing up that swap box - the requirements are one handmade item (since this is a coffee-themed swap the options for handmade items are cup cozies, coasters or a bag), one skein of yarn, one Starbucks item (either a lb of beans, a mug or a gift card) and whatever extras to bring you to the swap budget of $25-$35. This is not a secret swap, so I have actually emailed with my spoiler, Kathie, who is currently an expat in Korea - pretty neat! She even asked for input on the handmade item and posted pictures of it - check out her progress here - isn't it gorgeous?? I feel spoiled already :-) The person I am spoiling is named Joann and I'm about 50% done with my handmade item... still brainstorming some aspects of it, but if all goes as planned I think it will turn out pretty great - I'm excited to try some experimenting to (hopefully) get what I'm visualizing in my brain :-)

The last swap I signed up for is the "Dyed Sock Blank" swap which introduced me to a whole new aspect of knitting - dyeing the yarn yourself. And even more yet - dyeing a sock blank, which if you don't already know is a machine knit rectangle of off-white sock yarn that you hand dye, and then you can knit right from the blank by just unraveling the yarn - cool, huh? The blanks are made with two strands, so I think the point is to knit two socks at once so they will look like an actual pair with the same colors in the same direction. So the point of the swap is to dye your own sock blank from Knit Picks and then send it off to your spoilee for them to enjoy and knit up into socks. Knit Picks also has a tutorial for dyeing as well as free downloadable patterns for Toe-Up Magic Loop Socks - which I am definitely going to need to check out.

My daughter and I used Kool-Aid to dye my first blank and it was fun to do, but the results were not something I would wish on anyone else, so I think I'll be knitting that blank up for a pair of socks for Grandma. A Grandma would appreciate my daughter's choice of colors (green, red and black cherry). I'll post more on that soon...