so today was yarncon, which — i didn’t realize when i first heard about it — was actually organized by some friends. who knew? also, it was held at the Pulaski Park Fieldhouse, which is, … oh, a whopping three or four blocks from my house.
i’d volunteered to be a Stitch Doctor, and help out folks with questions, but apparently everyone already knows how to knit and crochet and were therefore not in need of help. at any rate, at least it was a good excuse to get in some more work on my clapotis.
i also sat for Franklin of The Panopticon, for his 1000 Knitters Project. i am, IIRC, knitter number 198! it was fun to sit with him — i thought i might feel self-conscious, knitting for a camera, but he was really friendly and fun to chat with, and i barely paid attention to the camera. actually, i think i tried to convince him to go buy some sock yarn from the vendors in the next booth over.
i was very good, myself. i had promised myself that i was only allowed to buy yarns that were unique and indie crafted — no commercial yarns! also, those yarns tend to be expensive, and i am cash poor until monday-payday, so that helped keep me in check as well. i came away with three skeins of yarn:
hand-dyed with natural dyes merino worsted handspun single, from Green Apple Yarn, in a pleasing sort of daffodil shade.
hand painted raw silk from “Carpool,” who does not seem to have either a URI or even much google-fu, as i cannot find a link, which is sad, because she had the most fabulously pretty handpainted tussah silk fiber which i totally lusted after. i’m not sure what i’m going to do with this — she was knitting a sock out of it, but as pleasant as i find the idea of cosy warm silk socks, i’m just not sure i can really get behind it in reality. also, this yarn seems too pretty to stuff in my sneakers. we’ll see.
this DK, handpainted by Shannon Okey, jumped into my bag. i never saw it coming.
and a book: i was talking to shannon while i waited for Franklin to photograph another knitter, and she talked me into knitting a sweater — chiefly by showing me a top-down raglan in her book and making it sound incredibly easy. part of the appeal was that it makes it easier to use handspun for a project, in that i wouldn’t have to actually spin enough yarn for a whole sweater, i could make the yoke out of handspun and make the rest of it out of commercial yarn. but really, the idea of a simple top-down sweater that sounds ridiculously easy is what appealed. so, we’ll see.
and finally, as mentioned earlier in this entry — i got some more done on my eternal clapotis of fuzzy mohair doom! i got the decreases about halfway done at Yarncon, and finished it up once i got home. i wove in the ends, scrubbed my kitchen sink, soaked it in warm water, and then set it all up with my shiny new blocking wires i got for my still-not-done MS3, and so here we go. clapotis: thy name is mine!
it seemed not very wide, what with the curling and all, so i stretched it out to 26 inches wide. it worked out as 56 inches long, which was actually longer than my kitchen table, but i’m not so worried about it stretching to be even longer than it is now. so, i’m glad that’s finally done! i just have to trim the ends off (i wove them in prior to blocking, but didn’t trim them yet), and it’s done done done. hooray!
so, anyways. that was my day! now i am going to cast on for a pair of Dashing for someone, and i shall continue to work on my Anti-Baudelaires, and with the clapotis done, this leaves precious few hibernating WIPs to feel guilty about ignoring, so i feel pretty decent about this whole knitting productivity thing right this very moment. :)
