Well, mabye overload doesn’t convey the right idea. Overload makes it seem like it’s “too much”, and that’s just not true. There is no such thing as too much Malabrigo. But we do have boxes and boxes of it that we put up tonight, and that’s a good thing!  We’ve re-stocked: Malabrigo Rios and Malabrigo Lace. We’ve also added in Malabrigo Rasta. To be honest, I saw Rasta last year at market and thought it was a bit …. big. Thick. Chunky. But I’ve kept an eye on it and then saw a couple of things knit up with it, and now I get it. Completely. Here’s a cowl (Howling Winds Cowl) that I did up in a couple of hours last week. It takes just one skein of Rasta and is knit on size 15 (10 mm) 24″ circs. I did my first ever i-cord cast on and cast off in this pattern, and I’m an immediate fan of how it looks! Plus, I can’t imagine a warmer cowl. It’s large enough to tuck into a coat, or pull up over the bottom half of your face when it’s really windy.  (I think this colorway is Arco Iris, but I’m not sure. It was a sample skein that my Malabrigo Rep gave me, and there wasn’t a tag.) You can get a copy of this pattern free, with the purchase of one skein of Rasta. If you’d like the pattern, just add an order note and let us know. We’ll email it to you. To top it off, we have Malabrigo’s Book 3 Pattern book in stock.

Also up tonight, more Lorna’s Laces Worsted, Lorna’s Laces Sock in the new colors (Hullabaloo, Kerfuffle, Monkey Shines, Shenanigans, and Tomfoolery), Loopy Project Totes, CiD Hanscom designs (including her new pattern set, Balloon Tying Creatures #2), lots and lots of Addi needle re-stocks, more Ysolda patterns, Stephen West patterns, Connie Chang Chinchio patterns, Grace Akhrem patterns, Bekah Knits patterns, Heirloom Stitches patterns, a re-stock of all GoKnit bags, Schoppel Walle Zauberball, and Regia’s new self-striping Kaffe Fassett colorways (shown here in the Anthracite colorway.) We also did a big re-stock of Knitspot patterns mid-week last week, in case you were waiting on a few of those to come back in stock. Come check out all of the new things for the week and see if you need a new project or two.

Thanks so much for all of your wonderful birthday wishes on Ravelry and Facebook! WH and I snuck up to Chicago this past weekend for fun and celebrating, and then when we came home last night, we found Web Guy waiting for us. That’s an awesome way to start a Birthday Week! (Well yes, I DO intend to extend the celebrations for a full week. Don’t you?)

Sheri whohaseatentoomuchinthepastthreedays.
Nextweek,justbreadandwater…

We dashed up to Indiana two weekends ago to surprise College Daughter for her birthday. While we were driving down the main street of Upland (it goes on and on and on… for two blocks…), we saw this snowman having a bad hair day. I can so relate, some days.  Not that my hair ever stands straight up like that. But did I tell you about the time (in 4th grade) when Web Guy had to write a “Top Ten Things You Love About Your Mom” list for Mother’s Day? Number 4 was: “I think you’re really pretty except in the mornings when your hair looks like a pulled apart bush.” He pretty much nailed that description. Actually, that was my favorite thing on the list and the original note is now in the scrapbook, preserved for posterity. But I’m thinking that this snowman really has the pulled-apart-bush look mastered, don’t you think?

Your Cat and Dog comments cracked me up on Wednesday’s blog! Did you all read some of those? Like Diane’s cat who walked off the end of the dresser while bird watching? And Cathy’s doxie Gretel, who felt threatened by a rock on an evening walk? Or Sue’s cat Max, who was scared of dust bunnies? So many funny stories! It makes me feel better to hear that Gracie isn’t the only dim (much loved) bulb out there.

Lots going on this weekend – I’ll fill you in on Monday. I’ll also be working on my Ultra Pima sweater (almost done with the back) and I’m thinking of starting 28′s Cousin 53 in DC Smooshy with Cashmere. I picked a lovely color, and then the Elves pointed out that I rarely wear what I knit. (Socks, yes. Shawls and scarves? No.) I realized that it’s because I tend to knit colors that I love, but that don’t always “go” with things I wear. So this time, I picked Basalt, because I wear a lot of black and it will go perfectly. What about you? Do you tend to pick colors you want to knit or colors you’re most likely to wear?

Sheri partoftheproblemisthattherearetoomany
prettyyarnchoicesaroundhere

I’ve always loved Sharon’s sense of color. She was one of the Yarn Love dyers and came up with some of your very favorite colorways (which we have carried since our first Loopy year) and she continues surprising us with beautiful color mixes through her Three Irish Girls company. This is Kirsty, done up in the March Mosaic sock pattern. (Pattern by Wendy Johnson and shared with our sock club last year.) As I mentioned in last week’s post, slipped-stitch patterns are great for mixing up multi-colorways and making the colors play nicely together. Of course I know there are many knitters out there who like pooling and letting the color just do what it’s going to do, but for those of you who don’t, watch for these types of patterns to add to your library.  One thing to note if you’re making socks with a slipped stitch pattern, you might want to go up a needle size. We have more fun things planned with Sharon and Three Irish Girls. We’ll keep you posted!

For those of you with cats and an iPhone or iPad, you might check out the Cat Toy app. Here, Gracie (right) and Zoe (left) are watching the butterfly fly around the screen. It comes with a Butterfly, Spider, Laser Dot, and Mouse. Generally, Zoe is too smart to be fooled by this toy (although she is more entertained by the butterfly), but Gracie wants the mouse on every evening, so she can try (once and for all) to finally catch that dumb mouse, as it runs across the screen. Gracie isn’t the brightest bulb in the pack, but she makes us laugh and she’s a sweetheart. She dives at the screen and talks to it. I’m hoping she doesn’t put a paw through it one day…  Does anyone else have a cat or dog that has more sweetness than brains?

Sheri goodbye70′s,hello30′s.
Somuchforspringweather.

We’ve been waiting a long time for another batch of this beautiful yarn – Dream in Color’s Smooshy with Cashmere. When it arrived last week, we had the bags spread out all over the floor, just to see the colors all at once. (And I might have picked out a couple of colors for my own self. Job hazard.) This MCN mix is 70% superwash, 20% cashmere, and 10% nylon. The higher percentage of cashmere in the mix (like Sanguine Gryphon’s Bugga and Sweet Georgia’s Cashluxe Fine) makes this yarn especially smooshy, and great for socks, cowls, scarves, and shawls. This is the special yarn that we used in last summer’s Fourth Anniversary Kit, and we’ve had it here in the shop one other time in multiple colors. We now have 32 colors in stock for you to choose from, done up in Dream in Color’s unique dyeing method.

Also up in tonight’s Update, you’ll find a big re-stock of HiyaHiya needles, including extra cables and tips for their interchangeable sets (and Puppy Snips – always more Puppy Snips), Marie Mayhew patterns, and red and turquoise Knit Kits.

I finished up my slip-stitch sock – I’ll share that on Wednesday. I did pick yarn to make the Batik pattern that I linked to in Friday’s post (this yarn – yum!), but I left it sitting on my desk, waiting to be wound. I came to my senses and decided that over the weekend, I needed to finish my sock, and then I needed to be working on:

1.  My Cabled Scarf project and
2.  My Cascade Ultra Pima Sweater project and
3.  The eleventy billion other projects in the works.

Now that I’ve spent time on numbers 1 and 2 this past weekend, I think I can overlook #3 and will be winding up the Fiberphile shortly ….

Sheri whocouldeasilygetusedto4dayweekends

It was fun to log on to Ravelry this morning and see that my favorite group (the Loopy Groupies) had hit 5000 members in the past day. Wow! That’s very exciting to us. I love that our board has a lot of active conversations going on, I appreciate how warm and welcoming all of you Loopy Groupies are over there, and I like knowing that if anyone has a question about a pattern or technique or just needs advice and posts on our board, people jump in immediately to help. (Actually, that happens all over Ravelry. What a great group of knitters and crocheters.) In celebration of hitting that 5000 mark, I have a contest going on over there. Just leave a link in the contest thread and we’ll be drawing a winner next week. See the first post on the “5000 Contest” thread for details. I am adding so many projects to my Favorites list over there, as a result of that thread. (Note – this photo is from our post on Ravelry’s Bob, when he was featured in our Loopy Limelight. You can’t have a big reference to Ravelry without Bob’s cute face, right?)

I’m watching our Facebook and Twitter groups, too. We’ll celebrate with a contest when each of those hit 5000 as well. Facebook is close, but we have a ways to go on Twitter. It’s always fun to celebrate with a contest.  And speaking of that, we have RED yarn to award to several of you, as a result of our Valentine’s Day blog contest. Most of you found something to appreciate about that day, although a few of you still don’t like it, and that’s ok. I liked reading about all of the Valentine birthdays. And I like that so many of you feel loved the whole year through. We used the Random Number Generator to pull the winners. We’ll be sending beautiful red yarn to: Carol L in NY, Pat F in WV, Marla G in CA, Karen S in MO, MIchelle M in Ontario, Canada, and Kathy R (comment #1102, who was glad she’s SINGLE – but Kathy, I can’t find you in our system – please email me so that we can get your prize out to you!)

Here’s a quick coffee cake recipe to whip up on a cold day. The brown sugar in the mix gives it a caramel-cake kind of taste, and of course the crunchy topping is delicious. We had this here at Loopy on Valentine’s Day to go along with our morning coffee.

Heath Bar Coffee Cake

Mix together:

1/4 lb. butter or margarine
1/2 cup sugar
2 cups flour
1 cup brown sugar

(Reserve 1/2 cup of this for topping.)

Next, add in:

1 cup buttermilk
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. vanilla
1 egg

Mix and pour batter into greased 9 x 13 pan.

Take the 1/2 cup reserved topping mixture and add in:

1/2 cup crushed Heath bars (or Skor toffee bits)
1/2 cup chopped pecans

Mix well and sprinkle over the top of the batter. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.

It’s another long weekend here in the U.S., since Monday is President’s Day (and a no-mail Monday). We’ll be back in on Tuesday to get your orders packaged up from Monday night’s update. We have a big batch of Dream in Color’s Smooooshy with Cashmere that arrived this week, so watch for that to go up on Monday, along with a few other fun things as well.

Sheri nowgoingtowalkaroundLoopyandfindyarntomakethis

Today’s finished project is a Linen Stitch scarf, knit lengthwise. What an easy knit, and I really like the resulting fabric. It’s thick and warm and almost looks woven. Slip stitch patterns are great for mixing up colors. I checked out several linen stitch projects on Ravelry (including downloading a few) and have come to the conclusion that …. you don’t really need an official “pattern” when making this as a scarf. Just jump in and go!

I Googled to find Linen Stitch directions and here they are (except I end with the slip-stitch on each side – not a K1 or P1). I used 2 skeins of Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Worsted (in the Sublime colorway), but you can use any weight yarn. You can also use leftover yarn in many different colors, since the linen stitch is a good one for mixing things up and making them all look good. Just add a new color at different points as you go along. For my scarf, I knit it all in the same colorway.

Since it is knit long-ways, you’ll cast on a lot of stitches and will be knitting long rows. If you want to be all official in figuring our your cast on number, you can knit a gauge swatch, figure out how many stitches per inch you’re doing, and then multiply that by how many inches long you want your scarf to be. (5 stitches per inch x 72 inches long = 360 stitches to cast on.) Did I take the time to do a gauge swatch? Nope. I figured a general ballpark figure was good enough. I generally knit 4-5 st. per inch on worsted, so I cast on 310 stitches and it worked out fine. If you typically knit 8 stitches per inch in fingering weight and want to use that for this scarf, you’ll be looking at something like 8 st. x 72″ long = 576 stitches to cast on. My scarf ended up being  5 ft. long and about 5″ wide. Next time I’d probably cast on 376 stitches or so (and I had plenty of yarn left over to make it that long). Just make sure that your cast-on number is an even number, since the pattern is a 2-stitch pattern. You’ll also want to go up a needle size or two from what you’d typically use for that weight. I knit this on size 9′s (5.5 mm).

Suggested yarns for colorful versions of this:

Worsted: Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Worsted, Malabrigo Seleccion Privada Worsted, Araucania Panguipulli, Fiesta Boomerang, Huckleberry Trillium

Sport/DK: Hand Maiden Bess or Camelspin, and Lorna’s Laces Honor or Pearl or Sport,

Fingering: Dragonfly Djinni, Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Sock, Sereknity, Studio June’s Sock Luck, Sweet Georgia’s Superwash Sock or Tough Love Sock, and  Three Irish Girls Adorn Sock.

(Or use bits and bobs from your leftover yarn. Just make sure you’re using all the same weight within the same scarf.)

I’ve also been working on a slip-stitch sock for a few weeks, which I’ll share with you soon. You know, because I have to have fifty seven projects going on at once so that I can bop around and knit on different things on any given day. Or start something new. I’m good at that, too.

Sheri alsoworkingonexcitingstealthprojects.Can’twaittosharethemwithyoueventually!