PA Knit & Crochet Festival

Yesterday my friend Debbie and I went to the Pittsburgh Knit and Crochet Festival. The ride was nice, a little over two hours. The Garmen Streetpilot 550 got us there without a hitch. There were 40+ vendors. One of them even had Angora bunnies for sale. No I did not come home with a bunny, but that doesn't mean that I didn't think about it. Now onto the stash enhancements. What's inside the bag you ask?

First up is some malabrigo (color 135 Emerald) that I purchased from Uncommon Threads. I think that I may use it to make another Cherie Amour. I really love the color. I also bought a single hank of malabrigo (color 20 Cypress) to make Koolhaas.

Next, I bought some Alpaca with a Twist Baby Twist (colors 1008 & 0100) from Fiberworks (Dayton Ohio). I will be using it to make the Deep V Argyle Vest. This yarn is soooo soft and each hank is 549 yards. The color of the blue in the picture is not accurate. It's more of a gray blue.

My next purchase was from Brooks Farm. They had so many beautiful yarns it was hard to choose. I decided to purchase two hanks of Acero (color Maritime -I think) and the Magic Shawl pattern. I'm going to make this for my grandmother for Christmas.

Next, I stopped at Bloomin Yarns and I decided I needed to purchase a bag to carry my purchases. I could not resist the Sweet Life bag by Amy Butler (Ashbury - Pewter). The ladies working the booth were a lot of fun. I would like to take a road trip out to there shop some time.














Victoria's House of Needlework was my next stop. I purchased two colors of pace sock yarn. I'm going to use this to make Eunny's Endpaper Mitts. I'm excited, I can't wait to start these.

Finally I stopped at Cultured Purl. I bought a pattern to make four different types of animals. There is an elephant, lion, zebra and a giraffe. You can use almost any yarn but the samples they had made up were out of Noro blossom. I have some in my stash and I had no idea what I was going to use it for until now. Also, I purchased a knit kit to make a sirdar baby sweater. The yarn is Sirdar Snuggly baby bamboo (color 133). I don't know if it was the yarn or the baby on the pattern that convinced me to buy it.

Debbie also made some really nice purchases. She bought a lace blocking kit and some yarn for a shawl from Knitting Notions. They had some beautiful shawls knit up with their yarn. All in all it was a very nice trip and I'm now officially cut off from making any more yarn purchases. I'm glad that we went yesterday because this is what it looks like outside today.

The First FO of 2008

I'm not sure why it took me so long to complete this sweater. The body knit up really quick. The sleeves however took forever. It could be that I kept forgetting which row of the lace pattern I was on. Not something I could knit while I was tired but it still worked for TV knitting.

Pattern: Cherie Amour
Source: Knitty
Size: Small
Yarn: Malabrigo worsted
Color: 610 Red Mahogany
Quantity: 3 hanks with a little left over
Modifications: None
What I would do differently: Knit a couple extra
rows for the bust. I feel that the ribbing comes
up a little high.

I am hoping that the sweater will stretch a little so that the bust fits better. Trust me I am not busty by any means. I would like to make this again maybe with another yarn so I could wear it during the summer months.