Beginnings

Because, after all, what is yarn but a beginning? (You there, in the back, fussing about raising sheep and spinning and how yarn is not actually the beginning. Shut up. You're ruining my poetic comparison. It's the beginning for me.)

I got some gorgeous Christmas loot. There was apparently some sneakiness involved during our visit to Cloverhill for the Dragonfly Fibers trunk show.

Djinni Sock in Black Pearl



Love it. That makes 5 skeins of Djinni sock total in my stash. 2 skeins are slated to become Taygete, the next shawl in the 7 small shawls series, and one is in the process of becoming a pair of socks. I feel like I'm going to save the Black Pearl and Reluctant Dragon colorways for a shawl. Ooo, maybe I will look at them together. At the trunk show there was a gorgeous Clockwork made from two skeins of Djinni.

And...even better...1200 yards of Dragonfly Fibers Gaia Lace in Black Pearl. I can't tell you how many times I went back to this at the trunk show, and it was only a very limited budget and an iron determination to be good that let me walk away from it. I was absolutely delighted to open this gift!!



It's gorgeous. Absolutely stunning, and so soft. 45% cashmere and 55% silk. Oh, let's have another shot, just for kicks.



I'm officially on the prowl for a pattern worthy of this goodness. Something night-themed would be awesome. Just the thought of being wrapped in all that soft gorgeousness....oh, sorry, where was I?

From my friend in Texas who sends me yarn every year from the Heritage festival, I received these:



Mmm, warm squishy worsted weight naturally dyed merino goodness. I'm just now noticing that the yellow in that photo is wrong...it's more peachy in real life. I have no idea what I'm going to do with these as yet, I will have to wait for a project to strike me. Historically the Heritage yarn has come in very generous skeins but I don't think there was any actual yardage listed - only the 4 oz notation. But I'm sure I can get a couple of cozy hats out of these at the very least!

One of my friends went to Spain on vacation and she brought me yarn from Barcelona, and some other yarn that was also made in Spain but she wasn't sure exactly where. She also bought me an absolutely soft, beautiful woven shawl. And I, of course, forgot to photograph any of it because it was in a separate bag from the other Christmas loot.

I also bought myself some things with Christmas money from grandma - a skein of Sanguine Gryphon Bugga in Arachne for the final installment of the 7 Small Shawls ebook (planning to knit #6 from stash), 3 skeins of Handmaiden Silk Twist in Silver for Galadriel's Mirror, and Unique Sheep Ling in the Mirkwood colorway for the In Dreams mystery knitalong. Those items haven't arrived yet - but that's got to put the cap on my spending for a good long while. That was a pretty major splurge, but between that, the stash, the Christmas loot - I really ought to be set on yarn for quite a while. My project list is already bigger than I can probably manage for the year and I now have yarns for just about everything, so I'll try to be good from here on out. It does not help me, however, that one of the group members on Ravelry just posted that Signature Needle Arts will be offering size 3 and 4 circulars starting January 18. Oh well. They will have time to work any kinks out by my birthday.

Before I close, I leave you with a funny story related to yesterday's post. I got my beads back and was working on Phoenix when I realized how few beads were left in the tube. I groaned, thinking I was in for yet another delay in finishing this shawl while I ordered more beads. Fortunately, I thought, the people over at Bobby Bead are wonderful and if I ordered right away I would probably get my order before I had time to run out.

Something about this thought triggered a memory, though. I ordered a bunch of beads in different colors some time ago when Bobby Bead was having a sale, and I remember looking at one of the tubes when they arrived and thinking, oh, that was the color I used for Phoenix, and how silly of me to order something I already had.

I went upstairs and sure enough, in my bead bin was a tube of size 8 Toho silver-lined smokey topaz. This is great because it means I can keep knitting with no fear of delay - but it also made me mad because if I had just remembered on Sunday that I had that tube, I might already be finished!!! There I was thinking that I couldn't work on it because I forgot the beads, and I had a whole tube of them upstairs. Argh!