Dear blog, I know it’s been a while. The weather has been so dismal there’s not been a lot of impetus to take photos and no photos means no blog entry.

I’ve been knitting more than I’ve been spinning and I have things to show, but instead I have some news…

Yesterday morning I got a message to say my sister had her baby! Well, I was a little shocked. The little one was not due for three weeks and guess who hadn’t taken final photos of The Baby Blanket!

Visiting my sister I have to say was a little freaky, in all sense of that word. Her baby daughter looks just like her when she was born, how very frightening and very confronting! The blanket was very well received and I predict this baby is going to be very well dressed in woolens I tell you. I’m so happy it’s a girl because now I can make cute girl things in pink; I think my niece and I are going to get along just fine.

Picture this: The Op Art blanket is blocking. I finished knitting the final stripe of six hundred plus stitches, which in turn used no less than two 50g balls on Thursday evening. The ends were sewn in this morning. It has been machine washed on a fancy woollens cycle and is currently harnessed between 4 strong blocking wires effectively making it square. It looks awesome. I’m not talking about the knitting, my meaning is to the optical pattern which has suddenly come to life in my knitting.

Despite having begun a pair of socks in a weak moment a few weeks ago, and desperately wanting to cast on Golden Wheat; my thoughts this morning returned to my Winter set.

I entered my personal yarn store and spent a good amount of time accessing and deciding on yarn and in turn patterns to make up my winter set. I must say I was a little inspired by Katie’s recent cardigan, in the pink and grey stripes. It reminds me of my fav fleecy dress which I wore throughout grade one and two. It’s a colour combination which still speaks to me today. It’s pink, it’s grey, it’s the best of both worlds!

I was determined to knit something a little chunkier, something a little faster, my attention span for projects is a maximum of four weeks as proven by my recent projects. Ideally, I would like my winter set complete in under two weeks; that’s do-able.

Without further a do, my winter set for 2012 will consist of Veera’s ‘shimmer in blue’ cowl and ‘here and there’ cabled hat and ‘Dashing’ mitts from Knitty for my hands (Veera hasn’t designed any mitts as yet). I have chosen a selection of yarns which I hope will complement each other and not look dreadfully ‘matchy matchy’, just cool and considered, thanks Louisa for the tip!

After making my pattern decisions, I purchased them and they downloaded immediately. I wound my yarn from skeins to balls and I cast on. Is there anything better than that? Perhaps downloading an entire book to my new kindle in under 10 seconds flat, that was pretty shocking. Technology has made me feel very powerful this week, I’m excited and a little afraid.

I’m on my last stripe for my sisters Op Art baby blanket. The very last stripe, I kind of think I can get there now. I have loved knitting the Op Art blanket again (the first one was for my sister-in-laws baby), but I won’t lie to you, I wish it had gone faster. The very nature of the illusion, beginning in the centre, the rapid growth and then nothing… just the constant knitting and something that doesn’t look bigger than a hand towel!

So here we are on the long weekend and it’s still not finished, I was hoping to cast on ‘Golden Wheat’ perhaps today. It would have been a nice little reward for a job well done. But alas I’m still defiant, the blanket must be done first!

The baby shower was yesterday, a month early; I never intended to have the blanket ready this early, so instead I gifted some bootees I made some time ago. Saartje’s with ladybird closures. They were received with squeals of delight, I was very pleased and relieved with that.

The feeling I got from the room of 30 or so women, was that my sis would be having a boy. I have no idea how they’ve come to that conclusion, although there were many different theories circulating.

My sisters husband is a mad Yoda fan, so at some point I may have to knit a baby a Yoda wrap, and my fav umbilical hat. If my knitting dreams catch up with reality that is.