It has finally snowed here and boy did it cover us up with a blanket of white stuff! Now the weather has decided to get super cold and was -3 degrees this morning at my house and I know for some of you in the northern states it may not sound cold, but to us high desert rats here in Reno it is a bit chilly. I must admit that I love it though and hope that the power stays on and all will be well! Here is a picture of our parking lot in front of the shop and there were 3 backhoes here Monday making the snow mountains that will now be here until late spring.




Of course this cold weather really stimulates my desire to knit and I just finished Terry's easy slouch hat pattern and once we get all the kinks worked out we will be putting it up as a free pattern on the site, thanks Terry for such a great pattern. I used the Lorna's Laces Swirl DK yarn in Watercolor and stranded it with the Rowan Kidsilk Haze yarn in color 626.




I am one lucky bean as I got to take care of our littlest bean, Huck, the other night, what a GREAT baby! Doug and Laura got to go out for a bit of holiday cheer with their neighbors while I got to hang out with the baby and of course those dogs you all write to me about, Buddy & Wiley.














Wiley is looking at the tennis ball on the floor and then Buddy took the ball from Wiley, sorry Wiley!

Huck is sitting in his basket and as you can see he loves his little pumpkin from his first Halloween. The next day his first tooth popped out so chewing on that pumpkin helped.

I loved taking care of him and getting to know the dogs too! Thanks you guys for trusting me with these treasures and come on go out again, please, please!

As always happy knitting!

Jeanne

I talked recently about the 'knitter's spirit' and I have just have such great friends who are so generous with their knowledge, time, hugs, WOW! I had such a fabulous day yesterday learning to warp my little gifted loom (thanks Fran) and getting an actual weaving lesson from my friend Sharon. Thanks so much Sharon for all of your time yesterday and it was so great to spend time at your house out in Red Rock which is a beautiful area that is remote, but well worth the trip. Your Llamas, Sheep, Dogs, and of course Charlie the Cat were a pleasure to have help with the weaving. Ok the Llamas and Sheep stayed outside, but everyone else had something to say about what we were doing. Here is Charlie supervising the whole business with a cavalier air about him.

Here Sharon is helping me tie up my treadles and then we warped, warped, warped and finally got to weaving.

The little twill sample below has lots of mistakes, but I still did it and am stoked to learn this new art.



However, just like when I learned to knit boy do I have a lot to learn. I can see that just like knitting I will never know everything and that's what keeps me doing it, the promise of something new and exciting right around the corner.

Of course I knit yesterday too (good heaven's I am obsessed!!) and I am currently working on some mittens out of the Lorna's Laces Swirl DK yarn in Maple Grove and hat will be next to match. Now I know they look like socks (I am using the magic loop), but I wanted to play with a custom fit from the finger tips down and am going to do an after thought thumb, so stay tuned on that one.

I finally finished my Hand Maiden Yarns Casbah socks (in Morgana and sorry that color is sold out) and am back on my Shetland sweater from Rowan Magazine #46. You may notice my odd chart keeper and it may look like an old cookie sheet to you, well you are correct that is exactly what it is. I got some of those cut to fit magnets and enlarged my chart to keep track. I use the magnets to move up my rows on the chart as I go and with my row counter I am usually right on the money.

So my life is filled with fiber, fiber and more fiber, phew!! Of course there is family, work, animals and somewhere in there I probably should sleep, NOT!! I can sacrifice a bit of sleep to take in all this fabulous learning, oh yeah and the other stuff too!

As always happy knitting!

Jeanne