I Won! I Won!

Ok, it wasn't the mega-million dollar lottery, but it is pretty cool.  It was a contest on She Shoots Sheep Shots  for a subscription to Knit Circus, an online magazine.  KC has a unique scheme for revenue--the magazine is free to look at.  In order to get the patterns they show, you can either purchase them singly or subscribe and get all of them as a download.  I'm not sure how long my subscription will run, but I got the Winter Issue full pattern download.

The embarrassing thing is that I was notified of my win via a comment on my previous blog post.  Unaccustomed as I am (ahem, I'm talking to you, dear reader/lurker) to receiving comments on my literary effusions, it was many days before I noticed and responded. 

And maybe this is the place to also talk about what I found in the blog stats that Google keeps for me.  I have had hits from Russia, Australia, Denmark, Italy, India, and Hong Kong.  People were searching for the Jali cardigan, the Ptarmigan cowl, and vegan cookies mainly.  No, it's not a major international audience, but it still is kind of a buzz that the power of Google can bring the world to my dusty little old blog.

Finished with Some Objects

Various Finished Objects for show & and tell.  There's the graphic stripe scarf...

And a Baby Surprise jacket and booties for the new granddaughter of a colleague. The yarn is Socks That Rock medium weight in My Wild Irish Girlie, a skein from this year's Rockin Sock Club.

[Aside: I wonder how many warped people like me there are who love sock yarn but aren't keen on wearing handknitted socks.  How crazy is it to belong to a sock club and then knit anything but socks??]

The Surprise Jacket is always a minor miracle.  You knit this very strangely shaped rectanguloid object--

And then sew up two seams and it magically turns into a little jacket.  Awwww.  With little pink heart buttons.  And enough yarn and buttons left over for a darling little pair of booties:

I also managed to resurrect another item from the Heap of Malfunctioning Rubble, the Willow Tunic from Jamieson's Shetland Knitting Book 2.  It had been knitted and just needed sewing up and the neckband added.  Putting it together showed me why I let it slide in the first place--the neck is enormous.  Not so terrible, I guess, because, being made of Shetland yarn, it would be too scratchy to wear against the skin anyway.

Now it's onward and upward with the Christmas knitting!  And the Grandboy needs more mittens.  And his dinosaur sweater.  And a couple more intriguing projects are whispering in the wings...