It's SHOCKING ....

Pink !!!
A lovely pink scarf for the Summer of Lace.
Pattern: Mountain Streams Scarf by Susan Pierce Lawrence - also available here!
Yarn: Freza Kid Mohair (85% Mohair, 8% Nylon, 7% Polyester) - gift from Susan (thank you!!)
Needles: US size 6 Susan Bates Silvalume circulars. Not my favorite needle but when you are stuck in a place where there are no yarn shops (Mesquite Texas), you make do with what you can find.
Love rating: 9 <3's

This is the first time I've worked with mohair and it wasn't as hard as I had anticipated. The pattern is wonderful and very easy to follow. The scarf is not difficult but I would not recommend it to a new lace knitter. Now I just have to find cold enough weather to wear it.

The other pink thing I'm working on is what has been labeled the ugly sock yarn project. I belong to a sock-a-month group (Twisted Socks) at my local yarn shop,Twisted Yarns in Spring Texas. The shop picks a yarn, pattern and you get a brown paper grab bag so you don't know what color you are receiving. The first project was the Anne socks I posted back in June and I loved the yarn, the pattern, but not the color. The July project was out of Claudia's Handpaint and the pattern was Y2knit's Lace Rib Socks. I wasn't thrilled about anything in the kit. The yarn is 100% merino wool so I have my concerns about how long it will wear. The pattern is OK but with the color that I ended up with (Fresia) it looked awful. The yarn looked like someone had taken pink, purple and lime Skittles and tossed them into a blender.

I tried and tried to get it to look good .. even trying a child's size .. and it still looked awful. I even complained to the shop which is something I rarely do. But since I had already balled the yarn, there was no exchanging it. I learned to ask before I wind the yarn.

Anyway, this yarn has been the bane of my existance and I was about to toss it out but I decided to try a simple stockinette anklet and see how it looked in a smooth pattern. It is a world of difference! I still hate the color (the acid green/yellow is just not my thing) but they will make a nice charity pair for CIC. What do you think?


When I went to pick up my August kit, I grabbed a bag out of the basket and opened it to find some lovely Mountain Colors Bearfoot in Flathead Cherry. I love the color! I then found out they had put aside a bag just for me so I would not end up with a 'bad' color this time. I went ahead and kept the Cherry and am still wondering what color was in the bag. But thank you gals at Twisted Yarns for thinking of me :)

Not that there aren't problems *sigh*. I put the yarn on my swift and counted the number of 'rounds'. I then divided in half and wound that many into a ball. I then wound the rest into another ball. That is my usual way of dividing a skein exactly in half. But ... I found 2 knots in the skein and some places that were thinner than the others. Plus some places where it looked like the yarn had been spliced. Not at all the standards of Mountain Colors. And the balls did not weigh equally. But seeing that I complained last month, I decided to just settle in fear that I would be labelled a trouble maker. I do love the color, though. The pattern is Mountain Colors Leslie's Double Eyelet Socks. I've done this pattern stitch before but can't remember where but that is OK. I tried something different and cast on toe up using the Magic Loop method. Should be fine.

Till later ~~ Dene