Things that make my day

Thanks to Knitting Nonni, who gave me a "You Make My Day" award! I'll spread the love by giving the shout-out to ten blogs I love to visit. All the blogs in my sidebar are ones I visit daily, but here are ten that are not in my sidebar, and that I visit just as often:

1. Tech Knitting: Unbelievably simple technique instructions and clear illustrations (okay, it's in my sidebar, but under "links").
2. Ruthless Knitting: Got hooked on this one because of the "Adventures of Florence."
3. Ysolda: Gorgeous and creative designs.
4. Spooky Knitting: It's always a pleasure to see what Batty's been cooking up and what trouble her cats have gotten into. Plus she's a prolific commenter and a fellow medievalist!
5. Fluffbuff: Just spent hours the other night poking around her very funny blog.
6. Wooly Ewe: Her ability to finish beautiful fair isle sweaters shockingly quickly makes me seethe with envy.
7. Zimmermania: Awesome inspiration from a bunch of EZ aficionados.
8. Knititch: An inspirational EZ knitter.
9. Anny Purls: Gorgeous baby designs that make you want to get knocked up just so you can knit them!
10. Geoffrey Chaucer: Can't be a bona fide medievalist without nerdishly giggling over this one.

Reading these blogs definitely makes my day.


And the other thing that makes my day is a finished object!


This is my baby-sized Cobblestone. Knit by the seat of my pants, top-down, without following directions, and improvising button plackets and increases. It was hard for me to get a good shot of the whole thing in today's super-strong light; here's the best one I could get:


Andrew's getting so big that his sweaters won't fit on my windowsill anymore!

I forgot to knit the roll-collar, so I knit on an i-cord that looks like a rolled collar. I think it worked pretty well. My favorite thing about it is the buttons, though:


I think that these are plastic imitations of bamboo buttons, but they might just be real bamboo. I found them in the "99 Cent Zone," my favorite neighborhood dollar store!

A plague of frogs.

It's a little known fact that the natural spawning season for frogs of the superwash merino variety is mid-January.

You may recall the original sweater for which I ordered five lovely skeins of Knit Picks Swish in lemongrass, and one in delft blue, the ill-fated car intarsia sweater. After that project failed miserably for a number of reasons, I frogged it and decided on a top-down raglan sweater with stripes. But, as is perhaps visible in this photo, the act of altering my usual top-down sweater pattern for a worsted weight yarn resulted in a sweater with skinny arms and a body that is easily big enough for a four-year old (in fact, I held it up to my own torso and it looks like it would fit me).


So that, too, has been frogged, in favor of a baby-sized version of the popular Cobblestone Pullover. Of course, being a creature of habit, I had to knit it top-down, and being cheap, I had to cast on for it without actually buying the pattern, a fact which resulted in my not knitting the roll neck of the original sweater. It's okay, though, because I think I will just finish it up with a knit-on i-cord at the neck, which will approximate the same look (I hope).

I really should start thinking ahead before casting things on...