Hasta La Vista, Baby...

It is literally boxing day here. The grey sweater will be boxed up for shipping this morning and start thumping and bumping across country to its new owner. Good bye sweater, you were a fun knit until the neck, but we got you done.

Seriously, the neck knitting was just awful. I don't know why they had me do some of the things they did, and the sweater itself was heavy to move along a short circular, but next sweater, we're going to do the ribbed collar exactly as the ribbed bottom. I caught Gene petting his yarn yesterday too, so I know it won't be long before I start in on that one. I might just do the two sleeves first on a long circular together. Might.

I have some boxes for Carolyn so her final packing is on the to do list for today. Some weaving is also on that list. The blanket was whispering to me yesterday as I only had time to do an inch or two of weaving before it was time to head for town.

The Murphy loom has not sold. There has been some interest, but we'll see if it pans out. Shameless plug here, I've put together one heck of a good weaving package for under $400.00. Loom, bench, warping board and raddle. So if you know of someone in the west who is looking for a nice weaving loom, send them over here. ;-)

The ride home yesterday was a NIGHTMARE. Two inches of wet white grease that packed down to ice as you drove over it. The steep incline, the lack of plows or any other cars on the road, the windy white out and the tires that really are at the beginning of the end of their useful life all made for a very slow and tense ride home.

Okay, lets get to the good stuff. The new loom is ordered. Susan at Thrums asked what I was going to get in one recent comments. I have ordered a new Glimakra Julia 4 harness, 6 treadle counterbalance loom in red. I hemmed and hawed over going for the countermarche set up but in the end decided that I like a CB and having a simple tie-up on one loom is not a bad thing. This is a very small loom with a footprint of just about a yard square. I might even try my hand at some rosemaling on her beautiful bright red finish. Seems red is the color of new equipment. The Schacht Ladybug spinning wheel is also red. I suspect it's because we all know they go faster....

I'm working on a small, thoroughly silly project, which you all will see when it's done.

A first toy pattern has been selected too, along with yarn. I looked over my weftovers, scraps and half balls and couldn't come up with anything that was suitable, so while it doesn't look it now, this is the Deadliest Crab in waiting.

The yarn is from The Philosopher's Wool Co. and since Dona sells her Romney wool to them, it might even have some local sheep in the mix. Should make a nice red crab!

On farm news, Buzz somehow got himself into the dog pen overnight and was so terrified he went under the porch and couldn't figure out how to get out of the mess he got himself into. Plus the dogs all sniffing around the lattice of the back porch had him frozen with fear. It's good he didn't try to bolt. I put the dogs in the house and scooted him out from under the porch into the open pen. He looked pretty pitiful meowing at the chain link, but let me scoop him up and carry him outside to safety. He won't do THAT again. He was back to his sweet unruffled kitty self by afternoon feeding and met me at the front steps like usual. Only a passing glance at the fearsome dog area.