What I would like to know is, who is it that decides what we are going to wear each season? And what kind of drugs are they on anyway? I picked up 4 different fashion mags last night (Vogue, Marie Clare, Lucky, and In Style) and while I haven’t finished going through them yet, some of this stuff is just down right strange. I had wanted to look to see if any of what is in the Fall knitting magazines bears any resemblance to what is in the fashion magazines . . . . Surprise! Some of it actually does! The whole wool tweed thing is in right now (Vogue Knitting has a coat made of wool tweed) and there were several other interesting sweaters and a few scarves (Stripes are still in apparently!). I have to finish going through them to get more info, but it seems that Fair Isle (or variations of it) are also in right now (Gap is doing some cute, cropped fair isle sweaters) . . . . I’ll post more on this once I’ve finished my analysis of Knitting Fashion vs. “High” Fashion . . . .stay tuned.

In other news, the CTH socks in Fall Foliage

are ready for me to start the heels. This should be interesting as I have recently learned I had misunderstood the directions for working short rows in the pattern I’m using and had been doing them a bit different than they should be done. My mistake was that when it is time to pick up the stitches again I wasn’t picking up the wraps, I was just knitting the stitches that were on the needles and leaving the wraps where they lay. The heels I’ve done have come out okay, with the exception of those pesky corner holes, but trying them this way should be interesting. I figure I’ll try it the “right” way once, and if I don’t like the results I can go back to the way I was doing it on the next pair.

Speaking of the next pair . . . some Grey Regia flung itself onto my new set of #2 Bryspun DPNs last night. This is both a new yarn and a new needle type for me so it should be interesting. I’m hoping that I can actually knit socks on these plastic needles (they do seem to grab the yarn more than the bamboo) as I would like to take some knitting along on our trip in October.

Headed to Minds Eye Yarn tonight for the spinning group. This will be A’s last chance to go before school starts and she won’t be able to stay out that late any more. I may not even bring my wheel this time, I may just work on one of the pairs of socks or on the shawl as I really need to make some progress on them . . . . we’ll see how I feel when it comes time to pack up to go there . . .

Oh, and I bought dye yesterday for our Dyeing Day! Looks like it will be Sept. 7th as it seems everyone can make it that day. I’m really excited about this, I think it will be a lot of fun! I plan to dye the roving for Mom’s Shawl, my sweater yarn if its done in time (hmm, maybe I should bring the wheel?) and possibly some silk top I have . . . . if there is time. I really have to start by focusing on the roving for Mom’s shawl. The idea is that the dyeing (materials and labor) and spinning the yarn are to be her birthday present this year and the knitting of the shawl is to be her Christmas gift. At the moment I’m thinking of knitting the main section of it in “Old Shale” with a wide repeat so that it has a very oceany/wavy effect and then adding some sort of scallopy knit on lace edging. This may change as I recently ordered a couple of books on knitting lace shawls so I may get some other ideas once I read them. We shall see. I’d like to have the roving dyed and some samples spun before her birthday (the following weekend) so hopefully she can see what the yarn might look like. I also need to weigh the roving since I know we sent 4.5 lbs raw weight out but have no idea what came back. . . . . might help to know ;)

Well, off to work . . . . have a great day!