Three Days before Christmas

December 22, 2009| Lindy| 0 Comment | 2:44 pm

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As the title of this post states, it’s just three days before Christmas and I am down to the wire with two Christmas presents still on needles. I just haven’t had enough time this last week to knit very much. But I DO have all my Christmas shopping done. (This includes all the supplies for Christmas dinner.)

There’s a Winter Storm Watch in place for Omaha and most of the surrounding states and if the weathermen are correct, we will be snowed in for Christmas. The snow is supposed to start on Christmas eve after 2 days of freezing rain, which is supposed to start tonight.

Fortunately, our only traveling member of the family — my DD from Boston, has already arrived ahead of the storm. Now all we need to do is batten down the hatches and ride out the blizzard — I sense some long uninterrupted knitting time in my near future….

Hopefully, I will have a chance to take some pictures and post them before I need to wrap up the unfinished knitted projects. Happy Holidays!

New Local Yarn ShopsNew Local Yarn Shops

I recently visited two new yarn shops that opened in my area. They are both lovely shops and filled with some lovely yarns – some of which aren’t carried by the local yarn shop that has been the only shop in the city for a number of years. Each shop offers a different variety of yarns than the other, so I am hoping that both of them can be successful. We certainly have a growing number of knitters in our community, so having new yarn shops is quite appealing.

ImagiKnit Yarn Shop is located in the Bel-Air Plaza at 120^th and West Center Road, Suite 602, Omaha, NE. This shop does not have a website, but does have a Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/ImagiKnit-Yarn-Shop/263171999129. The owner of this shop moved her business to Omaha from Hastings, NE.

Wooly Mammoth Yarn Shop is located in Rockbrook Shopping Center at 108^th and West Center Rd, Omaha, NE. This shop also does not have a website, but does have a Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Wooly-Mammoth-Yarn-Shop/150211221662670. The owners of this shop recently moved from Kearney, NE.

I’m sure the knitters in Hastings and Kearney miss having the shops in their towns, because they are both wonderful yarn shops and we are very lucky to have them here in Omaha.

Appealing, as well, are the yarns I purchased from both shops. (I couldn’t resist).

From Imagiknit, I purchased a skein of Smooshy fingering weight yarn from Dream in Color. The colorway is 2014 September and it just spoke to me of autumn. It has this delightful mix of fall colors: reds, purples, golds, greens in various shades. See the swatch below

I also bought a skein of Fabjous Fibers Cheshire Cat in the colorway Off with Her Red – which blends perfectly with the Smooshy colors. I am using these yarns to knit a shawl using the Merlot pattern, which I purchased at Ravelry. This will be the topic of another post.

From Wooly Mammouth, I purchased 4 skeins of Addiction yarn by Claudia Hand Painted Yarns – also fingering weight yarn. I bought 2 skeins in the colorway Teal and 2 skeins in the colorway Prussian Soldiers. I plan to knit another two color shawl using these yarns, but I haven’t decided on a pattern yet. I like the Merlot pattern, so I may choose to do that again – but there are so, so many lovely shawl patterns in my queue…

If you are in Omaha: check out our new local yarn shops. 🙂

WIP: Progress report on the ClapotisWIP: Progress report on the Clapotis

The clapotis scarf is knitting up nicely. I am now about 3/4 done with the straight row section. So far I have dropped 9 stitches and now have 9 ladders of varying length running diagonally to the edges.

The straight row section is supposed to be complete after 12 repeats of the 12 row pattern. However, the instructions also say that if you want to make your scarf longer, you simply knit more repeats of the straight row section. So, I when I finish three more repeats, I will need to decide if the scarf will be long enough, or if I need to add some more length. The 12 row pattern for the straight rows is really fairly easy to knit and it doesn’t take too long to complete one repeat. I am thinking that I’d like this scarf to be a little longer than the 55 inches stated in the pattern, but will see.

The scarf is really soft and has a nice drape. So far, I’m happy with how it’s knitting up.

Happy New Year! Ending 2009 and Beginning 2010Happy New Year! Ending 2009 and Beginning 2010

Happy New Year, Everyone! It’s been quite a year, hasn’t it? Many changes, many happenings. As always, some good, some okay, and some not so good. I am fortunate that most things that happened for me in 2009 were good. And I look forward to new beginnings in 2010.

2009 ended with the Christmas Blizzard of 2009 – where we received somewhere between 12 and 14 inches of snow along with high winds and drifting. This caused a number of changes to our traditional Christmas plans and meant going to plan B & C when it came to celebrating with family members. I’m sure it will be a Christmas we all remember – because, in spite of the weather, we managed to celebrate and share the holiday with family.

On December 28, my daughter and I embarked upon a cross-country road trip from Omaha to Boston. (That’s approximately 1500 miles, give or take a few.) We did this so she could take her new car back to Boston. We started out at 6:30 AM – and after being momentarily stuck in the snow just past our driveway, had clear roads all the way into Ohio – where we spent the night. We pushed to make it a distance of 846 miles (14 hours of driving with just a few short stops). I thought I’d get a lot of knitting done on this trip, but it didn’t happen.

The next morning, we hit the road at 6:30 AM. It was snowing lightly when we left, but we soon drove out of it and headed for Pennsylvania. Daughter was driving and about 30 minutes into Pennsylvania we came around curve and drove straight into white-out, blizzard conditions, with traffic moving cautiously at less than 40 mph. Luckily, conditions improved rapidly and by the time we reached the next exit, road was improved enough for us to continue our journey. After a coffee-break/potty break in Clearfield, PA, I took over driving and drove all the way to Danbury, CT, where we stopped to eat and change drivers. We made into Boston around 6:00 PM.

That’s an exhausting 2-day drive, to say the least. But we had each other’s company, saw some beautiful country and arrived safely at our destination. Plus, I had another day to enjoy with my daughter in Boston.

I flew home yesterday, dealing with a delay out of Boston that left me only 10 minutes to catch my connecting flight to Omaha. Fortunately, the airline held the flight so that all of us on the flight going to Omaha could make it. (Thank-you, Midwest Airlines). After arriving back in Omaha, DH and I went to see “Sherlock Holmes” at the local movie theater, then went home and I fixed a late supper, then crashed around 10:00 PM. We ended 2009 by sleeping through all the hoopla… 🙂

So we are now at the beginning of 2010. Today, I plan to finalize my 10 in 2010 list (Ravelry Group), relax and just enjoy a quiet day at home. Now where did I leave my knitting? ….