A few months ago, I had plans to attend Rhinebeck this past weekend for NY Sheep and Wool. But when it came closer I just didn't feel like traveling that far and dealing with crowds. It's been a busy fall and just felt like one more thing to add that I didn't need to. Instead, I had my own perfectly wonderful fall weekend with hiking, visiting friends and family, knitting, and decorating for Halloween.
Not only did we take a short road trip to spend time with family, we also got to see college friends and go hiking. If you're close to Bloomington, Indiana, I highly recommend a nice hour-long hike at Leonard Springs Nature Park. A beautiful hike accented by caves and little waterfalls and a perfectly gorgeous walk overall.
We decorated for Halloween, which also included trying to untangle the webs that our five-foot spiders live on. We did not succeed. Note to non knitters who pack up the web at the end of the season - take direction from the knitter in your life and store your string properly. LOL!
I also cast on and finished a new project that I'm calling my Sunday Scarf because it's easily finished on a Sunday. A simple scarf using two skeins of Malabrigo Caracol, a super bulky weight yarn that feels wonderful and knits up super quick. I chose two skeins of Caracol color 249-Talisman, cast on 19 stitches with a 24" US 15 needle and did the Cartridge Belt Rib the entire way. What's the Cartridge Belt Rib? It's just a two row repeat. Row 1: K3, *sl1 wyif, k3; rep from * to end. Row 2: K1, *sl1 wyif, k3; rep from * to last 2 sts, sl1 wyif, k1. And continue for as long as you want your scarf. I had about 20% of one skein left, and I'm planning on using that for a thick stripe on a coordinating hat.
Tuesday (tomorrow) marks our 4th week of Socktober goodies and we'll have a bunch of beautiful sale yarns. Dream in Color's Colossal Sock will be back, as will a special silk blend sock yarn from Austria. We'll also have new Opal Yarn collections, and three new collections from Laines du Nord. One of them is live now, shown below in color 201. Each ball has enough yarn for two matching socks.