We had a wonderful time, and I really miss them. After visiting us, Marjon and Ivon headed down to the Finger Lakes in NY. While they were here we ended up going to Centre Island and the CN Tower, which I hadn't been to in ages. I'll post a few shots of the weekend as soon as I feel like going through all of our pictures.

For now, I've got some shots of the stash I scored in Oakville at The Wool Bin. They're really friendly and they carry Koigu! We happened to be in the area a few weeks ago for my cousin's wedding with a couple of hours to kill between the ceremony and reception.

I got two skeins each of four colours. I didn't like any of the colours for a shawl, so they're going to be for socks. I started a pair of Monkeys with the yellow.

I also got a couple of skeins of Sea Silk - one in gold and the other in shades of sea blues. I thought I'd combine them to make a shawl, since I was in Sea Silk Shawl Withdrawl. I managed to finish my Leaf Lace Shawl in time to wear it to the wedding (finally, a finished object to show off!).

The shawl used up almost exactly two full skeins of Sea Silk, knit on a 3.5mm needle. I had just under half a skein left after the 19th repeat, so I decided to knit the edging at that point and as it turned out, I had exactly enough yarn leftover to add seven 12" strands of yarn, looped in half and knotted, as fringe along the entire shawl. Perfect.

Finally, here's my (almost) latest handdyed handspun. It's all superwash merino. Both yarns are similar in grist, but I didn't measure yet so I don't have any details. The green one is from the fibre I dyed here, and I rather think it looks more like green grapes than it does olives. The green and orange fibre was dyed the same night.

The latest spun yarn is sitting in its finishing bath right now, and I'm about to go slap it about and hang it to dry. It's 4oz of the polwarth that I dyed with Rochelle back in April.

Finally! Here are my finished Fleece Artist socks. I finished them two weeks ago. They're my basic top-down socks, heel flap, 60 stitches around on a US 1 needle. I generally make my socks 64 stitches around, but this yarn is heavier than Regia and its ilk. I made them pretty tight but I added a slightly longer gusset which improved the fit. I love these socks. So this makes pair #4 for me in the 200Sox Along. I thought for sure I'd have knit at least 8 pairs by now, and I would have, if I could count all my socks without mates. Someone's knit up to 31 pairs since January! Not to sound all sour grapes or anything, but she CRAZY!

Here is my afghan so far. I got a little sidetracked so it hasn't grown much since I last mentioned it. I'm almost finished the 3rd ball now. So far so good, I think it's really turning out. I can't wait to block it out when it's done. I guess I'll have to soak it in the bathtub!

Last but not least, here is what sidetracked me. Last weekend I popped into one of the yarn shops around here looking for something to make a quick lacy scarf and ended up walking out with 3 hanks of Handmaiden Sea Silk. The third hank is slightly different and much darker, so I'm going to work it into the shawl by alternating rows for a while with the first colour, then end off with it, so the shawl ends up darkest at the bottom. I hope it works with the colours I've chosen. I did my Charlotte's Web this way, but I only used 3 shades of similar browns, going from light to dark and it worked out really well. The variance between my Sea Silk colours is much greater. It'll either be absolutely stunning or a total fucking disaster.

I also got another hank of Fleece Artist sock yarn. I'm going to try to finish a project (hopefully one of my many unfinished pairs of socks) before I cast on with this stuff.