Psychic Knitter

 I LOVE colorwork and I LOVE cowls so naturally I am a huge fan of the Pacific Knit Company which is home to Doodles! Doodles are  collections of design charts made for color work knitting. They are easy to follow because they are so well designed.. There are many themes to choose from in order I used colors  to design your own cowl or hat. This set was knitted using the Arctic Collection. I used colors that were almost identical to the colors used in the design shown on the pattern I bought. The Doodles use DK weight yarn. Using DK you will get better details. One of the colors (perhaps even 2 ) are worsted weight because I could not find the right color in DK at my LYS. The gal there helped me find a worsted that was light enough in weight to match the DK I had chosen. This also helped me save a little money since I had to buy four different colors. If you don't have an LYS near you, I recommend Wool and Company. They have an inexpensive line of DK with a good selection of colors to choose from. The headband was something I design myself. It started out as a cowl but I soon realized that it was a bit too small so I finished it off with a rib on the top instead of ripping it out. I did make a matching hat, which like the cowl was easy. I had the pattern for  a hat from one of her other designs so I used that as a template .Colorwork is fun and it doesn't take very long to do on these small projects. It gives you just enough of a challenge to be interesting but it's not that hard that you can't watch television or listen to a book while you knit. Just make sure to stick to just ONE martini because there is a bit of counting involved.

 As we approach the end of the first month of Winter, I am ready for a nice cozy fire, a nice blue gin martini made blue by using Magellan Gin and some online shopping to keep me from having to venture out into the cold winter night. While it's preferable to shop your LYS, sometimes it's just not possible for a variety of reasons. You may not have an LYS in reach or it's a bit too far. Keep in mind that you can shop online and also be shopping at a LYS even if it's not your LYS.

This is where I have to give a huge shoutout to the only yarn shop I shop at online and that is Wool and Company. It is located in Illinois and it is an actual yarn shop, so it is an LYS. Why I like Wool and Company is because they offer a price variety in their yarns AND they offer free shipping on every order which is fantastic, AND the biggest thing is that they will wind your yarn for FREE!!! The free shipping is great but the free winding of my yarn is a blessing and this is why my loyalty to them is undying! Their customer service is outstanding as well. I had ordered a few skeins of a color for a shawl project and they wrote to tell me when they looked at the skeins they were not as matching in color as they should have been. They offered me a few options and I decided to go with one of them rather than wait for the color to come into stock again. These kind of things are important when you are shopping online because you can't see each skein you are ordering. 

While nothing beats browsing your  LYS or the LYS in a place you are visiting, there are some alternatives online that can be a good substitute. 

Happy knitting!

 It's been a while! I have been busy all these many years knitting and trying new crafts and returning to old ones. Life is a journey after all. The primary focus of my knitting lately has been for charity. It has been so much fun and so nice to dig into that rather large stash I have. This is a baby blanket soon to be mailed out to Knitting For Peace in Denver. They were in need of baby blankets so I decided that knitting a blanket would be a nice change. This pattern called for Sport weight and I had some DK in my stash so I decided to use that and I am pleased with the result. The colors used were a dark teal, purple and ice blue. The pattern is called Jordan Baby Blanket and it is free. I found it on Ravelry. Happy knitting!