I was attacked by the flu bug two weeks ago, and it was the worst! It started with Scott on Valentine's Day and then I got it that weekend. It took at least an entire week for me to start feeling normal again; I felt like the walking dead!

You'd think that being sick, stuck on the couch all day with nothing to do, would yield lots of knitting. But it didn't. I did read a lot, and finished the first two Beautiful Creatures books. They are sooo melodramatic and cheesy, with lots of teenage angst. The first book was just made into a movie and the trailer always catches my interest. So when the series was the Kindle Daily Deal, I bought all of them. What I like about the series is that it moves quickly and there's enough suspense/intrigue that the books read fast. What I don't like is how much I enjoy reading them, especially because it's in the teenagers-with-supernatural-powers genre. Sigh. It's my guilty pleasure. (and I definitely want to see the movie!)

There hasn't been much progress on my cardigan because I've been busy test knitting for a friend!

The pattern is Great Divide Shawl by Michele Brown. It calls for DK weight yarn but I used fingering weight with US 6 needles. I used stash yarn: Knit Picks Stroll Tonal in Blue Yonder and Araucania Ranco Solid. Besides changing the yarn weight and needle size, I knit to pattern. It's a beautiful pattern and is very well written. I love the shawl!!

I've recently purchased some yarn candy and am itchy to cast on something! I primarily purchase yarn as I need it for projects, but these recent skeins are just plain stash enhancers!

MAD TOSH!!!

the white yarn is nice, but not part of the enhancement

Those are my very first skeins of Madeline Tosh and I am soo excited about them! One skein of DK (maybe for a hat) and one of fingering (shawl). And the above photo contains my first skein of Malabrigo (it's the middle blue. I think it will be a cowl or mitts!) and the colorful skein on the right is A Stash Addict's sock in Mermaid Hair!! So I have a lot of project ideas in mind, I just need to settle on one.

It's Wednesday, friends :) Enjoy the rest of your week

Sweater Reclaimation Act, 2013

I have wanted to knit a sweater almost as long as I've wanted to knit socks, but I've always held myself back. The main issue has been yarn quantity and cost; committing myself to that many skeins at that cost, I just could never do it What if I never finished it?

But then I had a light bulb moment to reclaim yarn from an old sweater to knit a new one. Reclaiming yarn is not a new idea and I've heard of the practice before, yet all of a sudden it seemed like a practical and perfect idea.

So I found a few sweaters at a local thrift store, some that looked nice already and in a variety of yarn weights. The top sweater is an angora wool blend, middle is 100% wool, and bottom is an acrylic wool blend:

Before I cut into a sweater, I did a little googling and found this awesome site that takes you step by step in sweater deconstruction. Thankfully I had chosen sweaters with seams that are easier to take out! (dumb luck, eh?)

And now the process!

This is what the original sweater looked like

These are the sweater pieces after pulling out the seams:

Then I wound the yarn into skeins with my improvised niddy noddy:

it's really the backs of two chairs put together

And the finished, reclaimed yarn!!

I ended up with just over 800 yards of super bulky yarn :) It was a very exciting process and it's still thrilling to think of all the possibilities reclaimed yarn can become.

This 800 yards is becoming a Campus Jacket. I will share progress photos soon.

I hope you are all having a safe and warm weekend.