Sheepy Souveneirs

Thank you for all the compliments on my Biscotti top. It is definitely one of those projects that I am truly and completely happy with. I got to wear it again this weekend when we took my Dad out to dinner to celebrate Father's Day. The Biscotti top really does have all the elements I wanted it to have: it can go to work, but it's a little sexy; it can go out, but it can still be subtle; it has texture, but the texture isn't over the top. And the shaping is perfect. There's definitely something to be said for a pattern designed for the individual who is going to wear the garment.

We had a number of missions to take care of while we were in Ann Arbor. Most involved shopping for something (for instance, making sure that my mother got her very late Mother's Day present, a set of Denise needles that she can take on the airplane when she wings off to Hawaii for her 40th anniversary). One of our shopping trips took us to a lovely nursery full of wonderful annuals, perennials and other good plants -- even some pretty extraordinary bonsai trees. I was able to avoid most purchasing opportunities (except for one day lilly destined for a big pot on my deck) until I found this:

Very Silly, Very Delightful Sheepy Whirligig

Sometimes, a girl just gotta get something silly in her life. What could be more silly than a metal sheep whirligig? Since I can't have a real sheep in the back yard, I thought this guy might be a good alternative.

(The trip to the nursery also involved the purchase of a gorgeous magnolia tree for Mom and Dad's yard, but that's a multi-picture story that will take more time than I have tonight to put together. Stay tuned.)

I also figured out what top project I wanted to tackle next -- the brightly colored tank top made out of the incredible microfiber ribbon that I bought from Tess' Designer Yarns at MSW. Winding this stuff into a ball was a little bit of a challenge, given it's eel-like slipperiness, but they put very helpful directions on the ball band to help you get going. I didn't think there was much more to learn about ball winding, but now I do know something handy -- turn your swift 90 degrees from it's normal angle when working with slippery yarns and wind by hand as tightly as you can and then stick the ball into a nice safe plastic sandwich bag.

I haven't had a lot of good swatching luck lately. The pattern recommends US size 6 needles (4.0 mm) to get gauge. I ended up on US size 9 (5.5 mm, I think). The good thing about this yarn though, after ripping out my swatch 3 times, it still looked fresh and happy in my final swatch. Which you can see below:

Tess Microfiber Ribbon Yarn Swatch -- Click the Picture to See the "wrong" side of the swatch

The main pattern stitch is mostly reverse stockinette. If you click the image, you can also see the stockinette side, which I think is quite neat as well. Sometimes hand dyed stuff just doesn't give you nice intervals, even when the colors look lovely together. This stuff (the Confetti colorway) is just as lovely knit up as it is in the hank -- and it smells good as well! I'd love to know what they use to wash this stuff after dying it.