I'm on a bit of a yarn high right now. I just got back from Loop, a LYS in Philadelphia, where I bought five skeins of Blue Sky Alpaca's Alpaca Silk in peacock to make the Lacy Hug-Me-Tight from Knit 2 Together. The yarn is gorgeous and soft and the color is incredibly vibrant. Most of the knitting is just a big rectangle of K2, P2 rib, but I figure that won't get too boring given the monumental amount of baseball I will be watching during the post-season. I have a bit more than a month to finish this, if I want to give it to my Mom for her birthday, and I do. But I'm not going to pressure myself too much, if it's not done by her birthday it'd be a fine Hannukah present, and if it's not done by then it'd be a great Monther's Day gift.

Speaking of LYS, I find that I like Loop a lot better than the store right around the corner. I'm more comfortable there, and I feel like people are happy to talk to me. I think I may go there for most of my knitting needs in Philly.

Oh, and in other news. I finally sent of the Linus baby blanket to its intended recipient. Go me! It's only a year and a month late.

I have jury duty tomorrow. It will likely be quite boring. So I bought some new sock yarn (Louet Gems Pearl) in a lovely, pale pink and cast on for Cookie A's Baudelaire socks. They are lacy and pretty. The figure eight cast on nearly gave me a coniption, but I finally figured it out, and now I have the definite start to a sock. I'm a bit unsure about the size of the sock though. The largest size has a 8.5" foot circumferance, and when I measured around my instep I got 9". So we'll see how this goes. I mean, I only have a size 8.5 foot, I shouldn't have to make the largest size.

I have also finally conqured my fear of sweaters and cast on for my Something Green. I'm about halfway through with the initial raglan shaping, and I'm loving it. It's such a neat way to increase. I'm knitting on size 8's (7's are recommended, but I'm a super tight knitter) and the yarn is just so lofty and squishy that it's almost hard to work with. Especially since I'm working with sock and laceweight yarn for my other projects.

I have successfully avoided SSS and I'm about halfway through my second sock. I had some problems picking up stiches, for some reason I was knitting from the wrong side of the sock (ie I would have had to purl every stich on every row for the rest of the sock). I fixed that, although I don't know if I did it right. Eh, it still looks like a sock.

I finished the second clue of the Mystery Stole and it's looking good. It's so satisfying, especially the purl rows, because I can just watch my hands. I'm using Addi Lace needles and I like them, but they're a bit too grippy for tinking. Sometimes I find that getting the stiches back onto the needle can be difficult.

I finished the Branching Out for Millie and I think she loved it. I've taken a bunch of pictures of different projects to post on Ravelry, and I really like having them up. Since I give so many of them away it's nice to have some of them preserved.