Updates and New Toys

OK, I've been busy working on my Ravelympics project - Gail. Here is a "bad" picture of it. I tried to take a close up of the pattern, but it was too blurry. I'll have to pin it out tonight.

I had to take last night off though. I'm prone to Tennis Elbow when I knit too long and it was starting to hurt on Tuesday night when set my knitting aside. I'm going to try knitting tonight, but probably not as many rows as I have done before. Maybe I should knit a couple of rows, take a break, knit a couple rows... We'll see how it goes. I am anxious to get this done so I can start my next new project.

Which leads me right into the "New Toys" topic. A year or so ago, Knitpicks.com had a colorwork bag pattern for sale as a kit. I was too intimidated by it to even contemplate buying it. But now that I have tried knitting colorwork, I think I'm ready to give it a try. So I went looking for the it. The kits are no longer available, but I was able to get the pattern and yarn. Here is a picture of the bag. It is called Sipalu created by Kerin Dimeler- Laurence. Ain't she beautiful?!?!

I got the yarn to do the orange/fall colored bag. The pattern calls for 17 balls of yarn, but if I read it right, that is enough to make 2 bags. I figured it out that if I bought the 17 balls of yarn, it would actually have been more expensive than buying one of their Sample packs which has 21 balls yarn. (All different colors of course) And since it was such a bargain :o) I bought the Sample Pack . It came in the mail on Tuesday. Can't wait to start it! Still need the right size needles though.
I did buy 3 extra balls in the orange colors (on the left), because I really wanted my bag to look like the fall colored bag. I played with everything Tuesday night and have all my colors figured out. It will have more green in it than what the picture shows, but I cool with that.

While looking on-line for the needles for my Sipalu bag, I ran across an interesting link on Erica's Sewing Center web-site. Joyce Roberts of Arkansas, sent in a great new idea for storing all your knitting tools. I was floored!! I have been looking for a solution to all the different containers that I have my needles in and low and behold she found one. Thank you Joyce for the wonderful idea.

It is called the StitchBow Needlework Travel Bag and it is made by DMC (as in DMC embroidery floss). It works perfectly for storing my Knitpicks options circular needles, Boye interchangeable circular needles, DPNs, and crochet hooks. Check these photos out.

Nice expandable handles and an outside pocket.

See the dark spot in the lower left corner? It's piece of dark felt for putting your needles in. Thanks to an idea by Antonette, I'm going to put saftey pins there to hold my stitch markers. There is a 3-ring binder inside that hold floss binder sheets that are perfect for storing your needles. 1 sheet comes with the bag when you get it, but you can buy more in packs of 2.

I put a piece of paper behind it so it is easier to see it. Here are my Knitpicks Options Circular needles. Each sheet flips out and you can store the needles on both sides. I plan to label all the pockets with the appropriate needle size. (Just need to buy batteries for that pesky label maker)
It even fits your 8" DPN's.


The front and back sides have nice big pockets for storing all your miscellaneous items also.

I took this to my knitting group last night and they were all oohing and aahing over it. I just know there is going to be a stampede once everyone realizes they can buy these at JoAnn's with the 40% coupons.

No pushing or shoving ladies!!!