Catch Up With Criquette, Chapter 1

I can't figure out what exactly has made my schedule exponentially explode into "busyness", the likes of which is consuming what little free time I had. I suspect it's a combination of work, extra critters, an increased commitment on my part to spend more time with friends, tackling some overdue home and office organizing projects, and other miscellany that is interfering with the time I used to spend blogging.

Unfortunately, none of these reasons will be going away anytime soon. I have also allowed myself to finally be talked into writing a book with my friend, who is a child psychiatrist. It's geared towards kids, so won't be a ridiculously major undertaking, but will eat up some more time on weekends. What this means is that I won't be able to blog with any predictable frequency.

I thought about even giving it up, but I'm still loving the whole experience too much to do something that drastic. I don't want to lose touch with the friends I've made through our mutual love of blogging and knitting, and I need to have the time to visit you all at your blogs. So it may be a couple of weeks between posts, but I will still be around.

I've had a lot to blog about and instead of one massive post, I'm dividing it up into a few that I'm hoping to post in the next couple of days. Since I haven't run much knitting content to speak of, I thought I'd start with that.

There have been a couple of wonderful sales sponsored by 2 of my favorite local dealers where I scored some serious wooly crack. The first (and best) took place at The Studio, where the entire store contents were on sale. I could have easily bought more since I saw so many yarns that screamed my name, but this is what I managed to squeeze out of the remnants of my Christmas gift cards:

Addicting, but 100% legal

After knitting a Calorimetry in the mossy green version, I grabbed some more of the scrumptious Colinette Cadenza in a summery periwinkle hand-painted merino:


And even though sock-knitting and I don't seem destined to become a couple, I saw this and fell instantly in love -


It's Lorna's Laces Shepherd superwash (Franklin's Panacopticon colorway). It's a limited edition yarn, so if you too think this is a fabulous new color combination, scoop some up now.



I also made a couple of Calorimetry's with this lovely handpainted Peruvian merino, Mirasol Hachu. The colors are very intense and just pop, and the yarn is nice and springy to work with.

Here's my favorite score of the day, a huge hunk of the soft and sproingy goodness that is Shaeffer Elaine, in the byooteous "Shirley Chisholm" colorway. I am most excited by this because I first experienced this wonderous yarn as a newbie knitter. It was the yarn that suffered an identity crisis but, with therapy from moi, was able to decide it wanted to be this lovely length of squishy warmth.



I loved the pattern, the colors and the whole sensory pleasure of knitting with this wool so much that I have felt several pangs of regret at gifting it to my SIL (who wears it a lot and seems to like it). I've been keeping my eye out for a colorway that is different than the original, that I like as much as that one, and this was the one. I am savoring the anticipation of casting on, but it will have to wait until my September vacation.

This yarn is to die for!

I also picked up some Araucania merino in this pretty pink color for my Dogs on Thursday swap partner.


I thought I was done with stash enhancement for the rest of the year when I discovered that the Knit Wit, another of my favorites, was having a summer sale. Jan usually puts good stuff into the big sale boxes, and all kinds of things jumped into my basket before I knew it.



I picked up some Trendsetter Scoubi Do (the 2 bright pink balls) for chemo caps, the Cervinia Madrid for a baby jacket and a couple of baby hats, the Berrocco Comfort DK for baby hats and matching booties, and the 2 single skeins of sock yarn for the 1st two squares of the Barn-Raising Quilt I will be making for Mr. C and I (over the next several years). I also picked up about a million balls of Fixation for chemo and baby hats, and a pair of house socks for me.

And speaking of stash enhancements, I wasn't the only one getting a fix around here. The lovely lady who adopted Gumbo gave us an obscene amount of her finest organic home-grown catnip. While it was drying on the back porch, Criquette kept a close watch, guarding her stash from the notorious nip-head, Bitsy BonTon.


Sadly, Criquette couldn't stand guard 24/7, and Bitsy consumed vast numbers of leaves before they could even fully dry out.

After eating her way through an entire pan of catnip brownies, Bitsy awaits her next fix, not realizing that plans are already in the works for rehab