How a yarn store in Spokane, WA helped a girl on Long Island

Important Knitting Tip: When working on something, like ... oh ... a never ending wedding afghan, make sure you have enough yarn.

Thanks to Paradise Fibers in Spokane, WA, I will be able to finish this darn present. They seem to be the ONLY shop left on the planet that still carries Cascade Yarns 220 Superwash in Light Iris ... and they not only shipped two skeins to me, they shipped it to me IMMEDIATELY. I placed my order on Friday, the yarn arrived in Monday. I love Paradise Fibers, Ravelry, and the United States Postal Service immensely.

Now I just need to knit ;)

The neverending project

Back to working on the Wedding Afghan. Remembered why I don't work on this during my lunch break: too difficult to read pattern, wield cable needle, and eat lunch at the same time.

Yardage Concerns

I've been bad this past week, as I have hardly knitted at all. Today I picked up the afghan again, and realized that I am now on my third ball of Cascade Yarns 220 Superwash in Jelly Bean. However, I am still working on the first panel of the afghan. I am beginning to worry that I may not have enough yardage to complete the darn thing.

Not your average wedding afghan

I haven't been blogging as much as I would like to, and I've fallen quite behind in keeping up with my blogroll. I have a vacation coming up, so there will be some time reuniting myself with the knitting blogosphere.

Last week I cast on the Celtic Knot Afghan, and I reached row 19 tonight. I'm enjoying the pattern so far, though why, oh why, Nicky Epstein, did you not chart this?

Progress so far...

There would have been more progress made this weekend, but I idiotically left my knitting behind when I went to a lecture. I picked at my nail polish in sheer frustration.

Celtic Wedding Knot

Light Iris

Jelly Bean

I love my local yarn store, Knitting on the Lamb. The owners are incredibly helpful, and fun to talk with. After work today, I drove over to Huntington to get around 1700 yards of worsted weight wool for the Celtic Knot Afghan that I will be giving to my cousins as a wedding present, come September.

Five skeins of Cascade Yarns 220 Superwash Paints in Jelly Bean and three skeins of Cascade Yarns 220 Superwash in Light Iris... I think I might have enough yardage. I just need to scare up a size 10 1/2 circular knitting needle, my trusty cabling hook, and my row counter so I can cast on tonight.

My cousin and his bride-to-be already know they are receiving an afghan as a wedding present, and I doubt they know about this blog. So there will be sneaky pictures posted every once in a while!

Veil Making for Idiots, Part 3

Today's discussion involves ... trim.

The edge of the veil was unfinished, and since I'm a bit of a perfectionist, I hand sewed several yards of ribbon to the edges.


Today, I added the finishing touches to the headband. I hot glued some ribbon to the headband ... then started with the rhinestones. I hotglued 4mm and 5mm rhinestones to the headband, 5mm rhinestones on the veil, and several 4mm rhinestones on the bridal bouquet.

Hot glue and rhinestones ... and already burned fingers? Ouch.


Final masterpiece!

Not a veil

What else does a bride need?

A bouquet!

Ten fake roses ... which I attached in groups of two and three with rubber bands ... and then the whole bunch with rubber bands (should have used duct-tape for reinforcement). Then I wrapped the "stems" with ribbon, anchored everything in place with my needle and thread ... and added a festive bow (also anchored!).

Veil Making for Idiots, Part 2

The Veil Making Saga continues.

I bought about thirty-nine dollars worth of materials ... twenty-nine of those dollars going towards this veil.
I bought a veil kit thingie at Michael's, and promptly took the veil off the hair comb. I then started to pin the veil to the headband.

The next step involved sewing the veil *to* the headband. This was a lot harder than it sounds. My fingernails ripped, the needle and my thumb became a little too well acquainted ... and then I grabbed my great-grandma's thimble. Oh thank heavens for that thimble. Made the sewing much easier.

After that, I tried on the veil (because, um, that's what you do. Yeaaah). See how it's almost reaching my butt? I wasn't too thrilled with that.

So I decided to make it poofy. Trust me, it was horrifying in person.The veil is almost finished, so part three should be posted in the next few days!

Veil Making for Idiots

As I've probably mentioned before, I'm the volunteer costumer for Tech Savvy High School. This spring's musical is The Wedding Singer. I just got the email saying what props I could start on ... a wedding veil, a bridal bouquet, and a fake wedding cake.

I have never made a bridal veil before, so I'll be documenting this step by step.

Step One:

Locate a headband.

My inspiration is from the wedding veil-headband worn by Laura Benanti in the Broadway production of The Wedding Singer.

(not my picture, taken from the http://www.flickr.com/photos/whatarerecords/144101843/ page)

I finally found this at Claire's Boutique:


And ripped the flowers off to make this:
I'm saving the flowers, in case I need to fashion a boutonniere.

There's enough fabric for me to wield a needle and attach the veil, which will be in our next installment.

Wedding Planning

Caught you off guard with that title, eh? I'm not getting married, but one of my cousins will be tying the knot in September.

I'm planning to knit up brooklyntweed's Hemlock Ring Blanket as a wedding gift. I'm torn between Comfy and Swish Worsted. I've worked with Swish Worsted before and loved it, but more fond of the colorways available in Comfy (Neither bride nor groom are allergic to cotton or wool).

So my question is: has anyone worked with Comfy? While I want to tear my hair out from working with something that is mostly cotton, fiber-wise?