Signs From Above

Every Tuesday and Thursday that I'm in Texas (which, as any of the ladies may tell you, is probably half the time or less), I knit at Yarntopia with the knitting group.  This week, I opened my bag to find three projects after finishing (well, talking Sheryl into grafting) the store sample:
1.  The garment on size 8 circulars
2.  The shawl on size 5 circulars
3.  The other garment on size 7 straights...I've had it for about two months and haven't worked on it in probably six weeks.  It's made with yarn from the yarn store, however, and I always try to knit with yarn that I buy there while I'm in the store.

So as I was taking out the store sample and replacing it with a Yarntopia project, two things crossed my mind.  The first one is that all of my projects are on relatively small needles right now.  The second is that I had a fifty-dollar credit burning a hole in my pocket.  Hmm.

I was taking out a couple of balls of yarn for the size 7 garment...I did not need to bring four balls of yarn with me because even on my most coked-out day, I can't knit that fast.  (Editor's note:  The Fiber Friend does not do drugs, but she did see Al Del Bene's standup routine about doing cocaine so she feels she knows what it must be like to knit while on coke.).  In the bag, I found a coupon for ten dollars off of my next purchase.  SCORE!

Thursday night, I was on a mission:  I needed to start a big-needle knit so I could actually...you know...finish a project before I died.  If I was doing the math correctly, I now had SIXTY dollars burning a hole in my pocket!  I wandered around the store for a bit, and then I finally settled on some Tahki Montana that I'd been fondling for the better part of the ten months I've lived here.  I was picturing some sort of raglan, cropped, bulky and heavenly shruggy sort of thing, with a button.  Four skeins of it would pretty well knock out the store credit.

But then I saw a ball of Noro that I thought would make a pretty scarf for my real estate agent, who...let's face it...deserves way more than a scarf.  She actually deserves something not knitted, like a large diamond or a plane ticket to somewhere cell phones don't reach, but whatever.  I'm a knitter.  So I got the Noro.

Then, there was the lace-weight Filatura that comes in 1,500-yard skeins...and in GREEN...that I've also been eyeing.  That went into the mental shopping basket as well.

Finally, because the Malabrigo worsted is right next to the cash register, two skeins of the lettuce color jumped onto the counter before me, and there was nothing I could have done about it.  My total after the credits and coupons was $49.12.  At fifty bucks, I could get two punches on my frequent purchaser's card instead of one.  My eyes started to dart around the store.

Ooh!  A button!  How could I forget!  I made a beeline for one that looked like it might go nicely with the Tahki Montana.  It was perfect...Jack and Jill sort of perfect.  Sheryl laughed at me, saying she would have punched my card anyway, but I was not about to compromise the integrity of the frequent shopper's card when that button was so gorgeous.

It all fit into one bag, despite the skeptics in the knitting group.  Sure, I had to get some air out of it, but still.

Today, I started knitting with the Montana after drawing out what I thought the pattern should look like, doing the math, and of course not bothering with a gauge swatch.  The first ball went on forever...it actually knitted so much that I did a gauge of what was on the needles.  I was close enough to the ball band where no beads of sweat were produced.

I feel satisfied.  Oh, and the bag of yarn is actually on the top shelf of the closet, since Tahki Montana is untreated wool.  In other words, it smells like sheep and I have two pit bulls who would be more than happy to take the Montana off of my hands if I would be nice enough to leave it at toy level.  I feel some pictures coming next week!