ashes and roses

Today is rising bright and cool...all the colours outside my front room window seem sharper after the haze of those 100 degree days we had last week!

I'm planning a quiet day today, as I'm feeling a little poorly. A trip to the local yarn store may cheer me up. I want to score a skein of Seacoast Handpaints sock yarn in Ashes and Roses:



for a sock pattern called "Ashes"

I never used to like pinks of any kind. But just about a year ago, I started being drawn to different shades of pink and rose. It started with a very pale pink kid mohair & silk Kid Silk Haze yarn, that I used with Debbie Bliss Cashmerino baby yarn for a pair of spiral stitch bed socks...so sweet. Then I started noticing the pale shades of pink in nature - the blush on the edge of a purple iris, the edge of a seashell, a streak in the granite foundation....Its not all kool-aid hot pink, sometimes it's more pink lemonaide...The subtle pinks in nature are like the promise of affection in creation, the assurance that this world was made with love.

This is how the Ashes and Roses yarn looks when it is knit up, subtle and soft:



Just like wearing matching underwear, matching your yarn to your sock pattern is a secret pleasure...who will ever know that the Ashes and Roses yarn is knit into a pattern called "Ashes", or that the Snake Poison yarn is knit in a pattern called "Snakes on a Sock" or that the deep marine blues of the Subterranian Mermaid yarn is knit into a sock with a lace pattern called "Fish Scales Lace"? Little things like this make me happy.

While at the yarn store, I'll also look for an orange yarn, as my little sister's new boyfriend is said to like orange *and* handknits. Can you imagine? Orange - the colour of optimists! I interrupt this sock knitting to bring you The Orange Hat for Brodie. I feel a new original pattern coming on, like a pearl forming in its solitary shell.....

During my early morning blog rolling this morning, I found a few more sock patterns:

Red Dwarf

Dragonfly

Rayne's socks

A visit to the local quilt shop is also in my plans, I think. I contemplated driving to the coast and visiting the Portsmouth Fabric Company, but given my low energy, staying in town is a better idea. The Quilt store here has wonderful fabric and I feel like sewing. I want to make bags (knitting bags of course!) - like the bags I see all over Etsy. First, I want to make a square bag and put the embroidered sheep on the sides that Nadine's mother made for me: pine cone sheep and violets sheep. This bag will be big enough to hold more than one project and will have a sturdy lining, with pockets! And then I want to make a little rectangular bag with a zipper - just the right size to hold whatever the current sock project is, with its DPNS... Nice old-fashioned fabrics, like 1930's or 40's...

For anyone who is planning to stay in quietly and knit today, there is both a Britain's Next Top Model (VH1) and a Top Chef (Bravo) marathon going on all afternoon....