Knitter in Progress

I did not get as much "hermit" time as I would have liked. It's fall, it was nice out, yard work took priority for most of the daylight hours this weekend. I was able to stitch yesterday evening. I am working my way through the confetti nightmare that is the coral :)

Yesterday, I finished the second month of Chalean Extreme--PUSH. The Push month is all about using the heaviest weight possible with slow reps and short sets. I really enjoyed concentrating on one muscle group at a time with the heavy weights. I never thought I'd say this but I think I will be investing in 30 pound dumbbells pretty soon--my 25s were getting pretty light by the end of the month when I was doing leg work. I only lost one pound over the month but I feel a lot leaner and stronger(not P90X stronger but stronger). My eating has been cleaner this month than on any other program I have done. I still have my lapses but they are getting fewer and farther between. I am finding that, although it is boring, having a set menu to turn to is really helping. I stuck with the two cardio workouts on the workout schedule plus I added an additional cardio on Tuesdays(just like I did in month 1). I love the length of these workouts, they lend themselves easily to doubling up which I ten...

I found a tutorial for yarn wreaths and I think it would be a fun weekend project to do with the kiddos. In addition to continuing the tradition we started last year of making our own glass ball ornaments stuffed with shredded Christmas paper, glitter, and/or yarn/stitching scraps. I also got this book, Holiday Boutique Knitting , and I LOVE the wreath patterns in it--I want to make them all.

Love this : I will be working on HAED QS Swimming with Dolphins.

I am already looking ahead to 2012 and I have decided it is the year to "finish(or at least make a dent in) what I've started". With that in mind I joined the WIPocalypse . We will be posting progress on every full moon in 2012: Full moon dates for 2012: January 9 February 7 March 8 April 6 May 5 June 4 July 3 August 1 August 31 September 29 October 29 November 28 December 28 Finding WIPs to finish will not a be a problem--I think I will need WAY more than 1 year to get through them all ;) Are you a cross stitcher? Do you want to play along? If so, then sign up through the link above or just watch the madness unfold here.

Still feeling the crafty mojo here and I love it! It feels so good to have the energy to work on my favorite things AND to be able to carve out the time. For the first time in well over a year I pulled out one of my HAED projects. QS Swimming with Dolphins(Nadia Tate/Heaven and Earth Designs) I put about 600 stitches in over the last week. You can see the before pic in this post from September. I am going to be working on this one until I finish the page I am on. Knitting is also getting done--hopefully I will have some progress to show soon. I am working on 2 blankets, a pair of footie socks, cupcake themed fingerless mittens, and the Cambridge shawl.

socks for Rage 2011 , a photo by KnitterinProgress on Flickr. I finished a pair of socks for Rage last night during my hockey viewing time(LETS GO PENS!). I actually started this pair of socks in April. I finished the first one quickly then it got back-burnered with spring and summer. When I wanted to start the second sock I had Rage try on the first. . .it didn't fit. Apparently my young man is getting very big feet SOOO I had to rip out the first finished sock and reknit the pair. He is now at a 60 stitch cast on(I usually use a 64 for me)--he's 8 almost 9. Rage picked this color on our trip to Texas last year. It's Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock in Satsuma. Perfect October orange :) I can't even tell you how proud I was that he picked Lorna's Laces. He and his sister had their pick of the sock yarn(she chose Noro sock). Neither kiddo may want to knit but they sure can pick yarn ;)