If you recall, I put my mother's fandango vest aside when the first panel came out too short. I needed to rip back to the armholes and add several inches. I got discouraged and then along came the holiday crunch and sent the fandango to the back burner. Rip-a-long to the rescue! I pulled it out again yesterday, so I could rip it back to kick off the rip-along.

Before.

During.

After.

That felt good.

Alright, rip-alongers, the rip-along is ON! Ivete has already ripped out her ribby (mine's up tomorrow!). Carol ripped out her felted bag (yes, felted!). And Knitsmith Carrie has enough projects to rip one every day this week. Oh yeah, it's a week long frog-a-thon. Try to have fun and be sure to share some pictures!

Sorry to say it, but my mom's fandango vest has turned into a fandang-stop. I finished the first of the front panels a while back and proudly showed it to mom,

only to discover that it's too short. So it'll have to be ripped back to the armholes. Although I didn't mind working with the Fandango yarn -- it is a large gauge at least -- there's a lot of knitting still to go on this one and the idea of going backwards instead of forwards is discouraging. Which means that I just haven't felt like picking it up for a while. I hate having unfinished projects lying around, but I think I'll put this one on the back burner at least until all my holiday knits are done.

Gotta go find a new present for mom....

(You can tell I took this picture a while ago, 'cause now my porch looks like this!)

Four days back from vacation and we're sleeping well enough that I got some knitting done!

Here's the ribbing on the leftovers vest. I liked the deep ribbing so much on sooty mango that I've decided to do it on this vest as well. I knit the ribbing with two strands held together, so it's nice and bulky. But I'll knit the rest of the body with a single strand, cause I'm not sure if I have enough yarn to do bulky for the whole thing. Plus, it would be blazing hot! For those of you who saw me working on the stripes at Knitsmiths yesterday, yes, I frogged all the stripes that I had finished. Random is hard for me. I think I'm going to have to do a lot of ripping to get the random right!!

And joining the new project parade is my mother's fandango vest. This is the first and largest of my Christmas projects, so I wanted to get it started right away. All I did was cast on, but knowing it's on the needles will help me get motivated to work on it.

Even on 8mm (US 11) needles, this is going to be a big project, as mom likes her clothes long and oversized. She also enjoys color, can you tell? Now we know where I get it!

I've been knitting much less these last few days and, well, it's driving me positively stir crazy! In those down times during the day when I usually knit, I'm missing my needles pretty bad. I filled one gap by going to the yarn store and buying supplies for a few Christmas presents (stripey scarves for everyone!). And another evening was spent working out the technical details for my mother's asymmetrical vest (which I'm not knitting in garter stitch in one piece, but in stockinette in three). I also dreamed up a few new projects (a little down-time can be a dangerous thing) and even fantasized for a while about designing something myself (someday, when I can knit again).

Of course, there's always the boys, who are happy to distract me from my knitting anytime. But what a happy distraction they are. We went to a local farm over the weekend for a hayride. I wore my ribby and the boys wore their curls.

Keeps the doctor away, I hope. As promised, there will be no starting new projects this week. But I am thinking about what I will do once the finishing fiesta is over and I'm on vacation! I had planned to start the filly cardigan, but after feeling that little soreness in my hand over the weekend, I'm considering putting smaller gauged, more fiddly projects on hold for a while. In fact, I'm toying with the idea of doing the next project continental style so as to give my right hand a nice long rest. So that meant that I had to knit some swatches to see which of my projects would be the best to bring with me on my vacation/convalescence. Is that cheating??

I started by swatching up some dreamy alpaca I have earmarked to make the Mystical cardigan from the latest Rowan mag, but it wants to be knit on like US#3's, so it's out for now. Sorry, fall/winter sweater knit-alongers, I'm going to be a bit behind!

Taking a dramatic turn away from fine gauge wool, I knit up a swatch of the Colinette Fandango yarn that my mother picked out for her asymmetrical vest from The Knit Stitch. I really liked knitting up this yarn. Big gauge, but not too large as to be awkward. Still, it was too chunky for me to knit continental. Nevertheless, it's a possibility.

Then I had to knit some swatches up for knitting class last night. I didn't know what yarn to use, so I just pulled out some of the yarn for leigh's sweater. I was able to knit it up with my left hand with no problem and the yarn seemed very forgiving of my not quite perfect tension. So I'm also considering this one for the vacation. Not the filly, but a phil'leigh. Hey, it's close.

My hand's doing fine, by the way. No twinges or soreness while swatching. But now that the little swatch interlude is over, it'll be back to the finishing for me. Keep your fiesta hats ready!

I took my mom to the yarn store during her visit and we went a little crazy.

Apparently my mother has VERY good taste in yarns. When I'm browsing in the store, I always manage to fall for the luxury, designer yarns that go for $12 a ball (see below). It's a curse! Well, mom saw some yarn that she absolutely loved (all knit up in a baby sweater) and just had to have it. Colinette Fandango, thank you very much.

Ahh, like daughter, like mother. Now we needed a pattern. I remembered flipping through Sally Melville's The Knit Stitch once and seeing a lot of stylish, loose fitting sweaters that I thought my mother would like. We settled on the asymmetrical vest (less yarn!!), which she wants done in stockinette. So I'll be redoing the pattern. If she'll love it, I'll do it. (It'll be a breeze compared to native, which by the way will be appearing as an f.o. this week!).

And then we picked up a little something for me. I've been dreaming of making something in pink. I've had a pattern in mind for a few weeks and have been poking around for the right yarn. And I still have that pale blue cotton that I won at the Granite State Knit In, which I wanted to turn into something oh so lovely with 3/4 sleeves. So, I just happen to see the Chaise pattern in Jo Sharp's new book, The Holiday Island, show it to mom and she says I have to make it. Any idea what yarn I want to use? I didn't remember the Granite State yarn right away and so we picked out some of the Noro Cash Iroha. In the prettiest pink.

*Light bulb moment.* Use the Cash Iroha in the winter sweater and the pale blue yarn for Chaise. Three new projects in one trip. I'm one happy knitter!