So I finished the Teva Durham Ballet T...

This was a super quick and fun knit - almost as fast as the Tartelette shawl that I did on the plane from ORD to LAX for our Hawaii trip!

I am super short waisted, so I did only one round after the last set of increases on the Teva T, and that seems to work - it hits me right at the waist and with a little blocking, it'll lay flat.

The finished measurements in the book are really misleading – she is right when she says the fabric is very stretchy – I measure 35” and the finished measurement was I think 25”? The hardest part of the whole thing was joining the stitches in the round at the beginning, as you use long tail cast on and a double strand of yarn (and I did this on Addi turbos) so the stitches are kind of all over the place. I had previously attempted this a few times one night while “drunk knitting” and as Sandy can attest, it was not a pretty sight. I was completely frustrated. This was a few months ago though, and I had put the yarn away for awhile and on a whim decided to start it Monday night, with great success this time. Cheap too - $8 a skein at the Yarn Exchange in Dekalb (they have more Brown Sheep than I’ve ever seen in one place before!) so it was a $16 top.

Trying to decide which top to vote for on the Sexy Knitters Club knitalong. I’m torn between Calla and Waves. I know Tempting II will probably win though as it was in the first poll they did – they’re redoing it as a few patterns were left off. I have the Calmer yarn called for all three of these patterns and love it as that was what I used to do the Soul top. Here's a picture as promised - looking at the picture I see I put it on sideways with the seams at the front! (I have to take some yarn and fill in a few of the holes at the side seam - knitted it in the round, but somehow did some yarn overs when starting some of the new rounds so I have some holes. Other than that, though - I'm pretty happy with how it turned out!

Started the one shoulder ribbon top from the Teva Durham book – I was partially good in that I’m using some “Pomegranate” tartalette from my stash, but also bad in that I needed to buy 3 more skeins on Ebay to make it.

I thought it would maybe just be one or two, but when I calculated the difference in yardage between the ribbon she uses (which is acrylic and polyamide as opposed to the lovely tartalette in I think a cotton and wool blend) it yielded a result of 3 more skeins. Actually 3.2, but I always have yarn leftover (loose knitter that I am) so I only bought 3.

I’ll probably be done with this top in a few days, so I’m thinking of doing the CeCe pattern I bought on Bonne Marie’s site. Another one with Calmer or Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece. I’m thinking maybe I could use up the 2 balls of “Drift” (off white) of Calmer I still have on it and buy just a couple more. I’d like to come up with a more interesting color than off white, but I’d also like it to go with stuff.

And here's some miscellaneous pics from last post:

JoAnn's plants (you can see why I wouldn't want real ones up there!)

"Dress Me Up" dress for Mia in S. Charles Victoria and Crystal Palace Fizz

I'll post on Bob's basketweave cardigan another day - I think Blogger is going to blow up if I keep posting these huge pictures as they're taking longer and longer to post!!!! (Any experienced blogger hints, let me know!)

Robin