Oh, and a Tea Cozy

My normal tea pot is visiting Kentucky this month, along with the tea cozy I designed for it, and for Adagio's PersonaliTea Pot.  That leaves me with just a small tea pot to use, and in the grand scheme of first world problems, it has been a miniature trial.  As one who sips tea throughout the day, it's a bit of a challenge to only get two cups of tea out of one pot.  And especially one pot that had a tea cozy which was a bit of a challenge to get on/off, being a bit undersized and gappy. 

So, what's a knitter to do?  Knit a tea cozy, of course!  And since a friend of mine had sent me in quest of tea cozies on Ravelry, I already had a good idea which one I wanted to make.  (Totally ignoring the pattern, mind you, which was in a magazine from several years ago.)  So I rummaged in my stash, pulled my favorite needles out of a sweater sleeve (hibernating at the time, finished now), and cast on. 

Behold, my tea cozy!

It's lined, and I am happy to say that I have 6, possibly 7, fewer oddments of yarn in my Fingering-weight Wool Yarn Stash.  And of those, only the gray can be positively dated to this millenium. 

The current project is a stash-busting Honey Cowl, which is slated to remove 100 grams of Elsebeth Lavold's Silky Wool in Denim from my stash. 

Popping in briefly

Filius was home for spring break recently, and he managed to get my iPad talking to my computer briefly, at least as regards sharing photos. Here we have the Huge Glove

This glove has a rather cunning construction, and, when knit to gauge, would be a fabulous project for the knitter who doesn't like to weave in ends but adores finicky construction.  I believe that the whole glove is knit with a single strand of yarn - no scissors necessary.  No purling, either.  It comes from Elizabeth Zimmerman's Knit One, Knit All.  It will remain an orphan glove, but it did use up some yarn from my stash!

When Filii are home, bread must be made.  Here's a charming little loaf of a simple no-knead bread.  I do not think it survived to see the night. 

And then we have Grace.  Grace has been on the needles for a while, awaiting this and that.  I was very happy to get her off the needles and blocked, since my gauge was turning a 40" sweater into a 33" sweater, and I was starting to wonder what had happened.  I've made 4 sweaters with this yarn now, three of them while using a knitting belt and the same set of needles ... and everything in my closet had a gauge of 7 spi, while Grace was coming in at 8 spi.  She blocked to the right size, so I am a happy camper.  Pewter buttons have since completed her ensemble.  And for you eagle-eyed ones, yes, I did spot and fix the unwanted purl stitch in the front zig-zags.  

Today is the first day of spring, and the geese are merrily flying west.  I am fairly sure I saw a 2-3 year old bald eagle when I was out this morning.  The sun is shining, and the 'must do' portion of today's activities is practically done.  The only items remaining are the ones that must happen at 1:45, 3:00, 3:30, and 6:00... and I can't get those done earlier. 

So many things to talk over and consider ... stop over for a cup of tea and let's get caught up!