Dawn Brocco's Life and Design Blog

Maus asked for more hollyhock photos for this year, so here's the first of the season:





The bed walls are either 10" or 12", to give an idea of plant height so far - hubby and I both forget what size wood it is - I'm thinking 10".

We came back from hubby's visit to the pain management center to find bills delivered from the PO - blech - but the UPS box I was expecting from Webs - yay!



Just the pink and yellow Eco+ (4 hanks pink, 1 yellow) and the Tahki Donegal Tweed (7 hanks) are from this order. The bright blue Eco+ hank was a previous order, but altogether, this represents the yarn for next 3 designs in the queue, after the cashmere baby sweater design, which is almost done. I'll be washing the Donegal before knitting with it, just as with any millspun yarn, it can use a softening up before spending all that time knitting with it.

I *was* planning on a new design for the Donegal Tweed, BUT it gets the 4.25 st and 6.5 row gauge I need for the 2nd sample of the fitted cable raglan pullover I knit for my daughter this past Christmas.

As the first sample was done in Peace Fleece, I *was* looking for a softer yarn for the 2nd sample, BUT, the Donegal gets the gauge so perfectly so far (I haven't swatched in cable pattern yet, just St st), that I MAY just use this yarn. My cashmere yarn wants 4.5, not 4.25 sts/1" and tho Karabella's Magrite Bulky would probably do nicely enough, the cost would sink me.

I'm reswatching Beaverslide's new lot of Thimbleberry worsted wt., with the 10% kid mohair. Naturally has a new yarn called Harmony, a felted merino wool, feels nice - Fiber Trends sent me their yarn binder - but it's just in natural sheepy colors, and I'd need to swatch with the 8 ply doubled, as it's just in 8 and 10 ply - not a bad thing, but I had my heart set on a rich red. I don't need to decide yet - other projects have jumped the queue.

Work awaits. Onward.