Happy Halloween!!!

Remember how proud I was of my Sunflower Tam made with the Noro Kureyon? With the cool colors? My cats ate a hole right in the side of it. Not sure which one but my money is on Chaucer (he's kind of like a goat in cat fur). Not a good Halloween trick, especially since its now freezing outside. Boo.

Current book-in-progress: The Legend of Sleepy Hollow and Other Writings by Washington Irving (a little Halloween reading).
Current knitted item: Still working on that shawl (stitch by stitch) and I can make progress on the first stocking because I got the yarn dyed (Dale of Norway does not make even remotely flesh-colored yarn in the Baby Ull variety), and now I have to make another hat.

Hat done, stockings started. Shawl? Still not done.

Went to see my Grandfather for his birthday. He was 80 years old on Saturday and had a party to celebrate - the best quote of the day was from one of his good friends who said the gathering looked like a geriatric ward (kind of funny, since all my Grandpa's friends are around his age). But I got absolutely nothing done, except to finish The Thirteenth Tale, by Diane Setterfield. I had been wanting to get that finished because the author is going to read on Wednesday.

As far as knitting, I made a hat on Thursday from the Noro I just bought using the Sunflower Tam pattern - based on phyllotaxis - from the book Knitting Nature (and I have enough to make another hat since I think the pattern needs tweaking, but the yarn makes the pattern really interesting). One Christmas stocking is started but I need to dye some yarn before I get to Santa's face (flesh colored yarn is not a commodity apparently).

And I need to write a paper. Sigh. I would rather read and knit.

Current book-in-progress: Rooms of Our Own by Susan Gubar, one-half of the team that wrote The Madwoman in the Attic (a very good book also)
Current knitted item: Torn between the shawl, Christmas stockings and another hat.

Growing 8 stitches per row...

My shawl, which is sooooo pretty, is taking about 20-30 minutes per row since it grows by eight stitches per row. There are now about (140 x 4) + (6 x 2) stitches and I'm on Row 120. The patterned part of the shawl continues until Row 160 and then there is a 12 row garter stitch border. Just think how many stitches that will be. Eeep.

But I also bought more yarn (huzzah for more yarn!). Enough to finish two Christmas stockings for the neices (found some really cool "hairy" yarn for Santa's beard). And since I couldn't leave without something for myself, I bought three skeins of Noro Kureyon in color 164 (green/gold/cream/aqua combo) to make the Sunflower Tam from the book Knitting Nature. Pretty!

Current book-in-progress: Diane Setterfield's The Thirteenth Tale. And some poetry by the Earl of Rochester for a paper (due in 10 days). And Les Liaisons Dangereuses....
Current knitted item: Working on the shawl. Need to cast-on for the stockings. And I'm itching to start the hat.