Stash Enhancement and FOs

These goodies were the spoils of my one-stop LYS yarn crawl yesterday.

There's some Noro Silk Garden Sock (I hope I will like working on it since it's not the dreaded Kureyon) The yarn in the back is for my partner in a Ravelry exchange, she likes natural colors, and Araucania yarn. It's Ranco multi, and more mixed than in the photo. The Rowan cottons are destined to become super cute beach hats, and hopefully won't suck the life out of my finger tips. Now I just have to figure out the pattern to work it in the round. I'm not a fan of seaming.

*Speaking of seaming...Dianne and I were discussing on the drive up how some yarn shops offer finishing services, to seam up a sweater or what have you. One of Wooly's sales people was finishing someone's sweater as she manned the sidewalk sale table as a matter of fact. I hate to seam, but I am not sure I'd go as far as to have someone else finish it for me. I've never even done a pattern that requires a lot of seaming, so I have no reference. Thoughts, anyone?

The Noro Silk Garden Sock does look like 2 diffent yarns the way they're skeined, don't they? But they are the same. I love those "me" colors, and until I find a perfect pattern for them they will rest in the stash bin.

And now for some things I've finished recently, to prove I really do knit, and not just buy yarn. The first is a "so you think you can hat" (Ravelry link) based on a hat worn by Mia Michaels during one of the audition segments on SYTYCD. I loved that hat and really appreciated the girl who worked it up into a pattern for us. This one went to Sublynnminal Healing as my contribution for July, but I want to make another for me sometime. I used Filatura Di Crosa "Zara" 100% merino, and I love that yarn. It's so sproingy? The hat is meant to be slouchy, and it really is cute.

When we were in Tucson, Tamar and I visted a LYS there, and she asked me to knit her this shoulder scarf. She bought the yarn, and after we got home, I had some issues with the yarn suggested by the sales girl and the pattern. (which you can read about on my Ravelry project page if you're interested) but let's just say it worked out fine in the end, even though it cost me some $$$ and angst to complete the scarf. I used Schaefer Heather, and loved the feel of the finished scarf after blocking, it's so soft. I'd use Heather again if no one offers to buy it from my destash.

There are more projects on the needles, so I better publish this and get to at least one of them.