Knighthood

I'm officially a prince and a knight, as the above envelope clearly indicates. It's good to be me...

It's a beautiful Sunday morning and, although I secretly resent Sundays simply because they're the end of the weekend, I find them to be wonderfully suited for certain things like napping, knitting and enjoying an entire pot of coffee. Yes, milk and sugar, please. Thanks!

I'm about a week overdue in properly expressing my thanks and gratitude to one of my favorite intrawebs knit buds, Peter, who sent me a fantastic care package! As a dude on a yarn diet for the past ten months, I was understandably twice as excited when I opened it up and found all the goodies inside!


The main reason for the package was to return to me the grey Icelandic top there in the back. For those not in the know, it's essentially a bag of unspun wool, acquired a couple years ago when I thought I would spin myself oodles of gorgeous yarns using only my trusty drop spindle. In fact, it was Peter himself who inspired me to give it a go. I discovered soon enough, though, that spinning just isn't my bag, baby...so I send the grey fluff to him, hoping he might get more spinning use out of it than I did. Peter, however, has been crazy busy, moving cross-country for school and even taking a jaunt to Bali to study their traditional music. Yeah, he pretty much rocks!

So, though the fluff remained unspun (and probably will into the near future), he did include a collection of seriously yummy treats, including those of the edible variety:

It's a thing with knitters...chocolate. Oh, and cupcakes, too, which seem to have been adopted as the official treat of the knitter world. Personally, I like normal cupcakes with a little frosting on top. Recently, though, cupcakeries have sprouted up all over this fine nation, serving what can only be referred to as mutant bastard cupcakes, sometimes the size of a small child's head, filled with oozing, delicious cremes and fillings, topped with metric ton of icing and sometimes with edible sculptures of chocolate, spun sugar and other craziness.

But, I digress. Though the chocolate will be thoroughly and sensually enjoyed, I assure you, the real excitement comes from the other stuff, mainly new yarn! Starting off, we have a beautiful, shadowy hank of the oft-coveted Malabrigo worsted, containing deep hues of blue, green and a bit of brown. It's a popular yarn, a little on the pricey side, but knits up like spun butter, so very smooth. Yum...but what I'm most excited about is this one:

It's a hank of hand-spun done by Peter himself. Seriously, I love this...from the colors to the plying of the various strands. Peter, seriously, you know how to spin some serious fiber, my friend. This makes the third hank I've been fortunate to receive and really, in my opinion, from one knitter to another, a hank of expertly rendered hand-spun is one of the most thoughtful and meaningful gifts. I know how much time is involved in its creation...thank you, Peter, so very much. In other news, 'Ber's Baby Blanket is officially on the needles and speeding ahead! I'm almost ready to add in the first garter ridge of accent...which I'm dying to do if only for the little variety it will give me.

On the upside of repetition: this blanket is great movie/tv knitting! Yes, copious amount of the same, smallish repeat but I've made it through a third of the second season of "Buffy: The Vampire Slayer." No, I'm not kidding...it's like seeing an old friend all over again. Plus, being able to stream it through Netflix and my PS3...nothing short of the single most revolutionary development for homebodies and nesters everywhere. Seriously...it's the solution to over-priced cable and satelite services.

Now, if you'll excuse me...I have a pot of coffee, a bag of chocolates and a baby blanket to work on.