Knitting and sewing weekend

Well, not so much knitting, but shopping for knitting - that's always fun, right?

First, the sewing. On Saturday my darling husband pushed us forward a tiny notch on our home improvement projects. He hauled out the drill and the curtain rods I bought last month and put them up in the kitchen. So this prompted me to pull out the sheer polyester fabric I bought at G-streets in Rockville, Maryland last summer. The fabric was a bargain at $2.77/yard and there were 7 yards of the 56" wide fabric. I decided I wanted to a do a sort of valance, just a simple rod pocket at the top, one piece along the entire window, with a length of 24 inches. Anything longer and the cats will mistake it for something they can dig their claws into. The drape's only function is to provide some color and texture since there are blinds on the windows already. I calculated the fabric repeat and factored in the width of the two windows and by some miracle I had exactly the amount of fabric I needed for drapes that are 2 1/2 times the width of the window. I've only gotten as far as cutting the panels (cheers for the serrated Ginghers - a perfect scissor for sheer fabrics!). I ran into problems figuring out the best way to join the panels. I'm inexperienced at this, but I think I will serge the panels together, on the advice of my mom. I was going to use a French seam because the fabric frays easily but that makes joining the pattern even trickier since the first seam sewn is not the final one. Plus mom thinks the French seam may be too stiff. I'm concerned about matching the pattern exactly, but mom says it'll be lost in the folds of the drape and not to worry too much. I didn't get any further on the drapes because my husband needed me to help finish the planter box we started last weekend and plant some plants. He was on a roll with the home improvement projects.

I woke Sunday to rain - the first storm of the season. I was glad we'd done the planting the day before. A rainy day seem like a good excuse to do some sewing and knitting but I ended up doing some shopping instead. My husband was called into work so I tagged along and dropped him off at work and then visited a quaint downtown nearby. There was a sidewalk arts and crafts show going on but it was fairly dismal due to the rain. Of the displays that were up, most were covered in sheets of plastic. I browsed the art but was mainly interested in going to Knitter's Studio and not just to get out of the rain. I walked away with some new bamboo needles for my next project (a hat from Sinsation yarn) and this book on knitting socks (you're right, Alison, it's just knitting). It took some restraint but I managed to avoid buying any more yarn. I visited my stash yesterday morning, reclaimed the yarn from the unfinished baby bunting, and fondled the other skeins I purchased for projects long forgotten. There's barely room for my fabric stash - I simply can't afford space for a yarn stash too!

To fuel my current knitting urge, I cracked open Stitch 'N Bitch last night and began reading. It's a fun book so far. I also might sign up for a lesson from Knitter's Studio. Believe it or not, I don't think I've really knitted in the presence of other knitters. I honestly don't know if I'm knitting correctly. Even if I am, I could probably benefit from some help in how I'm holding the needles, throwing the yarn, or how tight or loose I'm knitting. I specifically asked if they could help a lefty knitter and they say one of their instructors can. I hope so.