Pretty Yarn and Silly Yarn

I was back at work today after my awesome 4-day weekend. I really enjoyed the whole thing, but after lazy napping whenever I wanted and the DST change, going back was tiring. Still, I had a day where I actually figured things out and had challenges, which was fun.

I decided to head up to Mary Maxim on my way home to see if I could find more of the sock yarn I was using. They were sadly all out, though. They had a different colour, so I grabbed it. The pinks in the two yarns are the same, so I'm going for totally silly socks and doing the heels in the opposing colours.
Who knows how they'll turn out, but it should be fun! They do look somewhat clown like anyway, in a way I like. The entrelac is fun- sort of a mini-tunisian crochet thing, but it's fairly slow going. Well, you do so much at once that it really isn't, but it seems like it.


While I was at the yarn store, I decided to grab some skeins that called my name last time I was there. I felt this yarn before and it was so soft and gorgeous, but out of my budget. Since I've had a bit of extra money, I decided now was the perfect time to grab some. Of course, the question was, what colour and what do I make?

I really wanted to make something that would touch skin. This yarn is too soft to be a hat- I was thinking more cowl or gloves. Then I saw this gorgeous ruby colour and decided that it would be perfect as a little shrug over some of my summer dresses.

The yarn is Diamond Yarn Mulberry & Merino- 50% merino, 50% mulberry silk. Yummm! It's staining the bamboo hook I got with it a little bit, but it's gorgeous. I can't get mad at it! And my very first all bamboo hook is working perfectly with it. The grippyness of the hook is good with the soft slipperyness of the silk.
I'm working it in a simple open pattern to get as much as I can out of the yarn. They only had 3 skeins- and that was about my budget limit, too. That's less than 300 yards, so simple and open it is!

I'm planning on a ribbed border around the front and sleeves. We'll see how much yarn I have for that! I'm almost through the first skein and have almost finished the back, so I'm thinking I'll have a nice bit of ribbed band. This is one time where I wish I could work scblo ribbing like you work knitted ribbing, so I could just keep going 'til I ran out of yarn! Still, it'll look good.

I came home to find that my Paton's order had arrived. Sort of. I got this big but not very long box and was kinda confused. No way could blocking wires fit in that, right? Yup, no blocking wires. Just a big old box with lots of packaging... and one tiny little booklet. It's beautiful, but where are my blocking wires? I've emailed them so hopefully I will soon know.

Maybe they had to send them separately- after all, they sent this part in a giant box when a little bubble mailer would have done, so maybe they're sending the blocking wires in a refrigerator box.