My life seems to be surrounded by pink lately.  I'm not so sure why, but I do think that my affection for the color has something to do with it.  My 3-year-old's affection for the color probably also has something to do with it (like daughter, like mother, right?).  Also, as my MIL pointed out, "Pink is very in these days." 

Because on Sunday I ran in a Pink Race ...

... with Ms. Pink socks, Pink Hair (myself), and someone who will forever more be known as "Pink Lightning."  It was an awesome experience.  Libby, me and Cathi (photos courtesy of Cathi), ran and we had an awesome time.  Beyond the fun female early morning bonding, it was an amazing experience to be surrounded by 76,000 people all going towards a single goal (okay, not all at the same time, but still) ...

... running down the off-ramps off the Interstates in Denver ...

... I mean, how often do you get to zoom through people on the interstates while running??

We have big plans for next year ... if a certain someone who dreams of sheep in the city wants to come up with a neat design of tennis shoes and a ball of yarn or something like that (we'd like to commission you, Stacey!), then we are thinking of putting a "Knitters for the Cure" t-shirt on cafepress.com, with profits going to the Race for the Cure, and that way we can form our own little pink-wig-clad-pink-babydoll-t-shirt-wearing-teams ... wouldn't that be great?? 

And the pink yarn?  I've been spinning away.  That is, while not engaging in extreme bouts of startitis which I'll have to fill you in on tomorrow. 

So ... I mentioned earlier that I learned to spin last Saturday. 

It is indeed addictive.  If you have an addictive personality like me, don't learn this particular little aspect of our hobby.  There are all sorts of zen-like qualities to spinning that I'll get into one of these days.

But once I spun up this two-ply ball of yarn, already getting into the newbie stash that I'm supposed to be sharing with other MHC Knitters*, I needed more...

Does any one at all out there in blogland remember that I joined Stephanie's Thrum-along last fall?  I actually get a number of hits from her site every week, from people who are supposedly browsing around for thrummed mittens.  Well, I made the mittens** using mohair locks rather than sheep roving because I just couldn't resist how soft they were in their natural state.  Having bought 2 oz. of mohair locks for the mittens, and having used well under one ounce for the project, the mohair locks have been sitting in a dark corner of my closet for almost a year now.

So, what's a newborn spinner to do? How about: Show the mohair locks the light of day!

And so they've now been spun up ...

I honestly don't know what I'll do with this yarn, as it seems a pretty bulky gauge, but I'm thinking that it'd make the nicest trim on a pair of mittens for Lia, and perhaps the ends of a little matching scarf, and perhaps even a little trim on a hat.  We'll see if any of those projects come to fruition before the weather gets very cold here at the altitude of 5440.***

But as I was spinning them I did have the foresight to think:  What am I going to spin once I finish this little ball of fluffy heaven?  Being the planner, and the eBay addict, what else did I do but get on the internet and start hunting up some fiber bargains.

It seems that a basic wool costs just about at or slightly over $1.00/oz. -- is that correct, you fiberphiles out there? 

HERE COMES THE BARGAIN ...

Because this is what I scored from Oregon Trail Yarns on eBay:

Yes, 15 oz. of yummy superwash wool fiber, called "Soft Pink", which looks suspiciously like my favorite pink shade of yarn in the world, "Victorian Pink" in Lamb's Pride.  I paid just over $1.00 per ounce, which is about the same price as a local yarn store's roving, but without the hassle of bringing my children in with me while I fondle fiber.  However, as soon as I finish up this mass-o-fiber, I'm going to stop by Shuttles to pick up some various colors and try to spin up some homemade Noro Kureyon.

(That's the real reason for learning to spin.  You knew that, didn't you, me being such a Noro addict?) 

The eBay store has lots and lots of deals, including some nice deals on Lamb's Pride Worsted/Bulky on cones ... the prices seem somewhat competitive, for those of you felting hos and lamb's pride fans out there.

So, as of this moment, this is what I have spun up:

Skein 1: The mohair locks, coming in at 1.4 oz.
Skein 2: My first attempt at the pink.  1.2 oz.
Skein 3: The more recent attempt (getting a little better, I think!) 2.5 oz.

And there's more on my spindle.  If I can get gauge, I'd really love to make this project ... but my gauge may be off a little.  And my gauge may change throughout the project. (The only thing keeping me from winding up those pink skeins and trying them out.)  I may try the pattern anyways, rewriting it for about 4 sts/1".  We'll see about that.  And it's not like I don't have a wig to finish this weekend anyways...


*But don't worry, Talissa and Amy -- I still have some left for you.

**And what ever happened to those mittens?  Within a week of finishing the second mitten ... I was using them while driving, and I dropped one of them outside my car, never to be found again. (sniff.)  The mohair locks, while a novel idea, really didn't work out too well anyhow as they were pretty slippery.  Next time I'll use real wool.

***See, now that I'm not stuck knitting at 5337 any more, I can say my true altitude.

So you're probably heard of Race for the Cure.  Cathi, Libby and I are going to run the race on Sunday, October 2, here in Denver.  Now for my clever segue to knitting content ...

Progress-as-a-photo-essay ...  (This means I'm a little too busy to ramble on like I normally do)

So ... besides searching for yarn bargains (that's self evident) ... what have I been up to?

1.  The Second Annual Boulder Knit-Out was this last Saturday!

We had a wonderful, wonderful event.  Hanging out behind the Boulder Farmer's Market, next to some fun Reggae Rasta music, and a lot of great knitters and new people learning ... it doesn't get much better than that.  Many, many local yarn stores donated scores of yarn for the event, as well as piles of needles.  Whole Foods came through with enormous fruit and pastry platters.  The Boulder Hand Knitting Guild hosted the event, and if anybody out there is reading this and in the Boulder area, go march on over and sign up for our group if you'd like.  We're fairly low-key and fun, we've been known to carry crackers, cheese and wine to our get-togethers, and while some of us have made some great progress on our Level 1 TKGA master knitter's certificate ... some of us*  haven't.  We don't bite.  Our famous leader, and last year's president, is Tara Jon Manning, and we also have the famous Kristen and Michaele (on hiatus while in Utah this year).  Outside of blogland, we have a number of amazing knitters in the group, some who have recently joined, and I treasure knowing every one of them.  We generally meet one evening a month ... sometimes the first Monday, sometimes the first Wednesday ... join up and you'll know the details.  

More photos**...

(Left to right: Carla, Wanda, Cynthia, and Ashley[?])

The amazingly talented Amanda B. (who really should have a blog of her own) recently quit her engineering job and now works at a dream job in Loveland, CO, at Interweave Press --and in particular for Spin-Off.  She brought 25 drop-spindle kits with fiber and instructions, and taught us to drop spin!  The amazingly talented Kristi (a.k.a. Knitting Fool) was there, as well, helping us to figure out what was going on.  I'm hooked.  I have a few extra kits ... so if any of you MHC Knitters couldn't make it to the event, but would like a drop spindle and fiber, please let me know so that I can save some of it for you. (I'm now not to be trusted with fiber as well as yarn in my house.)  Meanwhile, I'm trying to figure out how I can score some more fiber now, so that I can once again self-hypnotize myself in my spinning efforts.  [EDIT:  I scored some ... updates on this week's Fridays are for Bargains special.] 

My first real efforts towards spinning a Z twist, and then plying them together with an S twist: