wip: orchid wrap

the slump is officially over. all it took was a new technique and this super cute, super easy capelet pattern. found four skeins of misti alpaca chunky in my stash. these two colors are more harlequinnish than i'd envisioned for this piece, but hell...they were just lying there, totally bored, in my stash. they seem much happier co-habitating in light-as-a-feather entrelac. and entrelac! where have you been all my life! my new better-than-chocolate BFF. at least until lent is over.

thanks to knitlit friend pascale, who points out that palace blue and slate grey are two of color arbiter pantone's top picks for spring '09.



according to pantone, "bright colors return to the top 10 list for spring ’09, as designers incorporate vibrant pops into their collections, yet temper the vibrancy with deeper, translucent or neutral tones." a good tip when combining colors for this chic and springy capelet.

slumpbuster?

the capelet seems like the perfect spring accessory. and this entrelac version by cecily glowik mcdonald from the spring knitscene may be just the piece to lift me out of my knitting slump. perhaps a white-on-white version?

cooper's flock

knitting draws us closer in the most extraordinary ways. four years ago, i became friends with lucinda, the owner of a charming little yarn shop in my neighborhood. fast forward a few short years. the yarn shop closed, lucinda married a wonderful guy named jamie, and the two of them had a beautiful baby boy named cooper. after a very short time on this earth, mini cooper's heart gave out.

somehow, a mere three months later, lucinda and jamie's hearts are going on. lucinda began to share her grief through a series of carepage postings which turned into a beautiful and simple idea. an idea to pay tribute to little cooper, whom they lovingly called "birdy" because of a little cooing sound he used to make. it is an idea that has already begun to help heal lucinda and jamie's broken hearts.

it's called cooper's flock. lucinda is hoping to knit 100 birds that will be placed on a special tree during cooper's memorial service. after that, they will be donated to the pediatric intensive care unit of a local hospital. there, each little birdy will be a symbol of cooper himself, watching over each tiny struggling life.

you can read more about lucinda and cooper's flock here. and if you like, you can even download a birdy pattern to knit yourself. in the process, you will help to ease a fellow knitter's pain, one stitch at a time.