Before Retreat and After Retreat – I’m a very different person each year based on where I am regarding the Men’s Spring Knitting Retreat.

Last Blog Post BR

Everything is ready…in fact, more ready than it’s ever been in prior years.

We have 46 guys registered to attend the retreat and additionally, we have two guys participating as “unofficial” attendees.  Eight of the guys have never been to a Men’s Knitting Retreat before and three of the guys will be learning to knit (yes, we recruit!).

For the new guys, we like to have a full box of yarns they can pick from and start their stash.  So any time I find a yarn sale throughout the year (BR), I pick ups what I think might be useful.  Having realized I needed a few more balls of yarn for the niece blanket (below), I went back to “Knit” in Newtown, PA where I got the original yarn, and three wonderful things happened:

1. The yarn I’m using was on sale for 50% off…since I really love this yarn, I bought 10 more balls.
2. They had two big boxes of $1 yarns – some of them quite beautiful – I bought 25 balls of various yarns.
3. Linda, the yarn store owner, surprised me by donating two bags of yarn (Euro Baby Maypole yarn) for the guys!

I’m still always amazed at the generosity of folks.

Stay tuned for regular blog entries next week with lots of photos from the retreat center, the guys who come to knit and the projects they’re working on.

Current Knitting

Blankets, blankets, blankets…well, actually only blanket, blanket…but you get the idea.

I’ve made a little bit of progress on the niece blanket.  I really love the pattern for this blanket and will most like publish it.  I love that it’s  fully reversible, including the cable in the center panel (which you can’t see in the photo.

I also finished binding off 415 stitches on the kid alpaca blanket (using the sewn bind-off)…it took FOREVER…and the sewn bind-off unplied this yarn, so I had to constantly work to get the twist back in the bind-off yarn.

It looks like the final measurements will be about 72″ x 60″, which is a great size.  Now I just have to knit up miles of edging to sew onto the other three sides.