Poison Ivy Blues

Great beginnings met with a large brick wall this week when I encountered my first case of poison ivy! I have been off the bike and miss it terribly! August 11 was my last day for riding and I had accumulated 252.5 miles!! Then I started itching everywhere. My need to keep the body cool overtook the incessant desire to put more miles on the tally. Fortunately for me the weather has changed a bit and we are enjoying some lovely cool nights here in the mountains. The plan is to wake up one day (VERY SOON) and feel 100% again.

So with the down time from biking I have moved away from sock knitting. (I found it to be the easiest to manage while the legs are going at 19 mph.) I completed my Swallowtail Shawl from Knitting Daily (this was a free download but is not currently available). Now there are two beautiful and completed shawls in my to-be-blocked pile. Perhaps I will get to that this afternoon. I am also close to complete with all the pieces of my Henley Perfected. The goal here is to get as many projects off the needles as possible before starting something new. Unfortunately the closer I am to completing anything the harder I have to fight the urge to start something new! In my mind I have cast on a new cardi , the Flutter Sleeve, multiple socks for the Winter Holiday Gift Giving Season, 2 more shawls, a lace scarf, Sweater Girl Pullover for Kam, 3 other marvelous pullovers for me, and the fabulous Winter Twilight Mitts. The real challenge here is when I can cast on which one do I choose? It really does make sense to get some of those gift things going but I have a lovely russet red alpaca lace weight I dyed to make the Sweater Girl and really though the mitts are beautiful and alluring I have not done any stranded knitting as yet. I believe I have time to think on this dilemma and I could always put the names of the projects in a hat, pull one out, and let the yarn fly!