The Sweatshop of Love Blog

It’s not like I’ve been talking about it constantly for the past month or anything, but TODAY PT and I are off to SPAIN! SPAIN! hehehe

First up? A Megabus trip from Minneapolis to Chicago, where flights to Spain were much cheaper. We’ll be hanging out with Chicago friends for the evening then leaving for Spain from Ohare tomorrow afternoon. We’ll be spending two nights in Madrid before traveling north to spend next week with my friend Kirsten, who is spending the entire winter in Spain.

Next Friday we’re headed back to Chicago. And from there I’m headed to Michigan for a week with my family before heading back to Minneapolis on the 8th.

Got all that? Me either. All I know is that is a LOT of traveling! Like 50 hours of traveling over the course of 15 days means a ton of knitting time. Excited doesn’t even begin to describe it!

So I’ll be pretty MIA until March 9th. I’ve got blog posts scheduled, and I’ll be keeping up with the KAL instructions, and even blogging like mad over at Holla Knits! And you can be sure to be knocked in the face with pictures of Spain when I’m back.

Take care of yourselves, and I can’t wait to catch up with you in two weeks!

Every time a new year starts I’m always convinced I’m talking about a year in the far far far future. 2012? How can that be now? My head might forever live in the 90s. It’s 1997, right? I can’t really deal with the fact that we live in 2012! Somewhere George Orwell’s brain is exploding.

But we aren’t here to talk about the future. We are here to talk about 2011, a year that seriously rocked out.

Lake of the Isles

I moved to Minneapolis in Dec, 2010, so I spent the winter of 2011 falling in love with living in a frozen tundra.

Baby Nolan in Minneapolis

My nephew Baby Nolan and family came to Minneapolis from Michigan to check it out.

Renegade Craft Fair Brooklyn

PT and I went on a road trip to New York City where I was in Renegade Craft Fair Brooklyn. We drove around the east coast for a while, visiting friends and eating a million bagels.

Baby Ryenn

Our family welcomed another member! Baby Ryenn joined her brother Baby Nolan in my brother Adam’s growing family.

Minnesota State Fair

I was back in Minneapolis for the summer, enjoying the Minnesota State Fair along the way. After spending the fall working in Chicago, I was ready for a long break in Michigan for the holidays!

Baby Ryenn Getting Big!

So much like 2010, in 2011 I traveled a ton, knit a ton, and grew my business. It was my most successful year yet! And just like at the end of 2010, I’m feeling so lucky to be leading the life I am. The Sweatshop is more popular than ever, and I’m happy and healthy. I get to design, teach, and talk about knitting all day every day, and that is all that this girl can ask for.

2012 is shaping up to be my best year yet! Holla Knits is launching in April, I’ve got a TON of travel already scheduled (SPAIN! NYC! BOSTON! maybe even INDIA!), and I may or may not have a book in the works.

Life is pretty damn good over here, y’all, and I have all of you to thank. I couldn’t do it without you, my friends (both in life and online) and family. I wish you all the same.

I headed up from Chicago to Michigan last Monday with nothing on my to do list but knitting, snuggling babies, watching football, and eating for a week, and that is exactly what I did.

Baby Ryenn

My new niece Baby Ryenn is getting cuter by the second. She was pretty damn cute when she was born in July, but LOOK AT THAT FACE!

Baby Nolan!

And speaking of faces you just want to kiss off, Baby Nolan is too cute for words, too. And he is all running around and feeding himself! And he finally has hair! It’s a Thanksgiving miracle!

TINY SWEATERS!

Since those babies were born, knitting time in Michigan has severely diminished, but I did get a head start on my Snow Day projects! I saw this pattern in the Knit Picks catalog and just had to have it, so I ordered the entire kit. All NINE skeins of  Palette and the pattern. The Snow Day pattern is full of adorable tiny projects that need to be on my Christmas tree, and they could not be more fun to make. Six sweaters, a penguin, a sled, a felted gingerbread man, tree lights, and a string of popcorn. Three down, eight to go!

Short Row Sweater Progress... ?

And it’s hard to tell what the hell is going on with my Short Row Sweater, but progress is being made! I ran into problems with the stitch counts after separating for my sleeves, so if you are working this pattern just ignore them. The instructions for what you are doing is right despite the stitch counts being wrong. I wrote more specifically about what is wrong on my ravelry project page.

Oh! I almost forgot!

Winner!

A huge thank you to everyone that entered my Wool and the Gang Snood Dogg knit kit giveaway last week! The lucky winner is Lily of The Owl and The Bee! This makes me even more jealous because now I’ll have to see it all the time! You lucky bitch!

I’m in and out of Chicago this week. I got back into town yesterday and I’m Megabus-ing to Minneapolis Thursday for No Coast Craft-o-Rama this weekend. It’s going to be a crazy couple of weeks over here!

And just like that it’s October. I’m late with this revelation, too, because I’ve been caught up in postseason baseball, spending the first part of the week in Detroit watching the Tigers split their home games against the Yankees, and then scrambling to catching up.

TIGERS!

So I have not been doing very much knitting. Lots of fighting about baseball, reading about baseball, freaking out about baseball. Baseball!

Yoda Hat

I’d give anything to blow off my work this afternoon and work on the one project I’ve got on my needles right now: FELTED YODA HAT!

When Finished...

My nephew Baby Nolan is going to rock this Yoda Hat for Halloween this year, which means only one thing for my new baby niece Ryenn!

Princess Leia Hair!

Yoda and Princess Leia? It doesn’t get much cuter than that, does it? Hopefully I’ll have Yoda’s ears and Leia’s hair finished soon so I can get them in the mail to my sister in law Emily (who is now on twitter AND etsy, by the way) very soon.

I’m still trying to figure out what I’m going to do for my own costume. With Waldo and a Cupcake off the market, I’m coming up short in the idea department. Any suggestions?!

And then, magically, my summer in Minneapolis was over. It hardly feels like three months ago that I got here, and here I’m already packing up to leave. But before I head back to Chicago Friday, we knew we had to have the weekend to end all weekends. And we surely did, starting Friday with a trip to Target Field.

WAAAAAAAAY Up THERE!

See those people WAY up at the top there? That is where we usually sit. But Friday? Ohh no! Friday PT got CHAMPIONS CLUB tickets for the game, which meant that we got all you can eat and drink free food, and our view for the game was this:

WHOA!

I was so happy during this game tears were shed. The food was amazing, getting to drink all I wanted to was amazing, not waiting in line to pee was amazing! But the baseball. It was RIGHT THERE! It was almost scary how close we were.

Ohh HOLLA!

And then there was the fair. This is me, trying to eat a deep fried Reeses Peanut Butter Cup covered in powdered sugar. Because there isn’t enough sugar on the inside of that thing that it needed more. And yeah. It was good. Because EVERYTHING IS AMAZING AT THE FAIR!

Beer on a Stick!

This is my third Minnesota State Fair, and I think ever time gets better. It’s Tuesday and I’m still recovering from this trip. It’s just that glorious.

Bunny!

I love that I take the same pictures every year. In 2009 it was food, bunnies, crop art, and baby sheep. In 2010 it was food, baby sheep, and crop art.

Baby Sheep!

This year is shaping up to be food, bunnies, baby sheep, and crop art again!

Crop Art!

And, of course, the underwhelming shots of knitting.

Knitting, Just Hanging Around

We were at the fair for 11 hours, so it’s really no wonder that I’m still recovering. I could barely walk yesterday! I’m already excited for next year.

And I’m already excited to come back to Minneapolis! I kinda love this place. I’m Chicago bound Friday, which means I’m frantically packing up my life and finishing all my unfinished projects before I’ll be away from them. Why does leaving always sneak up on me?!

But we went out with a bang, Minnesota. And those 5 deep fried pounds around my middle will be with me for a long time.