Oooooh crap!

A few years ago I started knitting, I was fresh out of university, working as a volunteer and consequently very poor but quite rich in spare time.  Since then I have got better and better jobs and can afford much nicer yarn and crafty things but have way, way less time to spend on hobbies.  Consequently I try not to acquire new hobbies and spread that time any more thinly.  Obviously buying a sewing machine and taking up sewing was a bit of a bump in the road, but I do enjoy it and the results are quicker than knitting so if I need a bit of (almost) instant gratification the sewing machine is there.  Soooo, having resisted any urge towards weaving, foraying only sporadically into cross stitch and refusing to even read about/acknowledge the existence of spinning, I've been doing well.  Except now I really really want to try dying my own yarn.  I've spent the last two days obsessively googling dyeing yarn and reading every thread about it I can find on Ravelry so I suspect this is not a passing fancy and I will probably be back here in a few days showing off my first dyeing disaster!

I have done a wee bit of knitting this week, but not too much.  I cast on for the first cap sleeve of the Cap Sleeved Top, did the ribbing, realised I'd forgotten some decreases and ripped back.  After reading the instructions properly I cast on again, realised the instructions made no sense to me but stuck the decreases in where I felt they made most sense and now I'm ready to finish that sleeve tonight..... when I've stopped stroking my new yarns!

These are 2 skeins of Araucania Ranco I got for making scarves, I'm loving the colours so much that even though I would like to make two scarves for the christmas box, I suspect one of them will 'accidentally' end up with me.  I can't decide which one I like best though.

Also purchased (eBay, I love you!) was 6 balls of Rowan Fine Milk Cotton in a nice lilac shade which are destined to become a Blossom from Kim Hargreaves Misty collection, I'll probably leave this til next Spring though because my thoughts are really turning to autumn/winter knitting now, but more on that tomorrow I think!