Love is in the air

Happy Valentine's Day, all. Hope everyone is enjoying some delicious chocolate and a snuggle with a loved one (be it human, canine or feline).

Just a quick glance at the hat I knit up for the Hogwarts Sock Kit Swap dueling club . . .

Wait, wait, wait--who shot who in a what now? Well, photo first, and then some details.

Yes, perhaps the HSKS has come out of left field--I don't think I've really mentioned it, and I know when I started blogging I commented on not really understanding all of the Harry Potter hype. I've since read the books and found them enjoyable (though I'm certainly not one of the series' more, um, exuberant fans), and I thought a theme swap would be fun--it's kinda nice to pretend you live in a fantasy land for a few minutes every day.

This is a fairly involved swap, with a lot going on other than swapping. One of those activities is dueling, which is akin to a much smaller scale version of sock wars or hat attack. Pattern requirements are posted a few days in advance, and once the pattern is posted, you knit knit knit as fast as you can and get that sucker in the mail. I am dueling a fellow Hogwarts student, and whoever receives the hat first LOSES.

I have a feeling I'm going to be killed off rather quickly--I knit a few rows during lunch yesterday, a few more on my commute, and then finished up on a rockin' Friday night--but here's hoping my dueling buddy's owl flies a bit slower. This hat went off to the post office first thing this morning (nothing like waking up on a lazy Saturday and dashing off to the post office to mail a hat to complete stranger and pray that it gets to her before hers gets to you!).

In other news, I wore my Two to Tangle cardi to the office yesterday. I'm still pretty happy with the fit and so far a day's worth of wear hasn't led to any sagging or stretching, but I have decided the sleeves are too wide at the cuffs. Nothing really to do about it now, and probably good for when I'm wearing a buttondown underneath (just a cami yesterday, because it was still relatively and oddly warm) anyway.

Some relatively steady progress on my other projects, only slightly interrupted to take care of this hat duel nonsense. For reasons unknown to me, I decided to take on the Vest-uary challenge (the Wicked Rib Eyelet Vest was next in my queue, but that's really no justification for inexplicably deciding I could knit it in a month--and the shortest month, at that!). Here's my progress on the back:

Not too shabby, and it's going pretty quickly.

Also plugging away on the first set of socks from my personal sock club:

I was also working on the Knotty Gloves, but I've decided to put them to rest. I jacked up the cable trying to knit on the subway, and need to rip back, and by the time they're done, I'm sure it will be May. So I'll pull them out again in late summer to get ready for fall.

I really need to cast on for my friend's wedding shawl ASAP if I hope to have it finished before she gets married. I've picked the Print O' the Wave Stole, and have decided to temporarily forget that I don't really know how to knit lace. We'll see what happens!