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It's Knit Along Time at Elliebelly.  Adventurous April starts on April 15 and (mercifully) doesn't have a deadline.  You can knit with any yarn that you like — those with Elliebelly still in their stash, me included, are planning on using it, but any yarn is fine.  We've chosen four patterns to focus on, but there is also a catchall "Knit All The Things" category for those who want to knit other patterns but hang out for the camaraderie.

The pattern choices are:

• Citron - a shawlette
• Abalone - a seamless, short sleeved cardigan
• Lente - an easy cowl that can be knit in any weight
• Antler - a cute little baby cardigan that is a perfect first cables project

Please come and join us!  Anyone is welcome.  You can find the Elliebelly Group on Ravelry here (if you aren't a Ravelry member, it's a free, easy sign up and a must for knitters).  There is a sticky post with the rules here and you can find some background on Adventurous April here and here.

Everyone needs a knitting adventure now and then.  Come and knit.  Make new friends and drool over the prizes.  And even though there isn't a deadline for finishing your project(s), you're sure to walk away with something you will love.

Here is the progress on my Fuego Hat (I can't figure out how to embed the link while posting from the phone, but it's here: http://www.ravelry.com/projects/elliebelly/fuego-hat ). This is a great knit for expanding your horizons, from learning the über-stretchy German cast on to making the rib pop by knitting through the back loop.

We’re missing the nighttime routine of knitting in front of the Olympic Games in my house. We aren’t big TV viewers, so two weeks of non-stop winter sports was a real change for us and a lot of fun.

But I am managing to rebound and rebuild my knitting mojo.  I'm  finding new knitting inspiration from Malabrigo March.

Malabrigo is one of my favorite yarn brands, as you can see from my stash (this is actually my Malabrigo yarn stash before I discovered at least 20, um, several, new projects I wanted to knit and didn’t have the right yarn for, but who’s checking?) 

Every year, a group of knitters who adore Malabrigo get together and knit.  They plan knitalongs, discuss patterns, and even have prizes, supplied by the company.  This is the first year I've stumbled across "MalMarch" and I'm excited beyond words.  In addition to finding some great projects and expanding the types of Malabrigo in my stash, there are a lot of nice knitters playing with Malabrigo out there!

Because this event is more about planning projects/casting on/getting started than it is a race to the finish line, it’s just my speed. I have a busy month, but I’m using this as an opportunity to get projects started and far enough along that I can easily pick them up and take them on my travels.

I’ve been busy swatching — doing it right with the whole big, blocked, swatched thing. This is my favorite one. The colorway is called Pocion.

Malabrigo's Rasta has been  a long time favorite yarn for me, and I am knitting a couple of projects with it for MalMarch, notably this hat and this cowl.  My two most enterprising projects are the Modern Garden Sweater (I'm very grateful to Harry for his help in swatching) and the Underwater Garden Shawl, which I'm knitting in another long time favorite yarn, Malabrigo's Silky Merino in a pale green.

In addition, I'm planning to cast on several more projects over the first week of March:

• Fuego Hat in Worsted
• Douglas Fir Hat in Worsted
• Metallurgy Cowl in Silky Merino
• Amy March's Slippers in Mecha

We'll see how it goes from there, but I'm hoping to get a number of projects started to carry me through the next few months, while continuing to work on some of my long term projects.  And I've deliberately chosen projects that require me to learn new skills along the way.

So what are you doing after the Olympics to keep your knitting mojo going?  I would love to hear from you!

For what ever reason, in part because I like using DPNs but also because I can be something of a slacker about exploring new techniques, I have managed to avoid learning how to knit using magic loop up until now.

I was doing some cleanup in my studio this weekend and rediscovered Bev Galeskas’ booklet explaining how to use magic loop. Magic Loop lets you use a 40 inch circular needle, to completely avoid the need to have a variety of circular sizes and the need for DPNs when the knitting gets too small for the circumference of your circular.

The Bella Mitten pattern, which I wanted to start work on this week, is written using Magic Loop. When I first noticed this in the pattern, I decided I would avoid learning the new technique and just use my trusty DPNs. But finding Bev’s pamphlet in my knitting materials seemed like too much serendipity to put off learning Magic Loop any longer.

The bottom line is this: I wonder why I went so far out of my way to avoid learning how to Magic Loop. The pamphlet is clear. The technique is easy. And the results are really nice. It took about five minutes to master the process using the easy-to-follow drawings and directions.

I’m swatching the mittens’ cable pattern to get used to Magic Loop and preparing to knit the mittens. If you’ve been putting this off, delay no longer. You’ll be happy you invested the time in figuring out this simple but very approach to knitting in the round.

I love knitting Jared Flood’s patterns. The Bray Hat is no exception. Knit in four sections of 30 stitches each, the hat features a 12 step central cable flanked by columns of lace and smaller cables on each outer edge.

This pattern makes me feel like I am knitting beyond my capabilities and it’s because of the clear directions and internal logic of the pattern.

Things have been a little bit busy around here lately. My Mom has moved cross country and has a cute little cottage in our neighborhood that we've been working on (you can see it here), so the move has taken up a lot of my attention. A little knitting eye candy up above — I hope to be back to knitting and dyeing within the next few weeks. Happy new year!