What a GREAT Start to the Weekend

This weekend started of with, none other than....

HAPPY HOUR!!!

Several of my friends and I went into D.C. Friday evening. We took the metro down and our first stop was the Chocolate Moose! What a funky store! My friend Naomi loves this place. Talk about eclectic! This store ran gammet from $2 gadgets and gizmos to nice martini glasses *very hard to resist not buying myself a set of 4* for gorgeous jewelry! We had a blast walking around and checking everything out.

Next stop was Hello Cupcake, sounds like a strip joint doesn't it? But in fact, it is just that, a cupcake place. I don't know who comes up with these ideas, but places like these certainly show me that Americans just have money to burn! The cupcakes are $3 EACH!! Sheeeet, for $6 I could have made a dozen at home! But, we all bought cupcakes while we were there. Kathy was the only sane one to buy 1 and just try it. The rest of us crazy gals, we bought either a box of four or six. I knew I was having company Saturday night so I bought a box of six. *Bellview called and they're looking for me* What the hell was I thinking??

Last stop on this crazy train was Happy Hour!! Finally!! Our final destination was just down the street from Hello Cupcake. We went to Cafe Citron for food, drink, music and laughs. My friend Sarah found this place on some "Hot DC" Happy Hour list. Just as we sat down at our table Sarah remembered we were in DC and that the Power Ball Lotto could be purchased in DC. So we started asking our waiter, who was oh so hot!, about Power Ball and if anyone had won and where we might be able to buy some tickets. It was quite amuzing. I'm sure the hot waiter thought we were all nuts when we played the number that corresponded to his name and then we asked his age. Oh if I was just 10 years younger! Of course Sarah said he was the perfect age for me *laugh*

We had pitcher after pitcher of Mojito *hell, no one was driving! We metroed it!* we shared several different appitizers, had great music playing the whole night and laughed it up. It was the perfect start to the weekend!

Saturday was nice and relaxing. I cleaned up a bit since I was having company and then finished knitting my Forest Canopy Shawl. It took me all while to find the right pattern for this skein as there are many colors through out and I wanted to create something that would show off the gorgeous colors without the colors detracting from the pattern. The FCS was the perfect match. This shawl was such a quick knit and with a great yarn. This dyer has a real eye for mixing colors together. This was one of the skeins I received in my first shipment from the club. The dyer's Etsy shop is called Fresh from the Cauldron and the club is the Vampire Sock Club. The shawl only took me 5 days to knit.

I wanted to use as much of the skein as possible. so I just kept repeating the main pattern. As the skein was dwingling down, I would put a lifeline in at the end of the repeats. I put one in after repeast 12 and then 13. This was if had misjudged how far I could go with what's left, I could just rip back to the lifeline and be safe. Turned out I was able to get 14 repeats out of a skein with 440 yarns. It was such a gorgeous day that I was able to take pictures outside when the shawl was dry.


Pattern: Forest Canopy Shawl
Yarn: Fresh from the Cauldron - Silk Sock
Colorway: Debbie Pelt
Needles: KnitPicks Harmony size 8
Modifications: completed 14 repeats of the main pattern and then completed only 4 of the 8 row edging.

Here's a close up of the stitch pattern. Just look at those amazing colors!



Here's what little yarn I had left after binding off.



Saturday night I had my good friends Kozykitty and KnitRedSox over for dinner. We had a blast. KK brought the fixin's for Pomatinis and a broccoli slaw salad, KRS brought roasted red potatoes and I grilled up some T-bone steaks for us all. We drank, we talked and just enjoyed each others company. At one point we started talking about 80's music and before we knew it, it was 1 AM! Now that's what I call a great night! When time just flies by like that.

It's nice to have good friends you can hang with on a long weekend like this!

What a great was to start off a long weekend!!