Lovely trip

Our family trip to Branson and Silver Dollar City was lovely. Here is a Christmas photo of Michael and me. The lad would not pose with us. It was very foggy that day.We got an overload of outlet mall shopping. Our son loves to shop. He sure did not get that gene from his momma! I hate shopping and put it off as long as I can. I only shop when I have to. So when I do, I have tunnel vision. Get in, get the item, get out! The mall does not stay in business because of me. I help the yarn stores out more than the mall.
I got to visit 2 yarn stores while away. I bought yarn at both. I had spied out some yarn in October for another design to go in my twisted sts book, but knew I would be back to Springfield before I had time to start it. It is called Nashua Handknits Creative Focus Worsted. I have a friend who made a cabled wrap in some of it and I loved the way it knitted up for her, so I decided to use it on one of the designs in my twisted sts book. It has a great price and GREAT yardage, 220 yards for less than $10 a skein. It is 75% Wool/25% Alpaca. I bought it in the Brick Red color. Here is a photo of my dishtowel. I finished weaving and hemming them. They really turned out lovely and I am looking forward to keeping dishtowels going on one of my loom all the time. It is great mindless weaving with great results.
I had intended on taking my Ozark Autumn remake with me on this trip, but instead took my In the Pink Autumn version with me. I am on the edging. I worked on it on the way up on Thursday, but then switched to sock knitting for the remaining time gone. That meant that I came home with 4 cases of Second Sock Syndrone. The first sock was some yarn I found at a yarn store in Branson called "Cecilia's Samplers". It is located on the Shepherd of the Hills Blvd. The yarn is called Knitcol trends by Adriafil. I really love the striping effect of this yarn. The second sock is in some Jojoland Worsted weight that I had left over from a cardigan. You know I love Jojoland yarn! The third sock is some of my handpainted. It is what I call "Watermelon Rind" color way. It will be a great funky set of socks. The fourth sock is my "Socks that Rock" yarn. One is finished and the other is almost. It takes longer to knit because it is real sock yarn at a gauge of 8 sts = 1". The other 3 are dk weight and they knit very quickly. I really enjoy knitting socks in dk weight yarn. They knit up quickly and are really cushy, thick and warm on my feet, too. I love the mindless knitting that they give me.
Knitting progress: Mostly the socks above.
Traveling Shawl progress--It has been to Bethlehem, PA; gone to Culloden, WV; and is now on its way to Pawleys Island, SC. Check out our blog here.