We had a change of venue to Marsha’s house from Carol’s house because Carol had to put her Big Kitty to sleep.  We are so sorry, Carol.  We’ve all been there and know how strong those ties to our pets are.  RIP, Big Kitty.

It was a cold day with ice and a skiff of snow on the ground, but we met in front of my little gas stove and were warm.  I had to work at Flathead High School but got home in time, barely, but Mary brought treats – a delicious egg-nog spice bundt cake, crunchy toffees and veggies with dip.  Everything was yummy.  Thanks, Mary!  We Castoffs are all about being flexible.

Treats, wine and good friends in front of the fire.

Francy was there and brought several things that Betsy had made. Two felted pumpkins  were snatched up by Leslie.  She displayed them, along with her charms, and with the skinny scarf that she used as a tie.  Very professional, Leslie.   Very metro.

Scarf tie and pumpkin bubas.

Here's another shot of the felted pumpkins that Betsy made.

Francy modeled a crocheted newsboy cap that Betsy made.  We are surrounded with newsboy caps lately.  Betsy, Marylane, Linda and Mary have all made, or are making them.  Cute.  Timely.  Makes me want to wrap myself in newsprint and stand on the corner.

Betsy's cute newsboy hat modeled by Francy.

Francy is knitting her granddaughter, Grace, a Christmas stocking that is really darling.  Stripes in lots of colors and Grace’s name at the top will be an heirloom that she can keep all her life.  What a great Christmas gift, Francy.

Merry Christmas, Grace!

Marylane knit a hat for our friend Lisa whose first grandchild will be born in the spring.  It looks like a little berry with a big green leaf.  BIG leaf, but very adorable, Marylane.

The leaf makes a real fashion statement.

My friend and hiking buddy, Aarica, stopped by for a glass of wine and a piece of cake.  We were all glad to see her.  At one time or another, most of us had met Aarica, so it was good to catch up with her.  I took a photo of that end of the room and, once again, I have to apologize to Marylane for the photo of her.  I always seem to catch her with her mouth open or her eyes closed.  Better one next time, ML!

Welcome Aarica. Sorry about the bad photo, Marylane.

Linda was still working on her cowl which is soft and beautiful.  Julie is working on her afghan for her in-laws.  Keep plugging away, Jules.

Linda and Jules.

I brought out my nearly finished shawl and someone commented that the colors were very similar to Linda’s cowl, so we put them next to each other. And they are similar!  Soft, Scottish colors – trees and heather.

Can't tell where my shawl ends and Linda's cowl begins...almost.

Didn’t catch all of Deb in the photo, but she was there.  Good to see you, Deb.  Everyone is looking forward to Thanksgiving next week.  I can’t believe that 2011 is nearly over.  Marylane is off to New Jersey and Mary is off to Arizona.  The rest of us are either visiting or hosting family and friends.

From my house to yours, Have a wonder Thanksgiving!  We meet at Julie’s house week after next in December!  Wow, December!  Keep those needles blazing, Castoffs, and enjoy the snow.

We all met on 11/11/11.  OOOOOhhhhh!  The planets were aligned just right.  Some of us took a silent approach to this once in a lifetime event.

Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil, go to a disco.

The rest of  us took no approach at all.

Michele made delicious pumpkin bread and sparkling fruit drinkies.  Yum.  As usual, we don’t know how Michele manages to bake delicious treats AND work full time.  My hero.

It was a time of skinny scarves.  Leslie finished her triangle-directional scarf and modeled it as a tie.  Cute.

Very handsome tie, ma'am!

Leslie then showed us the next scarf using the same pattern with Berocco yarn.  It has a slight metallic sheen and is going to be fun.

Next scarf for Leslie.

Michele showed us her version of the same scarf with a different colorway.  They love this pattern and want us all to make one…not really, it’s just their level of enthusiasm that’s infectious.

Michele and her directional scarf.

The triangles are made by knitting short rows, wrapping and turning.  Sounds like an interesting pattern.  I love the idea of multicolored, self striping yarn.

We welcomed Francy’s sister, Jan, who is on a visit.  She modeled the fingerless mitts that Francy knit for her using the beaded pattern that Leslie gave her tutorial on.  Leslie joined Jan in being a hand model

Mittens, mittens, lots of mittens.

Linda’s mohair cowl is beautiful.  She’s still working on it and I can’t wait to see how it looks when she’s finished.  I like the idea of using it as a head cover as well as a cowl.  You can really see the gradual striping now.

Softly striped cowl.

Marylane finished her newsboy cap and it is very cute.  She added a strap on the front with buttons.  Adorable.  Mary is still working on her newsboy cap that uses a cable stitch for the body of the cap.  Can’t wait to see it.

Happy knitter with her newsboy cap.

Mary's cabled newsboy cap.

We Castoffs are all about helping each other.  At any given meeting, you can find one or more of us asking advice on a pattern, stitch or yarn.  That’s one of the reasons I love this group of knitting friends.  We love to share information and help each other.  Thanks to you all for being so wonderful.

Carol getting some advice from Leslie.

I’m sorry I didn’t get a photo of Francy and Jan together.  They look a lot alike – well, duh, they are sisters.  As someone who doesn’t have a sister, it’s hard for me to imagine some other female who looks like me.  But, anyway, we were glad to have you with us, Jan.  I didn’t get a photo of Julie, either.  She was there?  Yes, she was.  See you next time, Jules.

I can’t wait to see what’s up with all the Castoffs next week at Carol’s house.  We could have our first snow of the season in our futures.  Brrr.  Winter’s coming!  Until then, keep those needles blazing and have a great week.

We all gathered at Leslie’s house in the bright fall sunshine.  What a lovely fall we are having.  Big piles of bright leaves lying all over town.  We’re expecting snow soon, so raking is in full progress.  But in Leslie’s living room, all was quiet.  Hah.  The Castoffs are never quiet.  We all got a glass of wine or tea – and some of the most delicious pineapple that I’d ever tasted – and settled in for a session of knitting, talking and fun.

Leslie has a beautiful upholstery pattern on her furniture and it looked wonderful when I staged our knitting against it.  First I put Leslie’s directional scarf on display along with the yarn that she’s using (Mini-Mochi sock yarn).

Mini-Mochi directional yarn scarf.

Michele is knitting the same scarf with similar yarn, but she couldn’t be here today (parent-teacher conferences).  That’s why Deb couldn’t join us either.  However, Michele did leave her yarn at Leslie’s, so we passed it around and spoke to it as though Michele was embodied in the wool.  Here is Carol speaking to the surrogate Michele:

The Ouija yarn doubling as Michele.

Speaking of Carol, she had big news!  She’s going to be a Grandma again!!! Yay!!  This makes number three and we all are thrilled with her news.  Getting to be a lot of grannies in the group.

I've gathered you all here to make an announcement.

Last time Mary told us about her news as a coming grandma.  She sent me the email that she got from her son and daughter-in-law that was the announcement.  It involved the baby hint that Mary had knitted for them last Christmas.  Must’ve worked, Mary!

Mary knew at once what it meant.

Mary is still working on her newsboy cap, but Linda finished hers.  It’s so cute that Marylane wanted to model it.

Very cute hat...and model.

Marylane, Francy and Leslie were all working on various projects, but they paused to smile and make sure I got a good photo.  Apparently, some people aren’t happy with the quality of my photography…hmmm. Well, this one’s a keeper.

Happy knitters, good photo.

I used Leslie’s wonderful chair to photograph the fingerless mittens that Francy has been working on.  She is beading them – thanks to Leslie’s workshop last week – beautifully.  They look great.  This may be the next pattern that grabs a lot of us.

Love these mitts.

AGAIN, I used the wonderful chair to show off my mohair shawl that is much longer, but still not completed.  It looks great against the chair, too.

Marsha's shawl.

After I was through with my staging, Linda decided to sit in the wonderful chair to work on her mohair cowl.  It’s going great and promises to be one of those garments that we’ll all love.

The cowl will look great in the wonderful chair too!

Julie finished her baby blanket and it looks great – we especially like the basketweave pattern that she used.  Jules is going to back it with fabric and brought it to show us.  This will give the blanket a longer life.

Blanket with fabric backing to be added.

Closeup of the basketweave pattern that Julie used.

Now she’s back to working on the blue afghan for her in-laws.  Julie says that one row takes 10-15 minutes.  Yikes.  Hope she’s finished by Christmas.

The afghan that will eat Julie's time.

It is a pretty pattern though, even if it is complicated.  That’s what makes afghans so special – the time and love knitted into them.

I’ll close with a shot of Leslie modeling the asymmetrical shawl that she loves.  It’s very versatile and very striking.

Great scarf. She's got another one in a different color scheme.

We’ll be at Carol’s house next time, so until then keep those needles blazing and hope for more fall weather.  The snow will be here soon enough.

We all met at Deb’s house on a brilliant fall afternoon, and the colors in Deb’s neighborhood were magnificent.  The sun streamed in onto all of the Castoffs except our Arizona Joan.  We miss you, Joan!  It was the perfect day to sit and catch up, sip a little wine or tea and think about what we wanted to knit for the winter.

Carol and Marylane enjoying the sunny afternoon.

Julie looked like she was enjoying the snacks and wine after a long day of slogging books around in the library.  Thanks to Deb for the crackers and cheese, wine and tea.

Yummy.

Leslie had alerted us to a beading workshop about how to string beads on the working strand of yarn for a mitten (or any other knitted item that you want to decorate with beads) but she had a hard time gathering us together to begin the demo.  Finally, we all grabbed our wine, tea, snacks, etc., and paid her our utmost attention.  Ahem!

She had our...undivided and fascinated...attention.

We did really listen, eventually, and learned.  Thanks, Leslie.  The mittens that she beaded are beautiful and we all got it…until we start to knit our own mittens, in which case we’ll probably need a remedial lesson or two.

Beaded mitten plus one.

Francy started a beaded mitten also, but lost count somehow and was trying to decide what to do about it.  It’s still pretty, but just has a more random pattern of beading.

Francy's beaded mitten.

I got emails from Leslie and Michele after the meeting to show us what they had been up to over the weekend.  They found an Ann Norling directional scarf that they LOVED so they rushed out and bought yarn and made scarves…at least Leslie did.

Ann Norling multi-directional scarf.

Love the topknot, Leslie!

That crazed look in her eye must be from non-stop knitting all day.  I do love the yarn and pattern and can’t wait to see it modeled at our next meeting.

Until allergy season calms down, I decided to put down my very fluffy Shawl yarn and go back to knitting my blue vest.  The pattern for the front is very complicated, so I just held it instead of knitting.  Michele suggested that I enlarge the chart for easier knitting.  Great idea, Michele!

Tiny chart needs to be enlarged.

The back of my sweater vest.

Leslie seems to think that I knit a lot of blue garments, so I will report to her just what color I seem to prefer.  Hmmm.  She could be right.

Mary’s newsboy cap is coming right along.  Poor Mary, now that she’s retired, she understands that there is no mythical ‘time’ to do all those things you put off until retirement.  Marylane, Francy, Linda and I found that out.   She did find time to knit a few more inches.

Newsboy cap.

On the newsboy front, Marylane has knitted some on hers.  It’s starting to look like a hat!

Newsboy hat redux.

When Marylane found out that Linda is knitting a buttonhole for her newsboy cap, she mused about the buttonholes that she knitted into the band of her striped sweater.

“I know I knitted five buttonholes on that sweater, but I haven’t seen them since.”

If anyone finds Marylane’s buttonholes, please return them ASAP.  Thanks.

Michele’s sweater for her daughter is nearly finished.  She has the back and front and is working on sleeves.  This is a rather complicated pattern that she doesn’t work on at our meetings – a good thing to remember when your attention is scattered among all the conversations – so I was glad to see it again.

Voila! Fronts of sweater.

Back of sweater.

Julie and Deb were in a sunny corner knitting their ongoing projects and talking.  I snapped a photo of this blissful scene, then had to do a double-take on the slippers that Deb was wearing.  I get it.  On with the comfy shoes after a hard day’s work.

Ah, sunshine.

Ah, comfort!

Linda is working on a beautiful, mohair cowl that looked so pretty in the sunshine.  It will be both for around the neck and over the head.  She got yarn and pattern on her trip to Chicago.

Looks warm and soft.

Deb’s Yorkie Izzy was enjoying the sunshine, but she wondered why nobody was paying attention to the DOG!  Just too busy with our own toys, Izzy.

But, but...what about the Canine Goddess?

Next time we’ll meet at Leslie’s house and look forward to seeing the Ann Norling scarf in person.  I doubt that I’ll take a better photo than the one that Michele took, though.  Until then, have a Happy Holloween and try to stay upright in the blustery weather.  Keep those needles blazing, Castoffs!