Nanook of the North(west)

I wore this finished object (that I finished a few months ago) for the first time this past week:

Pattern: Nanook by Heidi Kirrmaier

Yarn: Cascade 220 Heathers, Rainier (purchased in Madison, WI at Lakeside Fibers, in anticipation of moving near Mt. Rainer!)

Needles: US 8 26" circ and 12" circ

This yarn was fascinating. Cascade 220 is my bread and butter, and I always love a good heather style color. This was a project I worked on during our road trip from Wisconsin to Washington in May. I was playing around with some of the scrap yarn, and unraveled it. To my surprise, the fibers were three different colors:

And as you can see, none of them were purple. The fibers were downright aggressive primary colors mixed together in such a way to give the illusion of purple, with the bright red, yellow, and blue only peeking out occasionally. MADNESS, I tell you.

Then I smoked some pot, and took a picture with it unpinned:

I enjoy wearing it both ways (that's what she said? No, it seems like it should work but it doesn't).  I was working downstairs in a lab area that is always cold, so it was going to be great to snuggle up in it and stay warm. And indeed it was, but the trouble came whenever I tried to leave the area, which is a radiological buffer zone, so everyone has to use a hand and foot counter before they exit to see if they are contaminated. I kept coming up contaminated on one arm, then the other, then both. Even when I pushed up the sleeves, it set off the detector. I even set it off for a couple of minutes after I took it off.

Is my sweater radioactive? Nah. I called the radiological technician down to double check, and he sighed and asked if my sweater was wool. "Static" was the verdict. False positive.

Check out this sweet pin that I used to anchor it! Kam Baker at Everyday Peacocks responded to my plea for a neat shawl pin and this was my first opportunity to wear it. I love it, in spite of my coworker's query of "so when did you visit Lothlorien?" Check out her shop for more fun knit accessories!