Why You Don't Want Lyme Disease

There are a lot of reasons why you don't want Lyme Disease. Fevers, aches, pains. About a month ago, Bill woke up with a strange red rash on his leg. It quickly grew to the size of a softball and had a "ring" characteristic to it. He was diagnosed with Lyme disease and put on antibiotics for 3 weeks.

He's fine, and the worst part was him just feeling fatigued (and not being able to drink beer while on the drugs). I had a mini-freak out and fortunately, because I work in a medical research environment, I was able to get the OK from an infectious disease expert who said this was the right treatment plan. Anyway, if you have deer in your area or are near the woods, check yourself for ticks regularly. We thought this was a rare disease, but it's becoming more common.

Onto knitting . . .

With my mom's sweater finito, I've made some good progress in the last week on some WIPs and started a new project.

Cable Down Raglan: I've made it to the point where the sleeves are separated. I'm making the 31 1/4" size. I'd like this one to be more fitted, and after putting all the stitches on scrap yarn, it seems to fit well.

This might be a slower-going sweater, only because of the cables. I like them and following the chart is pretty easy, but my hands do start to get tired after working on this for an hour or so. I don't use cable needles, so after a while, I just want some plain ol' stockinette.

Which works out well, because I can pick up this new project:

One-tone Shrug from Fitted Knits: I cast on for this on Thursday and quickly made it through all of the increases for a 13.5" size by Friday night. I finished the first sleeve last night and seamed it. Tried it on, and it's too small. There doesn't seem to be a general consensus in blogland on the fit of this one; I've seen some say they've found it too big when knitted to their measurements and others have said it's too fitted. So I've ripped back and am going to do some more increases and re-divide for the sleeves again. My arms looked like stuffed sausages in the 13.5" size!

I'm knitting it in Kona Bay Cotton in cream, which is ubersoft (softer than the Berroco Touche I've raved about).

Rusted Root is done, ends woven in, but not ready for primetime yet. It's a little big and needs a run through the washer and dryer.