Well, here it is: my finished Opteka. I am so in love. This was a really fun knit and I can see why Isabell Kraemer has such a devoted following. Her designs are amazing. I am really looking forward to wearing this out and about, I think its going to be a staple item in my fall/winter wardrobe. I used some local silk/alpaca sport weight yarn that I dyed with madder root last summer. It gives off this really nice halo effect, which you can sort of see in the bottom photo.

Truth be told, I finished this thing almost two months ago but it has been too dang hot to model for photos! We took these at 8:00 PM at night when the temperature has dropped to the low 90’s. I was outside for all of 15 minutes and I was sweating terribly toward the end. I’m glad I powered through though because I’ve been so excited to show everyone.

I have some more wips and finished objects to show off, but I have yet to take photos because of the heat. I’m going to try to do that over the next few week or so, probably after school starts. We will be starting school next Monday and for some reason this whole “hey, I’m homeschooling a first grader” thing is WAY more stressful than I thought it would be. It took me 6 hours to plan the first week. I’m not kidding. Once I figured out a plan, it took me less than an hour, but that first five and a half hours mostly consisted of me sitting cross legged on the floor with my laptop, frantically flipping through curriculums and researching books online into the late night hours. At one point I was certain that there was no way my son or myself were surviving this process without severe emotional scarring. I may or may not have overreacted a bit (read: yes). I’ll let everyone know how the first week goes. Wish us luck!