Latest circus recruit

Our mouse circus is finally complete with the addition of a girl...er...female clown. Her male partner has been waiting for her patiently for many months.

There are actually twelve mice in the Cirque de Souris designed by Alan Dart but our troupe is complete at ten because we decided not to have the trapeze artists that would require extra rigging.
   Here is a group shot of the entire troupe. Some of them have appeared in previous posts and if you want to see them in greater detail, click on the tag for toys on the right side of the screen.

In case you are wondering, the circus mice travel in Airstream trailers.

I've been asked how big (or small) these mice are. They are just over 5 inches/12.7 cm.

This female mouse towers a 1/4" over her partner, but he is so secure in his masculinity that he doesn't care one whit. The yarn is either Kauni Wool 8/2 Effekgarn or Shetland jumperweight.

Button happiness

A popular Irish blessing begins "May the road rise up to meet you.
May the wind always be at your back." I have a new blessing for knitters of sweaters: 

May your buttons always be evenly spaced. 

I've always found that very challenging, until I discovered this phenomenal tool: the SimFlex Expanding Sewing Gauge. 

Believe me, the rather hefty price felt completely worth it the very first time I used it to space some buttons and button holes. Even using the metric system rather than our ungainly system of inches and fractions thereof, I always had problems with the arithmetic of spacing seven objects evenly.

    With the help of my handy tool, I have finally finished my Mayan Dreams sweater by sewing on clasps. (If there's anything I dislike more than getting spacing even, it's making buttonholes.) I will make buttonholes if I feel the sweater demands them but these clasps from Schoolhouse Press are just so lovely and go so well with this sweater. 

The nitty gritty: The sweater is my own design and knit with Kauni Wool 8/2 Effekgarn in color ways ET and EZ. I needed to edit out some light grey and dark turquoise yarn to get the amount of color contrast I wanted. Start time to completion was one and a half years—it lay dormant for quite a while. I finished it just in time for some lovely crisp autumn weather and I have found it a joy to wear.