Elephant peices and parts

Today, I bring you the very beginnings of the elephant that I'm knitting for my mom. Yes, I know it seems strange to knit a toy for an adult, however, it makes sense. I promise. You see, my mom loves elephants. Ever since I could remember, a large photo of elephants graced her bedroom wall and the house was brimming over with beautiful elephant figures. Ones of glass, of stone, of clay, of crystal. Little ones, big ones, ones with babies, ones that were actually tea pots. Tea pots are another thing that mom collects, but I choose not to combine two things she loves by knitting an elephant tea cozy. I have to draw the line somewhere.
So what you're seeing is the two arms and the beginning of the leg. The arms worked out perfectly in width, and I just had to keep going until the length was proportionate. You see the LMKG pattern says to use sport weight doubled, and I say why make my life harder? I prefer to work with a single yarn so as to not confuse my already inadequate counting skills. So I chose this yarn from Joann's. It's their exclusive collection and it's a wool/nylon/cotton blend. The yarn is like what I imagine would be created if someone carded up a bunch of cotton balls and spun the drafts just enough to convince them to stick together. The yarn has no spin, whatsoever, so in that, it's a little strange. I wasn't sure that this was going to work out when I first cast it on, but the more I work with it, the more fond I become of it. I'm even thinking of making some of those gloves they have on knitty. You know, the bulky ones that are seemed? I would link it for you, but I'm
a) pretty sure you know what I'm talking about
b) know that if you've never seen them before, you could find them on knitty in a flash
and
c) stuck in my post-lunch coma and litterally too lazy to go clicking around to find it.
Seriously, it's amazing that I have the energy to type right now. Damn Subway and their ridiculous bread.
Anyhow, the yarn is amazingly soft, not so unstretchy as to really strain the hands and remarkably warm but not itchy at all. Seriously, even I could make a scarf out of it and sleep in it and I wouldn't even itch. Not bad for $5.99 for a 50g ball (131,2 yards) of bulky yarn.
The only thing is that it's not exactly matching guage here, which I didn't think would be that much of a problem, but it is involving some thinking. Since the arms worked so well in width but not in length, I thought the same would apply to the legs. But, not so much. So I've already reknitted and ripped another larger version of the leg and got this far on my new version. The first was too skinny, even with stuffing, and really - what elephant has skinny legs? That's just crazy talk.
So, when I get to the rest of the pattern, it's going to be on a wing and a prayer. The body is knitted straight up from the legs (in some weird 2 circs method yet to be comprehended), so I'm not worried there, but the decreases, head, and ears are going to be interesting. I hope that there's not too much ripping back needed here because
a) the yarn can really only stand to be frogged once
b) a knitted toy for an adult shouldn't be that much work
and
c) I don't know if this post lunch coma will ever wear off

Anyhow, the knitting might be slowing for a little bit because I've got this

and I'm sooo excited to start gardening. There are some early plants that I can even get in the ground this weekend from seed and I can't wait. At first I thought that any magazine put out by a company that sells garden products would just be a big advertisement for their products, but this one isn't at all. Sure there are ads, but none of the articles push their products at all. No mention of stick Miracle gro here or fertilizer there. It's very well done, and extremely helpful. I'd highly recommend it to someone who's just getting started with vegetable growing or growing from seeds.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~HOORAY FOR SPRING~~~~~~~~~~~~~