Two Hour (and Four Minutes Felting) Handbag

I like to keep a skein or two on my desk as I am, ahem, working, if only to daydream about or to consider what I am going to knit with it. I bought this skein of Crystal Palace Taos, in Mineral, to make mittens for my mother for Christmas, but she made some comment about not liking mittens, so it got tossed on the desk for further contemplation.

Then I got the book, 101 Designer One-Skein Wonders and as I was leafing through it the other day, I spotted the pattern for the Two Hour Handbag (Ravelry linked). While it calls for a bulky weight yarn, I just doubled up the Taos and sat down Sunday night with Jane Austen's Mansfield Park (Well it purported to be Mansfield Park, for it had little resemblance to dear Jane!). And in less than two hours, I had this:

I really love the way the colors came out, and the Taos is so easy to knit with. Now I intended to make this as a thank you gift for someone. Then I tossed it in the washing machine, felted it, (for only four minutes--thank goodness I checked it as it felted VERY fast) and it came out like this, in these very Monet sort of colors and I was enchanted. I can't get the colors right with my camera, but trust me, it is wonderful. And so perfect for something else I wanted, that I can't give it up. So next up, you'll see what I've turned my Two Hour Handbag into.