Finished Object: Birthday Socks

Pattern: Started as Alison’s ankle socks, changed to Laura’s intuitive socks, and finally morphed into variations on a heel by Joanna
Yarn: Koigu KPPPM in unknown colorway, 1 hank
Needles: 3.25 mm (US Size 3) DPNs
Comments: I had 10 g of yarn left over, I suppose I could have made taller ankle socks instead of these little footie-style socks, but I didn’t know that until I finished and by then I wasn’t about to rip the socks (again).

Who wears wool footies? I guess these seem terribly impractical, but I’ll probably just use them as bed socks.

You can see the pretty short row heels and toes here.

With Friends Like These, Who Needs Enemies?

It all started when Valerie showed me Cookie A’s socks. Now, as you know, I don’t get excited about socks, but I do always appreciate a beautiful knitting pattern—even if it’s a pattern that I’m not likely to knit. So was the case with the Cookie A patterns—I loved them.

A few weeks later, Tania mentioned that she could get printed versions of the Cookie A patterns at a discount through a co-op. “Hmm,” I thought, “printed patterns.” I don’t have a color printer, so I don’t like to purchase patterns that are primarily available as downloadable PDFs. So, I asked Tania to buy the Millicent and Twisted Flower patterns for me—just so I could have them and admire them. Certainly NOT so I could knit them.

Fast forward to a couple of days ago. A package arrived bearing enough RED sock yarn to knit Millicent. Apparently, Valerie and Sarah have decided that I must start knitting socks. They are ignoring my constant “ho-hum” attitude toward socks. They are obviously conspiring against me. I’m sure they hate me. Okay, maybe they don’t hate me. If they hated me they wouldn’t have sent such luscious yarn in the most perfect shade of red. I love the yarn. Thank you Val and Sarah!

Don’t worry Debby, despite all this sock and sock-yarn action, I’m not going to abandon the Apathetic Sock Knitters Club! Knit on! er… Apathy on!

I’m a swinger!

(I wonder what kind of search engine hits I’ll get with that title?)

When I began Morrigan, I had every intention to be monogamous to her. For better, for worse, until finished object do us part. Just before I started Morrigan I had begun a Flower Basket Shawl. FBS has joined Lotus in the “who? what?” pile in the yarn room because of my undying love for Morrigan.

But then something happened to cause me to be unfaithful to Morrigan. It’s nothing bad—Morrigan understands and is being patient. She’s not angry with me for doing a little wife- project-swapping.

Months before I met Morrigan, I had promised the delightful Kristen that I would do some knitting for her. The knitting is somewhat time-sensitive and well, it’s a job of sorts, so work before play for me. I’ve finished one of my projects for Kristen—both are super-secret so I can’t show you very much. But I will say this much about the first project: It involved pompoms.

I have started the second project and hopefully it will go as fast as the first. And then it’s back to blissful harmony and cable crossings on every row. I miss you Morrigan!

Meanwhile:

Yarn happened.

I won—or rather Scout won—a contest over at This Kitten Knits and Jacque sent me the most delicious prizes. RED yarn and PINK stitch markers. How in the world did she know that those were my favorite colors? Is it obvious? Do I use those colors a lot? The yarn is from HandpaintedYarn.com and is wonderfully soft. It should make a good hat for someone who likes red. Hmmm...I wonder who that could be? Thanks Jacque! I love the yarn and the pretty markers.

I bought some interesting laceweight when I was in Austin last month. It's Yarn Palace Graceful. Check it out! Self-striping laceweight! I was quite excited when I bought the yarn. But now I'm having conniptions over what to make. My feeling is that the self-striping nature of the yarn will be a feature of a shawl but could possibly be distracting as well. Triangular, circular, and square shawls are all out because the number of stitches increases, which would make the stripes irregular (more narrow as you go along). A long, rectangular sampler shawl (such as the Song of Hiawatha shawl) wouldn't work because the stripes will interrupt the beauty of the differing horizontal lace patterns. A rectangular shawl with a knitted-on border will be problematic because the stripes in the border will not match up with the stripes in the center. *sigh* I do have one candidate, but am still looking for other options.

Then Kristen sent me three hanks of Fleece Artist Bluefaced Leciester yarn in Raspberry. It’s my payment for the super-secret knitting. Each hank is as big as Scout. Yes it’s extremely pink. I didn’t think it would be so…well…bright. But hey, I still love it and will still revel in its softness. (Note to self: Laptop monitor makes colors appear less bright. Always check colors on desktop monitor.)

And finally, because blog entries sometimes need a good animal photo: I always thought that opossums were some of the ugliest creatures known to man. But OMG! CUTE! Baby opossums are pretty adorable. Even Scout thinks so.

Feeling the Handspun Love

Remember when I went to Alaska and came home with some fiberly goodness? Well, I asked spinner extraordinaire Sarah of Morg to spin the fiber for me. Sarah—in her complete amazingness, spent months working on my fiber. It wasn’t the cleanest fiber in the world (that’s an understatement) so she had to do a lot cleaning and prep work before she could spin it.


Thanks to Sarah’s hard work and dedication, I now have over 300 yards of lace-ish-weight qiviut! It’s the ultimate souvenir from my Alaska trip: fiber bought in a fishing village from a local artist and spun by a dear friend. Sarah also sent me a copy of Arctic Lace aka The Qiviut Book. Soon I will use my lovely yarn to knit one of the patterns from this book. But for now I’m enjoying petting my skein of fluffy softness. It’s so light—holding it is like holding a cloud.

And as if all the hard work Sarah did wasn't enough, she decided to send me some more of her handspun yarn. The purpley pink hank is yarn that she spun from some Spunky Eclectic roving. I think it will make a nice contrasting trim on a sweater someday.

Thank you SO MUCH Sarah—for everything.

For you yarn p0rn addicts, gaze upon the fantastic photos that Sarah took. The photos show off the incredible spinning job that she did.

I'm a Flasher!

Yes kiddies it's that time of the year again. The 2nd Annual Stash Flash. Although my stash has grown considerably since last year's flash, I'm still not close to SABLE. I do make efforts to keep my stash under control by trading and giving away yarn that I know that I won't use. In fact, I have hardly any of Mrs. Stranger's stash left at my house. Most was given away (a lot went to Monkee and her mother) and some was used as prizes for the Ugly Ball of Yarn contest. So, without further ado, I present my stash! All photos can be enlarged by clicking on them.

Group shot, not very scenic. This photo was actually taken after all the other photos were. As I finished taking photos of the yarn, I'd carefully pack the yarn in nice zippered bags and then toss them in this pile. Scout is not sure what to make of all the yarn.


Cool Cottons

Cottons and cotton blends here.
* The jewel-toned cakes in the top left are the remnants of the unfinished sweater that I showed last year. Helen wanted the laceweight from the sweater, so I frogged the sweater.
* The two large skeins in the top right are from Mrs. Stranger. 500 yards per skein! I think it's destined to be baby stuff.
* The pastel balls in the front right are leftovers from Moni. Moni was just a bunch of yarn in last year's flash.
* The rest are leftovers from Curlicue, Rosa, Rebecca Pirate Sweater, Arrowhead, and Elspeth.

Furry and Fancy
Some of my nicer yarns--most of it fuzzy. Clockwise from top left:
* Pleasure is almost certainly going to become Starsky. The gauge and yardage are spot on--almost as if the sweater was written for this stash yarn.
* KFI Angora Extra: I overestimated how much I would need for Berkshire Breeze. So, I bought another ball so that I would have enough for another sweater. Clever, huh?
* Texas mohair: To become a Flower Basket Shawl eventually.
* Cotton and tussah silk from Mrs. Stranger's stash. Certainly enough for a sweater, but I haven't found a suitable pattern. I may design my own.
* Kid Silk Haze from Reversible Rib Shawl. I think it will be Marianne from Rowan 37.

Yarn DOES grow on trees! (or at least some plants)
Karaoke (tofu yarn) Twize (bamboo yarn) and Euroflax Linen. Apparently, I like plant fibers in shades of purple.

Thin Stuff and KnitPicks
From the left:
* Lorna's Laces Helen's Lace. An impulse buy. I haven't picked a pattern yet.
* Barbie Rose laceweight. Someday it will join the other hank in the Barbie Shawl.
* Tiger sock yarn to be made into a stuffed tiger--not into socks.
* Random leftover sock yarn
* A variety of KnitPicks yarn that I bought for swatching.

Woolies, part 1
Daletta yarn for Lotus and Cashmerino. The Cashmerino was supposed to become Tempting, but I changed my mind.

Woolies, part 2
Odds and ends of wool and wool blends from various projects. I always buy extra and I always have extra leftover, funny how that works. For some reason the leftover Cestari (aka machine washable purple sheepies) from Rogue didn't make this photo.

Novelty and Petroyarns
Lest you think I'm a complete yarn snob, I am displaying my yarn consisting of mostly human-made materials. I made baby stuff with a lot of this yarn. Let's face it--acrylic yarns yarns are perfect for babies that are going vomit on their clothes and then outgrow them in 2 months.

Need more yarn p0rn? Check out the other stash flashers!

Spinning and Winding things

Although Friday may not have been the best birthday ever, Saturday was definitely the best day after birthday ever. First, I had time in the morning to seam together the pieces of Elspeth and to try her on. She fits! But more on that later. Then, Peter came home from Dallas. He gave me a card that contained 2 IOUs--one for a "spin-y knitty thingie" and one for a "wind-y knitty thingie." Apparently, he was planning to buy me a swift and a winder on his way home from the airport, but wasn't able to. Sooooo, on the way to dinner at one of my favorite restaurants in Houston, we stopped at my favorite yarn store in Houston, and purchased these goodies:



A swift, a winder, and yarn to wind. That yarn is enough Euroflax linen to make a tank top. Happy happy happy!

Damn the torpedoes crochet hooks!
Back to Elspeth. I finished knitting, blocking, and seaming the pieces together. Then, I danced around in joy upon discovering that she fits. Here I am wearing it with a stitch marker holding it closed. (Note that I don't have to stand with my arms akimbo.)



But soon, the joy of the fitting bolero started to fade. It was time to crochet. With the handy diagrams in Vogue Knitting, I figured out how to do the crochet borders around the sleeves and allllll the way around the sweater. The sleeve-borders went well. The very very long border around the sweater ... um ... not so good. After spending hours crocheting that border, I held up my work and saw that the border flared outward badly. UGH. Riiiippp.... Good thing that I have a new wool winder. I'm starting over. Needless to say, the progress on my other sweater (Moni) has been nonexistent.

One of these things is not like the others

My favorite Houston yarn store had a sale last week. All Debbie Bliss cashmerino was on sale for 25% off. I went on the last day of the sale, hoping that the selection would be limited and I wouldn't buy anything. (I don't really need another project right now.) But alas, the best laid plans...well, you know. I left the store with this:



Enough to make Tempting. I have been toying with the idea of knitting Tempting for quite some time, but just never had a strong enough urge to hunt down appropriate yarn. How can I resist now that I found the yarn just sitting around waiting for me to pick it up?

However, the purchase of this yarn just confirms that I am in a rut. Let's see if you can figure out the trend in my wardrobe. It's time to play that old Sesame Street game! Which one of these things just doesn't belong?* (1) Tempting yarn above; (2) Reversible Rib Shawl; (3) Arrowhead sweater; (4) Moni (next on the needles); (5) Ribbon X-back (in progress again); (6) Debbie Bliss's Grace (to be knit in later this summer) or (7) a bunch of store-bought clothes. Pondering, pondering...

Time to confess. Hi, my name is Laura and I'm addicted to red and pink clothes. At least I'm not the only one.

* The answer is Moni--as if you couldn't tell!

Flashing!

I hope I won't disappoint those of you looking for serious "yarn p0rn." My stash is just not that big. I won't be wearing one of these T-shirts. When I first started knitting I was too poor to keep a stash. But now that have more discretionary cash, I still don't buy yarn without a project in mind. So most of my stash are leftovers. I always have leftovers because I'm always paranoid and buy an extra ball of yarn for my projects.

First up, the group shot:

Next, various closeups:

Yarn for Moni that arrived too late to be included in the group shot:

Some Other Rowan Yarn:

I have lots of "leftover" kidsilk haze because I ordered an entire bag (10 balls) of the stuff thinking that I needed 8 balls for my Reversible Rib Shawl. But I ended up needing only 5.5 balls for the shawl. I think I'm going to make Maggie with the rest of it, but I'm not sure yet.

Acrylic "Naturally" Follows All That Fancy Yarn:

The white and lavender yarn was used for my niece's baby blanket. The yellow is destined to be a baby blanket for my coworker's baby. I cast on for that blanket this week.

Ba Ba Brown Sheep:

Notice the "vintage" Brown Sheep labels at the top? Those are the leftovers from the first sweater that I made for Peter. Someone horribly miscalculated the amount of yarn I needed for that sweater. When I purchased the yarn, I didn't know much about gauge, yardage, or buying yarn in general. I relied on my mother and the yarn store owner to figure out how much yarn I needed. Obviously, math skills were lacking on the day of my purchase. I still have 2.5 skeins of brown, 1 full skein of red, and 1 full skein of blue leftover--and I've been using this yarn to play around with for a few years!

Most embarrassing Stash:

This is an unfinished sweater. It must be at least 10 years old. I started the sweater, lost interest, tossed it in the closet, and forgot about it. By the time I found it again, the sweater was no longer my style. Sorry, I just don't wear gigantic, jewel-toned sweaters any more. I'm thinking I'm going to frog the sweater and use the cotton yarn (the yarn in skeins) for making stuffed animals. I have no idea what to do with the space-dyed lace-weight yarn on the cones.

I hope my little stash wasn't too boring. Click here for links to other Stash Flashers.

Edit for Helen, a close up of the lace-weight yarn:

You can kinda see on the left that the yarn has little loopies coming off it. I'll be out of town tomorrow through Saturday so if anyone else has questions, please be patient! I will answer them.