Road trip!

My SO and I visited Janesville, WI, last weekend, to attend his family reunion.  As is my habit, I scoped out the possibility of an LYS, and discovered the Dragonfly Yarn Shop.  It did not disappoint, and I made a significant contribution to the local economy.

After I made my selections, the owner graciously offered to wind the yarn.  Oh, no thank you, I responded, I like to wind my own.

And you can see what a mess I made of that on skein number one.

Yarns clockwise:  Malabrigo Superwash Merino Sock "Violeta Africana', Malabrigo Superwash Merino Sock 'Abril', Dragonfly Yarn  Shop Hand Spun (merino), and Misti Alpaca Baby Me Boo 'Rosario'.

Squee!

These infant socks are impossibly tiny and just too cute for words.

Pattern:  Infant Socks by Judy Ellis (found here)
Yarn:  Schaefer Anne in 'Powder Puff'
Needles:  US1 DPNs
Modifications:  None to speak of, but I didn't realize that the foot consisted of fewer stitches than the leg, and so the gussets don't quite line up with the toes.

These socks used about 15g or 0.55 oz. of yarn, so are great for those bits of leftovers we sock knitters seem to accumulate.  I have just one question, though:  how does one block socks this size?

No anigurumi here

My daughter was enchanted with the anigurumi dolls in a book from the library, so I decided to give them a try. In a fit of rationality, I bought only one skein of yarn to try only one pattern, to see if I even liked crocheting toys. After an hour or two of hand-cramping effort, I gave up, and in frustration, whipped out the ensemble above.

The pattern for the hat is from the Knitters Handy Book of Patterns, the mittens from here, and the scarf of my own informal design.  The yarn is Caron Simply Soft in "Soft Green" and I used US7 DPNs.

These items are more toddler-sized than newborn-sized, but I had to knit something while waiting to find out the baby's gender.  Impossibly tiny pink socks coming up soon.

It's a girl!

I was going to say, "It's (going to be) a girl!" but it's a fact that will not change with the birth in October.  Anyway, now I know what color yarn to buy for my first grandchild.

Nothing seems to be making it to the FO pile these days.  I was on a business trip last week and took only one project and did not finish it, even though it was a baby HAT.  A reversible baby hat, which is like knitting two hats in one, but still a baby HAT.  You would think I could accomplish at least that much.

Yesterday I took my daughter shopping for some maternity clothes.  The store had a few newborn items as well.  That stuff is TINY!  My kids both weighed over nine pounds, so they never seemed very newbornish.  It is difficult for me to get my mind around just how small babies can be.  It's almost freakish!

Now I have the urge to knit teeny tiny socks.

Do I need a tetanus shot?

I spent part of this holiday weekend at a friend's house, where I knit upon the couch, bag of yarns and sticks at my side.  One of the sticks in the bag was a US3 13-inch straight that I planned to use to cast on a baby hat.  While uncrossing and recrossing my legs, I managed to impale my right calf on said needle, which was poking (ha) out of the bag, point up.  And by "impale" I mean the needle was stuck far enough into my leg to hang there by itself.  Too embarrassed to admit what I had done, I surreptitiously pulled the needle out and slunk off to the bathroom to cleanse the wound, which fortunately did not bleed much.  Remember this story if the TSA confiscates your knitting needles next time you fly; they really can be lethal.

Now, a pet peeve:  splices.  For one baby blanket, I purchased four skeins of Lorna's Laces, two of which were perfect.  While winding the other two into balls, I came across splice after splice after splice.  Some of the splices were across all three plies, but some were in just one ply.  Either way, I snipped them out and restarted winding.  By the time I finished, instead of two balls of yarn, I had eight.

I don't know much about the economies of waste in the yarn business, but when I am paying $20 per skein, I really, really, really would like there to be a minimum number of splices.  Like zero.

Toilet runner

Another FO!  One of those projects that just kind of gets started, then when it is 90% done, bogs down.

All I wanted to do was replace the hand towel on the back of the toilet with something a little bit nicer.  Only by leaving the project by my bedside and committing to four rows a night did this get done.

Pattern:  None.  Just started knitting double seed stitch, but for the bendy places, knit a row of reverse stockinette, and inch or so of stockinette, and another row of reverse stockinette to get it to hang nicely over the ends of the toilet.
Yarn:  Elmore-Pisgah cotton in "Shaded Denim".  For some reason, I bought spools of this stuff a long time ago.
Needles:  US7 straights

Now, time for grandbaby knitting!

The socks are done!

After all my whining about knitting toe up, the pinkish socks are finally finished.  Due to a combination of factors, these took over a month and a half to knit.

Pattern:  Lacy Ribs Socks, from Socks from the Toe Up
Yarn:  Green Mountain Spinnery Spinnery Sock Art "Forest"
Needles:  US1 circs and DPNs
Modifications:  Used the Russian Bind Off; switched to DPNs when I reached the legs.

Neither of these photos do justice to the lovely colorway with its subtle pinks, yellows, and lavenders - it's a gray rainy day here.  As much as I love the color, I'm not sold on the yarn, which is a blend of wool and Tencel.  Not very soft or elastic, and it is supposed to be hand washed.  The socks are still damp from blocking, so I haven't worn them yet.  We'll see how they feel at a future date.  Right now, I am just glad to be through with them.

The neverending socks

I did not knit as much as I had intended during my road trip because, well, I was on the road.  A lot.  I am losing hope that these socks will ever be done.

With top down socks, by the time you reach the foot, things are sailing along because half the stitches are plain old stockinette.  But with toe up socks, you are knitting the pattern all around the leg, which is really bogging me down.  And by now, the pattern is rather boring.  I sit down and do a four-row pattern repeat, and then I want to do something else.

Absolutely no progress was made on the baby blanket during the road trip, but here it is, in its WIP glory.

I am taking today off to recover from my travels, and if the promised rains materialize, they will keep me out of the garden, so maybe, just maybe, I will make some progress on one or the other of these today.  Or I might watch a movie.

Too bad the LYS's are closed on Monday, or I could go yarn shopping for baby knitting.  I purchased the following and now just need some yarn to get going on something new:

Still not much new

I finally made it in for a deep-tissue massage and now my shoulders are feeling much better, so I've been knitting more.  I am finally past the heels of those pinkish socks I've been working on for over a month, and baby blanket number two is about halfway done.  (Baby blanket number one is still in pieces.)  No progress on the back-o'-the-toilet thing - that is one of the culprits that screwed up my shoulders in the first place - but it is in the homestretch if I ever decide to run with it again.

BUT I have a road trip coming up.  Unfortunately, I will be doing the driving, so no knitting then, but I do expect to hit the needles as much as possible while taking a break from the yard and garden.

Not much new

Still getting used to my camera (which, BTW, is a Sony Cyber-shot DSC-W330).  There is not much knitting to photograph, anyway.  I have been so busy at work that my lunchtime knitting has fallen by the wayside, and at home, the yard and garden call to me relentlessly.  I am still plugging away, but much more slowly.

Anyway, I had a new Ravelry experience recently:  someone asked to purchase some of my yarn.  I had a half-dozen skeins of Classic Elite Four Seasons (now discontinued) left over from Sitcom Chic, with no prospects for it in sight.  (Besides, one fuschia garment per wardrobe is plenty.)  The purchaser had some of her own Four Seasons, but not enough for her planned project.  Incredibly, mine matched her dye lot.  She offered a fair price, so now I have a few more bucks in my PayPal account and she has the yarn.  Win-win!

I forget where I read about brioche knitting, but I checked Knitting Brioche out of the local library.  It looks like fun, but it also looks challenging and I am not quite up for a new challenge right now.  In fact, I have a lot of challenges, like spinning and dyeing, to name two, that I am not facing.  There are simply not enough hours in the day.

Turn, turn, turn, NOT

The bootie thing is just not working for me right now, so I turned my attention to another baby blanket.  (The first has yet to be seamed, and at this moment, I'm thinking it will probably never be seamed, but instead will magically morph into something else.)  My intention was to knit a garterlac baby blanket, so I traded in the Lorna's Laces left over from the in-limbo baby blanket for a variegated colorway, and started out.  But by the time I reached the end of the base triangles, I had had it with turning the project back and forth and back and forth.  Ugh.  And the colorway was not liking the garter stitch.  Double ugh.

I looked about for an alternative, because the colorway really is luscious, and decided on the twisted lattice motif from Barbara Walker's Learn to Knit Afghan Book.  I tripled the width of the afghan square and knitted up a pattern repeat (24 rows) and definitely like the result.  Except three was not the magical number, as the blanket was too narrow.  (A little foresight and math would have prevented this debacle.)  So I ripped that out, determined to start anew.  And I will, but just not quite yet.

The other projects are creeping along, but I have no progress photos because, once again, the camera batteries are dead and I am tired of feeding that thing two AA's every other day.  I ordered a new camera from Amazon, a Sony W330, which has a 3" display and 14.1 megapixels, but is about half the depth of my current Canon.  It should arrive in a few days, so expect a plethora of pix.

Oh, I give up, sorta

So far, I have not become a fan of knitting socks on two circular needles.  Since I like to knit both socks at the same time, I originally tried to knit two-at-a-time on circs but it was a big FAIL.  Then I decided to try one sock at a time, and that is better, but I am not convinced circs beat DPNs.  The problem is, using one 24" and one 16" works as long as I am knitting stockinette on the 16" set.  Once I get past the heel and need to knit the fancy shmancy lace pattern on the 16" ones, my freakishly large fingers cramp up.  I know I could use two 24" needles, but I don't have two 24" needles in size US1.  But I may have one 32" set, so maybe I will try knitting on one circular needle.  Next time.  Meanwhile, I am finished the legs with DPNs.

And I am not becoming a fan knitting socks toe-up, either.  Knitting top-down, one starts with the hard stuff, and once past the heel, one is in the homestretch.  Or so it seems to me.  Toe-up, on the other hand, starts with the easy stuff, then gets progressively more difficult.  In general.  Not that the socks are all that difficult to knit.  It's more of a psychological thing.  But I do favor toe-up when in doubt over whether there is sufficient yarn.  The legs of socks can always be shorter, but not the feet.

Meanwhile, I actually finished something:  the mistake rib scarf.

Pattern:  Mistake Rib Scarf, from Wendy Knits.
Yarn:  Classic Elite Inca Marl, in "Tobacco Road" colorway
Needles:  US7 straights
Modifications:  I cast on 31 stitches instead of 19, and the scarf is as long as my wingspan is wide.

The above photo is an attempt to showcase the yarn, but my camera just doesn't do it justice.  This scarf will look great with my brown faux shearling coat, but neither will be worn for many a month.

To get into the grandma knitting mood, I ordered a boxful of Valley Yarns Valley Superwash DK, one skein in each color available at Webs.  First up, baby booties:

I think baby booties are quick but difficult.  And these are falling into the classification of "practice" booties, as I'm not thrilled with the decreases (the pattern, from 50 Baby Booties to Knit, is not very specific).  Sometime between now and October, I will get the hang of knitting booties.

In other news, the toilet tank runner grows, albeit slowly:

The pooling looks like clouds.

Lately, between working and gardening, I have been too busy to keep up on blog reading, let alone blog commenting.  And other things are falling by the wayside, like spinning and dyeing.  And sometimes blog writing, although I justify blogging by reminding myself that this is the best way to keep a log of my knitting projects.  I am so looking forward to retiring, someday, hopefully while I can still do the things I want to do.

Can you tell I am busy?

And my shoulders hurt?  Recent knitting has left me with inflamed rotator cuff muscles or tendons or whatever they are.  I am trying to take it easy, but it's not easy.  While I am not burning up the needles, I am making some progress of the two-steps-forward-one-step-back nature.

Socks.  I started a pair of top-down in DK yarn, and they were coming along nicely, the variegated colors working well with the ribbing.  But when I got to the leg portion, my passion cooled.

The colors began to pool in such a way that the socks developed vertical stripes.  I tried to convince myself they would look "unique" but my eyes would not cooperate.  I frogged the yarn and put it away for now.

To replace that pair, I started another pair, these toe-up:

I definitely like how these look, but I have not become enamored with the two-circular needles thing.  And the yarn, a blend of wool and Tencel, is gorgeous but kind of inelastic, like cotton, contributing to my shoulder problem.  And these are 64-stitch socks, which ordinarily would be too small for my gargantuan feet, and maybe it is the pattern or maybe it is the yarn, but these are turning out big on me, even though I feel like I am knitting too tight.  The gauge is spot on, too, so I don't know what to think.  Good thing they are so beautiful.

The latest BSJ is waiting on shoulder seaming, and then I plan to add a hood.

I should do the seaming so I can finish this one up during a 4-hour meeting that is scheduled for next week.

And because I can't not knit, shoulders be damned, I picked something easy and easy on my old arms:  a mistake rib scarf.

My photo does not do justice to the yarn, which is Inca Marl, 100% alpaca.  If I crank the AC up this summer, maybe I can wear it.

Catching up

After spending all day on a computer at work, I rarely feel like coming home and doing more of the same in the evening.  Another reason I am a bit slow to post is my camera was not working.  Turns out the camera is fine, but the rechargeable batteries are not.  I did not realize that after a while, they won't recharge.  Boo.

First up, the garterlac dishcloth.  Side one:

Side two:

Gartelac really is reversible.  I think it is easier than entrelac, too, but not necessarily the look one wants, depending.

The lime and gray socks are done.

Pattern:  Chevron Patterns for Self-Striping Yarn (chevron stitch) from Sensationally Knitted Socks

Yarn:  ONline Supersocke 100, colorway 1055

Needles:  US1 DPNs

Modifications:  none, other than I used the old Norwegian cast on.  I think.

These have a "forethought" heel, which is supposed to create a bulls-eye effect with self-striping yarn, but this yarn was not as effective at this as the yarns in the book.  The heel also seems kind of puny.  These socks are for my daughter, so I will look forward to her assessment of their comfort.

As you can see from the pix, I did not try to match the stripes.  Instead, I knitted both socks at the same time, working off either end of the skein, which reverses the stripes.  One reason I did this was the last time I tried to match stripes, the yarn for the second sock had so many splices in it, the stripes were off kilter.  Another reason was I was too lazy to wind half the yarn into a separate ball.  But, as it turns out, I had to do that anyway when I got to the heels because you need to work with yarn from the opposite end to make the bulls-eye.

ONline is not one of my favorite yarns, but I like how these turned out.  I think this is also the last of the ONline yarn in my stash.

To use up the last of the baby acrylic, I started another Baby Surprise Jacket:

And then, not liking it, I restarted it:

The colors are pink and lavender.  As you can see, I am using YO's for the cuff (and eventually back) ease.  I tried using YO's for the other increases as well, but stacking YO's turned out not to be wise.

And, just to make sure my shoulders hurt a lot, I started a cotton runner for the back of the toilet:

I have discovered that knitting cotton is a sure way to cause my shoulders and left upper arm to cramp up.  My technique when knitting inelastic yarn needs some improvement.

Let's see.  Is that it?  I think I am all caught up now.

No felting here

I forgot to mention that I did knit up a swatch of the worsted weight yarn I used for the Quickie Socks and threw it in the laundry.  It went through the washer AND dryer and while it did pick up a fair amount of lint and pet hair, it did not felt.  So that yarn must have been the superwash worsted I vaguely remember buying a long, long time ago.  My daughter tried on the socks and they are a perfect fit.

Hopefully, these socks will be just as satisfying.

I'm actually farther along than this pic shows.  Both heels are, well, not turned exactly, because these socks sport forethought heels, which are like afterthought heels but you install them inline.  While working on sock #1, I dwelt on how much I hate fore/afterthought heels, but by the time I finished #2, I was getting the hang of it.

The knitting of baby blanket #1 is done - time for seaming (ugh!) and the border.

I tried seaming two the other night, using the recommended mattress stitch, but I do not like the results.  When I get up the gumption, I will try weaving them together instead.

And I finished up a garterlac dishcloth, but no pic because my camera and I are having a quarrel over how swiftly it eats batteries now.  It didn't used to do that, even after I dropped it a while back, but now it is definitely a problem.  I'm wondering if it is time for a new camera.

Final pic of the wrap and go for the gold

As I predicted, the Every Way Wrap blocked out beautifully.

Pattern:  Every Way Wrap from Interweave Knits Fall 2009
Yarn:  Karabella Aurora 8, in Anthracite
Needles:  US9 (I think)
Modifications:  Other than an extra pattern repeat, none

The buttonholes are there, but I'm leaving the button selection to my daughter, for whom I knit this.

A lot of the knitting for this wrap occurred while I watched the Olympics, but for some reason, during the final hockey game, I felt the need for a new dishcloth.

This is the Mason-Dixon 9-patch, with colors representing the US and Canada on the ice, vying for gold.  I picked up stitches through the bumps at the ends of the garter rows, in an attempt to make the thing more reversible.  I didn't photograph the reverse side, but take my word for it, it's still not all that reversible.

Speaking of reversible, I am interested in doing a reversible entrelac baby blanket and searched for such on the Web.  Turns out, I am not the only one with an interest in "garterlac".  There is a pattern for a dishcloth, so I will try that first, to see how it looks.  What I would really like to do, though, is a baby blanket in Tunisian crochet.  Check out the Winter 2009 issue of Interweave Crochet.  I'm just not sure I want to learn something new right now.  My brain feels full.

Truth in labeling

The Quickie Socks truly were a quick knit.  But that's what one would expect when knitting in worsted wool.

Pattern:  Quickie Socks from The Joy of Sox
Yarn:  I'm not sure but it is red worsted
Needles:  US4 DPNs
Modifications:  Unless you include modifications to correct the errors in the pattern, none.

I was afraid these were going to be too small, but once bathed and blocked, they proved to be plenty big for my daughter.  I think the yarn is superwash wool, but I can't find the ball band.  Since the color did not bleed, I will knit up a quick swatch and throw it into the laundry tomorrow to see if it felts.  Better safe than sorry.

Meanwhile, I went in search of baby-appropriate yarn.  The following Lorna's Laces is in the process of becoming a baby afghan.

And this Ella Rae Classic will become a crayon-colored blanket.

And why do I need baby-appropriate yarn?  Because I am going to be a GRANDMA!!!

Sockaholic

The purple Diagonal Cross-Rib socks are 100% done.

Pattern:  Diagonal Cross-Rib socks from Favorite Socks
Yarn:  Cherry Tree Hill Supersock Solid in purple
Needles:  US2 and US1 DPNs (cuffs and top of leg in US2, rest in US1)
Modifications:  None, except the toe ends with a different number of stitches on the instep and sole, so I knit one more round, decreasing the extra stitches.

With a 70-stitch cast on, I figured these would fit me, and I was right.

The diagonal cross-rib slants in opposite directions on each sock, which added interest to the knit, although I had to keep track of which one went which way.

Between the number of stitches around and the elongated length of the legs, plus my big feet, it is no wonder I used up every bit of yarn in the 4-oz skein.  Oh.  I just noticed that this pattern is designed to fit a man.  Ha!  Just call me Big Foot.

The red Quickie socks from Joy of Sox made some progress, lost some headway, then surged back.  Following the short row heel instructions just did not seem to be working for me, so I checked the publisher's website for errata.  All I found was a typo in the gauge.  When I turned the second heel, though, I modified the pattern and liked the results well enough that I redid the first sock's heel.  And only then did I check the pattern on Ravelry.  There are more errata there, including the corrections I figured out for myself.

These socks still look way too small, but the pattern says they are stretchy.  We'll see just how stretchy they are.  And I thought the yarn was some superwash merino I bought a while ago, but from wrestling with it, I'm guessing I am confused about its washability.  If they are too small for anyone, maybe I will wash them and see if they felt/shrink, and if they do, they can become xmas tree ornaments.

And since I think the above socks will finish up quickly, I started another pair yesterday.

The Chevron pattern from Sensational Knitted Socks, in the chevron stitch, in my last skein of ONline Supersocke 100.  I really don't like this yarn.  It's too thin, has no body, and the colors in the stripes tend to be muddy, although this particular colorway is better than usual.  These are for my daughter because, well, she's my daughter.

Also for my daughter is the Every Way Wrap, which is all done but for the blocking.

The final ribbing took forEVER because I kept screwing up thanks to an exciting Olympics.  I'm anxious to see how the cables plump after a good soak.