And a sock post

So I'm finishing up a pair of socks that never made it to the blog. These were my more portable project, something to knit on when knitting Jeanie was inappropriate or implausible. I've actually expanded my definition of when knitting Jeanie is appropriate. For a while, I considered her too bulky/finicky to take to work, but I've decided to just deal with the problems, since I can make serious progress by using an entire hour every day at lunch.



But back to the socks. I had intended these to be my July socks for the Sock-A-Month club. Yes, I did. I even thought I could make it, for I was making steady progress up the leg as July was waning. Yeah, well, I didn't. And then I didn't make it for August or September, either! At the end of September, I was only 3 rows from casting off. Now I've cast off one sock, and woven in its ends, too. It won't take me long to finish the second sock, but I'm just not willing to take much time away from Jeanie. I will, however, finish this pair in October.



My participation in the Sock-A-Month club this time round has been pathetic. What a bummer. I hope that I can finish off Jeanie and get back into the groove. I even have baby socks to make, so that might help me succeed in the sock department in the months to come.

Breaking the Silence

So, yeah, I didn't blog in a very long time. The quietude of the blog is a pulsating symptom of the unquietude of my life. Not much knitting time at all, and the very lack of time meant that any free knitting time was spent actually knitting, rather than blogging. And then I found that the longer I hadn't posted, the harder it was to break the silence and start posting again. So this weekend heralds the Return of Blogging. So it seems.



First off, I'm posting a better picture of the new yarn that arrived this weekend from the Loopy Ewe. I have been making progress on my Jeanie, and I was starting to panic that the wrap wouldn't be long enough. I decided to order another skein. Now, I ordered it knowing full well that it wouldn't likely be the same dye lot and could easily not match. I ordered it fully accepting this possibility. And when the yarn arrived, even though I didn't have the wrap nearby to check, I immediately knew that the yarn wouldn't match at all. It doesn't even look like the same colourway. Oh well. Now I will be forced to knit something else with this divinely soft and lofty merino. Woe is me.



I also have decided to use smooshy to make a pair of knee-highs. I didn't think one skein would be enough for knee-highs, so I ordered another skein of Ruby Red. Again, I knew the colourways might not be compatible, but in this case, I had no attachment to them matching. The new skein is, indeed, a little lighter, with more colour variation. I'm okay with this. I'm confident they'll be fantastic as socks, even if it's obvious they aren't identical.



I've been knitting diligently on Jeanie. At the moment, this is my primary project. I am yearning to cast on the abovementioned ruby red knee-highs, but I will not. I have a deadline on Jeanie, and I really have to finish her up. She's at 49 inches right now. The pattern says to knit to 66 inches before starting the edging. While the progress I've been making has seemed minuscule, I can finally say I'm approaching the end.



This weekend I worked on the lower edging. This lower edge has been parked on a knitpicks cable from my interchangeable needles kit. I had a very difficult time getting the edging right, because the stitches didn't quite line up with the stitch columns. Have you ever noticed that? I've noticed it in situations where I'm working on mittens, and have taken out the waste yarn holding the place for the thumb. The upper edge, especially if the mitten is in pattern, is awkwardly not aligned with the stitches. This was the problem I had with the lower edging. For a column of 8 stitches, I had 7 live stitches to edge. Awkward, yes? I finally just ploughed forward. I don't know if the edge is adequately pretty. I hope so. I also hope blocking makes Jeanie blocky.

Acquisitions!

Fresh from the Loopy Ewe, 2 new duplicate colours. I was hoping the Pansy yarn would be a good match for Jeanie, but no luck. The ruby is also a duplicate because i want knee socks. Wow did they arrive fast!

Singular Sock Wrap-up

In a previous post, I weighed my pine and pumpkin sock yarn and determined I had enough left to make one more sock. In a previouser post, I had examined the finished socks and pondered what project could use up the yarn. In the spirit of serious stash-busting, I went ahead and made another Hiiumaa sock, to match the others and use up what was left. I started it last April on a trip to Seattle, using my nice Comfort Zone needles on the plane. (These needles are in my comfort zone because I'm terrified of having my needles confiscated. I figure the Comfort Zone needles not only aren't metal, but can hardly be threatening in any interpretation.) Unfortunately, the sad truth is, while I admire double points, finding them aesthetically pleasing, and they appeal strongly to my vintage sensibilities, I just don't like knitting with them at all. Thus, the entire sock has been a pain in the bum to knit.

Two nights ago I was finally about to start the toe decreases, and the menfolk came into the room to chat. I showed them the sock, along with how much green yarn was remaining.

#1Man, with a sigh: Does this mean you need to buy more yarn?
Me: No, it just means the sock will have an orange toe.
#1Son: That's what I love about homemade socks. You work with what you've got, and they always turn out cooler than any other socks.

Yes, the #1Son does deserve many, many pairs of socks.



So I began knitting the decreases, and immediately discovered a grievous error. While 3 needles had 18 stitches, as they should, 1 needle had 21 stitches. Very, very wrong. The error originated from some anomaly in the gusset decreases, this I am sure. I cannot offer a satisfactory explanation. I can only say that I completed the gusset decreases during a lunch hour at work, sitting outside in the shade during a hot desert noon, listening to Orson Scott Card's Shadow Puppets on my mp3 player. Apparently I was distracted enough not to count thoroughly and notice that while the first decrease needle was at the right spot, the second one most certainly was not.

Then I began to agonize. Clearly, the extra three stitches over the course of the sock were responsible for me running out of yarn. I had a choice: rip back to the decreases, fix, and reknit the foot, or just proceed. I articulated the question:

If I knit forward, making the toe orange, will it be a visual reminder of my failure and mistakes? Or will it be a powerful symbol of my flexibility and adaptability?

The menfolk clearly couldn't see that an extra three stitches on one needle was any thing to get upset about and certainly couldn't see why I would have to rip back. I decided to adopt their casual attitude and proceeded, using what green remained to make an echo of the cuff pattern. And I am very pleased with how it turned out! I'm happy, not annoyed, that I didn't rip back, and delighted with how the toe looks.


These five socks in the photo began with four balls of Knit Picks Essential. All that remains is that tiny little length of pumpkin yarn. Not a bad output from four balls of yarn.

Road trip wrap up post #4

From my sister-in-law comes a treasure, on loan.

These antique sock blockers came to her from her daughter, with special but secret meaning relating to their origin. But they don't see much sock-blocking action, so for now, they will be treasured here, blocking socks as they are made to do, but will return to their previous domicile at an unnamed date in the future.

This last is a good picture of the Whidbey-Kiwandis Socks, which have been difficult to capture visually.

Singular sock progress

Probably because I started it in April, this singular Hiiumaa sock has seemed to drag on and on. I am pushing to finish it up before I succumb to the temptation to start a new pair. I'm running low on green yarn and i'm curious to see what will end first- the yarn or the sock.

Delicious

Last night, #1Man and I went for a nice evening walk. We wound up at a local bookstore spent a happy hour browsing. Before departing, my husband discovered a cookbook that totally inspired him. Now he's not normally the cookbook buyer in our house. There are a lot of cookbooks on the shelf and that's entirely my fault. However! If he's going to be excited by a cookbook, I'm going to encourage impulse purchasing!

Tonight he made the dish on the front cover and it was sensational. A bajillion flavours in one happy mouthful. 

Road trip wrap-up post #3

So I've gotten into the habit of knitting from Knitting on the Road whenever I'm away from home. It's a cutesy little habit, but fun. This time I upped the cute factor by casting on the Friday Harbor socks on Whidbey Island. We didn't actually make it to Friday Harbor this trip, but we stayed in Anacortes, and spent a day on Whidbey Island, the very places she references in her description of the pattern.



Pattern: Friday Harbor from Knitting on the Road
Yarn: Mountain Colors. I've lost the tag on this yarn. I thought it was the yarn called for in the book, but I also thought it was Bearfoot, and the pattern called for Weavers Wool. So I'm all confused. Ravelry calls Bearfoot fingering, and this is chunkier than fingering. So I just remain confused.



Needle: Size 5 Knitpicks circular. The pattern called for a size 2 needle, so I'd brought along a size 3, expecting to use that. I was swatching in the car on our drive from Anacortes to Langley, and I was so very impatient to get knitting. Size 3 didn't give me gauge, so I pulled out my set of interchangable needles, but size 4 didn't give me gauge, either. I was so relieved that size 5 worked, because then I could STOP SWATCHING AND START KNITTING. Unfortunately, I had stitch gauge but not row gauge, and thus wound up running out of space on the foot before I'd properly completed the second chart.



While it seems like a flagrant act of insubordination to knit Nancy Bush socks on circular needles, I'm just not such a fan of double points. I was grateful that I knew the cuff chart involved a little tweaking and knit-reading on the part of the knitter. If you follow the chart blindly, it comes out wrong. I knit each cuff, heel, and toe separately, and worked the legs and feet together, magic loop style, on the circulars.



The cuffs and legs were knit in the Puget Sound area. The first heel was knit in Wenatchee. The second heel was knit on the beach in Pacific City, Oregon. The feet and toes were completed on the long drive home.

Road trip wrap-up post #2

We took a pilgrimage! We had an evening in Portland, and as well as a lovely visit to Trader Joe's, we made a special journey to Powell's Books. It truly is a City of Books. We only had an hour to explore, which was completely inadequate.

I started out seeking a book on women's history. The section was huge, and had many tantalizing possibilities, although one set that particularly interested me came in four volumes, and they only had two. When I stopped to think about what I really wanted, I realized that I was particularly interested in reading about the librarian of Alexandria. I browsed the section on history of Egypt, but didn't find anything remotely relevant. There were plenty of generic history of Egypt books, but I wanted more than a brief mention of the Alexandria stuff. I also looked at their customer computer, but didn't find anything with a keyword search.

Discouraged, I moved on to browsing through their staff recommendations. There were several books on there that caught my eye. But then I found a book, there in the recommendations, The rise and fall of Alexandria. I was surprised it hadn't been in the Egypt section! While not specifically about the library, which is why I hadn't found in when searching on the computer, it's about the academic and intellectual environment of Alexandria, which suits my purposes just fine. I've read a few chapters and am really enjoying it.

When done browsing the history floor, I wandered down to the craft room. The knitting section was so plentiful I couldn't even begin to explore it, but I did find some very affordable and interesting vegetarian cookbooks.

Powell's is awesome! The entire family was enchanted, and the selection was unbelievable.

Road Trip Wrap-Up Post #1

Well! Yesterday morning I was knitting on an Oregon beach, the Pacific Ocean keeping me company. Today I'm back in desert country, baking in near 100F heat, wondering why I just finished a pair of thick woolen socks.

But one of the most important developments to come out of the road trip--even more important than a new pair of socks--I am no longer a graduate student!! People ask me what I'm going to do with all that time now. I glance down at my knitting and shrug.

Knitting on the road

A finished object! Knitted completely on the road, these road trip socks even have their ends woven in, though they could use a good blocking. Many pics and details to follow.

More on acquisitions

Even better, my 6 new skeins are from home grown, well loved family alpacas. The cousins scooped the poop and now i can knit the yarn. More pictures to follow when i get a chance to upload from my camera.

Acquisitions

6 skeins of delicious, soft, pettable alpaca yarn and It's all mine.

pretty ballerina!

I have a finished object!




Leg warmers
Yarn: Duets Middy in frostberry
Pattern: Broad spiral ribbing from More Sensational Knitted Socks
Needles: Addi Turbo Size 3 circular



It's been a long dry knitting season, and I'm so pleased to have finished SOMETHING.



As usual, when I went to take pictures, my dear friend came to investigate.

Actual knitting progress

I have knitted on nothing but leg warmers in the past few weeks. They have slowly approached their limit, and now need only one more 4-row repeat before I start on the upper cuffs. Onward leg warmers!

Acquisitions

Okay, so no yarn acquisitions to report, but a really good haul at the thrift store. I actually showed up there to find a simple too-small black t-shirt for the #1son for him to use for 80s Rocker Day at school. I succeeded.



Inspired by this flickr group, I browsed through the sheets at the thrift store. While I didn't find any fabulous sheets, I did find a pillow case that will make a perfect skirt for my grrlee. Although she's making the case for a sundress, which would also be lovely. Aaaaand, I also bought a wee skirt. The skirt is size 4, which doesn't fit anyone around here. But I'm such a sucker for those lovely fabrics that I just needed to bring it home with me. I might tailor it a little to fit a dollie, or chop it up to make knitted babes clothes, or even just hang on to it so I can admire its delicious fabric whenever the mood strikes.



Lastly, I found a fabulous skirt. Interestingly, its label declared it to be a size that I know for a fact that I cannot fit. Holding it up, I could tell it was generously sized and certainly not the size it claimed to be. I bought it without trying it on, and was pleasantly surprised to find that it's even a little big. I wish this could be my claim that I've dropped two sizes, but really it's just poor sizing on the part of the manufacturer.



ETA--After writing the above about sizes, it occurred to me that it's quite possible the skirt was designed to be worn low over the hips, which would explain why it's so wide. I'm just of the wrong fashion generation to even consider such a possibility. So it's not an error of sizing on the part of the manufacturer, it's just my lame fashion sense.

Mother's Day Joy

Yes, I'm 2 weeks behind. Yes, I'm playing catchup today. I'm 3 weeks and 2 projects away from the end of graduate school and so my priorities continue to be time-wasters that do not involve knitting or blogging. However, I did want to note my nice little set of Mother's Day giftees.

I was quite bemused the Saturday evening before. The family was discussing a walk, and I suggested we walk to the bookstore. My #1Man and #1Son exchanged glances and said, "Naw, not the bookstore." Me, being obtuse, asked, "Why not?" #1Son said, "Because there's, uhm, a tornado over by the bookstore and we wouldn't want you to get hurt."

His gift to me was the pictured copy of Things I Learned From Knitting (Whether I Wanted To or Not). When I got it, I immediately cracked open the book and sure enough, it was signed! He hadn't even noticed that. I missed the Yarn Harlot's visit, which was a bummer, but again directly related to the amount of schoolwork going down here. So to get a signed book was a nice little gift to make it all better. The book is perfect for an overworked graduate student, you can read short little chapters of knitting hilarity whenever you want to sandwich it in.

As you can see in the photo, I also scored a nicely framed photo, taken by my #1grrl, and a biography of Julie Andrews, Home. As I've long been a fan of Ms Andrews, (Victor/Victoria, anyone?) this was a really cool gift. I'll be reading this on our Monumental Road Trip this summer.

Acquisitions

Check it out! A brand new Laptop Lunch! Actually I bought three of them, although only one is pictured here.



This came from the fine folks at Red Apple School Supply, also home of the Green Apple Earth Friendly School Supplies. I'm sure I sound like an ad, but no affiliation, I'm just glad to support these guys.



I purchased these for myself and kidlets, in support of the new lunch excitement that pervades the household. You see, I browsed pictures of bento lunches with the kidlets, and they were both very inspired.



Now they're making exciting poser bentos, and two good things have come out of this. First of all, their lunches are now packed with colourful and nutritious variety. Secondly, the inspiration is such that they are making their lunches the night before, which makes for much easier mornings.



The pictures show our attempts at making rice balls. I first had rice balls 20 years ago, when us Canadian teens (college age) had cultural exchange parties with some Japanese teens who were attending an English school in our town. We fixed nachos, which was a common party food for us at the time, and involved sprinkling grated cheese on chips and broiling it in the oven. The Japanese girls fixed rice balls, which were far more labour intensive. As we watched them assembling this lovely feast, we were shamed by our lame little addition to the party. The rice balls were so delicious, too!





I attempted making rice balls with the kids a four or five years ago. I had googled some recipes and gave it a try. They were not very impressive, and the kidlets didn't like them. I asked some Japanese mothers at school, and a very nice mom had her husband pick me up some rice ball molds while he was in San Francisco. I'm afraid I was too intimidated to try it again. But now, with the kids so excited, we ventured into that cultural adventure again. We used the molds, which work great. And since they made them themselves, the kids liked the rice balls.

a finished object!

I've been participating in the Sock-a-Month knit-along for over a year, now. I do like the regular discipline of ensuring that I finish at least a pair a month. My wavy socks, started in March, were slated to be my April pair. I didn't turn the heels until the final Sunday before April ended, but I still maintained high hopes of finishing them in time.



Unfortunately, as bedtime approached on April 30th and I was still knitting up the leg, it became increasingly obvious that I wasn't going to make the deadline. While examining my options, it became clear I had two choices: Miss the deadline, or cast off where I was, just so I could finish in April. The socks were at that moment as tall as crew socks, but I have noticed that the socks with a little extra height quickly become my favourites, so I really wanted to add a couple more inches to the socks. I finally admitted that finishing the socks too short was sheer foolishness and admitted defeat.



On May 1, I attended a band concert, and I had enough sitting time to finish the socks, and even did the bind off while enjoying high school jazz. I did a bindoff I believe was recommended by Bordhi, where you bindoff with two strands held together to give the cuff a braid-like appearance. It looked lovely but unfortunately was too tight.

The socks languished, finished but imperfect, since then. Today I was preparing to attend a knitting circle. I know it's a vanity, but I like to wear a pair of hand-knitted socks when I hang with knitting buddies. A peek in my drawer showed that all my hand-knitted socks were in the laundry! (Yes, I know what I'll be doing all weekend.) So I pulled out my finished but imperfect socks, ripped out the bindoff, and finished them with an EZ sewn bindoff. It took me 45 minutes, and I was able to wear the socks to the knitting circle. It's not really showing off, it's more like show-and-tell, or maybe like a group identification object, like the Red Hat Ladies and their red hats.



Pattern: wavy rib from More Sensational Knitted Socks
Architecture: Riverbed Architecture from New Pathways for Sock Knitters
Yarn: Araucania sock yarn
Needle: Addi Turbo Size 2 circular
Notes: For the heel, I dropped down to a size 1 needle. This made a nice tight fabric for the heel. It also attempted to compensate for me knitting the foot a little long, but obviously didn't compensate enough, because when I look at the picture above, I can see the heel is a little baggy. These socks were my first try at a garter stitch toe, as shown in the picture below, and so far I'm pleased with the results.



Unfortunately, when worn, the wavy pattern disappears and it becomes rather blocky, instead.

Life happens, too

Since I'm mired in a slow-knitting quarter (though I do have a finished object to show when the batteries charge), I just thought I'd poke my head into blog land, say hi, and share a few tales from the real world.

Hi!

Yesterday afternoon, my daughter asked if she could have a brownie. I replied "Yes, if you eat three baby carrots, first." We both wandered upstairs to munch on baby carrots. She liked them so much she decided she didn't even want a brownie anymore and took the bag of carrots outside to share with all her friends. Go figure.

Last week, my 13 year old son announced somewhere around 7:30pm that we needed to make cookies for the bake sale tomorrow. Oh really? I whipped out my classic Better Homes and Gardens cookbook to look at a few ideas, and he decided that macaroons looked simple. Now I know that blending eggs to a soft peak and stiff peak and all that is not simple, but I didn't bother to squash his enthusiasm. Especially since we had all the ingredients on hand. The first step is to separate the eggs. He was familiar with the process, so he must have witnessed it at a friend's house, because I assure you, I don't separate eggs on a daily, weekly, monthly, or even yearly basis. He wanted to try it, and the first egg went really well. I showed him how you separate them into a different bowl, so that if you goof up one egg, you don't contaminate the entire batch. The second egg... well he cracked that egg open and wouldn't you know? There was a yolk in both halves! I laughed so hard. What a time to get a double-yolked egg! Incredibly, although we had 2 yolk-escapage events, I was able to scoop them carefully out without incident, the egg whites were not contaminated, and we were able to acheive the proper peakage. There was an emergency call to my mother mid-process, but the line was busy! We had to proceed without advice and the macaroons turned out delicious.