Socks, socks, socks

Okay, yes, I have a lot of unfinished socks still lurking about. And, look, oh dear, three of them are the same as the last time I examined my Unfinished Objects. At least the St. Peter Port Stripes are onto the second heel. I'll progress on them when my next two pair are finished. The Hiiumaas haven't progressed at all, but I have decided not to rip out the heel. See? Procrastinate long enough, and the motivation will vanish. I'll work on them on the next road trip. The spaghetti socks haven't progressed, either, and will absolutely have to be ripped out. I can see getting back to them after Christmas. And snuck in there is another little project. I want some 'plain knitting' socks, which they will be after a little bit of effort. But December is approaching, so I started working on the Kai-Meis instead.

Pretty, pretty yarn

I am knitting with the prettiest yarn! It's called Sapphire Sparkle, and it's more of that non-existent Dream in Color Stardust.


It's very tricky to photograph. Both these pictures make it look brighter than it is. It's a very deep, dusky blue with indigo in it. Total twilit-sky colour. I'm working on the ever-popular Kai-Mei from Sock Innovation. The cuff is so easy. Just 3x3. All knitting-heck breaks loose right around the gussets.

Split Pea Curry

It started in an IM conversation. I was confessing to a friend that on the rare occasion that both children are out of the house, we tend to make a curry run. Since we're the only ones who like to dine on Curry in a Hurry, it's the sensible time to indulge. Plus curry is good for preventing dementia in your later years, and has, uhm, other health benefits, so it's really in our best interests, anyway.

So then I had to google "health benefits of curry" to remind myself of the other benefits. Like warding off cancers! And reducing painful swelling for arthritics. I might not be arthritic, but I do have painful swelling from that encounter with the uneven pavement earlier this week.

Suddenly, I wanted curry. While I can walk from work to a lively business district, there is no curry, except that curry soup at Noodles & Co. I decided that it was too cold to warrant a walk to Noodles, and went to the cafeteria. Look! Curry soup! I finally managed to find a worker who was able to tell me that no, the soup was not vegetarian. Drat! I had a sandwich instead.

So when I got home from work, it was obvious that I needed to make some curry. I started combing through the cookbooks, looking for something that called for ingredients I actually had. I found my answer in Vegan with a Vengeance. Well, it called for a pound of split peas, and I only had three-quarters of a pound, but I rounded it out with red lentils. (I love my scale!) I also had to skip the quarter teaspoon of coriander. I decided that the want of coriander would not keep me from split-pea curry. I even made cumin-fried rice to go with it.

I've been reading food blogs lately, and now I'm supposed to post a very appetising photo of the successful, delicious, flavour-packed curry. I'm afraid it made for much better eating than it did photographing. The lentils weren't even noticed, and while I'm sure it would have been better with the coriander, it was still everything I'd dreamed of.

Evil Hat Heels, Laughing

Pattern: Hat Heel Socks



Yarn: Gothsocks in Evil Laugh





It's so not gothy, but this song is all about Gothsocks, if you ask me:

What is love?
What is love?
I think I know what love is.
I think I know what love is.
I think I know…I think
What is love? What is love?
Mmmmmmm
How do you say…
Delicious?
Delovely?
Delectable?
Devine?
How do you say…
Degorgeous?
Dewith it?
Degroovy?
Define?
Ooh lala lalalalala
How do you say delicious?
How do you say delovely?
How do you say delectable?
How do you say devine?
How do you say deGROOVY?

(Lyrics by Deee-Lite)

Knit-along update

Oh, baby, there's a whole lotta socks goin' on round here. My Gothsocks Evil Laugh yarn is knitting up beautifully. Those colourful stripes are so poignant they make me sniffle. The hat-heel pattern seems to work aesthetically well with self-striping yarn.



I decided to do a garter-stitch toe with no shaping. I learned this in Cat Bordhi's New Pathways. The difference here is I did them top-down. I'm very pleased with the results.

Don't bug me

People, people, I am on a schedule here! I have a knit-along to complete, plus I'm expecting some delicious yarn in the mail, and plan to cast on the moment it arrives.

So I have no time for diversions!

Uhm, that said, I have no real good explanation for this little sock. I knit it up Wednesday night out of leftover Duet Sock Yarn, and attached a travel bug tag. This makes it a trackable item that travels about in geocaches. Sadly, when you send travel bugs out into the world, you have to have low expectations, and be understanding that they may well disappear, but the excitement of watching a travel bug travel successfully means that I'll still send them out. Its travel page is here.


And then on Friday night, I finished up the last leg on this alien. It's been in progress for ages. I added a bilingual mission tag to explain what this alien's goals were, and the tag, and sewed them firmly into the little guy's hand. I knotted it in so many ways, that if some one tries to remove the tag, they'll probably ruin the alien's arm. Not that I want the alien ruined, but I wanted to make it less-rewarding to mess with its mission. And this one's travel page is here.


There was a mega geocaching event here in town this weekend, which is why I rushed these babies out into the world. They were sent to the event, where other cachers picked them up to take them to new destinations.

Okay, distractions over, back to sock knitting!

Celebrate Mercedes

Yesterday, my husband, who reads news in Spanish, read that Mercedes Sosa was failing, and this morning he read of her passing. We spent this stormy, wet Sunday snuggled up, listening to her incredible music.



While listening and snuggling, I was naturally also knitting. The Gothsocks group on Ravelry is sponsoring an October Knitalong, and I absolutely had to join in. Once again, I started with the heels. And while I had intended to knit with Business Time, I got diverted to Evil Laugh before I finished the heels.



Once the heels were finished, I joined the socks and knit the feet two-at-a-time. It's gone pretty quickly today, and I'm almost ready to start the toes.

Finished Object--Opa Socks!

When I last blogged these socks, I was knitting like a madwoman, trying to finish the socks by the end of the weekend.


Fortunately, all that mad knitting paid off, and I wove in the ends about 11pm last Sunday evening.


To refresh, these are hat-heel socks made with Dream in Color Stardust.




I chose to do a reversible cable pattern, just because I like how it looks. The reversibility is an added, unexpected bonus, and the socks can be cuffed or not cuffed.


Also, new shoes! On sale from Lands End for $25.

Mitten shoot!

Today many, many photoshoots happened at our house. The first one I wish to share shows my Monochrome blue-ribbon mittens.

Now joined together

Until now, I've been knitting my hat-heel socks separately. I was going to knit them together starting at the ankles, but I needed to experiment a little. Now that I've settled on a pattern, and knit both legs to the same spot, I've joined the two socks on the same needle.


I have planned four pairs of socks that need to be knitted in the next two months. This means I absolutely need to have these socks finished by the end of the month. I'm hoping for completion by the end of the weekend. We'll see!

Booties!

I am studiously studying leg patterns. Because I have a complete sets of footsies!

Stupid Question

What do you do when you get a new pattern and new yarn all in the same day?

You cast on, of course!


This is the new hat-heel sock from Knitty. I've mused with the idea of starting around the heel before, but never ever from this angle. I tried making the woman's size, but it seemed really tight, so I ripped it out and upgraded to man's. On that needle size, I always do 60-ish stitches around, and the man's size is 64 stitches.


The drawback to this pattern is that there is a lot of picking up stitches. I am not a fan of picking up stitches.


I do rather like knitting the foot first and then the leg. I'm still pondering the leg pattern. I utilised my recent favourite reinforcement techniques on the ball-of-foot and toe area.


I do have a confession. I had my doubts about this Dream in Color Stardust. When I saw the colour variation, I had my suspicions that it might pool. Oh, me of little faith! I should have trusted Dream in Color, because check that out! Splashes of colour, no pools in sight! I love love love it! This is what I always want out of variegated yarn. YES!

State Fair

This is the third year I've entered handwork into the State Fair. I had plans to enter a variety of things, but I wound up just making two entries.


My first entry, the black and grey mittens, took a blue ribbon! I'm not very pleased with how they're being displayed, because they turned the top inside-out to show the convertible finger part. It's hard to see just what's going on. But that's okay! I squealed and jumped up and down.


I also entered a Knitted Babe. I found it more difficult to enter her. I think it might be because she has a face--I have more severe fear of rejection for her, although that is totally silly. She got a red ribbon! I hope she enjoys her stay at the State Fair.

Further acquisitions

I think I have favourite yarns. Yes, I think I do. It's official: my favourites are Gothsocks and Dream in Colour. While I'm doing pretty good, well, sorta, about not acquiring yarns heltersketer, I do wind up acquiring my favourites whenever the opportunity arises.

Discontinued Name Brand Yarns has been selling Stardust. It's a cousin to Starry, an experiment that didn't make it to the regular product line. But it's delicious. Everything I love in Dream in Colour, plus a little sparkle. And lovely colours. Slightly discounted. SQUEEEEEE.

Aquisitions--Gimmee gimmee Goth!

Yes, yes, I've muttered many times about how hard it is to buy Gothsocks anymore. Etsy-stalking is involved. It goes like this:

• Update is scheduled for 10am
• In the hours before, ponder what you really want. Make decisions in advance.
  
• At 9:55, load all applicable pages in firefox. Log in to Etsy.
• At 9:59, start hitting F5, watch for the pages to fill with yarn.
• When you see a yarn you want, don't stop to think. Grab whatever it is you see that you know you want. Only one skein.
• Checkout at top speed. Commit to buy the yarn.
• If you're lucky, hooray!
• If your yarn vanished from you, remove it from the cart.
• Try other yarns, other pages. Do the same until the yarn is all gone.
• By now it's probably 10:01. Go to the Gothsocks group on Ravelry and gloat about what you got, or whine about what you missed.
  

I managed to score 2 skeins a couple weeks ago. Evil Laugh was the top of my list, and I got it! Then I also managed Business Time. I am a fan of the Shades of Grey theme.


Stephanie, the yarn artiste, is kind enough to combine shipping costs, even when you purchase separately, or refund what you overpaid. The yarn arrived really fast, and it's as lovely as ever. I don't really spend my evenings petting this yarn. No, really.

*pet*pet*

Knitty!

Congratulations, Kathleen, on your Knitty pattern!

Emergency Tailoring

At the end of last school year, my middle schooler was preparing for high school, and my lower schooler was preparing for middle school. My son pulled all middle school uniform shirts from his room and set them out for his little sister. She went through them and determined which ones she would wear and which she wouldn't. I was satisfied that she had a good set of nice, unstained, quality uniform shirts to wear. And, because I'm a nice mom and understand that a new shirt now and then is nice, I even bought her two brand new uniform shirts in girl colours.

Fast forward to the start of the school year. It's the second day of school, and the girl is wearing the same shirt as she wore the first day of school. I question this, pointing out that it's Uncool to wear the same shirt two days in a row, and why doesn't she wear another shirt? She says there's only one other shirt she'll wear, and she's saving that for Friday.

So! Whereas I thought we had over a week's worth of shirts, she's thinking she's going to complete her entire school year in only two shirts. Further questioning reveals that the rest of the shirts are all BOY SHIRTS, and she'll only wear girl shirts. This is definitely a generational thing. To me, they're all t-shirts!

Well, I'm not the kind of mom that's going to dish out a hundred plus dollars to buy the girl a new middle school wardrobe when she has perfectly fine slightly-used shirts to wear. On the other hand, I do understand that middle school is a strange and delicate time, and sometimes it's incredibly important to fit in. So while I will not buy her new shirts, there is something I can do. I can tailor those boy shirts into girl shirts.

So 7am on the second day of school found me in the sewing room, basting a t-shirt for her to try on. Then I even had to thread the serger, because apparently I had walked away in disgust when it became unthreaded, last time I was sewing. I still managed to cut the shirt down and we all got to school/work on time by 7:30. (Although I didn't manage to make myself a lunch that day. That's what work cafeterias are for.)

What's the difference between a boy's t-shirt and a girl's t-shirt? About an inch on each side, all the way down from the hem of the sleeve to the hem of the shirt.

Lunch Stuff

I have a deep dark secret. I privately long to be a lunch-time chef and artiste extraordinaire. Reality is much less entertaining. Reality is more like the kids slapping together a pb&j, while #1Man cuts up apples for them. But while reality is dim, I still peruse lunchtime cookbooks and purchase cute bento items. I have recently been exploring Jennifer McCann's books and blog.

Yesterday I made a batch of flautas. While I got the recipe from her book, it's actually available on her blog here. I cooked flautas until I ran out of refried beans. Surprisingly, that was only enough for three of us to try one each last night, and then the same three of us to take three for lunch. Poor #1Man didn't even get to try one.



Lunch was packaged with a generous container of salsa, a little cucumber-tomato salad, and some leftover white rice. After dipping the flautas in the delicious salsa, I mixed what salsa was left with the leftover rice, which was even more yumminess. Yay lunch!

Weekend knitting report

Well! I've been knitting! But not much blogging. The last two weekends have involved travelling, and this weekend involved some day trips.

I have completed, and even blocked, my Monochrome mittens. I'd like to get some nice photos of them, all finished, to blog their final monochromosity.

I have a bad habit of starting projects, and then abandoning them. Surely I'm unique in this! The ones that get abandoned often don't even make it to the blog or to ravelry, they're that neglected. Maybe I'm just not sure enough about them. One such project was a hat that was slated to use up the yarn leftover from the Strawberry Kiwi mittens. I looked up an i-cord cast on, and got to work. My enthusiasm faded somewhere around 90 stitches. That cast on has been sitting in my bedroom for over six months. This week, I picked it up, and progressed on it. It's nearly done, just needs some finishing touches.

I've also started another Knit First, Dye Later pair of longies. It's been done before. But I want to do it again.

Baby socks!

They're just like another pair I made.



They are made from the last of the Dusky Aurora Dream in Color yarn, using the Sky Sock pattern from New Pathways.

I started them last March, when the baby's grandparents were visiting me. I didn't quite manage to finish them before the folks left, and the socks languished. I pulled them out and finished them up last week, before going to a family wedding.

I asked to hold the baby they were made for, my grand-nephew, who is now 7 months old. I wandered off, and tried the socks on him in secret. They did indeed fit, with just a little room to spare, so I went ahead and gifted them to the parents.

Dream in Color Classy is wonderful. I want an endless collection of it.