What a girl knitter needs...

Is a way to surf Ravelry and knit at the same time. Overload! I can read while I knit, but being on the internet is hard what with all the clicking and scrolling. What bliss it would be to shop for new yarn while I fondle old yarn knit though...

It would also be nice to have a way to tink SSKs. Those are a real mess to undo.

DH's socks are halfway done, and I know this because #1 is complete (with the exception of end-weaving) and #2 is cast-on. The finished sock is a perfect fit. :D Which means, of course, that I'd better not throw it in the dryer, lest it not remain a perfect fit. (Oddly, though, my swatch--and yes, I made a swatch and washed & dried it--did not shrink a bit. If anything, it grew, which really blows my mind.)

have you any wool?

Time for some yarn pr0n! *evil grin*

I got a Knit Picks catalogue in the mail the other day and open it up to have a row of happily-dressed feet and saw this:

I'm just tickled by that color combo for some reason. I love chocolate brown paired with other colors because it heightens the prominence of the other color. But here, it's like the others set the stage for the brown. It's cute.

Then, I saw a pic of some other yarn by Claudia Hand Paints and toodled on over to her site and found this pretty picture staring at me:

Oh... that's yummy. All the golds, browns, and pinks blend together but then there's the splash of pretty blue.

But what's really tempting me is the Panda Silk from Crystal Palace. My LYS carries it and I've been thinking about it ever since I laid eyes on the stuff. (that was months ago.) I love monochromatics and I can just see a knee-high sock knitted up in the Nutmeg striping yarn with the ribbing, heel and toe in the coordinating sButterscotch solid. (The brown-toned ones) I want!

Once I saw these pretty yarny colors I couldn't get them out of my head! I love the idea of bamboo/silk/wool blend. How luxurious is that?

Funny thing is: I don't wear pretty socks! Isn't that a riot that I would drool so much over sock yarn? And adore knitting socks? I always wear basic white or black socks and I like them thick and squooshy on bottom. So, what would I do with fabulous sock yarn, or for that matter, fabulous knitted socks? I'm terrified of knitting fabulous socks for myself only to find I don't enjoy wearing them. Oh yes, this is ironic, miss Acciosocks...

Baa, baa, black sheep...

Anouk is complete! I put snaps on last night. I'm disappointed with my alignment skills, as the snaps are a little too visible for my taste. Still better than the dress gaping at her shoulder though!

I've started DH's socks and so far... so good! The Trekking knits up quite sharp in k3 p1 ribbing. (Could it be that I've used so much cotton lately that wool is surprising me? This must be why the Yarn Harlot loves wool because dang! It looks slick.) The top is k2 p2 for stretch and the ankle and top of foot will be k3p1 for a stylish look and a little stretch. I've slipped the 3 inches I have on DH's tickly feet and, well, like I said. :D

Dh wanted to order something from Amazon but it came up $5 short to get free shipping, so he asked me if there was something I wanted. Well, of course! Don't you know I have a whole list of knitting books I'm interested in as a matter of fact? I ordered No Sheep For You and should be seeing it soon. Exciting stuff, whilst I knit with a bamboo blend yarn...

(OK, I do ctach the irony of extoling both the sheepish and non-sheepish virtues of my Trekking simultaneously. Let's just enjoy the complexities of the thing, shall we?)

Come back, Jack

OK, coming back to my blog after a while I actually realized how long it's been since I updated and... how long it's been since I started Anouk! Well, Anouk is done with the exception of adding a snap to secure the shoulder. Bonus picture on the blog of Pumpkin showing off her dress!

I did lots and lots of math to make this thing work, given the re-formulation of the yarn. On my gauge swatch, the yarn knit up smaller, so I calculated how many more stitches I needed to get the size in inches that the pattern wanted. I added that many stitches throughout the pattern then doubled all the instructions since I knit one piece in the round, not two pieces flat.
I widened the shoulder strap, as per another Raveler's recommendation, but then didn't think to add another buttonhole. So one button isn't really cutting it, hence the need for a snap.

Pumpkin seems to enjoy the dress, but she does tug at it a lot, which stresses me out. Please don't stretch out mommy's work! On the plus side, she has now learned the word 'dress.'

It was a bit mind-bending to make this dress work, which is why it took so long. I also have whipped out one of the many baby hats I'm going to need for the year and I'm just getting warmed up! So far, I'm not behind at all. The babies being born next month have knitted things ready for them, and the next babies are due in August. For now I'm going to concentrate on DH's socks, then return to baby hats and hopefully knock those out quickly so I can get a start on Christmas knitting. Which is pretty much all socks. Accio socks!!!

It's never easy, is it?

I want to accomplish lots of knitting this year. It's only January, I know! But I would like to have knitted gifts for Christmas this year, everyone is pregnant right now (except me), and my DH and Pumpkin need hand knits, too! I updated my queue on Ravelry to try to get it all out of the jumble those projects were making in my head and get myself organized and prioritized. Trouble is, with as much as I want to accomplish, a baby blanket for a baby due in May seems like it needs to be done tomorrow when I have so many others to knit. But I'm excited about each and every project.

Ugh, except Anouk. No, I'm excited about the yarn, which is quite soft, and the finished look I have in my head which is going to be extremely stylish on my sweet Pumpkin Pie. I chose celery and chocolate and will probably duplicate stitch flowers in pink (later...) But I have come to discover that the Cascade Pima Tencel has changed since the pattern was written, and so the original gauge for the pattern is impossible to obtain. So now the sweet little dress that I ordered the yarn called for specifically so it wouldn't stress me out changing things--needs to be changed. Argh!

So now it's on hold and I'm starting a baby blanket for a baby due in May. It's simple and I want to work on something I can just get out of the way and off my queue. I have so many things on there I'm having a hard time just relaxing and doing them one at a time. Adding to it, my little baby has learned to walk and is becoming a little girl, which means I'm running out of time to knit her all the cute tiny things I want to knit her!...OMGIgottagogetbusynow!!!... :)

No Sheep For You!

I checked out No Sheep For You at the library last week and have pored over it. It is so amazingly informative about all the nonwool options out there and has patterns that capitalize on the properties of nonwool yarns. I am particularly interested in Eileen, Tomato, and the Drunken Argyle sweater (knit out of sock yarn!), because I just love argyle. (I really need to learn some intarsia one of these days so I can actually knit some...) I so want this book next Christmas!

Skinny scarf is all done. It is a freakish 5 feet long. I had no idea it was so long, all scrunched up on the circulars, OMG. It was a pretty stitch pattern and cotton yarn worked well, except the bind off was a little sloppy, I think. I'd like to wash it to see if it will lay flatter, but I'm afraid the navy yarn is going to bleed.

I just finished a class on Tunisian crochet, which I find much easier than regular crochet. I will be making the Stashbuster blanket using the technique. It was a more rustic, hand-made look to it than I normally like, but what a godsend project to use up (most of) the bucket of yarn I got from my mom & grandmother. It's really clever.

Prettier than Storebought Sin

I did it! I took pictures of some of my old projects that actually make them look a little nicer than they really are.

Project 1


Exhibit A:Looks a bit wonky laid out on an uneven surface like that, doesn't it? Or maybe I just knit it wonky.

Exhibit B:

Now isn't that nicer? It's very 3-dimensional, draped over the edge of the sink. It's in natural light and in context, so it doesn't look like a fledgling knitter's first attempts at purling.

Project 2
Grandaddy of all ugly projects to try to make look nice (I believe I said it was "uglier than homemade sin")

Exhibit A:

Ouch.

Exhibit B:

No amount of photo editing would have erased all the "love" that's been put into this thing, but I think I did a good job showing it off to its best. First of all, I draped it so you can't see the odd shape as my tension got looser as I went. Secondly, the cute kitty cat distracts from really looking at it anyway. :)
I win!