Last week I knitted like crazy to try to clear some WIPs before the start of Ravellenics. I have to be honest; right up until the night before I was not sure I was going to sign up with a team and enter my sweater into an event with Ravellenics, but in the end I did. Oh, but that is another post. This post is about the socks that flew off my needles last week.
So, here they are. I finished my simple vanilla socks first. Easy-peasy.
Here they are. Simple, cute, in a yarn that acts like it will wear like iron. The yarn is madelinetosh twist light, the first time I have used it, and I am liking it. It is really elastic, flashes the colors, and is nice and cushiony on my feet. My Ravelry notes are here.They fit great! It was cold and snowy here this weekend and I wore these guys. I’m really happy with them.
My second pair of socks were more labor intensive. The pattern required following a chart with lots of stitch increases/decreases, so I was slower. Still, I did get one of the socks done and the second one cast on so I wouldn’t abandon it.
It’s hard to see the pattern detail because of the kinky yarn (I unravelled it from a sock blank), but it is there. There is a diagonal rib that travels down the foot of the sock. Cute, but slow to knit. I can’t wait to finish and wear these guys. Ravelry notes are here.
So that’s it. All the WIPs (the unfinished sock and a Mixology shawl) went into limbo while I launched into my traditional Olympics sweater. I started it on Friday and knitted on it all weekend. Wait until I show off my project and progress. Wait until you hear about the group I found of Ravelry. I am so excited and having fun.
I’ve been knitting like crazy and hatching plans. Why, you ask? Well… it’s Olympics time! Time for a great sweater (or two). I’m so excited about getting some serious knitting done while watching the winter games.
Except… I have these WIPs lurking downstairs bleating pitifully. It really is sad. Somehow they know that they are on the verge of being abandoned for weeks to come. For the last few days I’ve taken their cries to heart and have been knitting on them like crazy. Here they are:
These are simple vanilla socks in the pattern by Rachel Coopey called “Dave“. The yarn is a really nice sock yarn from madelinetosh called twist light. This is a simple pattern. Don’t you think I should get these done before Friday night?These socks have been languishing for way too long. Another Rachel Coopey pattern, “Eugene“, they are being knitted from a sock blank dyed by Bonkers. The sock has an interesting pattern that you can’t see well because of the kinky yarn (hey, it was unraveled from the sock blank. It’s trying to be good…), but I think it will look really cool as soon as I finish knitting and block the socks.
Socks are fast. I can almost knit the Dave one while reading. If I work really steady on these I might, just might, get them done before the start of the Olympics.
That just leaves the Mixology Scarf. Right. That is so not going to happen.
Here’s the beginning of the shawl. Nice, huh. I only have about 6 more feet of knitting to go. This is Mixology by Casapinka.
I love the colors of the shawl. I’m completely intrigued to discover how all the different colors will interact with each other. I couldn’t wait to get started on it the day that I cast on. I still am really happy about it.
Poor thing. It is going to be hibernating until I get those Olympic projects done. I have to knit a sweater. It is TRADITION!! I’ve done it for 4 years in a row, and I really need a new sweater. I live in Colorado, and March is typically our snowiest month. I’ll be rocking the new knit as I shovel my way free after some storm or another.
But during the storm I’ll be knitting on Mixology. Hang on, little guy. Your day is coming.
In case you’re wondering:
I do know about Ravellenics. I struggle with a official, online commitment when it comes to knitting, but … maybe it is time for me to get my feet wet. There has to be a sweater event, right?
I’ve made an organizational chart of yarns, patterns, and am trying to decide which sweater to start on during the opening of the games. I have a wonderful bluish grey Rios yarn, but there is also some happy red Lamb’s Pride calling my name. Both are cold weather sweater yarns. Can you feel a new post coming?
So, last year didn’t end quite as well as I had hoped. I was in a flare of my autoimmune diseases (systemic sclerosis and Sjogren’s Syndrome), drowning in fatigue and befuddled with brain fog. Ugh. Not the best for knitting or anything else come to think of it. Christmas shopping was a challenge, Christmas cooking didn’t happen (expect for a cheesecake!), and I took almost a month to do one knitting projects (ahem… the Turkish Hell Socks).
This, however, is a new year. As in, my energy is coming back, I rediscovered my special cache of “yarns I love beyond all reason” (seriously, that is the label that I put on the storage bin…), and I started casting on with abandon. I have had these projects waiting to go for weeks and weeks, my needles were empty, and… knitting happened!!
I made myself a cute, cute, cute winter hat. This is the Copycat C.C. Beanie. My project notes on Ravelry are here. I have some more of this yarn and am thinking about how to make fingerless mitts with the same pattern.
My niece in Virginia contacted me right at the end of the year to ask if I could make her some fingerless mitts and a pair of the ones with dragon scales for her to gift to her own niece. Wow. Time flies. This is a sort-of grandniece who is now an adult. How did I get here so quickly? Anyway, you know I bought the supplies the weekend before New Years and here are the finished mitts.
Pretty darn spectacular, don’t you think? These are actually warmer than you would think, as there is a layer of wool between the aluminum scales and the wearer. I mailed them off to Virginia yesterday. My Ravelry notes are here.
I also have two pairs of socks and a couple of shawls on the needles. Crazy, right. The socks are for simple knitting while doing errands, and the shawls are for binge television watching and long evening knitting. I don’t want to bore you with all the pictures of knitting bits on needles, but this Marfa shawl is totally worth a picture.
This triangular Marfa shawl is garter stitch with strips of two color brioche. After a couple of false starts (and some frogging) I am rocking the brioche and really loving the way this looks. My Ravelry page for this project is here.
I have to admit, I have already started digging in the stash to put together the yarns for another of these brioche shawls. I need to seriously cruise Ravelry to see what else is there. Brioche love. Who knew?
Finally, I have had a sweater all knitted up and stored in a plastic bin waiting to get finished. For weeks. Kind of embarrassing as this sweater was knit from the neck down and needed very little finishing. In my defense, I was hunting for the perfect buttons. Feeling pretty good about myself after I completed the hat I took it out one afternoon and finished it up just in time for a weekend snow storm.
These simple wooded buttons aren’t all that special, but they were certainly hard to find. I needed them to be exactly the right size with two holes big enough for the yarn.Here’s the finished sweater. My goodness, I do love this pattern. This is the second drijfhout sweater that I’ve made, and it is extremely comfy and versatile. My notes on Ravery are here.
You know what they say, start out as you mean to go. I’m feeling pretty good now, I’m catching up on chores, and the knitting is just jumping off of my needles. Way to go, 2018.
We’re having snow here tomorrow. I’m ready, winter. Bring it on!
I know that it has been a long time. I hope that you haven’t been missing me.
The Mother of Cats has been a severe disappointment for just weeks and weeks. She caught some kind of cold early in December, carried on like a baby for over a week (nasal spray, salt water gargling, boxes of tissues… Yellow Boy and I became quite concerned about her mental health…) and COMPLETELY ignored our needs. As if that wasn’t enough, when she finally got over the virus, she then became even worse. She slept for hours and hours, stayed in her bed even when she was awake, and totally failed to deliver our cookies on time. SHE DIDN’T EVEN DO CHRISTMAS!!! which is totally our favorite time of the year. Hello… Christmas trees = world’s best cat toys. How could she have failed us this way?
She said she was in a flare. Whatever.
When she was awake she worked endlessly on these socks for her cousin’s Christmas present.
The yarn for the socks was from this sock blank that she bought at a yarn festival. She made it into a ball and wouldn’t let me help even a little bit.She wanted to make these complicated socks for her cousin. This cousin is special… they were born two days apart and are kind of like displaced twins. This cousin once gave her a whole quilt for a present. The least she could do was to make these socks! She started knitting the first week of December. Lots of time. I looked forward to days of great knitting together.But she was too tired to knit very long on them at a time, and can I be frank, she was pretty stupid with brain fog. Lots of mistakes. Lots of stress. She kept chasing me away while I was helping. She tried to knit in bed, which is MY place. So I ate the yarn a couple of time. If she gave me cookies in a timely manner these things wouldn’t happen.Her lack of energy and general stupidness was really obvious when she knitted the heels. It took her THREE HOURS to pick up those stitches to knit the afterthought heel. She started sighing and pushing me off the bed. She began to refer to the knitting project as the Turkish socks from hell. The Mother of Cats was really in trouble.I just kept on encouraging her. I purred a lot. I settled for fewer cookies. I even stopped eating the yarn. She was really in pitiful shape.By Christmas Day she had finished this much. Her cousin reminded her that Christmas continues until January 6th.Finally, finally they were done!Those horrid and ill behaved heels look pretty good, don’t they?
The Turkish Hell socks were packed up last week and mailed out. On Saturday, the last day of Christmas they arrived safely in their new home. They had better behave themselves and last for years and years; I would hate to travel all the way across the state to whack them into shape!
I’m such a good boy.
Can I have some cookies now?
>^..^<
Notes from the Mother of Cats:
These socks, called Classic Kilim, are from the book Around the World in Knitted Socks by Stephanie van der Linden. The socks were supposed to have tassels and embroidery; that so did not happen!!Here is the info on Ravelry with more info about the book. My notes on Ravelry are here.
On December 1st I got my pneumonia vaccine even though I had been struggling a little that week. That night my youngest son became ill with complications of diabetes and was rushed to the ER . I spent the next 2 days/nights at the ICU with him. Yep. About the time my son returned to work and I moved back home I was sick; my autoimmune diseases flared while I was fighting through the viral illness. My Sjogren’s symptoms have been off the chart and crushing fatigue and brain fog appeared along with them. This week I am better and have been knitting up a storm and planning blog posts. Hopefully I’ll be online again in a couple of more days.
I’ve been helping the Mother of Cats for the entire week getting these socks done. It is a lot of hard work; the kinky yarn from the sock blanks is really hard to get a good chomp on! I’m sure she doesn’t appreciate all that I do. In this shot I was warming up her needles and the sock blank by napping on top of it. Isn’t that nice of me?! Why does she get so snippy with me?
These are the socks that she ripped out a few weeks ago and restarted using fluffy white yarn with rabbit fur in it. Wow. This stuff is really yummy! For some reason she is keeping it closed up in a plastic bag so I can’t play with it after I dragged it upstairs to play “roll the ball” under the dining table. Whatever. She is just horrible about sharing her toys!
Here are the finished socks!! Aren’t they totally cool? Much nicer looking than the other attempt with the ugly brown lace yarn. I think that the sparkles are especially catchy.
I really like these socks, and they are just perfect for napping on whenever she leaves they out. So nice and toasty to sleep on. Just the right size to kick and bite when I’m feeling a little frisky. I think that she should keep the in the kitty toy box with my catnip-stuffed squirrel.
I’m such a good boy. She really should give me these socks.
Can I have some cookies now?
>^..^<
Notes from the Mother of Cats:
These socks are make with handpainted sock blanks by Greenwood Fiberworks. The minute I saw the blanks at a trunk show this fall I knew they had to be these socks. Even the name of the colorway was cool: Paper Roses. The sock pattern is Dave by Rachel Coopey, which is basically a nice vanilla sock. I made the version with afterthought heels to maintain the color sequence down the sock. The fluffy white yarn for the lace cuff is Knit Picks Bare Hare.
Check out this heel! This is really nice fitting on my foot and feels great. I’d never done a heel like this, but I’m glad that I tried it.
I’m really happy with the cuff at the top. I made good notes of what I did and recorded them into the Ravelry project page, but I also got some nice pictures and am thinking of blogging the pattern later in the week.
As you can guess from the title of this post, I hit the wall yesterday. I had been knitting for days with a growing sense that my projects *sucked* and should not see the light of day. The colors, fit or the overall concept was just off. I wanted to believe, really, I did. Yet, why knit something that won’t make you happy in the end? Pushing through on an unhappy project is probably always a bad decision.
Not that I’m an unhappy knitter. 🙂 Check out me (right) and my best knitting buddy Deb knitting through the eclipse last Monday.
Yesterday morning I reached that magic moment (after texting Deb first) when I whipped out the needles from TWO DIFFERENT PROJECTS and then either put the knitted fabric into a corner to think about what it had done (a sweater) or rewound the yarn back into a ball to be re-knit (a sock).
Let’s start with the sock. I found this fabulous sock blank (I now think that sock blanks may be the best things since sliced bread…) and decided to play around with knitting a simple sock with a lace top.
Sitting outside with MacKenzie I cast on a simple lace on one set of needles using yarn from the stash, began the ribbing for the sock with the blank on a second set of needles, and then joined them at the bottom of the ribbing. Cute, right? That sock blank is from Greenwood Fiberworks. Don’t you love the sparkles?
Right away I knew that things weren’t quite right. I make my socks in 2.25 mm needles with 64 stitches. Since the lace was a multiple of 6 stitches, I tried knitting the cuff with 66 stitches and then decreased to 64 stitches right before the join. The lace was a little too snug. The color wasn’t quite right. I kept looking at it and telling myself that it would look better as I got to the darker colors in the blank.
I’m almost done, and I still am not happy with the lace. It is too dark, and it doesn’t stick up enough, and it looked even worse on my leg as it was too snug. The color of the sock looks dull; it is that darn lace! I should have made the ribbing shorter. I should have made the lace whiter. Why did I use that blue yarn for the afterthought heel placement: picking up stitches will be a nightmare! I hated it.
To make things worse I made a mistake on the heel (too many stitches in that section that will be the afterthought heel) and when I got to the toe I found out that I had 6 more stitches on the top than the bottom of the foot. How did I do that? The whole thing was a disappointment.
Whap! I pulled out the needles, ripped like crazy and had the yarn rewound for knitting in just a few minutes.
A hunt through the stash found some Bare Hare from KnitPicks that became the new knitted cuff, and this time I cast on 72 stitches for the cuff, and decreased to 64 stitches a couple of rows before the join. The ribbing is now shorter. The sock colors look brighter. I’m much happier with this look.
Now the sock fits my leg perfectly! Here’s the project notes on Ravelry.
I also entered the unhappy zone with the Marled Magic Sweater. I was making lots of color changes and trying to channel Stephen West while I knitted. You know what, I need to be true to myself and I should knit using the colors and vision that I had when I bought the yarns that are singing the Marled Magic song to me.
Really cool, but I’m being overwhelmed by all of the color striping, and I don’t think that the yarns themselves are shining like they should.
These yarns are fabulous, but they are hidden by all the color changes. I mean, look at them. I love each one of these guys. They are bursting with potential.
Aren’t these great? I pruned out the partial skeins and kept yarns that made this collection of rose, purple and blue with lots of gray overtones.
I pulled the sweater off the needles, put the fabric off to the side, and cast on again. I picked one yarn that I loved and one mohair to go with it, and I’m going to knit the whole first block with just those two yarns. Since the sweater is a modular construction I’m going to focus on balancing colors between the blocks to make this sweater shine for me. It will be great!
Now the subtle colors in this yarn can strut their stuff. I’m really happy with the block that is emerging. That mohair makes the fabric feel fabulous, too.
I’m happy and knitting like the wind again. I can’t wait to get to the second block of this sweater. I think I’ll use one of the yarns with a lot of rose in it with a silver gray mohair. Then I’ll go with a black yarn and purple mohair. This is a way to approach the sweater that I can deal with.
Look at what my niece in California sent me last week! I’m so happy. I can’t wait for cooler weather so I can wear it.
Cooler weather! In just another month there may be snow in the forecast.
Time to make the magic happen and to crank out that sweater! I am on fire and knitting like crazy now.
Have a good week everyone.
PS: As I type this I am watching the news coverage about the horrific natural disaster that is unfolding in Texas and Louisiana here in America. My heart is broken for all of those who are displaced and dealing with disaster in their communities. Hugs to all of you who are affected by this, and stay safe.
I really dug in and worked on my Marled Magic sweater this week. So many colors. So many combinations. So much fun. Seriously, this is addictive knitting at its best with a big side of stash busting. I blogged about this project earlier and showed off all of the yarn I had collected to use in the sweater. I am now well into the second section of the sweater and I am feeling the magic for sure. This sweater is going to be great this winter and I am having a great time dreaming/knitting it.
The gray colored section at top is the first one in the sweater. I am now about half way done with the pink section in the lower part of the picture.
The sweater is knitted with one strand of fingering yarn held together with one strand of mohair. As the two are knitted together they create the marled look of the fabric.
In the first section I used a single gray mohair from the stash with different fingerings that were mostly gray with pink and purple highlights.In this second section I am using yarn that has more color in it and I am knitting it with pink, purple , and gray mohair. I am changing both yarn types as I knit to switch up the marl effect.Here are the yarns that I’m using in this second section.
I’m have over a dozen different yarns in this section, and I have to lug around the box of yarns while I’m knitting. So… I admit it. I lost control. I cast on a small project that is easy to carry around to work on while away from home.
I couldn’t help it. These yarns are in the bins that I’m using on the big sweater project, and as I dug through yarns to put together the combos for the second sweater section I noticed that speckled yarn. It was near the solid blue yarn, but there were those black specks in the speckled yarn too… I started to dream about how they would look as a sock combination. Cute, right? Here are my project notes with the yarns that I used for these Jelly Rolls. There are some other sock combinations calling to me already that I’m trying to ignore while I keep working on the sweater.
It’s just crazy to think that I would have only one project going at a time.
If I cast on ANOTHER sock I may need to go buy some more needles.
Oh, little things like that have never stopped me before! 🙂
It all started when I saw these sock blanks near the front door of Shuttles, Spindles & Skeins in Boulder, Colorado. So cute! Such happy colors! I had to have them.
See what I mean? Who can resist colors like these?
These are single-strand sock blanks dyed by The Hummingbird Moon, and I blogged about learning how to handle the blank to create TAAT socks that matched here. I learned a lot, loved the final socks, and had a enough yarn left over to make a pair of fingerless mitts.
Or… I could use that leftover yarn with the second sock blank to make a pair of Jelly Rolls socks. Oh. My feet totally need Jelly Rolls! They were practically chanting, Jelly Rolls! Jelly Rolls! Jelly Rolls!
I wound the second blank into a ball……cast on, and started knitting. I’m using the left over yarn for the contrast color, and the second blank for the main color.Here are the finished socks!Because of the double rolls at the top of the sock they stay put on my feet just the way I want them to.
I am so happy with these socks I’m fighting off an urge to cast on many, many more of them from the huge stockpile of leftovers from past-knit socks. The weather is cooler this week, there are birds flocking in the back yard, and my feet want socks. I can feel the pull of the fingering from the craft room even as I type this, but I am resisting the call.
I’m going back to knitting the Marled Magic sweater. It will be amazing! Stay tuned for further developments. 🙂
The larger needles for the sweater are rubbing against some calcium deposits on a couple of my finger joints (thanks, scleroderma…), so I made some finger protectors using a pattern that I found on Ravelry. These babies work great. Marled Magic, I am coming for you!
Yep. This is an event of such astonishing rarity it makes a blue moon seem common: every single one of the languishing items hanging out in the WIP basket has been finished. The basket is now empty. MacKenzie was all astonishment for at least 20 seconds before he moved in to make the basket his own. It took the whole month of May, but I now have all of my needles and stitch markers back where they belong.
Arent these cute? I love the way the lace pattern switches on the socks to make a mismatched pair. It wasn’t too bad keeping the different lace patterns under control as a different needle is used on each side of the sock. This pattern is Milfoil by Rachel Coopey. My project notes are here.The moebius cowl that I was working on is also done. Like my model?Moebius knitting is really fun. I started with Cat Bordhi’s cast on and then knit from the center outward in garter and blackberry stitch that I had to modify a little to accommodate the circular knitting and my stiff hands. Because this is a moebius the right side has the “up” side of the blackberry pattern, and the left has the “down” side.When worn the shape allows the wearer to fold the cowl with the same pattern on both sides.This is the same cowl with the other side up. I like them both. If the cowl is doubled up or worn draped around the shoulders both patterns show.
I took really good notes while knitting this time so that I can post the pattern in my next blogging adventure. If you want more info you can find my project notes here. That yarn is Tosh Merino DK in the colorway NIght Hawk. I was worried about how it would knit up, but I like the finished project.
I’m off to cast on a shawl using yarn from the stash and a pattern a friend gave me.
There is nothing more that I like than working my way through a big project. What can be more exciting than finishing that new sweater or gigantic, endless, Find Your Fade shawl after watching it slowly grow day after day, week after week from a pile of skeins to a beautiful finished project? The drama of the whole thing: is there enough yarn, will the colors go together, is my gauge correct, yarn chicken, and all the other questions and worries of the large project are part of the fun. A little stressful, but a labor of love, each and every one.
So, it was a little bit of teeth gritting that I pulled out the basket of unfinished projects (UFOs) down from the top of the bookshelf a couple of weeks ago.
My goodness. Now I know where all of my knitting needles have been hiding out.
I wrote about cleaning up the UFO pile a year or so ago and got trolled by people who hoped I was writing about aliens. Nope. I guess I should follow Ravelry’s lead and call them WIPs. Fine. This is the WIP (works in progress) basket. It is full of smaller knitting projects that should get done in a couple of knitting days each. Check it out:
There is a half pair of socks (I did cast on the second sock, but I still put it aside…), and three pairs of fingerless mitts. I also found a scarf that was half done and a cowl that had just been cast one night when I was curious about how that great Night Hawk colorway from MadelineTosh would knit up.
Well, how long can all of this take? Time to jump in and clear the basket, I told myself. I pulled out the socks (hey, it was snowing outside!) and got started.
MacKenzie helped as much as he could.
Now, after two weeks of steady work and cat entertainment I am happy to report that I have made real progress. The basket is almost empty, needles and stitch markers are returned to their proper places, and I have gained a number of small knitted accessories.
Here they are. I have finished a shawlette, the socks, two small pairs of fingerless mitts, and a pair of long beaded fingerless mitts. The yarn in these socks made them turn out really cute. This simple pattern for a vanilla sock with deep ribbing at the top and a traditional heel is called “Dave” by Rachel Coopey.The long mitts are Akiko MItts by Sivia Harding and the short mitts are my own simple “Scleroderma MItts” pattern that I recorded in the project notes here.The finished shawlette is the Riverbed Shawlette (this is MacKenzie’s favorite) by Grace Akhrem. I wore it this week to my knitting group and it was quite a hit.
Now I’m down to the last item in the basket, a cowl. Wow. I thought that this may take me all month, but I should have the basket cleared by the end of the week. Well, there was that one pair of socks that I couldn’t help casting on while I was working on the WIPs, but still, the end is in sight.
Excellent. I have some large projects all kitted up and ready to go.
Wait until you see these sweaters and shawls I’ve got lined up!
Yarn, Books & Roses 