Must Stash

I had a busy weekend.

First, take a look at this humongous ball of yarn that recently found it's way into my stash. It has four siblings that haven't been wound yet. This is Cascade Ecological Wool, Color 8063. It's destined to be a blanket that I'm concocting as a Christmas present. I've already been ragged on multiple fronts for the color (or lack of it), so feel free to pile on. I'm immune. My winder is to small to hold this amount and thickness yarn. They have one at The Knitting Nest that could handle it. But no, I was in a rush and though I'd do it at home. Not wanting to make Jeff perform his husbandly duty of holding the hank, I just wound it myself, and, of course, got a huge snarl in it that I eventually had to cut out. When will I learn?

On Friday, I got an email from Staci saying that there was a new colorway of Lorna's Laces sock yarn at The Knitting Nest that I was going to flip over. She was right. I hadn't been there five minutes Saturday morning before I bought a couple of hanks. I really like this color. Lots of darkness and that startling ice blue. Very nice.

I took my Aunt June with me Saturday morning. I mentioned her before when she had gifted me a bunch of my great-grandmother's crochet and knitting tools. She was in town for the Austin Area Quilt Guild 2008 Quilt Show (which was awesome, by the way). It was great for her to meet my friends. We talked knitting and quilting and laughed a whole lot. Great fun. Aunt June totally gets the urge to create with fabric and fibers (she's no slouch herself) and is nothing but supportive of me and my attempts at knitting. Love you, Aunt June!

Saturday evening, I started a pair of socks with my new yarn -- I felt like I needed something on the needles besides the Piano Cushion. So I started these. Then I ripped them out and started again this morning. I'm using the same toe-up beginning that I used on the Back to Basics Socks that I just finished. Then I'm thinking of doing a standard short row heel and then the slipped stitch rib for the cuff from Charlene Schurch's Sensational Knitted Socks. I did vary the increases on the toe by using Cat Bordhi's method of paired increases described in this video* -- thanks, Janelle, for the suggestion. I like the way it looks.

I completely thought through the plan on these socks, which will probably come back to bite me. But for now, I'm having fun.

I've got some goodies coming in the mail. Hopefully I'll be able to post about them soon.

*(Cat Bordhi doesn't say this on the video, but she clearly knits into the back of the stitch that she grabs for the left-leaning decrease. I think it looks better this way.)