Big Needle Therapy

After months of knitting with cotton yarn on 2mm needles, my hands and my brain needed some big needle therapy -- forgiving wool, large gauge, easy-to-see stitches and quick progress. But first, I had to wrap up some loose ends.

Because the tablecloth was getting bulky and the chances of major knitting disasters at such a late stage in the process were getting higher, I decided to leave it at home when we traveled to Zion National Park at the beginning of the year. I always want to have something to work on for in the air or in the evenings when away from home, so I cast on for a pair of socks using some yarn given to me by my friend Jene at Christmas. Thus, the Fickle Step Socks. They're knit on 2.25 dpns using Quince & Co. Finch sock yarn in a colorway called Honey. Such a great matchup of yarn and pattern. By the time I'd finished the tablecloth, I'd been taking this project around to knitting get-togethers, but hadn't made a whole lot of progress. But as soon as the tablecloth was done I launched right in before the momentum wore off.

The cables use a double wrap on the row before the stitch crossing, which creates less pull on the lower stitches. At first, I wasn't sure I liked it, but after blocking, the effect is quite nice. I have a tendency to torture cable stitches and this is a handy antidote to that. Not sure if it would be appropriate in all cases, but it worked here. It also made crossing stitches without a cable needle a breeze.

Then it was on to a project and yarn that were both outside my wheelhouse, but just the thing I needed -- the Arrowhead Poncho by Pat Walker using Kraemer Yarns Mauch Chunky in a color called Blueberry Ice, also a gift.

It uses 6.5mm (US10.5) needles. I can't remember the last time I knit something on needles this large. It went by so fast! Thirteen days from cast-on to seaming. The pieces were finished pretty much in the first week, and this week was just blocking and waiting for some time to be able to piece this together.

It's a cool construction -- two long rectangles (mine were 33" x 20") with ribbing across and a couple of squishy cables on one side. Then you sew the two pieces together in a twisted way that creates this natural poncho shape with beautiful cables to frame the wearer's head. On this one, I did use a cable needle. Four-over-Four is a bit much for trying to knit without one. I did attempt it -- once. Then I dug out a cable needle. This thing is warm and heavy. It's not for me, and I'm not sure what I'm going to do with it. I'm leaning toward donating it to a silent auction that my medical librarians' group holds in the fall. We'll see. For now, I'll just admire it.

Already on to more things! I'm working on some self-striping toe-up socks using some yarn I got over the holidays. They're going to have a contrasting toe and heel. And I'm thinking of incorporating German short rows. I've never used them in a pattern before, and I'm looking forward to it. I had a bit of a problem visually while trying to do the increases on the toe with this dark yarn, so I'm anticipating a bit of trouble, but fiddle-dee-dee.

I'm also thinking ahead to sweaters. I'd like to make Ann Budd's Cambridge Jacket because I fancy a zippered cardigan. I like the purl lines that make this interesting -- and will likely help with the fit. It's been a while since I've worked with a zipper so I think I'm up for that challenge.

I also just saw an episode of the current season of Project Runway that had a sweater that really called out to me. It was worn by contestant Sebastian Grey. I kept driving Jeff nuts by pausing the show every time it came on so I could make note of some different aspect of it. I like that it has some fairly muted "me" colors interspersed with stripes in tangerine and lemon yellow, which are so not my thing. But it looks good here.

I think I could backwards engineer this. It looks like a set-in sleeve, but I think it might work also as a raglan. All the colors looked heathered up close -- the tan, the dark teal and the charcoal gray. I'm thinking solids might work better, but this doesn't look wrong. Something to think about...

As you can see, getting out from under that tablecloth (literally), has really unleashed my creativity. Hope you're feeling the urge to knit all the things like I am!

Hands and Feet

Since last time I checked in, I made some socks. And more mittens. I'm kind of out of control.

After finishing the pairs of mittens for my sister and sister-in-law, I started looking at all the yarn I had leftover from the kit and thought I really should do something with all of it. The colors I had the most of were all the shades of brown. Perfect! At first I thought I'd make a hat, but wasn't sure I had enough. I knew one thing I had enough yarn for, though -- more mittens.

I searched Ravelry for Fair Isle mitten patterns that used five colors, but didn't really see anything that spoke to me. So I started flipping through my copy of Ann Feitelson's The Art of Fair Isle Knitting for some ideas. There were some mittens featured as a pattern, but they were a bit subdued for the yarn I had on hand. Then, on page 50, I ran across just the thing.

From Feitelson's The Art of Fair Isle Knitting

There in the margin was a pair of vintage mittens that Feitelson uses as an example of common items that Fair Isle knitters might make. Next to the caption "Mittens, the work of today's older hand knitters, (ahem)" was a pair of mittens that really captured my imagination. They appeared to use six colors, but I thought I could adjust. However, now that I was smitten with mittens, I'd have to figure out the pattern myself.

With much squinting at the photo and a bit of guessing, I was able to chart out the pattern by using an Excel grid with different background colors. It was very slow going, but it really helped me figure out the symmetry. While making it, I kept thinking that the person who originally made these likely just had a few common motifs in her head and designed it as she went. I made a chart for the left hand, and then for the right. The original mittens have the thumbs arising from the palm, but I didn't have any idea how to do that having never done it myself, so using the patterns from the kit I'd just used, I charted out a thumb jutting from the side and keeping the pattern from the palm all the way around. Afterwards, I charted out the top of the thumb that is added at the very last after the body is complete. Once I had it done in Excel, I downloaded a PDF copy, and then pulled it into my KnitCompanion app so I could keep track of where I was as I went.

I'm surprised at how smoothly this all went. Luckily, the number of stitches in the mittens in the book matched up with the number in the kit patterns, so I could refer to that when I got in the weeds. I'd originally planned to make a 62-round pattern, but since the last round involved a color change right at the end, I left that last round out and used Kitchener stitch to close the finger tips across the last 20 stitches.

The thumbs were super fiddly and involved multiple yarn color changes across just 19 rounds of knitting. I use the same method used to catch floats in fair isle knitting to introduce new colors and weave out old ones. This adds a bit of time to the knitting, but is so worth it (to me) at the end when I can just turn the whole thing inside out and snip off all the dangly bits without having to worry about them coming undone. This was really hard to do inside the the thumb which was basically a 24-stitch tube. But still worth it.

I'm pleased with the results! I do wish that I'd been left with some more heathered colors to use. I think the overall effect is a bit more graphic than the original. The only heathered color is a goldish one (called Camel Heather) that you can see as the first color past the wrist ribbing. All the rest were solid colors. And they didn't always play nicely. I got several inches into my first mitten when I realized two colors weren't contrasting enough and went back to the drawing board, or rather, the spreadsheet. Jeff likes the tan background color (Almond), but that's the one that bugs me the most. The heathered grayish-blue in the original is so much more, I don't know, subtle and fluid. Still, I think the whole things works. These are too small for my hands, so I'll hold on to them and find someone with daintier hands to give them to.

I also made some socks at some point since the beginning of the year. The yarn was a Secret Santa gift from my friend Abbe and boy, does she know the kinds of things I like. It's Crazy Zauberball yarn in a colorway called Herbstwind (Autumn Wind). I love all the greenish blues and dark reds. Like other Zauberball yarns, these are kind of hard to predict where they'll go with their striping so I chose to use a solid yarn for the toes and a matching afterthought heel to pull it all together. The rest is just 2x2 ribbing across 72 stitches, with solid stockinette across the soles. I'm really happy with them. I finished them about a month ago, and am just now realizing I haven't worn them. That window may have closed, though. I'm afraid our cold weather is mostly gone for the year. They'll be there for me next year, though.

Not entirely sure what's up next. I just got a book from the public library, the Japanese Knitting Stitch Bible by Hitomi Shida. It's absolutely gorgeous and I'm entranced by all the intricate patterns. I'm sure some of these could be used to make some socks, a cowl, a scarf, a hat...

Guido Pullover

Finally finished the sweater I started for Jeff this summer, and we're both pretty happy about it. In my early knitting days, I made a few sweaters for Jeff. When I proposed making them, he happily said yes, but then rarely wore the resulting garments. He instinctively knew that I'm a process knitter and that the journey is way more important to me than the result. He knew I'd be happy making them. But he just doesn't care to wear wool that much, and our Texas climate doesn't provide that many opportunities to wear it comfortably. So I'd stopped making sweaters for him.

Then, as I started watching the Fruity Knitting podcast, Jeff admired a smart striped pullover that Andrew wears in some of the episodes. When we got to meet Andrea and Andrew this summer, I asked her about it, and she pointed me toward the pattern and yarn. Rowan Purelife Revive is (or was) composed of roughly 1/3 each recycled cotton, silk and viscose(rayon) -- much more wearable for a Texas winter -- or a German spring! Though discontinued, I managed to scrape up enough yarn from various online vendors in the right colors and got a copy of the Rowan magazine (#55) with the pattern.

I went through several mood swings with this pattern and yarn. It has no "give" to it, so it's kind of like knitting with kite string. Knitting for long periods could be a bit rough on the hands. And I mistakenly looked at an errata page and ordered one less ball of the main whitish color than I needed for the 42" size and ended up having to order that extra ball later. Fortunately, the supplier still had the same dye lot. Some parts of this I just flew through -- one of the sleeves was done in just a few days -- while others took ages. One factor for the time it took was this project's non-portability. All those different colors to wrangle and all the careful counting and slipping that had to happen.

Seaming it all up was also difficult for me. The slipped and therefore wrapped stitches on the edge made it difficult to see where to run the yearn for the seams. On the sleeves especially, the edge stitches switched from wrapped slipped edges to stockinette edges and I got confused. I tried doing a backstitch from the wrong side, but I really don't have enough experience with that and wasn't pleased with the results, although I did use it for the shoulders. I managed with mattress stitch seaming on the right side for the rest. The seams are fairly obvious, but I don't think that's a problem with this particular garment. At the point where the collar starts, the instructions say to use the color that's right in the center of the front. But in consultation with Jeff, we agreed that the ribbed collar should match the ribbing on the hips and the cuffs. I think that was a good call.

Jeff likes it and it looks really good on him. And the cotton/silk/rayon blend means it will be wearable for a longer part of the fall and winter. Especially happy that I got this done before the coolest part of the year hits. Notice I didn't say "coldest". Not sure that term applies anymore. Anyway, I like the striping, and that I branched out into colors I wouldn't normally choose. I think it has a bit of an 80's retro vibe to it. It fits me, too. Just sayin'....

On the same day, I funneled my just-completed-a-project adrenaline into some socks I'd had on the needles for OVER A YEAR! I just wanted them done. I'm not usually opposed to fraternal twin socks with this kind of yarn, but this pair, which I dubbed the Domino Socks, just aren't doing it for me. I liked the yarn when I bought it, and loved the shop in Maryland run by two Mennonite sisters where I bought it. I remember casting on for these using my plain go-to sock recipe just to have a portable project for some event, then never really took it out of the house much again after that. But they're done and I won't have to stare at that the WIP label under it in Ravelry any more. I did enjoy the solid black toes and afterthought heels, though.

Maybe I can cast on for some socks that actually interest me soon. I also have an interesting scarf coming up and beautiful yarn for a Fair Isle hat. If you're still here, stay tuned!

 

No Mean Feets

The past few weeks have left me little time for the needles, but I have managed to get a few things completed.

First of all, are these stranded slippers, called baffies in Scottish parlance. They're the first pattern in the Seven Skeins club I subscribed to recently. I was going to postpone making these until later in the new year, but I wanted to make something handknit for a friend of mine with a November birthday and I thought these would be just the thing. I hope you like them, Mary Peace!

They're pretty easy to make. Although you can see I had some tension issues, they're really not as different in size as they appear in this photo. They're made toe-up until the garter stitch striped heel. That's worked flat and then joined with a three-needle bind-off. Then it's finished off with an applied I-cord edging. A smart design, really. The white color is called Ptarmigan and the other is called Highland Coo after the shaggy cows of The Highlands. But everyone in Austin thinks it's UT Burnt Orange. I have to admit it's pretty close!

I've also finally gotten around to completing the first of my Domino socks using the ombré-spun Crazy Zauberball yarn I got in Maryland. The rainy, gloomy weather in north Texas this long holiday weekend has given me plenty of time to catch up with this project. It's been on the needles for months. I usually pick it up when something else gets too big or complicated to be easily portable, so I hadn't been working on it with any regularity. The black toes and afterthought heel are a bamboo/wool/silk combination called Panda Silk. This yarn would look better on 2mm needles instead of the 2.25mm that the rest of the sock is knit with, but it'll do. I turned once again to Janelle's excellent instructions for an afterthought heel. So helpful! One more sock to go...

I'm getting pulled in a lot of directions inspiration-wise. I've got my eye on a pullover pattern, I need to make a hat for a friend, I'm kicking around blanket ideas, and I've been wanting to try my hand at a houndstooth double-knit scarf. There's never not something to knit!

We Come 'Round Right

I'm going to be attending a reunion of my grandmother's family, the Weavers & Armstrongs, next weekend. She was one of eleven children, so as you might imagine, it's quite a crowd. My early memories of summer visits to Texas involve this reunion, and being greeted by dozens of people whom I'd never met, but who all seemed to know me and my place in this large group. It's a day for warm memories, great food, bad jokes and just catching up. I love it.

To raise money for renting the space and catering some of the food, relatives bring handmade items to be auctioned off in a silent auction -- or maybe not so silent -- we are talking about Weavers here. Items can run the gamut from preserves and jams, to handmade quilts and wooden toys, My contribution this year is a set, or possibly two sets, of Shaker Dishcloths as designed by Staci Perry at VeryPink. I made some versions of these in placemat and coaster sizes a few summers back.

Because I went rogue and chose a different yarn than the pattern called for, I had to make an adjustment. This yarn, Cascade UltraPima, while beautifully shiny, is a bit on the thin side for this project. This picture shows what was going on -- a strange gappiness right before the color change, most noticeable in the white (see photo). I tried going down a few needle sizes, but didn't like that. I settled on wrapping the slipped stitches, like one might do on a short row heel on a sock. Then I tweaked things even more by twisting the wraps just before knitting them together with their accompanying stitches. This added a bit more density to the final row, but I preferred that to the weird laciness I was seeing.

In other projects, I'm working on a pair of ombré socks using the Crazy Zauberball yarn I got in Pennsylvania in May. I love just working the 2x2 ribbing. You can't really get a matched pair with this yarn, but I did at least want to keep the patterning a bit more symmetrical, so I'm going to use afterthought heels in solid black. The toes, too. That way, even though they'll be striped quite differently, they still have the same heels and toes and look a bit more like a pair. That's the plan anyway. We'll see how that pans out.

Socks and Smocks

Uh, hi.

A topsy-turvey work schedule, along with a professional meeting, a chorus concert, a mini-vacation and getting the interior of our house painted, have all conspired to make knitting a rare thing lately. For weeks all I did was work on a pair of socks on Saturday morning with my regular knitters. That was it. Two hours a week for nearly a month. And it really bugged me. But this weekend I dusted off the cobwebs, literal and figurative and mental, and resumed some semblance of momentum.

Yesterday, I finished the Moorish Stripe Socks, one of the Six-Stitch Stranded Patterns from Charlene Schurch's More Sensational Knitted Socks. I used the yarn I bought at The Quilted Skein in La Grange when I visited with Leah Wilson King back in March.

I think these turned out fine. I did do the gussets differently on each sock, a danger when the two are knit so far apart. You can see the one on the left above has a gold line on the top of the gusset that the other doesn't have. I also managed to repeat an extra row on the sole/instep of the second sock, but didn't catch it unti just before,working the star toe. Oh, well. I'm over it now that I've confessed. My sock model, who normally doesn't go in for handknit socks, declared these "wonderfully soft" and that he wouldn't mind a pair like these. Maybe it was because the gold color has silk in it? He better not hold his breath. It may be a while before I tackle stranded knit socks again.

After completIng that pair, I started right away on another installment of my knitted pillow project. I'd toyed with the idea of a honeycomb cable for a bolster pillow, but wasn't sold. Staci suggested I take a look at a smocked rib pattern that she'll be posting an instructional video for soon. She graciously sent me the instructions and I've set to work. The idea I have is to knit this with a provisional cast on so that I can graft it closed once the tube is the right circumference. However, this means that I had to both knit and purl into the provisional crochet chain. No easy feat, that. I had to use a tiny crochet hook to help get the purl stitches on the knitting needles. And it took forever. And I have to find instructions for grafting 2x2 ribbing. I'm sure that's a thing (he said, without ever having checked).

But it's going well now. All the fiddliness happens every six rows, way better than what I would have faced with honeycomb stitch. And I like the pattern it makes. It reminds off the gathered fabric I've seen on top of old sewing boxes.

So something finished and something started. Here's hoping that my slump is over.

Stripes and Spirals

The flowers are blooming, the weather is warming, and I'm entering into my annual springtime knitting slump. I still have projects that are grabbing my attention, but I just don't seem to have enough time to do much knitting. Plus, the looming warmer days put me off the idea of handknits. I'll get over that soon, I'm sure. In the meantime, I've made some progress I can share.

It may be a bit premature to post this, but I finished the first of the Moorish Stripe Socks. There were options for knitting pinstripes into the heel flap and the toes, but I decided for solid navy. As Tim Gunn might say, these socks are already "a lotta look," so having three solid patches gives me eyes a chance to catch their breath. I know I'm confusing senses and mixing metaphors there, but you get the idea. The hard part for me was realizing that the pattern across the instep is meant to be continued as if the gusset wasn't there, so that when the gusset does eventually draw together, it just disappears into the pattern. I didn't get that at first, overthought things, and ended up having to un-knit a few rounds to get back on track. Such a lot of fuss for something that will be covered by shoes most of the time, right? Now to cast on for the second one and do all this all over again before Second Sock Syndrome sets in.

I also got started, yesterday, on the second of my pillow projects, the Spiral Galaxy Pillow. I needed something round that would knit to 16". This one is scalable out to nearly any size, really. It's designed by Daniel Yuhas, appears in 10 Secrets of the LaidBack Knitters, and came to me through the magic of Interlibrary Loan. Thanks, Dallas Public Library!

It's knit from the center out and is pretty simple to follow. Except for the instructions about slipping stitches and moving markers around. I overthought those, too, starting over three times before figuring out that keeping the same number of stitches between the 15 spiral segments is really the goal here. The first side is about 10" across right now. I still have quite a bit of yarn left, but I also know that it gets eaten up faster and faster as the circumference grows. I'm thinking of putting a big button right in the middle of this. Maybe a big wooden one? Or maybe a knit-covered one?

Not to let sheep out of the bag, but as it happens, I have a little trip planned soon that will surely shake me out of my spring slump. More on that later...

Texas Two-Step

After finishing my pillow, I found myself this week in a bit of a lull between projects. For the next pillow, I had the yarn but not the pattern. It's coming, but I'm at the mercy of the Interlibrary Loan system. For a runner I'd like to make, I have the pattern but haven't settled on the yarn. So I decided to fall back on my favorite thing to knit. Socks. I'm not a big yarn hoarder, but I always try to have some sock yarn around.

I decided to return to one of my Charlene Schurch books, More Sensational Knitted Socks for inspiration. There are several stranded patterns in this book that I haven't tried. And with good reason. They take twice the yarn and are thus twice as warm as normal handknit socks. Not exactly necessary in Texas. But some of the patterns intrigued me, and I had just purchased two skeins of yarn that would work well together.

The pattern is called Moorish Stripe. I like the little one-stitch lice pattern interspersed with the geometric stripes. On the foot, a much jazzier stripe that is a variation ofthe one on the cuff runs around the sole and instep -- pictures to follow when I get there. The tan color contrasts pretty well with the dark navy, but I think the effect might pop more if the contrast color were a variegated or semi-solid yarn. This is looking a little flat to me. I still like it, but if I do more of these stranded patterns I'll try to remember that.

I bought this yarn last week while I was on spring break. I met my childhood piano teacher and longtime friend Leah for lunch in La Grange. Non-Texans probably know La Grange from its most infamous business, but it's a great Texas small town with lots of little cafes and shops. One of its big draws is The Quilted Skein, just a block off the Fayette County courthouse square. It's right next to the Texas Quilt Museum, which unfortunately, was closed.

The Quilted Skein, which is dedicated almost equally between yarn and quilt fabrics, is one of the most beautiful yarn shops I've ever visited. Everything is new shiny wood, and the ceilings go up forever. The selection is really wide, with lots of yarns I'd never heard of. The back of the shop has large windows that overlook an intimate garden space. The staff were very friendly, too. I didn't get to meet the owner, Stephen, when I was there, but hope to get to on future trips. Because there will be many more trips down there, I'm sure.

Two by Fours

I started some new socks in late January, and just finished them last weekend. But I haven't gotten around to writing anything about them until today.

I knit these on size 2.25 (US 1) dpns. I go back and forth between using dpns and a long circular needle for magic loop sock knitting. Right now, I'm in a distinctly double-pointed mood. Sadly, I seem to have lost one of my favorite green Signature Needle Arts size 1s, so I may have to go back. I'm sure it will show up somewhere. I imagine it's lurking in a cushion or pillow, waiting to impale me at some opportune moment. I just discovered that you can replace these singly if necessary. I think I'll put that off since I still have the bare minimum of four, but it's nice to know it's possible to get single needle replacements. I love these sharp pointy things so much.

I didn't really follow a pattern, but used my standard personal sock recipe. I did a German twisted cast-on of 72 stitches and knit in a K4, P2 pattern to the heel. I executed an eye-of-partridge heel across half the stitches until I had 18 slipped stitches on each side of the heel. I actually ended up picking up 20 on the edges after turning the heel on the first sock, so I made sure I did the same on the second. Then it was just reducing the gusset back to a circumference of 72 stitches and knitting on down, with the 2x4 pattern continuing across the instep and stockinette across the sole. The toe was pretty standard, ending with 8 stitches left to be grafted.

The yarn was Trekking XXL, which I've used before. It's nigh on indestructible. And I can get nice man-sized socks out of one ball. I could have even made them a bit longer. I had close to 7 grams left over from100 when finished. This yarn was a gift from someone in Jeff's dance class! She used to have a yarn shop, and had some yarn to give away, so Jeff brought this home for me. How nice is that? Thank you, Karen! I'm really going to enjoy these.

Spring has finally sprung around here. My college is on Spring Break this week, and some of my time-off plans involve a yarn shop not far from my hometown. More on that soon, I hope.

Deflect Reflection

This afternoon I finished up my latest pair of socks, from a pattern called Deflect.

In my previous post, I spent some time pointing out flaws. Not this time. Okay except for the odd unevenness in the picking up of the gusset stitches on the left sock. But besides that, I'm pretty happy.

I had a bit of panic toward the end of the second (or, right) one. Even though I thought I'd divided the hank evenly by weight when winding it into balls, I either mis-weighed or wasn't consistent with my tension. The first sock had several yards remaining when it was finished; I saw that the second sock was going to cut things closer. Much closer, it would turn out.

When I finished grafting the toe on the right sock I had exactly 5 inches left over. Barely enough to weave in the ends properly. I don't think I've ever cut a project so close. I still had the leftovers from the first sock, but having to use a scrap to finish up the toe would have been so demoralizing. I kind of dodged a bullet this time. That's what I get for ignoring the yardage listed in the pattern. It seems I got lucky this time. All's well that can be woven in well.

I like so much about this pattern. I like the fact that there is a left and right sock, and hope that I can remember that when wearing them. I can imagine looking down and seeing these cables snaking down into the inner sides of my shoes (shudder). I like how the cables split and their little cablet spawn continue twisting on their merry way down toward the toes. I worry that they might sag a bit doe to their sparse ribbing, but we'll soon find out. Overall, a cool pattern.

What's next? I'm thinking pillows. We just got a new duvet cover that has a lot of earth tones in it. Rather than try and find what a friend refers to as "show pillows," why not just make some? There a lot of great patterns out there in all kinds of shapes -- square, rectangular, hexagons, round, tubes. I've seen some stranded patterns that might be fun to play with. And the cable bug hasn't departed, so there may be a few more twists and turns in my near knitting future. I've also seen some good cabled pillow patterns out there. I'm toying with the idea of coming up with something on my own. If anyone has a favorite cable stitch dictionary or design book that you could fill me in on, I'd appreciate it.

 

 

Deflect Defect

This week has been full of working on those little chores that get put off -- a little tree limb trimming, fixing the garage doors, catching up on housework. One of of my self-assigned tasks was to tidy up my knitting basket that I keep in the living room. In doing so, I found some yarn I'd purchased last spring and decided to use it for a new pair of socks.

The pattern is Deflect from the Deep Fall 2013 issue of Knitty. Most of the sock is straightforward, but the two socks are sided for specific feet, with a cable that runs down the outside of the leg down to the toes. This cable starts in the cuff ribbing and splits at the gusset, with half of it trailing off into the heel flap. The heel flap is half cabled, half slip-stitch. And this smooth Shibui Staccato yarn in the color Ash is perfect for it.

However, I got off to a rocky start. It probably had something to do with knitting while binge-watching Vikings, distracted by all the woven and knitted garments, among, um, other things. I swear I saw a woman putting out hanks of yarn in the Kattegat marketplace in the last episode of season 2. See how easy it would be to be distracted? In my daze, I left out two 8-round cable sections in the pattern. In the first picture here, there should always be two cables leaning in and then two cables leaning out. You can see that twice I left out the second leaning-in cable. So I ripped it back.

I paid more attention the second time, and it looks better now. Cables are so strange to work with. It can be difficult to discern from the charted pattern what the resulting design will be. In a pattern like this one , it doesn't really make much difference visually if a small error is made. But this was a pretty big error, and it did make a difference in length, which is how I caught it. The sock just looked a bit shorter than it should have. Plus, not fixing it would have bothered me to no end for as long as I'd owned these. Take that, Loki!

I'm getting down to about 16 rows left for the left foot and its cable before decreasing for the toes. I think I have enough yarn left. And then it's on to foot two, where I get to do all these fancy cables in mirror on the opposite side of the foot. Here's to more luck the second time. Skol!

 

Footy

Lots of knitting wrapped up this week, having to do with feet and foot-intensive sports.

First, I finished the Inlay Socks I'd been working on in fits and starts since this summer. I used some yarn I bought at a shop in Idar-Oberstein, Germany last winter while visiting my brother and his family. This pattern features diagonal traveling twisted stitches that give the illusion of weaving. And best of all, the cabling aspect is done without a cable needle or dropping stitches precariously off the main needles. Very fiddly and a bit difficult to get used to. I never could memorize the flow of it, but I still enjoyed the process.

These are a bit snug on me, but I imagine that's due to the lack of ribbing. They're 76 stitches in circumference, which is a tad bigger than I usually make, but the traveling of the stitches pulls the fabric in and makes it a bit inflexible. I made the largest size, but if you ever make these, consider looking at the next size up. Can't wait to wear them this week. The weather has turned chilly, making for some brisk mornings on my bicycle. My hands and face have been frozen, but my toes have been warm in my handknit socks, though now I'm faced with a pile I need to wash today.

We'll be going to Germany again this Christmas, and this time I'm planning on taking some handknits for our niece and nephew. They're quite the English Premier League fans, and their parents are treating them to see a Boxing Day match in Manchester, featuring their favorite team, Manchester United. I found a pattern in Ravelry that I thought might be a nice little something to keep,their heads warm during the match -- the ManU Hat.

I ordered the yarn, Knit Picks Brava Sport, a few weeks ago. It got here Wednesday and I immediately cast on. It's tougher than it looks. First of all, knitting with acrylic is always a challenge, but I wanted this to be durable. And there are some awfully long floats in the red and yellow sections, necessitating catching the unused color behind the work every few stitches. It pulled in a few places, but I think it mostly worked.

I made a few modifications. There were supposed to be additional Red Devils and a soccer ball motif in the black section up top. I couldn't get the floats to work around the corners without pulling. So I left them out with the idea of duplicate stitching them on later. But when I was done, I decided I like it better plain. And I added a tassel using all the colors and attached it with some i-cord. Overall, I think it looks pretty sharp, although I won't know until I see it on some little noggins.

Now -- to make another one. I'm playing with the idea of reversing the red and yellow in the pattern, but haven't decided for sure.

Vest Laid Plans

Some knitting has occurred in the past few weeks, but mostly planning for a new major project.

We got out of town for much of last week, visiting relatives in northeast Texas and spending some time in the woods hiking and relaxing -- and enjoying unseasonably cool weather, along with the sound of rain. Rain! I worked on a pair of socks that I'm making using a free pattern from Knitty and yarn I bought in Germany last December.

These Inlay Socks are kinda cool. The effect is a woven fabric, but it's all knitting. You do this weird technique that allows you to do two-stitch cables without a cable needle or slipping stitches off temporarily. It's fiddly and a little weird to get used to, since one stitch in each pair is intentionally twisted. I can't manage to memorize the pattern, but I'm liking how these are turning out. Things should go a bit faster when I'm only doing the complicated pattern over the instep rather than around the whole cuff.

While I was gone, some yarn arrived that I'd ordered from the UK. I tried to find a closer source, but just couldn't. It's Jamieson & Smith Shetland Heritage in beautiful, rich colors. Or, rather, colours. They're all solid, with nary a heathered color in the collection, and they're all based on colors found in traditional garments housed in the Shetland Museum and Archives. Nice.

I'm planning to make a vest using a pattern by Kate Davies called Machrihanish, after a village on the Mull of Kintyre. I love the bold designs, and since some of the vests I've made in the past, like the Hillhead and Vaila slipovers, no longer fit me well, I've got a great excuse to start something new. So my days ahead will be filled with careful swatching, two-handed stranded knitting, and steek cutting. Kate's pattern gives very detailed instructions for swatching, which I don't often see for stranded knitting projects, and I'm very appreciative.

Can't wait to get started.

The Gist of the Twist

I've been on a roll with knocking out the projects these past few weeks. Today, I finished the Boyfriend Socks that I started back in May.

This pattern has been available online for free for years, but I just now got around to trying it. I used some Cascade Heritage Silk in the color Limestone that I bought when Janelle's friend (and now mine) Kris was in Austin for a conference and we spent a lovely Saturday driving around to yarn shops, knitting, and stuffing ourselves with barbecue. Good times! I started these socks shortly afterwards, but they too fell victim to my late spring/early summer knitting doldrums. But it was easy enough to pick up where I left off. I'd forgotten how luxuriously smooth this yarn is to work with. It can be a splitty with my sharp dpns, but totally worth it.

The construction is rather straightforward in this pattern. They're made toe-up using the magic cast-on. I followed the instructions for increasing on the adjoining edge stitches, but I wish now that I'd offset them by one stitch. And I'm not all that great with wrapped short row heel construction, but at least they look uniform.

I really do like the cables and how they drift back and forth across the ribbing in little bunches of three. Once I figured out how to count rows to find my place it was easily memorized. And the generous yardage on this yarn meant I could take these a little further up the calf before the final 1x1 ribbing and the sewn bind-off.

Those are Jeff's feet modeling in the top photo. He'd rather model than put up with my somewhat demanding photo direction. But he did mention how silky smooth these were -- this from a man who thinks most handknit garments are "too scratchy." Maybe someday I'll make a pair for him, although I suppose I'd have to change the name to Husband Socks.

Hiatus

This is the longest I've gone without a post since I started this blog. I find that a bit frightening. My knitting has slowed down a bit, that's true. I'm just worried that I don't have much to say about it lately. I suppose my mind has been focused elsewhere, with a work-related project that consumed my creativity and imagination for a while. And other extra-fiberly activities. Perhaps I did let that take over too much. I've picked up the needles again lately, though. Sure feels nice.

Work continues on the Fine-Knit Cardigan. I've finished the back and managed to make some progress on the right front panel. I'm still using a ratio calculator to make necessary gauge adjustments to the pattern. It's like taking a standardized test. 140 is to 120 as 9 is to _____. The answer is 7.7 -- or, rather, 7, since that section needs to be odd-numbered. Kind of fun, but also a bit nerve-wracking. I've been taking good notes, though, to ensure that if it ends up misshapen, at least it will be symmetrically misshapen.

And I started a pair of socks to have something to knit for the flight to a recent conference. This is the beginnings of a pair of Boyfriend Socks by Alice Bell. I'm using some Cascade Heritage Silk sock yarn in a nice neutral color that's really showing the stitches off well. I'm almost to the first heel on these toe-up socks. They're not nearly as complicated as they look since the cabling only happens every 6 rows.

I'll try to be better about making progress and posting about it. Hope all of you are hitting your knitting stride during this lovely spring, or autumn, depending on your habitational hemisphere.

It's a Barnum & Bailey World

A rainy cold weekend and a new sense of mission means my Paper Moon socks are finished -- including the re-knitting of the leg on the first sock. I really got into "the zone" on these lately -- and fitting with my modus operandi of letting projects languish and then suddenly knocking them out. A knitter's version of spring cleaning, perhaps. Which is also happening around here this spring break week. Believe me, it's needed.

You can't tell from the above picture, but I did re-knit the leg on the first sock. It would have just driven me nuts to know that these were "wrong," even if they looked fine they way they were. So I unraveled and unraveled and put the live stitches back on the dpns. Usually when I rip way back, I end up a row or two off, but I calculated it just right this time. And I was left with a giant wad of telephone cord yarn. (Sigh -- I just realized that "telephone cord" is starting to look like an anachronism.) In the past, I might just have wound it into a ball and started knitting, ignoring the fact that the kinks might make the knitting look wonky. ButI this time, I decided to be a bit more professional. Plus, I was worried that the kinks would make cables difficult to execute.

I wound the yarn around a box as I unravelled it. Using some scrap yarn, I tied off around the unravelled section in four places to keep it from tangling and I tied a stitch marker to the end so I could locate it later. Then I soaked the whole kinky mess for half an hour, leaving the rest of the sock on the edge of the basin. I squeezed it out, wrapped it in a towel and stepped on it, then draped it over a hanger with a slight weight and hung it in the shower to dry, again with the foot of the sock still attached. I had to get a bit creative, but it all worked. The next morning it was dry. Jeff did his husbandly duty of acting like a human swift while I wound it all up again, and then I was off to Saturday morning knitting.

Sunday evening, I had them finished. I washed and blocked the pair overnight and had my sock model pose for a picture on this glorious late winter day. They turned out beautifully. Jeff, who is not the biggest fan of wool socks, reports that these are quite comfy. That would probably be the silk. I'm glad I took the time to get these "right." And, because I'm a bit obsessive about these things, and because I'm hoping someone else out ther might be too, I can report that there are 392 cable twists in this pair of socks. And I'll have that number in my head each time I wear these. And I kind of like that.