Knitting Pharm

Cheatin' and Feltin'

The past week has been a time to tally up the Plunge and cheat on my socks.  Socked out once more, I am planning a sock hiatus and enjoying larger gauges and longer needles.

Plunge pair 26.  Halfway there.  Trekking Pro Natura.  Yum.

Plunge pair 27.  Artyarns Ultramerino 4, and a very recognizable pattern.  Still my favourite.  Still want to tuck Cookie A. in my pocket and take her everywhere with me.  (When I worship, I go all out.)

Cheat #1, the mystery Gloss project, is now a skein and a half in.  Here's a photo with about a skein done.  Thermal, by Laura Chau.  Yarn and colour as in the pattern.  Squee factor:  high to extremely high.  (Pop the designer in my pocket factor:  dangerously high.)

Cheats 2 through 5 (so far, and I'm not done yet):  clogs for friends' kids.

Top pair are Cascade 220, black and maroon twist.  Bottom left are Patons Rustic (grey) and Classic (red), with the uppers done in a strand of each.  Bottom right are Patons Rustic (grey) and Classic (blue).  The red and grey ones are for the oldest son of a high school friend, so the colour scheme is perfect.

Next are clogs for my favourite SIL's hospital bag.  (She's bringing me a niece in August.)

(Patons Classic.  Again.  And I have more stashed away.)

Last cheat is the finished Montego Bay scarf, finished, finally photographed and already worn twice.

Be warned, Amy.  There's room in my pocket for you too, lovey.

Back to Ravelry.  They're about to go full-time, folks, which will mean access for all.  See you there soon!

Time Warp

In my world, I'm known as a knitter.  Whether I'm attending a dance class full of teensy girls, waiting in line anywhere at all, or just relaxing at the park, my hands are perpetually busy.

A fellow dance mom was engaging in the local pastime, cruising the yard sales of Colchester County, when she found this:

 

Front and back of a sweater, with more than enough yarn to work the sleeves and finishing, as well as the Fall/Winter 1984 Vogue Knitting issue with the pattern.

Oy.  Now that's a dated shape.  I agreed to tackle it over the summer.  Thankfully, the sleeves are not started at all, as they need to be worked completely differently.  Ditto the neckline.

Meanwhile, I have continued to chip away at my own projects.  Pair 24 is done, much to the delight of a certain daughter.

Pair 25 is done for my dear FIL, who graciously accepted a skein of yarn last weekend as a Father's Day gift.  Now he gets these:

26 is coming along nicely, in Trekking ProNatura.  This is my first experience knitting with bamboo, and I'm delighted with it.

Montego Bay Scarf is done, but not yet photographed.

As my yarn partner in crime prepares to return home, we hit just one more shop, my beloved Loop.  Just one skein made it into my bag.  And a book.  And a magazine.  Ouch.

 

Now I'm all about a certain sought-after membership that came through for me today.  I don't think I'll take the time to photograph and enter my existing stash, but I'm greatly enjoying queuing up my projects.  Speaking of which, the queue calls!

Cheat a little, sock a little

I'm still entertaining the world's most fun knitting partner, so blogging has fallen a distant 3456th in things to do.  It's also been a blur of family activities, with Amy's first-ever dance recital and the beginning of her soccer season.  Laurel is just enjoying being along for the ride, and is glued to her Gran whenever she can get anywhere near her.

I've been cheating on the yarn diet by the mouthful, a skein here, a hank there.  Same with the plunge.  Cheat a little, sock a little.

Gaspereau was disappointing this time around, for reasons I won't express publicly.  However, I did find a nice discounted bit of Sea Wool.

LK was as wonderful as usual, and the basket of Fleece Artist beckoned once more.  These 2 yarn cakes were sold together, and while one looks considerable bluer than the other in the photos, they really do appear to be twins in real life.

A forgotten e-bay transaction arrived.  STR lightweight in Tide Pool.  Project still to be determined.

And in major cheating acquisitions, this arrived last week.

(as well as some of the newer size sock needles.)

Any guesses as to the intended pattern for the above?

I've settled on winding and working one hank at a time, between socks.  That breaks up the Plunge while still allowing me to do something a little bit different.

Something different?  Sea Silk!

Amy's Montego Bay Scarf from the latest IK.  This one gets a few rows here and there, when I crave a little sheepless fun.

Plunge Pair #23 is now on the feet of my beloved.  Opal Mosaik, plain ol' stockinette, his favourite colour.

(My God, I loves me those skinny little chicken legs.)

#24 is just about done, a pair of Pomotamus for Amy done at 2/3 scale.  I don't know what I'll do when her feet grow much more, as right now it's so easy to base her sock size on my own.

Tonight it's knitting in the city, perhaps an evening of cheating on my socks.  Happy Tuesday to all, and thanks for all of the nice comments and messages re. Coupling.  Knit on!

Plunge. That is all.

Multiple blog posts have me running out of even remotely clever post titles, so this one's just about the Plunge.

I cycle between complete focus and total rebellion from my sock mission.  Right now I'm at a small standstill, having been distracted by other fun knits.  That said, I have made some progress.

Pair #20, in my prize yarn, STR mediumweight in Undertoe.  The stitch pattern is from Meg Croft's Shimmer, from Magknits March 2007.  The lifted stitches help to break up some of the pooling, blending the colours just a smidge.  I love them.

Pair #21, one sock down and second started.  Crosshatch lace from More SKS, in Artyarns Supermerino.  This yarn has more than sproing, it has BOING!

Pair #22, Sweetpea, from yesterday's Knitty release.  In the Lucy Neatby hot pink I've been itching to work with.  I'm going toe-up to ensure the longest socks possible, because the yarn is so very special.

These socks must be completed before I take on my newest distraction.  I will reward my focus with a non-sock project, the details of which are to follow.

Too much for a single post

I've been insansely busy, with my favourite knitting partner at my house for the past week, and for two more weeks to come.

We've been running the roads from yarn shop to yarn shop, enhancing the hell out of our respective stashes, and working mini knitalongs in my family room.  Much more to follow.

For now, kindly meander over to the new Knitty, where I am ever-so-tickled to have my third design published.

If you are having any trouble obtaining Sea Wool, I highly recommend Red Bird Knits.  Robyn is based out of Toronto and ships all over the darned place.

Now go!  Print patterns!  Knit!

Wednesday's Wooliness

Am back-dating these posts in order to capture the recent timeline of yarn crawling.

Wednesday was a 2-LYS kind of day.  First was a pit-stop at Tangled Skeins in Dartmouth.  We found inspiration, in the form of Artyarns, for Kate Gilbert's Syncopated Caps from the latest Interweave Knits.

Mary's hat, with some white Lang Jawoll as the background and 2 shades of red Artyarns Supermerino:

Mine, with solid Artyarns as the backdrop for one of Mary's leftover reds:

(Should it be up to standard, mine's a sample for the shop.)

My cap was supposed to be worked in the shades below, but the Fair Isle was lost in the similarity between the solid and the variegated.

 

Next, we headed for Mahone Bay and Have a Yarn.  I had a Hallalujah moment in the discount aisle, where I found more sock yarns for the Plunge.

The only one I paid full price for, Regia Sierra:

And a bunch that were on half price.  The first one was discounted because a small amount had been used to knot up a sample swatch for the shop.  The remainder were discounted because the world wants me to have more sock yarn than I can knit in my lifetime.

(the last two aren't quite identical, as the top one is slightly grayer than the other.)

And because it's so darned affordable, I got a couple of Sisu solids to use for my More SKS patterns.

 

It was a lovely day that also included a lobster lunch, shoe shopping and the company of very old friends.

May's Head to Toe and other knitterly goodness

It was a great month, both for the Plunge and otherwise.  I had spells of real sock focus, punctuated by the rebellious need to knit other things.  As always, photos and details can be found in the May archives, and my Plunge Page.

Socks:

• Plunge Pair 11:  BMFA April Club socks
• Plunge Pair 12:  Austermann Step socks
• Plunge Pair 13:  Scrolls socks in CTH Supersock
• Plunge Pair 14:  Cookie A's Flicker in Louet Gems Sage Green
• Plunge Pair 15:  Jaywalkers in KP Simple Stripes, Vineyard
• Plunge Pair 16:  KP Simple Stripes Snapdragon socks
• Plunge Pair 17:  Jaywalkers in KP Simple Stripes, Snapdragon
• Plunge Pair 18:  CTH Supersock socks

Bags:

• French Market Bag in various scraps of worsted
• Felted backpack for a friend's niece

For the wee bodies:

• Monica for Amy
• Monica for Laurel

For the not-so-wee body:

• Modified Isabella for me.  Added cap sleeve, worked in Fleece Artist Merino Sock yarn

For the head:

• Stockinette cap in the 2 strands of Opal I had plied together in April
• Stockinette cap in my Navajo-plied KP Shimmer
• Pomotamus cap in my Navajo-plied KP Shimmer

Here are some photos of the caps in question:

(that Laurel is a walking ray of sunshine, isn't she?)

 

I also started and frogged a pretty ambitious sock project in May.  I've been fascinated by Meg Swansen's Arch-Shaped Stockings since I spied them in last fall's Vogue Knitting.  After much swatching and playing, I found the errata for that issue included the entire pattern and decided to give it one more try.  I was starting to doubt I'd like the thickness and lack of stretch, but solidered on.  My last straw, the one that told me to let it go (what, your last straws don't talk to you?) was this:

See the smaller diamonds at the red arrows?  Yeah, they're not supposed to be smaller.  And while the remainder of the diamond pattern is as written, it's still fugly.  I do, however, like the corrugated rib, which I'll definitely incorporate into future projects.  The solids will become other projects, at least one of them Ariel Barton's Cablenet from last fall's Knitty.

One more fun knitterly event was a contest on the Rockin' Sock Club blog.  We were asked for a creative, fun or other answer to a question.  My answer definitely falls under the "other" category.

Question:  How many knitters does it take to screw in a lightbulb?

My answer:  Two, but how on earth do they get in there?

It pays to have a dirty mind, because I was one of 15 winners chosen!

Then the decision.  My prize was a skein light or medium weight, any shade on their website!  It seemed a monumental choice.

I made the right decision.

 

Medium weight in Undertoe.  It had been on my lengthy wish list since they posted their new colourways, and it is the most gorgeous yarn I've ever seen.  In fact, I think I need to go be with it.

Happy a restful Sunday, all!