Knitting Pharm

Nine days without blogging make Jack...

something clever.  More clever than something I can come up with on the fly.

I've been working.  Knitting and working and knitting at work, but still working.  Apologies for the delay, but I bring the gift of a zillion finished stitches.

First off Bayerische, which I can't seem to stop photographing from every angle.  These are like knitted art to me.  I will work them again, but the tiny, twisty cables are as hard on the hands as they are on the brain, so I will need a break before I tackle another pair.  Click for bigger.

   

  

Wee Koigu t-shirt got its finishing touches, and I got the KPPPM monkey off my back.

Soy Raglan got done too, including some fun details.  I made puff sleeves by adding a box pleat and applied i-cord to each sleeve.  I love the effect, and I also love the lacy body.

Amy suckered me into another pair of socks, and I got to try another of Cat Bordhi's sockitectures.  These are the Cedar Dancing Socks from New Pathways, worked to kid size by using finer yarn and smaller needle.  She loves them, and my Cherry Tree Hill Supersock from last spring's Portland trip has now been depleted.

Ms. Yes came last weekend with kids in tow and a Branching Out on the needles.  She also brought me a nifty knit pouch she made, no doubt inspired by the horrifying sight of me dragging skeins around on my kitchen floor.

Sunny yellow goodness...

and by the weekend, I had a Branching Out of my own, in Alchemy Bamboo.

[cute on her, but she can't have it!]

A skein of Plymouth Sockotta magically became a pair of Cables and Corrugations, also from Cat's New Pathways book.  I may just end up knitting the entire book by the end of 2008!

[lousy photo of great socks]

Cables and Os is 4 skeins (of 16-18) in and measures about 10 inches now.  The pattern is addictive and fun and effective and kind of perfect.  I'll post a photo once I get to shapings, but take my word for it, you need both the pattern and the yarn!

I'm also working one more (still unphotographed) pair of socks from New Pathways, the Sunrise socks, in double-stranded Tofutsies.  If you find the Tofutsies a bit on the thin side, you may like the added squish from double stranding it.

With tomorrow comes a yarn trek to Tangled Skeins (with Happy and Yes, to pester Extremities), a play date with Yes and family and hopefully enough caffeine to sink a battleship.  Have a great weekend!

First things first

Please take a minute and pay a visit to the divine Miz Happy, who is having a birthday today.  Steph, I hope Henry and Mr. H. are good to you today.  And I sincerely hope there's cake.  Lots of cake.  Happy birthday!

I've been sticking to my rules, only raiding the stash room to continue my ongoing projects.  First is the Bayerische socks, which are delicious and fabulous and a ton of fun to work.  I just wish that I'd bought enough yarn to make these ones as knee socks.  Oh well, next time!

[mmm, twisty...]

I've also allowed myself to raid the room to grab additional balls of CotLin for the Cables and Os sweater I started last week.  I've just joined on the third ball of this birthday yarn, and I'm really loving it.  I have to watch it carefully due to twisted stitches and very slight splitty tendencies, but it's very much worth the effort.

I'll be working some lazy knitter tricks for this one, so stay tuned.

Blue Moon's January club socks are done, and I love them.  Once again, they've broadened my horizons with a colourway I wouldn't have chosen on my own, which I appreciate.  Pattern is Serendipity by Adrienne Fong, colourway is Dragon Dance, to honour Chinese New Year.

Gung hay fat choy!

Also sitting in my project buckets was a 3/4 skein of Handmaiden Sea Silk.  I purchased this for an undetermined project last summer, then used a bit to do some slippers.  In the spirit of February's rules, I banged off a sweet scarf from what was left.  The pattern is Strangling Vines from Nicole Hindes, and I can't wait to work another one.

West Coast Sarah will have a new sweater, just as soon as I get it mailed out to her.  These raglans are a major addiction for me right now!

And what to do with a half skein of Socks that Rock?

 

[a new hat, natch!]

Amy and I continued to work on the felted bag, and got it done over the weekend.  She's a bit proud of it.

Looking heartbreakingly mature, no?  Perhaps fitting for a little girl who REGISTERED FOR SCHOOL THIS WEEK!

And the nutty thick-n-thin yarn from the beside-the-computer basket became Urchin hats for the girls.  Love this pattern, and love that Ravelry suggested it for the yarn.  (Send money to Ravelry, please.)

And since, in my world, another day brings another pregnancy announcement (I call my circle of friends the Breedy McHumpalots; please don't tell them), stash is most useful for little sweaters.  Here are two more:

[Koigu KPPPM and Cherry Tree Hill Supersock]

[Bernat Naturals Soy]

Lots of pictures and few words today, so I'll leave it at that.  I'll be fighting the urge to enter the stash room, but haven't changed my mind yet.

Happy VD, one day early!

Cake can undo any ill

Thank you for all of the birthday wishes and comments.  I had a wonderful, cake-filled, butter-frosted day, despite a few changes in plans.  Nothing like a birthday to bring out the Febrile UpChucking Kid.  (capitalization intended; look a little closer, and know that I'm not nearly as upset as the flowery language may imply.)

With my sweet Laurel in her sad state, I opted to stay home with the people I love last night.  We oinked on nachos with the best guac I've ever tasted, cake and chocolate.  Not a glamourous evening by any stretch, but a ton of fun.

Amy, at 4 1/2, is starting to get interested in knitting, so I figured no time like the present.  I have a knit-in-round stockinette project going on a large needle, which seemed perfect for her beginning fingers.  She took to it like a duck to water!

It warms my heart to see her so excited about it, and I'm certain Laurel will follow in her footsteps in no time at all.

The sweater for little West Coast Sarah is coming along, with just the sleeves left.  I worked a 3x3 brioche rib a la Grumperina's Roza's socks pattern on the bottom edge, and will do the same on the sleeves.

Sort-of-secret baby project is now finished.  Kindly avoid my Ravelry notebook if you're presently with child.  You likely know who you are.

Rounding out my month of sweaters is another pair of socks, Becca "Anticraft" Compton's Vinnland.  My only mods so far were to work gussets and a heel flap, adding the fun and addictive stitch pattern to the flap.  I love the effect.

I'm using some Koigu I purchased in Toronto last fall, and I got yet another joint-laden yarn skein!  My mom suggested, and I think she's right, that I don't get more joins per skein than the average person, I just go through far more skeins.  In any case, with the short yardage of Koigu, I didn't have the luxury of not using the wee yarn bits, so there will be lots of working in ends.

Looking at those photos, I think I'd prefer for the front surface of the toe to be ribbed.  Much frogging may ensue.

In 3.....2.....1.....

Come on in, the sweaters are fine

When I let my blogging go as long as I did this time, I always wonder where to begin.  This time, I'll dispense with the excuses and dive right in!

The finishing of Thermal sent me into a sweater frenzy that has yet to abate.  With about eleventy thousand friends "up the stump" (thanks Dad, for the charming, I suspect British, reference to pregnancy) and many neglected little folk in my circle of friends, I started with the small sweaters and just kept going.

Amy's Cascade 220 sweater was the first one done, and she loves it.

The whole point of this sweater was for her to have buttons to match the ones on my Thermal, so I made a twisted rib faux placket (look ma, no buttonholes!) as I worked the upper body.

BFF Nancy's son Charlie has turned two, and has also not received a holiday present from Aunt Fun, so a lil' letterman sweater was in order for him.

[I can't wait to see him in it.]

Wee Tyler will be 3 in the spring, just after his baby brother or sister arrives, so he gets to be a letterman too.

Both of the sweaters are worked in Sirdar Denim Tweed DK from a bargain bin.  Nice to work with, and a bit of cotton content, so it makes a nice, soft fabric.  I worked the two sweaters in different gauge and actually preferred the firmer gauge of the 3.5 mm needle I used for Tyler's.

Next was the fulfillment of a request from a dear old friend who will welcome her second child, a baby girl, in the spring.  Little Lauren will look just ducky in this.  I especially like the little fairy buttons.

[Yarn is Bernat Naturals Soy.  Surprisingly pleasant knit.]

Little Sarah was born last year, but she lives on the opposite coast, so I rarely get to see her parents.  (Mum is a high school friend.)  This has put me terribly behind on kid knitting, so this is a toddler sweater that I hope will fit her in the fall.  The yarn is Cherry Tree Hill Supersock and I'll post a more up-to-date progress photo in the next day or 2.  For now, you get this:

[Solid colour is Navy, variegated is Dusk.]

One last sweater is a secret, and I've set a crazy deadline for it, so there will hopefully be photos on my next post.

To round things out, I finished Jason's socks.  I'm not in the mood for socks these days, but I think he'll like them.

So, the magic formula for the sweaters, beyond blind obsession, is my persistent tinkering with the top-down raglan formula I've used many times before.  I've made a major change to the method:  when casting on for the neckline, I cast on the stitches prescribed within the worksheet PLUS one stitch for every row that will be worked before changing to the round PLUS the stitches that are intended to be cast on at centre front to complete the circle.

I join in the round immediately after casting on, work the neckband, then work short rows to shape the neck's front.  Instead of increasing at the end of each row, I work one more stitch than on the previous row, wrap and turn.  This creates a clean neckline, no raw edges, and one less step, as the sweater grows from a completed neckband.  Does this make sense in the least?

Tomorrow I'll be busy turning 36, celebrating today's surgeon visit, my resulting clean bill of health, and my weather permitting return to KOL.  My wish is for a healthy year, a comment from each lurker who reads this post, and 100 public Bloglines subscribers by the end of January.  Little help?

Thermalicious

With a gentle nudge from my pal Wendy to both finish the sweater and to blog it, I am pleased to present my finished Thermal, aka The Nicest Piece I've Ever Handknitted For Myself.

Click for bigger versions of the teeny ones.

  

[Apologies for the dorky photo.]

This is the best fitting, most squishy-soft, comfy piece ever.  I love everything about it, even the cutesy buttons I've been reclaiming from garments ever since the original sweater purchase of 1996.  (Those buttons are a very well-traveled bunch.)

The photos don't do it justice at all.  The set-in sleeves, the deep, scoopy neck, the just-right sleeve length and abundant twisted rib...

All of this has set me into sweater mode.  I've already started and finished one for BFF Nancy's son for his 2nd birthday / late holiday gift.  I'll post photos once I remember to take some in daylight.

Next sweater is for DD Amy in Cascade 220, a top-down raglan that I'll also post photos of later on.  It's really flying off the needles, and she's sure to wear it by month's end.  After that will be another one in the same colour for DD Laurel.  (They haven't yet rebelled against the matchy-matchy clothing, so I still indulge in it more than occasionally.)

In other knits, I cast on a bag so I'd have some plain knitting to do at the theatre while I watched the best new movie I've seen in years.  The yarn is the Bernat felting stuff, which isn't too bad, very Lopi-like.

Also, the first handknitted socks for my BIL, whose wife has had her holiday socks on every day and is making him very jealous.  These are in SR Kertzer On Your Toes, the sock yarn with a smidge of aloe.  It's an awful yarn, very scratchy for one with aloe.  It also had a very, very awkward join, where the patterning actually reversed!  After much winding I managed to salvage enough for the pair, but I'm quite annoyed and won't bother with the yarn again.

And socks for the other BIL are done and awaiting their postal trip west.

And just one more,a  secret project that went off in the mail to the States today.

Yesterday I had a wonderful visit from Ms. Yes and her littlest kids.  She was sporting the most awesome pair of Back to Basics socks, and we caffeinated, kvetched and, of course, knitted.  Now I'm dying to get my hands on some CotLin from Knitpicks so I can work a Tussie Mussie just like hers!

The girls (my 2, her 1) had a great play and got along famously.  Wee Gabriel?  Maybe it was the yarn fumes.  Maybe it was the lure of the squishy bean bag chair.

   

Or maybe, just maybe, he was just bored.

It just felt(ed) right

No sick talk anymore, just reports on smokin' fast knitting!  I have found my groove, then frogged it and knitted myself another one, all at my former blistering pace.

It wasn't really a resolution, as I've long since given up making them, but my UFOs were starting to bother me, taking up room and taunting me from the corners of my living room.  My revenge was to finish, finish and finish some more!

First was the swirly felted bag, oversized, boxy and about eleventy billion kinds of awesome.

Steph is right, she's awesome enough to deserve a lining, but that didn't stop me from using her today.  When I get the urge to sew a bit, I think I'll line her in chocolate brown.  Isn't she darling?

One last yarn run allowed me to finish David's clogs, not in time for the holiday but at least before his January birthday.  While on a yarn run at Michael's in the city, I had a chat with a random fellow knitter in the book section, and she turned out to be a blog reader (Hi Kim!).  She promises to get a blog or to at least delurk in 2008, so let's encourage her.

Here are David's finished clogs, denim blue and denim/baby blue twist.

I have officially graduated from Rockin' Sock Club 2007, with a perfect 6.0 GPA (all pairs completed).  I'd really put me more at a 5.0, since it took me a few kits to get into the groove of using other designer's construction methods.  Thanks to a loving husband who despises shopping for birthday pressies for the wife who has everything and needs nothing, I'm back in the Club for 2008.  Here are the Salish Sea Socks, in the exclusive colourway Bella Coola, medium weight.

While clearing out the UFO bin, I couldn't leave a second sock hanging, so I worked the other Retro Rib in Panda Wool.  These were simply a pleasure to work, and the resulting socks are very squishy and have nice elasticity.  I have 3 skeins in another colourway in the Panda Wool, probably enough for knee highs, so I'll be playing with it in the fairly near future.  The colourway below is Red Cinnamon.

And for the brother-in-law with the misfortune of moving west to Edmonton in January (brrrrrrrrrr!), socks are in progress, in Trekking.  His size 12 feet mean an endless, plain knit.  I'm working them toe-up in 4x2 rib, and the photo is a bit behind the times, as I completed the leg of the first sock this morning en route to a meeting, and worked about half of sock #2 over the course of said meeting.

Off to write and backdate a post with some (scary) promised stats from 2007.  I won't do a full round-up of 2007, but if you click here, there are monthly tallies starting last January.  It's a little nuts.  You've been warned.

Sock stats 2007

As promised, the sock stats for the year 2007.

Total pairs completed:  79

Total pairs completed during the 52 pair plunge part of 2007 (April 1 - December 31):  63

Average pairs per month in 2007:  6.5

Average pairs per month during the 52 pair plunge:  7

Fewest pairs completed in a given month:  2 in December

Most pairs completed in a given month:  9 each in June and August

Breakdown by month:

• January - 8
• February - 3
• March - 5
• April - 9
• May - 8
• June - 9
• July - 5
• August - 9
• September - 7
• October - 7
• November - 7
• December - 2

Phew!  Someone needs to take break and knit a sweater!

We have knitting progress!

In a month where words like thoracotomy, pneumothorax and empyema have featured prominently, stitching of any kind feels like heaven.

Obsessive, distracting heaven.

Upon my return home 8 days ago, I first set about finishing some pre-hospitalization knits.  These came with me to the hospital but, sadly, I was too unwell to make any progress.  No longer!

First is the Charade socks in a Fleece Artist mill end.  You can actually see (on the sock at the top and right below) where the colour changes slightly after a join, but it's better than what I expected from a bargain basket purchase and I'm still very happy.

[64 stitches, toe-up, Magic Loop on my Knitpicks Harmony wood circs]

Next was Bartholomew's Tantalizing socks from Cat Bordhi's New Pathways book, in the Black Bunny Fibers yarn I obtained in Philly.  The colours pooled really oddly, but it was a very enjoyable knit.

Christmas morning brought a generous stash-enhancement bag from my parents.  I think my sock yarn problem is genetic, as my mom is almost as bogged down in sock yarn stash as I am.  Here's the haul she put together for me:

I couldn't resist starting a new project from the magical bag o' stash, so I cast on with the red-orange Panda Wool and am officially in love.  Here's a Retro Rib, from Favorite Socks, worked toe-up starting Christmas day:

And, as if delivered by Santa himself, my final shipment from the Rockin' Sock Club arrived at dinnertime on Christmas Eve.  The first sock is worked to the cuff, and I'll definitely use the pattern again.

[apologies for the poor lighting; it seems the blinding white of a snowstorm may not be the best background.]

I am currently buzzing down the sleeves of Thermal and hoping to complete it as I welcome 2008.

I feel I simply must give shout-outs for some great service I received from yarn purveyors in 2007.

Firstly, Knitpicks.  As their new circular needles, both nickel-plated and Harmony wood, were new this year, the folks at Knitpicks were very kind and open-minded about feedback received.  They replaced numerous needles for me this year, first for a design flaw that led the cable to be pulled from the needle join, and later for severed cables that resulted from my overzealous magic looping.  Thank you for taking care of your knitters, Knitpicks.  I look forward to dumping my wallet in your direction in 2008.

Next round of kudos go to the Blue Moon team, who it is generally accepted have some of the best yarns in the business.  I recently purchased a skein of STR from a shop in Toronto.  Through no fault of the shop, the skein was riddled with joins, so I contacted the Blue Moon gals to let them know.  When it was determined that I couldn't get back to the shop for a return, Blue Moon sent me a replacement skein, promptly and graciously.  Service like that will ensure my long-term status as a customer, and is much appreciated.

Who treated you especially well in 2007?

Post-plunge pairs

It would seem the best thing for my sock mojo was to finish the Plunge and no longer feel I had to knit socks.  Add a few unplanned sock yarn binges, and you have the perfect storm of speedy, frenzied sock knitting.

Another pair of Pomatomus have jumped on and flown off the needles before I could say, "Cookie A".  These are for a holiday order, and I hope the 2.5 mm needle size took the size down sufficiently for her size 6 feet.  The yarn is Opal solid, which is just such a reliable old friend.

Before heading out on just one more plane trip and while catching up on PVR viewing, I snuck a pair from my Philadelphia stash enhancement trip.  This was my first time with the Skacel Lifestyle, and I really liked it.  It's similar in feel to the Artyarns Ultramerino 4, and I love the long pattern repeat.

One more out of town meeting meant plenty of airport, airplane and meeting room knitting this past week.  It also meant a somewhat accidental trip to Lettuce Knit.  I wasn't planning on being in the Market area at all, but my host for the day, a very dear friend, was dropping off a friend (another meeting attendee) there, so I snuck in just for a peek.  In just 10 minutes, I scared the bejeesus out of Laura Chau and purchased three skeins of Socks that Rock (lightweight in Pirate's Booty and Highway 30 and mediumweight in Lapis).

Ms. Happy fared quite well at LK as well, although she exercised enough restraint with the STR to make me look quite bad.  We also sat together at the meeting and knitted silently in a back corner.

All in 2 day's work, meaning every free moment spent knitting:

A Loksins and a half, in Fleece Artist Sea Wool.  I reversed the pattern to work it to my usual toe-up recipe.  The combination of my Knitpicks nickel-plated circs and the slightly slippery yarn has made for a mad fast knit so far.  I hope to work the leg of sock #2 tonight.

[the toe on the sock in progress isn't nearly as pointy as the photo makes it appear.]

One Charade sock, in a Fleece Artist Merino sock mill end from ages ago.  The pattern is easy, quick and effective.  It doesn't need blocking to look good in photos, because the herringbone rib creates a nifty, almost stiff farbic on its own.  Major kudos to Sandra Park for this one.

[I worked this pair toe-up as well.]

Since the completion of the Plunge, I've decided to continue track my pairs by number until its official close of April 1st, so here goes:

• 53:  Undulating Rib in STR lighweight
• 54:  Pomatomus in off-white Kroy
• 55:  Lenore in STR lightweight
• 56:  Roza's socks in Lorna's Laces
• 57:  Loksins in off-white Kroy
• 58:  Anita's socks in self-striping Online Sierra
• 59:  Skacel Lifestyle socks

In all of this sock hoopla, poor Thermal sits with barely a day's work left, and I can't seem to bring myself back to it.  Anyone care to set me a deadline?