Crafts

Remember a couple of weeks ago, when I mentioned some entrelac socks that just weren’t working out? Well, I ripped back and tried again in stockinette, and that didn’t look good either, so I temporarily abandoned those. Instead, I cast on for these two Sundays ago:

This is that luscious merino-tencel blend I bought at Ellen’s 1/2 Pint Farm at the fiber festival last month, and the pattern is from there as well. I love the way they turned out, and they were a really fast knit!

And literally, just as I was hiding the last end, the mail truck pulled up. And what was in it but my Hot Socks swap package from my pal Camilla! Yes, I got this lovely package all the way from Denmark:

There’s two skeins of lovely blue cotton/wool blend sock yarn, some very interesting looking cocoas, dark chocolates, a book of Hans Christian Andersen stories to share with Carrie, and some pretty little bangles for Carrie to wear. The cocoa is basically chocolate on a stick, which you put into your mug and pour hot milk over – I’ve never seen anything like it, but I can’t wait to try it! I’m also really excited about the solid colored sock yarn, since I seem to be on a lacy sock kick lately. Thank you, Camilla, for such a lovely package!

Unfortunately, some gift knitting – both Christmas and otherwise – needs to be accomplished before I can cast on another pair of socks. In the meantime, I’ll have to go in search of the perfect lacy (or cabled?) pattern to use my pretty blue yarn for…

Speaking of Christmas gifts, I have 11 gifts completed and 4 more so close it’s almost ridiculous to consider them unfinished. (I need to go buy two sets of 30″ shoelaces and they’re done.) There are 6 more gifts in the works, and then I may try to fit one or two more in there if I have the time. By Thanksgiving, anything that isn’t done, reasonably close to done, or is more than a day’s worth of crafting time to do is not getting done. That’s what Amazon is for, right?

Ack! It’s 36° right now – that’s 36° Fahrenheit, not Celsius! It was 64 this morning, just barely sweater weather. And now it’s almost freezing and Carrie doesn’t have a hat yet, because I just started knitting it yesterday. It’s snowing just a half an hour west of here! For heaven’s sake, it’s only October 12th! This is all because Carrie’s Halloween costume is the thinnest, flimsiest thing ever, isn’t it? (And it has wings, so she can’t actually wear her snowsuit over top of it.)

But back to the hat: I’ve gotten to the crown decreases, but it’s almost midnight and my head hurts trying to figure out where to decrease. See, I’m using a pattern, but I couldn’t get gauge (by a lot) and I adjusted the stitch count, and now I have to do some complicated math…and…I think I have to sleep on it. Not to mention that even if I finished the knitting tonight it’s a striped hat and there are at least four thousand ends to hide.

Poor Carrie. I wonder if last years’ hat still fits?

Everything I’m knitting lately seems to use my size US 0/2mm needles. So many things, in fact, that I have to plan carefully the order in which I’m going to work on things so that I have a size 0 needle available when I need it. I’m thinking I should order another KnitPick’s size 0 circular or two – they’re certainly cheap enough to have extras! So what are all these fine-gauge projects?

A teeny-tiny hat and the most ridiculously cute booties ever:

The yarn is some leftover Fortissima Cotton Colori, which is discontinued, but it is the softest cotton sock yarn ever. I have one more skein in these pretty baby colors, and I’ll be so sad when it’s gone. (For the record, one skein yielded a preemie hat, a newborn hat, and a pair of newborn booties, with about 6″ to spare.) And before anyone gets any ideas, these were a gift for a baby shower this past Sunday.

Another Devan sweater:

I didn’t take great notes the first time around, so I actually knit this much on smaller needles, realized it was much too stiff and figured out I had used a different size needle last time. Rrrrrrip-it! But using size 2 needles for the body (it’s still size 0 for the rolled hem) made a huge difference in the drape.

And last, but not least, the doomed entrelac socks:

The pattern, my friends, sucks. If I didn’t know how to knit socks in my sleep, and hadn’t knit entrelac before, there’s no possible way I could knit these socks. The pattern isn’t the problem, though, it’s the yarn. Who could possibly tell, looking at this skein, that the colors changed every single inch?!? This makes it impossible for there to be nice, defined squares, and instead I’m left with this variegated mess. I still want to make this pattern, and I still want to use this yarn, but they are not meant to be together. Better to figure this out now than before any long-term commitments were made…

Lolly posted some questions for the Socktoberfest participants. I would have answered them days ago, except that life keeps getting in the way! So, without further ado:

When did you start making socks? Did you teach yourself or were you taught by a friend or relative? or in a class?
I taught myself how to make socks with the book Socks Soar on Two Circular Needles. I admit I saw the same yarn on someone else’s blog and was overcome by an urge to make myself the same fabulous green stripey socks!

What was your first pair? How have they “held up” over time?
I made these socks in February, 2003. They were a tad bit loose, so they’re not the first handknit socks I reach for in the drawer, and they tend to get a little less wear than the other socks I’ve knit. That being said, they’ve been worn and washed many, many times and they still look great. (And I *gasp* dry them in the dryer…)

What would you have done differently?
Measured better? I’m really picky about socks being too long and bunching up in my shoes. I didn’t know that until after I knit my first pair of socks, though!

What yarns have you particularly enjoyed?
I haven’t really found a sock yarn I haven’t enjoyed. My favorites are probably Austerman Step, with aloe right in the yarn, and (of course) Koigu. I also really like the wool/cotton blends I’ve used, though I haven’t actually made myself a pair of those so I don’t know how they hold up.

Do you like to crochet your socks? or knit them on DPNs, 2 circulars, or using the Magic Loop method?
I knit socks with the Magic Loop method. I used 2 circulars for the first few pairs but found the extra needles hanging off the sock to be annoying. I also didn’t like having to sort out which end I needed to pick up next. (And forget DPNs. I consider them a necessary evil for a very few things, but you won’t catch me using them by choice!)

Which kind of heel do you prefer? (flap? or short-row?)
Um, I have no preference. Short-row is faster, but flaps are more easily customized. I’ve done both types on both toe-up and cuff-down socks, and I think they each have their uses. I tend to use short-row when making socks for other people because I think they fit a wider range of heel shapes.

How many pairs have you made?
Counting the “secret” pairs I haven’t published on my blog yet? How about the tiny baby socks I made for Carrie that she only wore once before she outgrew them? Including all of those, 19 pairs. I think – well, somewhere in the 18-20 range, anyway. Many of those can be seen on my sock page. Note that I’m not counting the (at least) four pair of socks in various states on needles in my craft room…

Tune in tomorrow when I should have a picture of my latest sock-in-progress, which I will then be ripping out mercilessly. It’s a very important lesson in choosing the right yarn for the right pattern, which I did not do. It’s also a very important lesson in trusting your instincts and not continuing to knit when you know it’s not working out!

Yesterday Carrie and I went to a come-and-play class at the recreation center. The recreation center is right next door to the local yarn shop. We walked over, really just to show off her orange cabled sweater (I had bought the yarn for it there).

I came home with some really fabulous sock yarn (isn’t it all fabulous?) and a kit for a felted backpack. No willpower. In my defense, the kit was packaged really temptingly, and it’s all my favorite colors…

I feel a little like my knitting has been floundering. Christmas projects, too – I haven’t worked on those in almost three weeks! But obviously something is getting done when I’m not paying attention:

Behold! The finished Jaywalker socks! I’m very, very happy with how these came out! I have realized, however, that I need a pair of sock blockers desperately. Carrie already promised to buy some for me for my birthday, but since she doesn’t have a credit card I’m hoping her Daddy will help her out…

And then there’s this:

A matching hat to the candy corn sweater. Carrie saw me making the little curlies for the top (I’ve added two more since I took the picture) and insisted on wearing it all morning, unwoven ends sticking out everywhere. I’m glad she likes the things I knit for her – I’m going to take full advantage of that while it lasts! Oh, and I only have a couple of yards left of this fabulous yarn, so that’s the end of the candy corn goodness. I’m not sure what else I could have knit to match the set anyway!

Finally, I’m joining the Warm Hands knit-along, because I’ve been attempting to create my own mitten/glove pattern to go with my so-called scarf & hat set. Since I’m knitting mittens anyway, I may as well join another knit-along, right?

They’re mittens with a fold-back top, but I haven’t decided if they’re going to have fingerless gloves or standard gloves as the lining. I’m using stash Koigu to line them (here’s hoping one skein is enough!) and I think that would be thin enough to have full-length fingers. But it would probably be easier to buckle Carrie into her carseat with fingerless gloves. I’m kind of stalled because I can’t decide – of course, I’m nowhere near the fingers, but that’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it. As always, this would be a much smoother process if I actually had a pattern to follow! (I just hope I can follow my hastily jotted down notes for mitten/glove number 2!)

Because I obviously can’t get enough sock knitting (my jaywalker socks are this -> <- close to being done, I just have to graft the toe of the second sock and weave in those ends) I joined two new groups earlier this week:

Socktoberfest, a month-long celebration of all things sock-y, and Hot Socks Swap, where we will exchange sock yarn and hot drink goodness. Go join up, you know you want to!

Also, this weeks’ Knitter’s Review newsletter had a review of a children’s book about knitting, Knitting Nell (which is already on Carrie’s birthday wish list) and it had a link to a project the author started called the Good Scarf Project. I really want to participate, and since I was going to knit Carrie a scarf this fall, maybe I can use that?