More Sock Knitting

I can't show you the pair of socks I finished today because they're a present for a bloggy person. Consider this a bookmark and I'll get a photo of them on said person's feet later.

Instead, here's my Daffodils sock - am knitting a row for every task I cross off my pre-WFC to do list. Kind of.

Sock knitting

Casting on for the second sock for my sister's birthday socks. I cast on last night.



Here's about where it was about an hour ago. Soooooooooo close to turning the heel and then I got distracted by this:



Daffodils by Dani at Sunshine Yarns. Yummy!

More FOs

My uncle is going to be 60 at the end of the month. He really enjoyed the cashmere socks I knitted for him last year so I thought I'd go the knits again.

Here is the first part of the gift.



This is a good representation of the colour. It's Cloud colourway from The Knittery.



This is a better representation of the object. (I'm still figuring out how to take photos at home when you are only ever there at night!)

I'm also going to make a pair of socks. I have till Thurs 25th! Argh! I have 2 other pairs of socks to finish first!

The Christening Jacket

I think commission work *sounds* good in theory but I'm not a huge fan of it in practice. So I'm making this Christening Jacket for my hairdresser's baby. Last appointment she was all "whenever" and then the appointment last weekend she said, "yeah its next weekend" (aka this Sunday). So ... I tried my very best but it was not to be.

Firstly, I didn't read the pattern properly - and I tried to make a 4 x 50g ball jacket with 2. It, um, didn't work. So I made the back and thought maybe I should source more yarn. Noone anywhere online in Australia was stocking it. So I decided to try and order it from my LYS but online. I have no fricking idea if they ordered the yarn because they never got back to me and they never took payment details. But none of that really is important, is it? I mean ... this is how far along the front left side is:



SO tomorrow I have to call her and tell her the sorry news. She told me she wanted it anyway, even if not for the christening. And in truth, its supposed to be 31 here this weekend so she may not have wanted a jacket anyway. Trouble is, if I don't get it done before I go, I get back very late Nov and surely she will not want such a thing then.

Presents

I feel so bad with this blog - a knitting blog should have colourful, enticing photos that lure readers in and inspire knitters to start new projects. My photos are all so hideously bad that I can't even keep my own attention on this blog!

I'm knitting up a storm on projects I need to wrap up before I leave on my month's holiday. My sister deserves a really cool birthday present this year. One part will be these socks.



Here's the skein unravelled and is close to the colours as they appear in real life. The yarn is Socks that Rock in Spring Fling which is a colourway they recently retired. I was checking out all the colours that they were retiring and thought that my sister might like socks in this colourway.



Another, closer shot. I love the potential of a skein of yarn.



The first sock cast on. My sister has itty bitty feet (yay - quick knit!)



And the first sock all knit up! Am just doing the ribbing after casting on the second sock. No time for second sock syndrome here.

Yarn purchases

In terms of stashing, it makes sense, right, to buy a lot of next year's yarn this year when I am in the USA. I mean the dollar is stronger, making the yarn cheaper AND no postage.

I'm just sayin' ...

Rocking Sock Club

I got my internationals invitation today to resubscribe for the Socks that Rock Rocking Sock Club. The price for the club has gone up again - it went up last year. I'm not sure how I feel about that. I personally think they might be absorbing some of the postage costs in the club price but ... I dunno, I guess at some point, if it increases every year (but the regular skeins stay the same price) I might eventually get priced out of the market.

Not this year though! Last year, when the club cost $20 less, I bought mine when the Aussie dollar was 75US cents. This year, the new cost price gets bought hopefully when the dollar is still strong - we don't pay till January, today the Aussie dollar was 90US cents. I'm still wayyyyyyyyyy ahead.

Kimono Patchworking

This is a photo of the kimono kit I've been working on this last week. I've done all the squares with the light background. The material for the dark background is a lot lighter and it turns out, less accurately drawn templates on. Lots of fiddling and easing going on.

So this might be one of the projects I take with me when I got overseas at the end of the month - especially since I've made it transportable now. And I can't see myself finishing it before then. I have at least 3 pairs of socks to make in the meantime - 2 of which I have not even balled the skeins of yet. Any ideas about crafting on board a plane? I'm thinking a needle and thread can get on - so cross-stitching could be an option. If I didn't need pins I could take patchwork? I'm vaguely toying with making fans to be appliqued onto blocks later. I could do that with card templates, tack the material on and then overstitch edges together.

I dunno. But the flight from Sydney to JFK is gonna be looooooooooong.

Craft weekend!!!!

Had a heavy schedue of crafting this weekend. No photos today but will post some this week.

I made a nice indent into the second sock I am making for a gift.

I also pieced half of the kimonos for my kimono wall hanging. There are 12 in the whole piece - 6 dark on calico background and then 6 lighter ones on darker background. I did all the dark on the calicos this weekend. And I'm especially impressed with myself because I fixed one of them that had been sitting in limbo for months. Does that ever happen to you? You're rocking along happily on a project nd then wham! something kind of annoying or fiddly happens and you put it down to fix later and the 'fixing it later becomes so big in your mind that the whole project comes to a grinding halt? That's what happened to me on this one. I bled on a piece of the background ... or something red got stained on it .. and it needed to be fixed somehow. And even though I could have left it for later and done all the other squares and come back, I didn't. Nothing happened and sewing ground to a screeching halt and I worked on knitting instead And you know what? It required undoing 3 seams, replaced the piece, redoing two more seams and voila! Done. I did it. And now the project is full steam ahead. I hope.

The other cool thing I discovered was that I think I was slow on this project because I was working one square at a time. On Friday night I stood and traced out all the pieces for all 12 of the kimonos. I cut them all out and put each kimono set in a ziploc bag. Then when I sat to sew, I could pick up one, and work on that without all the others getting in the way. Organisation! And portability! I loved it! I will definitely use this method in future. The cutting out really stalls the work and puts me off working on it.

Sore wrists!!!

I woke up this morning with a very sore left wrist. So sore in fact that I couldn't do my bra strap up! Just my left wrist and I coudn't bend it backwards nor forwards. Typing at work was painful. I didn't even do any knitting last night so surely it's not RSI. Although I did notice the same hand was cramping a bit the night before when I was knitting.

Still... it wasn't until half an hour into this evening's knitting that I realised I'd been knitting a sock - so at least knitting is still on!! And I spose then that it's not knitting-related RSI.



Here is the back of the Christening jacket done. I ended up scanning the internet widely for more of this yarn to absolutely no avail. It's Panda Baby Lustre, 4 ply in white. Noone in Australia with an online store seems to currently have it nor ebay. I think I can order some more from my LYS (via online) but will have to wait 2 weeks for it to come in and I'm not sure they have processed my order yet. So no pressure....

I have one more 50 g ball and I think that should do the two front panels. I hope. Cross your fingers for me.



And here is the stack of 9 patch squares for my 9 Patch Afghan. I made the stunning discovery last night that I still do not have enough squares. I never seem to with this project. It's made from the scraps of all the hot water bottle covers I've made. I have some blue yarn to knit up into squares that I think will mean I have 2 more large squares to add to this pile. There are 12 in this pile. So then I will have 14 - what the hell do you do with that? I need 2 more squares .... again...

Projects in Progress

My sister really liked the gift which made me very happy. She said "ooh this will get used!" which is totally what a knitter longs to hear.



Here is the back of the christening jacket I am making for my hairdresser's baby. It's a commissioned piece and I'm a bit nervous that it won't fit. I'm also running low on the yarn and having a little bit of trouble getting some extra balls.

So yeah, it occurs to me, this is a knitting blog and would be the appropriate and useful place to list all the projects I have a pressing need to get done.

So:
- hot water bottle cover for uncle's bday
- socks for uncle's bday
- socks for the bf's mum
- 9 patch afghan
- log cabin afghan
- pair of socks for me
- chemo cap
- sushi
- thing for C
- thing for other C
- socks for my sister's bday (awaiting STR package)
- shawls!
- christening jacket and bonnet (and booties?)

I'm sure there's more but that's a good start

Finished Object!

Done! A hot water bottle cover for my sister as a thankyou for hosting the breaking of the fast on Saturday night. My mother suggested I buy a hot water bottle as well, which I did. The yarn is Holiday from The Knittery.

Stash Part 2

Of course, that said, I've been lurking in my favourite online yarn stores lately and made sure to order some of the colourways soon to be retired from the Socks that Rock range. And I am travelling to New York and London next month (!!) and intend to visit stores over there.

So it's not *likely* I will run out of stash.

Plus ... there's my cross stitch kit stash AND my fabric stash to *also* contend with.

Stash

I go through varying emotions towards my stash. Most of the time I just love it. It's filled with yarns I have fallen in love with and still look forward to knitting with. It represents potential. And possibility.

Sometimes I feel anxious towards my stash. That there are so many projects already assigned to it and I am not knitting fast enough. Or I have cast on for too many projects and can't seem to finish any of them in decent times. (this was the weekend feeling)

And other times I feel like either I am working through it too fast, or what will happen if I *do* work through it too fast or that there is not enough in there! That was just now. I went to pull out a skein of sock yarn to make myself a pair of socks whilst knitting a variety of gifts - so that I won't feel like it's all too much of a chore. And I could swear I had more skeins in there to choose from! Or less skeins already assigned a project.

Seriously though - what happens if you work through your stash? I mean, somehow I am aware of all the money invested in it and the thought of having to replace it kinda scares me.

Do you knit anything other than socks?

These socks were one of "those" projects. I cast them on in about the week after my Grandmother passed away - November last year. My Aunt was just such a great support I thought she deserved a nice pair of cashmere socks. So I cast these on. The yarn is from The Knittery. I cast them on on bamboo needles to see what they were like to knit with. Hideous as it turns out - my hands hurt so much that this became the least appealling project on the go and trust me I have a lot of projects on the go. And so .. I am sad to say that I only finished these last week. Now I got my camera up and going again, I can wrap these up and get them off to her in time for the cold weather.

They are quite tightly knit so I must admit to being a bit nervous about the sizing. Cross your fingers for me!

Socks!!!!!

Finally I can post the socks I sent to my dear friend in Tasmania for her birthday.

I wanted her to have a pair of socks just for her feet and I'm assured they fit. The story with this yarn - Claudia's handpainted - is that I made her pick out the skein she liked from Sweet Georgia's last stash available, which she did. Then I ordered it and then .. it took 4.5 months to get here from Canada. So T got her socks from my very special, post-clapotis (proper post to come on that) disaster stash. I liked how these came out and in the end, were more what I wanted to make than the Sweet Georgia colourway.




A different view, flash versus nonflash.

And note, I was testing out how well my Tin Duck Award would work as a sock display prop. Not well, as it turns out.

Socks!

After the Clapotis disaster, I was very sad and my mother suggested I go straight out and buy myself some yarn I love and make myself a new one. I couldn't bring myself to knit another Clapotis cause it was theeeeeeeee most boring knit (part of why I was sad - knowing I'd never reknit it). But she had a point and so I decided to splurge and buy yarn I'd never been able to bring myself to buy before. I decided to splurge on some Claudia's Handpainted and to only knit myself socks!

Well the knit them all for me bit kinda backfired but here in progress is the first pair. They kinda survived the laundry disaster that followed the Clapotis one.

A Hat!

My first adult hat. It's a chemo cap and I was kinda sad to make it - it went to my Mum's best friend who is currently fighting her second bout of Ovarian Cancer. I was making it in summer so I did take my time but then luckily had a stint of online reading, I think, one weekend towards the end of February (?) and finished it just in time for a cold spell in March. It's made from cashmere sock yarn from The Knittery and I doubled over the yarn. She wears it at night when her head is cold and it makes me glad to know there is a part of me giving her warmth and comfort when she is not feeling the best.

The pattern is available online from Knitty

Finally! A new post

I lost my knitting mojo about at Swancon and it's taken me a while to get it back. Worse, I've knitted 6 pairs of socks this year and I'm not sure I photographed all of them.

I'll try and so better. Here's a pair I made for my Mum - she bought 2 skeins last time I did a Socks that Rock order. This is one of those pairs, I think I owe her a second. Just a basic plain pair and I fiddled with width this time for comfort.




Not sure if I showed my Lisa Souza haul from a while back but I love it so I will show again.




Pair of socks I made from the Violet Pink Ribbon in the stash above for the bf's mother's bday. Again, a plain pair. I ended up only using half the skein.

No new photos today

A highway patrolman pulled alongside a speeding car on the freeway. Glancing at the car, he was astounded to see that the blonde behind the wheel was knitting! Realizing that she was oblivious to his flashing lights and siren, the trooper cranked down his window, turned on his bullhorn and yelled,

"PULL OVER!"

"NO!" the blonde yelled back. "IT'S A SCARF!"