Busy Weekend

After the success of last year, the knitters and I decided to go watch the Rat City Roller Girls again...



It was lots of fun, just like before.



I even finished a pair of socks there... (deja vu, I swear that also happened last time!)



Pattern: Leafling by JC Briar
Yarn: Socks That Rock Mediumweight in Lucky
Started: 7/24/10
Finished: 1/15/11

Erin and I have decided to work through some of the old Rockin' Sock Club kits together, and apparently I need the motivation of having her do it with me!



This sock has very interesting construction. Despite the appearance of a semi-normal heel flap, the gusset is actually worked completely differently from how you might imagine. Very clever.

Then I finished another pair of socks!



Yarn: Regia Nation Color #5399
Started: 9/1/10
Finished: 1/16/11

This poor yarn has been waiting nearly forever. I love the socks, though, I'm even wearing them right now!

This puts me at 13.57 miles knit in my sock marathon, since January 1, 2009. Hopefully I can keep up the pace this year and finish before the end of 2011.

Horcrux Twin Socks!

Way back in March, right before moving away from Salem, I started making twin Horcrux Socks with Eloise in our Harry Potter Draco yarn from our mini yarn crawl to Twisted. And today I finally finished them!



Pattern: Horcrux Socks
Yarn: Opal Harry Potter in Draco
Started: 3/1/09
Finished: 7/4/09
.26 miles for a total of 2.29 in Sock Marathon

Although the Harry Potter yarns are an exciting idea, I didn't really like most of the colors. But blues and greys, though a bit boring, aren't bad. One weird thing was that after my psycho efforts to match the stripes exactly, they get all wonky after the heel. But there wasn't a knot! Just all of a sudden the order of the stripes changed! Strange but true.

So I've joined Summer of Socks, because it's summer and I'm planning to knit socks as I usually do. I've decided that my first goal will be to finish all my sock-WIPs this summer, this is 1 of 9 1/2.

Listening to: Kimdracula ~ Deftones, Evil In a Closet ~ In Flames

Socks and Vests

I'm in one of those phases where I'm not finishing a lot, and I've been working all the time so there hasn't been much blog activity. But today we have a couple things!

I was teaching a sock class for knitting two socks at a time, and the basic pattern specifies worsted weight - it's very useful for getting through 2 heels in one class. I almost finished the socks in the last class a week ago, but then they sat around on my couch waiting to be grafted, which is so unlike me! Usually once I hit the toe decreases nothing will prevent me from finishing a pair of socks.



Yarn: Reynolds Odyssey 441
Started: 5/30/09
Finished: 6/18/09

I bought the yarn in Boston shortly before it was discontinued, but I have so little worsted weight sock yarn in my stash this was the only convenient one to grab. I'm glad I did! I thought it would be a little more striped, but the finished socks are fairly subtle (and more pink/purple than blue, also a surprise.) The yarn is quite soft and the color effect is achieved by using plies of different colors. It was very nice to knit with and I'm looking forward to seeing how it wears.

I've also been knitting a vest for the yarn store.



Pattern: Portland Tweed Vest (rav link)
Yarn: Portland Tweed in color 5077
Started: 5/21/09
Finished: 6/20/09

I didn't have my camera today, so I took this picture with my iPhone. I'm trying to get WIPs cleared of my Ravelry page ASAP since I'm getting kind of guilty about their growing numbers. ;) This vest is, of course, not something I would normally knit, but I enjoyed working with the yarn. The pattern, on the other hand, was a bit annoying. It's written in a way that was very difficult to follow - probably to save room as it is printed in a booklet.

However, having the instructions about *how* to do the decreases on a separate page from where the directions for the pattern pieces (and *how often* to do the decreases) are is very very annoying. There were also quite a few things that were unclear due to the brevity, such as instructions like "knit to last 4 sts, ssk." Um... there are two more stitches left after that ssk, which I'm assuming I need to knit! Combine that with the fact that you have shaping going on at different intervals on either side of the piece plus a lacy cable panel in the middle...

Suffice it to say that it was not an ideal project for putting down to jump up and help customers. And that 7 stitch ribbed band around the front / neck? Knit as a strip and sewn on. Yeah. But hey, it turned out great!

Lots of ends

When Snarfy and I bought the same brand of yarn at the Superbowl sale, we decided to make fraternal twin socks. One night at knitting group - just before I moved up to Seattle - I wound off some of my blue for her and some of her green for me, and the Snarfytwin socks were born.



Needles: 2.25mm
Yarn: Newton's Yarn Country Happy Feet
Started: 3/3/09
Finished: 4/26/09
.24 miles for the Sock Marathon, 1.46 miles total

These socks were a long time in the making, mostly because they kept getting pushed to the bottom of the bag as I knit other more time-sensitive projects. But they were the perfect socks for a few rows of bus knitting in the morning, and when I got to the toe yesterday I figured they should be finished. Of course, knitting socks with contrasting bits gives you lots of ends... I have to remember that next time I think about doing contrasting ribbing, heels, and toes in my socks.

Secret knitting still continues, so the blog might be quiet for a bit longer. Of course, deadlines for being able to show you some of these projects are coming up so the blog will soon be full of things I finished already. :)

Listening to: How Soon Is Now? ~ The Smiths, Dose ~ Filter

Monkeys At the Beach

A while back I offered to knit some socks for some non-knitters. They may not knit themselves, but these people sure know how to appreciate handknit socks! One woman said she liked bright colors, and I immediately thought of this Madelinetosh yarn in Beach Towel, which was the summer offering from the Woolgirl Sock Club.



Pattern: Monkey by Cookie A
Yarn: Madelinetosh in Beach Towel
Needles: 2.25mm
Started: 3/5/09
Finished: 3/25/09
Miles: .22
Total Marathon Miles: 1.13

I originally started the socks on 2.5mm needles like the pattern suggests, but the yarn was pooling in a very unattractive fashion so I ripped it out and knit it with 2.25mm needles instead. The yarn is not my colors, but the recipient said she was up for "crazy" socks, so I hope she likes them!

The Madelinetosh yarn was interesting - it's pretty thin, but more "sproingy" than the usual 2-ply yarn you see as a base for many hand dyed yarns. But not quite as much as Socks That Rock or yarns that use the Louet base. The two ends of the skein did appear to be dyed a bit differently, as you can see from the socks one leg has much bigger spiraling stripes than the other, but on the feet they're about the same. The socks were knit at the same time on magic loop, so I'm sure it's not a gauge issue.

And, speaking of Cookie A, I picked up her new book today. So exciting!

Listening to: Girl's Not Grey ~ AFI, Disposition ~ Tool

Not-So-Nutkin

As I mentioned after finishing the Nutkin socks, I had some ideas for some modifications. I knit a pair "my way" which also ended up being my first pair for the Sock Marathon!



Pattern: very modified Nutkin
Yarn: Interlacements Beibi Seda
Needles: 2.5mm
Started: 2/1/09
Finished: 2/8/09
Miles: .23
Total Marathon Miles: .23

The main modifications I made were:
1. Substitute 2x2 rib for the picot edging, beginning with a p1 to match it up with the purl columns in the stitch pattern later.
2. Knit 1 repeat of the chart as written, then mirror it (changing the decreases to k2tog). Do the same on the back of the sock.

I also did a heel flap instead of the original heel and didn't do purl ridges before the toe. It would also be possible to use the pattern to form toe decreases by omitting the yarn overs - but in this case the end of the pattern repeat came where I intended to start the toe decreases anyway, so it wasn't necessary.

Mirroring the chart gives the sock a very different look and also solves the problem of biasing since there aren't a whole bunch of decreases all going the same way.



I got the yarn from the Interlacements Sock Gang a while back, but judging by the fact that no one else has entered it in Ravelry, it's probably not out there in the world. It's a fingering weight silk / alpaca blend. It's quite fuzzy and a little more drapey than a lot of sock yarn, but it's very soft. I don't think it's going to be particularly hard-wearing, but it's more of a "luxury" sock yarn anyway.

Listening to: Synesthesia ~ AFI, Weaken ~ God Lives Underwater