Which-Crafts?

I am working on my 2nd pair of socks here, I love the yarn (with only one complaint) and the color. The yarn is from Ellen’s 1/2 Pint Farm in a beautiful variagated teal color (i am not sure if the photo does it justice), its really soft and nicely stretchy, but every there are some weird spots in the ply where one of the plys went off and did a dance for a while. But it feels great to knit with, and the socks are working up pretty fast now that I have settled on a style and pattern.

I am knitting them top down, with 66 sts on size 1 needles, with a slip stitch rib pattern, this is considerably less stitches and a smaller needle size than the previous pair I knitted I am hopeing that these fit better. Speaking of needles, I got a few pairs of Chia-goo DP needles and I am loving them, they are very flexible (which does mean that they will bend while you knit) with a reasonably pointy tip, they feel great in my hand and are short enough not to get in the way on the socks—I think they are 5″ long.

If I wasn’t so distracted by getting my replacement laptop up to speed and catching up on work I was supposed to be doing on it I am sure I would be much further along on the socks, but I am hoping that I can catch-up a bit this weekend. I really want to start on the two color socks soon.

I have also joined my first “‘along”! Its a Dye-Spin-Knit-along called Twisted Knitters. I am pretty excited, my mom and I have been talking about trying fiber/yarn dying for a few months now (she does all kinds of fabric dying already) and I have been reading the Twisted Sister Sock Workbook and getting all inspried. I have 2.5lbs Falkland wool and 2lbs BFL that I am deciding between for the event. I really want this to be “designed” or planned, which I have never done for a spinning project before. With this quantity of fiber I could really have a nice final project. So right now I am in the planning/pondering stage.

So around here we don’t have a “ton” of spinning stores, but we do have more than none. I took my spinning classes at a lovely cozy store called Wool, Warp & Wheel in Richmond, Illinois (so close to wisconsin that you can smell the cheese).   This last weekend the excellent Heloptrope689 and her friend Katherine and I headed on a field-trip out to the other uh “local” store called The Fold, in Marengo.

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I know it seems like a big whooptedoo for a pair of socks, but the last bit seemed to take for F*ing ever. The first sock has some significant fit problems, the 2nd sock fits better - but still is way baggy (same amount of stitches, I think I knit it tighter). I knit them in Austerman Step which was mostly find to knit with, but washes up so soft that with a little wear they stretched-out even more than I was expecting. In any case, for a first pair I am very pleased with the end results, and being that there were no mistakes that took major frogging, I am feeling like I did a pretty good job in parsing out what I was doing.

I have started my 2nd pair, I started the toe-up socks with the instructions from my class at Stitches with Merike Saarniit, but after ripping them out 4 times, I decided to use a different toe up start (a short row toe that I found at knitty). I am not sure if the problem with my first tries came from me casting on improperly or what, but the toe never looked smooth and it was a PITA to knit. The short-row toe was very easy to do and appears correct, I suppose I won’t know for sure until I get the rest of the sock behind it. I am sort of doing combo-directions, a bit from Sensational Socks, and a bit from Merike’s handout.

Anyway here are some pictures of the socks behind the cut:

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My hands needed a break from the sock knitting for a few days, so I thought I would give H. idea of practicing stranded color work on a bigger project a go.  I did a little reading and a little math and went to it -

I cast on for a simple hat using yarn that I already had, ribbed at the bottom and then color work for the body of the hat.  All seemed to be going quite well - except it was developing into the ugliest thing I have EVER seen.  I mean really really ugl; babies crying and dogs cringing - ugly.  And everything I did just seemed to make it uglier, I ripped back a whole section of color work and did a different pattern; it was just getting uglier by the minute.  So even though I had gotten all the way to the decreases at the top last night I gave up the ghost and just ripped the whole thing out and started again.

I am hoping that later I will be able to show off a finished product (and have a nice warm hat for winter) that is a little less ugly.

The good news is, that it seemed to me it wasn’t the actual technique of the color work that was causing the ugly-just the combination of patterns and yarn colors.  I am experimenting with how best to hold the yarn for the best looking results, holding both in my left hand and knitting both continental, or one in each hand and knitting one continental and one englisgh.  Knitting both continental seems to get me a more consistent tension, but is a bitch on the coordination.  Kniting one in each hand is much easier to do, but my tension is really different in each hand which is giving some wonky results.

So here is a pic of the finished scarf with a close-up for a texture shot.

Now on to my sock progression dilemma:

I am just learning how to knit socks right now - I am 3/4 of the way through my first pair, and have taken a toe up sock class. My mom is interested in the idea of hand-made socks and has said that a pair would be a lovely gift for her birthday this year (Dec. 24.) So while at stitches, I told her to pick a style/yarn/pattern and I would make them - she in her ulitmate PITAness picked a 2 color fair-isle pattern. I don’t knit colorwork, by both preference and ability - now not only to I have to get up to speed on socks well enough to make some for someone else, I have to do it fair-isle. So I figure the bulk of my fall knitting will be socks (I hope my hands don’t cramp up from the little needles :p) and that I will have to work on my skills in progression to get to where I need to be to have her finished pair by her birthday; sort of a training program.

• to Knit a pair of matching socks
• to knit a pair of matching socks that fit
• to knit both top down and toe up
• to knit a matching pair with more than one color
• to knit a matching pair with more than one color on the same row
• to knit a matching pair with a series of different two-color patterns in the same sock

I need to finish the pair I am working on now (just need to finish the foot and toe). Then I was thinking a pair of toe-ups (I have started the swatch already). And then I am not quite sure which skill to buff up next: more work on fit/style or start in on color work. I have 4 balls of koigu and I was thinking about using them to try to experiment with some color work, one with stripes, and one with actual 2 color patterns. Because I’ll want to know what I am doing before I have to knit the more complicated one that mom picked. I have a few other balls of sock yarn I bought myself and I am hoping to use them to work on fit - because considering how the pair I am knitting right now turns out - I am concerned about the sock fitting properly, especially because the fair-isle patterns don’t generally allow for much or any ribbing so there will be less room for a slightly not correctly sizes sock.

le *sigh* - so much knitting, little time . . .

anyway here is a bonus shot of the swatch for my next pair (the toe ups), the yarn is turning out beautifully and I am really looking forward to seeing how these turn out.

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So yesterday work sucked, and sucked and sucked,  and left me with a sore crampy hand. I couldn’t contemplate knitting on my sock with those little tiny needles. So I pulled out an older project that was on bigger needles (well okay 5s, but after those short 2s they felt plenty big.)  It was a simple scarf for my nephew (who thinks that scarves are excellent play toys.)  It is in Manos Stria - Sky Blue which knits up with a lovely mottled watercolor feel.  David, Erin and Rowan live in Seattle, so I didn’t think he needed a huge warm wooley scarf, and I wanted it to be easy for Erin to wash.

Any way it was a simple scarf, and I hadn’t realized how close to being done I was - I started knitting and then there I was - DONE! (finished ends and everything) Its about 36″ long which I think should be plenty for a small child.

I will try to post a picture tomorrow - the camera ran out of batteries.

Maybe I will try alternating some old WIPs with my newer projects so that they have a chance of getting done some time this century.

So mom and I have started a tradition of taking a class on Thursday afternoon and then shopping till we drop Thursday night. Friday morning i met Helen and Elizabeth for more shopping in the Stitches Market, and then I couldn’t avoid it Saturday afternoon, durring class break. The result is a fair amount of loot, probably most of my year worth of knitting at the very least. Look behind the cut for hot sticky Yarn Porn (warning: large pics ahead):
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So stitches was this week, not only did I survive, but I had a great time and met some cool new people and visited with some friends and spent a lot of money on yarn and spinning fiber. (whew! what a sentence) In more detail:

I had three classes this weekend - Japanese Short Rows, Toe up Socks Your Way!, and Spinning for Knitting.  Overall I got a lot out of all three classes, and I don’t regret taking any of them no matter what else I say below. Continue Reading »

It has been pointed out to me quite a few times, that I seem to have an inordinate amount of items on my needles at any one time - and I think I even forget about projects I started and then find them packaged up in a ziplock bag, still on the needles months later. *sigh*
So I am going to try to keep better track of what I am knitting and limit myself to something like 5 projects at any one time.

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