I really am still knitting!
If you’ve been around here for years — and really, why wouldn’t you? Obviously I am full of stimulating knitting content — you might notice that any time a new school semester starts, my knitting drops off like a bowling ball going over a cliff. I should really find ways to NOT do that, but somehow … yeah, it doesn’t work out.
I actually am still knitting, but my horde of unfinished knitting THINGS is making me crazy. Eris languishes in a basket on my living room side table, petulantly whining, “I thought you were finishing me for last April?” My Hurricane Sock keeps begging, “Are you going to pick up the needles again and finish my partner? I am beautiful and deserve to be loved!”
I even have plans for projects. I have some very spring-like yarn in a light apple green and soft pink that I’m thinking of working into Crumpets. I have a new nephew who will be born in July and a friend’s baby boy who will be born in July, and I think they both need a sweater for Fall. Maybe Trellis? Maybe something that doesn’t require too much thought? Hmm.
In the meantime, I am knitting something very plain and simple (and now pointless for another 8 months) for Will: a reversible cap made from leftover sock yarn. It’s knit in the round, it’s plain stockinette, and it’s self-patterning yarn that makes it look far more complicated than it actually is. I’ll post a picture when I finish with one side of it … Will’s choices from my sock yarn are quite interesting.
I miss knitting!
Eet ees mah sock chapeau.
Still learning French, you see. I should probably focus my French learning on the part of my wedding vows that will be all in French, but whatever, right? It’s not like the wedding is two and a half weeks away or anyth– … right.
So it’s the last day of October. I joined Socktoberfest so I could get motivated to finish socks, but has that worked? Well, the motivation has been there but not the time. I have a sock swap pal still hanging out there who doesn’t have her sock yet because the needles and yarn have hated me so much i had to find another kind of yarn and needles entirely. Really. I was using KnitPicks shine and circs, and I had to switch to this fine gauge crochet thread and double points. ARGH.
But I’m making progress, so maybe that’s good for something. I feel horrible for the sock swap delay. I should have known better than to sign up for a sock swap right before my wedding! Add in being sick and moving and drowning a car — well, October was crazy.
Hither and yon
I can’t believe I never posted about receiving my Hurricane Sock party gift! This wedding planning has robbed me of my brain as well as time and money.
My sock sister was the so talented and super-organized Becky, and she definitely spoiled me! I had bright green flip flops for my plodding around Houston in our 90 degree September days, Crystal Light Pink Lemonade for being refreshed, and yummy almonds for snacking. And then … the sock. The beautiful “Broken Branches”, adapted from Yukon Leaves by Becky herself, knit in Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Sock Manzanita (now known as “I’ve Survived Damn Near Everything”). :-) Oh, and let’s not forget the knitting bag that the sock and yarn were in, complete with page-protected pattern and a beautiful little stitch marker. I was amazed at the attention Becky paid to every little detail. Wow!
I had it with me on the plane yesterday morning in case I needed something to knit on the flight to Baltimore. I was going to spend the day/night with Adelle, stalking Pete Yorn. Will’s away in Finland, so what else would we do? I also had a handful of patterns and fistful of needles so I could start my sock for the Second Sock Syndrome Swap. Know what I didn’t have? The yarn. I was in such a rush to get out the door that I left it in the living room. *sigh* So instead I hand-wound my skein of Lorna’s Laces and got started on my Broken Branches sock … except I twisted the stitches. Clearly I shouldn’t knit before 10 am!
RPM … finished!
Look at RPM, being all ballerina-like and flitting around the room. It’s just so happy to be completed!
Fun pattern, fun yarn (Socks that Rock in Lagoon). I did the smooth heel and shaped toe options, something I’ll be sure to let me Hurricane Sock Sister know. I kind of wish that I’d dropped to a US 1 needle, at least for the ribbing. The 1.5 was good, but I think it would have been better with the 1.
Her foot is slightly longer than mine, though, so I’m hoping this works out well! She can rest assured, however, that this sock has been thoroughly examined by Inspector LeMew.
Now on to the next sock … Adelle has clearly done some brainwashing here.
Sock-obsessed
Clearly my mind is not my own. There’s no other reason that I, the girl who can’t keep up with socks, the girl who loses socks, the girl who rips and rips and rips socks … would sign up for another sock swap.
RPM is almost done — just need the toe wrapped up — and my presents for the Hurricane Sock Party have been bought, so of course I need something else to knit for! No pictures just yet because I want to actually get RPM finished before I take another picture .. it’s almost like a jinx or something. Anyway, THANK YOU for the comments and encouragement on it. I’m going to be so thrilled to finish a second sock … even if it’s not the match to the first sock I knit. :-D That’s why this Second Sock Syndrome swap is perfect for me!
The SSS questionnaire is under the cut …
Read more
RPM is a tough sock
Not hard to do, but it likes to act all tough. I mean, look at it. You put it over your hand to get a photo, and it acts all mean and like Kenickie trying to protect his piece-of-crap car.
This, my friends, is how much you can get done while you’re lounging around in France, riding a train from Brive -la-Gaillarde (home of some excellent mustard) to Toulouse, and flying from Toulouse to Paris to Houston and THEN also knitting two days later as you fly from Dallas to Houston.
My hands are still a little stiff, actually.
I’m getting there, though, and then I can package the sock up with the goodies. I need to add some more fun little things to this package … hmm.
France, we have progress!
Well, I couldn’t very well say, “Houston, we have a problem,” now could I? First of all, I’m not in Houston right now, which leads to secondly, there is no problem! Yes, many of my problems can be solved by just leaving Houston, it seems. I’ve suspected this all along and I’m glad to get some confirmation.
Anyway …
So while I sat on the plane from Houston - George Bush to Paris - Charles De Gaulle, I fiddled with my yarn and new needles and cast on the pattern I had quickly printed before leaving as an alternative to the toe-up @#%$ards that I’d tried before. I will return to those some day, I really will. Just not until I’m sitting next to Adelle and she can tell me exactly what it is that I’m doing wrong with these socks.
Lo and behold, it worked. I knit knit knit for a few hours, only slightly troubled by the messy yarn cake that I wound out of this lovely yarn. It will definitely be re-wound once I’m home and before it goes out to my sock sister for completion. I knit and knit and knit … and finally fell asleep for several hours. This was momentous, because I never sleep on international flights. I guess the glass of champagne, little airplane bottle of wine, and two Excedrin PM finally worked. (Don’t start … for some reason medications and alcohol don’t affect me at all the same way as they do on the ground. They simply DON’T work on me. Last time I had prescription sleeping pills and was still wide awake for the entire flight!)
The pattern is fun, it is easy to memorize, and you just fly right through it. The cameraphone doesn’t show the colors well, but they are some pretty blues, greens, and greys. It’s more Blackwatch than what I’d think of as Lagoon, but oh well. :)
So my Sock Sister, if she’s figured out who I am, can rest assured that she will actually get a sock from me! I promise not to leave this one on the airplane.
Socks & Erin … mutually exclusive?
If anyone has been looking for evidence that my brain has ceased functioning properly, look no further.
My Hurricane Sock Sister’s yarn got here and I wound it up (although I might need to re-wind it … that ball is a little messy on bottom) and got all set to start knitting the pattern I’d picked.
Well, the toe-up socks … they defeat me. I cannot grasp the toe-up cast-on. Apparently it is something beyond my feeble knitting powers. I work and work and work at the cast-on. Dell even shoots a little video to show me how to do it, and I still end up with sloppiness that looks nothing like the toe of a sock. I check my needles and see a 2.0 on them. “A-ha!” I think. “I’m knitting with the wrong needles! I was supposed to be using size 0s, and I have clearly picked up the size 2s.”
(Knitters, I know. Just wait.)
So I put the sock down and search fruitlessly for the size 0s Dell had just sent me from New York. Because, you know, that’s easier than driving all the way across Houston to find a yarn store. Seriously, Houston. Could you PLEASE get a decent yarn store in the Clear Lake area? I know I’m totally spoiled by Woolie Ewe in Dallas, but can’t you come up with something that doesn’t involve half a tank of gas and a day’s field trip for me to get to?
Anyway, I search and I search and I search, and they are nowhere to be found. I do find some wonderful blue and white, stretchy Elann … umm … what’s it called? Esprit Print, I think. You know — the sock one like Cascade Fixation. “A-ha!” I think. “Cotton will be much more comfortable than wool for my poor Southern, hurricane-suffering sock sister.” I find another pattern, I cast on — even checking to find a good, stretchy cast-on instead of just winging it. I thought I’d be extra careful since these are for someone else. I’ve dug up some DPNs even though I hate knitting with DPNs, all because my size 4 circs are in my second Thuja. I check my needles with my needle sizer and they are yea, verily, size 4. Handy needle sizer thing, what?
(Yes, I know. Hold on to that needle sizer bit.)
And then, when I’m rechecking the pattern for the cuff, I realize this is supposed to be on size 3s. “No problem,” I think. “I’m only two rows in, I can switch back to my friendly size 3 bamboo circs.” Except not, because bamboo needles + this yarn = hell.
Completely frustrated, I go wandering around the apartment again, searching for needles. I go through the stash basket and the UFO basket and the notions/stash/random crap basket in the living room. Still no needles. I sigh and begin packing for France, thinking that I have completely let down my sock sister, and I have no idea what I’ll do next. I resolve to just find another pattern for the original yarn and the size 2 needles, and I stuff it in my carry-on tote.
And then I look at the needles.
And I notice that the size on them is, in fact, 2.0 … millimeters.
And I pull out the needle sizer, and yea, verily, these are the size 0 needles I have spent DAYS searching for.
And I call myself a dumbass.
And I begin searching the internet for an alternate pattern to include with my original pattern, because surely in 15 hours of traveling to Toulouse, France, I will get SOMETHING done for my sock sister.
ahem.
I would like the yarn for my Hurricane Sock Sister to get here so I can get busy.
That is all.
Oh, except to say that I’ve signed up to blog for Blogathon! I’ll be blogging for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, Lone Star Chapter. Sponsor me by clicking below, or read more here!
Hurray!
Missing Sock Report
I seem to be incapable of keeping track of socks that I’m actually enjoying knitting.
This specimen — known as “Jaywalker” to friends and family — was last seen on Southwest Airlines flight 57 on Sunday, June 25. It was accompanied by scribbled-up pattern instructions, some size 2 Addi Turbos, and some Southwest drink coupons. All seem to have gone missing at the same time because someone (ahem) forgot them in the seatback pocket.
We are hoping that all of the Jaywalker friends can be recuperated at Hobby airport on Friday, but we’re resigning ourselves that we now have no Jaywalker, no Addis, and a lonely skein of KnitPicks Sock Garden in Geranium.
*sigh*
Darn it!
