Quickie

Just so you know I'm not dead and that knitting goes on, I'm still working on my Drops Jacket and am loving it. It's so fun to knit the cables and the yarn (Drops Paris) is nice and lovely and soft and I like to just sit and stroke it ocassionally. That doesn't help my knitting speed of course, but it's still a nice fabric. I can't wait to be able to wear it *insert prayer that it fits when finished here*.

I won't bore you with pictures of the stockinet back and sleeves. These are just the interesting bits:

I'm also still working on the Shallow Sharks, which are nice and lovely, but will be a Christmas pressie (Grandma is cleaning up this year) so they still have time.

My next project (also for Grandma) will be the Every Way Wrap. I don't know what colour it will be, but I'll be using the Drops Paris again. It's a good yarn and I need cotton for California whether or she'll not be able to use it more than once a year. I'm looking forward to knitting this one too. So many cool things to knit, so little time...

New Project

Having finished Grandma's Funky socks and then the really ugly cat blanket, which the cat adores (this is her literally 20 seconds after cast off), I had to decide what to do next, so I came up with this: Drops Knitted Cabled Cardigan Ravelry. It's a simple sweater, but has cables, which is why I like it. It's perfect for me and I'm looking forward to wearing it. I have, however, as per usual, changed things a bit. I'm using Drops Paris 100% cotton wool in colour #48 instead of the Karisma and have changed the hem to a plain hem instead of the ribbing - since cotton doesn't really do well in ribbing - and took out the shaping. It's turning into a fairly boring knit for the moment as I'm working on the nearly all stockinette stitch back, but it's coming along quickly and I like the fabric that's coming out of the knitting. It's soft and purty and that's just what I wanted.

I'm also working on the next pair of socks for Grandma (she's getting 4 pair for Christmas). It's the Shark Infested Waters (Rav Link) pattern done in Spruce KP Essentials Kettle Dyed. I'm quite pleased with the way these look, so hopefully grandma will be too.

Finally, I'd like to apologize for not commenting much lately. Not only have I been busy, but they've now blocked all blogging and forum sites at work, so I can no longer read blogs during my breaks. I'm also not always motivated to turn the computer on at home again after having been on it for 10 hours at work already, thus, fewer posts and fewer comments. Sorry. I do try and get them all read though. Still like reading a lot.

Hope you're all having a nice summer!

Grandma's Funky Socks

You know that the weather influences your life too much when you structure your life around it. At least that’s what it feels like to me at the moment. We’ve been having some fairly erratic weather lately. So erratic that’s it’s like taking a ride on a yo-yo. By last Thursday, the world was becoming quite a cranky place due to lack of sleep from too hot and humid nights. I was so cranky that I decided to take Friday off just so I could get some sleep. Thursday night was another scorcher and then Friday, the rains came. And came. And came. And came. Lor’, didn’t it rain children, talk about’a rain, dinit, dinit, dinit, oh my Lor’ didn’t rain…

The world turned into liquid air. My dogs seldom refuse to go out because they’re used to the rain, but Friday night, there was no way they were going to go out and pee at their usual time. We had to wait until there was at least a little space between the drops. It also got cold, relatively anyway. By Sat., it was 50°F in the morning and about 65°F during the day, with Sunday being but slightly warmer. However, this lovely break is at an end. We’re set to get back up to 95°F by Wed., but then back down to 78° by Friday. Yo-yo time, I’m telling you.

What does this have to do with knitting you ask? The weather fluctuations have begun to determine what I knit and when. If it’s cold, I revert to my cat’s blanket, which is coming along nicely thanks to this weekend’s storms. Hot, I return to knitting cotton socks. Speaking of which, I’ve finished my Grandmother’s really funky socks. I really don’t know what I was thinking when I bought this yarn. Well, OK, I was thinking she likes green and I wanted to do cheerful, but seriously, these are so cheerful that she’s going to have to forego wearing them at church for fear of distracting people from the sermon. I wouldn’t want to be responsible for other’s souls by having distracted them with my loud socks. Besides, I don’t really want my grandmother to be known, in hushed whispers, as “the old woman who wears weird socks”. She only wears them because she doesn’t want to offend the insane granddaughter who knits them for her you know.

Actually, this is all not true. My grandmother will probably love them so much that she’ll show them off to people who couldn’t really care less, and/or then revert to thinking the above. It’s just very odd to think of my grandmother, who is usually a fairly plain sock person, running around in luminescent green striped socks and loving them. Also, if I remember myself correctly as a child, I wouldn’t have wanted to have been caught dead with her when she was wearing socks like that. I probably would have disowned her immediately. Now I’m knitting them for her. That means I’ve either grown up, or gone completely Dolally, or maybe both.

This week we’re headed for hot and humid again, so it’s back to plain cotton socks. At least I’m getting Christmas knitting done.

AWOL

Wow, it's been almost a month since the last time I posted. I can't believe time has gone that fast. Summer is my busy season at work and I'm too tired by the evening to sit at the computer and read more. I won't even pretend that I'm going to catch up on everyone's blogs since I know that's unrealistic at the moment.

I also haven't been knitting much lately, partially because of the heat and partially because I'm just too tired. I have started a cat blanket out of left over sock yarn. I'm hoping this will keep the cat off my current knitting projects, or will once she comes back in again in Fall/Winter. If not, at least I'll have used up a few remnants. It won't be a thing of beauty, but somehow I don't think the cat really cares much.


I finished the Bamboo Waffle Scarf which started out life as a Christmas pressie for my aunt, but is now a random Christmas pressie for someone else. Aunt wanted a lighter weight scarf in these colours, but this turned out pretty heavy since I was using two strands at the same time. It's very comfy and I'm sure someone will like it.


I also did a Falling Water Scarf for my cousin. I broke the Normal Knitter's Rules of never knitting the same thing twice. It's the same yarn and pattern I used for my own, but I think it will suit her and it was easy to knit. It's also light weight, which is a plus in the heat.


Finally I started a new cotton sock for Grandmother. This is turning out to be another one of those projects where the yarn in the ball is prettier than when it's knit up. I keep wondering whatever possessed me to purchase this particular yarn and what in heaven's name Grandma will ever wear them with. Fortunately my aunt thinks the yarn is pretty and that Grandma will like it. If she doesn't, she can just wear them under boots or to bed where no one cares. If she doesn, I'll have a Grandmother with funky socks. Never thought of my grandmother as funky before.



Future projects - I need more socks. Christmas is only 5 months away and I've not gotten all my pressies done. However, I think they're going to have to wait until I've done another sweater for me. I want to do the Drops Knitted Cardigan in Karisma, only in Paris, which is a cotton yarn. I want a cotton cardy and I love this pattern. I just hope it turns out ok and that I'm not makeing a huge mistake with the yarn sub. I want this sweater in cotton so bad I can taste it. Unfortunately, it will all have to wait until next month when I can afford the yarn.

New Commercial

There are some really clever ad people out there and whoever came up with the new string they have for our local grocery store was a genius. This is the latest they came up with (It takes place on a Sunday and the point of the ad is "respect nature and it will respect you - it's for the groc. store's humane treatment of animals food brand)

Animal Farm on Sunday

Now, if I could just convince my neighbour's geese to do this, oh, and maybe get the cows to hold still at night so their bells don't ring, it would be great. Think it would help if I hauled the TV out and showed them the commercial?

Boyfriend Socks

For the first time in a long time, I tried something new in knitting. I decided I liked the Boyfriend Socks so much, that I would finally try knitting a toe up sock, which I’d been too lazy to learn up ‘til now. I’ve also always been enamoured with the idea of knowing just how long I can make a sock when I’ve got two 50g balls, without running out in the end. The fear of running out of yarn when knitting a normal sock has always restricted the length of the shaft since running out would be no fun at all. I know it can be fixed, but I don’t particularly like fixing, so I’d rather just not go there.
I found out two things with this experiment. The first being that my feet are too short to require more than about 40g of yarn to make a pair of socks. Finishing off the ball would have given me socks that were impossible to wear since they’d reach halfway up my calves requiring me to start increasing and then they’d just wind up falling down. Ergo, 40g is enough. The second realization is that I neither care for working the tow increases, nor the short row heels. I usually don’t mind short rows, but working that second round where you have to pick up two wraps and knit them with the stitch is a real bugger and made me swear six kinds of blue. They also wound up too long since I found it hard to gauge the length the other way around. I’ve decided that I will stick to shaft down in the future unless I’m desperate.

Now I have to admit that this would all probably be no problem if I just practiced them a bit. I tried to convince myself of this the second, third, fourth, fifth and sixth times I knit the toe and heal only to find that they were too loose, or left holes, or I couldn’t get the needle through the wraps and the stitches. Alas, I failed. It didn’t help that I completely forgot that the cable pattern needed to be done on the back side of the shaft as well on the second sock and wound up having to frog half the sock, only to find that I had started the heel too soon and wound up with the cable pattern in the wrong place. That, of course, meant that I had to frog the whole heel, finish the pattern and then rework (for the second time) the d*%/ç* heal again. For the record, I didn’t like knitting it the last time either.

The upshot is that I will continue knitting my socks leg down whenever possible for the rest of my knitting career. But, at least I can now say I tried.

I do, however, love the socks despite being a little too long in the foot. I’m hoping they will shorten a bit, as so many of my socks have. Sod’s Law says they won’t though since I actually want this pair to. Whether or no, I love the pattern and the colour and the yarn and wish it were winter so I could wear them. Alas, it’s summer, the weather is humid and warm and wool is just not the thing to be wearing.

Knitting for MS

There aren't many things I tout on my blog, but this one is a must for me since my mother had MS and I’ve seen what it has done to many, many wonderful people over the years. Frankly, it’s not something that I would wish on my worst enemy and we need to come up with new ways to treat it and ultimately eradicate it.

Claudia of Knitters Against MS is riding for MS again this year. She’ll be accepting donations up to June 29th. Lots of lovely people have donated some really cool prizes (scroll down on her blog) like a copy of Tudor Roses by Alice Starmore, which will run you into poverty if you want to actually purchase it. However, for just a $10 donation, you could win it, or one of a number of other fabulous knitterly things. If you feel so moved, please donate.