Sasha Knits!

I was hoping to have a new pattern out for consumption by the end of February, but as of right now, I don’t even have the pattern written.  In mid-February I started a new job which has severely cut into my knitting time.  Because of this, I was unable to finish knitting up the prototype until just a few days ago.  Now that they’re washed and blocked, there are several changes that I would like to make before releasing the pattern.

The yarn that I originally picked out is not a good fit, unfortunately.  I really love the ShibuiKnits Sock yarn, but I don’t like the way the striping competes with the stitch pattern.  I must admit I was expecting a much more subtle mottled coloration when I picked out the yarn.  Had I looked at all the projects knit up in it on Ravelry before starting, I would have realized my error, but I was already more than halfway through the first sock before I remembered I could do that.  One other problem I had is that the yardage just wasn’t enough to produce more than a slightly above anklet-length sock for me.  I have much larger than average feet, but so do many other knitters out there, and I would like to pick something that works for pretty much everyone.

There are also a couple of design elements that I would like to change and as I whip up a new prototype in a different yarn choice, I’ll get the chance to test out my new ideas.

I hope to have the pattern out sometime soon, but I’m not going to set a date for myself just yet.  I have a busy few months ahead of me and I’m still not sure what my permanent work schedule is going to look like.  I promise that as soon as it’s ready, I’ll have the pattern up on Ravelry for you to grab.

This should be the last of the Stitches West related posts, thank goodness.  I didn’t think that I would have quite this much to talk about, but that has turned out not to be the case.

One of my favorite booths this year was Little Red Bicycle / Femme Fatale Fibers.  Not only do both dyers produce gorgeous colorways with incredibly amusing names, but they clued us in to the LSG scavenger hunt that was going on (more about that a little bit later).  I had a hard time picking out my favorite colorways from each, but managed to pick out the three that caught my eye most.

The Femme Fatale Fibers hank is Mata Hari Sock in colorway The Boy Who Lived.  This hank was actually a wedding anniversary present from my husband that he allowed me to pick out and then paid for (thanks honey!).  Both of the Little Red Bicycle hanks are Snowflake Sock.  The pink one is Dumped on February 13th while the red one is Sharkweek.  I think Sharkweek is my favorite purchase this year.  Not only is the color gorgeously saturated and rich, but the name makes it even more awesome.

I chanced upon Tess’ Designer Yarns on day two and really liked the Merino Superwash Lace.  I picked up a hank in a bluish-green combo and will have to test it out.  It seems very similar to the Malabrigo lace I was hunting for earlier this month.

My last purchase at the convention I made before exhausting my budget was at the Royale Hare / Foggy Moon Fibers booth.  They had a small bin of Corriedale roving poofs out front and I found a blue/black mix that was exceptionally lovely.

Other non-shopping highlights for me included:

• The Lasy, Stupid, Godless scavenger hunt.  A few booths got together to hold this mini-event for group members that attended.  A forum-related photo was hung up in each booth and once you found it, you got a stamp.  Once you had a stamp from each booth, you could turn in your card and be entered into a raffle.  The husband and I had a lot of fun searching in each participating booth.
• I was able to test out a SpinOlution Hopper Wheel thanks to Blas in the Urban Fauna Studio booth.  I love the way it treadles and the fact that it doesn’t have a yarn-weight limiting orifice.  I’m very interested in getting one of these wheels for myself at some point down the road, but I think that I still want the Lendrum that I’ve had my eye on first.
• Running into family!  On day two, we accidentally met up with one of my husband’s aunts.  I knew she was crafty since she made us a beautiful quilt for our wedding, but I had no clue that she was a knitter and crocheter.

All in all, I had a blast and am really looking forward to going again next year!

Continuing on with my adventures at Stitches West…

After Wabi Sabi, I stopped by the Girl on the Rocks booth.  There were a ton of cute little knitting/fiber accessories there that caught my eye, but before coming to the convention I had decided to stick with entirely fiber this year.  I stuck to my word and ended up purchasing a hank of Superwash BFL Sock in Peridot that caught my eye (it’s my birthstone! squee!) and a braid of Falkland Wool top in California Redwood (my favorite tree).

Discontinued Name Brand Yarn wasn’t originally on my list of booths to visit in my first round of shopping, but as I passed them by I just couldn’t resist.   This booth made the largest dent in my wallet, but I got quite a lot of delicious goodness for what I spent.

From left to right, Dream in Color Rustic Sock in Sea Weed, Dream in Color Stardust Sock in Midnight Madness, Dream in Color Rustic Sock in Misty Blue, Dream in Color Rustic Sock in Deep Purple, and two skeins each of Louet Gems Fingering Weight in Indigo and Cloud Grey.  The Louet hanks were only $3.50 each!

Paradise Fibers was my next stop.  I wanted to check with the staff there and get an idea of when they would have the spinning wheel I’m after back in stock, but I got distracted by other things and completely forgot to ask.  They had a sample of Kollage’s new Milky Whey yarn (50% milk / 50% soy) out for folks to test drive, so I gave that a go and ended up falling in love.  It’s super soft and silky and looks lovely knitted up.  I was not such a big fan of the square knitting needles they also had out for demo, but I think that was more of not being used to the feel then genuinely disliking them.  I ended up purchasing three hanks of the Milky Whey in Eclipse and one skein of Zitron Trekking Pro Natura in color #1507.

Then there was the Lisa Souza booth.  I was completely overwhelmed! There were so many beautiful colors and types of fiber and I wanted to bring everything home with me.  Alas, that would have gone way beyond my budget, so I had to content myself with a hank of (from left to right) Hardtwist Merino Petite in Sapphire, a hank of Sock! Merino in Breath of Spring, and a bat of Superfine Merino Top in a beautiful blue aptly named Elektra.

I still have a lot more to share (some more stash enhancement goodness and some other things), but I think I’m going to have to save that for a bit later.

This past weekend I was able to attend Stitches West for the first time.  I wasn’t sure what to expect, but thanks to some sage advice from the girls at Purlescence Yarns (bring water and take it slow) and a bit of pre-planning on my part (mapped out the booths I wanted to visit first), I was able to enjoy myself and see everything that I wanted to see.

This is what the lines looked like before the doors opened up on day one.  I was pretty sure that there were going to be a lot of people there, but it was quite literally almost wall to wall con-goers.  Unfortunately, there was no photography allowed inside, so I don’t have any photos from inside the market floor.

My first stop was the Blue Moon Fibers Arts booth.  I had an inkling that if I waited until later in the day to visit, it would be swamped and difficult to shop.  This turned out to be quite true as every time I passed the booth later on, it was so flooded with people that you could barely see any yarn.

I picked up four skeins of Socks That Rock Lightweight in colorways (from right to left): Grawk, Saffron Jungle, Jasper, and The New Color of Love.

Next up was Jimmy Beans Wool.   They’re a personal favorite of mine and their customer service is always excellent, so I was happy to see them in person.  They had several very nice sales going on, but I opted instead to go for two skeins of luxury fingering-weight yarn instead.

The top hank is Handmaiden Fine Yarn Casbah Sock in Cedar.  The bottom hank is Fleece Artist Merino 2/6 in Ocean.

At the Wabi Sabi Yarns booth, I picked up a hank of Glow Sock in Orchid and a braid of Poppy Flowers Fiber 100% Blue Face Leicester top in teal.

My husband got quite a pleasant surprise when the girls at the Wabi Sabi booth recognized him from his “modeling” photos for projects I’ve posted on Ravelry.  He went around for the rest of the day in a great mood.

I have a lot more to show, but I’m going to save that for another day.  I still have a lot of packing away to do and several things I need to get done sooner rather than later.

A special package from Webs arrived earlier today which means that I can finally cast on for that Geodesic Cardigan I’ve been pining after since seeing the previews for the latest Knitscene.

Is it just me or is Malabrigo Lace hard to find in large quantities, especially if you’re after one of the darker colorways?  Originally, I wanted to go for a nice dark blue, but the only place I could find online that had the colorway I was after only had a single hank on hand.  I then decided I could settle for black, but each vendor I tried had no more than one or two hanks in stock. Argh!  I went to one local shop that supposedly carried this particular yarn, but was disappointed to learn that they’d cleared it all out a while ago.  Finally, I settled on Vaa, which is a deep dark green mixed with a slightly lighter shade and a bit of dark turquoise.  Although it wasn’t my first or second choice, I do like the colorway and believe that it will look nice against my skin tone.  The pattern calls for only four skeins, but I picked up an extra to have nearby in case of emergency.

Before I can begin the cardigan, though, I have two projects that I would like to get off the needles asap.

The first is a beanie for the husband.  I decided that instead of giving him candy or a card, I’d give him something a little more personalized.  I’m using the One Skein Noro On A Budget Spiral Rib Hat pattern, but rather than use Noro (which I’ve come to detest) I decided to go with Lorna’s Laces Green Line Worsted in Chocolate.  The combination is knitting up beautifully and I should have it done either tonight or tomorrow sometime.

The second project is a sock pattern of my own design.  I’m currently about half way through the first sock and should be done within the next few days.  After I’ve finished it, I can write out the pattern and get it sent out to test knitters.   From that point, I hope to have any necessary corrections made and have the pattern up for sale by the end of the month.

I’m using ShibuiKnits Sock in Wasabi for these.  I was expecting more of a variegated, mottled effect with the coloration instead of the striping, but I still quite like the yarn.  I have some other colorways in my stash that I will probably get to sooner rather than later.

Other than the hat and the socks, I still have my Springtime Bandit shawl to finish and I’ve started a blanket using left over sock yarn.  I was thinking that I might like to have the shawl done in time to wear for Stitches West, but now I think I would prefer to have the cardigan by then.  It’s not that I don’t like the shawl anymore or have stopped enjoying working on it… I’m just not sure if I’m a shawl wearer yet.  Eventually, I will have a chance to find out.

I should probably get back to working on the husband’s beanie now.  Goodnight, everyone!

January is certainly flying by, isn’t it?  I could have sworn that it was just yesterday that we were waiting for the clock to strike midnight so that we could welcome in a brand new year.

I have decided that this year will be the year of the stash.  I intend to slow down on my accumulation of new fiber and try to work with primarily what is already in my possession.   I know that I said roughly the same thing at multiple points last year, yet continued to acquire new fiber at astounding rate.  It took me setting aside some time to organize and take stock of my stash to realize just how much I have. In the year since I’ve learned to knit, I have managed to squirrel away over four hundred skeins of yarn.  Tucked away in my closet and one corner of my bedroom, there’s a pile of yarn that roughly amounts to over 92,000 yards (52 miles!) of good, usable fiber.  This isn’t counting what has already been used (which isn’t all that much, honestly), nor does it take into account fiber for spinning.   Yikes!

My goal is to use up somewhere around one hundred skeins of yarn from my stash over the course of the year.   To help myself keep track, I’ve added a counter to the sidebar of the blog which I will be updating each time I finish a project.  I’ve also joined the Stash Knit Down group on Ravelry so that I might be inspired by the quests of others in a similar conundrum.

The most important step for stopping a stash avalanche will be to asses and improve my spending habits as well as throttle my yarn budget  This doesn’t mean I won’t be buying more, as I still wish to support my local yarn stores, but I won’t be able to purchase as much at one time as I have been previously.  This should also help cut down on impulse buys as well.

Now, I’ve already bought my tickets for the Stitches West market place (I’m unable to take any classes this year, unfortunately) and I still do intend to shop my heart out.  I am, however, going in with a limited amount of money in cash only and I will be leaving my debit card at home.  This, paired with my husband’s voice of reason, should feasibly keep me from going completely overboard with my acquisitions.

Wish me luck!

What an incredibly busy past three months it has been!  Now that all of the holiday craziness is over and dealt with, I find I suddenly have the time to sit back and relax… at least for a little while.  I know my shoulder certainly appreciates the down time!

I didn’t realize just how much I had taken on this year until I was racing the clock, trying to finish everything on time.  Originally I had only planned to knit five gifts and had allocated my time in accordance.  Things were going swimmingly until the beginning of December when I found myself needing to add an additional two projects onto my workload.  I increased my pace to something close to frantic and my husband helped out immensely by taking over my portion of the household chores.  In the end, I managed to get my last project off of the needles and onto the blocking board on the morning of Christmas eve.  That was cutting it quite close, but I was simply happy to be able to have a gift under the tree for everyone.

My right shoulder and elbow are still sore and I think I’ve begun to go through the motions of knitting in my sleep, but it was worth it.  I must admit that until the first box was opened I was afraid that no one would appreciate their gifts.  That turned out not to be the case, however, and each person seemed quite excited to open their box to see what I had made especially for them.  While I don’t think I’m up to repeating the whole process again next year, I will certainly consider doing it again soon.
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Things have been a bit quiet around here this last month and for good reason!  I’ve been spending most of my free time knitting away in an attempt to get all of my Christmas gifts done on time.  I am now mostly done, thankfully.  Six scarves are finished with one left to go (it has to be wrapped before the afternoon of Christmas day).

Today and tomorrow have been marked as blocking day here. To make the drying process go a little faster, I’ve set up a small portable heater next to the blocking mats.  This batch should be dry by this evening and I will be able to start another round either tonight or tomorrow morning.

It has been a very busy season and I’m very much looking forward to its completion.

Enjoy your holidays, everyone, and I will see you after the new year!

Thanksgiving has come and gone for yet another year, leaving behind a huge mess, a fridge full of leftovers, and the remnants of a really great time.

My husband and I try to rotate which family we spend each end of the year holiday with in the name of fairness.  This year was my family’s turn and we ventured over to my mother’s house.  There were lots of familiar faces, plus a few new ones.  I spent time discussing pokemon with my eleven year old nephew and chasing around my darling eighteen month year old neice.  There were two turkeys, one brined and one barbequed, and a plethora of delicious side dishes.  After the main meal there was mint tea, pies, and homemade whipped cream.

As I’m pretty useless in the kitchen, I was put in charge of making the centerpiece.  My original plan involved fall leaves, but there were none to be found in any local craft store this late into the year.  I made do with what was available, however, and ended up with a result that I was pretty happy with.

The husband and I ended the evening cuddled up together in bed while watching a pretty hilarious Japanese horror film.

The day after Thanksgiving is traditionally Black Friday here in the US.  Most shops have huge sales starting in the wee hours of the morning and there are huge crowds.  Having worked in the retail sector for more years than we both care to admit, the husband and I tend to avoid them like the plague.  We prefer to stay holed up at home where it’s warm, safe, and not hectic.  This year, however, I woke up early and discovered that both my favorite local yarn stores were having sales.  It’s hard to resist discounted yarn,  so I woke up my husband and had him drive me down to Purlescence Yarns in Sunnyvale, California.

We arrived ten minutes before the door opened and hopped into line.  Once I was handed my discount card, I made a beeline for the Dream in Color cubbies and selected what I wanted before other shoppers managed to make it over.  I then also grabbed two skeins of Colinette Jitterbug that caught my eye and then headed off to browse through the lace weight selection.  Within twenty minutes I was ready to make my purchase and head home.

I ended up with six skeins total.  Clockwise, from the top:

• Dream in Color Baby, Absolutely Magenta.  700 yards of beautiful, color saturated lace weight.
• Dream in Color Smooshy, Black Pearl. The color variegation ranges from charcoal gray to an almost silver.
• Dream in Color Smooshy, Chinatown Apple.  I’d been eyeing this one for a while, but each time the store had ones that were not as variegated as I was hoping for. I got lucky this time and ended up with a beautiful skein.
• Dream in Color Smooshy, Black Parade.  There’s a bit of dark blueish-green in this skein that refuses to photograph.
• Colinette Jitterbug, Copper Beach (67).
• Colinette Jitterbug, Velvet Olive (114).  The color is closer to malachite than the photo makes it look.

For the last month and a half, I’ve been working my butt off trying to get everyone’s Christmas gifts knitted up in time.  I’ve got three scarves going on the needles right now in addition to two pairs of plain stockinette socks for those times when I can’t concentrate on a chart.  There are two completed scarves that need to be blocked that I will get to eventually.  I don’t have any pictures for the time being, but I hope to have some soon (preferably of finished objects).

Time to curl up with Netflix streaming to my PS3 and knit my hands off.  Enjoy your holidays, everyone!

October ended a while ago marking the completion of NaCraMaMo and I just haven’t had the time to summarize the month’s happenings before now.  I’m happy to say that I was indeed able to meet my goal this year.  Although my plan to craft a little each day wasn’t a very lofty goal, I did have a few life-interrupting events pop up that severely limited the time I had to do recreational things.  Despite it all, I did find time to knit each day, even if I was only able to get a few rows done.

My first pair of socks are finished and they are quite delightful.  People who have never had a pair of handknit socks made to fit their feet specifically are really missing out.  It’s astounding how much difference a well-tailored heel and toe can make.

I’ve already cast-on for two other pairs of socks.  Another pair for myself using a cotton/nylon sock yarn and a pair for my husband.  My only other finished project of October, a few sets of stitch markers, can be seen here.

Christmas is getting closer and closer, so I’ve decided to step my gift knitting into high gear.  I’ve got a cabled scarf more than half-way finished and I’ve started on a couple of other projects as well.  Last week I stopped by Purlescence Yarns in Sunnyvale to pick up a few skeins needed for gift projects as well as a few things to reward myself for finally getting my stash organized.

From left to right:

• Blue Moon Fiber Arts Socks That Rock Lightweight in Kawkaw.  This skein is all for me.
• Blue Moon Fiber Arts Socks That Rock Lightweight in Lauma.  This will end up as a gift.
• ShibuiKnits Socks in Mulberry x2. Also for myself.
• Dream in Color Smooshy in Midnight Derby.  One skein is for a gift and the other was an anniversary present from the husband.

As November zooms on by, I’m really starting to hope that I haven’t waited too long to get everything done on time.  The patterns I’ve selected are simple enough but are also quite large.  I am thinking that if I concentrate on the things I need to get done instead of doing the things I want to knit right this second I will be able to make it.  We’ll see.

I also recently came into possession of a mannequin, courtesy of my sister.

Although I didn’t take a photo of it, there is also a bottom half.  Only the arms are missing and I may be able to find a replacement pair later on.  For right now, I’m just going to focus on removing the several layers of paint that have left the thing looking like a bit of a leprosy victim.  Once that’s done, I will have a rather decent model for my projects from now on (not that my husband isn’t a good model… I just don’t think he appreciates me asking him to model obviously intended-for-female things).

Time to get back to my knitting!

Last week we were subjected to a bit of a nasty surprise.  We were hit by the residuals of typhoon Melor and had quite a bit of flooding in our house.  At one point, our backyard was under about six inches of water and instead of draining out into the street, it came inside through the walls.  All four bedrooms, the kitchen, and the garage quickly became soggy and then downright puddly.

We have spent the last week and a half replacing carpets, preforming mold prevention, and just generally putting things back to normal.

Amid all the recovery, I snatched a few moments here and there to work on a sock.  I used the basic gusset heel sock pattern from Wendy D. Johnson’s book, Socks From the Toe Up, as it was both small and something that I could pick up and put down quite easily.  Unfortunately I wasn’t able to get online to check for errata and got to the short rows where things went terribly wrong.  I ended up frogging the hot mess completely and started over.  By the time I got back to the gusset again, I was able to get online and see that it was a pattern error and not a knitter error.  A bit annoying, but these things happen.

The yarn is Patons Kroy Socks Stripe in Cyan Stripes.  Kroy Socks is a bit stingy with the yardage, unfortunately, but even with my 10.5″ long feet, I was able to get a decent leg length.  I cast-on using Judy’s Magic Cast-On method and cast-off with Jeny’s Surprisingly Stretchy Bind-off in conjunction with Cat Bordhi’s technique for a seamless edge.  I am such a tight knitter that the bind-off really wasn’t all that stretchy and I have a little bit of difficulty getting it over my heel.  This is entirely my own issue and not something that can be blamed on the method.

Hopefully now that we are mostly back to to normal around here, it will take me far less time to complete the second sock.

After winding up that skein of Dream in Color Smooshy last night I was eager to cast on with it, so I spent some time browsing patterns on Ravely.  Socks were out, since I don’t want to half hide the beautiful colors in my shoes, and so were scarves as I have enough of those on my menu for right now.  One skein isn’t enough to do a sweater or a shrug, so what to do with it? I found myself drawn to the shawl section of the pattern database.  I found a few that I liked, but nothing that really seemed to match what I had in mind.  While looking at what other people have knit using the DiC I chanced upon a spectacular shawl design called Springtime Bandit.  It was love at first sight!

I got to work and cast on (using a different method than what the pattern called for) and knit the set up rows.

The pattern only includes one side of the repeats and you’re supposed to knit the other side by sort of mirror-imaging the charts.  That was a bit strange to get the hang of at first, but it became easier as I went along.  The beautiful purples and reds of the yarn combined with the leaf motif in the pattern reminded me of a Red Barberry shrub, so that’s what I decided to name it.

I was in need of some stitch markers and I wanted some fancier ones then what you can get at your average craft store, so I decided to make my own.  It took me a while to dig my craft desk out from under temporarily abandoned projects and to locate all the supplies I needed, but I was able to complete three different sets.  The first set is made of faceted crystal quartz, the second is snowflake quartz, and the last set is plastic letter beads.  I bought them over a year ago and ended up never using them, so I decided to make myself one of those cheesy knitting term stitch maker sets.

Back in August, I received a Knitpicks ball winder as one of my birthday presents.  I’ve used it countless times since then to make myself some delightfully neat yarn cakes and for the most part, it has worked perfectly fine.  On larger yardage skeins, however, I occasionally run into a problem where the yarn catches on the bottom lip of the winder’s plate and makes a mess of things.

I have to stop what I’m doing and unwind the tangled yarn before I can continue.  It seems that it no matter how fast or slow I go, this problem is mostly unavoidable.  One fix I’ve found is stopping about mid-way during the winding process to gently move the cake up the central post so that the new yarn can slip under.  I don’t like this method because it is annoying to stop and start, plus I end up with not such a pretty cake.

After whining to my husband about the issue once or twice, he offered to figure out a more permanent solution.  I agreed to let him play with it on the one condition that if he broke it, he would have to replace it.  He discovered that if you raise the guide pole just a slight amount, the problem pretty much goes away completely. Great! Unfortunately, however, the metal is too tough to manipulate without risking breaking the plastic casing of the winder.  Somewhat disappointed, I took my ball winder back and continued along using the push method.

Tonight I pulled out my ball winder once again so that I could ready a skein of Dream in Color Smooshy for knitting with.  I was merrily doing my thing when the husband waltzed over and shoved the cap from his beer bottle under the guide post.

The yarn did not get caught under the plate for the remaining duration of winding.  Yay!  It is not the permanent solution I was hoping for and it’s certainly not a pretty one, but if it works that’s good enough for me.

If you have the same issues I have with your own plastic ball winder, try sliding a spoon or fork handle under your guiding post next time and see if it works for you.  Be careful not to use something that is too thick or you might stress the casing too much and break it.

October seems to be chugging along at a rapid pace and I feel like I’m having a hard time keeping up.  The cold I am apparently developing is not helping, since it is wearing me out before I manage to get anything done.  Thankfully, I have managed to accomplish a little bit of something each day in order to keep up with my NaCraMaMo goals.

Day 1: I knit on a toe-up sock for my husband and I spun a little.
Day 2: I knit a little more on the sock, but then ended up frogging it completely after having some issues with the heel increases.  For some reason my brain keeps forgetting how to do M1 increases even though, deep down, I know how they should be done.
Day 3: I did a bit more spinning, but didn’t have time for any knitting.  I didn’t take a picture because my work still looks much like it did in the last photo, only with a little more on the spindle and a slightly smaller pile of fiber.
Day 4: I started one of my many Christmas gifts; a scarf for my husband’s uncle.  It’s a lovely cabled number with an eight row repeat that I’ve managed to memorize. I work on it for one pattern repeat at a time and then put it down to give myself a break.  Fortunately each repeat is a little more than an inch’s worth of progress, so I am actually getting something done.

Today, day number five, marks the start of week number two.  I plan to work on the scarf a bit more and may also cast on something more simplistic to work on while I watch House tonight.  I am hoping that I can cast off this bug and have a much more productive week.

It’s time for National Craft Making Month again!  I will, of course, be participating once again this year.  Last year my focus was mainly on beading with a little kumihimo thrown in.  This time around I’ve shifted interests into knitting and spinning, so my participation this time around will reflect that.  I am planning on throwing a little jewelry making in, but my efforts will mainly center around the fiber arts.

I am off to a very encouraging start this year.

I began with some spinning.  I’m still working to achieve a consistent result in my yarn and the only way to do that is to practice, practice, and then practice some more.  I am slowly learning to draft more fluently and it is already making a big difference in the quality of my work.  That’s only about an ounce’s worth of merino fiber in the photo (about half on the spindle and the rest still unspun).   I am hoping to get at least a project’s worth spun before the end of the month.

My other project was a bit of knitting on the socks that I started for my husband over a month and a half ago.

It is a simple toe-up sock knit on US1 needles with Patons Kroy self-striping fingering-weight.  This project has taught me that I really don’t care for this style of self-striping yarn and I will be avoiding it in the future (sorry Kroy, sorry Opal).  Fortunately my husband likes the appearance just fine and will be happy to receive a finished pair (if I ever get around to it).  Although the picture really doesn’t look like much, I’m happy to report that it is actually about half a foot’s worth complete.

I hope to also get some more Christmas knitting done this month.  The more I get done, the less shopping I will have to do and that will make me a very happy woman.  I detest holiday shopping.  I do not enjoy being jammed into a mall with hoards of sweating, smelly, angry shoppers looking for a bargain.  By doing things my way, I hope to have a low stress holiday this year.