Always

A beautiful sky.

A finished pair of socks.

And a new sock on the go.

Wishing all my Canadian friends a happy long weekend.

New Ground

Boy do I ever feel out of touch with the blogging world! Things have been very busy this past week and a half. Between family, convocation, the bar admissions course, and a weekend away I haven't had any spare time.

There has been some progress on the fiber front but I warn you it's limited. Up first there is a convocation gift from my grandmother...a washed fleece.

I'm not exactly sure how much this puppy weighs but it seems to be a reasonable size (read: it isn't overwhelmingly large). Also included in the photo are some lovely student handcarders I purchased for the occasion.

Here's what my first carding attempt looks like.

Has anyone done any carding before? If so, do these rolags look like something I might be able to spin at some point? This whole process is a bit of a mystery to me.

I also started swatching for Stephanie Japel's Cable-Down Raglan, featured in the Spring '07 Interweave mag. The yarn is from Oceanwind Knits. I love the way the colour varies from a baby blue to a deep ocean blue.

Before you judge me too harshly for starting something new while neglecting all of the other lovely projects in my knitting basket look at these.

They're progressing, I swear! I still have a bunch of foot left to knit but I have high hopes that these socks will come off the needles later this week with Icarus to follow shortly thereafter.

A few stitches short...

Success! The cable has been found and the camera is cooperating once again. So here she is, the first of the Central Air socks from one of last year's Rockin' Sock Club kits (eep, and to think I still have two and a half pairs to go, clearly it'll be a while until I get to the new ones).

The fine ladies at Blue Moon sent me the yarn after my July club kit was lost then delayed. They also sent out an extra pattern in their September kit and I decided that the two would work nicely together. Many months later this is the result.

This sock turned into a bit of a knitting black hole just before the end of the leg and at some point during the foot. I knit, and knit, and knit and never gained any length. In the end it seems that I got a little carried away and it ended up being a smidge too big. Not enough that it's worth ripping out, but enough that I'll try and be more cautious with the next one.

I managed to start the second sock but let me tell you, it was tough, requiring much more will power than your average sock. I waited a very precarious three days before picking up the needles again. Perhaps I've contracted a mild case of SSS.

As much as I adore these socks, it's more than likely that they'll move to the back burner while I let Icarus rule my life for the time being. See what I mean about the startitis?

Cold Foot

Without further ado, here's how much sock knitting a girl can get done in one day while studying, flying, and unpacking.

Enough to make her proud but still leave her with some cold toes.

I'm hoping that I'll be able to get this sock finished before the end of the week so I can get started on its mate. The ultimate goal being to reduce the unwieldy collection of unused sock yarn in the stash (the opposite of what has actually been happening since my last update).

I'm thinking that I might commit to finishing two pairs of socks per month. This works out to one sock per week. It's feasible but a little ambitious considering I keep getting distracted by things like this (a.k.a. my first real attempt at designing anything from scratch).

Ignoring the polar bear pyjama pants, this charming tube is aspiring to become a airy tank top of some description to be used for summer layering (obviously to be worn with actual pants). I've already frogged the armholes about three times and have revised the original fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants design strategy as a result.

The original plan was to do a simple boat neck that would allow the silk to drape a little and add interest to the neck. Looking at this picture though, I'm tempted to plan in a V-neck instead. Any thoughts?

And on an unrelated note, I thought that I'd share some beautiful flowers that my mom sent to congratulate me for finding my first career-type job.

They definitely help brighten the otherwise dreary weather we've been having as of late and remind me that summer's just around the corner.

Ripples n' ribs

The last week and a bit has once again been a little iffy 'round the edges. Now that school's finished I've attempted to throw myself head-first into studying for the bar admissions exams I have to write in the next couple of weeks. This has meant daily 6-8 hour study sessions and little meaningful knitting time.

The few stolen moments I have managed to find led to this:

Project Specs: Kat Coyle’s Wave Skirt (Spring 2005 IK)
Yarn: Cotton Fleece in various colours (I’ll check if you’re interested)
Amount: 2 MC, and 4 CC skeins
Left over: Almost no MC but heaps of CC
Modifications: None

I've also managed to convince myself that I should join Liz's Sock in a Day Challenge (which you may still be able to sign up for if you email her and ask nicely). My chosen day is today. Here's how far I was when waiting for my luggage at the airport earlier this morning.

Although progress has been made, I think that it's safe to say that I will not finish this sock today. Luckily, the rules mention that I have up to 18 hours to finish the pretty. Here's a close-up of the lacy rib pattern stitch that I'm going to blame for slowing me down.

Wish me luck, or speed!

I *heart* the mailman

The new STR Rockin' Sock Club shipment arrived at my house safe and sound this afternoon (huge relief after the mail theft problems I'd been having). I may or may not have spent the day compulsively checking the KAL for pics of other people's kits, counting the number of days it took past shipments to arrive, and running to the door to stare out of the peephole at the slightest sound.

I am ecstatic about the red skein (click to big-ify). I love, love, love red and have been wondering all along when it would show its yummy primary goodness. As for the Rare Gem, I'm still not convinced, and find myself wavering between loving it and HoHum-ing it. I suppose I won't be able to tell until it becomes socks. Perhaps it will become a pair of these depending on what happens during swatching.

I tried to get a good picture of the finished sock on the pattern but it was not meant to be (if you supersize the photo and squint you can almost see part of it). For those of you who are dying to know, it is a stunning beaded cable-rib pattern by Sivia Harding who designed these. The pattern itself reminds me of a simpler/easier, non-knee sock version, of these in that there is a fancy design at the top, that morphs into a simple cable to the heel, and then becomes pretty heel and front ankle detailing.

The good news is that it's here and I can focus on more urgent matters (like that pesky 100% final tomorrow). For now it's back to studying. I promise more regular postings with actual knitting content after it's done. Methinks a trip to the bead store is in order tomorrow, on the way home from the beastie!

Cheating decreases

Feast your eyes on these puppies. Four months of committed sock knitting to produce an exquisite lacey (subtle mesh patterned) anklet. Both yarn and pattern came to me in my July Blue Moon Fiber Arts Rockin' Sock Club kit.















Yarn: Socks That Rock Lightweight in Peaseblossom (1 skein)
Pattern: Hippy Crunchy
Needles: 2.25mm Clover Takumi DPNs

Perhaps the only reason I ever finished these socks was that I found a way to cheat the K3tog and SSSK decreases about 10 rounds in. To encourage other knitters that feel a little woozy when see they a pattern with muti-stitch decreases, I thought I'd put a quick tutorial together on how to accomplish the aforementioned without breaking a sweat or a dpn. Note that basic information on these two decreases can be found here.


The Majestic SSSK

First you need to slip 3 stitches as if to knit from the left to the right-hand needle, just like you were doing a regular SSK.














Next you SSK the two stitches closest to the tip of your right hand needle as you normally would (if you're really struggling you can just SSK the first stitch, and use the leap-frog technique described below to deal with the other two later.)














Here's the cheating part. Lift or leap-frog the unworked-but-previously-slipped-stitch on the right-hand needle (now the second one from the tip) over the SSK that you just worked.














Et Voila! A lovely, angst-free, and slightly blurry SSSK.















The Regal K3tog

This one follows the same principles as the SSSK but with one extra (easy) step. First you'll knit the first two stitches on the left hand needle together (K2tog) same as always (again if worst comes to worse you can just knit the first stitch and repeat the leap-frogging described below twice for the same effect.)














Now you have your worked decrease on the right-hand needle and your left over stitch on the left-hand needle (see picture).














Here's the extra step part. Slip the worked K2tog decrease purlwise from the right to left-hand needle so that it looks like this.














Then you just lift or leap-frog the remaining stitch to be worked over your decrease.














Now slip the whole thing purlwise back onto to the right-hand needle and you're done another beautiful decrease.