Slogging along

I started some socks for a friend's Christmas present a few weeks ago, and they've been a tough row to hoe in several different ways.

The pattern is lovely, with lots of twisted stitches,

and the yarn is also lovely (and sparkly!), if a bit splitty at times.

But the absolute killer was the heel flap, with multiple rows of k1, ptbl...

Oh my aching wrist! I have a bone deposit on the back of my right hand that, 99% of the time, I don't even notice. (The 1% of the time I notice it is when I hit it against something and jump around turning the air blue for a few minutes because O The Pain.) However, every so often it becomes an issue. Like, oh lets say hypothetically speaking: when I get all fired up to finish a heel flap and end up totally wracking my hands doing ptbl on size 1 needles. Ooof.

Since my reckless foray into heel flapitude this weekend, my right hand/wrist have been less then happy with me, to the extent that large doses of NSAIDS seem to be in order. So in order to give it a bit of a break*, last night I cast on for the first of three parts of a present for Boo.

To say that my younger child has something of an obsession with animals would be a laughable understatement. Nemo is one of her all time faves. So I was hunting around Ravelry, and came across a free (hooray!) pattern for Nemo mittens. Originally using sport weight yarn, and sized for 4-6 years old, I'm using some left over Knit Picks Essential that I dyed (another post there), and size 1 needles. I think they'll fit. And they're using so little yarn, that I think I'll be able to bust her out a Nemo hat as well. Yee haw!

*To any normal person, a break would mean "Stop knitting you idiot!" However, the holidays are right around the corner and I Have Gifts To Make.

(Mostly) FO: Haiku

It seems that all I needed was a leetle bit of encouragement to get this baby done. A carrot on the end of a stick as it were. Just posting my dilemma encouraged me to sit down and whack out the last little bit of garter stitch that was left on the body. One viewing of Batman and some down time with the girls, and there she was...

Boo's Haiku in all it's boxy glory.
Yarn: Lion Brand FIsherman's Wool that I dyed, oh...four years ago? using Wiltons cake dyes. One of my first ever dyeing experiments. I went overboard on the colors a bit - five was too many - and it's been sitting in my stash ever since. I used about 1.5 skeins.
Needles: US 8/5.0 mm straights
Start/finish: 7/7-8/9/09
Gauge: 4.5 stitches/9 rows per inch in garter stitch
Comments/mods: I whizzed through the start of this baby in no time flat, and stalled out with 3 inches of garter stitch left on the body. I guess my need for mindless knitting passed fairly quickly! But I was dying to start the next socks, so I got back on the horse and finished up in just a couple of days. Once the knitting was done, I paused briefly to wind the yarn for the next sock project, and then sewed up the seams and set in the sleeves. I have not yet put any buttons on, but that should be easy to accomplish before it gets cold.

I actually like how the pooling turned out on this, splitting into yellow/brown and pink/orange sections with the green bleeding over into each. Unfortunately, novice dyer that I was, I didn't quite rinse the yarn enough, and after each session with this stuff my fingers were a lovely fuschia color. That might also have contributed to the lack of progress for a while.

I was curious to see if I could get the sleeves to match, so I started at the beginning of an orange section for the cast-on edge on both and managed to get them pretty close. The next big debate was whether to have the pink/orange side or the yellow/brown side face forward. I like pink and orange better, so that's what faces to the front. The nice thing about this pattern is that the pieces are reversible, so if you don't like the color combo on the "RS" of the sleeve, you can flip it inside out, designate that the right side, and carry on your merry way.

I showed this to Boo when it was done and her response was...minimal, to say the least. She looked at it, looked at me, and wandered off to look for her animules. Hopefully she'll actually wear it this fall, and there's enough yarn left for a hat and mittens if she's really lucky.

Right. Lucky. Lucky in that she's short and her mother dresses her funny.

No fiber this Friday

Last weekend, I did something I've only done once in the last two years.

I folded up my spinning wheel and put it away.

There was a good reason. We were having company for dinner (and I try not to scare the Muggles too much if I can help it), the bobbins were empty, I wasn't going to have a chance to spin much before we left, and I didn't want to start something, take a two week break and come back to it. So the wheel is folded down in the gear/stash room, and I have no fiber to show off today.

Instead I will share another example of how I have corrupted my youngest child (in a good way, I promise). Devil has been at day camp for the last week and a half, so Boo and I have been hanging out together. One of the bonuses of just having one urchin to look after during the day has been getting out for some nice runs. Last week we went up to the Heath with some containers and our run lasted an hour, half of which was spent picking/running quality control on the wild blackberries.

This week, we spent one afternoon at the 1 o'clock centre in town, a wonderful London invention - a free play area for kids up to age 5. So there we were. I was sitting on a bench, zoning out a bit while Boo played with some animals. Next thing I know she comes zooming past me, pushing a small stroller crammed with a naked baby doll, a stuffed lemur, and a dinosaur.

"Mama! I running!" she said as she went by.

Fantastic.

Dilemma (partially) resolved

Because having completed this:

meant I could do this:

If I play my cards right and sneak my needles through security at Heathrow, there will be much Glynis knitting tomorrow. Yee haw!

PS - I've changed my mind about the second WIP I need to finish up. Yes, the Estes Vest is mostly done, but I really don't want to haul around several pounds of wool on my lap in August in Vermont and/or Maine. So I will be trading off a shawl for a shawl: finishing Veil of Isis in order to start Aestlight. Seems fitting, and Isis is a heck of a lot smaller/less wooly.

She's been corrupted

Boo just came and picked this skein of yarn off of my desk and, cradling it in her arms like a baby, said "What's this?"

I said "That's some yarn."

She said "Oooooo, yarn. Can I see pictures of yarn?"

My work here is done.