FO: Glynis

Last week we had to drive from my MIL's house in southeastern Vermont to my parents' new abode in southeastern Maine. As anyone who has ever tried to drive from Vermont to Maine knows, yuh can't get theah from heah.

Well, you can get there, it just takes 5 hours. Or forever, depending on how many children you have in the car with you. The good news is that, even after driving part of the way, I still had time to finish up some socks.

Pattern: Glynis by Cookie A, from Sock Innovation
Yarn: Green Mountain Spinnery Sock Art Forest, 70% wool, 30% Tencel, 400 yds/100 gr
Needles: US size 1/2.25 mm (do I knit socks with anything else? Apparently not)
Gauge: Close enough to the required gauge so as not to have to make any alterations
Comments/mods: Again, a very fast knit from Cookie A. Although, to be fair, I did knit 6 pattern repeats on the leg instead of 9, and the socks are plenty long enough. There is a slight caveat to the leg chart: at the end of row 5 you have to shift the start of the row to the right by one stitch. I managed to notice this before I'd done too much damage, but some others weren't so lucky...

I didn't change anything on the heel flap/gusset/foot at all. There was a small error in my version of the foot chart in row 8, but it was pretty straightforward to figure out (k2tog instead of k3tog). There are some errata for the book available, so for future installments I will check the errata before starting off.

I did change the toe, as promised. Instead of decreasing every other row 12 times, I decreased every third row three times, every other row four times and every row five times. I realize that the mathematicians out there will have noticed that this is more decreases then called for in the pattern. But I've recently taken to reading all grafting instructions as "Decrease to a small number of stitches, cut off your yarn, thread through the remaining stitches and pull tight". This has been necessitated by the fact that a) I have maybe three darning needles left out of some ludicrous number (like 15) and I don't know where they are and b) I cannot remember how to graft to save my life. This is much easier.

The yarn: I liked this yarn less then the yarn I used for the Pomatomuseseses. It felt a bit harsh in my hands, and was a bit stiff to work with, unlike the Forest which was wonderfully supple (and ended up really soft after blocking). I will admit that I have not yet blocked these at all, so they may soften up quite a bit, but in the future I'll stick to the mohair version of GMS sock yarn.

You may have realized that finishing these socks* meant I could start my obsession. Which I did. But that will have to wait for another post...

* Two FO posts in a row with socks? What is the world coming to?

FO: Mermaid Socks*

Now that these have been presented to their new owner, they can be shared with y'all.

Pattern: Pomatomus by Cookie A.
Yarn: Green Mountain Spinnery Sock Art Meadow, 50/50 wool/mohair, 400 yds/100 gr
Needles: US 1/2.25 mm
Gauge: 9 sts/12 rows per inch in stockinette
Start/finish: 7/21 - 8/5/2009
Comments/mods: After several months of doing my own sock patterns, it was a relief to get to follow someone else's directions for a change. These socks were so speedy, in part I think because the lace pattern is so intriguing. I kept knitting to see how it was going to come out next!

The yarn is awesome - it has a similar toothy feel to Araucania Ranco (which I talked about with these socks), and the yarn feels really sturdy. The colors were perfect for Mermaid socks, although it wasn't until I was done that I really noticed all the yellowy-green in there. In any event, the colorway was perfect for sea-type fish-scaly socks. It's tightly plied as well, so the twisted stitches really pop.

The only mod I made was to only do 2 repeats on the leg instead of 3. I always have yarn panic when I do top down socks from one skein of yarn, so I opted for fewer repeats. Turns out I have a whack-load of yarn left, so three repeats would have been just fine. However, the legs would have been really long. I'm not so in to really high socks myself, so I tend not to make them at all. This long leg seems to be a trend, because Glynis (now underway - squee!**) calls for 9 repeats of an 8 row pattern plus an inch of ribbing before the heel flap. I might get 7 repeats if I force myself.

The other mod that I didn't do for these socks but will do for future Cookie socks is to change the toe decreases. These came out really really pointy. They look fine on the foot, but silly otherwise. So I'll switch that up in the future.

In conclusion, really well written pattern, amazing stitch pattern, lovely yarn (wish I could justify getting more!), speedy knit and (hopefully) a happy Mermaid with toast warm tail fins this winter. Win all around.

* What is the plural of Pomatomus anyway?
** Glynis is also speeding along in the same "Wow, this is a cool stitch pattern!" way, thanks to a viewing of GI Jane and Mulan (all in one day!).

More dilemma

So I was just sitting on my mother-in-law's porch, taking advantage of the fact that she took my children off to do some blueberry picking, and knitting away studiously on the Veil of Isis, when something horrible happened.

I finished the yarn. Mind you, I'm knitting this thing out of some lovely alpaca yarn Ironman bought me himself in Peru. I've got 17 balls of the stuff left, so there's plenty of yarn to knit this with. I'm on row 9 of 32 of the edging, so the end is definitely in sight. But the rest of the yarn?

In England. Ha ha ha, say the knitting gods.

Aestlight is still burning a hole in my metaphorical yarn pocket, so the only solution I can come up with is this: I have to finish Glynis before I cast on for the shawl.

There is good news and bad news. The good news is that I finished the first sock and cast on/did the ribbing for the second sock on the plane. The bad news is that I have to finish them in the next few days or hide away somewhere to work on them where someone (stop reading here Mom!) won't see them.

Bah.

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.

What I knit on my summer vacation

One and a half Pomatomi. Apparently France agrees with fish scales...