I'm such a liar

Yesterday I left a post for Emily, commenting on her daughter Ellie's adorable booties. When I've done baby knitting, I've never ever been a booty knitter - sweaters, hats, bibs even - but never socks or booties. I always figured that those little suckers would slide or fall right off those little smooth baby feet - so why bother? Yet all it took was one picture of Ellie wearing her Saarjte booties and I was a goner. Of course, I swore up and down to Emily that I wouldn't cast on for a pair immediately. Because - you know - I'm currently quite full with WIPs, thankyouverymuch. Dad's socks (50%), my May Day Sock Swap socks (70%), Gryphon's tank top (40%), and swatching for my brother's Inga hat.

Ahem.



Yeah.......right. (Humming softly to herself: "Liar, liar, pants on fire......")

I've already cast on for a second - larger - pair as well. It's the perfect project for any knitter who is a bit stuck - not only does it use up such a tiny amount of yarn that you can't tell that your ball of leftover sock yarn has actually changed in size whatsoever, but they're quick, they're adorable when you're done, and you feel so damn clever once you take the flat construction and seam them into something so cute and rounded and twee. For my first pair I used size 1 needles and leftover basic sock yarn - some handspun that I bought via Gryphon at the farmer's market last summer - spun by a friend of hers and ultimately turned into a pair of Monkey socks for my mom - topped with some of the SockPal pink bamboo/wool that Jessie custom dyed for me when I pulled Ava as my Sockpalooza 4 sock pal and with which I made her a pair of lusciously pink knee-highs.

It was really fun to work on these, too, as it gave me the perfect excuse to finally pull out my buttons.



And ducks, I have lots of buttons. I was gifted all of these - and honestly, not to brag or be at all snotty, but they're pretty much all vintage-ish - by a co-worker's wife who was an incredible sewer, but was both downsizing her crafting activities and switching full-time to weaving.

I have lots. And lots and lots and lots. Of course, I couldn't find four of the ones I first wanted for the booties, and so had to 'settle' for the pearl ones instead, but still. Not exactly a hardship, huh?

A ton of the buttons in the big cardboard shoebox are huge funky woven leather ones that would only be suitable for a jacket or a manly cardigan. But still, if I ever decide to make a good three dozen manly cardigans, I'll be totally set in terms of buttons.

My excuse for why it is more okay than not to work on the booties instead of my other official WIPs is that I'm home today and tomorrow with the Munchkin. He has fallen prey to a nasty virus that is hitting roughly half the town. He started running a fever in the middle of the night - restlessly rolling from side to side and moaning, while scalding hot to the touch all over his body - and today he's spent 90% of his time on the couch passively watching movies when he wasn't sleeping for a solid two hours. This is such an active child - for him to be this still, I truly know that he's sick. Not terribly - and not anything that so far needs a doctor's attention - the virus just needs to run its course - but for him to stay this still this long? Other than the first week of his life, this might be the most passive I've ever seen him. From what I've heard, the virus takes about 4 days to run it's full gamut - by Sunday he should be up a bit more, and by Monday all that should be left is a dry cough.

Now all I can do is hope that I don't catch it as well!

Once the second pair of booties are finished, the silk tank top is next. I swear. With Dad's sock and the May Day sock worked on between in spare moments and before bed. I want to get the front of the tank finished and get started on the lace panel insert by this weekend. Ook, that reminds me, I need to e-mail Gryphon about the designing contract that I'm supposed to sign. She trusted me with some very valuable silks - not to mention a skein of silk and cashmere! - I need to make sure that I do right by her - and the fibers as well...

- Signed, Sealed, Delivered -

Today so far is a Very Good Day.

I woke up and almost immediately my ears were filled with the sound of massive giggles coming from my son as he and Peggers tickled each other on the bed and were generally Quite Silly. That's a stunningly good thing to wake up to.

Then I had a slice of the farmhouse oatmeal bread that I made on Tuesday smothered in creamy peanut-butter and a mug of ginger-peach black tea with a splash of milk for breakfast while I read the ending of Greenwitch. It wasn't bad. Not as good as The Dark Is Rising, but still not bad. The series is shaping up to be a decent way to work your way down from the crushing disappointment after finishing HP#7, if I do say so myself......


Then I came into work and packed my Sockpalooza package:

She hates yellow, and I've been teasing her for ages now that I was knitting her a pair of Tweedy-Bird yellow socks, so I couldn't resist covering up everything with this yellow tissue paper...

Absolutely anything and everything looks better packed in a nice basket, don't you think?

We have starting at the top and going counter-clockwise: finished sockpal socks (!), Tarantulas Gummies, a mini skein of sockpal pink yarn for darns or whathaveyou, a lavender sachet, some Bertie Botts Every Flavour Beans, and a greeting card with a little note from me plus a printout of my blog page from the day I posted about signing up for Sockpalooza 4 in the first place. Dead center (hidden somewhat by the insanely-pink ribbon) is a lavender aromatherapy candle. Also scattered in the basket are some salt-water taffies from a local candy shop.

And last but not least, the all-important Care & Washing tag to let my Pal
know how to care for her pink lovelies.

Everything was carefully packaged up, sealed, addressed, and then stamped via Priority mail - and finally entrusted to Carl, my lovely local postmaster. As she's only over in PA I'm wondering how quickly this will in fact make it's way to her. I'd like to think Saturday, but I'm guessing in fact next Monday. Now all I can do is hope that the box doesn't get lost in transit and when the socks arrive and she pulls them out her face doesn't immediately fall with disappointment!!!!!

I showed the basket and contents to my two new co-workers and they both ooh'd and aah'd over the goodies and the socks - and the two of them were BOTH wearing pink shirts today - so there was no need to ask if they liked the colours! - so I took that as a good sign.

There is no new painting news to report, as I took a break this morning to not only eat breakfast but to also do the dishes and tidy up the house a bit - something that hasn't been done in nearly two weeks (the tidying, that is - dishes have been dutifully washed while painting was going on!) I also worked a bit more on my EZ Baby Surprise Jacket.

Pattern: BSJ from EZ's Opinionated Knitter
Yarn: Gedifra 'Dandy' in this insane yellow/green/purple colourway
Needles: Addi Naturas - size 7 - 4.5mm
Finished Size: 3Tish or thereabouts
Mods so Far: like many others, I've done a provisional cast-on so that I can add length to the sleeves as necessary once everything else is finished...

I started this Tuesday night and managed to get a good amount done yesterday evening while eating cheese fries out of a plastic baseball helmet, watching our local minor league baseball team play - and lose - over 7 innings. Good times. Tonight is the bi-monthly Boys Night In - where Peggers and his mates all congregate in our dining room until late in the evening - and while I shut the french doors between the dining room and living room and happily curl up on the couch and knit and watch DVDs or listen to books on CD. No idea what I'll be watching or listening to tonight, as we've no new Netflix DVDs to watch and I've seen all of the ones we already own, and I've listened and re-listened to every book on CD that we likewise own. Hmph. A visit to the public library might be necessary before I go home tonight. Oh shoot. They close at 5 PM tonight. Damn budgetary cutbacks! Looks like I'll be hitting the Redbox $1 DVD setup in the grocery store instead this time! (hmmmmmm........maybe I can get that monster bag of peanut M&M's that I've been craving ever since I read Franklin's comment about how peanut M&M's are his favorite movie food......)

Speaking of Franklin I was thrilled to see that there is a Dolores Devotees group in Ravelry - you can betcher' bottom skein that I ran right on over & joined that particular group as soon as I found out! Isn't the banner for it just fantastic???

.....and my day just keeps getting better & better! See what I found waiting this afternoon when I got back to my desk? It took the journals folks almost 10 weeks to have these sent off to the bindery, bound, and returned to me - but for less than $20 I now have four full years of Interweave Knits in sturdy, bound form safely at the ready for my reaching hand whenever I need them. Hooray to no longer hunting down that one last elusive issue, or finding that an issue was wrinkled and squashed underneath a pile of comic books, a pile of cooking magazines, or a large Tonka dumptruck!

Happy Weekend everyone - I'm home with the Munchkin starting tomorrow until Friday the 10th, so don't expect more than one post from me - if any - in that interim time. I'll be too busy painting the house, taking the little guy to the beach, and hitting the zoo to once again check out the Stinky Buffaloes!

All good things must come to an end...

...and others must begin.


Work continues on the painting front. Many thanks for your kind words - both as to our efforts so far and as to our colour choices. Green is apparently not a traditional or popular house painting shade - and we've gotten many a raised-eyebrow because of it. We, however, like it very very much.

Tomorrow is August 1st. Tomorrow is also for a group of some knitters Get Your Sockpalooza Pal Package Prepped & Ready To Go Day, as the official send-out day is August 2nd.

I have ready to go in my package:

• One finished pair of bright pink knee-high sockpal socks. (check!)
• One mini skein of bright pink sock pal pink sock yarn for darns (check!)
• One package of Bertie Botts Every Flavour Beans (check!)
• One lavender-scented candle (check!)
• One package tarantula gummy candy (check!)
• A large handful of locally-made saltwater taffy (check!)
• One tongue-in-cheek greeting card (check!)

Hopefully the gummy candies and candle will suitably distract her in case the socks don't fit or are too short or too slouchy or just..................not to her Sockpal taste. So that package will get prettily wrapped up and packaged up tomorrow and then first thing on Thursday I'll walk it to the post office and send it off 2-day priority mail. As the package only has to go about 2 states over I'm guessing she'll get it by Saturday. I should say, I'm hoping she'll get it by Saturday.

So that is ending. But what fun it's been!

And tomorrow (yes tomorrow!) the official Dish Rag Tag begins! I'm one of the 200 or so folks that joined up to play in Emily's fun race - and I'm on the Cotton Commandos Team. We've been discussing and plotting and chatting for the past several weeks, and we've got a loose strategy in place and know where we're mailing things and how - so all I now get to do is keep one eye on the team's forum page and keep the other on my mailbox!

Also today at work I got a lovely message in my inbox:

Dear Susan ______

A loan that you had requested:
Loan Title: The opinionated knitter : Elizabeth Zimmermann newsletters 1958-1968 /
is now available for checkout.

So what fun, too! That means that a BSJ is soon to be working it's way on my needles. The first of (probably) many. This particular BSJ will be worked up in an eye-blazing yellow/orange/green/purple yarn that I have absolutely tons of - and the jacket will be (of course) for The Munchkin.

I can hardly wait - even though the first few lines of the pattern look like gibberish at the moment. However I've always found that with the yarn and needles in hand most patterns tend to make sense after a bit of head-scratching and squinting.

Progress on all fronts will certainly show up here - including the Belle Shrug! I picked a cuff pattern and cast on yesterday and am up to the crook of my elbow as of this afternoon.......

O-U-C-H

Munchkin, having a fantastic time this weekend at the beach...

I'm not exactly sure why, but I ache everywhere. My back, all along my spine, is stunningly sore. My knees, hip joints, neck, and the left hinge of my jaw aches. My shoulders ache too. When I mentioned this fact to the Munch's daycare provider this evening as I went to pick him up, she said that maybe I had fibromyalgia. Or else maybe I had previously-undiagnosed rheumatoid arthritis and the incoming thunderstorm (and corresponding change in barometric pressure) was causing it to seriously twinge.

Cheerful, isn't she?

Peggers has it too, tho' - when he came to get the Munch he said that he too aches all over - mostly in his back - which makes me wonder if this isn't the start of something ickily viral that we've both caught and will soon fully come down with. Either that or else we've been bitten by the same tick and both have Lyme's disease. I'm guessing it's viral, myself.

Damn viruses.

It's not only achy and potentially stormy here, it's also STUNNINGLY hot. Today's heat index was 102 degrees, with almost 100% humidity. And while I went for a walk/run yesterday the warnings against such strenuous activity were just too obvious for me to do so again today. So rather than come into work a wee bit early and get in a run/walk (I work until 9 PM tonight, so I got to stay home until the early afternoon) I instead sat on the couch in my central-air-conditioned house set to a lovely and low-humidity 81 degrees and started watching the second season of Deadwood while I worked on a new pair of socks.

New socks that I can't show you, as they're an *original design * (Say it all together, now: "ooohhhhhhhh, ahhhhhhhhhh") of my own that I might - just might - submit for publication somewhere. Depending on what my design workshop folks tell me. Even if they're not accepted anywhere, I really really really like them - which is good - because no matter what at the end of all this I'll have a nifty & beautiful pair of handknit socks for myself, which is always a good thing, right my lovely ducklings?

New stamp, stamp pads - black and brown - and twill tape. All 15 feet of it.

I'm also currently working on writing up the pattern for my Screw-y Socks - one that Gryphon might take as a pattern to sell on her Etsy shop. I'm having fun typing it up and making it look all magazine-y and official. When I'm done I'll put it in pdf format, so it will look really and truly special and official. (Again, everyone: "ooooooohhhhhhhh....................aaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh!") To help me in this endeavor I was able to steal back the original pair of Screw-y socks from their gift recipient which is extra extra extra helpful - nothing like actually physically counting stitches and poking at a gusset to help you to remember what you did while knitting! That also means that I can take extra pictures, which is always good as well.

Speaking of extra pictures, here are some recent ones from my digital camera taken over the weekend, this morning, and this evening:

A finished sockpal sock heel. More pictures will - of course
appear here eventually. Many, many more. :)

Beautiful, beautiful, smooth organic woven cotton ribbon/twill tape.

Pink sockpal footsies.

Remember how I won a contest at Mim's blog? My gift box from Miriam came! 2 skeins of Claudia handpainted sock yarn ('Chocolate' colourway) plus real chocolate as well! That's in my tummy - so no pics of that, I'm afraid.....

A shot of how I more (or, in this case, less) managed to get
the cuff of my sockpal socks to match.
Sorta'.
Kinda'.

And I have a confession to make about Mystery Stole 3. I've frogged it. Again. You cannot cheat with Ms. Mystery - she's not a Birch or an Icarus that is quite so easy and forgiving as those two kind, kind souls. There is no room to craftily hide your lack of attention or your extra stitch or missing yarnover - she's a demanding, demanding snippet of a mistress. Every stitch, every row, has to be carefully counted, watched, looked after and scrutinized. And what that means for me is a book on CD or iPod (goodbye 2nd season of Deadwood - you and I shall henceforth only meet over vests and socks!), a cookbook holder used to prop up my chart and written directions, a pencil to shade out my knitted rows/stitches so that I can better keep track as I go, and - last but certainly not least - a lifeline every 10 or so rows. I'm personally a lifeline virgin - I jumped right in to the lace game with Birch and never looked back - in fact I even arrogantly scoffed at lifelines when it came to knitting Icarus - and either because Mim is extremely kind or else I just got very very very lucky - I never needed a lifeline for either lace project.

But Ms. Mystery - she is a-kickin' my ass - and with her I need all the help I can get.

I just might - maybe, possibly - start her tonight. Sitting comfortably propped up in bed, embroidery thread poised & at the ready to be my first lifeline somewhere around row 10 or 15 - with Harry Potter and The Order of The Phoenix (read by the superb Mr. Jim Dale) keeping me company while an achy hubby peacefully snoozes next to me..........

Holy Knit One Purl Two!

My sockpal socks are done. Both of them. Holy knit one purl two speedy knitting, Batman! (The blog post title refers to this lovely little snippet that Peggers e-mailed me earlier this week while I was home on full-time mommy duty. Amusing to see how we knitters are shown as total psychopaths, huh?) They are currently at home, washed and blocking. The second cuff was snipped, the top cast-on edge taken off, and then I did a horridly inexpert job of picking up the stitches. Well, I picked up the k2 stitches easily, but I'll be damned if I could find the purl stitches - so I kind of had to make it up as I went along - which took me two separate attempts - and even then I knit it once, cast off, and then glared at it, as it looked so half-assed'ly done. So I undid the cast-off, ripped it back down, and tried picking up the stitches again, doing a better job this time with the cabled stitches and did the cast-off with EZ's sewn cast-off to make sure that the edge was nice and stretchy. They still don't match perfectly, but they're much better than they were before I tried, so that's a good thing. Otherwise I think they're near twins which is always a nice thing in socks. And appropriate, seeing as how my lovely sockpal is mommy to twin girls herself!

I immediately pulled out some stash yarn and started knitting away on a new WIP - but one that I can't post about here as it is ultimately destined to be a gift knit for someone that I know reads the blog. For those of you in Ravelry (and said gift recipient is currently NOT yet in Ravelry) take a peek in my projects notebook to see it - my Ravelry username is susanb.............. However the knitting of these is going so quickly that I'm guessing I'll be finished in the next two weeks and so they will be unveiled quite quickly. So for those of you that are impatient and not yet in Ravelry, there won't be much waiting.

I am half done with the First Clue on my Mystery Stole. I'm somewhere around Row 56. I think. The First Clue goes all the way up to Row 100 - and Clue #2 comes out tomorrow. I obviously won't be ready to start the Second Clue tomorrow, but that's okay. I'm still having loads of fun with this and am just in seventh heaven with the softness and colour of the yarn.

Happily enough, the chart has also been kindly posted in written-out form - BUT - it was written out (for the first time that I've ever seen!) in the way that I write out charts - in column form instead of lengthwise. I cannot tell you how lovely this is going to be - to be able to have someone else write out these charts for me! I can most certainly work from charts - I just prefer not to. Finding this out today and seeing other folks' finished Chart 1 work in the Yahoo Group for the project has totally spurred me on to work on this tonight, if I'm able. Go on and join - you've only got until tomorrow to add you name to the group before Melanie shuts the group to all other joiners!

Other than my finished Sockpal socks, my new secret WIP, and my Mystery Stole 3 progress my other Big News is along the finishing school line of thought. I've seen several knitters out there who have spent some major money buying their own custom name tags to sew into their pieces of handknit. One of my absolute favorites, hands down, is Caro's. However while I'd love to have something similar, not only am I currently trying to pay off my current yarn bill but I'm also not sure that I really and truly know what I'd like to have on this ol' name tag. And while the name tags aren't like buying a car or anything - they're not exactly cheap. Well, once again thank goodness for the collective knowledge of knitters and crafters out there. Parikha of The Brown Sheep is both a knitter and a crafter - so she keeps her eyes on blogs that would otherwise go totally unread by yours truly.........and while reading a Shim + sons blog post from last fall she read about the option of using a custom-designed stamp (less than $5, generally), some heat-set ink pads, and twill tape and making your own............

Photo used with extremely kind permission.

Doesn't it look fantastic? I ordered the heat-set ink pads in both black and a chocolate brown, and my stamp is identical to Parikha's - { by susan}. I know - not terribly original - but I tried loads of variations - *astericks*, ::colons::, carrots>< - you name it - and nothing looked good. So I went with what I liked.

Now I just have to be patient and wait for everything to arrive in the mail.

So if you'll excuse me, I have to leave work now and go check my mailbox.

;>

A Toast!

A toast to MS3 & Collective Knowledge Between Knitters!

Thank you thank you thank you everyone to the advice about my too-short sock ribbing. As little as I was favoring the idea of unpicking that persnickety cast-on edge, even **less** was I favoring the idea of unraveling the entire sock and starting over.

No, that's not quite accurate - in fact that wasn't even an option as far as I was concerned.

But to hear that I had an even easier option - to snip a stitch one row below the cast-on, unravel, slip exposed stitches to my circs, and then just start knitting? BRILLIANCE.

And that is exactly what I shall do, once I'm finished decreasing down along the gusset of the sock (which is where my progress currently is on said knitted item) and finished with the foot and finished with the toe decrease and the kitchener graft.

Hip! Hip! Hooray! Hip! Hip! Hooray!

I get to spend the next six days out of the office and with the Munchkin - daycare is closed as she's taking a vacation up to see her family and so I get to spend some fun Mommy/Munchkin days at home, roaming town, taking in the zoo, hitting the beach, etc. I'm looking forward to it (altho' I should probably warn my husband that on Monday or Tuesday it's almost certain that I might need to go out & drink at least one cup of coffee on my own just to get a break in there somewhere! The nonstop questioning of a 2-year old can drive even the most saintly to start daydreaming about the financial viability of adding at least one soundproof room to the current layout of their house... )

While I am doing all of the fun Mommy stuff - making muffins, playing playdough, using my son as a perfect excuse to buy some Boardwalk Fries while we are down at the beach, etc. I shall also be working not only on the previously-mentioned Sockpal sock (I'm hoping to have it done before the end of next week) but I shall also be knitting away on the First Clue of Mystery Stole!

What is Mystery Stole, you ask? I cannot explain it nearly as well as Melanie can - so I'll simply point you in the right direction, urge you all to sign up, and show you my current progress to date:

These are my two MS3 swatches that I finished knitting just this very afternoon.

(Ever block a lace swatch on your office chair? No??? You should - go on - don't be afraid!)

After some pondering & some friendly consultation, I have decided in favor of the swatch on the left - which was knitted with:

.....this oh-so-lovely and HEAVENLY soft skein of Lane Borgoseia Cashwool that I ordered from The Loopy Ewe. This was my first time ever ordering from the Loopy Ewe & it was lovely and everything that everyone has raved about. I might have found my permanent online store from here on out, methinks...................

Like to see that incredible softness again?????

I'm so loving the colour I chose!

The swatch I'm choosing was knitted on size 4's - my new Crystal Palace circs, no less. Again, a splurge from the Ewe. I went with the Crystal Palace ones because the yarn was so happily inexpensive - 1400 yards of glowing "Pearl" laceweight (100% merino - Italian merino!) for only $14. Talk about a steal!

I had been anxiously awaiting my order since about, oh, 5 seconds after I placed it - and by Tuesday night I just **knew** that it should be waiting at the house. So I asked Peggers when he went home (I work Tuesdays until 9 PM) to please call me as soon as the package arrived. No call. I got home and was seriously bummed - all we had apparently gotten was some junkmail and a bill.

So I soldiered on as best I could Tuesday night, working away on my Sockpal sock, while the boys slept all around me:


In a move that should shock no-one, the dog fell asleep first.

Peggers was next. (Hmmmm....think we need a bigger couch? The man is 6'4" - that's TALL, folks!)

And giving in to peer pressure, Ella (one of two felines in the house) finally allowed herself to doze off a bit.

It was only the next morning when I went out into the front perennial bed to cut some flowers for a friend of mine that I turned around and found this on my front steps - where the postman had cleverly hid it behind a large potted trailing rosemary and some elephant ears!

Woo-hoo!!!!

So the First Clue is due out tomorrow for the stole - which means that I get to spend six happy days Playing Mommy, knitting away on a variety of very fun projects, and (hopefully) amassing some truly decent blog fodder for when I return! I also have a lovely story to tell everyone about my new label options, but that will wait for another day (and another package from the post office!)

Can you swear in a blog title?

I mean, I know it's totally ok to swear in the body of a blog posting, but what about in a blog posting title - what's the 'netiquette on that?

;>

Why, you might ask (o' my ducks) do I want to swear? Why, in the face of such general goodness & triumphant knitting progress?


One finished ribbed baby jacket....

...complete w/ intarsia heart on the back.....

.....Munchkin, wearing his new bike helmet, as he helped me to "pound" (aka knead) the dough when he and I made a triple-loaf producing batch of the world's BEST EVER Oatmeal Toasting Bread.

I might send a loaf of this to some friends to thank them for loaning us a movie, but then again I might be greedy and hoard it all for ourselves. We're having BLT's this week one night for dinner (altho' we never actually have real BLT's - Peggers normally has a BBBT {bacon bacon bacon & tomato} while I have a BCT {bacon, cheese & tomato} and the Munchkin normally has........well, maybe these days a bite of bacon, or a sliver of cheese, or a crumb or two of bread. And then after such a dramatic intake such as that he promptly asks for..............oh, cookies or muffins or juice or other things that he KNOWS full well he's not allowed to have - much less at dinnertime!) and the idea of a warm, fragrant, drippy sandwich like that doorstop'd on both ends with oatmeal bread just sounds as good as good can get.

.....my recently-organized knitting basket that I keep next to the couch, in which you can not only spy the lovely little gift (lavender 'home fragrance') that I got from a friend this weekend as thanks for letting her use some of our not-in-use baby gear (honestly, what was so hugely generous about such a loan? Let someone use your baby swing because they just had twins or let it sit in the attic and get dusty because your own screaming one is far too big to fit in it anymore - - is that even a real choice?????) but also the purple raglan sweater that I'm in the progress of happily unraveling - I told you guys I would frog it! You can likewise see the recently-purchased lime green Cotton Ease skeins with which I'm currently knitting up a half-finished Debbie Bliss boatneck baby sweater for the newest male addition to Peggers' Buddy Boy Crew..............

Admiring the pinkness & cabled twists on Sockpal sock #2.

....and then finally my most triumphant piece of the week.

I decided that given my current list of WIP's.................

* 3/4 done with Peggers' vest
* 1/2 done with the boatneck baby sweater

..................and given my current list of projects that I'm about to start.....................

* Mystery Stole #3 (more on this to come later this week!)
* Picovoli

......that I should get cracking on that second sockpal sock ASAP. So crack away I did - I cast on for it Thursday night and by last night you can see the progress I had made - the heel flap has been started!!! I was sooooo pleased with myself (To the heel flap already? On a knee-high sock???) that I tried them both on at the same time to admire them.

(Pride goeth before a fall.)

And swore.

And swore.

And took a deep breath and swore again.

Why?

Did you not see it immediately either? (It took me a bit of looking as well before I caught it.)

Let me show you again.

On the left is sock #1 with all six or so cuff rounds of RT, p2 ribbing. On the left is sock #2 with only four rounds of the same damn cuff.

What to do? What to do?????

It should be obvious to everyone by now that I am not not not ripping this out and re-knitting from the beginning. In fact after I discovered this snafu of mine last night I still continued knitting on the sock - and did another good hour or so this morning in the Toyota dealership while waiting for an oil change.

My current thought is this - can I carefully un-pick my cast on row, slide all of those stitches to my circulars, and knit, er, up the needed extra rows before casting off?

Will that work?

What say you, O Knitting Gurus?

Susan's (Un)Sensational Saggy Sweater

I checked my e-mail yesterday afternoon to find a posted comment from Sandy (who must have been reading some back posts) asking when I'd do a F.O. report on my green tea raglan - as I'd been obviously negligent in that area. I decided that there was no time like the present - so when I got dressed this morning I reached for my purple raglan - and within 5 minutes was mentally composing a post on why this sweater has really, really, REALLY disappointed me.

I don't think it's the pattern - I didn't discover any huge errors or suchlike in it at all, and don't get me wrong either - I love the yarn. It's softer than I ever imagined bamboo (100% bamboo!) would be - and I just adore the colour I chose. It's just that the sweater - which fits me for the first 2 minutes of wearing - starts to sag and droop and just kind of fade around me somewhere after the 2 minute, 30 second mark. (But, oh, for those first magical 90 seconds how I do love it so.....)

But two perfect minutes are just not long enough.

The first day I wore the sweater all was good - all was GREAT in fact - until I went into the bathroom and noticed that my sleeve, which had started out nicely snug and slim against the underside of my arm, was starting to bag a little bit. "Hmmmmmmmm............................" I thought. "Well........... that's probably okay - I don't want the arm to be too tight, right?", and so I didn't give it another thought.

But then about an hour later as I walked across the library I looked down and saw that the hem, which had previously been just a hand's span below my bellybutton and smoothly sleek against my pants, had stretched so much that it was starting to........sag a bit lower, and to blouse and ruffle around me. Now while I might be a bit blase about my arms, I'm anything but when it comes to my hips. No extra weight or yardage around those two monuments of mine nosireethankyoubob. So that broke my stride and made me frown a bit as I kept on walking around the building, running my little errands.

I had already come to terms with the fact that it was - due to the nature of the yarn & the needle size I had to use to get gauge - essentially see-through and reminded me more of a piece of chain mail than a sweater. I had even gone out and bought camisoles to wear under it, I had decided that I was *that* okay with that particular design element. (If you can call it such a thing.)

But for me the final straw came when, at the end of the day, I walked outside to mail something in the blue U.S. Post Office mailbox on the corner. As I walked I heard this sort of.............slapping flapping noise and looked down. My sweater hem, which had previously started out a few inches below my bellybutton and was snug around my hips was now down to the middle of my thighs and was literally flaring out like a dress. If I had just a pair of opaque tights on instead of jeans nobody would have even blinked - they'd have thought I was wearing a purple knitted minidress. Not Cool.

Not Acceptable.

So I pondered that evening what I could do to the sweater to fix it, and as I had been reading some Elizabeth Zimmerman not too long before that, suddenly I got the urge to Tell My Knitting Who Was Boss! - so I took a measurement, yanked out my scissors, and simply cut off a huge whacking piece creating a new bottom hem. I pulled out the stray pieces of yarn, shoved the raw stitches that were sticking out on a size 7 circular needle, knitted a row, and then cast off, leaving a rather silky crumpled heap of chopped yarn behind. While that has most certainly helped, I still can't quite get over the 'growth' factor of this yarn - how much it stretches upon wearing, how see-through it is knitted at this gauge, and how while it's lovely and light and silky I can't really feel any of that like I'd like to because I have to wear a camisole under it to keep from showing everyone my bra seams & hooks. Plus the neckline keeps on stretching and showing both bra straps and camisole straps after just an hour or so of wearing.

So, I'm 99.9% reconciled to frog it - my only question is do others think that this yarn, knitted at a much tighter gauge, will sag and droop just like this sweater does, and therefore should I make something completely different? Or should tightening up the gauge give the sags the old heave-ho and knitting a second sweater in a tighter fashion is certainly worth a try?

And while you ponder all of that for me, here are some pictures of what else I've been doing during my recent silent time.................

One finished sockpal sock.

One finished 'Picovoli' gauge swatch.

One almost finished Ribbed Baby Jacket for Maxine. With mods.

.........and last, but certainly not least, for Mel - pics of our beloved Takezo, the Wonder Pup.....

.....then........

............and this very morning, a few weeks after his summer haircut.

A Little Quiet Time

Things are currently a little quiet here at Chez Pointy Sticks. Partially because I'm finished with Icarus, partially because I'm diligently working away at my Sockpal's knee-highs, partially because I'm uploading loads of pictures into Ravelry and adding in projects & stash notes & lining things up in my queue. Partially because I'm starting to hit a true wall of exhaustion with all of the visiting and airplane trips and house rehabbing and suchlike that has been going on over the past 5 weeks and is still not yet quite over.

But mostly things are quiet because on Tuesday I got the stunning news that a friend & co-worker of mine died in her sleep that morning. She was only 40, and was a wonderfully vibrant and funny woman. To make matters even more horrific her husband was out of town at the time on a business trip and her death was discovered by her two young daughters, who went in to wake her up and found her.

This has shaken me deeply - and so I've retreated into silence and contemplative knitting and long walks to try and reach some sort of acceptance and peace. However I'm not there yet, so I'll most certainly be a bit more silent for a bit longer.

In the meantime here is what I am looking at while I try and find my own way through this: