I cast on for these socks the other day and they are really short and cute. Once they're done I was thinking of crab-stitching the top, to give it a picot appearance. Picot hems on socks tend to feel very thick to me, so I wanted to try it a different way. The yarn is pretty nice, wouldn't you say?

This is what's left to ply of my second batch of corriedale, which is being immediately knitted into this shawl:

I think it's going to drape really nicely. I just hope I have enough yarn to make it a decent size. I should probably have used a slightly larger needle. Anyway.

What else have I been doing?

A little of this.

And that.

And this, too:

My handspun on display:

I finished my first Bruise sock, ain't it purdy? It's 3x1 ribbed all the way down, regular slip-stitch gusset heel. 60 stitches around, 7sts to the inch, made with my handspun corriedale. I cast on for the second one, but I have honestly been so fickle lately, don't count on me to finish it.

I also spent about an hour out on the deck with my spinning wheel. I've got a class tomorrow and the last couple of days have been about clearing up my bobbins so I have something to spin on. It's so nice outside. Cool and breezy. I guess it's time to clean up our deck and get to using it! I just hope it's not long before I STOP reaching to the patio table for my goddamn nonexistent cigarettes! Today is 91 days smoke-free for us, and this old habit is dying so, so hard.

Seaming Starsky is taking me a bit longer than I thought. Well, only in terms of the sleeve caps. The sleeves and sides will be a snap, but after all that knitting I'm determined to set the sleeves in right, and I'm not rushing it. Last night I started and after seaming the shoulders, I set in the first sleeve. It took me a bit of fiddling; sewing and picking out, sewing and picking out. Finally I got it right. The calculations for knitting the caps were bang on and the sleeve fit perfectly, but I had to fiddle to make sure it lined up. By the time that was done, I put it away for the evening because I'd had enough. Today I'm doing the other sleeve and I hope I can get it in the same way as the first.

I draped the sweater over myself once the sleeve was in and tried to hold it together at the open seams to see if the shaping and fit were correct. I think it's working out! Apparently I added some waist shaping to the sweater (something I don't actually remember doing since I knit the body of the sweater in March and April) and it seems to be in the right place.

I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that I had finished another pair of socks at my SNB, and that I was unhappy with the fact that they didn't turn out matched up stripe-wise in the toe. I finally tried on the second sock and realized I had knit it too short. It's just short enough in the foot that I can feel the discrepancy when I put both socks on, so I'm going to have to rip back to before the toe shaping and add about 4 or 5 rounds. Highly annoying. The few rounds that I need to add won't be enough to match up the the final toe stripe, though.

In between seaming and sock fixing, I'm going to fish out all my single, unpaired socks and take an inventory. I think I have three left to knit mates for.

Finally! Here are my finished Fleece Artist socks. I finished them two weeks ago. They're my basic top-down socks, heel flap, 60 stitches around on a US 1 needle. I generally make my socks 64 stitches around, but this yarn is heavier than Regia and its ilk. I made them pretty tight but I added a slightly longer gusset which improved the fit. I love these socks. So this makes pair #4 for me in the 200Sox Along. I thought for sure I'd have knit at least 8 pairs by now, and I would have, if I could count all my socks without mates. Someone's knit up to 31 pairs since January! Not to sound all sour grapes or anything, but she CRAZY!

Here is my afghan so far. I got a little sidetracked so it hasn't grown much since I last mentioned it. I'm almost finished the 3rd ball now. So far so good, I think it's really turning out. I can't wait to block it out when it's done. I guess I'll have to soak it in the bathtub!

Last but not least, here is what sidetracked me. Last weekend I popped into one of the yarn shops around here looking for something to make a quick lacy scarf and ended up walking out with 3 hanks of Handmaiden Sea Silk. The third hank is slightly different and much darker, so I'm going to work it into the shawl by alternating rows for a while with the first colour, then end off with it, so the shawl ends up darkest at the bottom. I hope it works with the colours I've chosen. I did my Charlotte's Web this way, but I only used 3 shades of similar browns, going from light to dark and it worked out really well. The variance between my Sea Silk colours is much greater. It'll either be absolutely stunning or a total fucking disaster.

I also got another hank of Fleece Artist sock yarn. I'm going to try to finish a project (hopefully one of my many unfinished pairs of socks) before I cast on with this stuff.

A few days ago I finished the pair of Fleece Artist socks I'd been working on. I don't have a photo yet; I took a lot of pictures this weekend at the wedding and I have to sort through those first. I loved the yarn so much I actually knit both socks in a row, and they're very warm and comfy.

Right now I've got three or four single socks that I knit over the past few months. I cast on for the mate to one of them once the Fleece Artist pair were finished, and I'm just knitting the heel flap now. I should have another full pair of socks in a couple of days.

I've also been knitting on my afghan. I settled on the stitch pattern from Cozy after all. I went down a needle size and swatched again, and I ended up liking the result. I cast on 201 stitches; the pattern is a multiple of 6+1 and I added two stitches for selvedge. I've got 12 balls to work with, and I'm partly through the 3rd ball. I decided to save the final ball for a crochet edging and some fringe.

I'm using the Patons Classic Wool from my stash. I really am not a fan. The afghan looks and feels great, but the yarn itself is rather splitty and poorly spun. I doubt I'll ever use it again for anything other than felted projects, and I certainly won't be knitting any sweaters out of it.

I ordered the Knitpicks Options needles, and they came in the mail on Friday. I've got my afghan on the new needles, with a 40" cord. So far so good. Then I thought the cord was too long because sometimes I like when my stitches are a little bit bunched-up together, so I switched to a 32". Not so good. I knit one row before the cable itself fell right out of its join. I have heard about this happening to other people online, and I wasn't deterred because I also heard that Knitpicks replaces the faulty cords immediately, without asking you to send the broken one back. I'm not going to contact them just yet, I think I'll try out more of the cords and see how they fare first. Just in case I will be asked to send them back, I'd like to be able to send it all at once. I'm back on my 40" cord which is holding up strong. It seems their quality control is sorely lacking, but as long as they make up for it in customer service and replacing their product, I'll be happy.

School started today! Alex is now in grade seven. Even though it's been over twelve years, sometimes I look at Alex and think, I have a kid? It's still a mindfuck. And now he's in grade seven and wears giant, size-11 shoes.

I spent most of Sunday knitting swatches for an afghan. I have to work from stash, and I've got twelve balls of Patons Classic Wool in natural. At first I thought I'd knit a big Cozy, but I couldn't make the stitch pattern look good. Then I tried about seven different stitch patterns that I found online and hated them all. I don't know if it was because I was frustrated or because the Patons just knits up like shit. Maybe I just need to go down a needle size or two. I'm going to try again this afternoon.

I've also been working on some plain stockinette Fleece Artist socks. I just finished the gusset on the second sock. The second same sock in a row! I'll have a new pair of socks with a photo soon.

Remember Starsky? I'm almost finished. All I have left to knit before blocking and seaming are the sleevecaps for each sleeve. Because I couldn't get proper row gauge and because I needed to widen the tops of the sleeves, I have to redesign the caps to fit properly. Afterward, I'll just have the collar and belt to go. I may run out of yarn. Hopefully I can finish the collar with what I've got and will only need to use a different dyelot for the belt.

I haven't posted a picture of the cats lately. Here is Pippa. I took this a few weeks ago. This is how she likes to sleep.

Natalie and David got engaged earlier this year and had their party on August 6th. It was beautiful and a lot of fun. Unfortunately Natalie didn't think so, she was so busy running around greeting guests and making sure everything was running smoothly, so she didn't really have a chance to enjoy it. We don't get to see many of our cousins very often, so it was great to spend some time with them. The weather was perfect, the food was delicious and the booze was plentiful, thank god. The back garden looked great...my mom and sister did a lot of work to make it look good, and they should be really proud. There are a few more pictures up at my Flickr site.

I almost finished that sock last night, I've got only the toe left to knit. As I mentioned, that will make the fourth individual sock without a mate that I've made. I know it's wrong, but I'm itching to cast on for a fifth instead of completing a pair. I have some Fleece Artist sock yarn in my stash that's been there for over a year, and after using Regia and Meilenweit, I just want to knit with something really soft.

At SNB last night, we missed the company of our friend Rochelle, who had gone to New York to visit her daughter. She'll be back with us next time, along with her new Knitpicks Options needles. I can't wait to see them in person. I hope they're as great as everyone says because I want a set, too.

I whipped these up as a birthday gift for Astra, whose party I talked about here. I used most of two balls of Noro Shinano, colour #9 from my stash. They're knit from my own pattern on 5mm needles. I didn't discuss them while I was making them because they were a surprise. I've got a few pictures from the party posted here at Flickr.

I haven't been doing much knitting lately. I let my Non Soleil fall by the wayside since I realized I wasn't going to finish in time to wear it to Natalie's party. Instead, I completed my first toe-up sock with gusset and heel flap.

Knitting this way is kind of fiddly. I knit my socks using magic loop and I wasn't quite sure how to align my gusset stitches on the same needle while I was turning the heel. I used dpns, then transferred them back to the circular when it was time to knit them to the heel flap. Now that I've done it once, I see how it works and for the second sock, I'll be able to forego the dpns. While I'm pretty impressed by the construction, I still prefer to knit the gusset and heel flap the other way; I feel like I have a lot more control in terms of altering the size on the fly when knitting from the top down. However, I'm still going to do the other sock the same way because I don't want them to feel different on my feet.

I've got SNB tonight, and I'll be finishing up another sock that I started a while ago. When I finish this sock tonight, I'll have four individual, unmatched socks. Why can't I just knit two of the same socks in a row?

Tomorrow: Pictures from Natalie's engagement party!

I woke up today to find my kitten has gone insane. See the crazy lines coming off the cat here? Those lines are radiating from Pippa now. Because she crazy! She turned 10 weeks old yesterday and all her kitten energy exploded this morning. I don't think she understands our laws of physics because she's running horizontally across vertical surfaces. Also, I'm astounded to see how much she's grown in the two weeks she's been with us. At first she was so fine and delicate but now she's gained weight; she's sturdy and very, very fast.

Alex's birthday on Tuesday was a big success. As it turned out he loves his new mattress. He also loves his new bike, which is blue. Unfortunately the weather around here has sucked so we haven't gone for a ride yet, but I'm hopeful today will remain clear. He scored some other loot, too, like games and headphones for his DS, a book he's been waiting for and a hefty gift certificate for Amazon.ca and can't wait to shop online.

About a week ago I started knitting the Pomatomus socks. Clever pattern, that. Not particularly difficult although it's very easy to make a mistake if you're not paying attention. I've been alternating working on sock number one with the baby blanket I should have finished 2 months ago, so neither is growing very quickly. I've just finished the gusset on the sock and neared the halfway point on the blanket. I'm still not feeling the knitting, so when I do knit it's slower than I'd like. What I really need is something absorbing to put in the dvd player. Pictures to come; I've gotten very lazy about unloading the camera.

The forecast for this weekend was originally supposed to be 72 hours of straight rain, but since I first checked it has shifted. Right now we've got rain scheduled only for tomorrow, but I have faith that will clear up, too. That's because Jeremy miraculously has the weekend off and I've declared it to be Gardening Weekend. We are finally going to try to tame our abysmal front garden. I've done nothing but complain about it to anyone who will listen for weeks, and tomorrow we're finally going to do something about it. It's horrifying; there are more weeds than anything else and these aren't your typical weeds. These are huge, man-eating dandelions. There are other weeds too, and they look equally mutated and frightening. The constant rain has done nothing but fortify these things and I'm sure the neighbours think our place is an eyesore. More importantly, I think our place is an eyesore, so much so that I'm rather ashamed of it. We don't have much to spend and we don't really know what we're doing, but tomorrow we're going to the nearby garden centre and throwing ourselves at their mercy.

My third pair of the year is made from cotton/wool Ja Woll, 64 stitches around, knit on 2.5mm Addis. Very comfy and really stretchy. I probably should have knit them on 62 stitches. They were very tight going on, but stretched right out after about a half-hour of wearing.

Here we have Cuba posing underneath my latest pair of socks, which I finished on Sunday. This picture is from a few weeks ago. I have one of the completed pair, but I've been too lazy to dump my camera. Maybe tomorrow. The yarn is Ja Woll, a cotton and wool blend, and the socks are very, very comfy. This is only my third pair of the year and we're already into April!

Things around here have been pretty ho-hum and I'm in a kind of slump, knitting-wise. I'm uninspired and bored. The truth is that I have just too many projects on the go which is rather overwhelming. I'm going to sit down tonight and try to get some stuff done.

The cats seem to be doing much, much better. When I last posted we were about to try a second variation of special food for them in the hopes that their insides would start working properly. They hated the new food and only ate when they were very hungry and the diarrhea didn't clear up by the time the vet had hoped. Luckily, the vet allowed us to return the opened bag of food. Apparently that brand comes with a money-back guarantee which was great since they barely made a dent in the bag. The next step is bloodwork for both cats, but we have to wait on that because it's expensive. In the meantime we went back to the special food they liked and the good news is that over the past few days we have achieved solid poop! Unfortunately it's not all solid poop, but I'll take what I can get.

Want to see a couple of photos from my birthday? I got an awesome tripod from my awesome friends.

Continue reading "Socks, Cats and Birthday Crap"

What have I been doing lately? I've been disillusioned with my knitting. The last time I picked up the baby blanket for Astra, it looked a bit funny. I folded it over and realized I had loosened up in my gauge so much that the width of the blanket was almost 2" wider than at the cast-on edge. I was horrified. I argued with myself about letting it go and working it out in the blocking, but in the end I just couldn't continue. So I'll be ripping about half of it out and reknitting. Sorry Astra! I swear Sebastian will get this blanket before he goes to university.

Starsky went swimmingly along until I got to the plain stockinette sleeves. I knit the back and two fronts in record time but for some reason, when I started working the sleeve, I just couldn't keep gauge. What is wrong with me? I ripped out the sleeve back to the ribbing twice. I think I need a smaller needle to get gauge with the stockinette. I was using a 4.5 mm for the rest of the sweater, and I'm going to try again with a 4 mm for the sleeves. Believe it or not, the pattern calls for a 6 mm. How tightly do you people knit?

In the meantime I have almost finished a pair of socks. I made the second one a bit too short, so I have to rip back the toe and add about 4 rows before I reknit the toe. Not only can I not keep gauge, I also cannot measure. I have just been so frustrated!

Jeremy had the last couple of days off, so we decided to get something done around here. We used a gift card from Christmas for Home Depot to buy a new door for Alex's bedroom. We have plans to replace all the doors because they are awful, but Alex's came first because it was hung the wrong way. It opened into the centre of his room instead of toward the corner; when the room in question is so small this is awkward and stupid. Particularly awkward was the fact that the door, when opened, obscured the lightswitch. You had to enter the room and close the door in the dark before you could turn on the light.

We've never hung a door and jamb before, but lack of experience doesn't stop us. We tore off the trim, ripped out the old jamb and started shimming. On the top and left side it was easy to get the jamb plumb. The other side was a nightmare because the framing for the door was way too big. The new door is exactly the same size as the old door, and we discovered only after ripping out the old jamb (which was shimmed in the most creative manner!) that we were going to have to get creative as well. What we ended up doing is screwing the old jamb directly to the 2x4 of the frame, and then shimming the new jamb from there. It sounds confusing but I took some pictures and it'll all make sense when I post them later on.

Anyway, with some struggle we managed just fine, and that jamb is perfectly square! We are awesome. It's probably the only square thing in our house. Right before we went to hang the actual door, we decided to read the instructions.

Now, we used some vague directions we found online. That combined with watching countless doors hung in countless frames on countless home reno shows gave me the confidence that we knew how to do this. When we looked at the instructions that came with the door, they said we should hang the door before we shimmed the jamb. Wha? I guess that would work when your jamb actually fits into the frame with millimetres to spare, but we were working in a space that was about 3" too wide. Anyway, the door hangs correctly, but it doesn't swing because the bottom needs to be trimmed about a half-inch to allow for the bedroom carpet. Jeremy's going to saw it off this morning, and tonight Alex can have his room back!

I finished the first Embossed Leaves sock, tried it on, ripped it out. It was a bit too tight around the leg and the twisted ribbing in the cuff made it just too hard to get over my heel. I started again with a larger needle for the ribbing, and I also cast on 4 extra stitches to work into the purl parts of the pattern. It's much better now, but when I get to the foot part I'm going to decrease down by 2 stitches for a snugger fit in that area.

I've had a request for the pattern of the handpainted socks I just finished so I'm writing it out. It's more of a tutorial than a pattern; because the sock is plain stocking stitch it doesn't need a particular stitch count so I thought I'd give directions for how to calculate and design your own sock and plan heel placement. Writing it up turned out to be harder than I thought so I'm only halfway done. Then I'm going to get someone to read it through because I fear it makes sense only to me.

On Sunday Jeremy and I attended Rabsy's Oscar party. It was a lot of fun. I love their apartment, it's in a brownstone walk-up and when we're there I can't stop looking at the wood trim and baseboards. So beautiful. We had a great time, I drank the better part of a bottle of wine and filled up on fondue. I don't understand how I got so full, though. It must be the way I ate...I didn't actually put away that much food but I guess just the act of grazing and picking is what did it. I left my dirty fondue pot there for Sandra to wash because I'm like that. In exchange, we stole their set of The Office (BBC) dvds.

Tonight was my SNB. Our very own Angela has a pattern in Debbie Stoller's new crochet book which is very cute (p. 168). I worked on Astra's baby blanket and I'm just over halfway finished. She's coming over tomorrow with her new baby and I'm glad I can at least give her the cardigan, yay!

I finally finished the socks from my handpainted yarn! Now I can move on. I started a sock with the Ja Woll cotton, have most of the first Embossed Leaves sock done, and need a mate for my Knitpicks Simple Stripes sock. I'm sadly behind in 200Sox.

In kitty news, we took Cuba to the vet for the first time yesterday. She was very lethargic and seemed to be gagging or coughing. It turns out she has a cold and we got some meds for her. She's already done a 180 in terms of mood...she's playing and talking and affectionate again.

The vet asked us how old she is; we told her what the shelter told us, 9 months. The vet disagreed and aged her at close to 2 years, according to Cuba's teeth. After looking at the papers from the shelter's vet, it indeed estimates Cuba's birthday to be January 2004. So she's a teeny, full-grown cat. Jeremy told me that one of the women at the shelter said she assumed the vet made a mistake because Cuba is so small. Why wouldn't they just believe the vet? I don't know. They also told us that Jonah was 6 months old but after looking at his papers we see that he's actually 8 months, which makes sense because he does have all his teeth. Not a big deal in the long run but it's good to know the truth. Also, Cuba's been eating kitten food all this time and I think she must have been missing out on adult nutrition, so we need to take care of that.