Friday, November 16, 2007

Hello Frogpond, My Old Friend

I've come to rip with you again...

Yep, 72 stitches = too big now. sigh Perhaps this is why I so rarely attempt socks? (I mean, who swatches sock yarn?)

The pattern calls for 64, so by God, I'm doing 64. See you at the shoreline.

ribbet ribbet rippit rippit

Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Moving right along

So now I have two items done (but could stand to be washed and blocked), one so close to done (replacing the cast-on for the Anemoi Mittens was not nearly as easy as I had thought), and one with a good start. Well, it was a good start, until my son pointed out that the Charade socks for mom out of my hand-dyed yarn were rather small. My swatch came out to 6 sts/in; my sock is 7.5 sts/in. Ah, me. Frogpond city. Oh, well, I only have about 3" done of them, I'm happy with the pattern (Nancy Bush's "On Your Toes Socks" generic toe-up sock pattern from IK Summer 2007 as a basis, and Charade for interest), and I'm VERY happy with how my yarn looks knat up.

So I'll frog and restart and be even better at it (that cast-on is a bitch). I'm feeling very good about everything (oh, and I finished G's Y-Kids teacher's black fluffy scarf, too!).

Phew. Maybe I'll even pick up Clapotis again.

Monday, November 05, 2007

Steaming ahead

The four main Christmas gifts I've selected are

* A Palindrome scarf for my sister in di.Vé Zenith (in 43394)
* A wide/narrow striped reversible stocking cap for my dad (Cal colors, of course) in Elann "Sock It To Me" Essential sock yarn (no longer available)
* Anemoi mittens in Hyacinth and Ash Knitpicks Palette yarn for my stepmom
* Socks (pattern TBD, maybe Charade) for my mom in the darker hand-dyed sock yarn I did at KnitCamp in April

I'm so happy to write that the first 2 are done, and the third is mere rows from being finished. I have decided that I hate the cast-on of the first mitten and am going to snip a thread (gasp!) and graft on a better start (just the first 6 rows) done on size 2s instead of 0s. (I can barely pull it on, and she has larger hands than I do!) But they are really lovely.

I wound out the yarn for Mom's socks, by weight, and snipped the yarn at 50 g of the 100g skein. Then, out of curiousity, weighed the other ball: sigh 57 grams. Argh. Oh, well, I'll have a little left over.

I'm also considering making a Teddy for G, but he's not terribly decisive these days... we'll see. Also, his is the only gift I don't need to ship. It will be interesting working on a secret project with him around, though. Although if I can continue to stick to his 8:30 bedtime, I'll have a full 1.5 hrs each night to work privately. Aah, private 'me' time. Loving it.