2 month catch up

I don’t know if anyone is still visiting here, but if you are, thanks for sticking around! Let’s see, since I last was around these parts I’ve done quite a bit. My energy levels went back up for a little while so I finally got around to catching up with some of my projects.

I’ve done some sewing: finishing some box bags that had been half done for a long time and reopening the Etsy shop, making a Scottie Dog for the baby

and finally making covers for couch cushions we bought a year ago.

I also cast on for another pair of socks: a pair of Sunday Swing socks out of some variegated Yarntini [Ravelry details]. It was due time for another pair of pink socks!

I’m also making good progress on my Ursa cardigan. I finally finished the back and am now ready for finishing up the fronts. After that, just a collar and sewing up will be left!

I’m really looking forward to finishing the cardigan so that I can start on some knitting projects for the baby! I got this awesome green Cascade 128 to make a little cardi.

DH got me these 4 skeins of Knitpicks Stroll Tonal with which I plan to make some pants, cardi and hat set also.

I’m being realistic though and don’t know how much I’ll get done before the baby’s born. I’m due in 8 weeks, it’s getting there fast! I also want to sew a quilt, make a bunting and a mobile… Yikes! Thankfully I’ve only a few weeks left at work and then I’ll get to do more of the crafty stuff! Wish me luck!

Knitting again!

I want to thank all of you for your wonderful comments last week. I loved reading all of them, you guys are so very sweet. And thanks for hanging on when this blog was so very quiet. Energy’s back, the new house is getting better organized every day and I’m actually knitting and sewing again!

I had no idea how much I missed knitting and sewing until I finally was able to do it again. I caught up with my quilting bee blocks, finished my first baby knit and even finished a pair of socks! I also started working on my shawl again, figuring it out where I’d left off so many weeks/months ago and knit a row. Yeah, I know, just one row, but that was quite the accomplishment : )

So about a week ago I finished a cute little vest for the baby. I really wanted to try Pebble as I thought it looked like something that I could manage easily and would still look cute. I wanted to avoid buttons so I knit in the round and did a 2-needle bind off on the shoulders. I had this one skein of Lion Brand Wool-Ease in the stash so decided it would be perfect for this little project.

I don’t really know when this will fit exactly but I expect it will fit someday! After knitting the vest I still have plenty of yarn leftover, so I’ll knit a pair of legwarmers and maybe a hat.

Yesterday I finished another project that had been on the needles since November, my first pair of socks of the year. And it was perfect timing because I killed my first pair of socks the day of our move. Close your eyes if you get shocked easily…

One big gaping hole in my Yarntini self-striping socks : ( . I knit these socks in the summer of 2007 so I can say they’ve had a good life. The color had faded quite a bit but they were still lovely. They will be missed. But at least I can replace them by another pair of self-striping socks (with nylon this time) which should last me another many more years.

These socks were knit toe up, short-row heel with a stockinette foot and 3×3 ribbed leg. So now I don’t have any socks on the needles! Time to wind some yarn and find an easy pattern. Any suggestions for an easy, mindless pattern?

WIP Wednesday

It’s time to come clean with all my projects! In a perfect life, I would have 2 projects going at once, maybe 3.

• Stockinette socks for the car/travel
• Larger project for at home or visiting
• Long term project like a sweater or shawl

I guess I’m not doing too bad because this is what I’m working on now:

Stockinette socks: I’m working on the leg of the second sock now

Larger mostly mindless project: Lu vest, almost halfway done

Long term project: Ursa cardigan, set aside for the summer but I’ve started working on the sleeve again.

Of course I also have the Tessarae sock you saw last week and many more projects on the mind!

I hear that purple is the “In” color for this winter and that’s what I’ve got! The 3 skeins of bulky weight (Araucania Coliumo Solid) will be for Carol’s Kensington Cowl and the 1 skein of worsted weight (Madtosh Tosh Merino) will be for another cowl, the Tamarind Cowl. I also bought the Little Colonnade shawl pattern and I think that might be my next shawl. I also quite like the Wandering the Moor shawl pattern, so that’s going to be a tough fight deciding which to go with!

But first I have to finish Lu! How many WIPs do you have?

Pomatomus, Pamotomus, Pamatamus…

I’m way overdue sharing my latest knitting FO. I finished it right on the dot on August 31. I really was hoping to finish them by the end of August and I made it!

It took me just over 11 months to finish these socks, but I did it. The Pomatomus are done!

These socks were a fun knit. The pattern isn’t incredibly complicated and became fairly mindless towards the end. Of course, I made changes to the pattern. I knit them toe up and put in a short row heel. I think it would have been cool to reverse the pattern on the second sock but I don’t mind that both socks are identical. Maybe for the next pair of Poms?

I used the lovely Dream in Color Smooshy in Blue Lagoon and I love how the color works with the pattern. I haven’t gotten around to wearing them yet but the chilly days have started again and I’m wearing wool socks every day already so they’ll soon get their turn.

I finished as well the set of box bags to head out to the Vermont Sheep and Wool Festival. I’m quite happy with the assortment of colors and prints. I hope they’ll all find new homes during the festival. If you’re in the area and are planning to go, make sure to stop by the yarn4socks booth and say hello!

small size

large size

Now I should really get back to the other batch that’s on my sewing table right now!

WIP Wednesday

During my short vacation in the Adirondacks, I made some progress on 3 single socks. I really was hoping to finish the second Pomatomus sock but didn’t quite make it. There was a little stitch problem at the start of the last repeat and, although I knew that the solution was in the text of the pattern, I didn’t have it with me. So I just put it on hold and started working on another sock.

I started working on the left most sock. It’s the Tesserae pattern by Knitspot and the yarn is Madtosh Sock in Black Currant from here. The pattern is very easy and once I’m done with the Sock Hop sock (in the middle) it will become my on the go sock.

So these are the socks that I am currently working on. Both the Pomatomus and the Sock Hop are on sock #2 and the Tesserae is on sock #1.

That’s practically it for knitting projects. I haven’t touched the only other knitting project I have in quite some time. Hopefully, when my deadline knitting is over I’ll be able to devote all my time to it.

Even though I’ve slowed down on my knitting quite a bit these last few months, I quite enjoy always having socks to work on. What are you working on these days?

FO Friday

For once I actually have some FOs to show you. I even have two to share, can you believe it?

One was knit, the other one sewed.

By order of finish date:

Milkweed Shawl by Cosmicpluto Knits [Ravelry details]

This shawl was knit in the beautiful Handmaiden Mini Maiden, color unknown (one of you just might win enough to knit your own). It took me just under 1 month to finish, or 2 weeks less than how long it took me to knit Ishbel.

But then again, my Milkweed came out just a smidgen smaller than Ishbel (see photo below for the difference)

I love this shawl, very, very much. It was an easy knit (love the garter stitch), the lace was easy to read and the yarn was a pleasure to knit with. I only had to tink back a couple times and the yarn handled it well, even though it had a tendency to stick to itself.

Since summer has finally started here in New England, I’ve yet to wear it except for the photo shoot. But I am looking forward to wearing it when it gets cool again!

My second FO is the Strips and Bricks quilt I started at the beginning of July. I tried to do one step every weekend and a few weekends later I have a finished quilt.

I used a lot of my favorite scraps to make it as well as scraps I received from Linda (check out her new book!), Carol and Kate. Thank you to all three of you for making this quilt possible! This quilt is going to be given away shortly, I hope the recipient likes it!

I might have another FO within a week or so if I can manage to sit down and knit for a bit. My Pomatomus socks less than 2 repeats from the ribbing. I think I just might make it before the end of August!

Things that make me Happy Friday

I was going to post today about my UFOs, but I think that this post is going to be more fun!

This morning I met with my dear friend Carol for a coffee and she had the most amazing present for me! She made me a pair of socks, for me! About 2 months ago she was working on a pair of Nutkins for herself, the first  sock was coming out too small so she had me try it on, and it fit me perfectly. So she decided that she’d make them for me for my birthday! Fast forward to today and now they’re mine! Aren’t they lovely? And they fit me so well too, like they were made to fit me and only me! I’m a very lucky girl to have such a wonderful friend. Thank you Carol!

If this non-summer we’ve been having lately continues, I’ll be able to wear them soon!

I got some great fabrics in the mail too. These were from a swap with Elizabeth:

There’s over 20 Erin McMorris Wildwood fat quarters plus 2 pieces of fun Alice in Wonderland fabric. Wildwood is a great collection and will make a great quilt one day.

I cast on last weekend for Cosmicpluto’s Milkweed shawl and it’s going along quite well. It’s still small enough that it doesn’t take very long for each row. I try to do at least a row every day and more when I can. I’m using HandMaiden Mini Maiden for the yarn and wow, that’s a gorgeous yarn to work with. The finished shawl is going to be a pleasure to wear.

Last but not least, I’m happy that my sewing machine is finally operational again, and I was able to finish 2 box bags this morning. I’ll be finishing up a few more over the weekend! It’s good to be able to sew again.

Of course, the fact that today is Friday and that I’m enjoying my early weekend makes me happy too.

What makes you happy today?

Flop or not?

I cast on for this sock on Friday. My other sock in progress was ready for a heel, and I needed something easy to bring with me over the weekend. I didn’t have time to ball up one of my skeins of sock yarn so I went for my Sock Hop which was already balled up.

I got this Rasta Rasta Man colorway back in February from someone’s Ravelry destash. I happened to be on the Destash forum at the right time, and I had the money!

So I cast on and started with a toe and then yesterday, I was waiting for a wedding to start and had to make a decision: plain stockinette or not. I went for the “not” and started inserting purl stitches and purl rows. After a bit this is what it looks like

and I just can’t decide if it’s plain ugly or not.

What do you think? Keep going or rip out and go back to plain stockinette?

Thanks for your input! In the mean time, maybe I’ll just go knit a heel.

The prodigal sock

Yesterday, something totally horrific  happened at the Knitting in Pink household, a hand knit sock went AWOL.

In the morning, I placed my Simply Cables socks on the chair in our bedroom, thinking they were safe there and would not go anywhere.

Later that day, after DH came back from work and changed into more comfortable clothes, I went back to the bedroom and discovered that something terrible had just happened. I saw that one sock was crumpled on the floor and the other one simply had vanished.

After a heated discussion with the hubby I started tearing apart his drawers and his closet. You see, when he changed that evening, he had put away all his clothes that were also being stored on the chair and that’s when the sock went missing.

I looked everywhere, inside drawers, unfolding and refolding his pants, doing the same with sweaters and even digging through the dirty laundry. Sadly, the sock stayed un-found.

This morning I created a Wanted poster hoping that someone would come forward assuming the theft of the sock. It was either DH or me and if we’d had a cat, I could have blamed the cat too!

After coming home from work tonight, DH decided that he would start looking for the sock again, him accusing me (jokingly) that I had lost it, and me, accusing him of stealing it!

A few minutes later, DH comes out of the bedroom with a pair of socks in his hands! The sock had been found! Hurrah! He wouldn’t admit it, but I found out that he indeed had bundled the sock up by accident in one of his shirts the evening before.

Phew, crisis averted. Happiness is restored in the KIP household.

PS 1: no socks were hurt in the making of this post

PS 2: if you want to make your own Wanted poster, go here!

PS 3: DH is not claiming the sock yarn reward, I guess he doesn’t like yarn as much as I do!

FO Friday

There’s been a lot of thought about sewing this week, although not much sewing because my craft room is still pretty cold temperature-wise and haven’t spent much time in it. So, lucky for you, I have been knitting!

Remember that baby hat I was working on for my colleague’s baby? I finished it on time and was given to the baby, and it sort of fit!

Here’s a shot while the hat was still blocking. I know it looks kind of creepy but if fit perfectly this vase I had.

I gave it to my colleague to try on her baby, and even if the pictures didn’t come out that great, you can still see that it sort of fits. I’m not sure that the hat would stay on the baby’s head for very long, but at least it fits. I told her I would make her another, larger hat, hopefully with better luck.

I’ve already cast on for another one, this time in fingering weight and in the medium size. I’m not quite sure what baby it will go to but I’ll figure it out when I’m done! You can see more details about the pink hat here and the second hat here on Ravelry.

My second FO is another pair of socks! I’m really, really happy about these ones. The pattern (Marigold socks from Flint Knits) is perfect, the yarn (Madelinetosh Sock in Chamomile) is gorgeous and to top it off, they fit very well. I finished them a couple days ago but had to wait for some break in the clouds to get a good shot.

These socks are a ray of sunshine, and made me start to like yellow! See more details here on Ravelry.

My third FO almost didn’t end up ever being an FO. This finished object is my scarf from my weaving class. 2 weeks ago, I was weaving along, minding my own business, when I realized that I had over 2 feet left of warp and what looked like 6 inches worth of weft. Uh Oh. Time for a back up plan! I promptly contacted the dyer I got the yarn from, Yarn Sprout, to see if she had any more of that yarn or was able to dye some more. She got back to me telling me that this skein was a one off, from before she started making notes about her dyeing process. So a dead end. I also contacted Purl Soho and the Purl online store, sending them a sample of the yarn, thinking that maybe some of their Koigu would match my yarn. Purl Soho got back to me almost right away with a negative answer, whereas the Purl.com only got back to me this week, a little too late. I also went to a couple yarn stores in the area and only the day of my class was I able to find something that would remotely do. At the Black Sheep Knitting Co I found, not a sock yarn, but a dk weight yarn in a color close enough to work. So I brought it over to class and finished my scarf. After a good soak, you can tell that there is two different yarns but only up close. When worn, or in these photos, it is a lot less noticeable.

I still need to figure out what to do with the fringe. Do I twist it or let it loose, that is yet to be seen. The scarf came out really nice and long so it covers my neck really well. Too bad I need to wait until next Fall to really enjoy it! Ravelry details here.

Now that these projects are over, I’m working on knitting yet another single sock, my Ishbel, who is coming along quite well and the second baby hat. Expect a progress post next week!