Life has not been kind to my knitting, I must say. I graduated in May and began my Big Boy Job, which is basically the same thing I did before but full time. Lately I've been so exhausted that I don't even want to knit! Well, to remedy that situation, I started a sock last night. It's just a plain jane ribbed, but I need something simple to get my head back in the game. I have some big plans for the coming months, in terms of prospective projects. Pictures to come!

A brief respite from the brief sock knitting.

I had a birthday a few weeks ago, and my LYS gave me ten bucks to spend in the store. So I dove in and bought the Noro Silk Garden to make a striped scarf, something I've always admired but never wanted to spend that much money on.



I cast on 35 stitches on US size 7 needles, working two rows of each color, 252 and 264, in 1x1 rib. I knit 84 inches and bound off, then misted it with some water and ran a warm iron over both sides.



It's a big hit around here. I love it and got lots of compliments on it at work today. Even Sophie sat still long enough for me to snap this photo, which is her way of giving two non-existent thumbs up. That's really saying something, considering she has the attention span of a ferret stricken with ADD.



Now back to the socks.

Boy, it sure has been a while since I've knit any socks. That's the exact thought I had last week, so I sat down with some lovely green Heritage sock yarn from Cascade and started searching Ravelry for a sock pattern. I came away with Boyfriend Socks.



The heel of this sock gave me so much grief. I tried to go with the written wrap-and-turn heel, but I kept screwing it up. I don't like this kind of heel, anyway. I really prefer a gusseted heel. So I found an awesome tutorial over at Maia Spins.

I mucked up the first gusseted heel when I came up a few stitches short of what I needed, and the second one looked... too sloppy. By then it was three o'clock in the morning on Tuesday, I was in the middle of a shift at work, and I was cursing about this damnable sock. I may have likened it to tiny piles of knitted dog excrement.

Here's a close-up of the cable:



I've also been doing some spinning. This is superwash merino, the colorway is Lilacs.



This is my last bit of roving. I really need to beef up my spinning stash.

I'm only taking two classes this semester (and then graduating, there is a god), and I have no definitely plans for a full time gig, so I should have plenty of time to knit in the coming months.

Hemlock Ring Finished

I said that I wasn't going to knit anything for Christmas this year. However, I will be gifting some knitted goodness, although neither were meant to be gifts when I started them.

The first is the Hemlock Ring Blanket. It was a pleasingly quick knit, I had it done in less than two weeks. However, the difficulty came in blocking the damn thing. It was pretty ripply when I finished it, and it took a solid two hours to pin out all those points and then adjust them until they were acceptable. They're not perfect, but when it's drapped over my grandma's legs, no one will be any wiser. I originally knit it for myself, using some wool I got while I was in Ireland, however I've been meaning to knit my grandma a throw for Christmas for years, and I'm always afraid there won't be a next year to put it off until. She'll get more use out of it than I will, she spends a lot of time on the couch.

Sorry for the crappy photos, I'm pretty busy today and I'm not in the mood to shoot forty photos.





I also knit two hats that I was planning on taking to the White Rabbit to sell. I knit a gray one that I gifted before I remembered to take photos of it, and then this one from some handspun. I made up the pattern as I went along, and it's going to my mother.

Hello again

It has been quite a while since I updated this thing, hasn't it? Just a quick note to say that there has been close to no knitting going on in my house for a while now. School and work are taking their toll on my free time.

I think that I'll be participating in Socktoberfest this year. I'd like to knit something really intricate. This limits me to socks for those of the feminine persuasion, it seems, so perhaps I'll knit some Christmas presents, perhaps.

"My favorite weather is bird-chirping weather."

What a lovely day it's been here in Iowa. Of course, I was inside working all day, but luckily I was able to come home enjoy a nice evening of knitting, picture-taking, and soon dinner-eating before I dive head first into one of my two French papers due next week. Yeck!

Anyway, it's no secret that soon I will be fleeing the country (but only for seven weeks). I'll be going to Europe for the first time in my life! So, while I was at the yarn store yesterday with Sarah and Alyssa, I bought a set of bamboo DPNs so as to appear as least threatening as possible when I board my flight. I'm knitting the Undulating Rib Socks from Interweave's "Favorite Socks" book.



The bamboo needles are nice, but I feel clumsy with them. I much prefer metal needles, either aluminum or steel. The yarn is some of the Knit Pick's Bare Superwash that I dyed a few months ago.

I've been thinking about what projects I'll take with me to Europe. Given that I'll be spending the majority of my time staring in awe at every little thing, I think I'm going to stick to just socks. Oh, and this -



I can't really talk about it right now as it's a surprise and I don't want the recipient stumbling upon it, but I will eventually. Folks on Ravelry, however, are free to go check it out in my projects list to get all the details.

I've also been spinning:



This is some Corriedale from Louet. I forget the name of the colorway, but it's gorgeous. From four ounces I spun about 249 yards. I'm a little on the fence about if I'll bring my spindle to France or not - this is going to require more consideration. I bought the fiber at Home Ec Workshop (Myspace link; I don't know where their blog is located) here in Iowa City.

I leap across the Pond in a few weeks. I'm certain that I'll still be blogging fairly regularly, I'll having computer access at the university I'm sure, so look forward to knitting pictures with more exciting scenery.

Finally, the yarn!

Well, I'm happy to report that the snow cone yarn is behaving much more agreeably now, even though it's still a bit of a rebel in places. I'm going to attribute that to my skein winder, which was giving me fits when I wound this off the bobbin a few days ago.

I'm pretty happy with it, overall. I really love the little slubs of pure ivory silk that showed up for the party.



And now the prerequisite penny photo.



Merino wool/silk, 3 ounces, roughly 600 yards.