Knot Again

A peek into my knitting bag

I give up.  I've been done with the tiger socks for as long as I took to knit them... except for weaving in the ends.  If I wait until I've got that done (as I've been trying to), I'm just never going to get them posted.

They fit really well.  But... the stitches pull opposite the heel and a bit up the leg (if you click on the picture to bring up the bigger version, you can see what I mean).  This bothers me... not enough to rip, and not enough to spoil my enjoyment of the socks (I love them!), but I have to wonder why they're pulling if they don't feel too tight.  I guess I'll have to remember that Opal requires a couple extra stitches than Koigu does for me.

Kathy thinks it's hilarious that I got the stripes to line up so well... my perfectionism cracks her up.  But really, I only had to tinker with it a little bit to do so.  They're not identical... just close.  And see, Kathy... the heels are off, and I'm still NOT ripping them.

I did them toe up with my own weird version of the figure 8 cast on, Wendy's short row heels (but on 60% of the stitches instead of 50%... something suggested by another pattern I have, and the only reason the heels worked out for me), and a sewn-down (probably very badly, but since I can't find any instructions on how to do it, I just winged it) hem with a purl row to turn it nicely.

Next up... I started another pair of socks:

These are Elfine socks, using the Koigu P500 that I got for Mother's Day.  For these, I did a Priscilla Gibson-Roberts short row toe, but I only went down to 14 stitches, because my toes don't taper that much.  The pattern isn't showing up in the pictures, but you can see it in person (the centers of the little leaves indent), and I think it'll be a little more evident when the sock is worn.   I'm really enjoying knitting these and watching the way the colors are coming out.

And then I also cast-on for a Liesel scarf with the Alpaca & Silk:

The picture isn't the best (I had to tinker with the image to get the color even close to right, since I took them at night with the flash), but you can start to see how the lace will look.  I had to go down to size 5's, because the yarn is a bit smaller in gauge than that used in the original.

Hmmmmm... so looking back at those pictures, does anyone else notice a theme going on, or is it just me?

4 days to knit a tiger

And that includes having to reknit the heel.

I knit these toe up using some sort of a cross between a figure 8 cast-on and an easy toe, both described in this article in knitty by Wendy of Wendy Knits... I started with 16 stitches per needle (my toes don't narrow all that much).

I did a short row heel that also used the wrapping technique Wendy describes, but I had to do it over 60% of the stitches (as suggested by another toe-up short row pattern I had copied from a now defunct website) instead of Wendy's suggested 50%, because I have a deep heel.

For the top of the sock, I purled a turning row (if you enlarge the picture, you can just see it next to the green arrow), and then knit a few more rows to make a hem/welt/whatever you want to call it (I didn't count... I just went until I was done with the white part, so that when I sewed it down it would be less  noticeable... that is IF I can figure out how to do so). 

I didn't cast off and sew the hem/welt thing down yet, because I want to make sure I have enough yarn to make the second sock as tall as the first... if not, I'll have to rip back to where I can make them even.  Socks of different heights would just be weird.

Now... how fast can I get that other sock done?  In case you hadn't noticed, I have a pretty serious case of SSS.  The only pair I've finished lately was the Sockapalooza ones, and that's because I had to.  In fact, for me, the only pair I've ever finished was my first Koigu pair.  My Lacy Scallop Sock and my Not Quite Thuja sock are still waiting for their mates, and my sock yarn drawer is full to overflowing, and I have this insatiable desire to buy (and perhaps dye) more sock yarn.

Mother's Day... aka my sock drawer runneth over

For Mother's Day, I told my family I was going yarn shopping and that could be their gift to me since they hadn't had a chance to get me anything yet anyways convinced my family to buy me yarn. 

We were visiting up in Denver on Saturday, so we stopped in at String (the store that got in their Koigu order 3 days after our yarn crawl last fall).  String is now officially my favorite (semi) LYS.

I picked out a few things (all by myself... the rest of my family thinks the yarn store is SOOOOO boring), and when I got back out to the car and wanted to show them, my 5 year old wanted to decide which stuff she "gave" me, and then of course, the other two wanted to do the same thing, so, here they are, in order of "giftee":

From my 5 year old daughter... Koigu P609:

From my  8 year old daughter, Koigu P419:

From my 10 year old son (orange is his favorite color, and I told him I'm making the Liesel scarf out of it, and I think he liked that idea)... Blue Sky Alpacas Alpaca & Silk in Brick:

And (by default) from my husband... Koigu P500 (this one's been on my list of colorways I hope to find... woo-hoo!):

Interesting note... I took all these photos one right after another, in the same spot and all from the same angle... but look how different the carpet looks in the pictures.  Weird.

I had a bit of amusement when I got home... check out how remarkably consistent my tastes can be...

Koigu P609 and Cherry Tree Hill Supersock in Spanish Moss (I suspected this one in the store, but it was just so pretty, and I don't mind at all that I will have... or at least knit... 2 pairs of socks that are so similar in color):

Koigu P419 and Lang Jawoll Superwash 8281:

It should be noted... in a pinch, children can be used as a substitute for a swift, but the yarn tends to catch on their thumbs and elbows, preventing an even tension as you're balling the yarn, and they tend to get dizzy, so there's a limit to how many yards you can wind at a time, and you're pretty much limited to one skein per child within any reasonable working time frame.

A reprieve, Murphy's Law, and AAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!

First up... the reprieve.  It turns out that the second picot edge that I thought was going to be too big actually isn't, so I only have to redo one.  Phew!

Murphy's Law... I thought I had a way to do the new picot edge easier (ie. knitting it up and sewing it down like a placket, rather than having to knit it seperate and then graft it), but I had never done that before and had no idea how to go about it, and I wasn't able to find any instructions on how to do it... so a lot of time wasted hoping to simplify the process. 

You know, though, with my luck... if I'd started on the new picot edge the way I'd planned on it anyways, I would've found out the answer right away, and the wasting of time would've been in doing it the hard way, rather than just waiting a bit to find out a way to save myself lots of time and frustration.  That's Murphy... and he's my long time buddy.  Truth be told, he's more like a stalker, and I'm more than a little sick of his antics.  I apologize to my sock buddy for the holdup.

And lastly... AAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!

There are scissors in my knitting!  In order to put the new picot edge on, I... of course... had to cut the old one off.  This was more of a pain than I would have guessed.  I ended up with a bunch of tiny little pieces that all had to be pulled out before I could really rip, because they were acting as individual lifelines.  Then, the yarn would catch at the end of every row, and I had to tease it out each time.

I got a good start on grafting the new picot ege on, but I ran out of oomph before I finished.  So, I'll have to tackle that tomorrow.

Update (Tuesday, May 9th): 

I finished grafting on the picot edge this morning, and then sewed them up (the ends of the picot edges... since I had to knit them flat), and finally wove in all of the ends.  They're soaking in Euclan now, and I'll rinse and spin them out tonight so I can hang them up and they can have a chance to dry... I'm planning on mailing them tomorrow if they will.

Stats

Pattern: Simply Lovely Lace Socks by Karen Baumer, Interweave Knits, Spring 2006

Yarn:  Sisu 5226 purple (2 skeins with quite a lot left over)

And as an aside... I managed to catch me (my first ever) a case of pink eye.  I have to say... it's incredibly hard to graft and sew with goop running across your eye and blurring your vision - not to mention trying to ignore the pain and irritation.  That explains a little more of the holdup... I kept putting it off hoping I would feel better later, and the process would only be its normal rate of difficulty and frustration.

Sockapaloooza update... or why I feel like Goldilocks.

First up... I got my Sockapalooza socks today all the way from Germany!

(Click to make it bigger... they deserve a closeup.)

They were knit for me by Astrid of http://glimmerflimmer.blogspot.com/.  They're made of Opal Rose yarn, and they are such gorgeous colors... autumny and purple.  And, they're JAYWALKERS.  How nice is that?  Here's another shot that shows off the colors and pattern a little better (although, it does make my legs look fat):

She also sent me a couple of packets of gummy snacks... which I am just about to eat so the kiddies don't beg me for them :)

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Now, for my update.

(Please forgive the sad, pathetic picture below.  The socks were in no mood for posing, and I was in no mood to fight with them). 

I finished up the gusset on the second sock last night.  The first sock is done except for kitchenering the toe and... this it the Goldilocks part... I have to reknit the picot edge on both of them.  The first one was TOO SMALL (it won't stretch out enough to go over the heel... at least, it won't if I sew up the side.  I could just barely get it over without sewing it up).  So, I redid the start of the second sock, trying to compensate for that, and overcompensated (I upped both the stitch count and knit them on bigger needles)... they are TOO BIG. 

So, even when I'm done, I won't really be done quite yet.  Not to mention that the picot edge is totally my nemesis.  I so love the finished result, but I have such a hard time doing this (picot edge is honestly the hardest knitting thing I've ever run up against... I just can't get it to come together easily).  Oh, and when I've redone the picot edges... I have to kitchener them to the tops of the socks.  Not particularly hard, but annoyingly time consuming.  *sigh*