Hello!!

Sorry for my silence!  I have had a lot going on and I haven't been doing a good job of keeping track of all the stuff that's happened since my last blog.  So here's a list of the things to come:

1. Sleep over for a 6 yr old

2. February socks

3. March socks @ the Super Bowl

3. unfinished February Socks

4. Returned a few sweaters back to their original state: yarn

5. Dishcloth knitting for a day.

Ok, that's it for now cause that's all I can remember. . . 

 

January/February Sock Progress

I've been quiet, I know. . .  Niece's 6th birthday party + Nasty cold + busy at work = no blogging.  My bad. But! I have come with good news!!!  

JANUARY SOCKS ARE DONE!! 

I finished them Jan 18th.  Ok, the ends are not sewn in yet and they haven't been blocked or photographed.  BUT the knitting is totally done.  Hubbiekins is happy to have a pair of kind-of-well-fitting socks for his weird feet.  Once I do have the finishing work done, I'll post pictures of the happy hubby wearing them.  

In the meantime, I started the February socks.  I'm glad I've started on them so early, there are a few things that make me feel a bit nervous about finishing them on time.  

1) it's a lace pattern 

2) they are on size ZERO needles, I've never used needles that small 

3) February is a shorter month (even though it's a leap year) 

4) I've been summed for Jury duty, Feb 23-May 23.  

Not sure if I should really worry about that last one.  I mean, I can knit while I wait at the court house, right?

Knitting in an Asteroid field

One of the many skills I had to learn in order to be the wife of a Lego fanatic was proper sticker placement.  I kinda already had this skill mastered due to my history with scrapbooking but, Legos are a bit different.  So the other night, between stickers, I worked on January’s socks.  I’m on sock number two.  I will not stress out over this sock until the 15^th.  Why? ‘Cause I started this pair of socks on Dec 18^th and I WILL FINISH THEM in less than a month!  I will start swatching for February’s socks soon. . . I will darn it!

But here are some pictures of the progress we’ve made

Sock number one just before I finished up the toe.

Millennium Falcon takes shape.

Luke and Vader battle my knitting needles in an alternate time vortex where they are on the same side.

Vader wanted a picture showing his "kill" &  Luke photo-bombed it.  Go Luke!

Negative Ease

So far I have made two pairs of socks using the book Sensational Knitted Socks.  I learned a lot of things while making that first pair.  Other then how to knit a sock, I learned about negative and positive ease and how/when to use one or the other.  The first pair of socks turned out to big.  I did all the things the book told me to do, I swear I did.  I measured my foot, swatched in the round several inches to get gauge, I even tried them on as they were being made.  But I decided that all was well, they would shrink in the wash.  Um, Hello? Earth to Sarah, you used SUPERWASH wool.  Key word here is SUPERWASH.  That ain't gunna shrink hunny bunny.  So now I have a pair of socks that I usually wear doubled up with store bought socks during the winter.  Nice, comfy, hand knit, and toasty warm.  These socks were made with a bit of positive ease.  The fabric covers the wearer but doesn't stretch, there is room to spare.
The second pair I made, I wised up.  I measured my foot again, this time subtracting a whole inch from the circumference of my foot so that the sock would be snug, the fabric would have to stretch.  These socks fit nicely.  These socks have negative ease.
January's socks have a good amount of negative ease and so far (he's had to try them on like three times already just today) they fit well.  I'll finish the toe up tonight and start on the second sock!  For tomorrow, I'm thinking Lord of the Rings marathon and I'll have the cuff and most of the leg of sock # 2 done.  YAY!!!

So, it's been almost a year, almost, since my last blog.  Way to be consistent there Sarah. . .So here goes, my attempt to share the amazingness that is knitting with the world; my 2012 New Year's Resolution: 12 in 12'.  Let me explain that.  That's twelve pairs of socks, hand knit by me, one pair a month for the entire year of 2012. Ahha?  Whatcha think of that?  It usually takes me 4-6 weeks to finish a pair of socks so, this is a challenge for me.  Plus, I have a crap-tun of sock yarn that needs to be knitted up.  I've applied some rules for myself, just to make it interesting, at least for me. 

Rules

1. Finish one pair of socks a month.  

Key word is FINISH, not start.  So my plan is to cast on another pair of socks in the next few days so I'll have two on the needles.  That way if I get bored with one, I can work on the other, or if one is at a difficult-to-travel-with state, I can work on the other.  And no, I do not knit at work *cough cough*

2. Each sock pattern comes from the book Sensational Knitted Socks.  

Why? because I own the book, the patterns are easy to follow, and I can make them with any gauge so only one swatch, I hope.  If you want to learn to knit socks or already know but want some more options, check out this book!  All the math is done for you, all you need to know is that the author, Charlene Schurch, dosen't include 'negative ease'.  More on that later. . .

3. Each month is assined a color(s) that I personally associate with that month.  

Yeah, that's how much sock yarn I have.  You'll just have to check in with me at least once a month in order to see the different colors. :)

So tomorrow I'll show you pictures of what I have so far for January's socks AND some negative ease info.

Applying the new rule

Written January 26, 2011

Applying the new rule

I’m almost finished with the first half of the shawl.  I have the pattern memorized so well that I’m not really interested in it anymore.  *sigh* I really want to finish it though; lately during KIP many people have stopped to tell me that it’s beautiful.  So I can’t wait to actually wear it.  I have this feeling though, that when my KnitPicks stuff comes in I won’t be so eager to finish it.  A pattern book is on its way as well as some yarn.  Oh to start a new project yet again!  I did decide that sewing ends in is nice when on a road trip.  Ball band dishclothe's ends are for road trips.  Plus I kind of like having a crap-ton of finished items all at once.  That’s what happened when my DH and I drove home for Christmas.  Five hours of sewing in ends of dishcloths and we were at my parents house.  Then another hour of sewing in ends and we were at my in-law’s house.  I did Sudoku on the six hour drive back home.  Keeping that in mind, I am making a clause to my new rule.  If it’s a just sewing in ends then it can wait for a road trip.  If I have to actually finish knitting parts or sewing parts together then that doesn’t count.  I have to finish one of those projects before I start on another!

I did do some cleaning; however the forgotten WIP drawer did not get cleaned out.  I feel too attached to these ugly handmade things to just throw them out.  I did find a baby hat I made when I was learning to do circular stuff.  So that is going to my friend and fellow employee who had her baby last night.  Good thing she had a boy cause the hat is an autumn orange kind of color.  I also found a newborn onesie that I had originally bought for my sister.  My niece is now five years old.  When I got the onesie, my mom told me that it looked to little boy for my niece so I kept it, waiting for someone to have a boy. 

Well, I could go on about the amazingness of doing laundry and waiting for that load to dry so I can put on some pants but. . .I won’t.  I’ll keep today’s message short.  Besides, I have a dishcloth to finish today.

New Rule

Written January 24, 2011

New Rule

Today is my day off from work.  I just want to lie in bed and knit.  However there are two things that are making me anxious and leaving me sitting by the phone, waiting for the call, “Can you come in today?”  First, my boss threw her back out the other day, literally she coughed and it went out.  It spasms and she is in a great deal of pain, she also has a nice collection of pain killers and muscle relaxers.  So she’s trying to work through it.  The second reason is that the other bookkeeper is pregnant, very pregnant.  She could pop at any time.  In fact, if her water doesn’t break today she’ll have to go in for another sonogram.  I’m expecting overtime this week.  That means less time for knitting. I’m silently crying as I write this.

However the obsessive knitting is going great.  I ordered $100 worth of stuff from KnitPicks.com on Friday.  I am super excited and can’t wait for it to get here.  Let me explain how this poor lady got the $100 to spend on her obsession.  I am a bookkeeper/department assistant manager for a grocery store.  Since I deal with the money end I come across gold colored $1 coins.  So I decided if I had the cash to exchange for a $1 coin, then I would buy the coins.  This keeps me from over spending on unimportant things like food or gas for my car and gives me spending money for my drug habit (just joking mom, it’s all for yarn I swear).  About six or seven months ago I cashed in my coins and went to New York City to visit a friend.  When I got back I started saving the coins again.  Well, when I discovered that I was going to go to Wichita and potentially go to some yarn stores I cashed in my coins again, $186 dollars to spend on whatever my heart desires.  I decided that almost all of it needed to go to knitting related stuff.  In Wichita I got some yarn, some pattern books, and Stephanie Pearl-Mcphee’s book Yarn Harlot.  But I still had over $100 bucks!  So I went online. . .  I’ll go over that inventory when it arrives.  And just so you know, I love KnitPicks.com. 

So the title of this blog is New Rule.  In a previous blog I mentioned that I started a new project, Morning Frost Wrap from Stitch Nation.  It’s going well, about sixteen inches into the first half of the scarf I found a mistake. I tinked and kept going, found another mistake, tinked again.  I spent most of yesterday tinking.  I’m now back up to sixteen inches.  As you may not know, I have about a gazillion hibernating WIPs.  So I decided that my new rule is “Before starting a new project, I must pull out a lonely, long forgotten project and finish it.”  Phew, that kind of hurts and/or is kind of scary to say.  I have LOTS of projects that just need ends sewn in or separate parts need to be sewn together.  Why do I have to hate that part so much?  I made a pair of mittens once, alligator mittens from Stitch n Bitch: Stitch Nation.  There is a body and a red mouth.  They lie there in the plastic bag, waiting to be sewn together.  The frustrating thing about this new rule is I got the pattern yesterday for Lettuce Knit Arm warmers, another amazing pattern for Stitch Nation yarns.  I have been drooling over that pattern ever since the Stitch Nation yarns were sold at my LYS, Hobby Lobby.  However they didn’t sell the right kind of yarn for the pattern!  While in Wichita I found the right yarn!  WOOT!  Here’s the kicker, I won’t allow myself to start on this project until I finish an old project.  Seriously, I have a dresser, christened the Craft Dresser.  The top drawer is full of “sew the ends in” projects.  The second drawer is full of art supplies, the third has beading and hemp jewelry stuff, and the bottom is overflowing with cross-stitch stuff.  An entire top drawer designated to stuff that is 99.9% done.  Mostly it’s ball band dishcloths, but some of the other projects are things I made in my first year of knitting, knitted items that I no longer care for.  It’s sad, I know.  I can see the mistakes that my newbie knitting eyes couldn’t see before.  Weird color combos, and yes, 100% acrylic stuff that looks bad.  I know I said I wasn’t a yarn snob, well I’m trying not to be a snob, but really, that pink scarf with the green stripe just looks crappy.  The pink is the acrylic, the green is 100% wool, and what was I thinking?  My tip to the new knitter, don’t mix fiber types unless you know, like really know what you are doing.  Maybe today I should clean out that drawer.  Today is suppose to be my day off and tomorrow is trash day.  *sigh*