Love and Seamonsters

One of the answers to what is on my needles right now is this:

These are gloves (yes, gloves. Not fingerless gloves, not mittens, gloves), that I've been working on for a while.

The seed of the idea for these fell from a woman who attended our knit night a few times a few years ago. She had some stranded gloves made with handpainted yarn that were just gorgeous. I decided then that I was going to make some gloves.

I poked around looking at glove patterns. It didn't take me long to figure out I was going to have to make my own, because if I'm going to put that much time into something, I want them to be exactly how I want them.

I wanted them to be long(ish). I wanted them to be true fair isle, and I wanted the main colors to be purple. I wanted them to be subltle and colorful and beautiful.
If I had not ripped these back at all the first glove would be done already. I think I did the ribbing 4 times. I keep changing stitch count, colors, the thumb gusset was wrong. But, I loooove them more deeply than I've possibly ever loved another one of my knits.

BTW they're still not right. I don't like the colors in the center of the star. So I will most likely rip that back, but not until I figure out what to do.

Also, it's really hard to take a picture of your own hand.

They should probably be finished right about the time when the snow is melting.

One more thing to share, now that my swap partner has recieved her package, I can share. We were supposed to make something under the Care of Magical Creatures theme. I've wanted to try out this guy for a while, so here it is.
I made it out of 4 hanks of embroidery floss. If I were to make him again I would probably use something thinner/split the floss, and use a smaller hook (don't ask me what hook I used, I can't remember.)
The pattern is Seeungeheuer and can be found here, but it's in German. It comes with a chart, and I can offer the following for anyone who wants to try to make them.
Stabchen and St = American dc
halbes Stabchen and hSt = hdc
FM = sc
"Bogen aus LM entsprechund der Zahl" translates to "chain according to the number"
The words along the side of the tail translate to "continue to the head"
Also one more tip - start at the neck, work the body to the tail, then go back up to the head.

Socks Socks Everywhere

A couple of people have told me that my recent blog post doesn't count, because it had no pictures, so, here are some pictures for you, stop yer whining. In this episode we will be traveling back to November.


Birthday socks for Rob. The yarn is Berocco Comfort Sock. They were going to be Christmas socks, but then one day when I already finished with the first sock, I was wearing some olive/grey socks I asked him if he liked the color (for future reference), and he said "I don't really like grey socks".

Doh!

I was unable to mask my reaction to this statement, so I gave it away and went ahead and showed him the sock of yarn that I'd specifically picked because I thought it was plain enough for him to wear, but interesting enough that I might actually knit it. He then proceded to backpedal beautifully, trying to convince me that he didn't know he could wear grey socks to work (uhhhh). And that *these* grey socks are VERY different from the other grey socks. I'm not totally convinced, but, he does wear them. I finished them on his birthday, just before Thanksgiving.

Tiny socks for the Reducio Sock Swap on Ravelry. Basically it's a Harry Potter swap, on a small scale. These are the only swaps I'm willing to commit to, because I'm so convinced I will knit fancy socks for someone recieve socks made from DK acrylic and 6 sizes too big (this has happened to people).

But reducio sock swap is awesome and fun and you get to play with things and you know if you never got a tiny sock? Wouldn't be the end of the world. The teeny one here is a stitch marker. It's knit on 0000 needles.

Horrible picture of Christmas socks for my mom, in a pattern of my own devising. They are binary cables, one says Left, and one says Right (my mom is a math teacher). Yarn is Patons Kroy.




This is where I began my love affair with Cat Bordhi and her new sock architecture.

I'd started first with the Coriolis sock, but I hadn't really given in. I made those socks top down, basically I just took her idea of the increases and put them in a regular sock. And then, you know, lost it. Still bitter about that.

But I'd decided to make the kids socks for Christmas, and kid sized socks seemed like a good way to try out her patterns all the way. Molly's, of course, had to be pink. These are Lion Brand Sock Ease, and they follow the Cedar architecture master pattern. I did that because I still wasn't convinced on the whole toe up thing, and that was one of the only patterns that is top down in her book. They look really freaking weird when they're not on her feet, but they fit fine, and she loves them, and I was all enamored of the heel stitches not ever being on a flap. It's wild. (BTW, I really like the yarn)

Next I had just 1 50g ball of Panda Silk to use for Caitie's socks, so toe up seemed like the answer. You'll have to imagine a picture of Caitie's socks here, because they are going to have to be secret for now. But they're really really cool and I love them, and Cat Bordhi was totally right about the math for figuring out where to start the heel (which has never worked out for me before and always ticks me off with toe up socks)

Sean said he wanted slippers instead of socks.
He chose some Patons Classic Merino (blue, naturally), and I made these slippers with the Upstream master pattern. He kept looking at me like I had a second head when I was making them, and once or twice came up to me and told me that um, Mommy, I think, you might, possibly, be making those a little too big.
Actually several of my knitting friends thought I might be a little wrong about the size of that sock too. And they were making me start to doubt myself. I was really not at all sure they would shrink enough.
Now he tells people I made them out of magic shrinking yarn. They're awesome.
This time I didn't have the size of DPNs that I wanted, so I did these with 2 circs.
I can't say that I'm TOTALLY convered to 2 circs, but I can definitely see the appeal in some cases.

(Insert bright flashy light and things disappearing and other things appearing)

Here's another reducio sock swap sock, Also Cat Bordhi-ized (Riverbed)

I didn't even need to open the book for the heel this time.
BTW, if you're thinking about this book, DO EET! It's on sale at Knitpicks right now.







One last sock-ish thing. These are Yoga socks, that I made to use on our new Wii Fit. I left out the 1x1 ribbing, didn't seem necessary.
The yarn is Karabella Aurora 8, which is really yummy, and I got it from a christmas swap, which is even better. (Thanks Gonzopants!)

Katie asked me what's on my needles.

I'd like to point out (for those of you reading in a blog reader) that Ravelry has this cool thing that lets you pull tickers from your raverly account and put them on your blog. If you're reading from my actually blog page, they're over there -------> (well and up some)
Or, you can just wait for me to get around to blogging about it, but you know how that goes...

So..

I know. I have been a Very Bad Blogger (TM).

The problem is, the longer you go without blogging, the more behind you are, and the more pressure there is to make up for all of the time you didn't do it. And the more things you've done and the more pictures you have to edit. At some point it just becomes a death spiral and you have to give in.

One of my new year's resolutions was to start blogging again. I was going to start earlier in the month, but hey, I got it in in January, so that's something. And I have so very much going on/planned right now to tell you about.

SO, can we all just agree to move on from here as if there wasn't a giant gaping time warp in the blog? And I may, periodically, jump back in time and and blog about something that happened months ago.

It'll be just like LOST.

Lost

I made this beautiful sock. It my favorite sock. I loved it.

It was my first Better than Black sock yarn. It was sooo soft, wool and silk. It was a really cool Cat Bordhi pattern (Coriolis). It was knit on size 0 needles. It fit perfectly.

Then I made a second one, and when I got to the toe of the second one I went to find the first one to make them the same length and it is gone.

It's gone. I can't find it anywhere. I've trashed my house dumping things out, looking under furniture, looking through baskets of yarn and WIPS. It's not there.

I made several humiliating phone calls to movie theaters and Target stores asking if anyone found a lost sock. Nope.

I can't believe how upset I am about this sock. I was so excited to wear them. We still have no furnace and I was putting all my furnace energy into making my feet warm with those socks and now I'm left with 90% of a useless sock.

The only silver lining I can find is that Sean can always make me laugh. In all of his infinite, 5-year-old wisdom, he suggested "Mommy- you should go on knitting dot com, and type 'Mommy lost her sock' " Apparently that's what you do when you lose something.

So, well this isn't knitting.com. But -

Mommy lost her sock.