Knitting? What knitting?

The BBS strikes again!
And that’s not even half of the haul…

Ceci n'est pas une chaussette

Imagine a sock.
Imagine a pink sock.
Imagine a pink argyle sock.
Imagine a finished pink argyle sock.
Had I not manage to forget my knitting at my parent’s house after my visit there yesterday, I wouldn’t have to ask you, dear reader, to do all the work today. Not only did I leave my argyle sock there at the kitchen table but because of my inability to ever decide on a single project to bring with me whenever I go somewhere, I also managed to leave all of the other projects I was working on there. At the kitchen table. All in one neatly packed zip-lock bag.
Le sigh.
Perhaps this is a sign for me to get on with the gift knitting?

More reason for girlish squealing

The birthday bouquet from I.



In almost exact argyle colors!


Squeal!

An excess of sugar and spice and everything nice

I. the fiancé sent the best birthday care package ever.


Icelandic lace patterns and chocolates and a card that makes one go “squee!”


The sugar, the lace, the adorable, fluffy, and resolutely un-ironic anthropomorphosized animals –– it all makes me feel fluttery and girly as anything.
Sometimes, it’s nice to leave the irony behind to revel in a bit of good-old-fashioned sugar and prettiness. Take for example this shawl (my sole reason for coveting Three Cornered and Long Shawls).


Ever since I saw hyrna herborgar knitted up here, I’ve wanted one. Yes, it’s lacy and girly and impractical for actual wear in the t-shirt and jeans world of a graduate student but something about the absolute frivolity of it appeals to me. It’s just so unabashedly pretty! Not only that but the distinct looking lace motifs promise for some interesting knitting too. And really, when have I ever been rational about my knitting (to wit…making wool socks and gloves in an extremely temperate climate where it rarely drops below 50°F)?
So, excuse me while I go indulge in some more girlish squealing over the b-day goodies (certainly makes getting a whole 'nother year older much more pleasant!). I’ll leave you with one more dear little drawing from the card.


So sweetly adorable that it’s positively cavity-inducing.

Voilà, back!

Not of much visual interest but highly satisfying for this knitter: the back of Cyd is done!



Now, on to the diamonds!
(The yarn is actually a much more pleasant color than the liverish shade of red in the picture above...more like this...)

Stockinetting away

Many thanks for all the kind words about my argyle socks! Thank you too for the advice on the sock heel. To tell you the truth, I may have been dithering over the heel more because of my dread of facing the one part of the argyle sock construction that remained stubbornly opaque to me despite much brain-wracking: the knitting of the gusset and the transition to the foot. At some point last week, I finally took the reinforcement thread-less plunge and made my K1, Sl1 heel. With that out of the way, I couldn't put off the gusset any longer. Happily, everything clicked as soon as I started working at it. A few hours of knitting decreases and some mattress stitch later, I had myself an ordinary sock-in-knitting on the DPNs.


It's all St St from here on out. Should be quick except that rows on US 0's accrue length oh-so-slowly and there's been some competition for my attention in knit 1 row, purl 1 row. You see, my sudden infatuation with argyle patterns didn't just compel me to do these socks, it also induced me to start working on this vest...slip-over...diamond-covered thing.


This is Cyd from the Jaeger booklet JB31. Though I have never in my life felt any interest in wearing a vest, this one caught my eye. After seeing it, I was rather surprised to find that I suddenly did want to wear a vest, or rather, wanted to wear exactly that vest, in exactly those colors. But, I had promised myself that there would be no yarn purchasing this month. So, I was the very picture of restraint. I told myself the project could wait for a few months while I knit up some of the stash. I told myself that the project wasn't going anywhere and would still be there in a few months. I told myself many calm rationalizations and I held firm and all was well until a quick Google search informed me that the Jaeger Luxury Tweed the vest was knit in had been discontinued. Once the word "discontinued" worked its way into my brain, a sense of franticness compulsiveness seized me. Before I knew it, I had hunted down the yarn and obtained a copy of the pattern. And here I am, knitting away on the vest back.
When I was working on the intarsia of the second argyle socks, I kept feeling a longing to do some simple, mindless knitting. No changing of colors, no fancy stitch work, just straight knit, turn, purl, turn ad infinitum. Well, I suppose my wish has been granted, in plenitude. Perhaps by the end of the week, I'll be itching to start these. (Not that I wasn't already tempted...)

Why I love used bookstores: Reason #547

Look what I found at the neighborhood one!


I couldn’t believe my luck in coming across a Japanese craft-book, looking absolutely brand-new, no less, tucked between two heavy volumes of art prints. And here I was mourning the fact that I didn’t having the time this weekend to stop by Kinokuniya for a craft-book fix! Of course I snatched up the book immediately. Once I thumbed through it, I was really quite beside myself with delight at the find. The book (ISBN4-14-927553-X) is a squeal-inducing hodge-podge of craft projects of every kind.
There's everything from a cozy baby doll made from towels



to beautiful Japanese costumed dolls



to traditional bean bags



to a few sweet baby items (there are some children's clothing patterns too)



to a gorgeous hand-quilted blanket



to adorably silly felt animals of the zodiac. Here are my two favorites of the dozen.



I think the sheep on the right is thinking about her holiday knitting…

And then there were two

On to the heels!
But first, a request for some advice. Since I was absolutely unsuccessful in my search for matching pink reinforcement thread (unless I want to resort to using elastic), the heels and toes will be composed solely of Dale Baby Ull as the rest of the sock. So, asks the worry-prone sock-knitting and hand-kitted sock wearing novice, can any sock knitters out there comment on the durability of non-reinforced socks? These are knit on US 0's so the fabric is relatively dense but I'm concerned about the nylon-less fiber content. Also, does anyone have any recommendations for a well-wearing stitch pattern for the heel flap (e.g. ribbed vs. K1, Sl1)?
Many thanks in advance for any and all purls of wisdom. (Wince...sorry, just couldn't resist the pun).

Argyling along

It was a pink, orange, and green sort of weekend. I’m almost done with this second go-round of the chart.


Intarsia is so much faster and neater once one finally figures out that “twist strands together” doesn’t actually mean twist them together.

A most pleasant surprise

Today started off as a hectic mess. A knitting night with a friend on Friday ran quite late. When I finally came home, I was so hopped up on caffeine and sugar and laughter that there was no way I could get to sleep. So, I knitted. And knitted and knitted – until faint bird chirps began filtering their way into my apartment. Needless to say, I slept quite late into the day. That, of course, has the unfortunate consequence of squashing everything I needed to get done today into a much, much smaller window of time. Just as I was running out the door, much frazzled and stressed, I found this from Phillipa in my mailbox and suddenly, my day seemed much better.


I didn’t have a chance to open it right then but remembering that I had a special package waiting for me made all the errands I was running seem much less of a chore.
When I finally opened the package, I was greeted by a soothing perfume. It smelled like lavender and clothes dried in the sun and general coziness. Here is what I found inside the envelope:


An enormous cut of whimsical Liberty fabric printed with yarn and knitting (I have been desperately coveting Liberty fabric ever since I knew of its existence. Now I finally have some!). A bar of delicious smelling candy intriguingly called Kendal Mint Cake that was a great favorite of Sir Edmund Hillary’s famed Mt. Everest expedition. A lovely post card of some spires (a spire) of Oxford. And the wonderful goat milk soap that suffused everything with its perfume.
I’m quite over the moon with everything. I can’t stop fingering the delightful fabric (soft as well as adorable) and sniffing at the soap. It’s all so generous a thank you for a little felt hamster.
Thank you, Phillipa, for such a wonderful and unexpected gift!

I ♥ mattress stitch

Behold the wonder that is the result of the mattress stitch. See the seam? Or rather, the absence of a seam?
(Except the wonky spots where I somehow managed to offset the rows and then get confused at the ribbing, all entirely having to do with my own stupidity and not the technique.)
I've always had a vague fear of the mattress stitch. Not that I actually knew what mattress stitch was but all the dark (and occasionally resigned) mutterings about it on knitting boards and blogs had me convinced that it was at best, a difficult technique, and at worst, a pain in the ass and absolute waste of time. So, when the sock directions emphasized the necessity of using mattress stitch to seam up the back, I was filled with trepidation. So, I dithered. I took my time weaving in ends, spent ages trawling the web collecting directions for doing it, and generally dragged my feet. Then I actually sat down and read the directions for seaming together stockinette and a little light bulb went off. The technique is really quite brilliant and make a sort of intuitive sense...rather like weaving two pieces of fabric together. It's exactly the sort of mindless fiddly work that I find oddly enjoyable. The clearest directions I found were those from Lana Grossa. The diagrams are excellent and make the accompanying words almost superfluous. After all that initial dread, the seaming process was quick and uneventful, though I was surprised by how hard I had to tug on the seaming yarn to tighten the stitches and make the two sides fuse well together.
So now, with seaming done, I present to you...the argyle ankle warmer!


Just kidding.
The argyle tube is getting a heel and a foot and becoming a sock. Before I start all that though, I'm planning on knitting the argyle portion for the second socks to head off the potential onset of Second Sock Syndrome. After that, it will be all heels flaps and gussets and the rest of the sockly goodness.

Argyles on the brain

The unforeseen consequences of four days of devoted, monogamous knitting, besides completing the argyle portion of the sock: I see argyles everywhere.



The weaving in of ends is done too.


Next up, mattress stitching up the back…

The madness continues

The obsession with knitting argyles (alas, just plain argyles and not arrrgyles) has yet to show any abatement. Indeed, it only seems to increase with every row. Nevermind the chemical inbalance, I place the blame squarely on Moth Heaven's luscious Happy Socks (which I am unabashedly copying), the sight of which instantly filled me with covetousness. Add to that her endlessly helpful charts and instructions for argyle construction and there was no way I could resist the impulse.
Perhaps a little madness is a good thing…

Going a little crazy

I'm not a pink person. Nor am I a bright color person. And really, I'm also definitely not a patterned-print-wearing sort of person.
So why is it that nothing right now can make me happy except the knitting of argyle socks?
Bright pink argyle socks. With bright orange and green diamonds.


Temporary chemical imbalance?

Balm for all ills

In all my happy anticipation of autumn, I forgot the one downside of the transition into fall here: the sudden unexpected drops in temperatures during seemingly warm days. Apparently my immune system was caught off guard as well since Saturday morning found me achy and congested with a dully-throbbing head and feel thoroughly sorry for myself. After desperately trying and failing to sleep through my upstairs neighbor's excessive excitement over the start of the college football season, I was miserable. There wasn't much to do except lay there and wait for the ibuprofen to kick in.
And then the post delivery person rang my doorbell.
There's nothing like a special package from one's secret pal to turn a horrible day around. (And certainly worth every bit of the embarrassment in rushing to my front door disheveled and in my pajamas.) For the past three month, Jessica has been my secret pal and responsible for all the goodies arriving on my doorstep. Here are the wonderful goodies that she sent me this time.


Yarn in gorgeous warm shades of persimmon and pink and peach, beautiful orange ribbon, and yummy starbursts...

Here is a close-up of the beautiful fiber (I'm especially in love with the persimmon colored Classic Elite Princess skeins)


All this was enough to make me ecstatically happy but there was even more in the box! Vogue magazines...Vogue Knitting and Knit 1, three chocolate bars, and two sizable pieces of lovely fabric.


The sailboats are absolutely adorable and the purple will fit right into my next quilting endeavor. The magazines made the rest of my day in bed much more bearable. Instead of sulking and thinking murderous thoughts about my noisy neighbor, I dreamed of future knitting projects. Have you seen the Nancy Bush Traveler's socks? And the elegant grey alpaca cabled sweater? And that dainty Fair Isle number? And the...
Suffice it to say, I'm incredibly grateful to my secret pal.

Thank you, Jessica!

Pomatomus!

My first pair of socks, finished at long last!



O warm, wooly happiness!



The completion of this second sock was thankfully nothing like the emotional roller coaster ride that was the finishing of its sibling. Few curses were uttered during the kitchener process (thanks to the tutorial here) and no needles were harmed during the ensuing two-socked celebratory dancing.



Here are the stats:
Pattern: Pomatomus
Source: Knitty
Yarn: Trekking XXL colorway 66; Fortissima Socka reinforcement wool in 1088 at the heels
Needles: Brittany DPN US 2/2.75mm

The beauty and brilliance of this pattern has already been much gushed over in the knitting blogosphere. Truly, 'tis a wonderful pattern.