Ridiculous green hat

Yup, there it is, remastered for a humanoid head. I love this goofy hat. The Man wants me to make one for him. I might have enough yarn for another one.

Fair Isle Sock

When we last visited the Fair Isle socks, Bunny had used 25 grams of dark grey yarn in the first sock and had 25 grams of dark grey yarn left. We return now to the part where Bunny has finished the pattern and needs to knit the toe.


Will



she

make

it?

Doh!

That's Okay. I am not that compulsive. I can do this. I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and gosh darn it people like me!

Deep breath. In. Out. So they won't match exactly. So what? We have egomaniacal dipshits running for President and one of them is going to win, young Americans getting shot at in Iraq where thousands upon thousands of civilians are dead, the homeless are freezing in the streets, some child is being horribly abused right at this moment, and I'm going to care about a pair of socks not matching exactly? (hmm. I got some perspective there, but I can't exactly say I feel better either.)

Look at my handsome monkey enjoying the sunshine! Look at the nearly perfect bad-ass socks I made!

The good part of the purple cardigan is done, that is, the knitting part. All of the pieces parts are being blocked:




The sucky part remains, that is, the finishing part. Possibly I could finish in a couple of days, or maybe I'll shove it in a bag and never finish it. I'm pretty sure I'm not going to do a whole bunch of buttons. Maybe I'll do one closure at the neck. That leaves open options for the edging down the front. Maybe I'll pick something interesting out of one of my Nicky Epstein books.

The twinkle toes socks are finished. They are not the most difficult ones I've done or the most impressive, but I think they're my favorite so far, but that just might be because they're pink.

My compulsive brain is already starting to think of new projects. I've got two sock club socks to do, and lots of good stuff in the stash, and The Man needs more mittens.

More about the socks

So I'm at knitting circle on Tuesday working on leftover grey yarn sock #2. I am asked whether I have enough of the light grey left to finish the second sock because the ball I was working from was awfully small. The answer is I don't know. But I am so smooth and cavalier about it. If I run out, I will just use more of the dark grey. They won't match perfectly, but The Man won't mind so who cares? Certainly not Bunny. Bunny is a roll-with-it type of knitter.

Are you fooled? As soon as Bunny got home, she tore through the stash looking for more of the light grey yarn. Non-matching socks! An abomination! That cannot happen!



There is one more ball of light grey yarn left. I have enough. Crisis averted. Whew. I still freak out a little just thinking about it. God knows what's going to happen if I run out of dark grey to finish the fair isle socks. Great. Now I'm freaking out again. One drama at a time, Bunny. One drama at a time.

The twinkle toes are going swimmingly. They photograph oddly because the lace contracts when it isn't being worn. They are lovely. They are a toe-up sock starting with a figure-8 cast-on. Sock #1 was the first time I ever did a figure-8 cast-on, and it went perfectly. Sock #2, however, took me five attempts before I ended up with something I could live with. I love the pink.

Socktastic

Slowly, the leftover grey yarn gets used up. This a Man sock, knit on size 2 dpn.




All of my color work socks have been accomplished with self-patterning yarn. My mom wears her various Bunny-made socks and strikes up conversations thusly: My daughter made these! The yarn made that pattern! For example, tiger socks with Opal Rainforest tiger stripe self-patterning yarn, which I still have lots of and will make again eventually. But now, Bunny is doing her own color work. Behold:



That, dear readers is one bad-ass fair isle sock. I can hardly contain myself. It is not for The Man, and boy is he jealous.

Problem. I used up 25 grams of the dark color and have exactly 25 grams left for the second sock. Will she make it? Or will there be a weird little light colored stripe at the end of the toe?

Not getting very far

The holiday is over, and we're even starting to take down some decorations. I knit, but I also did a lot of sleeping, so I haven't finished anything. I have made progress on some old so-called friends:

There she is, ye olde beagle blanket. Two-thirds done. My mother took a good look at this and wondered why in the world anyone would knit anything this fancy for a dog. This is why. So I'm crazy. At least I'm not wandering the streets harassing people.

And now a message from The Department of Apples Falling Not Very Far From Trees:

This is my green blankie. You've seen it before here. My mommy knit it for me out of cheap crappy acrylic yarn around fifteen years ago. I love it. It is my favorite color and I use it almost every day in cold weather. The boys love it too. When it starts to smell funny, I throw it in the wash. It has no natural fibers whatsoever, so it goes in and out of the dryer on the low cycle in about 20 minutes.

When I was visiting over the holiday, my mother was knitting. What was she knitting with? I'm glad you asked. She was knitting with leftover crappy acrylic yarn from the year she made my green blankie, and my brothers blue blankies.

16 oz. for $4.99

proclaimed the label proudly. She can't part with her 15-year-old acrylic. Draw your own conclusions.

And now back to our regular post.

This is my purple cardigan. The careless tossing about of pieces parts on the table and the bad photography reflects pretty well how I felt about it that day. The fronts ended up about four inches longer than the back. Not good. I ripped them back and reworked them, painstakingly measuring them after every other row.

Did you know that one row of knitting can measure 1/2 inch, and two rows of knitting can measure 1/2 inch and 4 rows of knitting can measure 1/2 inch and six rows of knitting can measure 4 inches all from the same yarn and at the same gauge?

Let's just say this: The fronts are (finally) more or less the same length and the fronts more or less are (finally) a roughly comparable size to the back. Fuck it. I'm not frogging it again. On to the sleeves.