Socks

The bright blue socks are done. After all the unraveling and reknitting, and I really and truly did not have enough yarn to finish the toes the first time around, I have a bit of JitterBug left over:

Go figure. Anyway, I like these a lot. JitterBug’s color variegation obscures the Railway Stitch pattern a little, but I enjoyed making them and found they were worth the effort.

They fit Mr. MmmYarn perfectly:

Pattern: Gentleman’s Sock in Railway Stitch by Nancy Bush, published in Knitting Vintage Socks
Yarn: 1 skein Colinette JitterBug, 100% superwash wool, color 16
Needles: size 1
Started May 16, 2008 and finished June 4, 2008

This is the first pattern I have used in Knitting Vintage Socks. I like how the pattern is written. Some sock patterns use the numbered needle system, giving all instructions in relation to needle #1, #2, and #3 (and sometimes #4). I don’t number my needles so I find those kinds of instructions bewildering. This pattern uses the “work x number of stitches” approach which is what makes sense to me.

The instructions call for 81 stitches for the cuff and some leg decreases. After three starts, I reduced the enormously huge cuff to only 63 stitches, then decreased down to 60 for the leg. I had initially worked the pattern’s leg shaping in the first sock but that made the leg way too tight, so I ripped back to the cuff and made the leg without the shaping. I used my usual knit 1, slip 1 heel and ended up working the foot on 60 stitches. Hey, whatever it takes to make the socks fit the recipient properly.

I am sorry to say this project is for a family member:

Pattern: Knit Chemo Cap and Scarf by Berroco, Inc.
Yarn: nearly 1 skein Berroco Chinchilla, 100% rayon, color 5567 (Note: the pattern states 2 skeins, but you need only 1 for the hat. The other skein is for the scarf in the pattern.)
Needles: size 9
Size: 19″ around and 7.5″ tall
Started 5/27/2008 and finished 5/28/2008

The yarn took over a week to get here and I felt guilty about the delay, especially as the recipient had gone hat-shopping recently and it was a bust, and I finally had something I knew I could do that would be useful to her. Seven local yarn shops, and none of them carry it. The yarn arrived Tuesday and I swatched and cast on that night, then knitted the whole thing save the bind-off round on the bus yesterday. I mailed it off to her this morning. I hope it fits. She is doing pretty well, but the circumstances still mean she will need a hat (or a few hats) for a while yet.

While I wait for her to receive hat #1 and comment on its fit, I put in some work on re-knitting Mr. MmmYarn’s socks. Sock #1 is nearing the toe, then I need to unravel sock #2. I won’t bore you with photos as they look nearly exactly the same as they did a few days ago when you last saw them.

Nope. Not going to happen.

The lower sock in this photo is done but not grafted. The upper sock is short 12 rounds of yarn. Mr. MmmYarn first said to go ahead and unravel just one, having one sock’s leg shorter than the other, but once I showed him how much 12 rounds is he agreed that I wasn’t completely nuts for wanting to unravel them both back to the leg, then back 6 rounds each at that point. Which is what I did. I do have a perfectionist streak in me so I would have unraveled anyway, but it’s nice to know my husband doesn’t think I’m a few skeins short of a sweater.

No moth sightings today or yesterday, but this post scared me. It might be time for a stash toss.

I knew going into making these socks that JitterBug’s yardage was a wee bit short for socks, so I made the legs a little shorter than usual. It looks as though I may not have made them short enough:

The foot on each sock needs about another half an inch before I start the toe. And that little pile of yarn is all that’s left. Tomorrow I will alternate knitting a few rounds on each sock so I can determine how many rounds of the leg to unravel when I unravel all the way back past the heels. At least this will give me bus knitting for the week.

In scary fiber news, I have seen a few moths (!) fluttering in the room the computer is in, the same room that holds all my spinning fiber and a few of my finished felted bags. Now, the moths don’t hold still long enough for me to identify them as wool/clothes moths and a few moths did come out of the basil plant I bought, so I’m hoping they’re some sort of plant moth. But that may be delusional thinking.

Socks for Mr. MmmYarn are this week’s commute project. He likes his socks blue. And not just blue, but BLUE! JitterBug was the bluest yarn I could find at Stitches West this year:

The pattern is the Gentleman’s Sock in Railway Stitch from Knitting Vintage Socks by Nancy Bush. The beauty of the stitch pattern doesn’t quite show up in this yarn but it’s more interesting that the usual K2, P2 sock cuff I do so I’m sticking with it.

Sock #2 is now at the same point this one was yesterday when I took the photo. I am knitting them at the same time, alternating socks every few inches, so I make the same modifications to each.

In other WIP news: I frogged the sleeves and most of the body of my Berroco Memoirs sweater Sunday and now I’m waiting for a day when I’m not so tired to interpret the chicken scratch that serves as my notes and figure out how to fix the armhole problem. The green alpaca scarf is blocking tonight.

Mr. MmmYarn and I drove to Kern county this weekend to visit his sister and her family. For most of the drive, the view out the window looked like this:

The I-5 simply doesn’t make for much exciting scenery although I did see all manner of farm animals (horses, cows, sheep, what looked like goats but at 80mph I’m not sure) and orchards (almonds, citrus, etc.; lots of orderly trees, really). Mr. MmmYarn drove a stretch in the middle and the view in my lap during his stint was this:

With him driving, I managed to finish the Jaywalker socks in the car. Funny how the colors look so different depending upon the light at a particular moment; the two photos below were taken fewer than 5 minutes apart.

Pattern: Jaywalker, by Grumperina
Yarn: 3/4 skein Zitron Trekking XXL; 75% wool, 25% nylon; color 158
Needles: size 1
Size: I made the smaller size, casting on 76 stitches

I did not make any specific pattern modifications, simply because I ignored the pattern after the bit that said to cast on 76, then work in the 2-row pattern. I have made so many pairs of socks that I knew how to divide for the heel flap and work on down to the toe. My first foot was a little loose so I went back and worked decreases a few more rows, then wrote down that number of stitches and worked sock #2 the same way.

The socks enjoyed a brief moment in the hammock before the ropey terror unceremoniously dumped me and them out on the porch (I am still bruised but the socks are OK, not even a splinter), so I switched to a chair with a lesser view:

My initial plan was to photograph myself jaywalking while wearing the finished socks, but that’s a scary proposition in San Francisco so I decided on nature instead. Pardon the rather ugly power tower in the photo there, but if you look toward the top of the tower you’ll see a dark blob. That blob is a crow’s nest and I watched the crow parents (or parent; they kind of look the same) fly back and forth gathering supplies for the little crow(s) in the nest.

Mr. MmmYarn also drove a chunk on the way home, enough for me to weave in all the ends and knit the buttonband on the green baby sweater I started last week. Buttons went on at knitting group last night. Photo coming soon.

On this trip we learned Mr. MmmYarn’s stepbrother and his wife are also expecting a little one. Perhaps I need to rethink my plan to make one baby item for everyone born in 2008 or I’ll never make anything else. First birthday gifts are OK, too.

Today I buckled down and finished the third ply of what I intend to be 4-ply yarn. Spinning was on hiatus a few months while it was simply too cold in the apartment to sit at the wheel (I can’t throw a blanket over my legs like I can when I’m knitting) so ply #3 took a long time. I am tempted to ply this and forget about #4 so I can finally move on to something else but I did go to the effort to split the fiber into fourths, so I will spin it. Here is what I have so far:

I thought I’d also show you photographic evidence that the Jaywalker socks are progressing. They are also at about the three-quarter mark:

And my little basil plant hasn’t committed pre-planting suicide after all:

Hahaha! Just kidding. We went out and bought this happy-looking plant today because my windowsill seedling still looks like this, some 8 weeks after planting and more than 2 weeks after sprouting:

Plus it is still the only seed to sprout in the tray. I continue to blame the other houseplants for this; they must have whispered to it to remain a seedling, for its own sake.

I just watched a video of the Running of the Wools. All I can say is that sure is a lot of sheep.

No, no one has let the air out of my tires. But I think I may have Severe Second Sock Syndrome today: apparently the changing colors have ceased to entertain me, and I really don’t want to work on my second Jaywalker sock.

Jaywalker the first looked like this last night:

It was too long so I unraveled back several rows beyond where I started the toe shaping and re-knitted that bit. Then it was too short. Tonight I’m going for attempt #3. I worked on the second sock’s cuff on the bus today but my heart wasn’t in it. I think I’m not in the mood for knitting today, that’s all. Naw, this is not an April Fool joke, it’s just one of those days.

One positive note for today: someone on KnitU posted the address for an animal shelter in New Orleans that is still looking for cage cozies so the two I made last year will finally have a home. Yay!

After much swatching, I gave up and found a pattern I really liked for my Trekking color #158:

The spiral I was trying just didn’t turn out. I really liked the line it made down the cuff but that twisted stitch made the cuff really tight. I experimented with spacing it out more and with putting purl stitches before and after the knit. Neither idea worked. But Jaywalkers… I’ve admired those for a while and these are my first. Come to think of it, of the 60-ish pairs of socks I’ve made I think I have used a pattern only twice: I remember the Chalet Socks by Nancy Bush and Monkey by Cookie A. All the rest are simple rib patterns. Oddly, though, I’ve never been bored. The different colors of yarn apparently entertain me a lot. The colors of Trekking #158 definitely entertain me, and the Jaywalker pattern is so simple but interesting that sock #1 is at the foot already.

Now off to the yarn store to find another set of metal size 1 double-pointed needles.

Friday morning I noticed some action (finally) on the kitchen windowsill. That black strip in the background is the window. Due to the time change it is now pitch dark when I get up in the morning:

That barely visible teeny tiny sprout in the upper right quandrant is the first of I hope several basil plants I’m growing from the seeds of the previous plant. It only took this sprout 6 weeks to show itself (insert sarcasm here; 6 weeks?!? Is that normal?). And the other seeds? Perhaps they’re shy, or perhaps they have heard of my black thumb and have entered some sort of suicide pact, deciding to stay in the dirt rather than face my unique version of plant care. Time will tell.

After work we drove to my parents’ house and Saturday we had a fitting: I am very happy to announce that my mom’s socks fit! Before socks, though, my mom, Mr. MmmYarn, and I went for a walk along the coast. The California poppies are in bloom and are mighty glorious:

What? Not close enough? How about this:

The view on the other side of the path was nothing to sneeze at, either:

For poor Mr. MmmYarn it was all something to sneeze at as the pollen was out in full force. But for me, the luckily allergy-free, it was just so pretty out there that I had to snap a bunch of photos. Both sides of the path seen together, our walk looked something like this:

Nice, huh? But I did promise you socks galore, too, so here they come. We got back from our walk, my mom tried on all three pairs of socks, and I got to work grafting the toes. My stepbrother and his family showed up when I was nearly finished and my stepniece asked me what the socks looked like before I grafted them. I held up a skein of yarn and her eyes went wide with amazement and she gave a big grin. Future knitter? I finished up the last couple of toes, then the socks all went outside for their photo shoot.

Pair #1 with its banded colors reminds me of a snakeskin:

Pattern: own
Yarn: Austermann Step; 75% wool, 25% nylon, contains aloe and jojoba oil; color 01
Needles: size 2

Pair #2 looks like army camouflage to me:

Pattern: own
Yarn: Regia Stretch Color; 70% wool, 3% nylon, 7% polyester; color 88
Needles: size 2

I actually took several photos of each pair, against varying backdrops, but the lawn photos turned out best in each case, so you’ll need to see pair #3 against green, too. Ah, Trekking, with its lovely gradual and blended color changes:

Pattern: own
Yarn: Trekking Pro Natura; 75% superwash wool, 25% bamboo; color 1603
Needles: size 2

I hope you are not tired of socks yet as I have one more to show you. Mr. MmmYarn drove part of the way so I worked on my sock in progress in the car, but I am still working out some kinks in my design, making for slow work. The sock came to knitting group tonight. Now you see it:

Now you don’t:

Sigh.