Just Checking In . . .

Just to prove that yes, there is SOME knitting going on here, here are the socks I just did for one of my cousins, S. When her mom, K, got another pair of socks from me, she wailed, "Why does she get everything? I want some pretty socks, too!" Since no one except K has ever expressed any interest in anything I make, I was pleasantly surprised, and told S I would make her a pair. These are made from my tried and true standby, Opal. I love it - it wears like iron and to me it's always beautiful :-)

Here's some of my handspun - these are made of the Colonial I spun up awhile ago. The color is a little washed out - they are darker than they appear here. These armwarmers are based on the Highwayman pattern, but without the cables. The cables sucked all the stretch from the ribbing, so I went with just the ribbing and I love them. I've been wearing them all week long!

I'm still in the cast on a million projects mode, and I'm still blaming it on Knitterary ;-D

In the midst of the St. Patrick sweater (A Fine Fleece), I needed to just do something quick - thus, here's one Saxony sock. Also from A Fine Fleece, I thought this would be a nice, quick knit. It's going to K's other daughter, B, who, when she realized her sister was getting socks (and would have gotten this pair had they fit her) piped up with, "these fit me!" and so she's the next in line. Unfortunately I'm not too happy with this sock. You can probably see why - the biasing in the calf is quite bothersome, but B insisted that it didn't bother her - I think she was enamored of the Celtic knot :-) I've had some trouble recently with biasing and I'm wondering if it has anything to do with the direction in which I wind the yarn off the swift, or if it was just this seed stitch calf . . . anyway, this is Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock in the Iris colorway. This yarn has an almost cottony feel to it - really doesn't feel like wool to me at all. It's pretty, I just wish it wasn't pulling so hard. We'll see how it goes with the other sock.

And here's another sock I started. This is the first of Wendy Johnson's Spring Fling Socks. This pattern was written by Wendy for The Loopy Ewe's 2008 Spring Fling. It's written both toe-up (a Wendy specialty) and top-down. I went for top-down. The yarn is Yarn Nerd 900 MHz, in the Raspberry Sherbet colorway, from The Loopy Ewe. I am leaning more and more toward the semi-solids for socks with stitch interest. So much gets lost using variegated yarns for many patterned socks. Here's a closeup of the leg. I did not carry the diamonds down onto the foot, just put one in the middle there. I like how it looks :-) I'm on the heel flap of the second sock, so these will be done soon - and they are for me! A nice change :-)

So, not much is finished, but a lot is getting done, and my stash is getting smaller! And not just from knitting - one of my Iona sisters, Cheryl, was here last weekend. She had mentioned wanting to go to a yarn store, but I knew we weren't going to get the chance to do that, so I shopped my stash for her :-D And did you notice? It's two months today - I've been on the stash-busting wagon for two whole months! I've discovered that the longer I go without, the easier it is to say no to more yarn/fiber. For now, anyway ;-)