Tag Archive | handknits

WIP Roundup

Mar4

We are four days into the new month and I’m making good progress on two new WIPs. I had to cast on a new sock of course, and I cast on for the Blogville Water shawl KAL. Last night I made it to the end of the first garter stitch section and I’m ready for the first short row section. Before I dive into that, though, I need to make sure I know how to do the special stitches. Hopefully I can get into that tonight!

But I also have new things on deck! With warmer temperatures arriving, I’m discovering that shortie socks are my favorites for spring, and I only have four pairs. That’s not nearly enough, so I dipped into my bag of leftovers for a couple of little balls and I’ll cast these on later today. The rainbow yarn is my happy mail from today and my first yarn from Desert Vista Dyeworks! It’s Rainbows Run the World with colors inspired by all the women we saw on Inauguration Day. Why do I have two skeins? I don’t know, I just loved it so much I wanted enough! I know one skein will be socks, maybe the other will become a cool cowl or something.

What’s your favorite non-sock thing to make with self-striping sock yarn?

It’s March! And Monday!

Mar1

Hooray hooray, it’s March today! That is happy because it means that spring is coming. We could very well still get another cold spell, possibly even some snow, but somehow it’s easier to endure in March than in February. Plus this is the girl’s birthday month and she will be coming home for a visit and that is also very happy. Another happy thing is that I did manage to finish that sock yesterday, adding one more FO to my February total. (No, I don’t know what the total is. More than two and less than 10, that’s all I got.) These are my Sorry Not Sorry socks from Hedgehog Fibres, with contrast yarn from Less Traveled Yarn.

The first thing you may notice is that one heel is solid pink. That’s the annoying thing about this sock. See, I had a 20g ball of that contrast yarn but once I got past the second cuff, I only had 5.5 grams left and I wasn’t convinced that was enough for a heel and a toe, and I wanted a contrast toe more, so I went the safe route. Of course then I got done and I’m pretty sure I could have done the heel too. Next time I do contrasts, I think I will weigh as I go so I know how much yarn each little contrast element takes.

Now it is March and I carried over only two WIPs, a lace cowl and the gradient shawl. That means I can cast on all the new things, right? I have to have a sock on the needles and I don’t think I can resist my newest yarn, from Kenyarn and inspired by the Ella Fitzgerald Barbie doll. But I am also ready and eager to cast on the Water shawl (Rav link) for the Blogville KAL that Alissa is running. My yarn isn’t very water-ish but it is the only two matching skeins of fingering in my stash and there’s no way I was buying new yarn for this, especially since this gorgeous yarn (from The Periwinkle Sheep) was waiting for a project.

I might also cast on for a hat for the husband, and maybe the cowl with the Woolfolk. I have all these project bags, I might as well put them to good use!

Happy March Monday, friends.

Final FO of February: Madness!

Feb28

Today is the last day of February and that’s a little bonkers — how did this month go so quickly?? I’ve got one more finished object to share, my Mad Mini Wrap, and there was a bit of madness there at the end!

That final color, the green, was just for the border, and when I got to where the pattern told me to bind off, I still had quite a bit left. I didn’t want the yarn to go to waste so I added a few more rows. Sadly, I misjudged the amount and I was about 3/4 of the way through the bind-off when I admitted to myself that I didn’t have enough yarn and had to unknit the bind-off and the last row. It’s done now, though, blocked and everything. Blocking definitely helped this one get to a wearable length, though it’s still a tad shorter than I usually prefer. The pattern is the Mad Mini Wrap (Rav link) and I used the same yarn, same colors used in the original design, the 5 mini-skein pack of Mad Hatter Sport from Frabjous Fibers in Mice in the Tea. I found the yarn quite delightful, all supple and bouncy, and the colors are gorgeous.

I was hoping I’d get my sock done before the end of the month too, but spent too much time yesterday doing stuff around the house, preparing for some renovations. A necessary evil, I suppose, but today is for fun!

FO Friday: Gray Socks

Feb26

The boy’s gray socks are finally done! I looked back and realized I started them three months ago. And while they are very long, they’re also very simple, just plain ribbing. I think it was the boring gray that made them take so long.

The legs are 10 1/2″ long and I knit to 8″ on the feet before starting the toes, so yeah, these are quite a big bigger than what I make for myself. But he put them on the next day and seems quite pleased with them, so I’d say it was worth it.

I’d have another FO to share, my Mad Mini Wrap, except I tried to use up all the green and lost at yarn chicken. So now I need to undo most of a bind-off and the last row. Darn it all.

The good news is that I’ll definitely get it done by the end of the month, taking me down to three WIPs that I’ll carry into March. That’s not bad at all!

Sock It To Me Monday

Feb22

I’m starting to think ahead to March, when I’ll be casting on a Water shawl (Rav link) in a knit-along with Alissa and a few others here in Blogville. It’s a two-skein shawl that might have a trick or two up its sleeve, so to get it done by the end of March, I know I’ll need to focus on it quite a bit. Though I know I can’t finish all my WIPs before then, I decided I needed to at least finish the boy’s gray socks, which have been lingering for far too long. If I don’t finish them soon, I’m afraid they’ll get lost forever! After working on it most of the weekend, I got all the way past the heel turn.

That’s a very long leg, I’ll have you know! And the foot will be equally long, I believe, or very close. So this week I just need to watch some good TV and movies and zip through this foot. What about you, are you hoping to finish a WIP or two by the end of the month?

FO Friday: Purple Lemonade Socks

Feb19

This might be the fastest pair of socks I have ever knit, and the only reason is because I love the yarn so much. I used my favorite Vanilla Latte sock pattern, so they were simple and easy to knit during work meetings, which might have helped. These took less than a week!

And they are already being put to use! We have sunshine and temps in the upper twenties, so I can wear my handknit socks again. When it was so bitter cold, I had to wear thinner dress socks with thick boot socks over to keep my feet warm. It feels so good to have just one layer of sock again, and to see such cheerful colors. I ended up with a good-sized ball left over, so I’ll knit some socks from the grey skein like this and then do a pair of shorties from the two balls of leftovers. I do love it when a plan comes together.

Happy Friday, friends!

FO Friday: Another Hinterland Hat

Feb12

I just can’t stop making these hats. I have a finished one that I think will be a gift, even if it is a beautiful beautiful purple hat. The red one might also be a gift, since I don’t wear red with my purple hair.

The purple is Malabrigo worsted that I rescued from another project a while back. I think it was another hat that I frogged? I don’t remember, but I’m glad I did because it’s so good for this pattern. And the red is… hmm, it might be from Show Me Yarn? It was already wound and the tag is somewhere still on the shelf in the stash. I’ll find it at some point. Anyway, the red might be my last Hinterland for a while. I think I’m ready to get back to all my WIPs.

Grace is feeling a bit peaky and the dishwasher is broken and the temperatures are going to be in the single digits for another few days, so that’s all super. But let’s look on the bright side: the repairman is coming today and I took Grace to the vet and should get bloodwork results today or tomorrow, and I have flannel sheets and Cuddl Duds. And aside from milk, I don’t know that we need much from the grocery store this weekend, so I might just continue hibernating with knitting and blankets and dogs. I know it’s been pretty cold in a lot of places, so I hope you all are staying warm!

Mistake? What mistake?

Feb9

No, I’m not even talking about yesterday’s mistake! I was working on a cabled hat on Sunday and realized my cables were messed up. Like, four out of five cables around the hat were wrong. Argh, right? How many of you would have frogged back, or gone super crazy and dropped the stitches down to fix the cables?

Yeah, not me. I decided the brim would cover most of the bad cables and just moved on. I am nowhere near advanced enough to want to attempt dropping cables back, and it just wasn’t worth it to frog and reknit. It’s a hat for me, and I know I’m never going to look at at sadly and say, “Ohhh, too bad I messed those cables up.” Especially since it ended up looking darn good!

My cable-novice brain is suggesting that I must have done a back cable as a front, see down there by the brim? But then the rest of the hat is good and it fits well and it will be colorful and cozy… if I ever need to go outside in these crazy single-digit temperatures.

Pattern is Hinterland Hat (Rav link), my new favorite, and yarn is Malabrigo Rios, my old favorite. I don’t think I’m done making these hats. They’re so good. Do you have a hat you knit repeatedly?

Sock It To Me, Monday

Feb8

Oh, Monday. I was on a Zoom call this morning, one where I didn’t have much to contribute, so I had a little bit of sock knitting with me. I’d brought up the second gray sock for the boy and I did three or four rounds before pulling out the first sock to check the cuff length. This is what I found.

It might be hard to tell for sure, but no, those cuffs do not match. My typical cuff is 2×2 rib so apparently when I cast on, I did that without thinking. And without remembering that I’d done 1×1 rib on the first sock! I know what you’re thinking: would the boy care? Would he even notice? The answer to both is probably not, but I frogged and started over anyway. If I’d been further along, I might not have, but I like ribbing, so having to re-knit this isn’t a big hardship.

I do have a positive sock update to share, though. I finally finished the first Sorry Not Sorry sock late last week and cast on the second.

I’m not completely convinced I have enough of my contrast yarn for both a heel and a toe, but I’ll worry about that later. I still have about five inches of ribbing to think about that. I really want to cast on some new socks, though. There’s something about solid-color socks that bores me. I’m ready for some stripes or speckles or something more exciting…like this:

This is Doors of January by Mint Rain Yarns. It’s inspired by The 10,000 Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow and if you haven’t read it, definitely check it out! It was one of the recent books from my book group and it’s unusual and strange and I loved it so much. I ordered the black mini-skein to represent doorways at the heels/toes; it’s not a perfect match for the black in the main yarn but it’ll work. I’m telling myself I need to finish my pink sock before starting this one. I wonder if I’ll make it!

New Cast-ons

Feb7

Are you cold too? It seems like Mother Nature just all of a sudden decided we needed a good blast of winter, so now we’ve got snow and highs in the single digits, and we’re luckier than the states farther north of us. It’s ridiculous. Tell me again why I don’t live somewhere with mild winters? Oh right, because then I wouldn’t have as much need for knitwear! My four donation hats have been washed and are drying, and I think I got a little addicted to casting on because I’ve since started two new projects.

For my own Hinterland Hat, I decided to go with teal and pulled out an already-wound skein of Malabrigo Rios. I think the color is Reflecting Pool? My other new project is a shawl I’ve been planning for months. The yarn is a five-skein Shades of Lilac gradient from Neighborhood Fiber Company that I bought at Yarn Social the first time I took Sarah there. It stayed in the stash for a while until I found the Walls (Circus) wrap on Ravelry, which seemed like the perfect fit. I wound the yarn at least three or four months ago but just never cast on, until now. This first garter section is a little boring but it’ll get a lot more interesting very soon.

Since it’s so stupid cold, today is a good day to just pull out all the WIPs and work a little bit on each one! No, I will NOT be watching football while I do it.