Monthly Archives: June 2019

FO Friday: MOA Shawl

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Drum roll please, my MOA shawl is blocked and ready for her close up!

Pattern: MOA (Mother-of-All) Shawl by Nick Davis

Yarn: MJ Yarns Simple Sock in the Mice and Men color

Needles: US 7

Mods: Had to alter the bind off to avoid yarn chicken. I worked rows 5, 6, 11, 12, 13, 19 and 20. And I made it with less than 3 yards!

This yarn base is made with 75% Corriedale Yarn and 25% nylon. It’s definitely not a merino like soft yarn. It has some tooth to it and I wouldn’t necessarily want a full sweater of this next to my skin…personally. But this yarn is a light fingering and just blocks and drapes BEAUTIFULLY.

Above is a close up of my modified bind off to account for that fact that I didn’t have the full 440 yards of yarn the pattern requests. Based on weight I had about 350 yards of yarn and I put all but 3 yard of that into this shawl. But I think modifications work and it really blends with the overall aesthetic of the shawl.

This really did block out bigger like I had hoped. As I talked about earlier I’m finding the one skein shawls, especially those triangle shaped, to be harder to style, wear and keep on all day long.  I’m finding my taste shifting to toward two and three skein projects these days. But I started this in 2017 before I made that pivot so I’m going to give myself a little grace here.

I’m glad to finish a long languishing WIP and get a new shawl for my drawer. The pattern was easy and intuitive and I may well consider making it again but next time with two skeins worth of yarn instead of one and really go big with it. Now on to my next knitting adventure!

Happy Knitting

Cast On: Soft Serve Sock Snake Socks

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My sister has a June birthday and for the past couple of years I have made an effort to make her hand knit socks. She’s very knit-worthy as she lives in Colorado where it’s cold and she takes very good care of woolly items. But this year life with two kids just didn’t get me to a place where I could knit for other people. I really just wanted to take my time and knit for me as a self care theme.

But I talked previously about getting some sock snakes cranked by the dyer of MintRain yarns. So I cut off the first Felici snake in the Soft Serve color and pulled a mini from my scrap blanket stash and went to town. I was excited to see how this would work and if I liked it.

For the toes I decided instead of using the contrasting mini, I just pulled back the sock snake a couple of stripes and then re-knit down decreasing for a toe. I personally like hte idea of less ends woven in near my toe region. I’m not super fussy about the feel of it but I like the idea of continuous yarn being stronger in a high wear area of the sock.

I obviously did not get these done in time for her birthday but I hope to have the pair done before she visits in July. Fingers crossed!

Blocking MOA

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My MOA shawl is finished and drying nicely on my alphabet blocking mats. Note: These were a good idea pre-kids. But it’s becoming increasingly difficult to keep their mitts off of the pieces when they are holding knitwear. But I digress!

As predicted I ended up playing yarn chicken and had to drastically alter the bind off section. I need to move my notes from the paper in my project bag and get them up on Ravelry. Theoretically it could help someone else…and make it less likely I will remember months or years down the road. And when I blocked it I used my blocking wires and really stretched this as much as possible to make the shawl as big as possible. I’m finding that one skein shawlettes, while beautiful, are just too small to style and keep on during the day.

I did find a SINGLE dropped stitch in my work AGAIN. That happened on my Kindness KAL 2019 shawl, grr. But I laddered it back to a good place and then use some waste yarn to secure it in place. It’s somewhere in the photo above but even I can’t see it anymore when I look at the right side of the work. I can’t wait for this to be dry and get some FO photos!

Happy Knitting!!

From Across The Pond

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Hi, my name is Rachelle and I’m a sucker for beautiful yarn and the creative people who dye it. I have fallen down the rabbit hole of watching Amy Florence’s Youtube Podcast “Stranded“. I am working my way through her back catalog and I succumbed to the wool fumes. So here is my pretty little skein that made its way to my stash from across the pond.

I bough a skein of her BFL nylon sock base in the Antagonist color to make myself a pair of socks. I haven’t worked much with BFL but word in the Knitti-sphere is that it is very hard wearing. And that intrigues me. And the color is just so gorgeous. It’s a grey base with little speckles and blips of pinks, greens, yellows and all kinds of loveliness.

I’m not sure where this skein will land in my current sock queue but for now I’m just going to pet the pretty and smell the sheepy smell. Maybe I can start a pair that I only work on when I’m binging her back episodes? Hmmmm, I’ll have to think on that!

Happy Knitting!!

World Wide Knit in Public Day 2019 (And A Little Stash Enhancement)

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I decided to participate in World Wide Knit in Public day on June 8th. I passed PB and Jellybean on to my husband and was like “peace out I’m going to the yarn store!” and ran away.  It was a wonderful couple of hours. I managed to sit and knit for a bit in the mall courtyard outside the shop but I neglected to take photos. But I did snag a photo of some sweet ice cream treats the yarn store owner was passing out to knitters.

Well I’m not sure if it was the chocolate high or the yarn fumes wafting out of the yarn store, but they were have a sale and I fell down in the Malabrigo section. I’ve been toying with the idea of knitting a worsted boxy to use a nicer sweatshirt in the fall and winter. Like a socially acceptable blanket I could wear and be comfortable and stylish. Jellybean always likes when I wear green so I bought six skeins of worsted to knit a boxy.

I got the Fresco y Seco color and its wonderfully tonally green and bits of yellow. Now I fully understand I’m going to have to alternate skeins to prevent pooling and lines where I would change skeins. I’m thinking about trying helical knitting that seems to everywhere on the podcast and inter webs here lately.

I have like four projects that I need to finish before I let myself cast this on. So this is almost like Wishful Knitting but here’s hoping it is at least near in the future!

Happy Knitting!!

FO Friday: Gonna Need Sunglasses Socks

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Ready for those sunglasses? Because here comes my finished Gonna Need Sunglasses Socks!

Pattern: My own 68 stitch toe up vanilla sock recipe

Yarn: Schachenmayr Regia Flourmania color in 7188

Needles: US 1.5s

Mods: None

I’m just so beyond thrilled with how well the two socks match. I don’t get hung up on them matching mind you as I like my socks to fit not match. But it is a nice happy occurrence when the do. A keen eye will notice that the cuffs are slightly different. I got a little excited to have a FO and started the ribbing earlier in the green on the second sock. I have tried both socks on and love to report they fit quite nicely. The foots may be one or two rows too long but not near enough to bother me or prevent me from wearing them. I’m a mom of two littles and thus I have become a lot less particular about my items as long as they are done and don’t look shabby.

I am now for sure going to turn my attention to my Dad’s Christmas present socks and get some decent progress on those done. But after that….I may have to turn my attention to my sock tubes that I recently procured and knock out some more FOs! I’m becoming quite the FO addict lately!

Happy Knitting!!

MOA Shawl Progress

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I made the decision to reboot my MOA shawl after unearthing it from my UFO bin. And I seem to be making good progress on it. I think I’m about to start my last regular body pattern repeat before starting the bind off section.

I’m really finding myself drawn to the yellow and brown combination. The subtle variegation really shows up well in garter, stockinette and the eyelets. Admittedly the eyelets really could benefit from blocking. But that will come in time.

I may be playing a tiny bit of yarn chicken as I have 350 yards of my MJ Yarns Simple Sock and the pattern calls for closer to 400. But I think there are some stockinette sections I can shorten to conserve yarn if I start to run out. Do you think this ball will last me?

Happy Knitting!!

Sock Snakes

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I was enabled once again by social media. Many moons ago I saw a post from an Indie Dyer called Mint Rain Yarns. I’ve knit her yarn and loved it. But she also has listed in her Etsy shop a listing for machine knit socks and sock tubes. This idea had been kicking around in my brain for months and I finally bit the bullet. I sent 300 grams of light fingering weight yarn to her from my stash with the plan to make them into tubes that I could add heels, toes and cuffs for some quick socks.

My sister is not a “stuff” kind of person and is hard to shop for. But living in Colorado she does appreciate hand knits to keep her warm. My trouble is that given that I have two tiny human to keep alive and a paycheck I’d like to keep….my knitting time is small. And I’m constantly torn between knitting for myself and knitting for recipients. So I see this as a win win. I get the tubes knit and ready to go and I can still crank out a hand knit pair of socks without chewing up days or weeks of knitting time.

I sent her some Knit Pics Felici in the Dark Side colorway. Each 50 gram skein was cranked on its own with waste yarn in between. And this tube and all the other tubes are 72 stitches which is the stitch count I like my light fingering yarn worked up at. (Time will tell if the fit works out in the end…fingers crossed!)

Next up was more Felici in the Soft Serve colorway. Again in a 72 stitch count.

And finally I had some lolodidit yarn in the Hippo for Christmas colorway. This tube will probably be for me and likely the first up to be turned into socks.

I plan to experiment with these tubes to see what I can make out of them to maximize the yarn. I secretly hope I can get two pairs out of each colorway. Knowing that the second pair may very well be shorties. All in all, this Etsy vendor was prompt and her tubes came back to me in excellent shape and tension. If this works out as well as I hope…I may be ordering more snakes in the future!

Happy Knitting!!

MOA Shawl Rebooted

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I had one project that made it through the Finish or Frog It round last week. And that was my MOA shawl. Those long time readers may or may not remember that I cast this one in November of 2017 and then it got cast carelessly aside so that I could pursue Pigskin Party glory. (Note: I won nothing in that particular KAL that year!)

I so hastily set this project aside that I left in the MIDDLE OF A ROW! I quite literally never let myself do that. But apparently it was a thing for me in 2017. But past Rachelle was kind to current Rachelle and I had been making tic marks on a printed pattern that I left in the project bag. I quickly ascertained what row I should be on and knit the rest of the tow. But seriously guys….I had like 25/26 stitches left in 2017…why didn’t I finish that???

Nevertheless, I shall persist. This is quite possibly going to be my lunchtime/conference call knitting this month. I’d really like to see if I can turn this into a FO and be ready for fall. These nice golden brown neutral colors should be a nice addition to my wardrobe. Presumably this is why I bought this yarn, lol

Happy Knitting!!

Coordinating Accessories

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My Kindness accessories are complete! Below you can see my Kindness KAL 2019 Shawl, my Kindness Mitts and my Kindness Double Brim Hat.  These beauties used three golden skeins of Hedgehog Fibers Merino DK from my stash.

This all started with my Mothers Day Cast on and I was addicted I couldn’t stop knitting this yarn! Now they all just need to be washed and tucked away for the 100+ degree Kansas summers and wait patiently for Fall.

Don’t you just love when a plan comes together! Plus they make my eyes look blue, lol. Happy Knitting!!