Cast On: Mood Indigo Sockhead Slouch

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With my Hippo socks staying in my purse these days I needed some simple stockinette in the dark knitting for my bedroom. A while back I picked up some elusive Voolenvine DK in a destash score.  The cashmere and muted colors were too good to wait so I decided this needed to be a hat. I decided on another sockhead slouch for the knitting in the dark factor. I managed to get started on the ribbing. I thought my tool tin was especially apt for this project!

I’m working the sockhead slouch pattern but as it’s written for fingering weight I am following the mods made by Yarn Hoarder aka Amberlindemann on her ravelry page. So far it is really looking promising!

The yarn is kind of pooling and striping ever so slightly. But I’m not very far in so I will just have to wait and see what this works up like. No matter what it will be butter soft and wonderfully snugly hat!

Happy Knitting!!

Twinning Heels

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My purse knitting has been fruitful! My Helping Hippos Vanilla socks both have heels now! These have seen many a waiting room and lots of windshield time.

Pssst….don’t worry the sock feet are the same number of rows. I just managed to snap a picture from some weird angle that makes one look bigger than the other. I guess perspective is a b*tch, lol.

Now I just need to cruise up the legs and finish the cuffs. I gotta love me some auto pilot stockinette in the round. It is my happy place lately.

Happy Knitting!!

Finally In The Round

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My Jellybean has been PATIENTLY waiting for his sweater. It’s a sport weight top-down raglan cardigan in his absolute favorite purple. But I have had trouble mustering the mojo to work on it.

I had trouble getting it cast on and it took two tries. I was making good progress until the rows were getting really really long. And the work is really bunched up on the cord of my needles. And I have been to busy (read: lazy) to get a longer cord from downstairs. I am ALMOST at the sleeve divide and thank god have gotten this thing to the point it’s in the round. So yay, no more purling!!

I really do love this pattern so far. The only thing I’m not wild about is the button holes. But I’ll reserve judgement until the buttons are installed. Either way Jellybean is really anxious to be able to wear this thing so I need to get to knitting faster!

Happy knitting!!

A Zipper Incident

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I had a hand knit meet with an unfortunate zipper accident. You guys…I zipped my Age of Brass and Steam kerchief into my coat zipper. And I broke the yarn! Got it right in an eyelet…

I was at work when I noticed the problem. And I could tell it was going to spread quickly. So I grabbed some waste yarn from my knitting tool tin that was close-ish to the scarf and started securing off the running stitches.

It was a little tricky because it was in an eyelet row. And I did lose a full eyelet hole in the process. But I was able to catch all the open stitches and anchor them to the next eyelet over. Is it perfect? No…but I guarantee that bunched up on my neck no one is going to notice. And if you are close enough to notice then you might just be too far in my bubble and get a little love tap as a reminder to back away, lol.

This was 100% my fault and I’m a little sad I messed up a beautiful knit but I’m super glad I could save it. Now it’s just a shawl with character and a good back story!

Happy knitting!!

Goodbye One Twisted Tree

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One of my favorite podcasts is Prairie Girls Knit and Spin with Danie and Susie. Danie is also the dyer behind One Twisted Tree….a fabulous indie dyed yarn. I was killing time on Ravelry at the dentist when I saw Danie post that she was going to discontinue One Twisted Tree. Her family life and health has changed over the last few years making it very difficult for her to manage both a family and her shop. So she is closing….insert tears here…

She posted that she was going to put her remainder of inventory on discount in her shop. And I needed purchase (okay…hoard) some of this yarn because her color sense is like a perfect match to me. I really don’t need more yarn but this was 100% an emotional purchase and my last chance to support a small business I loved.

I got some Prime Fingering in the Forest Floor color. This is a 75/25 merino nylon blend in fingering weight. And I have several green skeins kicking around in my stash that I’m seriously contemplating a Free Your Fade by Andrea Mowry next year.

I also picked up a skein of Lavish base in the Chaotic Neutral color. This is 100% merino at a DK weight. And almost assuredly going to be a hat or pair of mitts. Possibly for my sister next year for Christmas? Or I may just hoard this as a golden skein that makes me happy as a pet skein of yarn. Time will tell!

RIP One Twisted Tree!!

Speedy Speckles

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I need to catch you up on my Helping Hippos Vanilla sock progress! Thanks to some conference calls at work (PB is now full time daycare so I’m not juggling her at work anymore) and some road hours to visit the grandparents my socks have seen some decent progress!

The first sock I started now has a completed toe up gusset heel and is ready to zoom up the leg. The second sock has gained 3 inches of foot. You can seen my progress keeper and corresponding progress.

This three inches is the equivalent of both my children napping in the car for two hours on the way to the grandparents. So you know…basically finding a unicorn or the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow!

I’m very pleased with the first sock as the speckles really distributed themselves nicely both through the foot and throughout the gusset heel. With speckled yarn you really can never tell how it’s going to end up. But this batch appears to make a fairly uniform fabric and I’m pleased.

Happy Knitting!!

Washing Day

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In the never ending laundry pit that is my basement, I finally wore enough hand knit socks/cowls/shawls to warrant a washing day. I gently soaked and washed my hand knits in some wool wash and hung them out to dry.

My genius hack this year….wire hanging frames with clips for my socks! I’m able to hang my drippy woolens in safe area of the laundry dungeon and have them nicely clipped or draped to dry really quickly. I’ve had these hangers for years as I got them for my long gone craft fair display days. Why didn’t I think of this sooner? It takes up sooooo much less space than my clothes line method!

As you can tell I’m not terribly fussy about blocking my hand knit socks after washing. Do I care they don’t look as nice? Yes. But do I have the hours in the day or energy to address this….no. See yesterday’s post, lol.

Happy Knitting!!

My Life in A Nutshell

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Life has been a wee bit crazy lately.  It’s almost Christmas (I’m totally not prepared and I’m freaking out), it’s nearing year end for this accountant and since we met our medical deductible all the people in my house are seeing ALL THE DOCTORS FOR EVERYTHING WHILE ITS FREE.

This is all to lead me to a snap chat I sent to a dear friend from high school last week. The photo pretty much sums up my life right now:

  • Nursing and/or pumping breast milk for an insatiable 6 month old
  • Spending hours driving or waiting in my mom van
  • Knitting away on simple things in a few stolen moments in time here and there

I’d like to say I’m balancing everything. But pretty much I’m just hanging on for dear life and making sure no one is hungry or naked. Anything after that is icing on the cake.

P.S. Having a 4 year old boy….the not naked thing is REALLY hard some days. Why does he hate pants so much?? It’s winter IN KANSAS….its cold!!

Happy Knitting!

Re-Swatching Because Swatches Lie

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Earlier this week I had talked about making a second gauge swatch but this time with stripes. Seriously glad I did…because my tension changed while working stripes!! Using this yarn and my needles and making stripes got me a LOT closer to pattern gauge. This means my first spreadsheet math would have had me make a WAAAY to big of a sweater. This washed and blocked swatch only has me go up 1/2 to a whole pattern size. Glad I checked before I had most of a sweater done.

This time I had some better light so I took some better pictures. I am still leaning towards the wrong side of the striping. And I think I’m going to mix and match the single and double garter ridge stripes in some sort of pattern. Stay tuned…

Happy Knitting!!

WIP Wednesday: Helping Hippos Vanilla Socks

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Thanks to some recent car travel time and my children not being COMPLETELY insane. I managed to work a fair bit on my Helping Hippo Vanilla socks!

The sock on the right is the first one and it’s ready for the gusset heel. I didn’t have my heel notes handy and I didn’t have a stitch marker either but I still had quite a ways to go on our drive. So I put those aside and started the sock on the left. I mean…I can’t not knit while in the car right?

I’m really pleased with the speckles and finding it hard to put them down!

Happy Knitting!!