Socks

David asked me why, if I loathe handwashing so much, I keep knitting him socks that he wears once and then sit on the top of the washer for six months. It is a very, very, good question.

I've decided that unless I find a luxury sock yarn that absolutely MUST be made into a pair of socks, all my socks from now on will be made of superwash wool.

When I planned to knit all my California family socks for Christmas last year I determined to make it as easy as possible on them, so all my Christmas knitting was superwash. Knit Picks is my friend - all these socks were knitted with Stroll I ordered online and had delivered to my door.

From top to bottom these socks were for Lauren, Dad and Mom - Lauren's and Mom's I heavily adapted existing patterns and Dad's I kind of made up as I went along.

Fin's were my favourites. I'd been wanting to try doing something with Latvian braid and I found this pattern just about the time I was planning my Christmas presents. All the trim was done using bits from the other socks.

 I knit Ally's and Madie's socks using a basic sock pattern but added an eyelet cuff (cause I love eyelet) and did duplicate stitch on the heels for their initials. I couldn't get the colours to come out quite right in the photos - Ally's are a little more purple and Madie's are a really vibrant hot pink.

 By the time I got to Cedric's socks I was running late so didn't initial his heel. However, I don't think anyone's going to be confused about whose socks these are.

Over the winter I did manage to coordinate our church's Homeless knitting project and we ended up with over 200 donated items (some handmade, some bought) - here are a few of them.

One lady brought all hers in individual ziplocs with hand-written notes inside, which I thought was a nice touch.

 For the rest I printed little labels and attached them with a bit of scrap yarn.

 Since Christmas I've only knit one pair of socks for David (no pictures yet) and one sock out of a pair for me. I loved Fin's so much I found another pattern with Latvian braid and am doing myself a pair in purples.

I have a long-ish list of requests, including a knitted viking helmet/beard from Lauren which I was hoping to have done for his birthday, but I'm so far behind it may have to be a Christmas present. I'm also commissioned to knit Evie's young man, Greg, a Jayne Hat but his birthday's in October so I have time to get to that one (this request deeply satisfies the geek in me).

So, that's my knitting for the last few months. I'll try and get pictures of David's new socks (superwash for the win). I have a flight to California coming up next week so hopefully I can get the second sock of my Latvian pair done then and pictures up soon.

Wendy

Knitting Update - September 2013

It occurred to me recently that I haven't written much about knitting for a while. This is mainly because I haven't done a lot of knitting for a while. Not sure why. Partly this summer was just so hot and sticky that wool didn't hold its usual allure for  me. Also, there was so much going on this summer - both good and bad.

In May the sump pump failed and our basement flooded. We got someone in to rip out the soaked carpet and put in dehumidifiers and fortunately our home insurance paid for this (although, unfortunately, not the cost of a new sump pump). Just when everything dried out we had monsoon-like rain again, and again came down to find water all over the floor. But this time it was coming in one of the basement windows (which is not covered by the insurance) so more carpet ripped up and more dehumidifiers. By the time we figured out why the water was coming in that window the basement had flooded a third time, and we had to pay for a third lot of carpet-taking-up and dehumidifiers.

Not long after the first flood David was away on a short trip and I popped out to the bank. As I was pulling up to the stop sign to exit the parking lot a woman coming from my left tried to pull up to the stop sign as well, without noticing I was there. She plowed into the front, driver's side corner and just seemed to keep going forever. Eventually she noticed she'd hit me and stopped her car - she had a dog in the back seat of her car so I assume it had distracted her because otherwise I can't see how she failed to see me. Her car was hardly scratched of course but my poor car was a mess. I had to really shove the door to get it open as the front panel was buckled.  We exchanged the usual information and she left, both of us thinking I'd just drive home and then contact a repair shop. Unfortunately, when I got back in the car and turned the key, absolutely nothing happened. It didn't even turn over. So I had to get the car towed and in the end it was in the shop for nearly two weeks. Fortunately the woman's insurance paid for everything, including a rental car, but it wasn't good timing at all.

Then our airconditioner failed - twice. During this hot, humid summer.

So not a lot of knitting over the summer.

I did make a fair number of baby things earlier this year for the Washington Adventist Hospital's baby unit.

A few of the hats (the super tiny ones are for the babies born too early)

A few of the cardigans - aren't they cute?

Squishy baby blankets

A close-up of the thermal stitch

A burial gown set

Most of these I knit with my very favourite baby yarn - Bernat Softee Baby - the softest, squishiest baby yarn I've found.

I did do some knitting while we were on vacation.  A pair of slouchy socks for myself from the Verdant Gryphon's "Bugga" I bought at the Maryland Sheep & Wool Festival in May and a lacy hat for Evie (she declared she doesn't wear socks) from the Miss Babs. The hat didn't take up a lot of the yarn so I still have more than half of it left to make something else.

I cast on a pair of socks for David while we were still in England but only finished the first sock about a week ago. I've cast on the second sock but haven't got very far with it yet.

Earlier in the year I bought enough wool to make David the knitted waistcoat from Jane Austen Knits and Evie has recently expressed a desire for a hooded scarf for when she's traveling this winter.

She also wants these -

(c) Ann Kingstone

 So I really need to get on that second sock and get them done.

Our knitting group at church has reconvened after the summer break and is re-starting our knitting for the homeless project. Last year we collected nearly 200 items so this year I'm hoping we can make it to 300. So now that it's finally cooling down I will hopefully have more on the knitting front to report later in the year.

Wendy

Knitting 2012

2012 was a funny old year knitting-wise. I really didn't get much done the first half of the year and the second half was mostly charity knitting with a bit of Christmas knitting at the end.

One of the charities I try and knit for when I can is "Mitts of Steal" on Ravelry. Fingerless mitts are knitted for patients on dialysis suffering from Steal Syndrome where the blood is diverted from the extremities, causing cold hands.  Mitts are fairly quick and easy to knit up and my favourite pattern is Susie's Reading Mitts - it's fast and very pretty.

This was my first pair, made in 2011:

During the Olympics this summer we were challenged to see how many pairs of mitts we could make during the games so I knit while we were on vacation and ended up with 4 1/2 pairs done during the actual games and the other 1 1/2 before and after (two of this pattern, 3 more simple ones and one colorwork pair).  This project was particularly good for stashbusting.

When we got back from England I started a new job, which has been very challenging, and didn't have a lot of time or energy to knit much until toward the end of October.

During the summer we transferred our membership to Sligo Church in Takoma Park. There are a lot of Adventist churches in the area and we visited a few of them but we felt the most at home at Sligo, partly because it felt the most like Newbold. Not surprising as the college is right next door.  One of the other things that attracted me in particular was its emphasis on ministry. I wanted to get involved in the church and in outreach and I thought of a way to combined my passion for knitting with my desire to give back to the community so I contacted the pastors and suggested a project knitting for the homeless for Christmas. They were interested immediately so we made announcements in church asking for knitters and crocheters to make hats, scarves and mittens in time for Christmas, and also asking for donations of unused yarn. It took a couple of weeks for things to start moving but once they did - wow!

We started getting bags of donated yarn and knitted/crocheted items left in the atrium of the church every week. I started a knit night on Wednesdays in the church and had people coming to learn to knit or crochet just so they could work on this project, including several students from the college next door. By the 22nd of December, when the items were given out at a soup run in downtown DC, we had collected more than 150 hats, mittens and scarves. I totally forgot to take pictures of the items I made but one of the pastors took this picture of some of the donations piled up on a table.

(c) Debbie Eiseley

This year I plan to start earlier and hopefully we can get to 300 donations!

I didn't knit a lot for Christmas this year. I did mittens for the nieces and nephews in California, which turned out really well, although I made Cedrics up as I went and it is a little wonky, but he loves elephants and is only 3 so I wasn't too worried.

I made another pair of socks for David. I actually started these in the airport in Cairo on the way home from Egypt in March but at some point in the summer one of the socks got felted in the wash and I didn't get around to finishing the replacement until December. So he has a pair of lovely cashmere blend socks.

 David had his overcoat and scarf stolen while he was in Chicago. He hung them up in a restaurant while he was there and when he went to leave the coat and scarf were gone! When he told me I immediately bought some yarn to make him a new scarf, although the original scarf turned up at the restaurant just before he left for the airport. Sadly not the coat though.  The first red scarf I made him was a bit lacy, in a manly way, and he liked it but complained that when it was really cold the wind came through the holes, so this time I made him a really thick cabled scarf that the wind will never make it through. This was my first real cabled project and it took a couple of weeks of pretty steady knitting to get it done. It's about five feet long and reversible. I'm quite proud of this really.

These were for Evie. As a juggler, huge fan of Labyrinth and David Bowie fangirl, I knew I had to make them for her. This first picture is of the palms and the second is of the backs. I'm pretty proud of these as well. I do love colorwork.

I bought this yarn to make myself a scarf just because I loved the colors but as I was knitting it just kept calling out a friend's name, so I ended up giving it to her for Christmas. I may buy some more of the yarn to make myself a scarf though, because I still love those colors.

So that's my knitting for 2012. Coming soon - Sligo's New Knitting Project or, How Much I Love Knitting With Baby Yarn.

Knitting Update September 2011

Finished Objects

I've been a very busy girl this month - I've finished the Crow Waltz shawl and the socks for mom, knit four scarves, three pairs of fingerless mitts, a little princess crown and an octopus.

I'm so pleased I've finally finished the Crow Waltz shawl. I didn't have enough pins to block it properly so eventually I may reblock it but at the moment I'm pretty happy with it.  Here's a picture of it blocking and I'll try and get one of me wearing it.

 I've been knitting fingerless mitts for a charity that distributes them to dialysis patients, although Evie tried on a pair and decided she wanted one. Since she's headed back to chilly Reading next week I'll give her the black pair and knit up some new ones to replace them. I was really tempted to keep the purple ones but I have some yarn left so I'll make a pair for myself next.

(Evie was the hand model for these.)

I finished the Monkey socks at campmeeting but, as I feared, they were too narrow for Mom's feet. I had my purple socks with me and they fit her much better so we did a swap, and I'm now the proud owner of the blue & green Monkeys.

I was working on my pink bamboo Shale scarf while at campmeeting and it garnered much interest and requests for similar scarves so when I'd finished mine:

 I made one for Noely:

 (she just got it in the mail and loved it so I've asked for a picture of it on her)

And then one for Mom:

 (Shh, I haven't sent it to her yet)

I've also knitted a little princess crown and a scarf for charities through Ravelry, which I don't have pictures of at the moment, and crocheted an octopus for Evie's friend Claire, in California, as a thank you for picking me up at the airport in July.  Apparently she loves octopi.

I think he's pretty cute

What's on the Needles

So, at the moment I'm knitting a lace cowl for myself out of the Debbie Bliss Andes I made my slouchy hat out of last year:

It's going pretty fast so I should have it done by the end of the weekend, if not earlier.

I've also started a coat for Evie out of Ella Rae Classic worsted wool in a dark red, held double, which will be felted down to make a kind of pirate-y coat. It's knit on big needles (8mm) so it's going pretty quick, but I won't be able to felt it until Evie comes home for Christmas (to make sure it fits), so I'm not in a hurry with this.  It's stockinette, so fairly mindless knitting and I can work on it while I watch TV, although I do have to be careful that I take up both strands in each stitch - I do have a tendency to miss one every so often.

And finally, I've managed to block the pink cardigan:

The empty living room is perfect for blocking at the moment. I've brought up the spare twin mattress and covered it and a throw rug with sheets.

If I can get the cowl done before the weekend I'm going to make a start on seaming the cardigan up.

Hibernating

Nothing at the moment!

New Stash

Apart from the new yarn for Evie's coat and the commissioned scarves I've been mostly knitting from my existing stash.  I did make one "retail therapy" purchase when I was having a very bad day, of some gorgeous Malabrigo sock yarn, with which I'm going to make a lace shawl.  The colourway is "Velvet Grapes" and the name of the shawl is "Candy Shoppe".

What I've Been Listening To

Lot's more Agatha Christie - it really is the perfect knitting listening, entertaining without being too demanding.  I've also been listening to a fair number of the divine Phryne (rhymes with briny) Fisher books by Kerry Greenwood, also very entertaining. I've just seen that the ABC in Australia (the books are set in Melbourne) are making a TV series, so I'll have to keep an eye out for that.

I've downloaded some more knitting podcasts - still working my way through the 150-odd KnitPicks episodes - but have discovered a few more that I enjoy, including "Never Not Knitting".

What I'm Reading

Again, not a lot, although I have discovered a fun knitting/mystery series at the library by Sally Goldenbaum, set in a little seaside town on the East Coast of the States (Massachusetts I think, they visit Boston a fair amount).  There do seem to be several knitting/mystery series but this is the one I've liked the best so far.

Knitting Update July 2011

Finished Objects

Hufflepuff Scarf - Oct 2010

Because in the Harry Potter World I'm a total 'Puff.

Felted Tote Bag - Feb 2011

I crocheted the tote but it ended up so enormous that I threw it in the washer on the hottest cycle and it felted down to this perfect size.

Lacy Summer Socks - June 2011

I started these on the coach trip in Europe at the end of May and finished them on the plane to California in the middle of June.  They are Cookie A's "Summer Sox" pattern and were so much fun to knit up.

Stashbusting Bags for the Kids

And some charity knitting

Recovery Buddies

Handmade Especially for You 

and a random alpaca hat for a homeless charity

I've also knit about 8 cotton dishcloths but haven't bothered to take pictures of them.

What's on the Needles

As of this moment I'm a couple of inches into a second sock for mom.

These are Cookie A's "Monkey" socks and are looking good in the self-striping wool I'm using.  I started these at Mom & Dad's in June and will hopefully finish them in time to give them to her for campmeeting in a couple of weeks.






I'm also knitting an "Old Shale Scarf" from bamboo sock yarn and I love the way the self-striping is creating the wavy pattern in the scarf.

Hibernating

I haven't worked on my pink alpaca cardigan since I finished knitting it in the winter.  It just needs blocking and sewing up but I just haven't found the initiative to do it yet.

I finally started the "Crow Waltz" shawl in my beautiful "Old Maiden Aunt" yarns in April.  I knitted up the lace border and then picked up the 200 odd stitches to make the body but several inches in realised I'd been doing something wrong and had to frog back to the border.  Since then I've been too demoralised to pick it back up again.  I think I will take this to California with me later this month and make it my campmeeting knitting.

New Stash

I got money for my birthday and the very next day went to Muse in St Helena and blew it all in one go.

The bright pink with a hint of green is Zauberball sock yarn and I've been coveting this colourway since the first time I saw it.  Initially I thought I'd make a pair of socks with it but then I saw a picture of it make up into a Citron shawl and due to the semicircular shape it looks a bit like watermelon so I think I'll go with that.

The other two skeins are Manos Serena, made of baby alpaca and cotton and I just couldn't resist them.  One is a solid purple and the other a variegated purple.  I'm not sure yet what I'll make of them yet but in the meantime I'll enjoy petting them.

So thanks to Lauren and Fin for the funds, and Maria R-B for her excellent enabling!

What I'm Listening To
Mostly I've been listening to books on CD lately, rather than music.  Right now I'm alternating between Agatha Christie's "And Then There Were None", and William Gibson's "Spook Country".  I've also, belatedly, discovered knitting podcasts and have been working my way randomly through some of the ones I've found on iTunes. I particularly like the Knit Picks podcast as it's well produced and extremely informative and entertaining.

What I'm Reading
As I've been listening to books on CD I haven't done a lot of reading of actual books but at the moment I'm re-reading Laurie R. King's "The Language of Bees" before I read the sequel, "God of the Hive".

34 Kids sponsored! (and my first radio appearance)

We managed to get 34 children sponsors in a day and a half. Well, less than that really because at the end of Thursday we only had five or six sponsors. We got no new sponsors for the first two hours of Friday but we got more than 25 sponsors in the last couple of hours of Friday! I'd been wanting to sponsor a child but was finding it difficult to find $30 in our budget (everything is costing more than we'd thought here) so I arranged to volunteer two hours a month at work and the station would sponsor the child for me, and as a result Monika sat me down in the studio and interviewed me for a couple of minutes to show people that they could be creative with their giving. I should be getting the information about my little girl shortly - I let the Mission of Mercy guy choose a child for me because he knew which were the most needy. I do know she's from one of the countries in Africa most badly hit by the Aids epidemic. I'll keep you posted.

Lovin' my job

I think I've finally got my head around all the things I need to do and have started to relax into the whole thing and enjoy it. I love being able to listen to music while I work and I'm starting to have favourites I listen for as I work. There is an absolutely gorgeous version of "Amazing Grace" which plays at least every couple of hours. I've put a link in at the left for anyone who wants to see our website and listen to the music. It is wonderful to have a job which I feel makes a difference to the world in some small way.

Next week we are going to be doing some fundraising for "Mission of Mercy" which sponsors children at risk in third world countries - there is a link from The Candle's homepage or you can visit it here. It is only $30 a month to change a child's life.