July 2007

...And Flame Off

Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Wow! I did it: I finished another pair of socks in just four days. The Flame Wave Socks are the fastest pair I've ever knit. Cast on Friday morning, cast off Monday evening. The 2007 FO page has my comments on the pattern and yarn I used.

Also on the FO page: Bottom Line for the Blueberry Lattice socks as well as links to other sock patterns that have a lattice-type cable motif. (Check the sidebar on the right).

Tomorrow is the official launch day of Sockdown: Ravelry. I think I'm going with lace.

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Flame On!

Saturday, July 28, 2007

I must be delusional to cast on yet another pair of socks just a few days before the Sockdown starts. But these are knitting up amazingly fast so I think I just might make it.

The pattern is Flame Wave Socks by Ann Budd from the book Favorite Socks. The yarn is one of the cones my mom bought from Apleks in Estonia. (Looks like their website is up and running again.) It's supposed to be superwash merino but it feels coarse and, umm, shall we say rustic. It's somewhat splitty because it's very loosely plied 2-ply and it knits up quite unevenly. Come to think of it, it reminds me a lot of Finnish Novita Florica. I wonder if they have the same base yarn?

Ooh, Brenda has a new episode out!

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A Very Socky Year

Thursday, July 26, 2007

I've been slacking with the Summer of Socks 2007 updates lately. How come it's taking me so long to finish a pair?? It's not like I have any excuses, like reading the last Harry Potter book. I'm still waiting for my pre-ordered copy to arrive from Amazon. (No spoilers, please!)

Anyhoo, here comes: Blueberry Lattice socks are finished! I'm really happy with how these turned out. The yarn is yummy and soft, and the socks fit perfectly. I shouldn't have doubted the pattern re: ankle increases. More pics on my FO page. (And I promise to write up the Bottom Line later -- I don't feel inspired to do that right now.)

This is why I love toe-up socks: no leftover yarn. :)

SOS2007 isn't even half-way through and I'm already getting jazzed up about other sock-alongs. If you're a sock knitter and on Ravelry, check out the Sock Knitters Anonymous group. And if you're not yet on Ravelry, I'm convinced it'll be open to public in a few weeks and then everyone can join. Starting in August 2007 (yikes, that's in five days!), SAK is hosting not one but two overlapping sock-knit-alongs that last a full year. That's a lot of sock knitting, folks.

That first one is called Sockdown: Ravelry. Every month, participants choose a sock patterns that fits in with the month's technique or designer. For example, in August you can choose either a lace pattern or a design by Sockbug; in September, a toe-up pattern or a design by Grumperina, and so forth. If you finish by the deadline date, you get to participate in the monthly price drawing of sock yarn... what else! :D

Now, here's where it gets a little complicated. The second sock-along is a part of Sockdown: Ravelry. It's called the Magical Mystery Sock Tour, and it doesn't actually start until November. Every other month from November 2007 onwards, one of the monthly choices is a mystery sock pattern in the same vein as the very popular Mystery Stoles. I guess we'll have the mystery clues in four parts, one per week. The first mystery designer is Mona Schmidt, and judging by her previous designs, I think there's some lacy socks in store. :)

Intrigued? Check out the post Sockdown & Mystery Tour explained.

Just one more thing (channeling Columbo): Interweave Knits Fall 2007 free patterns are out and... five of the six total are socks! :) Take that, people-who-say-sock-knitting-is-dead. I don't personally know who these people are but I've heard rumors. Now, must start swatching for the Sockdown...

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Out of Town, Out of Touch

Thursday, July 19, 2007

I spent the last few days visiting my parents back home, and now I feel completely out of the loop of what's been happening in the knit blogging world. :P

Knitting-wise, there's been some progress (yay for me!). I finished the cabled purse late Saturday night since I wanted to take it with me on the trip. It turned out pretty neat and I found these really cute antique looking metallic buttons. Check out the mods on my FO page. I'm still re-considering the handles -- should I buy two more buttons and attach the handles at the sides (like in Aurora) instead of just the two ends?

I also worked on my lattice socks a bit. I turned the heels, finished the heel flap on sock #1, and got about half-way through the second heel flap on the 3.5-hour car drive to my parents. Started on the cuffs late Sunday night. They're a little loose around the ankles because the pattern has you increasing 10 sts immediately above the heel. I'm not sure it was the wisest decision but I think it'll even out once I reach the calves. Unfortunately it was too hot to knit on the car on the way back so that's about how far I got.

Speaking of socks, my brother's new puppy (not really, she's a year-and-a-month old already) took a liking to my Monkey socks. She snatched them from my bag and started carrying them around. :D I had to hide them from her before any damage occurred. Here's said puppy playing a tug-of-war with my bro on another sock. Apparently, she appreciates hand-knit items.

On Monday, we went to a large shopping district a couple of hours' drive away. There was supposed to be a crafts/yarn store in the area but they'd apparently closed down... without bothering to update their website or even to remove the sign by the side of the road. The department store carried only the same yarns you get everywhere around here so no vacation S.E.X. for me. :(

I did score some yarn, though. My mom had bought me three generous cones of Estonian sock yarn from a shop called Apleks (whose website used to be at www.aplekstekstiil.com but seems to have disappeared now) from their trip to Tallinn, Estonia. It feels a bit scratchy even though it's supposed to be 100% superwash merino. Can't wait to see how it knits up -- I've been looking for a wine-colored yarn to do Clessidras in and this might be it.

Off to catch up on the gazillion unread posts I have waiting on Google Reader and Ravelry forums!

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Beadilicious

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Summer vacation!

I started my four-week vacation on Monday and have taken a short break from sock knitting. Not that I've gotten bored with them, far from it, but I've been busy with other stuff.

Last weekend, I hung out with my friends barbecuing, watching bad movies, and playing board games. I did have my sock knitting with me, did a couple of rows... and ended up tinking back those rows because I had continued the stitch pattern on the wrong row. D'oh.

I finally got down to trying my hand in stitch marker making. I'd ordered some frosted stars...

...and some purple hearts and seed beads.

The lady had also included three glass butterflies gratis and I made 2 of those into stitch markers as well. (Sorry for the shaky-hand picture quality.) I'm not very handy at making them, and I suck especially in tugging in the end of the wire so that it won't snag the yarn. The largest ring size the shop carries is 5 mm, which I can fit on my sock needles but nothing larger. For the frosted stars, I ended buying some 8 mm rings from the fishing department of a department store. :D I guess they're used for lure making.

I haven't completely abandoned the blueberry lattice socks, though. They're knitting along quite swimmingly and I'm enjoying the pattern and the yarn. Gusset increases are finished and I'm ready to turn the heel.

Also, the cabled purse is being blocked. I didn't want the garter stitch straps in the original pattern (wouldn't they stretch?) so I'm improvising some magic-looped tubular handles that have button holes at each end (à la Aurora). I also want some pockets inside for my cell and other assorted knicknacks. I did take some pics but they turned out like crap, so, no pics. A little teaser: I found some really nice buttons for the handles. :)

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Mail Day

Thursday, July 05, 2007

I have one of those slit-in-the-door letterboxes where you can barely squeeze a Sunday newspaper through. I have to stalk the mailman if I'm expecting a package -- otherwise he'll just leave a note that says come and pick up your stuff at the post office (which is really not that far away but hello? I'd rather have stuff delivered to my door. ;)

Tuesday morning, I'm running late for work. It's already past 08 when I hear a rattle at the door. Sure enough, it's the mailman and did he have some pretties for me!

First off: my Lime & Violet order! (WARNING: Site may cause screaming credits cards and short-circuited keyboards.) From Miss V's Dancing with the Yarns series, Merengue (which is more purple and less pink in real life) on the left and Seven Veils on the right. Yummy... There was also a card from Miss V (thank you!) and this hilarious note from AdMinnie:

Wait, there's more! (Yes, I splurged a little.) I've had these three books on my wishlist for ages. Like I needed any more stuff for my Raverly queue which, by the way, is already 4 PAGES(!) long.

OK, enough with the confessional. I have a FO to report in, too: the Midsummer Monkeys are finished -- and I'm wearing them right now. :) I'm still not a great fan of the color but it works quite well in the stitch pattern. You should've seen my swatches... or maybe not. The socks are a little snug, especially around the calves (that just means I have to work out more, haha). They're also a bit itchy but I can't usually wear wool against my skin so that's normal. But, they haven't been washed or blocked yet, so I'm hoping I can stretch them out a bit and make 'em softer.

I also cast on for the second pair of SOS2007 socks. The yarn (Trekking Pro Natura) is this yummy mix of blueberry, blackberry, and steely blue. It's a wool/bamboo blend and although it's not super soft on the ball, it's got this subtle sheen when knitted up. It's softer but also thinner than the Hot Socks I used for the Monkeys and the color is so soothing. I'm using sock pattern no. 100-19 from Garnstudio DROPS, which has a cute cable lattice on the instep and three 3-by-3 cables in the back of the foot. The yarn looks like it's self-striping but it's pretty tone-on-tone so I'm hoping it won't completely drown out the cable pattern. We'll see how it goes.

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About Those Monkey Mods

Wednesday, July 04, 2007

When I mentioned on Flickr that I tweaked the Monkey stitch pattern to fit my feet better, Maia Spins asked me whether I re-wrote it for toe-up. It's not as much as a re-write as me mashing up different patterns as I went along. :D Here's what I did (or, what I think I did cause godforbid I should write anything down):

Toe

Cast on 12 sts on a circular needle using the Turkish Cast-On. Increased to 30 sts on instep and sole (60 sts total), and worked in stockinette until toes were covered (about 6 cm).

Stitch Pattern

I prefer the way the stitch pattern looks when done cuff-down, when the "branches" flow downwards. So, the first thing I did was to try to reverse the stitch pattern to have the same cuff-down look, only doing it toe-up. Didn't work: it ended up looking like cat yak. The stitch pattern just didn't have the same flow as Cookie's original. But, judging by the comments on Wendy's (of wendyknits.net) post on June 25, many, many people have tried it and failed. Sarah has a detailed, analytical post of why it can't be done. The chart refuses to be reversible. (And I'm sure now Wendy's just going to whip out a perfectly flowing toe-up Monkey chart. :P)

So, the stitch pattern can't be reversed. I still had to tweak it, though, since I had 60 sts instead of the 64 in the original pattern. (On hindsight, the socks are slightly snug so I think I could've been just fine with the 4 additional stitches. Oh well.) I needed a 15-stitch repeat instead of 16 sts so what I did was take out 1 st on each of the "branches" and added a column of purl stitches in the purl triangles/wedges. The original stitch pattern is symmetrical so my mod is slightly off-kilter. It's only by 1 st, though, so it's hardly noticeable.

The above chart was created with Jacquie's totally awesome Java KnitChart. Give it a whirl! Kara has created a symmetrical 12-stitch mini-Monkey chart. See, she didn't reverse it either! (Huh, what's with the exclamation points?)

Heel

Instead of trying to do the heel backwards, I substituted for the Revisited Widdershins heel (which I looooove). Started gusset increases when the sock was about 7.5 cm (3") less than the length of my foot -- that's about 16 cm for me. Followed the chart numbers on the row for 30 sts (duh) and increased to 52 sts total. Then just placed markers, turned the heel, and did the heel flap per instructions.

Cuff

I continued in the lace pattern on instep stitches. The stitch pattern was in mid-repeat after the heel so I did a few rows of stockinette on the heel/back stitches until I hit row 1 again in the pattern. After that, it was pretty straightforward. After 8 repeats in stitch pattern (that's about 24 cm from the sole), I hit the point where my calves begin. Incresed 2 sts on the back needle on row 1 of the stitch pattern, then worked to the end of the repeat in a slightly wonky pattern. Then increased 2 sts again on row 1 of stitch pattern on back needle -- now I had two 17-stitch repeats on the calf that were like the original stitch pattern plus that extra purl column. Worked to the end of that repeat so I had a total of 10 pattern repeats in the cuff. Based on the yarn I had left, I decided I'd better start the twisted rib. I got slightly more than the 1" of ribbing but that was OK. Then did my favorite stretchy bind-off (last one on the page)... and almost ran out of yarn on sock #2! The stretchy bind-off uses more yarn so I had to do a regular bind-off on a few stitches to be able to finish. When the socks were bound off, there was a tiny bit, maybe 3 cm of yarn between them. I should've taken a pic, darnit. So, that was a close call. :)

The Monkeys are nearly finished now. All I have to do is weave in the ends and send a pic to SOS2007 "mom" Jessica so I can get my first point. Yay! I haven't had access to my main computer for the last couple of days so I'll post pics later.

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The Socks That Wouldn't End

Sunday, July 01, 2007

I've been frantically trying to finish my first pair of SOS2007 socks but the yarn just keeps going on and on and on. By now I can do the Monkey in my sleep! People have been turning in finished pairs left and right in the Flickr group, and the blog round-up for the first week is just overwhelming. So much sock-knitting going on! :)

The thing is, I'm determined to finish the entire ball of yarn on these socks. I could just decide that the cuff is long enough and bind off. But I'm not gonna because I'm sort of stubborn that way. I want to use the entire ball because 1) I want to see how much sock I can crank out of 100 grams, 2) I hate having leftover sock yarn, especially in this colorway (although it's growing on me), and 3) I want to make knee-highs someday and I'm curious to know how much yarn I'd need (see #1).

Usually I watch TV or movies while knitting but this weekend I've been listening to podcasts. Episode 51 of Cast On is out (*insert angelic choir*). I'd fallen behind on my Lime & Violet dose but I listened to six or seven episodes straight. Now I'm all caught up! I also started listening to Socks in the City which seems awesome. Love the vintage patterns!

Off to knit some more now. There's still a couple of hours of knitting time left this weekend.

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