Knits

Oy this week has been rough. I think the lack of doing much of anything in California did not help. It always kind of sucks going that far, actually relaxing and resting, only to come back feeling slightly relaxed and rested and then battle jet lag. The weather isn’t helping either. It’s been really windy all week — every morning I cycle into 20-30 mph winds and after two weeks of barely moving (ah, America), it was a bit rough. And last night on the way home, in the dark and rain, I got a flat tire barely a third of the way home. Bah.

I have done a teensy bit of knitting. I finished up a second pair of those wristlets — will have to get a photo tomorrow — and will start the third pair tonight, maybe. The original pair has stalled as I ended up ripping back the two straight rounds and still don’t have enough to do the picot bind off. I know I could do a regular bind off and rip back the finished one and do the same, but I think the picot edge reflects the ruffled look of the other end and a flat bind off would look odd. Anyway, I’ve managed to source some more of the discontinued yarn (even though I only need a few metres).

This weekend sees me heading up to Manchester for 24-hours. I’m attending a charity pub crawl… with 199 other people. Oh. Dear. Lord. At least there will be some knitting time on the ride up… knitting on the ride back down may not prove fruitful.

The new Knitty is meh. I like Ice Queen and Jeanie, but not in a must-knit way. Dahlia and Abontanicity are cute-ish, but would look goofy on me. And I’m sorry, but the Kilt Hose bug me simply because of the inaccurate historical description of Irish kilts and the designer’s Irish heritage and her father owning two kilts because of his Irish heritage. The Irish never wore kilts. Also, in the picture the model is wearing a Utili-kilt and those things make my head explode. They are so stupid looking.

But did you see the new Knit on the Net? The Little Black Dress is awesome. Will I knit it? Doubtful. But I think Gudrun Johnston is a designer to watch.

How about some new to me patterns? Okay!

• Aquaphobia socks from knitfreak — apparently good for those handpainted yarns that pool.
• La Digitessa from Yarnissima — available on its own or as part of a kit with an exclusive colourway
• Several of the patterns in Knitalong are cute (here’s the Ravelry project page)
• Dizzy from Berroco — simple spiral, eyelet hat
• Unbiased scarf from SavannahChik — looks like it’s knit on the bias, but it’s not.

Okay, so I actually wrote this post when I got home then because of a squiffy belly I’ve had off and on all week, I went to bed after a dinner of toast and ginger ale at the wild and crazy hour of 8pm knowing full well that I wouldn’t sleep through the night. So it’s now 230am, I’ve been up since midnight and I think I might just try going back to bed now as I’ve got to pack and catch a train in the morning. I’ll have to add in other links and stuff later.

Photos are from the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles. Gorgeous building — go see it.

That’s Durham Castle & Cahtedral from a bridge over the River Wear in the city centre if you’re keeping track. (Note it’s about 9pm in that picture!)

We finally had gorgeous weather this weekend. The constant rain and grey skies let up. So what did I do? Absolutely nothing. Well I did some stuff, inside. Since I had nothing I had to do in town, I was never able to make the effort to step outside further than my front porch to put some things in the recycling bin and into my back garden to hang laundry and snap some pictures of the few things that are actually flowering. I feel a bit lame not going for a walk and only basing going outside on the need to actually do something regardless of if that something involved me spending money on something I probably don’t need, having lunch or coffee, visiting the museums, or simply sitting outdoors in a green space and knitting. I just couldn’t find the motivation for it! I was actually pretty content just sat in my flat with my cats by my side: knitting, watching some films, listening to music (I dug out some old CDs), and today, having a nap. I guess being away from home for 3-days made me want to be a home body today.

Saucy is just under three repeats from being done so I might even knock that out tonight. Much of the weekend was spent catching up on my blog reading as I recently have added a number of new blogs (knitting and non-knitting alike) and I’m adding more. What are your three favourite blogs out there to read — regardless of content?

In all this blog reading I’ve found a handful of things to share. You may have seen all of them or most of them because they aren’t new (I tend to read back through archives and just click about on a new page and see what I find).

• A short-row dishcloth (pattern here in .doc) that’s rather cute and may be a good project to do after I’m done with Saucy. It’s called the 4 Corners dishcloth from 1870 Pearl — be sure to look at her Reader’s Gallery of cloths.
• From The Yarn Miracle, Haystack socks (scroll down — pattern here in PDF) which are billed as socks for the “uncooperative colo(u)rway”. It looks like a good choice for a highly variegated yarn much like the Flutter-by socks.
• Some very cute knitted toys (pattern here in .doc) — some of which are very similar to what the creator, Jezzeblog, sells on Etsy.
• The Walker Treasury Project — while I don’t actually own any of the books from Barbara Walker’s series, this site is beautiful and inspiring.
• And if I sewed, I’d so be on this project because it’s so damn cute — Dishtowel totebags from What’s THAT gonna be?. I don’t really carry totebags around, but at the same time, I’ve recently become obsessed with them because of all the really cute patterns and their relative inexpense.

I’m completely linked out now. Heh. Off to have some pizza, finish up the wine, and hopefully finish up Saucy. Hope you all have had a great weekend.

These are done. I’ve even written up the pattern in two formats. Further details can be seen in the finished object post or in the full pattern (see below).

They only need a wash before they’re sent off to my Sockapalooza pal on 2nd August. I think I can manage.

Download the full pattern or the chart-only if you’re more experienced.

This is the first pattern I’ve ever written up. If you come across any errors or are confused by anything, please let me know!

For other insect-related socks, watch out for Domesticat’s Drunken bee socks which have a very pretty heel.

Edited to add
First, thanks for all the positive comments on the socks. It’s really appreciated!

Second, I’ve just had a look at the PDFs again and noticed two errors - one in the caption for the images for making the flutter-by (and the number of times I proofed these! Argh!) and one in the chart. Something happened with the chart when it was converted to PDF. I have now updated the PDFs so that they are correct. Apologies for the inconvenience.

And if you do decide to knit these socks, please let me know and send along a picture as I will start a gallery for them!

Well, if you own the Vogue Stitchionary: volume one - knit & purl and were a bit annoyed that a list of patterns wasn’t included, well you’re now in luck - the nerd that I am has created both an alphabetical list of all 265 stitch patterns, but also lists by the four chapters in the book. I was going to really go nerdy on you and do a proper index - you know, with categories like Flowers or Geometric shapes. I may still do this. Yes, I am a nerd. A library nerd. Anyway, download the index if you desire (it’s in PDF). I hope the editors don’t come after me. Or maybe they’ll hire me to do proper indexes for future printings and books.

Now for a strange question. I’ve looked at a lot of sock patterns lately and wondered about pattern instructions that I find confusing.

Many of these patterns (top down) have a repeating pattern around the leg. When the pattern gets to the heel, many of them suggest you do one of the following when it comes time to do the heel flap (for simplicity I will use 64 stitches across 4 needles):

A. Complete the last round of the pattern as usual then knit across 16 stitches on needle 1. Turn and purl back and continue onto needle 4 and purl 16 stitches so you have 32 stitches on one needle.

OR

B. Break the yarn once you’ve completed the last pattern round and reorganise your stitches so that you have the same 32 mentioned above on a single needle.

Now I am sure sometimes these options are the right options. For example, and I’m just guessing here since I haven’t knit patterns that do any of the following, if the pattern is to continue down the heel flap or the repeat would be offset otherwise. When I knit a sock, I finish that last pattern round and then start the heel flap by knitting the stitches off of needles 1 & 2 since it doesn’t matter if it’s needles 1 & 4 or 1 & 2 since the pattern repeats around the leg. Am I missing something by not doing A or B above? I honestly feel like I must be missing something to make it that tiny bit more complicated.

Oh well.

I think I might look at a new theme for my blog. And trying to figure out the code to clean up the archives ’cause that’s just making my head feel a little crazy looking at all those months. Or I might work on my Ms Marigold.