Photography on sunny mornings can be as challenging as in dark, winter evenings. For dark coloured yarns, without a bit of natural light, the stitches just kind of morph into each other and you can't see any detail.
With bright light, though you need to deal with shadows and washed out colours. Here, the blue looks much lighter and the house casts a shadow.
Nonetheless, I am pleased that the retro ribs are finally done. I don't think that would had been able to finish them if I was knitting them during the winter. Even if I had a daily diet of carrots (and that's not likely to happen since I'm not all that fond of carrots), it's hard on the eyes especially if I have to rip back. (picking up stitches using fine, dark yarn is just a nightmare).
Finally, the artistic picture, taken in the afternoon, after a day spent doing the 'end of summer' gardening/clearing-up. No shadows, no bright lights, but I did have an aching back from all that bending. (and it's a very small London garden)
The garden really took a bit of a beating with the very hot July. The hose pipe ban really did a number on a lot of the plants. I don't think that one of my hydrangeas will ever recover. The wet, grey August was a nightmare too. Just as the veggies were ready to be picked, the rain (and squirrels) devastated the fruit (all the blueberries, plums and apples either fell off or were stolen, the tomatoes rotted on the plants).
Here's a shot of my latest garden gadget. They are super for gardeners that don't like bugs and don't like touching the soils or leaves with bare hands (because of the bugs, snails or slugs).
They may look odd, but they make gathering up the weeds and leaves go a lot faster.
Kerrie recently wrote about her Sunday night traditions. It's funny how easy it is to settle into a routine. One of my every 2-3 Sunday night tradition involves taking out my 'hubby' swift and ball winder and winding yarn for my 'next' projects. I use 'next' rather loosely because it can be the next 2,3 or 8 projects.
Having a swift and a ball winder is a great luxury. I love center pull balls. It makes it so much easier to knit without having the ball of yarn dance around the floor or works or roll onto the tracks while waiting for a train! (Yes, this has happened and to the socks that I was knitting for my father-in-law's birthday. It spawned an international search for about 10g of Opal to finish the socks. I tried to wind up as much as I could from the skein, but the train came and the yarn broke. The days when I clammered down the tracks to retrieve a ball of yarn are well, behind me.)
Getting out, setting up and putting away the skein winder and swift is a bit of a pain, so I tend to do my winding in batches.
So here's the fruit of this Sunday's labour.
The CTH black skein will probably be Latvian Lace socks from Nancy Bush's Folk Socks. I've been wanting to knit them ever since I saw Yarnmaven's pair.
The koigu variegated green will probably be a pair of retro rib, designed by Evelyn Clark.
The bright skein of CTH in Fall Foliage (to celebrate the arrival of autumn) will probably be another pair of Simply Lovely Lace by Karen Baumer or maybe Friday Harbor from Nancy Bush's Knitting on the Road. I haven't fully decided, because the colours look a lot more 'violent' in real life than when I saw it on my computer monitor about 2 months ago. I was expecting something a wee bit more subtle. This colourway is not subtle and definitely not for a shrinking violet.
Sometimes, I don't decide which pattern I'll do until I have cast on a few times. Take this skein of Silkwoods sock yarn. I haven't had much luck with. I've tried a lot of different patterns but I had a lot of very unattractive pooling. I think that the contrast of the white and the dark purple together can overwhelm the pinks.
I'm holding out though that one day I will find a pattern that will work with it, I'm stubborn, like that,
After 4 .5 inches of 1 x 1 ribbing, my doubt about the flattery of 1x1 ribbing grew as the ribbing grew.
I even did the increase and started the cabling...
before I ripped back to 1 inch of ribbing. I'm sure that I did the right thing because, I had a dream last night, with Trinny and Susannah and my newly finished slip-over ... !
and as I'm fiddling with the design, I need some input, because I think that it'll look nicer with a vee neck instead of the round neck. Do you think that it'll look too geeky with a vee neck?
I've never been much of a 'vest' or 'slip-over' kind of girl. I fact, I tend to like my clothing with long sleeves (and buttons). So what possessed me to start this?
It's cute, not sure that it'll flatter me, but it's been a while since I've finished a sweater for myself and I thought that without the sleeves this might go a lot faster, since I always seem to stall on the sleeves.
I'm not entirely sure that it would flatter because of the long ribbing section, that might give a poofing effect when you start the body. That model is pretty slim and she doesn't look all that slim in this vest... because of the poofing.
I'm substituting the Baby Alpaca DK that the pattern calls for with the Rowan Cashsoft DK. Much as I like the Alpaca DK, the colour palette didn't really appeal to me. The cashsoft was a better choice (for me) for lots of reasons
1. I love the colour, poison, it's a richer, dark aubergine.
2. It's cheaper per ball than the Alpaca DK
3. and it's got better meterage, so instead of the 8 balls that I would need to buy in the Alpaca DK , I only need 6...and with the £15 voucher, that means, the whole project, yarn and brochure cost about £18.
4. I've used this yarn before and I really like it. It's elastic enough to hide tension irregularities and very soft (but I do hope that it doesn't pill too quickly).
Casting on Cambridge also came with a bit of a palava. I'm doing a tubular cast-on and knitting it in the round. So the first time around, I managed to twist myself into a mobius loop and discovered it after about 2 inches.
1x1 ribbing can be pretty tedious. The instructions when worked in the round goes something like... cast on 202 stitches and work 8,484 stitches in 1x1 ribbing....
Is it a cop out? When the clock's ticking and I have a deadline to meet, I tend to go back to something tried and true. Much as I would had liked to work out a way to get those cables in the cable Rib socks to be more harmonious (and the pattern to be symmetrical), I gave up and started the Retro Rib. Evelyn Clark is one of my favourite designers and this unisex pattern just looks good, whether it's in a variegated or plain yarn.
It's not overly complicated and I've knit it twice before so I know that it works.
See how nice it looks on plain yarn (even on very dark plain yarn).
The pattern is so handsome.
Of course, these are larger socks and the dark yarn is much more slow going. Nonetheless I like the effect. With my tighter tension, I've added an extra repeat to this pattern. I'm always amazed to see adult men sock patterns in sock weight yarn call for casting on 60-ish stitches.
oh and thanks for your thoughts on the symmetry issues, it's good to know that I'm not an odd ball about these things
You know that advice that people always give to new knitters? The one that goes something like :
'Read the pattern thoroughly and make sure that you understand it all before you start'.
Well, I think that I should had done that. You see, I was after a nice, conservative sock pattern, so that I can make my father-in-law something to keep his feet warm in the winter when he takes his pooch out for a walk. The yarn that the hubby picked is pretty, but dark, so the pattern would be very subtle. I leafed through my Interweaves and liked the look of the Cable and Rib Sock by Erica Alexander. On the surface it looked nice but not too racy. I cast on immediately and after a couple of days, turned the heel.
Unless you stretch out the sock, you can't see that cable.
Here's the cable, with a bit of greying.
So what's the problem you might add, aside from the dark colour of the yarn... and the not very interesting ribbing?
Well, Erica Alexander has you run the cable down the side of the leg, so that there are equal number of stitches between the 2 cables. She then has you do the heel flap and turning using half of the cable stitches. You pick up the gusset stitches and you continue to cable down the foot, usng half the live cable stitches and the other half from the instep stitches. I thought .. hello... that's not symetrical. (and gosh, darn, don't knitters try to make this kind of pattern symetrical?).. so I ripped the whole thing in disgust ..and I'm now seeking another pattern to start again. Is this me or do patterns like this bother you too?
I wished that this was more obvious in the photo, but more so than this, I wished that I hadn't been so annoyed, because if I saw this before I ripped, I would had done the same thing. In the words of Homer Simpson, doh!
Whenever, I think of Long Island, I think of
I didn't spend a lot of time analysing the shallowness of Daisy Buchanan or the depths of Jay Gatsby's social ambitions. I thought that it was a good yarn with complex characters. I'll probably re-read it again one day and find a whole new level of understanding, like I did when I re-read the Power and the Glory.
These days, I see a lot more of the 'Island' since I usually stay out there during my trans-atlantic jaunts. While clearing down the card on my camera, I found a whole pile of photos that I took and meant to blog about, but somehow the hot summer weather put me off.
My family all knows that I'm yarn mad and knitting obsesssed. They are the ones that receive packages for me whenever there is an impending visit. They know that I'm due for a visit when the yarn starts piling up. In fact, my poor sister emailed me in March this year to say that she thought my annual Cherry Tree Sale order must had gone missing because it hadn't arrived yet. I hadn't actually ordered any yarn this year. My sis asked a nurse at her hospital, for a list of shops and one of them recommended this one in Huntington, LI. Hubby kindly drove me there and all I can say is wow!!!!!!!!! what a great shop. I could had spent all day there.
Knitting Corner 718 New York Avenue Huntington, NY 11743 631-421-2660
It might look a bit blah on the outside but on the inside.... there was everything. It was a sock knitter's heaven. I saw Cherry Tree Hill, Claudia's Handpaint, Plymouth Sockotta, Blauband, Regia, Louet's Merino...
There was also Katia, Rowan, Debbie Bliss, Reynolds ... I mean even my head was spinning with choice. But too much choice isn't necessarily a good thing. It was a hot day and hubby was waiting in the car, so I tried to be quick (less than an hour), and ended up buying mostly sock yarns. (I had to buy the Claudia's Handpaint, I love the colour and Wendy had mentioned that it was one of her faves. The colourway is Plumicious, the same as the one that Joy had picked. See how pretty it looks on the skein?
The people in the shop were really nice too and very helpful, striking the balance so well so that I got to browse but when I couldn't find something, they pulled out all stops to help. I definitely recommend this shop and I would go back next time, I'm in Long Island... or should I pronounce that as Lon-gi-land? 'Cause the guy in the All American Burger Place, did say to me, you're not from here, are you?
We drive past All American Burgers so often and it is packed all the time, so I had to schedule a visit to find out why. The burger was nice, not very expensive and certainly (well, in my opinion) at least one step above the like's of McD's.... not expensive, is good, especially as I bought quite a few balls of yarn ;-) and hubby did need a chocolate milk shake after sitting in the heat waiting for me outside the Knitting Corner. (cause men who don't knit, don't 'do' yarn stores)
This is the very first time that I've used Claudia's Handpainted Sock yarn ... and I have to admit, I love it. I've wanted to try this yarn, ever since Wendy mentioned that is was one of her favourites. If Wendy likes it, it must be pretty good, right?.
1. It's sooooo soft. I just can't stop touching it.
2. The colours are gorgeous. This colourway is plumicious and it's good enough to eat.
3. Sportweight knits up so much faster. These socks only took me 4 days.
4. With careful planning, I had enough for a pair of ladies socks with a few meters to spare.
5. These are just the perfect weight for boot socks.
The funny thing about these socks, Joy finished a pair in this same colourway and posted about it, on the same day that I visited the Knitting Corner in Huntington, L.I. and bought myself a skein.
The pattern is Simply Lovely Lace by Karen Baumer and can be found in Interweave Spring 2006. The Gems Louet Merino used in the original pattern is the same weight, meterage and twist, dare I suggest that the yarns might be the same?
I did make a few minor changes to the pattern, I cast on an additional 6 stitches (extra repeat), for a total of 54 stitches. The foot was done on 52 stitches. The leg worked out to be 4.5 inches. I also used a tubular cast-on, cause I thought that it would like nicer.
Here's the artistic pose on my feet. The socks are actually for my sister, who rarely asks me to make anything for her, but I think that she too liked the plumicious colourway.
Do you have any idea how many photos I took before I managed to capture both feet? I've discovered that I'm very adept at photographing my big toe!
I've never been a tremendous fan of yellow. Possibly because sallow complexion + yellow = looking seasick.
However, this colour combination together makes the yellow look so springy and cheery. This is the first time that I have ventured into knitting with Reynolds Sockotta. This yarn came with high praise from Alpaca Woman.
I have often heard about knitters complain about how cotton blend sock yarns are not comfortable to wear. How they could feel every little purl bumps against their sensitive feet.
With such a colourful and exhuberant palette, I opted for a simple 2x2 rib. Here's proof that I actually made 2 socks
Here are the artistic shots. Sock mascarading as a hyrdrangea flower.
