Homespun Socks

 

This is my first ever project made from yarn that I spun myself.    I was afraid that I wouldn’t have enough yarn so I used contrasting yarn (store bought) for the toes and heels.  I could have made it ok but if I hadn’t made the decision to go with the contrasting heels and toes, I wouldn’t have had enough yarn.   I didn’t notice until the socks were knit up that one of the balls I spun was darker overall than the other one.   I’ll pay more attention to that next time.

Pattern: Toe-Up  generic pattern with short row heels and toes.

Needles: US 1

Updating…

I took this picture  a couple days ago, but I haven’t worked much on it since then so it’s still a “current” photo.  It’s gotten to the point that the pattern is easy enough to keep track of.  That’s not to say I’ve memorized it, but I only have to glance at the chart to be able to keep my place.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In other knitting news,  I’m working on a pair of simple ribbed socks (for my mindless knitting) using some old Magic Stripes yarn from Lion Brand.  I like the yarn but the colorway is obnoxious.  I can’t find the picture of the first sock to show you so you’ll just have to take my word for it.  hehehehe

 

So far so good

Wow, it’s been five days working on this sweater, with a few spinning breaks. I’m getting into the swing of things after a bit of warm up time knitting with yarns in both hands. I’m regularly a continental knitter so the yarn in my right hand was a bit awkward at first.

Doing the corrugated ribbing, it was necessary to purl continental and knit English. I can’t purl English without some serious thought and ,frankly, knitting in two colors taxes my brain cells enough as it is, thankyouverymuch.

The only nagging thing is that I wonder if the colors would have been better reversed.

Now the obligatory picture and please pay no notice to all the gunk in my keyboard. My goodness, whodathunk that my keyboard would betray me by announcing my lack of housekeeping abilities.

Faroe

I’ve decided to start knitting Faroe by Alice Starmore.  It’s a 2 color stranded knitting project.  On one hand, it should be less hair-raising than Dale of Norway’s Lillehammer (which is still on my To Do List) because it is only two colors, but on the other hand, it’s VERY busy.  I also decided that, should I have any readers left, I will share with you the ongoing drama of knitting this thing.  At least that’s the plan.

So, I started it last night and then I frogged it this afternoon after having knit about 2 inches of corrugated ribbing because… you know how directions, when knitting in the round,  always say to join making sure the knitting isn’t twisted.  Well… OH HUSH!  I *did*  check to make sure.  And I “fixed” it so that it wasn’t twisted.  But apparently it wasn’t twisted and I fixed it so that it was.  Ooops.

I’m using St-Denis Nordique yarn in a burgundy color for the “black” part of the sweater.  And a dark grey of Dalegarn Falk for the “white” part.

And now I’ve gotten about an inch of the corrugated ribbing knit again.  I’ve checked a gamillion times to make sure that it’s not twisted.  And it isn’t.

Thanksgiving and other stuff

So, as usual, Thanksgiving dinner was attended by me and Jody. The girls were there, but they didn’t get as much of the turkey as they would have liked. On the other hand, Jody and I will be eating turkey for months. I thought I’d picked up a 10 lb turkey (which would be too big for the two of us, but we’d have a lot of leftovers and Thanksgiving is all about leftovers, right? Well it turns out that it was a 14.86 lb turkey. I can’t bring myself to round up to 15 lbs.

According to the Butterball site, a 2 adult family who are big eaters (which we’re really not) and who want a lot of leftovers, should purchase a 2 lb turkey breast. TWO! Well, hell, what’s an extra 12.86 lbs among friends?

So far with the leftovers we’ve had White Chili and King Ranch Chicken. We’ll see how creative I can get in using leftovers.

And I also finished the first mitten of the Joie du Printemps. Well, I didn’t do the thumb yet, but I will.

Oh and in a final bit of news, I finally broke through a huge wall in my genealogy. My grandmother’s mother, Flora, has been impossible to find any info on. She was born in Switzerland and moved to the states in the 1880s or 90s and I couldn’t find any info on her before she showed up married for 15 some years in 1910. Well, I finally found her marriage record, by a fluke, and that gave me her parents’ names and while I really haven’t found anything else on them yet, that’s a HUGE breakthrough. But the marriage record also had the maiden name of the mother of my great grandfather which allowed me to find her family (also by a crazy fluke of luck) in Wales in the 1840s and 50s. HUGE HUGE HUGE breakthrough. I’ve been stuck on these people for several years now.

And that’s all the news that’s fit to print from Chez Twig. Hope everyone had a good weekend.

A Quilt for my Queen-Sized Bed

Finally got this finished. Now, I’ll bet we’ll have unseasonably war

m temps.

 

 

 

 

 

UGG Classic Argyle Boots

UGG Classic Cardy Boots

UGG Classic Short Boots

UGG Classic Tall Boots

Socks!

I love wearing my wool socks even though I’m not a lover of knitting them. I don’t mind knitting them, I’m just not one of those people who live to make socks.

So when I do knit socks, they tend to be on the plain side. This pair is a simple 3K 1P rib. The yarn is Trekking XXL in some colorway that I don’t remember. The ball label has long since disappeared. (Gotta love the way I’m so organized, eh?)

GAAAAAH! I tried the socks on right before I took the picture of them and, in fact, wore them around the house as I tried to find my sock blockers for the picture. It has run off and is probably doing all sorts of things I don’t approve of. Anyway, I got a bit of leaf on the sock and didn’t notice it there on the toe when I took the pictures. The girls are all determined to bring in leaves every time they come in from outside.

UGG Classic Argyle Boots

UGG Classic Cardy Boots

UGG Classic Short Boots

UGG Classic Tall Boots

Two Week Sweater

After the long time I had St Brigid on the needles, I decided I needed a quick project. This sweater is the Seamless Hybrid sweater following Elizabeth Zimmermann’s percentage system. I’d forgotten that of my 3 hanks of Eco Wool, two were similar and one was crazy dark. So when I was ready to use the third hank, I knew that I needed stripes to give some space before I started with the much darker marl. Thankfully I had some plain brown eco wool.

Yarn: Cascade Eco Wool
Needles: US 8
Pattern: Seamless Hybrid

UGG Classic Argyle Boots

UGG Classic Cardy Boots

UGG Classic Short Boots

UGG Classic Tall Boots

St Brigid photos

Of course, ever since I finished St Brigid the weather around here has been rainy. We were finally able to get a couple of pictures.

Gotta say that I’m glad I opted for the fringe.
And then, of course, the glamour shot:

UGG Classic Argyle Boots

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UGG Classic Tall Boots

The End of a Long, Long Road

On May 14, 2008, I cast on for St Brigid from an interlibrary loan copy of Aran Knitting. On September 26, 2010, I finally cast off, using my very own copy of the reprint of the book. I will work on getting lots of pictures in the next few days to celebrate the journey that took more than two years but I couldn’t wait to tell folks it was done.

UGG Classic Argyle Boots

UGG Classic Cardy Boots

UGG Classic Short Boots

UGG Classic Tall Boots