Back in the Saddle

Mid-week my new US sz 1 DPN's arrived in the mail, so I was able to get going on the Monkey's again. I got in some time at restaurants and some time while chatting with friends last night, and I am now about 1 repeat away from beginning the toe decreases:

I also worked a few hours on Josephine during the evenings at home and have finished the lace section of the front. Since summer here will last until October, the odds are looking good that I'll get to wear it this year despite the delays and rework.

And our friends whose critters we tended last week returned from Wyoming bearing thank-you gifts. T-shirts for most of us, but this was for me:

A 100g ball of Tofutsies from a yarn store in Wyoming. I think only the best kind of friend helps you build your sock-yarn stash when she is not herself a knitter!

On the music front, 15YO R reminded me of my promise -- that if he worked hard to learn guitar using his dad's old acoustic, then we would buy him an electric guitar set-up. He seems to spend about half his waking hours with a guitar in his hand, so yesterday I made good:

That is an actual smile on his face -- more rare than you could imagine. And the smile stayed on his face for the rest of the day.

And finally, a picture from my garden. Although we rudely transplanted them in the spring and have had freakishly cool/rainy weather for most of hte summer, the birds of paradise decided to bloom after all. So beautiful it makes August in Houston worthwhile:

Knitting Delimmas

It has been a weekend of knitting...disappointments. Not catastrophes. Minor setbacks that may take many hours to fix, but not catastrophes.

On Friday at dinner I nearly finished the heel flap on the Monkeys. The Monkeys have been my carry-along project, worked at restaurants, while waiting, etc. But since picking up gusset stitches takes concentration, I decided to finish the flap and pick up the stitches at home. So, I was picking up the last stitch on the first side and SNAP. Like a toothpick.

Now, with all the extra gusset stitches to work, doesn't seem a good time to start working with 4 needles instead of 5. So...to the internet, order another set of Brittany Birch sz 1 DPN's. AND and a set of US sz 1 steel DPN's. I realize now that having options is good. I will no longer snicker at those knitters who collect needles in addition to yarn.

I can't NOT have something in my purse, but what to take along while I wait for replacement needles? The other small project I have cast on is the Dunes socks. I threw them in my purse. And I remembered when we got to our favorite Italian restaurant why I had not been carrying them along. This particular restaurant is well lit, but I could barely tell knits from purls, and I could only tell bad stitches (splitting yarn, catching the stitch below) by the relative resistance in finishing the stitch. So back to the box under hte Ott-Lite for Dunes. But I am getting close to doing the heel flap -- here's how they look so far:

After dinner I worked on Josephine and nearly finished the lace section of the front. Before I put it away for the night I pulled out the instructions, looked at the revised measurements I had marked in, looked at the back that I had finished, and realized that I had added the "get the drawstring below my boobs" allowance below the drawstring rather than between the drawstring and the armholes.

Surely not, I thought. I held the back up to my front to check. I held the back up to my back. I wondered whether I could fix this with blocking. I wondered if a different bra might hoist things up an inch or two. I tried to convince myself the drawstring across the lower third of my bosom wouldn't really make me look saggy. I considered whether I could cut the sweater and graft in a new piece. I put the sweater away and went to bed and dreamed of bad knitting.

This morning I woke up knowing what I must do: rip back to just below the armholes and rework all of that almost-stockinette. It will be tedious. I need to update my NetFlix queue.

To cheer myself up, I worked up a simple pattern and cast on for E's camo socks. With good ol' unbreakable Addi Turbo's.

Safely Back in the Nest

My darling oldest son returned from Sea Base this evening, full of tales of sea critters and of boy scout dorm room pranks. He is tired and sunburned, but in very high spirits. He even gave me a Real Hug (as compared to the grumbling, stiff-back, arms-at-side lean I get on ordinary days.) Now I can breathe a little easier, after a week of stamping out fear that he'd get sick or bit or worse, and then today a rough afternoon of watching thunderstorms while his plane was supposed to be landing.


One of his favorite things about this camp was that despite being a Boy Scouts of Americal high-adventure camp, they had some decidely relaxed rules around the BSA uniform. Class A uniforms were required at dinner every night, but the green and red socks weren't required if you were wearing flip flops. And the Class A shirts could regular uniform shirts OR...something else, so long as everyone from the troop matched. R and his troop-mates marched to the nearest souvenir shop on the 1st day and bought matching matching t-shirts. Voila, his troop's Sea Base Class A's:

Front

Back

On the knitting front, since casting on the Monkey's in Panda Cotton on Sunday, I've worked just a little bit every night on them. I find I can get a whole repeat of the pattern done while waiting on dinner (boiling pasta, waiting for my restaurant order, etc.) Very, very fast pattern. The sock fabric is coming out very dense and silky and stretchy -- and it feels cool on the skin. Depending on how it wears and washes, I may have found my new favorite summer sock yarn.

Here's progress so far -- 5 pattern repeats, 1 more to go before the heel:

Progress at Last!

Some bloggable progress at last! Clown Jr socks for K now finished:

And now my guilty conscience can rest -- these are the socks she really wanted, and the pattern suits the yarn. To get the ankles to fit, I used a wide rib (3 and 4 knit st's x 1 purl) down to the end of the gusset. Then it was straight stockinette to the toes.

Specifics: Marks & Kattens "Clown" yarn, 45% cotton, 40% superwash wool, 15% nylon. Knit on 2.5mm addi turbos. Pattern -- basic sock pattern from Ann Budd's The Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns.

About the yarn: like many cotton/wool yarns, it was rather splitty. It feels a little hard and scratchy while knitting and in the finished sock, but I'm expecting it will soften up when it gets washed. The colors are printed on this particular yarn, so aren't rich and saturated like I'd prefer, but then again I didn't pick this yarn, my daughter did. The yardage seems good -- I bought two balls, made two pairs of socks for a youth size 2 foot, and have about a half a ball left over. Would I use it again? If asked, but I wouldn't seek it out.

On other fronts, my second shipment from the Loopy Ewe arrived yesterday. In it, E's "camo sock yarn", a.k.a. Panda Cotton in the Fern colorway:


And, to my immense and continuing delight, some Cherry Tree Hill Supersock in the Champlain Sunset colorway:
The colors just take my breath away, and I can't wait to start knitting it! But since we still have 2 months of very hot weather here, I will work off the Panda Cotton first.

And speaking of Panda Cotton, I did some swatching with the Roses colorway. I knit stockinette with US and metric sizes from 2mm to US size 3 -- 5 different needle sizes. I got everywhere from 8-1/2 sts/in on 2.0mm addis to a little less than 7 sts/in on size 3 bamboo. The yarn looks good in all the gages, but I thought at 2mm it was tad stiff and at US 3 it was too loose for socks (but great for other garments.)

I opted for 2.25mm needles, and have cast on for my first pair of Monkeys. This isn't great yarn for the pattern, but it is a very good pattern for the yarn. And I quickly realized why so many people are hooked on this pattern -- it is completely addictive! It looks complex, but it is actually very simple, and it has a great rythym. And of course, it shows off variegated yarn very well. The Panda Cotton is knitting up great -- very silky and cool-feeling, and the pattern flies.

Where am I?

I know I've been delinquent about posting. I'm not sure what my excuse is. I'm not spending long hours at work. I haven't been reading the new Harry Potter book. I haven't been living at the piano. I haven't been going to extra Taekwondo classes. Heck, I haven't been grocery shopping or cooking or cleaning either. What I have been doing doesn't seem like it should take up that much time:

• getting oldest son equipped, packed, and on his plane to a SCUBA camp
• watching the Tour de France
• oggling sock yarns on-line

I have been spending a fair amount of time knitting -- about as much time as I'm spending watching the Tour. None of it is photo-worthy...yet. I'm working again on Josephine, but the front is progressing very much as the back did. I've knit a few inches on the Dunes socks, but since it's a dark yarn you can't see the pattern unless I put them on something, which I don't dare do again because a whole bunch of stitches fell off the DPN's last time I tried. And I am working a simple pair of ankle socks for K out of the leftover Clown yarn -- my "goes everywhere" project.

Since the sock-yarn oggling seemed rather pointless, I bought some Panda Cotton from the Loopy Ewe (who delivered faster than I thought possible):

The blue (Blueberry Grape) is for K. I've been playing with the other ball of the Roses colorway, and I have to say the yarn is kind of strange to work with. It feels very cool to the touch and is silky smooth, but it looks pretty heavy even though the ball band says you can get 7 sts/in. I've tried it with 3 mm needles (looks almost sport weight) and with 2mm needles (too tight for my taste, but amazingly it was still supple and stretchy.) I need something in-between, but my in-between needle sizes have the above mentioned socks on them. Back to Loopy Ewe for some more needles and another 2 balls. My 10YO son insists he wants a pair of socks in the Fern colorway.

And speaking of my middle child, he is still working on his finger weaving occasionally:

But this week's Hot New Crafts are bead animals and "coasters" (or what I called God's Eyes back in my Girl Scout days.) Here is the batch of finished goods he emptied from his pockets just before dinner yesterday -- a fair day's effort, eh? He's leaving piles of them around the house, but he is consuming large quantities of acrylic...

Glacier Rib Socks Done!

Another FO!

I did most of the knitting on these socks while we were on vacation in Glacier, hence the name. I wore them to work yesterday, and they're very comfortable.

When I first started swatching this yarn, I was disappointed to see it was self-striping. Stripes, ick! Check out the sole -- I'm just not an even stripes sort of gal:

Zig-zaggy patterns are the way to deal, I know, but after the Jaywalkers and K's Clown socks I was ready for something different. Since Charlene Schurch's book was the only one I took with me, and I took a fresh look at all her stitch patterns, and finally opted to use the slip-stitch rib pattern she recommends for breaking up pooling colors:


I loved the way it worked out. Still striped, but so much more interesting than plain stockinette or plain rib.

I used these socks to learn three new (for me) techniques: a short row heel, a tubular bind-off, and Ms. Schurch's "easy toe." I'm glad I learned the short-row heel -- it's fast and easy, if a little flimsy. I'll use it on kids socks, which will be outgrown before they can get worn out.

The tubular bind-off worked very well. I was surpised to realize it is really just kitchner stitch. But it should not be attempted while watching the Tour de France. I got off a stitch somewhere, and ended up with a slanty bind off on one half of one sock. I did not EVEN attempt to fix it (rip out kitchner stitch? are you mad?)

I will definitely use the easy toe technique again -- it is very easy, fits well, and it preserves the pattern on self-patterning yarns. Here it is on these socks (that's a tennis ball in there):



And yes, I know the socks don't match. The yarn came in a single ball and had no repeat that I could discern on the first sock. I'm still not convinced there's a repeat, but it makes no difference -- I've become very attached to the mismatched stripes.

Particulars:
Plymouth Sockotta yarn (45% cotton, 40% SW wool, 15% nylon). Knit on 2.5mm addi circs. Pattern assembled from Charlene Schurch's Sensational Knitted Socks.

I like the yarn, even though it's not as fine as I'd prefer. It's very durable -- I knit two other pairs with it about 4 years ago, and they've worn like iron. And it is not at all splitty like other cotton/wool yarns I've used. It seems to be spun very tight.

Fixed My Ribbing!

As I mentioned in the last post, I've been working on ways to fix my ribbing. Specifically, fixing the last knit/first purl stitch. They always come our looser than the other stitches, and the column seems to wobble because the stitches aren't consistently the same looseness. The sloppy appearance annoys me so much that I avoid ribbed patterns at all -- a serious problem for my sock knitting, since I love the way ribbed socks fit. And there are so many lovely variations of ribbing that I have to avoid!

For 1x1 ribbing, I generally cheat and use twisted rib. But for 2x2, 3x3, etc, the best I could think of was putting good firm YANK on the offending stitches. This approach has several obvious problems; it's tiring, and it makes my wrist hurt; "yanks" are highly inconsistent in and of themselves; it makes ribbing something I have to concentrate on instead of something that is, and should be, nearly mindless; and finally, it only addresses the looseness, not the wobble.

This is an issue for both flat and circular knitting, since when you work the wrong side the first purl becomes hte last knit. I recently re-read the first few chapters of Montse Stanley's Knitter's Handbook. She had a wonderful tip for fixing the loose knit stitch: on the right side of the work, knit through the back of the loop; on the wrong side, purl but wrap the yarn under the needle. In essence, purling with yarn under puts the stitch on the needle backwards, and KTB puts it right. On both sides, there's a bit less yarn in the throw and the stitches tighten up nicely.

But, how to adapt it to circular ribbing? Miss Stanley offers no advice.

After a couple of false starts, I think I've got it.

Here is a sample of circular 3x3 ribbing with my normal tension, no yanking or other techniques for the loose stitches:


I cast on too tight for this sample, masking the problem in the first few rows. But the sample still clearly shows the relative looseness of the last k/first p. The purl stitches seem to cringe to the left, as though there's something repulsive about the last knit stitch. And the last k stitch does form a wobbly column, even though this particular yarn is exceptionally forgiving.


Flip the blocker over, and here is the other side with the improved rib technique:



Not perfect, but vastly improved. When it's not stretched, the unevenness isn't noticeable.



So, here's how I did it.



On the first round (set-up round):

• last k: knit by wrapping yarn in front of the right needle


• first p: knit by wrapping yarn under the right needle
  

On all subsequent rounds:

• last k: knit through back of loop, wrapping yarn in front of right needle


• first p: purl through back of loop, wrapping yarn under the right needle

Here's how the last knit stitch will appear on the left needle after set-up -- the loop is backwards on the needle:

Wrapping the yarn in front of the right needle:

The first purl stitch as it appears on the left needle -- again, the stitch is hanging backwards:

Wrapping the yarn under the left needle:

I'm sure I'm not the only one out there who has this problem, and I'm equally sure I'm not the first one to fix it. But I wanted to share what I've learned so that I might help one of my fellow knitters (as so many of you have helped me through your web posts and podcasts.)