Toasty toes, happy fingers.

I think I've mentioned before that I'm not super keen on sock knitting. Now, the real reason that was the case was because I found it intolerably fiddly. Whether I did them magic loop or double pointed needles, it involved a lot of scooching and manoeuvring that just drove me mad.

Enter the Hiya Hiya 9" circular needle, purchased here. This nifty little needle had me churn out these lovelies in just two days (my previous record was about 2 months from procrastination).

To be fair, I think the speed was a combination of the lovely new circ and the super nifty self-striping yarn I grabbed on my last visit to The House of Wool. It's from Heathermaid, who is on Etsy. I can't be bothered linking right now.

But that's not all! As soon as those babies were kitchenered shut (a change from my usual toe-up, two at a time method), I cast on for a new pair of socks using my handspun, as seen below.

I can't express how proud I am of that handspun. It's the first time I've spun consistently and thinly enough to make socks, and although I did this first skein as a test (it's a mere 30 grams), I am itching to spin for sock two. This yarn is two plies of worsted-spun blue faced leicester, and one ply of 50/50 merino/silk from Skein. The merino silk is a lot harder to draft evenly (for this beginner, anyhow), so that ply varies a little in thickness, but on the whole, it's pretty good. I'm loving the barber pole effect, which comes from getting bored of the plain white BFL (lovely fibre though it is) on bobbin 2 of 3.

Funny story about skeining up that there yarn. Lacking a niddy noddy, I tend to wind off around two chairs in the kitchen. Well, last night around 10 PM (that should be a warning right there), I had the brilliant idea to get a more uniform, easy to measure skein by winding off around three legs of an upturned chair. I wound the yarn, measured the length, found my yardage (74 metres), and went to remove the skein to be washed. Well. One should check that the chair legs are straight. This particular chair's legs widened at the base. Sigh. So after a goodly amount  of staring (and swearing), I rewound around my arm. Lesson learned.

Oh! I finished the Tardis sweater. The front bit is a little irritating, but overall, considering I designed the thing on a whim, I'm content. Besides, the boy LOVES it. I had to pry it from his sleeping form to weave the last end in.

As a happy fluke, there are 12 Tardis' on the yoke, and one iconic bow-tie. Accidental cleverness. The red sweater only needs and inch or two on the bottom edge, the cheviot cardi is sitting untouched, and I think there's a fine layer of dust on Celestarium. Naughty. Must make socks!

A fierce case of startitis.

I can't seem to settle on a project lately. I just want it all, now, which makes no sense, as working on five projects at once leads to more waiting, not less. Any how, I'm currently working on:

Simple raglan shaping with a garter stitch panel at the sides. Cast on 100 plus 2 stitches at every raglan point.

This little tweed pullover, from the Debbie Bliss Luxury Donegal tweed I mentioned a while back,

This cabled, steeked cardigan,  which I'm designing and noting as I go. It has a few cute details, and although I've ripped and restarted once already, I have high hopes for it. Mm, cheviot.

A pile of blanket pieces:

Washed and blocked.

And in addition to that which I photographed,  I finished weaving a short alpaca scarf, warped up for a massive shawl for the mother in law out of alpaca, merino and cashmere, finished the body and 3/4 of the sleeves for a bottom up, round yoke pullover with stranded Tardis' for the boy, and finished a few rows of charts d1 and d2 of Celestarium. 

How many projects do you keep on the go?

Winter is coming!

I'll be prepared this time, because I have this:

Bunny goodness!

My obsessive reading of every archived post of Mason Dixon knitting led to me making a keyhole scarf. I love the thing. I used a little under one 50 gram ball of Sublime Angora Merino, which is super duper soft. The stuff sticks to itself like velcro, so simple is certainly best, but the results are sooo lovely. I can certainly see the addictive nature of this pattern, which can be found here. Bow tie scarves for everyone! I think it would be a great use for those little balls of luxury yarns one buys in a weak moment. 

I finished up the little pants for the bub, and I think they look pretty awesome, although I seriously mucked up my jogless stripes technique. I'll stick to Techknitter's jogless stripes technique from now on. Here's a shot which has been artfully arrange to disguise said stripes:

These were made with leftover Cascade 220, in a lovely silver heather (I lost the ballband some time ago), and the stripes are some Heirloom merino magic, in a shade I'll have to guess because I'm too lazy to run upstairs and get the info from the ballband. It's a sweet rosy pink, and I have sufficient to make a little pullover or cardigan to match.

Speaking of cardigans, I have a need to make Baby Sophisticate, and I know just the baby to wear it. My husband's godmother's grandson (now that's a mouthful) is the most delightfully expressive little boy, and I think the combination of those expressions with that cardigan will make the most adorable little old man ever. I better get knitting before the kid grows any more!

Multi-tasking.

Well, I've been keeping busy. After a marathon night of mattress stitching a collar on (aarrrrgh), hubby got his flash new sweater. Sans pockets. Because I just couldn't face any more hand stitching.

Wanna be model.

It fits pretty well, although it grew massively downward during blocking. Thankfully this time that was a blessing, as my long-torsoed honey wanted it good and long. I like to live on the wild side and skip the swatch. Naughty. I'm not 100% satisfied with the button placement, but again, I just couldn't face any more sewing. The buttons themselves are gorgeous, wooden with little maple leaves. I nabbed them at Wool Addiction on a rare child-free excursion to Bowral. 

I've also begun a long-awaited blanket for the big boy. I've been promising the kid a blanket of his own since I finished baby's moderne log cabin (man, I love Mason Dixon Knitting), back in August. Not entirely sure why, as the kid overheats in a sheet and we don't exactly live in the great white north any longer (I'm Canadian, did I mention?), but a promise is a promise, so I dug out the wool I've been stockpiling, bought a supplementary bunch of Heirloom Merino Magic from Bubs 2 Grubs, and cast on for my first square. Except, I was watching a particularly gripping episode of Person of Interest, and I was knitting on the bias. I increased every row until I reached 6" on the legs of the triangle (53 stitches for me), then decreased every row, slipping the first stitch. What I got surprised me. 

Woops.

Increase every SECOND row. Second row. That's what I was aiming for. But hey, it's a "design feature", and I'm just gonna pretend that was my idea all along. I've got a small stack of diamonds now, and I think it might just work.

The baby nearly has another pair of pants: 

They're loosely based on Kanoko  pants, which I made for the bub when she was tiny. I couldn't be darned finding the pattern at the time, so I flew by the seat of my pants. I knitted the waistband by casting on loosely, knitting a few inches of ribbing back and forth, knitting the cast on stitches together with the live (after folding the ribbing down), and joining to work in the round. Leaves a nice tube for a drawstring without the need for more stitching. When I'm done knitting, I like my knits to be DONE. These pants have had an exciting life, as I started them on a solo train journey I took without realising Sydney was about to be hit by the worst rain storm in 30 years. My brother in law was kind enough to rescue me from the station, only to discover the road home was flooded and cars were backed up 5 km. During the hour it took to drive around the mess, I made some excellent progress! I've won the in-law lottery.

Better get dinner on the go.