Meanwhile, in Knitting News

I finished some things. Without picture because they were on his feet when I had the camera out, and the feet were in shoes, and the shoes were moving very-very fast, a pair of toddler socks made from the remains of a skein of Lisa Souza’s Sock! in Joseph’s Coat. I already made a good-sized pair of men’s socks for my brother, and I had a fair sized ball left over. So I said to myself, said I, Self! You could totally make a pair of socks for Captain Adventure out of that!

So I did. They’re very cute, and whipped out in nothing flat. He seems to like them. Put them on his feet fresh off the needles and played with them before stuffing them into the sofa cushions and running off to bigger and better things. And I still have ‘too much to throw away, not quite enough to do anything with’ of the Joseph’s Coat. I’m going to hold onto it and maybe use it for accent on something else.

Which I find interesting. I’m not that much of a pack rat with other things anymore and have thrown or given away all kinds of “precious” things, but I cannot stand to throw (or give, let’s be honest here – I can give quite generously if all you want is boring old cash for your charity, but yarn?! Let’s not talk crazy, people!) away yarn. If there’s enough to make even a 1” ball, I will keep it. This is not a rational behavior on my part. Seriously. What am I going to do with a 1” ball of miscellaneous yarn?!

I do not know.

But I cannot throw it away, all the same. It will literally stick to my hand. Like Bilbo’s ring, I’ll walk over to the fire intending to throw it in, and then find it in my pocket hours later. Hmm, I thought I threw that away, how did it end up in here…?

I’m just grateful it’s yarn and not, say, stray cats. You can put yarn in space bags. Cats? Not so much.

I also finished the pink Girly Girl socks, but didn’t get a picture because I finished them right before their new owner arrived for the Christmas party (as in, about half an hour before!), so they basically went directly from the needles into a box and were wrapped. But they were sweet. And also, that Filatura baby yarn made for a positively delicious feeling sock.

There is enough left over there to make a couple preemie hats for Stitches from the Heart. (You see how bad I am? There are mere scraps of this stuff left, and yet there I am…no, not going to throw it away, gads no! it’ll make a cute little preemie hat or two!) (well…it will…since the hats are sized to fit on a lime!...)

I do, however, have pictures of the chenille washcloths. These are made out of Crystal Palace chenille, from a pattern in Weekend Knitting:



I don’t like knitting with chenille much. It’s better than mohair, mind, but it tends to be rather unruly on the needle sometimes. This is about the perfect project for me, if I’m going to work in chenille. About the time I’m starting to cuss, I’m done. This is the second set of three I’ve done, so obviously I like them.

They are super-soft, make even cheap soap feel luxurious, and are surprisingly low-maintenance; while you can’t toss them into the washing machine with your jeans, you can wash and dry them with your delicates (I know, the yarn label says you can’t – but you can). Or just swish them in the sink with some shampoo and leave them on the counter to dry flat.

OK, moving on. I also managed to stop moping about her sudden declarations of un-love and get back to work on Eldest’s sweater, finishing Sleeve #1 this morning:



I’m loving using two circulars for sleeves. I tend to have trouble with the tension between needles, especially when doing colorwork – so having only two such areas instead of three or four is good. And for some strange reason, I don’t seem to have the problem nearly as much with two circulars.

Once I’ve finished this, I think I may need to do a heavily cabled number, Cromarty, from Alice Starmore’s Celtic Collection. I tried to make it twelve years ago, before I knew what the *^@& I was doing (disaster!), and I tried to make it again ten years ago, before I had learned not to tempt the Gauge Gods (disaster!)…but I think I may just be ready. I’ve got plenty of the Happy Blue Yarn from the Stora Dimun (by which I mean, I’ve got another two cones of the stuff), and I think it would look spiffy.

And that’s the Knitting News.

And with that, my lunch hours is officially over. Dang. Because you know what? I’m not in a working kind of mood today. I’m really not. Some days are just like that, I guess – but everything I need to do today is booooooring. Oh well. The sooner I get to it, the sooner it’ll be off the list…