Sock Knitting

I love knitting socks.

My most recently completed socks are from the delightful patter Almondine by Ann Hanson in Ann Budd's book Sock Knitting Master Class.  This is my first beyond the basic sock and I loved it!  I highly recommend this book.

I used Serenity Sock Weight Yarn from the Deborah Norville Collection by Premier Yarns.  The color I chose was Violas.  Yes, I like purple.

Knitting socks is one of those benchmarks that serious knitters like to conquer.  Granted, we all are not cut out to be sock knitters.  Some of us as still in the wannabe stage, like the clerk at the store where I purchased my yarn.

I wanted to tell her to use the 9-inch circular needles.  DPNs are dreadful to start with your first socks -- I know from experience!  My first three pairs were done on DPNs.  If only I had known about those little circs beforehand I could have saved myself a lot of angst.

Of course, my first pair was riddled with laddering as I moved from needle to needle.  Second pair was a little better.  Third pair, I managed to eliminate the laddering altogether.  Then I discovered the 9-inch circulars at B'ewe'tiful Knits.

Back to the clerk, the wannabe a sock knitter.

Before I could relate my experience, she dropped a bombshell:
She did not know hot to knit!

Talk about ambition!  She probably didn't know the difference between garter stitch and stockinette stitch!

She told me she had heard good things about knitted on a sock loom.  I said that sounded like the way to go.

Can you imagine knowing nothing about knitted and attempting socks as your first project?

Can you remember your first knitting project? 

Print vs. e-book

My previous posts have focused on kitting.  I know that when I started this blog, I wanted to write about knitting and other topics.  Therefore, this post is about something not knitted.

Quick, pick one:  a printed book, or an e-book.

Which did you choose?

The good old fashion made of paper printed book, or the newfangled e-book which is readable on an electronic device?

I pick printed book!

I thoroughly enjoy the heft of a printed book.  I even like the smell of the ink and paper.  I like the idea that I can lend or give my book to anyone who can read without having to worry if they have a certain device or platform.

I find the printed book to be more convenient.  It does not require batteries.  As long as I have a light source, natural or manufactured, I can read it.

A printed book is very versatile   In addition to its main function of maintaining written information it can function as a doorstop, a paperweight, a weapon.  It can support a bookshelf and other pieces of furniture.  It can be altered into a work of art.  In a pinch you can soak up spilled liquids with its pages, use the pages as a toilet paper substitute, and should you ever need it, burn it for heat. (which, by the way, is the only acceptable reason to burn a book)

You can dry out the wet book (just freeze it first).  You can taped it, stapled it and glue it back together.

Try any of that with your e-book and electronic device!

And if you lose your printed book, or it isn't returned, it's much cheaper to replace the lost volume (unless it's your own personal copy of the Gutenberg Bible)

I am not a complete Luddite.  I have read a few novels on an e-reader device.

I found the endless tapping to turn the page annoying.  I did, however, like the idea of changing font size.  You really have to be middle aged to appreciate this.

I am also aware that my e-book purchases are tracked so that in event that my e-reader is lost, stolen or broken, that I can purchase another device and have access to my "library."  I can, if I want, "share" my e-books with others who have the correct e-reader platform.

Yet, these experiences (yes, I've read more than one novel on an e-reader) had only deepened my appreciation of the printed on paper book.

I firmly stand on the side of printed on paper books.

Now please excuse me while I go work on my novel which shall be published electronically.

A Change of Knit, Part 2

My no real plan project is done.

I'm calling it a shoulder throw -- too narrow to be just a throw and not fancy enough to be called a shawl.

I enjoyed playing with the new to me stitch patterns.  From three (or was it four?) sources, I choose stitch patterns that tickled my fancy.  Each stitch pattern had its own personality, from casual and classic to funky and fun.  I haven't decided which one I like best but know that some may turn up in future projects.

I think this project, more than any other I have done, is a reflection of life, of how we may not plan for a lot of things, but somehow manage to cobbled the various bits and pieces into a whole.  And if we are lucky, the whole is a pretty good thing.  May your life be so.

Surprise! You've won....

Sometimes the Universe surprises me.

I was surprised one Friday when I logged onto my Facebook page and saw that I had won a prize from my LYS (local yarn shop) B'ewe'tiful Knits.

The prize was copy of Interweave Knits Holiday gifts 2012 and a skein of Plymouth Yarn's Baby Alpaca Grande.  This was just enough to complete one pattern in the book.

Let me tell you that this yarn is so soft, so beautiful that I was loathe to work with it.  What if I messed it up?  It was so perfect as it was, nicely laid in its label.

But I resisted that urge and got my needles out.  I casted on and here's the result:

The most agreeable model in the world!

The buttons are from my Grammy M's button tin that I inherited.  I have no idea of where she got them but I know they cost less than a buck for all 500 buttons.

I like how the double buttons give the owls some personality.

Let me know what you think about the Owl Cowl.

A Change of Knit

I began my current knitting project with the idea of using knit and purl stitches and not much else.  No cables, no twisted stitches, no extra wraps.  Just plain old knit and purl.  A pretty vague plan, if you ask me.

Finding an old stitchionary at a church sale fueled my vague idea, then the purchase of yarn in some lovely fall colors and I was casting on.

It wasn't long until I found that this simple plan was vague and fraught with peril.

I found that there were no pattern corrects available for my old stitchionary.  I ripped out squares  changed needle size, and have been tempted to stuff the whole lot into a plastic shopping bag, tie it shut and toss it into the back of a little used closet in the basement.

The simple plan and the vagueness of wanted to choose my own stitches instead of following a ready made pattern set me up for failure.

As I considered what to do with this project I could not hep but think of how this was a metaphor for my life.

How often have I jumped into some new situation only to be enamored with the newness of it?  How often I have found that when the newness wore off that I was in the wrong place and had no idea of which way to go?

I should learn from my knitting that it is perfectly okay to unravel, rip out something that does not work for whatever reason and do something new with it.

So this blog it a bit that has been ripped out and worked into something new.  Writing has long been a passion for me, and knitting is, too.  

Violas!  This blog was born.

I would appreciate it if you would write a brief comment, or follow my blog.  If you have a blog of your own, especially if it's a bit crafty, let me know so I can link to yours.  Feel free to link to mine.

Make a Gauge Swatch!

Take time to make a gauge swatch!

Every knitting pattern has this advice.

The only problem is that I do make the gauge swatch being ever so careful to keep my tension just so, then something happens when I make the garment.  I end up with arms too long or the large I thought I was knitted suddenly turns out to be a small.

My problem is that I usually knit in front of the TV, multitasking while I k2, p1, 2lc, p1 k2 while watching Gibbs & his team chase down some bad guy or Sam and Dean hunting down a demon.  All this action on TV counteracts the calming effect of knitting and sometimes I lose my place.

Pictured below is a vest I just finished.  The 2 x 2 ribbing is a no brainer, but the eyelet top was another thing.  It is my first project done from a chart.    I unraveled both sides at least twice.  Maybe more. 

Vest I made using Vanna's Choice in Purple Mist.

It's no so much achieving calmness from the knitting as it's going into the knitted with the calmness. Anxiety, excitement, and other emotions will show up in knitting.  Excitement and other tensing emotions can cause an tightening of gauge therefore what might have been a 4 stitches per inch gauge suddenly becomes 6 or 8 stitches per inch.  Feeling too relaxed and comfortable can result in the opposite of two few stitches per inch thus the extra long arms of a sweater I once made. 

Although not perfect, I am proud of this vest.  I learned that a bit of patience is very helpful, that knitting is not a race.  Slow and steady will get it done.

Moral of the story is that same as the Hare and the Tortoise.

Lost then Found

I had a lovely pair of earrings that I wore to my cousin's wedding a year ago.  By the time I got home I could locate only one.  I was sad because I had worn this pair just this one time.  They went so perfectly with so much of my wardrobe with the greens & purples.

Last week I was at a jewelry party and decided to order a new pair.  The lone one I would make into a necklace.

Today, in a deep clean of my room, beneath a pile of rubble I found the missing earring!

The new pair should be in soon.  I think I may trade it in on the matching necklace.

I learned a long time ago that there is no sense in wasting energy fretting over what is lost.  Like the past, it is gone and that cannot be changed.  If it's meant to be, it will turn up again when I least expect.

Thank you, Universe, for the little surprise.

Winds of change

There have been times in my life when I could feel "the winds of change" coming.  By that, I had a feeling that some changes, big and small, were going to happen around me.  People change jobs, move, whatever.  And I can feel them today.


I wonder where they will blow me to this time.  I wonder if they will be gentle breezes signaling a new hairdo or color.  Or the hurricane forced winds that upset my life.


I know if I try to do the Mary Poppins thing my umbrella gets turned inside out. That thing of hers had to be reinforced with steel or titanium rods.  So guess I'll just hold on to my proverbial hat and hope for the best.  

Birthday Musing

Those big scary birthday numbers happen to us all (if we live long enough).  With any luck we manage to handle those landmark zero years with some kind of grace and not hyperventilating into a brown paper bag.  


Remember that a birthday is just another day followed by another.  


Time does march on.


We put aside the panic that built the entire nine year and wonder where the wrinkles came from and if they were always there.  We hear our parents' voices when we open our mouths.


I fear that someday, not soon I hope, I will look in the mirror and say to the image "Oh, Grandma, what are you doing here?"

First Entry

Welcome to my blog!


Yes, I have decided to join the e-sanity and post my thoughts for the whole universe to read.  These should relate to books, yarn, and turning another year older (frackin' year that ends with a big fat 0), and whatever else I choose.


Oh, the power of being a blog author!


Look out e-world!  It's little ole me!