Just in time

Here are the latest pair of socks for my son. He has size 11 feet and yes, that IS a gameboy in the pic for scale.

These are also my socks for the October Sockalong at Sock Knitters Anonymous on Ravelry. I can't get into it right now so this will hopefully be enough evidence to convince them that I have indeed finished in time.



Trekking XXL, will edit to add the colour tomorrow, 2.5mm needles, pattern pretty much made up as I went along. Stitch is "Gingerbread Rib" from a book I borrowed from Miriam.

I reversed the cables on the second sock. Looks nice, hey?



Will post more tomorrow. Now off to watch 4 episodes of "Smallville" with the wearer of the socks.

Does it count?????

If you have decided that you are not going to buy anything to knit as you have TONS of stuff in your stash and really should be using it, and that you really need to stop buying sock needles as you have tons of them started but not many finished, does it count as breaking this “promise” when:

1. You were going to be good and use leftover sock yarn to knit a hat for a friend’s daughter but your own daughter saw it and LOVED it and it fit her and she looks SO CUTE in it (scroll down to earlier post to see happy Jackie in pink hat) and now you need to make something else before you see her again in November.
2. You need to use it to make a chemo cap for a different friend as you were going to make her one but used the cotton to make her a shawl instead and she is worried about losing her hair and you’d like to have this done by November too.
3. Buying the wool is REALLY a favour to yet another friend who was wondering how it would knit up but has no real project planned for it and can’t justify getting any just to “test”.
4. All your sock needles (well, at least the 2.5mm DPNs whose location you can think of right now) are full and you want to do the mystery sock on Sock Knitters Anonymous on Ravelry next month and you need to make your daughter “long socks” because she asked so nicely and the are cheap and bamboo and you’ve never used bamboo DPNs before (bamboo circulars yes, by the same maker, and they are NICE) so really this is just an experiment not an actual purchase.

Because – if all these mitigating circumstances don’t count then I have been a BAD GIRL!

BAD GIRL
Originally uploaded by href="http://www.flickr.com/people/14942160@N02/">jaynewagner

Wool is 3 balls of “Elle Elite DK” 50% cotton, 50% wool, colour 034, feels lovely in the ball, will hopefully be just as lovely knit up. Jackie, who grabbed it and yelled “Thank you Mommy” the moment it came out of the bag has been told that it is not for her but that I will make her something with any leftovers.

Just so you know – I do get some knitting done every now and again – see Michael’s next sock below. Trekking (XXL), colour 23, pattern made up as I go along (and, if I’m being a GOOD GIRL – see above – noted on an index card so I can recreate the second sock to match it), stitch pattern called “Gingerbread Rib” from a book I borrowed from Miriam – “Vogue Knitting – The Ultimate Sock Book”.

Gingerbread Sock
Originally uploaded by jaynewagner

Commenter who asked about gardening with yoghurt tubs – that post will come over the weekend if I have a moment to plant another one.

I have Photos!

I have clever children – they both got Bronze medals for their Kumon – Michael for Maths, Jackie for English.

I have finished things:
Pink hat for Jackie – my standard patternless hat using the wool left over from her pink frilly socks.

Horcrux socks (from Six Sox Knitalong) for Michael – wool is one of the Opal hand dyes. It looked like the inside of a nappy on the skein but I think it knit up quite nicely. Michael has been told that, the next time he thinks I love his sister more than him, he must remember that I cast on 80 stitches for these socks. There are 40 rows in the heel flap, 98 rows in the foot, and 22 rows in the toe.

I started something – Margaret Tudor from Tudor Roses. This is the centre front panel.

I’m off to borrow a bed for blocking on Sunday (weather permitting) so there may be more pics then.

A funny sort of post

Just a quick post before I get so far behind with stuff that I fall over

It has been a funny few weeks.

Friday Jackie had a “Spring day” thing at school so I made her a hat with an old sunhat, some flowers, some ivy, and a hot glue gun. She looks a bit demented in this picture but I think that’s just the angle I took it at.

I also finished a pair of socks for her on Friday night. They are shown here with her feet in “playful” mode. I’ve put the egg-flips in for scale again so you can see just how small her feet are compared to her brothers.


She likes them a lot, but wants “long socks” – all the way up to her knees for the next pair. I can’t really complain as this is the same child who has told her friend’s mothers that they are stupid because they can’t knit. She also told me the other day that she knows that I love her much more than her friend’s mothers love them as their mothers just buy them clothes while I knit them things.

In other news – I resurrected my membership of the Six-Sox knitalong and am well into the latest pattern. I’m doing the little cables in a twisted stitch as I didn’t like the way it looked before. It seems much nicer now.

This is what it looked like earlier:


OK – that’s all for now. I need to finish my project proposal for my MSc this week and my task for the weekend, well, Sunday, as that is pretty much all that is left of the weekend now, is to get most of that done.

This is going to be complicated by the fact that I dug out some cross stitch projects while looking for a thin needle to do a Russian join with. I am torn. I think I will have to bribe myself – 15 minutes of cross stitch for every 30 minutes of REAL work on the project proposal – sitting and staring at the screen doesn’t count.

We apologise for the delay in blogging

Yesterday’s scheduled blogging was delayed due to the screening of the first episode of “Survivor – Cook Islands”. I know it isn’t marvellous TV but I like it. Jackie and I sit around and watch it together and it is cute to see her pick a favourite team based on their colours. She gets so excited when “her” team wins.

Then it was delayed again as a friend was visiting from the UK and we went out for dinner.

Now, as promised, a summary of what I have been doing with myself all year. Honestly, I would have had so much more time for blogging and knitting for me and all that sort of thing if people around me would just stop getting pregnant and having babies. Strangely enough – all little girl babies – I wonder if the thought of having something handknit is attracting them.

This was for a colleague at work – kind of a rush job – I was darning in the ends on the morning of the baby shower.

This was for my next door neighbour. I don’t always knit for neighbours but Jackie heard that they were having a little girl (she is big on little girls – insists that the world needs more of them and keeps asking when her baby sister is going to arrive) and asked me to make them something.

This was for somebody who just lucked out. The mom is the daughter of the lady who owns / runs the shop where we have our S’nB meetings. I had been really wanting to knit this shawl and her being pregnant was all the excuse I needed. It’s the Rosebud Shawl from the Heirloom Knitting site – done in the KnitPicks dye your own laceweight. I found the pattern incredibly well written and easy to follow, and other than losing a bit of steam once I hit the border (144 repeats of the same pattern – excluding the times when I zoned out, messed up, and had to rip back the best part of one side – TWICE) it was a fairly easy knit. Mother was instructed to USE it and baby has already been spotted in public wrapped up in said shawl so I am a happy knitter.
Shawl is too big to put in one pic and the only ones I have are of it blocking. Here are photos of the centre :

The border:

The edging:

There is also a hat I don’t have a picture of. Maybe Miriam would be kind enough to let me have a pic of it when she has the chance as it was a present for her new arrival. It was another rush job. I finished the knitting in the car on the way to the baby shower. It was well received, though, so worth the effort.

Finally – here is an exception to my normal baby knitting rule. On the whole I knit only for the women that I know and work with. In the whole pregnancy phase I think of the bacon and eggs analogy. With bacon and eggs the chicken is involved, the pig is committed. With pregnancy the father is involved, the mother is committed. Well, this blanket (crochet not knitting) was made for one of the men I work with. The little girl that this was made for is especially special to her parents. They have been trying to have a baby for 10 years. About a year ago they lost a child at 8.5 months. I think the exception to the rule was warranted. The best part is – when I handed it over I got the BEST response I have EVER received for a baby gift. He was absolutely delighted – almost glowing with appreciation. It’s apparently the first hand made gift she has received and, as his wife wishes she knew how to knit and crochet but doesn’t, they really appreciate just how special it is.

In non-knitting news I graduated with distinction. My first ever post-graduate qualification is now under my belt and I can start working on my MSc. I got my Graduate Diploma in Engineering – Mineral Resource Evaluation.

I was planning on inserting a picture here but I have just had a look at the pictures off the camera and I look insane in them so you can all just imagine how I looked.

I have also been making socks for the kiddies. I have finished this pair for Michael. You will see Jackie’s “egg flips” have been inserted for scale. I had to chop out the top of the socks as otherwise you would have had a close up of Michael’s groin. I am not that cruel a mother.

OK – off to rest after all this blogging. Will try to post more regularly in future. You know – if you lot posted more comments I might be more inspired to blog. As it is I don’t know if anybody other than me ever reads this stuff.

Things I have learned from knitting socks

In no particular order:

Handknit socks are one of the little luxuries you should not have to do without.
Kids socks look really cute while you are knitting them.
It is amazing how many people know that you are knitting socks.
It is amazing how many total strangers will ask you to knit them a pair.
They all seem to take it quite well when you tell them no.
They never seem to take up the offer of knitting lessons.
I like square (or almost square) heel flaps.
I like my heel flaps to be about 6cm long.
I have huge galoomphing feet.
I like knitting socks toe up and toe down.
I think I go faster when using double pointed needles.
Much as I like the way the top looks when I pretend to Kitchener the knit stitches to the purl stitches it takes too long.
When you start with a provisional cast on, knit a few rows, and pull out the crochet chain you get a picot-y edge and the stitches don’t seem inclined to run wildly (yet)
I should never have tried to make a perfectly matched pair of socks (photo was going to be below but I wore them to gym and they are not particularly photogenic).
Due to the above I have discovered that I am, in fact, secretly obsessive compulsive and anal retentive, as I am now DETERMINED to make the next pair match as closely as possible.
One of the best reasons for splitting your 100g ball into two balls is to find any KNOTS.
Once you find knots make sure that the bits either side of the knots have the same pattern repeat.
I didn’t do this and the bit on one side of the sock had slightly longer stretches of colour than the other one.
This is why my socks did not match and I am now obsessing about getting the next pair to match.
I really need to get a life.

In other news, Jackie is on a mission to bankrupt the tooth fairy. She has lost 3 teeth in the last 2 weeks (2 on successive days) and seems to spend every spare moment wiggling the loose ones to encourage them to fall out.

I have been invited to a bridge club from next year. Haven't played in over a decade. Must find out what system they use so I can brush up.

New Years resolutions – must post more to the blog, must work on breaking the 70kg barrier.