April Afghan Square - #1

I am going to have a drink & a lie down...I have sewn and cut my first steek:

I was wondering what the heck that sewing machine I had in the basement in a box was for. My mother got it for me a couple of years ago, and I had all these ambitious plans to actually *make* things. It languished on the dining room table for a month, collecting dust, and then moved to its permanent home on a shelf in the basement. It took me 15 minutes to even figure out how to use the thing - let's just say I have never taken a Home Ec class in my life. At any rate, I somehow managed to run a line down each side, and then *snip snip*! I don't think I'm actually going to *pull* on anything, but at least the worst is done. Just ignore the mistakes in the pattern at the bottom, I'll fix those when I finish off the border.

I thought it would be much more dramatic than it was, that I wouldn't be able to bring myself to cut it....surprisingly, it was pretty painless.

I'm still going to have a drink & a lie down, though - Elizabeth Zimmermann says so, so who am I to argue with an expert?

Mmmmm....Fleece Fair....

Not too shabby a way to spend a Saturday...drove about an hour south and got to play with knitterly things all morning! I had never seen an alpaca before, or little lambs, or Angora and Chincilla rabbits....or people spinning. Or so much FIBER in one place! *evil laugh* I went with a specific budget, and let's just say I didn't quite make it, LOL....my goal was to get some Socks That Rock, which I did, but I also fell in love with some yarn from this great little place in Michigan - I think I did the most damage there!
Lots of yarn for my stash and for more projects I have running around in my head!

My First Scarf...

...with some of my favorite models. I did this super-simple K2 P2 scarf at the beginning of February, but didn't get around to taking a picture of it until this morning. My stunning models are Stewie (spotted) and Albert (black), who were mostly very tolerant of mommy chasing them around & trying to get them to wear a scarf!

Scratch That...

...I now have a single-sock second sock problem! I just finished the Regia pair - the right one was done on US2 DPN, the left on US2 Addi Turbos. I got a looser gauge on the circulars, so it's a little looser (fortunately, my left foot is a little bigger). Either way, I think I'm going to start using US1's instead with a 64 st CO, with US0's for the ribbing. And *definitely* both socks at the same time, if possible, LOL!

Another amusing note - I didn't notice until I had turned the heel on the second sock that I did k1 p1 ribbing on the first one and k2 p2 on the left. No WAY was I frogging this one - so at least now I can tell left from right, right?

An Update

Funny how life runs away with you- I haven't been short on knitting, only short on things to say about it. While I am Addicted, I haven't quite figured out what all to say about it all the time. I think that will come with time - it has been only 3 months, I'm a beginner!

I spent a week in Paris - I was sick the whole time, which made for a bad tourist but a good sock knitter. Thankfully, I chose an aisle seat in order to make trying socks on on the flight over and back easier. I now officially have two socks - Regia 4 fadig in Jubilee and Bearfoot in Elderberry using mini-cables from Sensational Knitted Socks (which I love because all patterns are already written for DPN and circulars) and a two-sock second sock problem. In my quest to alleviate this, I picked up Cat Bordhi's book and knit the other half of the Regia pair on circulars! YAY! Next step, finish Bearfoot and cast on a PAIR on circulars.

The Musee d'Orsay must have known I was coming:



Or so I'd like to think. I'm pretty sure she's knitting socks, which thrilled me to bits. I was honestly pretty taken by the fact that she was knitting these because she had to - someone needed to wear them. I knit them because I *like* to. She's also probably half my age and 3x times as skilled as I am. How times have changed, and yet, we knit the same items the same way as women 400 years ago.



I returned home from said trip, and promptly finished a chunky hooded sweater - my first sweater, and it even FITS!



I had my first moment feeling the "need" to create a "stash." Fell in love with a skein of Feza Premier (ooh, pretty, must have for stash)....but instead, made what felt like the world's longest scarf. It took me 2 1/2 hours to untangle all the sections, re-knot and wind them up (a ball winder was my next purchase), and then decided that I needed to wear said scarf to dinner on Saturday night. As in, 48 hours after having my wisdom teeth out, and 6 hours after winding the yarn. Ambitious, yes, but bed rest does wonders for knitterly pursuits! I wore the scarf with pride on Saturday night, and I looked good (at least) despite not being able to eat a thing....

Socks, Take Two

J picked out this yarn for a scarf, but at this point, I thought I could do better. He didn't want a sweater (something about not liking chunky sweaters), so I asked if he wanted socks. BONUS for me - more practice!

I think at this point, I've just about had it with Knitting Pure and Simple's Beginner Sock pattern - I modified this one with a full K1 P1 rib for the top, per DH's request.

This one skein was 220 yards, and I barely had enough...still knitting too tightly, LOL, but he seems to love them!

Socks, Take One

Beautiful, aren't they? Nevermind that they're too big - despite the fact that they measured what they were supposed to for my foot size, or that I have already snapped one set of size 1 dpn because I knit too tightly. (Someone said this was supposed to be relaxing. We're working on that.) That's 5 stitches/inch on size 7's!

They are the most beautiful things in the world to me right now. They are my pass to River Knits' Sock Club (you have to knit one to "get in"), and they have introduced me to sock crack. Sock Crack is a horribly addictive drug, let me tell you. It's why I'm here. The rest of my life? That's for another blog. This is actually my second project (the first was a pretty cool, chunky, 6' scarf with Reynolds Smile yarn [Color: 205] - gorgeous variegated bulky stuff), but I think my journey begins with socks. I have been knitting for officially 1 month and 8 days, and I am hopelessly hooked.

So here I am. And here are my socks.