Knitting Therapy

I'm currently working on writing a hat pattern. It's amazing how many little tweaks happen during the process. I'm currently testing to see how the pattern looks done up in a nice summery cotton, instead of the wool-tweed and alpaca versions I've done before. Alpaca streeeetches like crazy, as much as I love it.

In other news, two days until the Tour de Fleece! I'll be spinning daily, on every day that the Tour rides, and trying desperately to finish enough for a sweater. Hmm, I should start carding and weighing tomorrow... my goal is 1 oz a day. I bet I can beat that most days!

I just love seeing the change from fiber to yarn. Last year, I kettle dyed some white merino/nylon fiber in vibrant emerald and sapphire tones during a dye day at a friend's house. I ended up with this:



It took me a while to get around to spinning it, but when I finally picked it up, I decided I wanted to try something a little bit different. I wanted to spin it up without carding it much to create a tweedy-looking, very squishy yarn. From bag 'o fiber to wheel:



Then from single to plied:



And finally, the finish product, all caked up:



I just love seeing how different it looks!

Normally, if I have to frog a project more than twice, I just give up. Sometimes, however, there is something that I want to knit SO badly that I'll keep on plugging away, no matter how frustrated it makes me. I'm working on a pair of socks that I desperately, truly want to wear - they are AWESOME - but I think I'm being conspired against!

Enter the sock. I'm testing a pattern that a friend is writing with a brilliant, innovative construction. I am now on my FIFTH start to it - and not because the pattern is badly written. I simply seem unable to follow directions! First, I read it wrong and knitted a section in the wrong pattern. Frogged. Then, I had a clumsy cast on that made the heel flap look odd. Frogged. Then, after getting halfway through the pattern, I realized that the sock was SO BIG because I'm too stupid to read a gauge swatch correctly that even my husband's size 12/13 feet had extra space in the ankles. Frogged. Down a needle size, which I had to go out and purchase, as I didn't have an double pointed size 0s. And to top it all off, just to show that the universe is out to eat the sock... one of my double pointed needles snapped in the middle of knitting. I had to exchange the whole package which meant... removing the needles so I could exchange them. While I was gone, a cat decided to drag the orphaned knitting around the room. Frogged.

I am going to take today off from knitting this sock. If I don't, I might stab someone with my (thankfully replaced) double pointed size 0 needles. And man, those things are tiny and pointy. They'd hurt.

New Birks = ahhhhhh feet.

Or in this case, spinning.

While cleaning and stash diving today, I discovered a braid of beautiful brown/skyblue mystery fiber. The store I purchased this from is now closed, and it never had a tag on it. It's 4oz and I'm fairly sure there's some silk in it, from how thin it wants to spin up. I think it's time for my first foray into laceweight spinning...

For laughs, I also spun up a few handfuls of border collie. That's right, it's shedding season, and my year-old collie mixes are leaving piles of themselves in corners. I've heard that dog hair is the warmest yarn on the planet, or close to it. Out came the Bosworth Mini. It was exciting spinning, that was for certain - Maya and Sansa have soft downy hair mixed with bristly overcoats, and while their hair is rather long and fluffy for dogs, it's short for spinning. I couldn't have spun this on anything heavier than the mini, I think, and even then the poor spindle in the floor half a dozen times. All plied up, I have a dozen yards of fingering-weight black/brown/white yarn. I think hubby needs a dog bookmark.

Everyone has their stories about gauge swatches. This is mine.

(Assume that the Law and Order scene change noise is inserted here.)

I don't swatch for socks anymore. I've knit oodles of socks, and the majority of those socks have been with a fingering weight yarn. I can order yarn and just knit it right up, no issues, and have it fit. I cast on 60 stitches, always, with fingering weight yarns.

I have some lovely Sockina Cotton, which is nice and soft cotton with a little nylon and stretch to it. Ravelry claims it's fingering weight. I cast on 60 stitches. Knit half a dozen rows in ribbing. And proceeded to put two feet into the opening. I should've taken a picture!

I then cast on 54. Knit half a dozen rows. Still too big.

48 ended up being the magic number. There's no way this yarn is "fingering weight"!

Yes, that's right! A knitting blog!

For a while, I'm going to be posting somewhere else. Probably all the information you need to know is right in the title.

http://sayinggoodbyemiscarriageandrecovery.blogspot.com/

I have puppies instead.

When I left this morning, there were no flies in my house. I returned from the office... and there were at least eight. I've spent the past half hour running around and spraying flies. (7/8 visible flies have now met the Great Fly.) Normally, this would be a mere annoyance, but my parents are coming to visit tomorrow and I'll already have enough cleaning to deal with before they arrive, but FLIES!? There's no garbage in the house, it got taken out last night! Arrrrgh!

/fly rant