socks – Page 2 – Behind the Smile

July 10, 2010

Adventures in Sac and an FO

Yesterday I headed up to Sacramento (explain to me again why I don’t live there? I like it so much more than the Bay Area. Oh right, I bought a house here. Sigh.) to help celebrate Malvina’s belated 30th birthday. As usual, we would be heading out to Chevy’s on the River for dinner, but I showed up early because traffic on Fridays is always a big fat suck and also I made her a coconut cake that needed to be refrigerated. So anyway, I got there around lunch time and we went shopping for Felicia’s wedding present at various places (Ikea, Target, Bed Bath & Beyond – which I always call Bath & Bodyworks to my eternal annoyance).

We decided that we were officially old because we were getting excited about kitchen tools. Case in point, here is what I picked up for myself at Ikea and Target with some birthday money:

I feel a little strange about this turn of events; not long ago I would have bought DVDs or something. But the fact of the matter is, I keep sending tea spoons and measuring spoons down the garbage disposal so I needed some more of those. I’m also turning into a cake-baking freakazoid, so I was in the market for a serving spatula thing and a better froster-er. And that stirrer thing on the right? I just wanted it. I think it will be great for the spaghetti sauce I make, and other things I cook. And I’ve been needing a rolling pin for quite some time; now I can make tortillas and sugar cookies.

(I also bought myself some Wii Points and shall shortly commence downloading such old school classics as Street Fighter II and Super Mario World, and possibly World of Goo, which is new WiiWare. Lest you think I have completely lost my mind and don’t continue to love things that are completely frivolous.)

Anyway, so after a successful shopping trip, we went back to Malvina’s house where Sam mixed us a cocktail of something with Bailey’s and chocolate, and then later after the rest of her friends arrived we headed over to Chevy’s.

For Malvina’s birthday I got her a copy of Little Women and Werewolves (hah!) and knit her some socks:

(“will be mad” is an in-joke.)

I actually finished this pair of socks in about 2 weeks. It is a midyear miracle! These are, as noted, Oolong Socks by Mona Schmidt (rav link), available via Twist Collective (link). I couldn’t post about them before as they were a gift. But they have gone off to their new home where I hope they will be worn a lot.

It wouldn’t be a Melissa knit if there weren’t some mods:

I knit the leg chart (A, I think) twice instead of three times.
Used my own heel turn instructions because I either read the pattern’s wrong or it was actually written incorrectly.

And that’s it, which for me is pretty amazing.

Tonight we’re going into the city to our friend Jen’s birthday party at the beach house where she lives. Should be fun! I think I need to take a nap first though. *is old now*

June 24, 2010June 24, 2010

Navy Rainbow Socks (FINALLY) & Etc.

I actually finished these socks in early May, shortly before we hied off to Environs Unknown (the midwest). I forgot to blog about them till now.

Man, these took For-Freakin’-Ever! I like how they turned out, though, and so did Abby – which was the point. As part of the never-ending “I Should Never Have Opened My Big Mouth And Said I’d Knit You A Bunch Of Stuff Since You Made Me That Fabulous Quilt” project, I am now three pairs into a five pair project that started oh. so. long. ago. (2008)

Anyhoo, that’s okay because if it hadn’t taken me so long to finish on this project, Knitpicks wouldn’t have come out with their rainbow yarn and as such, Abby gets a pair of those, which I think is pretty cool! (No those aren’t much further along than the last time I showed them. Shut up.)

So, these socks are the ever-famous Monkey pattern, which I have knit four times. And I do not plan on knitting them ever again. (Note how I didn’t say never… just in case.) I am tired of knitting Monkeys. Not that it’s not a fabulous pattern (it totally is) but four times is more than enough when there are so many OTHER fabulous patterns out there. Still, I will always hold Monkeys close to my heart because it’s the sock that taught me top-down socks. Before this I always knit toe-up because I was confused by and afraid of heel construction. Nowadays, I prefer top-down construction because heels are my most favorite thing to knit (you can file that under the WTF category).

The yarn is Perchance to Knit Sock Yarn, and I forget where I got it from, but I am assuming the Loopy Ewe. It’s very nice yarn and complements the pattern well.

Here are all the monkey socks I’ve knitted. Two are mine (the hot pink and turquoise) and two are for Abby (the blue/purple and navy rainbow).

It’s been a good run, Monkey socks! Now, onto something else.

***

Here’s some of the recent jewelry items I’ve made:

I’m definitely into antique gold/brass and bright colors right now. While I do love silver, it’s just so overdone these days. Everybody wears silver. I would argue that people need to broaden their horizons and get on the “other metallics rock too” bandwagon.

***

A few other things on my mind:

I got curious so I installed Google Analytics on this page. I feel like it’s 2002 all over again! Good times, good times.
I want to make macarons, the sandwich cookie kind. I found this great article on how to do it. Only problem is it calls for grams of ingredients instead of cups/tablespoons. I have been wanting an excuse to get a kitchen scale so this could be it.
Tomorrow I’m going to help Abby buy a flat screen TV. I like watching other people spend a lot of money. She says she needs me there to sigh dramatically and say things like, “Just buy THAT one already!” hehe
I actually am really tired today and feel kind of rotten. There has been much lolling about in these parts. I’m not sick – I don’t think I’ve been getting enough sleep.
I’ve been organizing the back end of my blog all week, and when I was working on tags, a list of the most popular tags that I used popped up:

I would say that about sums it up.
Burritos.

Hope everyone is having a great Thursday!

June 23, 2010June 24, 2010

Current Projects

I have been haphazardly working on various projects, and finishing none! It’s highly annoying. You would think that with the sheer amount of time I have on my hands I would be whipping out the finished objects like nobody’s business, but instead I’ve mostly been back and forth over the following projects:

These are the Rainbow Over Lahaina socks from the Sock Club book. I like them a lot. They are pretty easy to memorize.

Then we have Jaywalkers:

I’ve never knit Jaywalkers before, can you believe it? They’re kind of a classic. They’re being knit up in Knitpicks Felici, which I continue to enjoy working with (and good thing too, considering the sheer amount of it I have in my stash. Does one person need this many striped socks? Well, obviously.)

Then we have this Lacy Kerchief scarf (Rav link) that is going to take me for-effing-ever to finish because scarves are boring. This one is less boring, and I actually desire the finished product, so we’ll see how long it takes me. Not super long, I hope.

But I’m really like the garter stitch aspects of it. It’s still not quite reversible, but it’s an interesting knit, which is the important thing.

I also wanted to work on a sweater that’s not totally boring like the alpaca blob (but I will LOVE the alpaca blob when it’s done, hopefully by the end of the summer. I like the look of stockinette, I just hate knitting it when it’s not in the round). So one of the things I have been mulling over was making another Forecast. However, I already have one, and I do like the designer’s Bulky Cable Sweater as well. Though I don’t want a bulky sweater – I just want a regular worsted weight sweater. So I hybridized the two patterns and came up with this:

It’s knit out of the Stitch Nation Bamboo Ewe in geranium (a tomato-y red) which I got on sale awhile back. It’s actually pretty nice and is half wool, half bamboo (well, rayon if you want to get technical). A little splitty but nothing my inexplicably sharp Susan Bates circulars can’t handle. Seriously, those things are sharper than the Addi lace circulars, which are pretty dang sharp. What gives, Susan Bates? Incidentally, I really like them. If you’re going to go cheap on your needles, go Susan Bates.

Anyway, I think that’s pretty much it around here on the knitting front. I’ve also been working on some jewelry but haven’t taken pictures of that yet.

I have to go to a meeting for the library gala thing I’m docenting at this weekend and then going to Jason’s after for dinner, so I probably won’t have a jewelry post until tomorrow. But hey at least this whole unemployment situation has gotten me to blog more, right? I’m having fun with it again at long last.