fos – Page 3 – Behind the Smile

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 11, 2010June 24, 2010

Hey Look At That

I was whining yesterday on Twitter about being bored, so when my longtime pal Sam from New Zealand called me on it and instructed me to “knit something” I did what anyone else in my position would do:

I took a nap.

And then I finished a project that had been slightly languishing on the needles with only a few more rows to go.

I took this picture earlier this week.

I started this project about a week ago. It’s Annis from the new Knitty “surprises”. It’s an interesting shawl construction that has you knit the bottom edge and then using a series of short rows, much like the bottom of a sock heel, you shape the rest of the shawl. This causes it to curve and ultimately you have a shawl! I’d like to use the technique again with a different edging.

I soaked and blocked it last night:

And it was already dry this morning.

I used Knitpicks Gloss Lace in the (discontinued) Mermaid color. I still have quite a bit left of the skein and another whole skein, which can be used for another shawl of some sort. I’ve never used lace weight before and let me tell you: This shawl weighs approximately nothing. It’s fascinating.

So, yay, I finished something. This year hasn’t been much in the way of FOs, though I did knit two sweaters, so that has surely got to count for something.

Also considering my current lack-of-employment I really don’t have much in the way of excuses at this point! Hah.

April 18, 2010June 24, 2010

SOCK IT TO ME

So I finished a pair of socks. I like them. They are Papaver socks from Anne Hanson at Knitspot. The pattern is great and they pretty much knit themselves. I recommend all the patterns I’ve knit from Knitspot. The only thing I modded was that I didn’t do a short row heel because those don’t really fit me too great so I did a stockinette heel with the gusset decreases on the bottom of the foot to maintain the integrity of the pattern edge (blah blah blah, haha).

Yarn is Rio de la Plata merino sock in raspberry. I got it for myself for my birthday about 2 years ago. It was always destined to be Papavers! I’m glad I finally made them.

ANYWAY now I’m still working on the yellow socks I talked about last time and also these ones:

These are Laeticia from Twist Collective. It’s a fabulously written pattern, totally charted. Anytime a pattern isn’t charted it makes me want to smack it.

And I am actually pretty much following it exactly except for (haha) the cast-on – instructions call for a rolled edge which makes me want to screech so I did a turned cuff. Doesn’t look too much different. OTHER THAN THAT THOUGH it is by the book.

This yarn is also Rio de la Plata that has been marinating in the stash for awhile. It was briefly part of a shawl before I ripped it out. I don’t recall the colorway as the ball band has long been lost in the sands of time.

At any rate, Ravelry has informed me that Rio de la Plata is out of business, so good luck finding any! 😛

It is too bad because their base yarn is great, almost cottony and strong, but all wool.