Welcome Fall!

Well, it’s a new month and a new season and I have whole new pile of knitting and am pulling patterns and books out to select some new projects.  

But first, a few finished objects.

First of all, I took a brief hiatus from the socks I was knitting for my September PSC to knit some quick and happy instant gratification projects. 

We’ve been going to see our nephew play football on Saturday mornings.  Now that the weather is getting a little crisp (and occasionally soggy); I decided I could use a little something to wear for extra warmth without looking like a total wimp.  My last pair of fingerless gloves was pretty worn out, so I figured I could whip up a quick replacement pair.  Even though I can knit fingerless gloves/mitts without a pattern, I wanted to do something fun, so I dove into my vast stash of patterns and came up with Fetching.  Lots of people (about 16,000 on Ravelry) have knit this one so I figured I could handle it.  I ended up doing a few pattern mods*.  Now my hands can stay nice and warm at the ball games.  (Too bad I forgot them last Saturday, LOL!) 

Pattern: Fetching  

Yarn: Mountain Colors 4/8’s Wool in Huckleberry

Size 6 needles

*Mods: Added extra rows of cable pattern at top of hand for additional length; added thumb gusset for better fit.

Since these only used up a fraction of the yarn, I decided they needed an accompanying headband or ear-warmer.  Again, I could have winged it, but decided that I could also modify an existing pattern just as easily.  I think this took me about 3 hours to knit. 

Pattern: Calorimetery

Yarn: Mountain Colors 4/8’s Wool in Huckleberry

Size 6 Needles

Mods:  Added mini-cables to mimic fetching pattern; adjusted number of stitches / rows (down) to obtain correct size

I also finished Kasey’s Neon socks. 

Pattern: Ampersand by Kirsten Kapur (Free on Ravelry)

Yarn: Shi Bui Knits socks in color 4703

Size 2.75mm needles; magic loop, 2 at a time

Then decided I needed to knit her a hat as well. (She loves hats).  So I found some similarly colored sportweight yarn lurking in my stash (I won it at Stitches).  The yarn is heavier than I like for socks and the colors are pretty not-me. It was a really good candidate for some other project, but I hadn’t figured out what yet. Luckily it was close enough to the colorway of the yarn I used for her socks.  Then, I perused my zillion or so books and patterns and found a nice pattern that would be complementary to the socks and voila, a hat was knit.  I give you Kasey’s Neon Beanie.

Pattern: Beach Beanies by Maggie DeCuir; from Hats: A Knitter’s Dozen

Yarn: Interlacements Toasty Toes color 204

Size 6 needles

In all, I think I spent about two evenings and a morning working on these projects before I forced myself to face the socks. But, once I got the quick projects done, I was actually able to focus on my September socks better.  I’m doing a pretty simple pattern (mini-cables), so that may be the reason that I initially couldn’t get into them.  I was also having some issues with the way the yarn was pooling.  The yarn I’m using for them is Lorna’s Laces and I was hoping to fall in love with it the way some of my friends (and others I read online) have.  I like the feel of the yarn, but this particular colorway is a little tricky.  It is several shades of purple and for some reason the very nice spiral I was getting initially decided to up and reverse direction about mid leg.  Ewww.  It was actually the same effect in the socks I did for Kasey, but I didn’t mind it with the pinks and oranges, for some reason, the shades of purple just didn’t play as well.  I ended up ripping the first sock after I had nearly reached the heel.  I am now using both skeins of yarn and alternating every other row.  I’m getting a little bit nicer effect. Still, I think I might have been better off doing just a plain stockinette sock with this yarn which would have needed less stitches in the pattern.  

Oh well!  Since I’ve already finished one sock and am about to the point where I ripped back the very first attempt on the second on, I think I’ll just go ahead and finish them.

 (you can see the section where the maroon-ish purple and the dark blue-ish purple overlap, now imagine that doing a boomerang thing mid leg... yuck)

My parents are celebrating their 55th Wedding Anniversary in Ireland as I type this.  My Mom has a baby shower to go to when she returns home, and was worried about being able to get a present in time.  Normally she whips up little quilted blankets for all of the shower gifts and new baby presents she needs, but the new Mom let her know that she has already received mountains of blankets, so Mom asked me if I thought I could knit a baby sweater in week or so.  Seeing how I have a lot of empty needles sitting around and nothing really urgent to start knitting, I figured I could do that.  So I started a baby sweater Sunday night.  I’m using a pattern, but only as a guide since I’m modifying several parts of it.  I’m about through with the body and should have the finished sweater in the mail in time for it to be waiting on Mom’s arrival home. 

Meanwhile, the only other project on my needles is the shawl which is progressing, but slowly.  Not particularly photogenic at this point.

With the fall weather officially here, I’m ready to settle in with a nice hot cup of apple cider and some serious knitting.  I’ve got a few ideas and am working on my list of planned projects this week.  In the meantime, I’m ready to cast on for my October PSC socks.  I’m looking forward to those because I really LOVE the yarn.   I’ll keep you posted.

Welcome Fall and Happy Knitting!

Nana