WIP: Sock Hat

I have yet another project on the needles! This past week brought some sample work so my regular projects are on hold until I get it done. I cast on a hat for knit night last week so I would have something simple to knit. 

This yarn was a gift from a friend and has languished in my stash for several years. 

The yarn is Sleep Season Goods Sock Yarn in the color Sassafras and is 100% wool. Initially, this yarn was destined for socks but the lack of nylon and the light variegation changed my mind. Hat it is! This is a great project for knitting on the go and I'm happy to use some older stash!

WIP: Sock Hat

I'm taking a brief break from some slightly complicated knitting I have going on to knit  a nice simple sock hat. I grabbed a US #3 (3.25 mm) and three coordinating balls of leftover sock yarn and cast on. 

 The yellow is Lichen in Hazel Knits Piquant Lite, the variegated is Leading Men Fiber Arts Show Stealer in Anne's Story, and the lavender is BMFA STR Light in Bleck.

This is a great project for resting my brain from complicated projects and wonderful for social knitting. 

I chose a random stripe sequence to break up the variegated yarn and I really like how it's turning out. My color palette reads fall and that's probably a direct reflection of the warm weather we're having in Seattle at the moment; in the 80s most days. Fall is my favorite time of year and summer always seems to linger longer and longer just to spite my love of crisp, frosty mornings and my ability to wear wool sweaters again. This is definitely a wishful thinking kind of project.

WIP Wednesday: Rolling Thunder Gloves

 I started with something of a problem. Variegated yarn. Some people love it and some people hate it and I tend to be somewhat ambivalent about the stuff. It's difficult to find the right pattern for whatever it is your variegated yarn is doing. I think I found the perfect pattern for this particular yarn, which is Leading Men Fiber Arts Show Stealer in the Anne's Story color. I ordered the yarn from Little Skein in the Big Wool as a companion to my Anne of Green Gables kit (more on that soon). As you can see, it has beads.

 I've already finished the first glove...

and my project has a home in my new Chubby Cloud project bag that I purchased at KnitFit! this last weekend. 

The pattern is Rolling Thunder Gloves by Sivia Harding and it's available as a free Ravelry download. Sivia based the pattern on her Rolling Thunder Socks (found at knitty.com) and you'll need the chart and instructions for the beaded bits from the socks to knit the gloves. I'm using clear copper-lined beads that I had on hand and the effect is a little like rain drops on Fall foliage. The combination of purls, knits, beads, and garter rib is perfect for this autumnal yarn.

FO: Zombie Hello Kitty Socks

Pattern: Basic Vanilla Sock on 64sts (outta my noggin')

Yarn: Canon Hand Dyes Charles Self Striping Sock in Zombie Hello Kitty

Needles: US #1 (2.25 mm) Hiya Hiya Sharp Circulars

Mods: I made the leg slightly shorter than my normal six inches. I love the pink flecks in the minty green color!

WIP: Zombie Hello Kitty Socks

Last week was rough, wasn't it? I never got the feeling that things were going as they should and it was all I could do to get through the day and collapse into some knitting. To celebrate the end of the work week I cast on these vanilla socks in Canon Hand Dyes Charles Self Striping Sock in Zombie Hello Kitty. The little red stitch toward the bottom of the picture is my scrap yarn for an afterthought heel. I'm thinking about trying an alternate afterthought heel - maybe the Fish Lips Kiss Heel? 

Let me know if you've tried any of the variations on an afterthought heel and how they vary from the usual afterthought heel. I've got the rest of this sock to knit and the second one before I have to decide!

FO: Vanilla Socks

Pattern: 64 stitch plain vanilla sock from my noggin

Yarn: Regia Hand-dye Effect in Fog

Needles: US #1 (2.25 mm) Hiya Hiya Sharps

Mods: This is my own standard sock pattern using a 64 stitch cast on. Nothin' fancy. I have to say, though, that I really dislike knitting with this yarn. It's basically a wool single plied with a nylon thread. And that wool single? Hairy and splitty and not pleasant at all to the hands. I was mostly annoyed with this yarn's tendency to split since I cast these on to knit while I watched the Lego movie and I have some not very pretty stitches toward the top of the first sock and intermittently throughout the pair of socks (bus knitting is bumpy!). The finished socks are rather pretty and if the yarn weren't such a pain to knit with I'd happily buy more since I like the "hand-dye effect".

FO: Ruru

 

Pattern: Ruru by Kylie Bates (free on Ravelry)

Yarn: Dream in Color Smooshy with Cashmere in Ponder Dusk

Needles: US #3 (3.25 mm) Hiya Hiya Sharps

Mods: I used a larger needle and you can see what happened - I ran out of yarn at the top of the second mitt! It wasn't an intentional modification since I thought I had grabbed a 2 1/2 size needle and once I realized my mistake I had most of the first mitt done. These are really fun to knit and super fast. Little A will get a lot of wear out of them and she should be able to wear them through the rest of this year (I hope). The owl cable motif is really fun to knit.

This project counts toward my goal to knit more of my sock yarn scraps this year and use patterns that are in my Ravelry library. This yarn is now completely out of my stash!

FO: Sproutlette Dress

Sorry the blog has been a little light on knitting content lately. I'm spending most of my time in the evenings studying for a teaching credential test, a linguistics exam, and working on homework assignments. Some of the time I can read and knit at the same time, but when it comes down to geometry or writing papers I have to set down the needles and pull out my pen or pencil.

 

A co-worker of mine is having a little girl really soon so I wanted to give her something extra special.

 

The keyhole neck in the back still needs a button.
 

Pattern: Sproutlette Dress by Tanis Lavalee
Yarn: Hazel Knits Artisan Sock in Land of Sweets (Dec. 2012 Club Color)
Needles: US #3 Addi Turbo
Mods: None. Inspiration to cast this on came directly from seeing this example. There's something about seeing somebody else knit an item from my queue that makes me want to cast on right away. I'm thinking a matching pair of Saartje booties are in order.
 

FO: Imma What? Socks

Pattern: Improvised Vanilla outta my noggin
Yarn: Rainy Days Wooly Dogs Gothsocks Asphodel in Imma Bitch
Needle: US #1 (2.25 mm) Hiya Hiya Sharp
Mods: Well, it's my own pattern out of my brain so there's that. I paid special attention to where my stripes fell when casting on, starting the heel flap, turning the heel, and beginning the gusset. Short row heels don't hug my feet like heel flap and gusset socks so I knew I wanted my usual top-down sock construction. I ended up with: 3 1/2 stripes for ribbing, 12 stripes for the leg, 3 stripes for the heel flap, a chunk of red for the heel (Louis Quatorze heels, no?), 16 stripes for the gusset/foot, and 3-ish stripes for the toe.

 

They're lovely socks.  Yarn hoarding may be something I do when something is too "special" to be used; Gothsocks is notoriously difficult to purchase except in person (and sometimes there's a scrum) so I'm happy to say that the socks are better than saving, *ahem* hoarding, the yarn in my cedar chest.

Imma what?

My knitting life has been quite unexciting as of late. I have two large projects nearing completion and am feeling the itch to start new things. I'm mainly a monogamous knitter so when I get to feeling this way my cure is to knit faster on my current projects so I can cast on something new!

 

I may have jumped the gun on this one by a few days! I needed social knitting of the not top secret kind so I dug out one of my two precious skeins of GothSocks and cast on a simple pair of stripey socks. This is the Laudanum base which is an 80/10/10 mix of merino, cashmere, and nylon. Yum! The color is Imma Bitch (ha!) and alternates between four-row stripes of black and semi-solid red. The heel treatment is still under contemplation - I prefer a heel flap and gusset construction but haven't tried any of the afterthought heel treatments available. Suggestions?

FO: Fiar

Sometimes simple is best.

Pattern: Fiar by Irish Girlie Knits

Yarn: Black Trillium Fibre Arts Gradient Set in Flutter

Needles: US #6 (4.0 mm) Hiya Hiya Sharp Interchangeable

Mods: The pattern includes instructions for a 3-stripe or 5-stripe color sequence but the gradient set works with the pattern repeat of 20 rows. Each mini-skein of yarn yielded 20 rows of knitting so I just knit in pattern until I was about to run out of yarn and added the next color in at a garter section. I ended up running out of yarn right at the bind off so I pulled some white Dale of Norway Baby Ull out of my stash to finish off the bind off on the palest color section (you can hardly tell!). This pattern makes great social knitting as well as being a terrific sock yarn stashbuster. I used all 635 yards of my gradient set but if you have partial balls of sock yarn it would be a fantastic scrappy sock yarn project.

WIP: Fiar

I overpacked for my knitting retreat. The one project that I cast on during my knitting-filled weekend ended up being the only project I really wanted to work on.



This is Fiar by Irish Girlie Knits. It's a long cowl knit with sock yarn and I'm using my gradient set from Black Trillium Fibers. Each skein seems to eat up just about one repeat so it's coming along swimmingly and is really great for social knitting (and drinking) since every other row is stockinette. I'm using a US #6 needle since my #5 needle is otherwise occupied. My gradient set came with five mini skeins and I'm currently knitting the fourth of the set.

WIP: Tiny Rocky Coast

Tiny Rocky Coast Cardigan

yarma
Originally uploaded by ErinBirnel

There are a lot of people in my life who are expecting babies this Spring. While baby things are thankfully quite tiny and make quick knits the sheer number in my list is a little overwhelming. I cast on this little cardigan over the weekend. Tiny Rocky Coast cardigan by Hannah Fettig from the Coastal Kids Collection. It's knit in a very nice fingering weight - Dream in Color Smooshy with Cashmere in the color 'Ponder Dusk'. I'm knitting the 12 month size to try and use as much yarn as possible.

FO: Yellow Submarine Cowl

 I knit this cowl for my sister for Christmas and it is winging it's way to Ethiopia as I write this. She is a lover of all things Beatles so I thought this would be the perfect lightweight accessory for her to carry with her as she tromps around the countryside with her giant of a boyfriend.

Pattern: Yellow Submarine Cowl by yellowcosmo

Yarn: MC is Tosh Merino Light in Baltic, CC is Hazel Knits Artisan Sock in Stick o' Butter

Needles: US #2 Hiya Hiya Sharp Interchangeables (2.75 mm)

Mods: None. This is the small version of the cowl and it is pretty snug. If I were to knit this again (I might, actually) I would go up a needle size to make it slightly wider or knit the longer size cowl. Tosh Merino Light and HK Artisan Sock aren't quite the same weight so my tension is a little wonky in spots but overall I'm very happy with my color combination so that trumps the tension issue. I know this project is a total win since several people at my knitting group tried to take it home with them!

PS - There's also a hat version of this available if you're not the cowl-knitting type.