The last of the stripey sock yarn

Omigosh you guys, ever since I've been knitting socks (give or take a pair) I've been knitting with Knitterly Things Vesper Sock, and after years of club yarn and one-off purchases I thought I'd never get through...

I'm down to six final skeins. And there's no more shipping to Canada, neither. While I work out who I'm going to hit up to take yarn deliveries for me because honestly, the colours on offer aren't getting any less swoonable, I decided to cake two skeins for ready knitting, and eke out the other four. But which two?

I mean these ones are gorgeous.

As are these.

 

waaaaannnhhhh

 

This is SO HARD. But choices need to be made, so I am being ruthless. I don't love this one as completely and utterly as I do the others...

 

... so it's standing back for a minnit. 

And I really, really love these ones, so they're standing back for the final knits.

Which leaves these two!

I mean, they're perfect. One says summer, and the other says autumn, and by a complete coincidence we have a summer and autumn coming up.

Wouldya look at that perfect drape of luscious colour? Whaaaa

Cake time!

Nearly forgot how to do that, it's been so long. Reminds me of how I used to be all yarn all the time, instead of mostly yarns (har har, a writing pun.) It feels good to be getting some balance back.

Here's hoping you have a lovely balanced weekend. And by balanced I mean with equal amounts of good things and even nicer things. Thanks for dropping by, and I'll see you next Saturday!

 

(ps isn't this pretty?) 

 

 

 

Yarn colour choices for the decision-averse

I'm not even showing you a picture of the finished Christmas socks today, because I am super tired of them and I'm sure you are too! It's time to cast on something new.

Okay yes, I've got more socks on my mind, but this time with wool/mohair blend on bigger needles. And I get to pick all the colours. 

That's a slight barrier though, because there are so many in the stash! Anything I use for one set of solids won't be available for another, later. And I do need to blend, because none of these cakes are quite enough for a whole sock in the leg length I prefer.

I've done blue socks before, but not with the green accent I used to good effect in green socks a while back. I've knit in this beautiful soft mauve, but in solid only - it might look great with multicoloured stripes in blue and white and orange.

Or there are bolder options:

Emerald green socks with tan stripes, or brilliant yellow with a mixture of green and multi stripes. The green is left over from the aforementioned green socks, which means I'd have yellow left over for stripes on some future pair of socks... including the emerald green ones, if I don't pick them right now. 

In that scenario, maybe I'd want to save the tan to use as a solid stripe with socks from this multi-colour blue and mauve. Or I could use a blue accent to pick up the blue of the multi.

But wait, there's more!

There'll be some mauve left over from those socks, and I could use that to pair with the multicoloured blue.

My head is spinning. And I'm not done.

I could also do the mauve with the green multi, or the blue with the blue and orange multi.

sigh.

It's snowing outside today.

Our reindeer, currently not It in the ongoing game of hide and seek with the squirrels, is already wearing a white coat. 

I mean, if I can't benefit from working with bright colours at this time of the year, when would I?

Blinding yellow it is, then. Let me try to get a little closer so you can see the halo.

Isn't that gorgeous?

Let the game begin!

Hope you've got a lovely weekend lined up with some exciting new knitting in it, or something else that makes you happy. Thanks as always for dropping by and I'll look forward to seeing you next week!

Oh look sock yarn

I finished the second sock of the pair I showed you last week, but I haven't grafted the toes. Do you delay that sort of thing, I wonder? I find I need a total zen state to do kitchener stitch, with nobody around for the ten or so critical minutes it takes to start and finish. I'd better hurry up though because I have two sets of sock yarn I could be casting on and enjoying if only I had needles available. Behold, socks-to-be:

If I were a responsible generous knitter I would cast on the ones with the purple stripes and knit them up for my friend Jan, to whom I have given a pair of socks every Christmas for many years (except last year, when my knitting crawled almost to a halt and I really couldn't produce a whole pair in time.)

Probably I will do that. I'm so tempted to start with the other pair, though. The stripes on it look super cheery for springtime knitting, even if they wouldn't appeal to Jan.

I should also mention how weird it is that I was able to take these photographs on our back deck in February, where we normally have several inches of now piled up. Hmmm. Maybe it's better if I don't mention that.

It wouldn't be so bad knitting black and grey and orange and red and purple stripes in February, really. 

Maybe it would be equally not so bad to rush through black and white and orange and turquoise and acid green for spring, so as to finish a second pair of socks by December. 

Either way, I've got to get the current socks good and grafted. I guess when I'm finally done that, I could toss a coin?

Here's something that requires zero decision-making and lots of excitement and admiration: Amy's about to bloom! 

 

You thought you were going go get through a whole post without seeing my amaryllis, didn't you. But I'm committed now to sharing her journey from forgotten basement bulb to pretty flower companion, so here we are.

I hope you have a lovely weekend lined up. You know what I'd like to be doing? Putting a fresh coat of paint on a room, or building a custom bookshelf. I don't need to do either of these things (or have space for another bookshelf) but I am weirdly missing fix-it-up weekends and enthusiasm for same. This from the girl who can't make time to graft a sock toe.

Whatever your arrangements - thank you so much for dropping by to visit, and I hope to see you again next Saturday!

Eye candy

We need to start today with some eye candy, aka The Carrot:

Considering the glacial pace of my knitting lately it was a shock to discover

I'm almost out of caked sock yarn! 

Two pairs of socks left and then I have to get out my ball winder and set up with some more. Also I think I might finally be running out of Vesper Sock Yarn, which has been my go-to for fifteen years, give or take. Not sure when it will ever ship to Canada again. Not panicking... but I also heard this week that Kleenex will no longer be sold in Canada starting soon, so, stability breached. 

Anyway I gotta cake that sock yarn, but I've been writing so hard the last few months all our horizontal surfaces kind of piled up. You know how you put stuff onto a table so your hands are free and you can put it all away where it's supposed to go? It's a lot like that here, except more like when it's three weeks before you have time to do the putting away part. Or in my case.... h'mmm. I've lost count of how many weeks. 

So this weekend, I am CLEANING. Or at least, tidying. Yep, all weekend. 

Gulp. We need more eye candy.

Also I might have had another Paris Breakfast today to cope with the whole concept. As usual on such a day, it's sunny and gorgeous out. There are so many things I'd rather do, but I figure if I don't try to write or play or read or knit for two tiny days, the house can run on autopilot again for ages. And I can cake sock yarn while watching a movie on TCM, always a favourite pastime.

 

Traditionally, Labour Day Weekend is when we do projects around here, so I could have saved this job for that. I don't know why we're not always off barbecuing with friends like other people on such weekends, except that Pete and I are both pretty driven with this sort of thing and any long weekend automatically pings as three days to get through something big, rather than three days to sleep in (though, let's face it, in my case the sleeping in usually happens too.)

To that end, I have set out my must-do-on-Labour-Day project gear out in a decorative way, hoping to recapture the magic of my sock darning pile. And when I say 'recapture' I'm talking about the moment when I thought, if I just put it all out there in plain view, I will actually pick up a sock and darn it randomly through the day, and before I know it, all these socks will be completely free of holes and weak spots. 

Do I know how to make paint stripper and sanding paper
look glam or what? I should totally get a hardware store stylist job.

 

The reality of my darning design was several bowls of dusty socks, because I didn't factor in how busy I was going to be with writing (slammed, in fact) or messy the living room was getting as a result, and how not thrilling it was to curl up there with a darning needle and an audiobook. I'm hoping once I finally start stripping the paint off our mini nightstand from the cottage, the way I expected to do back in July, I'll be excited to finish and ready to paint it up in some fun way. 

Meanwhile, here's something I'm already excited about. A big wooly dust mop! It is true. And it is something I never, ever expected to say. But check this out:

And now for the closeup:

the STRIPES!! and also, the colours!
Seriously, they match our decor. It was meant to be.

 

This is the Big Wooly from Sladust, who I really wish was paying me in kind (the dry dust mop kind) for this product endorsement. Actually I can't speak to whether it works. But it's washable, biodegradeable, and much prettier to look at than popular landfill-clogging alternatives so I want both the mop and duster. Maybe more than one of each even. Maybe for Christmas? 

(that was not scarcasm, btw. I may hate cleaning, but I love wool. And I'm pretty sure I could come to love shaking out a dusty mop from the back deck, if I got to look at stripy wooly bits flapping in the breeze.)

 

Okay I had better get moving. Fingers crossed that next week I am sharing all sorts of elegant photographs of dust-free shelves, attractively staged with yarny treats. For now let's just hope you're having a funner weekend than me!