stash, knit, repeat

When Jacob asks for socks, he gets ‘em.

Pattern: Basic 52-stitch socks, 3×1 rib

Yarn: Sundara Sock, Bronzed Forest

Time Elapsed: Something like a week or two

Notes/Modifications: This is a made-up pattern, so modifications are nil, although I did notice that the 48-stitch ones are getting a little small. But still, no earth-shaking anything to say about these socks.

(He asked for them, and pestered me about them while I was knitting them. And then said he wouldn’t wear them for photos, and when he relented and put them on he hid his feet.)

He said he’d only let me get some proper shots of them if I wore socks and took pictures of my socks, too.

The Sundara is leftover from Daniel’s Tomten, which is still sitting on my dressform waiting for a zipper. I’ll get around to it before he outgrows the thing, I promise. It’s a lovely color, the Bronzed Forest, and Sundara’s sock yarn was nice to work with as always.

And really, there’ nothing cozier than a snuggly family in hand-knits, right?

While 2008 was nowhere near as difficult a year for our family as 2007, there was plenty of upheaval to go around. We moved from Monterey back to our house in New England, we had a baby, the husband switched jobs to a very intense start-up that failed to get what they thought was secured funding thanks to the credit crunch and laid him off after just five months, and Jacob switched schools.

With all of that, it’s a wonder any knitting happened at all.

1. February Baby Sweater and booties, 2. Syncopated Cap, 3. Flower Basket Shawl, 4. First Rivendell completed before baby born., 5. Cleopatra wrap, finished, 6. A. in sweater, 3, 7. Every shot of a toddler’s feet is blurry, 8. Final shot of beret and socks, 9. Christine’s baby blanket, I, 10. Bear in cable tank top, 11. Matinee Coat, I, 12. St. Anastasia, 13. Conwy, I, 14. Pomatomus, Complete, 15. DSC_0012.JPG

At the start of the year, I hopped onto this crazy idea to knit a pair of socks each month. Kelp did a great job (seriously, click through the link–you’ll be amazed), but I failed pretty miserably at this task. In fact, it’s pretty clear when my carpal tunnel hit and then disappeared–I didn’t finish a thing all summer.

Unable to knit, I finally picked up a new hobby that I’d been thinking about since my dad’s mom died.

I’m not sure this will ever come even remotely close to knitting in my affections (that last quilt has sat, quilted and bound, awaiting just the final hem, for 2 months now), but the quilting definitely kept me sane while I couldn’t knit.

What’s on the horizon for 2009? Hopefully our personal lives will be smooth sailing with no major disruptions. We could definitely, definitely use a quiet year to enjoy our many blessings.

Happy new year, everyone! Thanks so much for joining me here even when the knitting pickings are slim. I wish you all exactly the kind of 2009 you’re hoping for.

The destashing felt so great. The bulk of my stash is once again stuff I’m excited to knit with and dream about, it eased our finances enough to splurge on a couple of things, and hopefully it made some other folks happy too.

Meanwhile, knitting continues on at a maddeningly slow pace:

Yeah, that would be the very beginning of the front of a worsted-weight sweater in a 3-year-old size. In two weeks. SIGH. I ultimately decided to finish the back to see how it looked, and I think that many of you are right in that the muted color allows for a more complicated stitch pattern without looking too busy. Jacob pronounced it “gorgeous” and is harping on me to finish it. Maybe I’ll try to get the thing done by the time his school starts next week?

Of course, his feet are cold, too.

I had plenty of the emergency-acquired Bronzed Forest left over from Tomten, and I was stuck without appropriate needles at knit night one week, found a pair of dpns in my purse (just in case, you know, I ever had a sock emergency), and cast on. These are just basic 52-stitch socks (I get 8 stitches to the inch) in a 3×1 rib pattern.

I’m anxious to finish all of the Jacob knitting, though. One of the splurges I made with the destashing cash was to get some sturdy, less-spendy yarn for a more casual sweater for me. I feel badly wearing my really nice sweaters with the baby, who is still unpredictable in the spit-up department. The solution?

I can’t wait to cast on! Happy New Year, everyone!

Thank you all so much! I’ve knit most of the back of the aran, now, and as many of you said the muted color of the yarn is really balancing out the cables. I think it looks fine, after all.

I can’t believe I’m really going to make a pictureless post, but I wanted to mention something here. My stash has really been stressing me out lately, and the Sundara Seasons fingering silky merino that arrived yesterday made it worse (I’m not that into two of the colors). So! It’s time to do something about that, and that means destashing.

I’ve never destashed before, so I’m not really sure how this goes, but I’ve listed things that I’m happy to part with here in Ravelry. (The Sundara FSM will be up there once I get good pictures of it.) Some of the yarn is stuff one can buy in stores, some has been discontinued, some is festival-only. All is available for roughly 10% off of retail. All has been stored in ziploc bags in a pet-free, smoke-free home.

Hi! Can we just pretend that it hasn’t been nearly a month since I last posted? That my knitting time hasn’t actually been eaten up by two adorable, variably-drooly little boys? Because I need your advice.

The knitting on tomten is finally finished, and it just needs a zipper to be truly jaunty. Photoshoot to come soon, I’m sure. With the knitting done, though, it was time for something else on the needles.

Enter the Chunky Cabled Sweater by Zoe Mellor, from “Adorable Knits for Tots”. It looks cute as pie in the book, and I had some Sublime Cashmerino Silk Aran in the stash that was suitable. Here’s the progress so far:

I like it, but here’s my question: Sometimes when I look at this sweater, it seems sort of busy. The back, front, and sleeves are all done in this cable and moss stitch motif. Is it too much? Should I make the back and/or sleeves simpler? If so, how? Thoughts? Opinions? Suggestions?

Things may be looking up for the EZ knits, around here.

Pattern: Baby sweater on two needles, or the “February Baby Sweater”, Elizabeth Zimmerman

Yarn: Madelinetosh Sock, “Gracious” colorway (from the first run of Magnolia Society)

Time Elapsed: This version of the sweater and booties set were knit in under a week.

Notes/Modifications: This is a sweater with a saga. In short: Since the pattern calls for dk-weight yarn, and gives no schematics, I was worried that a sweater knit in sock yarn would be too small. So I upped the sizing, and ran out of yarn.

I then ripped it out and re-knit as written, figuring it’d all work out. And it did–the sweater measures 18″ around, which is a fine size for your average 3-month-old girl. Knit as written, I had enough yarn left over for a pair of garter-stitch booties, too. While I may not have enjoyed getting to know my inner process knitter, I will admit it turned out okay in the end.

Now let’s just hope the wee one this is for stays “indoors” for another week or two!

And, sneaking in without any notice, an FO!

Pattern: Kate Gilbert’s Syncopated Cap, Interweave Knits Summer 2007

Yarn: Regia Silk and Dale Baby Ull

Time Elapsed: Definitely under a week of knitting time

Notes/Modifications: No modifications. Jacob asked me to knit him a hat to wear, “to keep my ears from getting colder”. He requested red and black all together. It wasn’t hard to go from there to the Syncopated Cap pattern. Like many of Ms. Gilbert’s patterns, this is clever and a super-fun knit. The cable-like colorwork is fun, the cap shaping is really neat, and it produces a really warm hat.

The only real problem I had is that while the hat was a perfect size pre-blocking, the yarns really grew. I’m betting it will fit Jacob next year, as well.

Charmingly, he didn’t mind at all and insists on wearing it anyway (although after the photoshoot was done, he did let me roll up the brim).

I know this phase of requesting hand-knits isn’t going to last forever, so I’m cherishing every minute!

Foiled again. I feel like I’m overdue for a simple success, knitting-wise. And it’s all Elizabeth Zimmerman’s fault!

Well, actually, it’s only partially her fault. I had this sock yarn that was just calling out to be a February Baby Sweater, but the pattern specified a gauge of 5 stitches to the inch. “That’s fine”, I thought. “I’ll just increase the size of the sweater by starting with a few more stitches.”

It sounds simple, and it was. I wondered about yarn amounts, since EZ doesn’t give yardage requirements (CURSE HER), but noted that someone on ravelry had done the same modification, minus an increase repeat, with only 350 yards of sock yarn. Since I had 400 yards, I figured I’d be set.

Well, perhaps not. Now, this is the second EZ project in a month that I’ve tried to modify to work with sock yarn. And I wound up running out of (limited run!) yarn both times. Although things finally seem to be working out regarding Tomten yarn, I knew I didn’t want to do the trade/sell dance again in such a short time. So there was only one thing to do.

Ahhh, catharsis. I noticed, as I knit, that the modified version would probably fit a one-year-old–even as large as my kids come. (Ms. Zimmerman also doesn’t provide much in the way of sizing information at her recommended gauge, at least for baby things.) So I decided to simply knit the pattern as written, in sock yarn instead of DK, and trust that it would all work out for a newborn size. Fingers crossed, of course, but it looks good so far.

Once this is crossed off my list, it’s finishing Tomten and then on to a sweater for Jacob, first socks for the husband, and more winter gear. I’d love some warm mittens this year, and the boys need them too. And as much as I love the timeless quality of Zimmerman patterns, the next few projects will absolutely be of the knit-exactly-as-written-from-a-pattern-with-schematics-and-yardage-requirements variety.

(Up next: a comically big hat for Jacob. Just as soon as he’ll sit still for the camera!)

People, I have tons to tell you about for the first time in forever. A few new projects, more on the Tomten, an FO… but something else is more important today.

Vote.

May you have all treats and no tricks.