Glow in the Dark Socks for Claire

One sock complete.

Crazy, crazy day-glo sock yarn.  Girl of the House is excited.

Hidden socks

We're sending this piece off to the spa.  

It will return to us fully renovated and ready for use as a media cabinet.  We've been using it for years as the landing spot in the entry.  

Baskets of mittens and hats were hidden inside.  The bottom drawer held all our table cloths and napkins.

We found another place for the table linens, but while emptying out that location, I found all my old socks that are desperately in need of heel and/or toe repairs. 

I have no idea how long they've been in there, waiting for attention.  Honestly, I totally forgot them all.

Darning is never as fun as knitting new...

2013 Socks #2

Toasty Twist socks are done!

Blocking now and will go to their new home in the morning.

I really enjoyed this (free) pattern.

Toasty Twist Socks

Had a request for some purple socks.  

I have the freedom to pick the pattern, they just need to be purple.

Toasty Twist Socks in Dale of Norway Falk yarn.

Aran Sandal Socks, Live and In Person

Aran Sandal Socks.

Finished and blocked Monday Jan 7.

Modeled by Girl of the House today.

Wrapped and presented later this week!

Silent Auction

Every year, we have a silent auction at my hospital to benefit the local food shelf.  Last year I got a really sweet deal on a years worth of free range organic eggs, delivered right to my desk once a week.  Awesome.

I usually contribute a baby sweater.

This year, I've got a couple of different items.

A little pair of tiger baby socks.

A pair of Hippocampus mittens (my third pair - these are so much fun!)

In other news, spring has finally arrived in Northfield!  We still have piles of snow in the yard, but it reached 55 degrees today.

Paul joined me for a run, then we sat on the deck for our cool down.  Yup, he's wearing shorts on the 14th of March!  It's spring, I say, SPRING!

Blue Fest

I have managed to get a few things knitted lately.

A sampling of recently finished objects, all in blue:


Plain vanilla socks.

I dyed the yarn just before our trip out west this summer. I could have made these socks identical twins, but I went for the definitely fraternal twins.

Ain't it fun havin' weirdo socks sometimes?



Wooly camping sleeping socks for Bekky, who tolerated sleeping in a tent in 30 degree temps in the high Rockies this summer.


The yarn for her socks was spindled on that trip.






Some handspun, knitted fingerless mitts for Girl of the House.







There is one more finished sweater, but I'm hoping the recipient will model it for me when I see her this weekend.

Couldn't resist...

The Kauni yarn was calling, whispering to me, luring me to it.



Well, it couldn't hurt to knit a little swatch, could it? That wouldn't take too much time away from holiday knitting?

(Swatch lesson learned from the Retrofit disaster.)






Oooh, that's fun! I like that!


Couldn't hurt to make the yarn into balls, could it?



It turned out that my four balls of yarn were really seven balls in disguise.

Only one ball of blue/purple/black was a complete ball. The other three balls were knotted and restarted in a different color order somewhere in the ball.

This required much more time than I anticipated - winding and rewinding.

I deserve a reward, don't you think?

Holiday knitting be damned...

I need to try this out!

Inch and a half of corrugated ribbing, and now onto the pattern. YAY!








And, by the way, I finished my carry around alpaca sox. Wore 'em to work today.

Funny, how small luxuries are so satisfying.

road knitting - Sioux Falls!

We drove out to Sioux Falls, SD last weekend to surprise Paul's brother for his birthday. And we did surprise him! Excellent planning on Coleen's part...

We had beautiful weather, and a fabulous time!

Even the dogs were invited!

We all went for a walk on Saturday, and we discovered they had several geocaches right in their local park.

They entertained us, as usual, in gourmet style.

Of course driving the four hours to Sioux Falls, and four hours back, gave me lots of knitting time!



I've got most of Rogue finished.

Just the seaming up, and zipper installation to go.












Got some sock knitting in, too.

This was the easiest knitting to do, on the road in the dark. I certainly couldn't do all that cabling in the dark!









Little dog was suspicious of my photo taking.

He's very protective of my foot model, Girl of the House.






On the dark evenings this week, I did more spinning than knitting.

I spun up the two ounces of black alpaca I purchased at Shepherd's Harvest back in May.

This was full of vegetation matter (VM), and quite dirty, same as the brown I spun up earlier this summer.

Turned out quite lovely after spinning and washing, however.




I passed the underplied CVM back through the spinning wheel, and it came out much nicer.









There's been a project of some silk caps I dyed, sitting half finished on my Saxony wheel. I know I started that project in 2007.

They finally yelled loud enough to grab my attention, and I finished spinning them up.

One ounce of silk caps, 300 yards of lace weight.

The colors are difficult to photo accurately, but I'm loving the blues!

I see a silk scarf in the near future...

Continuing Education Knitting

I had an all day continuing education class today. Don't you hate it when you have to get up earlier on Saturday than you do the rest of the week?!

My class was an hour away. It was a good opportunity to catch up on a few podcasts. Sound Opinions and This American Life. Someday, I'll be all caught up on my podcasts. But for now, I catch 'em whenever I can. My commute to work takes less than 10 minutes, so there's no podcast listening during the drive.

It was an all day class. I managed to get lots of knitting done on the Alpaca Sox. The first one is almost complete. (those veg are getting a workout holding up socks, aren't they? Really, we've been eating them, too!)











Look what met me on the sidewalk when I came home on Friday.








Two pounds of CVM (California Variegated Mutant), already made into batts, ready for spinning.

I love the sound of that - Mutant Sheep - welcome to the future!



This is my consolation for not getting into SOAR this year.

I, and several of my friends, were waitlisted. Not a one made it off the list.

This may not be a terrible thing. It appears that they don't have enough hotel rooms available for all the participants. Nice - book a large gathering at a place without enough lodging for everyone.

Bitter? Who, me?!

Hah! I bet no-one at SOAR has two whole pounds of CVM! Take that, Interweave and SOAR!! Hah!

The six state sweater

If you recall, I started Rogue in February of this year. It's been picked up, knitted, put down, picked up and knitted, put down, etc, etc, etc.

This sweater has been knitted in Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, Colorado, Kansas and Massachusetts. In fact, it's been to Iowa several times, most recently this past weekend.

I have finally reached the hood. I think I'm coming down the home stretch. (Of course, that will leave the seaming up...)




I spun up an ounce of the pretty roving while we were camping this weekend.

Camping always makes me want to get out the spindle.






Last, but not least, my carry around sock.
This is Alpaca Sox yarn, and I'm almost to the heel.

It's good to have a sock to knit while you're sitting in a choir concert. You can knit in the dark.

It's been raining here since I returned home from work. Brightest room in the house is the kitchen - thus the sock is keeping the garden veg warm.

Todays Agenda

Lawn mowing!

It's May 17, and we haven't mowed YET!

Paul's been working long hours - to work in the dawn, home after dark. He takes Sundays off and I hate to see him do chores on his one day off.

My new full time hours are still taking some adaptation on our part.

In the past, I worked four days a week. My off day, I could do the shopping and errands, and do more work around the house (like mow the lawn).

We'll figure it out yet!


When I'm not at work, I've been chasing Girl of the House around from activity to activity.

Traveling soccer began a month ago, but they had their first game this week.


Go Raiders!



I finished navajo plying the BFL. It turned out very pretty.

GotH would like a hat, and perhaps some fingerless mitts. She claimed this fiber as soon as she got a look at it.





Last evening I spun up the brown alpaca I bought last weekend.

I only had three ounces of it, and that's plenty. It's not perfectly clean - my hands actually got dirty spinning it. Lots of chaff. Quite a bit came out, and I'll get the rest out when I ply.

Truth be told, I purchased it because the vendor was such a friendly outgoing fellow, and after a nice conversation, I felt too guilty to not purchase something.

It'll turn out nice after plying and washing, though, I think...


I still LOVE this Majacraft Alpaca wheel! I've been spinning in various chairs, and on the sofa, and haven't found an uncomfortable position yet. My Lendrum is a bit more particular - it's definitely easier to spin in certain chairs/positions. And it's so quiet!

Took a (three hour drive, one way) with co-workers to Aitkin, MN this week. We were evaluating a software product we're planning to roll out in July. It was a very useful trip, we got lots of helpful ideas.

I didn't have to drive, so it was lots of knitting time! Second Happy Feet sock will be done soon!

I did get some knitting done on the plane to/from Boston.

My own handspun lace weight alpaca, dyed with with logwood for another Seaman's Scarf.

Carolyn's Hearts and Rosebuds from Myrna Stahman's Shawls & Scarves.

I did 4 repeats of the lace after a provisional cast on. Then I picked up the provisional cast on and started the neck.

Of course, we all know, lace looks less than impressive til it's blocked!



Here's the second sock, knit during training.

Just beginning the gusset.












Yesterday, Mother's Day, we had a very nice family dinner with Paul's family.


Then we headed out for some hiking.

Can anyone tell me what this is? It's located in a wildlife management area.

The eaves are open, so we were thinking it might be a bat-house. But the door, roughly 8"x12", with the little perch area? No clue!




There was a mama goose, sitting on a nest, ducking her head so we wouldn't see the secret she was hiding.





The remainder of a deer carcass, feet black and shiny, looking freshly polished.









And my best fella, looking happy and relaxed in the cachemobile.

I'm not very good at sitting in darkened rooms and listening to trainers. It's interesting, it's useful, but my eyes start to cross, and I get very sleepy.

I fought it Monday, but Tuesday I finally broke out the sock in the afternoon.

Here's where it stood Wednesday after class. I finished it today, and began its mate.





In more fun news, on the advice of the seminar coordinator, we went to Newport, RI last evening!

It's less than an hour from here. My fellow trainee has a really cool GPS, and it directed us right there!


We walked to Goat Island, passing the Newport Shipyards on the way.









It was full of sailboats - Ben would love it.

I think someday you'll see it for yourself, college boy.




We walked into town. It's still winter season, so they roll the sidewalks up at 5:00. We walked along the ocean with runners and local folk pushing baby strollers and those walking their dogs.

We walked away from the main drag and up into the residential areas. We strolled by this cool church. The six o'clock chimes went off as we looked through the graveyard at the ancient headstones. Way cool...






We went to Fort Adams, built in the 1800s, and looked around.













We drove Bellevue avenue and Ocean Drive. Mansions! Lots and lots of mansions!

Stopped along Ocean Drive. The ocean smells different here than it does in Texas, Florida, or Washington/Oregon. It's difficult to describe - much more 'tangy'.


We left Newport, going across the Newport bridge to Providence.

It was well worth the $2 toll.








Now, tonight, we're braindead after training.



It's time to start thinking about supper.