Finished Objects

Yay! Two projects finished---finally! After spending two months knitting a pair of socks, I was able to get busy on two other projects-one, the dreaded beaded scarf, and the other, a scarf I had bought the yarn for about four months ago. It was nice to knit on something other than size two needles for a change.

I like the beaded scarf, and knitting it was much easier than the beading process was. Sixteen-hundred beads on yarn a bit too thick for the holes in the beads---not fun at all! I used the kitchener stitch to graft the two ends together, and it didn't turn out as well as I had hoped. The seam is quite visible and since the scarf could conceivably be worn with either side out, the seam detracts from one side a bit. I know (now) that the kitchener wasn't designed to work with a combination of knitted and purled stitches.

The second project is a scarf (Horndal Scarf from Noro Revisited by Cornelia Tuttle Hamilton) and it's an easy project. The garter stitch sections are knitted in Noro Kureyon and the ribbed sections are knitted in Noro Blossom yarn. As always, Noro colors are gorgeous, but I don't like the sudden surprise of knots, especially knots that cause a sudden shift in color. When I use Noro in the future, I will re-wind it into balls so that I can look for knots and color shifts before I knit.

Next project? I am starting on a sweater for grandson, who will be two this months. I bought that yarn last fall to make him a sweater for Christmas. Ooops......

Oops...

This past weekend, I went to Austin to visit my wonderful, perfect, gorgeous and funny grandchildren (and their parents). I had a great time just watching and listening to them. Yesterday we stuffed them in the hot car (it was HOT in Austin-over 100 every day, and one day, even 105!!!) to take them to lunch, and then to a new yarn shop in town. It's called Gauge and it's great! Lots of gorgeous yarns to pet and drool over. The woman there was very nice, and didn't even seem to mind 22-month old grandson "admiring" the yarn. I told older daughter that she was to stop me from buying any more yarn, but she must not have been listening, because, oops, I ended up with this:
It's Lorna's Laces hand-dyed Shepherd Sock Yarn (80% superwash wool, 20% nylon) and it is really, really soft and the colors are ...well, you can see the colors. My daughter and I each bought the same colorway, and will make socks out of it. Great minds think alike.

However, I REALLY had not intended to buy yarn, but resistance was futile. One of the best reasons to knit socks is that no matter where you are, if you see a sock yarn you love, you know how much you need. The same is not true of sweaters and other items, so you end up either buying a new pattern in order to buy the yarn, or you leave the yarn in the shop for another knitter. But you can ALWAYS buy sock yarn!

And if you live in Austin, and love this particular colorway in Lorna's Laces, too late---we beat you to it and bought it all. Sorry...

For Non-Knitters

A friend just spent a long weekend in Vermont, and came across these socks. Because she is not a knitter (in spite of my best efforts), she LOVED this place and bought two pairs of socks. I look at them and think that even though I love the colors and the fact that they are not identical, I would miss the knitting of them! So I will look at them for inspiration, but for all you non-knitting sock-lovers out there, this may be the site for you.

@#$%^& Noro Sock Yarn

Well, that's it!!! I am working on my second pair of Noro socks, and just as with the first pair, I've come across a knot. Grrrr. In the first pair, the knot was at the bottom of the leg of the first sock and that meant no chance for identical socks. But I love the colors that Noro uses in their yarns and I grabbed a new skein that caught my eye at my LYS.

I love, love, love the colors, but not the unexpected knot, this time in the gusset of the second sock. I had even unwound the skein so that both socks started with the same color and I really thought I was on my way to almost-identical socks. Nope.

No more Noro sock yarn for me.

Noro Colors

I love Noro colors. The sunlight was bright when I took this, so just how deep and rich the colors are isn't as apparent as I would have liked. I think these will be my favorite socks so far. This is Noro Kureyon sock yarn, 70% wool, 30% nylon, and it is color S40. There are 100 grams and 420 meters in the single skein, so there is enough for a standard pair of socks.