some finished socks

I'm feeling too glunky to create any kind of intelligent post today. I'm reduced to mindless knitting and posting about socks.
Uptown Boot Socks, from Opal 6-ply. These are comfy and warm. I was concerned that they might end up too thick or not fit comfortably because of a strangely narrow heel, but they are quite perfect.
Cat Bordhi Sky socks, from Trekking XXL. I misjudged where to start the expansion gusset, so I ran out of yarn and used some leftover Lorna's Shepherd Sock for the toes. I'm pleased with these, although they are just slightly too big. Not big enough for me to part with them, though. Sorry, mom.

And that's all I've got for you today.

Have a great weekend.

sick day knitting projects

Big is feeling glunky. Nasty head cold, bad cough, general exhaustion. We've canceled almost all our plans for today, and he has agreed to stay mellow and in his room for the one remaining event (a recorder class he doesn't participate in so far.)

So Little and I will continue to check in on our various gardening projects, and we're going for a walk to visit a neighbor's garden. After that, I'm planning to knit a lot. I have more projects going at once than usual for me, and here they are.

Uptown Boot Socks, from Interweave's Favorite socks, knit from Opal 6-ply. Are you noticing that even though the pattern doesn't call for it, I've reversed the cable, so my socks will be mirror images of each other? Thanks to Grumperina's excellent tutorial on cabling without a cable needle, this is child's play. (And you know I give the utmost respect to the play of children.)
Sorry mom, these fit me fine.

Socks from Trekking XXL, using Cat Bordhi's sky architecture. Coming along. The gusset goes at the very top of the instep. I tried to get a good photo, but, well, you should try taking a picture of the top of your foot sometime. Not easy.
These also seem to be fitting so far.



Chevron Rib Tank, a free pattern available from Knitting Daily. This is the front. I'm using Bamboo, from Southwest Trading Company. I like this yarn a lot, and I love the colors. If this doesn't fit me, I'll either give it to someone smaller than myself, or rip it out and knit it for me. This is the first sleeveless sweater I've ever been interested in, and it may be the only one I ever wear. That is, if I wear it. I mostly don't see the point of handknitted objects meant to be worn in the summer.

And finally, Diamond Fantasy Scarf, by Sivia Harding. I'm knitting this from a nameless coned laceweight purchased on Ebay years ago. You may notice (from the red cable) that I'm using one of the new Addi lace needles, and I like it very much, although it's not the life-altering knitting experience others have described. These needles are pointier and less slippery than the regular Addi Turbos.

Off for a walk!

crayola colors, two WIPs, and two FOs

I've been knitting some crazy colors lately. These are the colors that were completely worn down in my crayon box when I was a kid: the deeply saturated colors, the colors that were between the primaries. I loved the red orange, the yellow orange, the blue green, and so on. I still do. If I were braver, I would have a crayola house. As it is, just the bathroom is as crazy as I want it to be.

But I digress. Check out these socks:

Those are Loksins! in Claudia Hand Painted Merino. The color is Grape Jelly, and these are wild. They almost glow when I wear them around outside. The color is deep and tropical, and not like anything ever seen around here. I love them.

The Uptown Boot Socks from yesterday's post are still going strong, and the color is just as strong. They are ready for me to start the heel, but it's a weird heel: I start with half the stitches (32) as usual, but then before I start the heel stitch, I decrease four stitches evenly over the width of the heel flap. What gives? I've also noticed that the instep stitches are going to stay at 32, but the sole stitches are going to be fewer... is there something about this stitch pattern I don't understand? Do I knit the pattern as written, or decide that I know better and proceed as usual?

And then there are the socks I started knitting on the train, but finally decided to rip out after I'd made it well past the heel. They were too small, and I just wasn't ready to admit it until I got almost all the way home. Those are the ones to the right of the yellow orange Uptown boot socks, in seemingly unrepeating stripes of seaweed, ocean, and mermaid. Remember Sea Green from the Crayola box? These are going to be Cat Bordhi socks, from the New Pathways book. I'm using the Sky architecture, which means I don't have to do anything differently until I get to the top of my ankle bone. I'm knitting them both at the same time because the construction is unfamiliar, and I want to make sure I make the two socks as similar as possible.

Finally, here are the socks I finished just before we left for LA. They are basic socks, K3 P1 rib, 72 stitches around on 0s. The yarn is OnLine Supersocke Beach, and I don't remember which colorway. These are quickly becoming my favorite socks. I even took the time to match the stripes, a silly trick I've never even attempted before. It was satisfying for this particular pair, but I don't know that I need to repeat the feat.

grumperina is a genius!

Enough with intensely thinking through decisions I don't have to make for over a year, eh? Thanks for your willingness to engage in a discussion of my potential career paths and professional satisfaction, and so on. It has been very helpful, believe it or not. Here's what I'm going to do: teach the class, see how it goes, meet with some professors, apply for the program in January '09, do some research and writing about what I think might be my dissertation topic, and then, at the very last minute, decide whether to enroll for the fall of '09.

Let's talk about socks instead, shall we?

I just started these:
These are Uptown Boot Socks, by Jennifer Appleby, as found in Favorite Socks, published by Interweave in 2006.

I'm using Opal 6-ply, which is a nice fat yarn, so these are knitting up very fast. I started them just this morning, with lots of time off for changing sheets, vacuuming floors, and a quick trip to Target to buy socks for Little, who does NOT appreciate hand knit socks. This yarn comes in very large (150 gm) skeins, which I found particularly helpful when I was knitting socks for my brother, who has very, very large feet. I forget what size, but he's 6'8", and his feet are proportional to the rest of his body. I used the entire skein on his socks, so I expect I'll have plenty left over when I'm done with these. My feet are big too, but more in the normal camp.

The really amazing thing about the knitting of these socks has been learning a new technique from Grumperina, who explains oh-so-clearly how to knit cables without a cable needle. Her tutorial is here. She has also knit these socks, but she used a particularly stunning yarn. Pictures are here. This, my friends, has completely changed the way I feel about cables. No longer is this an experience to be avoided at all costs, a technique that tenses my shoulders and sets my teeth on edge. I like the look of cables, but I've always looked for patterns that require very little cabling. No more! Bring it on...

blogging is brilliant!

Uh, not mine, necessarily. I just mean blogging in general.

The title of this post violates a basic rule I set for myself when I started blogging, i.e. Don't Blog about Blogging. How interesting could a blog about someone else's life really be anyway, and then when people start blogging not about their lives but about their blog... well, you see what I mean. That gets really boring.

Point of interest: I have many rules about what I will and won't blog about, all designed to protect you, the reader, from the perils of Way Too Much Information. Boundaries about public communication do not come naturally to me, unfortunately, and so I must carefully study the behavior and blogging of other people in order to learn what does and does not cross lines of propriety.

Anyway, I knew I'd have to violate one of these rules one of these days, and today, it's the one about hopelessly self-referential meta-blogging.

Now then.

It seems that taking pictures of my knitting equipment, or lack thereof, has had a most delightful effect: people are sending me stuff! What could be better?

My mother's friend Liz noticed that I was blocking my Shetland Triangle with lots and lots of straight pins, like so:
Liz and my mom got their heads together electronically, which resulted in the arrival of this on my doorstep yesterday:
That's a set of lace blocking wires, available here. Liz told my mom it was the kind of thing I would love to have but wouldn't buy for myself, and she was right. Mom was going to wait until my birthday, but hey, why wait when you can have it sent now? My birthday's so far away, anyway. Much lace knitting to follow! Probably some previously blocked pieces will get blocked again, just for the heck of it. Fun fun fun.

And then last night, Joe came home from work bearing gifts from my good friend Amy, whose husband just happens to work with mine. Amy and I have been friends for years, and our lives are overlapping in some new and interesting ways these days, but sadly, we don't see each other very often at all.

Amy saw a few posts back that I was using a newel post as a skein holder, and sent me this:
A folding swift and a ball winder! Much fun was had with these two tools last night after dinner. First I had to wind some sock yarn. Then I wound some of my homespun. Then I ripped out a sock in order to wind some Shaefer Anne. (Don't panic; the sock wasn't working out. My cut finger is causing some gauge issues, which I devoutly hope will be solved when the finger heals completely.)

Meanwhile, I'm going to start a new project: socks out of kitchen twine. Think people will start sending me Trekking XXL?

as promised...

Here's the Shetland Triangle, yanked into shape after a soak in the sink.
I'm pleased. I think it's an intriguing pattern, and it was fun and easy to knit. I'm a little disappointed that it isn't bigger; I followed the directions exactly, and I wish I'd added at least one or two extra pattern repeats. It is a skimpy scarf more than a shawl, and one I'll use mostly when the weather is mellow. I'm planning to wear it to a wedding at the end of the month. The wedding's in LA, so I'm thinking it won't be snowing. Now I need a dress...

The completion of this shawl, the completion of the last pair of socks I was making for a Christmas gift, plus last week's rip fest, all combined to create an alarming situation: No simple knitting projects currently on the needles. I have a Cat Bordhi pair of socks currently going, but they're sort of languishing because it's not an automatic pilot project. I need those.

So I dug into the sock yarn stash, and started winding this:
That's a skein of Shaefer Anne, in an unknown colorway. A pair of socks made with Anne is a bit of a commitment for me, because it's skinny yarn, and I have big feet, and I knit socks on little needles. Anne knits up just right for me on 0s, with 80 stitches around. These should take a while. I may even be knitting them on our way to that wedding in LA.

rip fest

I've been having this lovely email exchange with my cousin, in which she asked me what I like best to knit. Isn't that an interesting question? One you would think I would have well in hand, and yet it required some serious thought. I've been trying to branch out some, into cabled sweaters, and I've had to knit some mittens out of necessity... but when I stopped to think about it, I remembered that my most favorite things to knit are lace and socks.

Socks, I keep up with. I always have at least one pair going, and they're usually for me. But lace, not so much lately. And I love lace, I really do. I love how you can figure out where you are in the pattern by looking at the knitting, I love that gauge doesn't matter, and I love the way the yarn overs, k2togs and ssks flow and balance each other. There seems to be a rhythm to knitting lace.

So last night I tidied up my knitting area, which meant ripping out a bunch of projects that have been gathering dust because they're just not doing it for me.

I ripped out what was to be an easy and fun shawl in a bamboo yarn, but it proved to be just way too boring to knit. I like the idea of feather and fan, but I can hardly ever bring myself to knit all those rows, back and forth, back and forth, and so little going on. And I ripped out that cabled cardigan I started some weeks back, partly because it was turning out to be too small for me, and partly because I have decided to face facts and accept that I just don't like knitting cables very much. They make my joints hurt, and they're so fiddly and time-consuming. And there was a pair of mittens that wasn't working out for me, so they got put away...

And I cast on this shawl in this yarn, and I'm enjoying myself very much.

mittens for me

My mittens are finished, and I love them. They are made from Zitron Avanti, which turns out to be the same colorways as Trekking XXL sock yarn, but in a worsted weight. I really love this yarn, and I wish I had balls and balls of it, in many different colors. Alas, this is all I have left:
The red is what's leftover from my niece's mittens, which were knit from what was left over from a scarf I made for my mom several years ago. Although a quick online search reveals that this yarn is available in various places, I won't be buying any. Still knitting from the stash for a while. Maybe these ends will be the garter brim for a quick hat, along the lines of these.

Thanks to everyone who chipped in with ideas for my couch. I think I'll be shampooing and covering.

And now on with the day. Kids need feeding and schooling, the sun is shining, and I have a to-do list as long as my arm.

some finished objects, and a cautionary tale

Christmas knits!

Let me be very clear: these are gifts for Christmas 07. Unlike some knitting blogs, which are rolling out the Christmas gifts well after, sometimes months after, they were knit and after the recipient has received, here at Elsie and Joe Deluxe we are showcasing last year's holiday gifts as they are finished, and before they are gifted.

I had an over-ambitious list of gifts to make this year, and it turns out that while I appreciate a deadline when I'm writing, a knitting deadline seems to have a slowing-down effect. When it became clear that I just wasn't going to make it in time, I stopped trying. My parents and Joe each received a ball of sock yarn on Christmas day. I finished my brother's socks on Christmas day, which did him no good at all since he lives in Hawaii, and I still had to mail them.

Fortunately my family loves me anyway.

So here are the gifts for Joe's brother and his wife, who are well-loved, I assure you. I told them that Christmas was coming in March this year, and they didn't bat an eye. Since it is actually February and not March, can I say that I'm early with these? No? Didn't think so...

Here's a hat. Joe and his brother both have big heads (this is a feature of their anatomies, not of their egos) and I cast on 112 stitches for this hat. The yarn is an alpaca blend I got in a clearance room some years ago in a very large and wonderful knitting shop somewhere in New England. Isn't that helpful? I did a deep K1P1 border, then two rows of plain stockinette for a firm fold line, then switched to K2 P2 ribbing to the crown, where I did a four point decrease. I would show you more photos, but black is just as annoying to photograph as it is to knit.


Here are Rebecca's wristlets, which are based on Fetching, from Knitty. I didn't have any suitable bulky yarn, so I cast on 60 stitches instead of the prescribed 45, and made other changes as I went along to compensate for a much skinnier yarn (Rowan Cashsoft).


These were fiddly. I don't like knitting cables very much; they tend to make my right elbow ache, and I had to rip back the thumbs a few times to get them attached without holes. I think they're really cute, and I'd love to have some for myself, but I don't think it's going to happen. I'm glad these are done.





and now, my cautionary tale

My local yarn store has a monthly email newsletter. Each issue contains info about new yarns, patterns, and classes, plus a knitting tip, the sort of trick that is often learned through experience. Customers are free to submit a tip, and a $5 credit is offered if your tip is chosen. I submitted this tip:

None of us like to rip out our knitting, but sometimes it's necessary. For me the ripping is easy, and picking the stitches back up is a pain. I've found that it's much easier and more accurate if I use a much smaller needle to pick up after I've ripped back. I'm less likely to split a stitch, and it's easier to get the stitches mounted correctly. Insert the needle from behind the work when picking up, and they will be just right for knitting when you get to them.

After I've picked up the stitches on the smaller needle, I knit them right on to the needle I'm actually using for the project. Gauge isn't affected because it's the working (right hand) needle that determines the size of the stitches.

and I got a $5 credit. I was so excited! I have been on a serious yarn diet ever since my stash has outgrown its designated storage area, and since I stopped working. The rule is, I don't get to buy yarn. Period. I've been knitting from the stash only, and that's been an interesting creative exercise, as illustrated by the wristlets above.

So to get even a small amount of credit was great, and I knew just how I'd spend it: on the current issue of Interweave Knits. I'd just gotten another email, this time from Knitting Daily, the online version of IKnits, and I'd become enamored of this pattern, in a have-to-have-it kind of way. This did not violate the rule, because it wasn't yarn. Never mind that I have enough pattern books to last me several lifetimes, and there are enough patterns available free online to last several more, I really needed this particular pattern in this particular magazine.

So the kids and I jumped into the car a few days ago and made our way across town to my LYS. I got there and talked to the lady behind the desk, and it turned out that I'd missed the small print. It was a $5 credit on a $50 purchase. Rats, rats, rats, and rats. I said to myself that I wasn't going to make a $50 purchase to get a $5 credit, but then, well... I just decided to browse a little bit. I was motivated by the fact that they were almost sold out of the all-important IK issue. I didn't want to miss out.

A careful browsing of the shop revealed a few things other than the magazine that seemed, um, useful, if not essential. I got a ball of Zitron Trekking XXL, in this color. (I know, I know, it's yarn, but I really love these space-dyed colors, and they're not so easy to find around here.)

And I, um... well, I... I also found, and it turned out that I really needed... um....

Well, I also bought another sock book.
New Pathways for Sock Knitters, Book One, by Cat Bordhi

And what a sock book it is. I read the customer reviews on Amazon last night, and somebody said that you should try not to have anything on your needles when you order this book, because you're going to want to jump right in and try something. It's really true. This book is full of crazy-ass ways of constructing socks. There's not a single sock constructed in the usual way, but unlike some recent radical notions in sock construction, these are totally practical real-life wearable socks.

I'm so excited about these projects that I got the aforementioned fiddly wristlets done this morning just so I can get started on something new. Ordinarily I wouldn't let a project in process stop me from starting something, but the wristlets were on some of my favorite sock needles. My only complaint about the book is that its layout seems very confusing, and unnecessarily so. I want to cut the whole thing out of its binding and rearrange it. I find myself flipping back and forth, here and there, in an attempt to follow the process for a single pair from start to finish. I was hoping others felt the same, because that might result in a differently-organized second edition, and that's why I was checking the Amazon reviews. It seem that most others feel that this book is just fine the way it is, though, so I will get started on something with an open mind.

One review said that this isn't a good book for a beginning sock knitter, and I agree. It's pretty technical and detailed, and would be overwhelming for someone who hasn't already knit at least a few pairs using traditional methods. Or so I think, and I could be wrong. It is an intriguing book, to say the least.

And there are two more books coming in the series! I'll need to make room on my knitting book shelf, particularly the sock section.

On a completely different topic, I figured out why I'm so uncomfortable with acknowledging my so-called housekeeping skills. It's because having developed even a limited reputation as a someone who keeps a tidy house, I feel that I now have to keep up appearances. We have friends coming over for brunch tomorrow, and the house needs a wipe and a vacuum, but I don't feel like doing it at all. What I really want to do is sit down with my mind-blowing new sock book, yarn and needles, and work some things out. My friends won't care if I leave the dust bunnies and the grime where it is, of course, but we all know that housekeeping is rarely for other people, only for ourselves.

So I take it all back. I'm a complete slob. I love living in a messy house, and my house reflects that.

some finished objects, and a language lesson

These are socks for my niece, who wanted some new socks when she saw the pairs of socks I made for her Mama and Papa for Christmas. They are a simple K2 P2 rib, using the formulas and measurements from Charlene Schurch's books, and I knitted them on a pair of addi turbo circs, size 0. The yarn is Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock, and the color is Watercolor. Although they've been finished since Thursday, I was prevented from getting them to the post office three times. On Thursday, I had to make an emergency trip an hour north on the interstate to jump start Joe's car, which was dead when he arrived back from a Florida business trip. Friday, we had an ice storm. Saturday, we were embroiled in a major project, details to follow.
And here are her mittens. I love these, love the yarn, love how they knitted up. I made them out of Avanti merino, quite firmly on anonymous double pointed needles from my vast collection, size 3. The yarn calls for a 5. Question: Why do I prefer to knit socks on two circs, but mittens on double points? Another question: where do you suppose my darling niece lives? She wanted wool socks, and specifically requested mittens from me, for her morning trip to school. She probably lives some place chilly, I imagine you're thinking.

Silly, silly you. She lives in, and on, Hawaii.

The island of Hawaii is a volcano, as are the other islands. You probably knew that. What you might not know is that the interior of the island is a mountain, and that it gets cold enough on the mountain to snow. The exterior of the island is, as everyone knows, a beach, and it's summer there, all year round. There is a main highway encircling the island, approximately equidistant from both the mountain and the beach. If you live on the mountain side of this road, you live mauka, or toward the mountain and inland. If you live on the beach side, you live makai, or toward the sea.

My niece and her family all live makai, but her school is mauka, and there is enough difference in altitude between these two locations that it is uncomfortably chilly for my sweet small niece to arrive with bare hands.

Hope you like them, sweetie!

Long overdue...
I've been a little long on the speechifying lately, and a little short on the projects, particularly house projects. So I am happy to report on a huge project, all but finished. We have lived in this house for four years, and for a series of uninteresting reasons, Little One's bedroom was the tiniest room in the house, a room scarcely deserving of the word, more of a closet, really, as well as the only route to the attic. We've been planning to move him to a larger room for some time, but we were sleeping in it. And the room we wanted for our bedroom has been our office/studio/storage space/catchall.

But this weekend we played musical rooms and put everyone where they belong. We were ably assisted by our friends Alison, who raised the tone of the whole project by mopping the floors, and AK, who made soup and salsa and hung out with the kids downstairs.

Here is my new office, Little One's former bedroom.








Here's Little's new bedroom, formerly ours.








And here is our bedroom, with some past projects on display. First there's the blanket on the bed, which you may recognize.







And then there's the lamp from this post, now rewired and with a shade, which has finally found a home befitting its loveliness.







And finally, here is my collection of knitting books, right next to the bed, right where they belong. I can't tell you how many times I have padded across the hallway in my pajamas to get one of these books for some project I'm planning while sitting up in bed. Most of my yarn stash found a home in this room too. I may never leave this room again.

a baker's dozen

Well. It seems that I have a little problem. (Just one? And it's little? Are you quite sure? I can hear you asking.) Yes, just one. That I'm going to tell you about. In this post. It all started when we had some friends over last weekend, and I wanted to show them a charming comic strip that Big One drew for me for my birthday.

"I think it's in one of the sock books," I said.

"One of the sock books?" my good friend asked, incredulous. It was immediately clear that her astonishment stemmed from her belief that if one were to knit socks, surely more than one book about it would be redundant. Surely what a sock knitter needs are not books, but yarn and needles. Need I mention that this very good friend is not a knitter? Not a knitter, but she's a hopeful person, so she asked:

"The extra sock books? They must be from the library."

"Oh, no," I said, laughing. "They're all mine."

It wasn't until after my friends had gone home that the awful truth emerged. I own not just a few sock books. I own so many sock books that even I might be forced to admit that I might have just one or two too many.

My friends, I own twelve books about knitting socks. I'll just let that sink in for a moment. Twelve.

This is more than I need, and I know this because I use a minority of these books, and indeed I find only a minority of these sock books to be interesting or inspiring. So here is my review of each of my books about knitting socks. They are listed roughly in the order in which I acquired them.

Vogue Knitting: Socks
This is the first sock book I ever bought, long before I thought about knitting socks in any kind of realistic way. Amazon says this book was published in 1999, and I think I probably bought it shortly after it came out. Back then, all I'd knitted were sweaters, and the only book I really needed was Knitting Without Tears, by HRH Elizabeth Zimmerman.There are a few interesting patterns in here, but I've never tried one. Perhaps this is a book I could have done without.



Fancy Feet, by Anna Zilborg
I believe this book was given to me for Christmas by Joe, probably around the same time. For me, this is not actually a sock book in any meaningful sense, because I would never want to knit up any of these designs as socks. The construction is too wacky, and they probably wouldn't fit in my Danskos.

This books is quite useful as a source of patterns for stranded knitting, and I have used it more than once when I was looking for patterns for mittens and sweaters.



Socks Socks Socks: 70 Winning Patterns from the Knitter's Magazine Contest
I got this book when I started to think about maybe getting some sock yarn and think about maybe making a sock or two. Actual sock knitting was still years off.

This is a good book, with lots and lots of patterns, including some outlandish ones. I've used one pattern from this book, but I look at it fairly often for ideas.


Cool Socks, Warm Feet, by Lucy Neatby

I like this book, I really do. It's engagingly written, and extremely funny. It also seems like a great idea for a book, some creative patterns for printed yarns. I've found, over and over, that what works best for fancy striping yarns is K3 P1, but I keep looking through this book to see if I can find something else I'd like to do instead. So far, no dice. I think I could have saved my money.



Folk Socks: The History and Techniques of Handknitted Footwear, by Nancy Bush

Ah, Nancy Bush. I love everything she's ever done, I think. I like her sock patterns very very much, and I've knitted many of them. What I really like about this book is that half of it is about the history of socks, with great photos and lots of interesting stuff. I don't think I've knitted any of these designs in particular, but I probably will someday, and it doesn't matter, because I love reading this book.


Socks Soar on Two Circular Needles, by Cat Bordhi
Although this is how I knit socks, on two circs, and in spite of the fact that there are some excellent photos explaining how to set up your socks this way, I don't find this book useful at all. The designs are uninspiring, the photography is not so good, and I've really just never used this book. I like a lot of what Cat Bordhi has done since, but sadly, this is the book of hers that I own. I could have saved my money on this one.


Simple Socks, Plain and Fancy, by Priscilla Gibson-Roberts
I really thought this was going to be the breakthrough book for me. I read it in my LYS, and I was sold on her innovative system. It's basically short row toes and heels, and I've never tried it. I studied and studied the instructions for toe-up socks, and just couldn't make them turn into a toe. I showed it to an experienced sock knitter friend, and she made it work, but was unimpressed with the results. I've paged through this book a few times since, but I've found nothing that interests me enough to want to try it again. Another book I probably shouldn't have bought.


Sensational Knitted Socks, by Charlene Schurch
This is the book that finally made it possible for me to start knitting socks, and Charlene Schurch is my hero. This is not a book of patterns so much as a book of sock formulas. Lots of charts, tricks, and plenty of stitch patterns, although once you understand her charts, you can plug any pattern into a sock. This is the book I return to again and again, and the book I recommend, over and over.

As I think about it, probably the reason this book works for me is because the author is much like HRH Elizabeth Zimmerman in her thinking. I apply her formulas to most socks I make, regardless of their source. Because of this, I can comfortably ignore instructions about gauge and number of stitches to cast on. I just do what works for my yarn and my tension and my needles, and figure out the math from there. Love love love this book. This is the book, along with Knitting Without Tears, that would go with me into exile.

Two critiques: I wish this book were smaller and spiral bound, because it goes with me literally everywhere, and I find that the lacy patterns knit up much larger than expected, based on the charts. Once I figured this out, it was not a big deal to compensate for it, but the book really leads you to believe that's not going to happen.

Favorite Socks: 25 Timeless Designs from Interweave
I like this book. I've made several of the patterns, including the socks on the cover, and I have several others marked to do in the future. Good photography, and it's spiral bound, so it lays flat.


Knitting on the Road, by Nancy Bush
Love her books, love this book. I've knitted several of these designs, and plan to knit many more. I bought this book because of Grumperina, and her gorgeous Traveler's Stockings, but I haven't quite worked up the courage to try them yet. I think our anniversary trip to the beach in May will be the time. Mine will be purple.

Knitting Vintage Socks, by Nancy Bush
Another great sock book. Here, Nancy Bush researches some old sock patterns from the late 1800s and translates them into knitterese for our time. It seems that back in the day, folks knitted socks as such tiny gauges that my size o needles would look like pool cues.

I've knit several of these designs, and this book is a keeper.

More Sensational Knitted Socks, by Charlene Schurch
This is (obviously) a sequel to her first book about socks, and it is in the same vein: charts and recommendations rather than patterns, and lots of good tricks. This book is arranged differently, with all the stitch patterns at the back of the book instead of with the chapters, and the main charts are in the back rather than in the front. This is very confusing if you are really familiar with the first book, but wouldn't be a big deal otherwise.

I like this book. It does cover some new territory, particularly in the stranded patterns. I've used it quite a bit since I bought it this summer, but in terms of concepts, it's pretty interchangeable with her first book.

And finally, a pattern I love: Loksins!

This is not a book, obviously, but a pattern available for free download here. I love this pattern so much, I've knit it twice, and I'm about to cast on to knit it again. It's perfect. It looks fancy and difficult, but it's really easy once you get going. You don't have to look at the pattern past the first repeat, just read the knitting and keep going. It knits up exactly right for me with this yarn (Claudia Handpainted Fingering) on size 1 needles.

I think AK was right. I have too many sock books.

Coming this week: a response to some of the responses I've been getting to Five Good Minutes.

living on the edge

So for about the last year, I've been knitting virtually nothing but socks. I wrote them all down recently, and it seems that I average a pair about every three weeks, since last Thanksgiving. My photography skills are not good enough to make a post of ALL THE SOCKS interesting, and besides, many of the socks have gone to live elsewhere. So, instead of socks, here's the pair of mittens I'm knitting. The light blue is a heavy and coarse unknown from the stash, and the cuffs are made from equally unknown leftovers. All wool.

The darker blue is a lighter weight yarn for a lining. If you've never done this, it's really very simple. After you knit the first mitten, you just pick up stitches along the cast on edge of the first one, and knit another mitten, checking along the way to see that the second mitten is slightly narrower and slightly shorter. I usually accomplish this by doing the same number of stitches in a skinnier yarn with smaller needles. Then when your second mitten is complete, you just tuck it inside.

The pattern on the cuffs is from Elizabeth Zimmerman's Knitting Around. There's a picture of an antique Norwegian mitten with an intriguing pattern on the wrist, but no chart for it. I worked out the pattern on graph paper several years ago, in order to use it for a sweater I made for Big One. This is the first time I've used it on an actual mitten.

See that ball of the light blue yarn? That's how much yarn I have left to finish the outer mitten. It's not enough. Living on the edge, indeed.

On my 40th birthday, almost a month ago, a friend of mine taught me how to spin. That is, she showed me how she does it, gave me a few pointers, and then gave me access to her excellent spinning wheel. It was bad going at first, but yesterday for the first time, I spun a more or less consistent piece of stuff for almost an hour. It was exhilarating. I don't know anything about the technical aspects of what I was doing, ratios and batts and so forth. I don't even remember what kind of sheep she has. But here is the so-called yarn I've spun so far. From left to right in that little arc is the first and worst to the most recent and best.

And here's the most recent pair of socks I've made. The yarn is leftover Sisu from a pair for my dad and a pair for Big One. There wasn't quite enough Sisu, so I used some Reynolds Swizzle for some of the parts. Many adults think these socks are quite charming. A certain five year old dislikes them, but is generous enough to wear them on occasion. His complaint is that they are different from each other. Socks are supposed to match, he thinks. I guess he has a point.

About Sisu: I really disliked this yarn at first. It seemed rough and splitty. I think I may have been responding to its price tag. It is relatively affordable, at about $6 for a 50 gram skein. Certainly the cheapest sock yarn I can find in a LYS. After the first pair, though, I really came to like it. It is consistent, and springy, and knit up into a great pair of totally washable socks for Big One. It may not be dryable, haven't tried.

As for the Swizzle, there's a nasty yarn. Rough, stiff, and ugly. Anybody want to take it off my hands? I have two red balls and two green balls, 100 grams each.

After I took photos of the socks the way I thought they should be photographed, with feet in them, much silliness ensued. It seems Little One has his own ideas about sock photography. First there was this:

And then this:

And finally this, exactly the way he wanted to show them:

And then he thought perhaps socks should hang from the ears:

Or maybe this:

Sweet silly boy.