Sweater weather!

 Sweater weather has arrived. Sort of. It's been cool in the mornings, cool enough that I've been wearing sweaters, but by the time I get back home from bringing B to school, i'm quite happy to take the sweater off. I love love love Aiken. Yes, it's a little long in the sleeves, but it looks and feels so good. It looks uber cute over dresses, and great with jeans, and I feel super sassy wearing it. I predict that this sweater will be worn more than any other item of clothing I own. At some point in the future, there will be some MadTosh Vintage (in Cousteau, Baltic, or maybe Whiskey Barrel) or Malabrigo Rios (in Paris Night, Teal Feather, Ivy or Pearl Ten) for knitting a second Aiken. Oh yes. This will happen. (after I finish all the other projects blah blah blah)

I have finished both sleeves on Greenfield-huzzah!

Not only that, I even started the waist shaping. In fact, just over halfway through the waist shaping. Not bad, not bad. I don't know why I'm struggling to knit this sweater-easiest pattern in the world, great yarn, no purling...why am I not zooming along? Maybe because it's so much knitting? So many stitches?  Maybe it's that I know that when I finish the knitting, I'm going to have to pick up a butt-ton of stitches for the button band. (I'm not very good at picking up stitches for button bands yet)

Orrrrr...maybe it's because I have several projects on the needles and I keep casting on new projects.

Things I have cast on this week:
-A vanilla sock made with Malabrigo sock yarn in Aguas.

I'm going to frog the sock because I forgot Malabrigo sock is 100% merino wool-which is why it's so awesome to knit with, but I know from experience will be destroyed in very few wearings (hello sock made from Dream In Colour Smooshy *sad face*) I basically grabbed a ball of sock yarn that was caked up as I was on my way out, and heaven forbid I leave the house without a sock to knit on. It's so beautiful though...*sigh*

-Zuzu's Petals (by Carina Spencer) using my Freia Ombre in Amaranth.

This is turning into a fun knit. I had a wee bit of trouble in the first couple of rounds, had to frog and re-knit it twice thanks to mixing up the marker  and yarn overs. Tricksy buggers. I finished section one, and now I'm on section 2, and have joined in the round and started the lace work. I'm eager for the colour to change. I'm getting sick of the purple.

- A cropped sweater for winter by Andi Satterlund.

Except I won't be making it cropped, or with 3/4 length sleeves. It will be a full length sweater, with long ass sleeves (bloody sleeves *grumble grumble*) I'm using stashed Knitpicks Swish (yeah yeah) and I'm going to make the sweater in a size smaller to account for the growth after blocking. It's a colour block sweater and I'll be using Rainforest Heather as the main colour and Dove Heather as the contrast. Working that stashed yarn, aw yeah.

Rainforest Heather is a really lovely colour, it's got blue-greens and reddish purply bits, the depth of colour is amazing.  And man, do I love me a top down, seamless sweater. I cannot stress enough how awesome it is to not have to  match sweater parts and seam them together. Like the other Andi Satterlund patterns I've knit, the construction of this sweater is vry nifty,

-A vanilla sock knit in Misti Alpaca Tonos Carnaval in Chocolato

This sock yarn is 50% Alpaca, 30% merino, 10% silk and 10% nylon. 100% squooshy! Was thinking of doing a "fancier" sock, but decided I don't want to put in the effort. I like plain socks, they show off pretty yarn (and this yarn is vry vry pretty) and take absolutely no brain power. And of course, being a simple stockinette sock means I can always have it stashed in my bag and not be worried about where I am in a pattern.



Things I have knit on while contemplating frogging said item:
-vanilla sock knit with Manos Del Uruguay Alegria in Cabarat.

omg, why you so ugleh?
Much pooling. Such ugly. Wow.
I was super close to frogging it, I tried to knit on this sock while dealing with a week long headache and it  made my headache worse (How was I surprised by this? I don't know). I threw the sock and yarn at the wall and cried a little "why is knitting hurting meeeeee". Then decided knitting while headachey is probably not a great idea, especially with the bloody pooling and that I shouldn't take it out on the yarn. It's such a squooshy yarn, and I have decided to finish it. I'm like half an inch from toe decreases. I'm just going to knit on it when I am sans headache.

Things I have finished:
Arc-en-Ciel socks! yay!

So.  My second pair of socks made with Biscotte&Cie Felix self-striping and I have to say...while the patterning is fantastic and they look lovely, I'm just not happy with these socks. I don't like the yarn base. Not squooshy :( I've knit these on 2.25mm needles and I don't like how they feel. There's no real stretch-even after a good long soak and block, the socks are stiff. Making them on larger needles makes them look icky, as it's a thin yarn. Making them on smaller needles makes them feel like you're wearing iron socks. I have a couple hanks in stash, and they are really beautiful colours, but i'm not eager to knit them. I think if I do knit them up at some point I may add a couple of extra stitches to my usual 64 st cast on for vanilla socks.

Things I have not knit on:
-Virpi.
Sorry Virpi, you are a beautiful pattern, and are being knitted with beautiful wool, but you are a shawl and you are at the bottom of the must-knits at the moment. Perhaps I will knit on you more when the snow has started to fall. Or when I stop knitting all the things.


Seriously though, I need to stop casting on all the things.

The suckage of sleeves

As an unapologetic tall&fat; my secret shame is that only for knitting do I wish I were but a tiny and delicate flower. Short of stature, and slender as a reed-if only to not have to knit such a large bust, and long sleeves and miles and miles of stockinette. If I were a wee slip of a thing, my sweaters would be so inexpensive! and knit so quickly!




 Anywho, I'm titling this blog "the suckage of sleeves" because knitting sleeves sucks. It just does. And I like long sleeves. Extra long suckage. Does anyone out there actually appreciate knitting sleeves? I've been reluctantly working on my Greenfield sleeves. I pick up the sweater, do a row or two here and there, then drop it for something else. And then I wonder why it's taking me so long to finish them. Happily though, I'm done switching colours on both the sleeves. One night last week, I opted to dedicate precious knitting time to weaving in all the ends from the colour changes, instead of actually knitting.  So many ends!

I also decided the first sleeve was long enough the way it was and decided to bind off with a picot edging.

Fun and cute! But it did not inspire me to finish the other sleeve quickly, like I thought it might.
I may do the bottom edging with a picot bind off as well. I'll see how crazy I feel when I get there (and if I have enough yarn).

Speaking (complaining) of sleeves...I (re)finished my Cypress cardy. I think i'm a lot happier with it now. I need to wear it out a few times before I can really judge. It was a LOT of 2x2 ribbing. 10 inches per arm. I started feeling like my wrist was going to get a repetitive stress injury so I took a two day break from knitting. That was painful, but a RSI and having to take a break from knitting for a couple of weeks would be way worse.  WIP!

                                                           FO!

The ribbing is under the elbow, I wanted a subtle leg of mutton style sleeve. I'm pretty happy with that design feature despite it not being a popular sleeve style right now. I used to have a sweater that had similar sleeves and I adored it until it fell apart in the wash.

If you are keeping track, that means I've been working on 4 sleeves.
Horrible.
BUT! 3 down, 1 to go! There is light at the end of the tunnel. I may be done the last sleeve by the end of this week if I focus and not cast on any more new projects (as if...)

I've sworn that I will not start any new projects until the sleeves are all done, but I'm amending that to swearing to not start any new sweaters until all the sleeves are done. Because I cast on something.

Ah, Maison Tricote-how I've missed you <3 In honor of my return, I cast on the Virpi Shawl with the pattern and yarn I picked up at TWIST.  It has a really nifty construction, and seems like it can be easily customized in terms of size. The Virpi is nice because I don't feel like I have to get it done (like sweaters which I want to wear right friggin now) and I can just enjoy the experience, pick it up whenever because the pattern (at the moment anyway) is easy to memorize.

And the yarn is GORGEOUS and perfectly squooshy and I keep smelling it because it makes me happy.




Socks. The perfectly portable, lightweight project is back in my life. I've made some major progress on my arc-en-ciel sock.

I finished the leg, knit the flap, picked up the gusset stitches, did the decreases and now I'm flying (or as much flying as my knitting actually does) down the foot.  While I had the arc-en-ciel waiting at home for the flap and gusset to be knit, I knit a couple of rows on my cabaret sock.

I still don't like the girly camo of the Cabaret sock, but I do love how squishy the yarn is. And then, at home one night, for a change of pace, I picked up my pixie dust sock and knit a couple of rows on that as well!

I may have to frog my pixie dust though, I've lost most of the pattern notes. I won't be able to do the second sock if I can't find the rest of my notes. I'm reluctant to frog it because of all the work that has been put into it, so it might just hibernate for the next year or so, and maybe the notes will turn up! ha!

Now, a few paragraphs earlier, I wrote about how I took  a wee hiatus from knitting in order to avoid an RSI? During that time I did a lot of internetting...Reddit+Imgur, Jezebel, and Ravelry of course. I've been coming across Zuzu's Petals by Carina Spencer, for a couple of years now, and hearing about it on several podcasts. I finally decided I MUST knit my own Zuzu's petals. I was originally going to knit it with the Julie Asselin Piccolo (in Nebula, which is stunning) that I have in stash and that I recently re-skeined, but the project pages on Rav showed some of the cowls that had been knit with Freia Ombre and they were so beautiful that I knew if I was going to knit a Zuzu's petals it was going to have to be in  Freia Ombre or nothing at all.
A quick trip to Espace Tricot and some lovely Freia Ombre M/S Fingering was purchased.

I chose the Amaranth and my fingers are itching to cast on. The only thing holding me back is that I need to get that last bloody sleeve done.

Though, if B remembers to pick out yarn from my stash that he likes, I may not be casting on Zuzu anytime soon. This morning on the way to school he told me he really liked my sweater (I was wearing Aiken-it was chilly this morning) and asked me if I could make him one. How sweet is that?  I told him that after school, if he remembers, we will look through my stash for a colour he likes and I'll knit him a sweater. More sleeves *sigh*  But at least his sleeves won't be as long as mine...



Once upon a time, before there was only knitting, I read. I used to read voraciously. I devoured books. Knitting has taken over the place in my heart where reading used to be. I still love reading, and books, but I love knitting more. So, oftentimes, when I read now, I read about knitting. At the moment, I am re-reading Knitting Rules by Stephanie Pearl-Mcphee. I have it on my e-reader, and I have a paperback version. I wish that I had read this book before I started knitting, or in my early days of knitting. I think everyone who wants to learn to knit or crochet, or is just starting to knit or crochet; should read this book. It's funny, and informative in a totally relatable way. It makes you want to be friends with Stephanie Pearl-Mcphee, even though I will forever ignore her suggestion of knitting a gauge swatch.
And recently, I read The Knitting Circle Rapist Annihilation Squad by Derrick Jensen and Stephanie Mcmillan. Not for everyone, because I really don't think everyone will get it, but I thoroughly enjoyed it and fist pumped the air a few times. This is a radical, feminist, smart ass book and I loved it.

socks but no socks

We made it through the first week of school!
There's been some dramatics in the morning with B; "I cannot handle another day at school" with the arm draped over the forehead, but once he sees that it doesn't phase me, he does get up and get dressed without any difficulty. So far.
(I know it won't last)

I have no FO's to share, and only a handful of WIPs. There has not been a lot of knitting this past week.

I am still knitting the Greenfield cardigan. I am never, ever, ever going to be finished the Greenfield cardy. I've been telling myself that I want it finished by the end of October. I seem to work well with a deadline that is far enough that I won't feel so pressured that I'll quit, but far enough that I can put it down and work on other things  (like the Virpi Shawl).
 I'm mostly finished the first sleeve and currently working on the second sleeve. The first sleeve hasn't been bound off yet, because I want to wait until the whole sweater has been finished so I can see how it fits before I either bind off or add another inch or so.
 I'm really happy with how the Field Mouse(grey) looks next to Medieval (purple).

In between working on the sleeves, I'll add a row here and there on the body-I'm at the waist shaping now. I just keep switching the needle tips for the end caps. I really do love interchangeables for that reason.  Cables are so inexpensive (at least for the knitpicks/knitters pride sets) that I could probably have 8-9 projects on the cables that require the same size needle tips.
I love the yarns (Miss Babs and MadTosh), but I am getting tired of this sweater. Which isn't fair, because I've hardly been knitting on it! I think I need to change my stance on knitting top down, seamless cardies. Maybe I do prefer knitting those in pieces. Except for the sleeves, I need to figure out how to knit a cardy in pieces, seam it, and then pick up stitches around the armhole and knit the sleeves in the round. I could probably manage that.  If I frankenstein a pattern.
Top down, seamless pullovers are still my jam though. Shout out and fist bumps to mah TDSP!

My sock mojo is still kind of low, but I've actually been knitting my second rainbow sock while waiting for B after school.  I haven't taken any pictures, it basically looks like the sock from this post except shorter, I'm on my second row of yellow.

And finally, I've decided to re-work on my Cypress cardy. I had liked how it turned out, with some small issues until I wore it a few times. I basically stopped wearing it because I had issues with the arms.  Can I just say how weird it is to me that a sweater knit in a worsted weight, wool and alpaca (aka warm) yarn would have 3/4 length sleeves. Why is this a thing? I mean, dude, if it's cold enough for me to wear a sweater that is warm, why am I exposing my forearms and wrists? Anywhoo,  I'd been thinking about unpicking the bind off, ripping back and lengthening the sleeves. In theory, it would work perfectly. In practice? Not so good. I am absolutely RUBBISH at unpicking a year old, washed and worn sweater bind off. So I cut it instead.
Why yes, I am insane.
I measured a specific length, picked up stitches around the sleeve, knit a round and started some ribbing. I have no idea how it's going to turn out-I envision it having kind of a bell sleeve, ending at the elbow, where it tightens and ribs all the way down to my wrist. Kind of "leg of mutton"ish. Either I'm going to hate it, and not wear it at all (and I'm not wearing it now so,..yunno), or I'll like it and actually get some wear out of it.

The thought of fixing up Cypress actually came about because I found the yarn for the sweater (Valley Yarns Stockbridge) while I was organizing my stash, I weighed the balls-50 grams for the big balls, 8 grams for the small ball, plus the two 50gram skeins. That gives me about 453 yrds to finish both sleeves, I think I can manage it.

I really want to cast on other things. I want to learn how to do toe up socks (yet I don't want to actually knit the socks) I want to finish all the unfinished socks (without actually knitting the socks) I want to knit something with a gradient kit (that isn't socks).  I want to learn to thrum. And spin. I need a 3 week retreat in the woods. Just me, and all mah knitting, and a bunch of tv shows (I just started watching Weeds-how did I miss that when it first aired?) and a yoga mat for exercise.