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.