So none of the people who I am giving
socks to this year read this blog which means I can put them all in the
entry for posterity before I give them out…
Apologies before I start for the picture quality - in Winter it is hard to get the decent natural light you need for good photos.
1. These are the Rambling Rose (pattern
by the Yarn Harlot) socks which I knitted up in some yarn wool and
nylon blend yarn from Knot Another Knitter in this gorgeous purple and
grey colour which was a mis-dye! When I first started knitting with it I just couldn't get into it and then when I got them out for photographing I suddenly fell i love with them. Despite the fact this is a mis-dye I think it looks amazing and should be
a regular colour.
I ended up doing the second sock wrong by putting the panel on the wrong side of the foot but I couldn't work out how I did it and I thought they look nice enough anyway so I am leaving them as they are. I loved this pattern and will definitely use it again, especially as this was the real beginning of a love affair with turn down cuffs which I seem to have acquired.
2. The Target Practice Socks (from Knitty) which are knitted in Socks that Rock Mediumweight Pink Granite.
These looked more fun to knit that they
actually were. They were very hard on the hands partly because I had a
very tight guage and partly because of the pattern. They do look good
but they fit a little bit weird so I don’t think I will be making them
again. Unfortunately this was about the time I discovered I much
prefer STR lightweight to mediumweight but the only skeins I have left
are both mediumweight. Nevermind I still love STR!
3. The Magus Socks knitted in Violet Green's Merino, Cashmere, Nylon base yarn and leftover orange Wollmeise.
These are socks for my Dad using a modified verion of Cookie A's Cauchy Socks which are a sort of fancy triangular ribbed pattern. They knitted up pretty quickly despite the massive size (size 13 - I used 80 stitches over 2.75m needles). I was worried that I would run out of yarn (because of these being for such big feet) and that is why I chose to do the contrasting heels and toes. I actually think that the contrasts look even better though and make the socks really pop.
4. The Other knitted presents I believe have been blogged before so Cowl (homemade pattern), Ribbed Sky full of Bees, Nutkins in Kaw Kaw and finally the Komet Socks in Indigo Moon which are being given to my pa from work.
Recently I had some unsettling things happen. Nothing terrible just something which unsettled me a great deal for a couple of weeks. Almost as soon as I happened I found some Tide Pooling STR on Ravelry for sale in lightweight. I loved this colour when it came out in the club and was really hoping I would be able to buy it. Clearly this was a sign so I got it straight away and very shortly it arrived.
Immediately I cast on for Cat Bordhi's Jewelled Steps Socks as I really
thought (correctly as it happens) that this would best show off the
varigated yarn. Basically I knitted out all my stress into these
socks. Partway through the first one I realised that the sums were
wrong and it was far too long (and too long in a way which would have
meant I ran out of yarn). So I ripped out about 1/3 of the whole of
the first sock and started again. And I didn't mind doing it at all
because knitting these socks in STR lightweight on Harmony needles
(2.5mm) was nothing but a complete joy from start to finish.
They are now finished and despite having knit them through such a stressful time everytime I look at them all I can think about is how calming the experience of knitting them was. I am not wearing them yet however. I have (in the last few years) started a trend of making sure that I wear a new pair of hand knitted socks every New Year's Day. It is a silly little tradition of indulgence that I have created for myself. They are in storage until New Year's Day or until I have finished another pair of socks for myself between then and now.
Currently I am knitting J another pair of Orange Socks - I am using the Saxony Pattern (72 stitches on 2.5mm needles) and some great merino cashmere sock yarn from Cariad Yarns in this fabulous bright colour. I am getting a bit of laddering on the needles which is annoying but I think I can block it out in the final product. I have made the heels unusual wide because a) J has strangely high arches and b) I was very worried that the intense cable pattern would make these very hard to get on over the instep. So far they fit him like a dream but the extra yarn has left me panicking I don't have enough to finish them. I am persevering and if the worst comes to it I have some other orange yarn which will have to finish a toe or something.
I am also knitting some red socks for R. I have never knitted socks for R before but I am confident she is someone who truly appreciates knitted gifts and she has dropped several hints over the last couple of years that she would like more knitted socks (I am not her only source of them you see!) I realised that knitting her a pair of socks was probably well overdue and so last Sunday I cast on for a pair of Kai Mai socks from Cookie A's Sock Innovation book (66 stitches on 2.5mm needles). I started out with some Lisa Souza Yarn but the gauge was totally wrong and I ripped out half a sock and then picked another yarn instead. This time I got out the red yarn of Unknown Origin. This is the yarn that Triskellian and I bought together about 3 years ago at Ally Pally. We bought 500g of it for £5! And then eventually split it in half. I already used some of it on the "push me pull me" socks in stripes with plain black yarn (and I happen to think that the PMPM socks are probably some of the most gorgeous and striking I have ever knit for myself) It is lovely stuff and really well dyed and doesn't seem to have lost its colour at all in the PMPM socks. I have now completed 1.5 Kai Mai socks in the red yarn (after having ripped out 3/4 of a foot for getting the second pattern repeat spiralling the wrong way and only realising far too late) and they look great. I will be giving them to R but only because I have a will of iron!
I am finally ready to admit something - 3 years after I first noticed the problem, our breadmaker really is just broken now. The only thing it is useful for is occasionally making pizza dough or pitta dough. Everything else - even wholemeal dough! Is coming out like a brick.
In fact the last couple of batches of bread were so bad that I began to doubt my ability to make bread at all. Enter "Fresh from the Oven" a bread baking community who post monthly bread making (by hand) challenges and you have to complete 8 in a year. I have been watching it for some time through the Domestic Goddess in Training blog and when I admitted the breadmaker was dead I decided to join myself.
I joined just in time for the December challenge which I shall be tackling this coming weekend but I also wanted to get a bit of practice in before hand so I decided to do the November challenge as well for a fast knead plain white loaf. The recipe is here on the DGIT blog. Well after several dodgy wholemeal loaves this was an absolute joy to make, the dough was easy to handle (the short kneads meant it wasn't too arduous) and using oil instead of flour is completely inspired. The first loaf was light and tasty and looked like this:
The 2nd and 3rd loaves were likewise and this is now the new favourite bread recipe in the Fraxknits household. There are a lot of fiddly bits to this recipe and I slavishly followed all of them each time (except I doubled the amounts to make loaves 2 and 3) and I can confidently say it was worth it and I shan't ever be tempted to cut corners if I make this again.
December is Stollen and I remember when I finally got access to the public blog to pick up the recipe being really rather excited by the prospect. This is precisely why I joined the blog. To make things I wouldn't normally make and improve my skills. So this Sunday J is out and I have a day to myself. I am going to spending it wrapping Christmas presents in front of old Dr Who episodes and making this Stollen recipe. Probably with some knitting and maybe some creative writing thrown in as well.
Not long ago I made a rash statement about how hard I wear my socks "and they never get holes in them". Well clearly this hubris in the face of the knitting gods would not go unpunished and within 2 months 4 pairs of socks had developed holes!
This was an excellent excuse to get out
my antique darning mushroom which my Mum bought me as a beautiful if
curious Christmas present a while ago. Here is a picture of it
unsocked although I don't think you get a good sense of it since I photographed it lying on a wooden table.
I can say that the old antique darning mushroom held up very well for the first two socks I darned and the wood was quite warm and comfortable to hold. It seems to take roughly an hour/45 mins to darn a sock at the moment using this great technique on You Tube.
My second darning (where I managed to use the same coloured yarn) was actually practically invisible which I am very pleased about and the darned patches actually seem stronger than the rest of the sock.
Here is a picture of the first hole
though so you can see it.
All my socks to develop holes have done so in precisely the same little spot everytime where the back of my heel bone rubs my shoe. The only one of J's socks to get a hole has been on the ball of the foot. I have no idea what this means.
I now have two more to do and might take them with me over Xmas to do when I want a break from knitting.
I know, posts are like buses around here...
Well I just wanted to do a final post to write about what I am currently knitting.
Firstly I am knitting the Elegant Ribbed Stockings by Ann Budd from Favourite Socks (still on my odyssey to knit everything in the book). These are particularly special though because I am using the Cascade 220 I overdyed. So this is the first thing I have knitted from my own hand dyed yarn. They are a surprisingly quick knit for being knee high socks, probably because the gauge is so huge.
Most people in the UK will probably know about this already but In Trafalgar Square in London there are plinths with statues on them and the 4th Plinth is empty. Various things have filled it over the years and for this summer the great artist Antony Gormley (who was responsible for the fabulous Angel of the North statute) has filled the plinth. He has chosen to fill it with ordinary people chosen by lottery who get to do anything they like (as long as it is legal) for one hour. The project is called One and Other and there is someone on the plinth 24 hours a day every day and yesterday between 1pm and 2pm Brenda Dayne of Cast On was on the plinth!
You can even see a small grainy picture of me, Kauket and Triskellian at 55.02mins on the recording of her time up on the plinth - yes I did watch the whole thing online just to see if I made it on to the video - sad I know!
Later on that day the three of us popped into the Slow Food festival at the Southbank which was a bit like a farmer market and I tried some exceptionally good food. I came home with some Svecia cheese from Sweden which tasted a lot like parmesan, some Phesant and Pear sausages, Duck and Orange sausages and some potato-rosemary-nigella seed bread all of which were gorgeous!
I finished the Komet Socks for a friend for Christmas and I am so pleased with the way they turned out. I think that they look gorgeous and they were great fun to knit. I shall definitely be knitting more of Stephanie Van Der Linden's patterns, free and paid since it was interesting and really well written. It looks really complicated and yet I was still able to memorise the pattern quickly which was precisely the sort of knit I was looking for. I think that the mixture of cables and lace makes the cables pop out even more.
I realised very late that Indigo Moon, the yarn I used, which whilst absolutely beautiful in terms of colour is probably the louet gems base yarn which is just not my favourite really and that was a shame. On the up side these are a gift so I won't be wearing them if that is a problem for me.
I also completed them during the blue phase of Project Spectrum. I haven't been following Project Spectrum much in my knitting this year. I think I got put off because it started with a colour I really didn't like and my knitting never got back in sync after that.
Wow - it is so long since I have posted. I did lose some mojo for a while and coupled with the dodgy typing on my laptop it has curtailed my desire to blog so much but I am going to try and make up for that now.
The first project I completed is the nearly fated Titania socks. I started these in some Natural Dye Studio yarn in rosebud which pooled in a very ugly way and didn't work at all. Then I lost the patter for about 2 years then I found the pattern and eventually tried it out with some Blue Moon Fibre Arts Socks that Rock in Thraven from the raven series of yarns overdyed in black. It was dark and gothic and gorgeous (despite it being nearly 10 years I am still a recovering goth!) and became the Dark Titania's Revenge socks. They are a little bit big for me (but my other pair of STR have felted a little bit so I am figuring that this might just reduce them to a perfect fit over time) and because of warm(ish) weather I have only been able to wear them a couple of times since finishing them. But I love them and I can't wait to wear them lots in Winter.
The pattern was lots of fun but it was hard to decrease the lace part over the top of the foot and make it look nice. There aren't great instructions for this so it was sort of a case of making it up as you go along which is fine but they haven't come out quite as well as I would have liked. Only I will ever know that though so I am not too worried but I would probably try and fix this if I was knitting these socks a second time in a lighter yarn where it would be more obvious.
Socks that Rock Mediumweight yarn is ok but a little bit on the thick side for my preference. I have 2 skeins of mediumweight left though and I like it, just in future will probably prefer to buy lightweight.
Wow - I appear to have completely forgotten to blog my last yarn purchase.
Ok I have a much smaller yarn budget these days because J and I are trying to pay off our mortgage early. Far from being despondent though I am treating this as a great opportunity to really get to know my modest but pretty decent stash. Not counting a big pile of leftovers just waiting to be turned into something new and exciting (see the earlier shawl) I have enough yarn to knit at my current speed for a year and half before I run out. Obviously in this time I can keep the tank topped up with the occasional purchase but I am looking at yarn with a much more critical eye than buying things because they are pretty.
I did buy one new yarn though, it was a little bit reduced and will be used to make a Christmas present so it will pay for itself twice over which is a good thing and I do find I treasure my purchases a little more now they are less frequent.
This is the muse base yarn from Violet Green (80% merino, 10% nylon and 10% cashmere) and it does feel softer than most other yarns (this MCN blend being incredibly popular amongst all sorts of dyers and knitters at the moment). It is the Magus colourway which is a sort of deep chocolatey brown and will make great socks for my Dad for Xmas.
I still occasionally catch myself panicking I am running out of yarn (not true in the slightest) since I am knitting it faster than I am buying it at the moment and then I remember that it is there to be used up and I relax and enjoy it again!
