The Knitting Pirate

Knitter’s Day at Veronica’s house was great! There were about a dozen people there, a half-ton of food, and *lots* of knitting. I brought the ribbed socks and got to within a few inches of the toe decreases. It will be great to finish a project, for the first time in months. Gonna crank through the rest of the socks-in-progress and get more of that finishing going on!

And I’ve made plans to go back to my old SnB next week for their anniversary celebration. I was there at the beginning; I would love to revisit everyone for an evening and catch up again. Besides, if I don’t spend the whole night talking, I’m sure I’ll make lots of progress on whatever project I bring.

In non-knitting domesticity, Pirate-Husband and I have been using the stand mixer to make lots of bread. The more loaves we make, the better they get! The latest was an oatmeal-raisin breakfast bread. We brought a loaf to my parents’ on Sunday, and they loved it. Last night we tried a recipe that could be used as a sandwich bread for cold cuts, with half white and half whole wheat flour. It was still in the oven when I went to bed, so I didn’t get any – but Pirate-Husband emailed to tell me that it’s “a semi-wheaty sandwich bread. Slightly chewy, soft, but it holds together well. The crust is perfect, it could be store-bought.” Hooray!

Yesterday, while at my parents’ house watching the Cowboys lose a football game, I knit on the second of Michael’s socks and drank gin & tonic with cucumber instead of lime. About those four things:

…while at my parents’ house celebrating my birthday! We were there for both lunch and dinner, and also mid-day snacks. Mom and I talked a bit about her next project; it may be a sweater for herself! Her shawl is all fixed up and now she just needs a fancy event at which to wear it. It was a lovely day, except for

…the Cowboys losing. Well, at least they got into the playoffs this year. But man, it was like they just threw away that game. I thought Minnesota would win, but I didn’t expect it to be such a blowout.

…the second of Michael’s socks is past the gusset decreases and on into the foot. I still think that Cascade Heritage is my new favorite sock yarn; maybe that’s why the sock is going so quickly! I’m bringing it with me today to knitter-friend Veronica’s house, where I expect to make a little more progress while I catch up with the women from my old SnB.

…gin & tonic with cucumber is surprisingly good. I usually like lime. Put a thin slice of cucumber, skin and all, into the drink. Let it soak in for a few minutes; it gets better the longer it sits. At the end, it will be the best piece of cucumber you’ve ever eaten!

Today I actually left the office on my lunch break, which almost never happens. I decided to walk over to Home Goods to buy bread pans, and because it was cold outside I put on my beloved Fleep-Tops. I was fleeping the tops over when the man riding the elevator with me commented, “Those are really clever!”

“Thank you, I made them myself!” said I, and demonstrated how they fleeped. “I figure that no matter what you’re doing, you really only need three fingertips, right?”

He looked impressed and said “You have the best of both worlds with those!” Had it been a longer elevator ride, he might have asked me to make him a pair. As it was, we got down to the lobby, I grinned and wished him a nice day, and we went in opposite directions.

Totally made my day, I tell you.

I was wearing my stripy handknit socks to ring in the new year. My guests admired the stripes; Nancy and I discussed the possibility of trading our work. She does gorgeous calligraphy, illumination and bookbinding… and she has tiny feet, so it might not be a bad trade at all. I think she only wears a size 5. I could probably crank out a pair of socks for her in the time it would take me to knit just one for myself.

Now that I’ve cleaned up the house and showered, I’m wearing another pair of the handknits, and my toes are warm and cozy. Having a roaring fire helps with that, too.

Michael tried on the socks that I’m knitting for him, and they fit! Hooray! I admit to being really relieved. I had nearly convinced myself that they’d be too small, but now I am no longer worried and can finish them with confidence.

Here’s to a wonderful, happy, healthy, productive, 2010 for all of us! Happy New Year!

2009 was a slow knitting year for me; I only completed three projects. (Of course, if I’d been able to keep to one sock at a time, I’d probably have three more pairs to show…)

Pomatomus are the most complex socks I’ve ever knitted. Although they’re rated as difficult, I found that the stitch pattern made a lot of sense and was actually quite easy to follow once I got the hang of it. On the other hand, they’re definitely not a mindless sock that I’d feel comfortable knitting on without the pattern in front of me, checking off rounds as I finish them. I love them, but unlike some other patterns (*cough*Jaywalker*cough*) I’m not tempted to knit another pair. Pomatomus were my introduction to Cookie A.’s designs; this free pattern came from the Winter 2005 Knitty.

I wear my Fleep-Tops more than any other piece of knitting I’ve finished, I think. They are amazingly warm and incredibly comfortable, and not quite like anything I’ve ever seen in a store. I used a combination of Knitty’s Cigar pattern and Sarkasmo’s Gnomittens, with added miniature fleep-top thumb caps. They were a good quick project, finished in only a month. It’s unfortunate that the yarn is discontinued; I would love to make a backup pair, or perhaps some as gifts for people I especially like. Perhaps some medium- or heavyweight Socks that Rock from Blue Moon Fiber Arts would be a good substitution.

The thoroughly misnamed Quick Toe Up Socks weren’t quick at all, not after I found a knot in the first skein of yarn and had to do some serious futzing to make the stripes line up from one sock to the other. I used Wendy Johnson’s Generic Toe-Up Sock Pattern, substituting a figure-eight toe, and made the sock 64 stitches around. It pleases me that they match so perfectly, even if I had to be ridiculously perfectionist about getting them that way! I like when my striped socks match up, especially wide stripes.

While it wasn’t knitting, I did do an overhaul of this site in 2009 to change the look and feel, and I added a Twitter account. I bought a new spinning wheel, a Kromski Sonata in walnut, on which I spun several skeins of yarn, including this BFL two-ply which is rapidly becoming my first pair of handspun socks. I’m considering selling the Ashford Traditional; while I love the way it looks, it doesn’t fit me quite right and I don’t spin on it. Perhaps I’ll give it one last try before I make a decision. Pirate-Husband says that it matches the house, and if I want to keep it around as a decoration, he’d be fine with that… but I think it’s sad to have a working wheel that isn’t ever used.

Also in 2009: I read 26 books, which took up some knitting time, and I finally learned to drive a car with a manual transmission so that I could trade in my old beat-up Cutlass for a new shiny Mazda3.

I am excited about 2010! I have plans to finish up the projects on my needles and start some new ones, to publish a design or two, and to improve my spinning skills. My parents bought a KitchenAid stand mixer for Pirate-Husband and me for our combined birthday and Chanukah gifts, so there will be fresh bread to go along with the yarn. Things just keep getting better and better!

The socks which fit perfectly, fresh off the needles, are now too big. The socks which I thought were too small, fit perfectly after a few wearings. There’s a lesson to be learned here, one which is brought to mind when I try on my handspun socks: “These socks are not really too small.” Sure, they’re difficult to get on and off – but a few wearings and washings will soften them up. And they fit just right around my ankles, no bagging or wrinkling at all.

This is what I have learned about socks this year:

• With standard sock yarn, I should make a 64-stitch stockinette-footed sock for myself.
• I might consider 68 stitches if I want ribbing down the foot.
• The socks aren’t too small. Really. Unless they are, in which case
• It’s so easy to rip back and fix mistakes.
• If I make the sock leg six inches long, there should be enough yarn left over for the foot.
• Heel-flap-and-gusset socks fit better than short row heel socks.
• Short row heel socks are acceptable, though.
• I need to learn to do a heel flap and gusset sock from the toe up.
• Here is a conveniently free pattern from Wendy for just that.
• I like to knit socks for the people I love best.
• Handknit socks are so much better than store-bought, but toe socks from Sock Dreams are a close second.

In the coming year I’d like to try new sock architectures – the Hat-Heel Sock looks interesting, and I have Cat Bordhi’s New Pathways for Sock Knitters book to work through as well. I have a half-ton of sock yarn and I’m not letting myself buy any more until I’ve used some up!

These socks are cranking right along, and I am absolutely loving the yarn. Fortunately I have another skein in a different colorway for myself! As I expected, there was a little pooling around the gusset, but for the most part the colors are distributing evenly. It is much more vivid in direct sunlight, which is a neat trick of the dye job. Indoors, the colors are quite subtle. (You can ignore the safety pin; that was just a place-marker.)

I have been thinking of the handspun socks as the “Perfectly Imperfect Socks.” There is something incredible about knitting with yarn that I spun myself – about being able to spin yarn that’s good enough to knit with – about watching the colors come together and knowing that there will never be another pair of socks like these. They’re mine, from beginning to end, and I am wonderfully proud of them. And of myself.

This is the first of the Stripey Striped Socks. I don’t think I’ve had a love-hate relationship with a yarn like this before. The only thing that might come close is the Plymouth Sockotta that I used for Pomatomus. The colors are just perfect, but knitting with the yarn… not so much.

I hate to admit it, but I’d kinda like a second pair of these. I’ve seen some gorgeous knee-high versions that alternate white with the colors. What can I say, I’m a sucker for the stripes!

The Sibling Sock is stripey in a whole different way. Trekking XXL is a beautiful thin yarn which comes together in completely random stripes. This is a skein which Janis gave me as a gift a few years ago. The leg is a little short because I was paranoid of running out of yarn, but that’s all right; I’m sure the leftovers will be put to use somewhere. When the sock is done, I plan to write up the pattern for it in two sizes, and then publish it.

One of my goals for 2010 is to finish all the socks I have on the needles. Another is to publish at least two patterns. I have the first one nearly done and ready to go… but I don’t yet know what the second one will be.

Last night I finished the gusset decreases on the first of the Cascade Heritage socks. It looks as if I’m getting nine stitches to the inch, which is slightly more than I’d expected from my first swatchattempt at knitting the cuff. I hope the socks are big enough for Michael, because they’re slightly too big for me. And I hope I don’t run out of yarn before I get to the toe. It’s going to be close.

When I picked up the gusset stitches, I picked up an extra two in each corner to eliminate the hole that so often forms there. But they were picked up into purl stitches, so I needed to figure out the purl equivalents for decreases. The opposite of K2tog is P2tog, but the opposite of SSK… is SSP, a complicated maneuver which begins in a similar way (slip two stitches knitwise, return them to the left needle) but then requires those two stitches to be purled together through the back loop. Fortunately there is only one of these stitches to be made per sock; I think I can deal with that.

Perhaps in a couple of years I’ll look back on this entry and laugh that I ever thought SSP was complicated.

Fortunately, only three stitches had slid from the needles of the handspun sock, and hadn’t dropped down very far at all. I was able to rescue them in just a few minutes (doesn’t everyone keep a small crochet hook in their purse?) and resumed knitting with no progress lost. The yarn seems to be slightly thinner in this section and I’m hoping it’s not too thin for the sock.

The truth is, I think I will love these more if they are slightly imperfect. As a perfectionist, I’ve always been a hoarder of arts and craft supplies, and now of yarn – because as long as it’s still unused, it has great potential. If I use it up, it might not come out as well as I imagine it in my head. These socks are an attempt to conquer that terrible attitude. I was hesitant to spin the fiber into yarn because I didn’t want to mess it up, and then I was delaying knitting the yarn into socks because I didn’t want to mess it up. But I have one sock done and another on the way, and they’re coming out all right if not perfectly… and they are mine, my very first handspun socks, and no matter what they’re like when they’re done I will adore them.