parlez-vous francais? konnichiwa, come and move it my way.

So, school is back in swing, now that our exam is behind us, which means I’ve started a fresh round of projects to work on during lectures.

This is the first sock from the Tanis Fiber Arts Blue Label that I bought a few weeks ago. I sort of fell in love with this yarn after knitting my second Ishbel with it over the summer, and I’m really happy that I found a place to buy it in Toronto.

Striped socks are just the beginning, here – with two skeins, I’ve got enough yardage for a couple of projects, and I’ve got all of these big plans for it. I’d love to be able to knit a pair of striped socks and then maybe an Ulmus, or another Daybreak, or maybe a striped Ishbel. The blue and the grey look really lovely next to each other, I think, and I’ve also got a lot of blues in my wardrobe – if I turn the sock leftovers into a scarf, it’ll go with everything, and that’s always a nice feature.

Song of the Entry: Jesse McCartney – Body Language (Listen)

fo: trekking socks

I feel like I’ve just completed some sort of knitting marathon. Except not really, because put together all of these unfinished pairs of socks were probably only a little more knitting than one entirely new sock. Still:

So, there’s that.

Pattern: lol. Generic stockinette socks.
Needles: little. I have lost track of it now, but I’m positive it was either 2.0mm (US 0) or 2.25 mm (US 1), which is possibly why I got so sick of knitting these when I first started with them.
Yarn: Zitron Trekking XXL, in Color 101.

I do actually quite like the striping in this yarn, and I am excited about how thin the fabric in these socks actually is (no risk of not being able to wear them with certain kinds of shoes, etc etc), but they were definitely the hardest of the bunch to motivate myself to finish.

But now they’re done, and I am practically giddy with excitement. I got to cast on for a pair of mittens! They are going obscenely fast! Look!

Song of the Entry: Spoon – The Underdog (Listen)

fo: abandoned socks (anastasia)

Working down the list of socks I need to finish, I thought I’d start with this pair. For one thing, they have an interesting stitch pattern, and for another, they’re knit up with delicious, delicious Koigu, in a colourway that, inexplicably, has not pooled. I have no idea if this is just the colourway, or if it’s related to the stitch pattern, but I have had some problems before, so this was a nice surprise.

Pattern: Anastasia Socks [Ravelry]
Needles: 2.5mm dpns
Yarn: Koigu KPPPM, in a mysterious blue-green colourway. Knit with two skeins, one of which was clearly lighter than the other.

The one challenge to these socks, for me, came from the fact that I’d already knit one. The second sock had been knitted up the foot, but stopped at the heel, which meant that I had to match the heels of the two socks. I knit the first sock a long time ago, apparently – I can tell this not only from the Ravelry page, but also from the fact that I used a Sherman heel, which I haven’t used in months because afterthought heels are so much more fun.

The Sherman Heel is a variation on the short-row heel, except neater and a little easier to work (no wrapping!), and I do really love the way it fits. I used to have it memorized, and would just work one up without thinking, but for the second sock of this pair I actually had to hit Google, dig out some resources, and relearn it. The original set of instructions for the Sherman heel are here, and there’s a site here that helps customize the instructions for different stitch counts. It’s a technique that’s well worth trying out, and I really love the look of the results.

And, I now have one more pair of socks that I can cross off the “abandoned projects.” I want to cast on for a pair of mittens so badly I can taste it – I can’t wait until these socks are all done so I can start.