Sweater Progress

OK, so you can now see how far along I am on the sweater:

I should have used circs, this is a lot of stitches to shove on a straight needle. Anyway, I love the way it is coming out, I just wish I was able to knit on it faster (or spend more time on it).

And some new yarn!

Bought this from someone on Ravelry. I like the way it knits up, and want to make socks for my grandma, who loves green. Now I just have to finish my huge pile of knitting to make grandma socks!


The latest Rockin' Sock Club yarn. I never would have picked this but I love it. I am sooooo far behind though - still on the kit from last June *wheeze* I think once I finish Arwen, socks will be flying off my needles though!

Yum

We had this for dinner last night and tonight. You must make it!

Golden Winter Soup

As for Arwen, I've reached the armpit (actually cast on for the sleeve as well). We'll see if I can get the sleeve/shoulder done over the weekend and maybe even some work on the hood. I have no plans this whole weekend except knitting - and I do promise to get a progress photo up :)

Arwen cables

Thought I would show you how the cables are going. I've been working on socks only for the last few days but am planning to do some more on this sweater today. It appears I did mis-cross a cable (right in the center there) but I had to stare at the official photo for 5 minutes to be sure, and I think it looks OK so I'm leaving it.



It's really cold today so my only plans are for knitting and bread baking. No leaving the house!

Web socks webbing

I was planning to post this photo on Ravelry tonight, but photos are being wonky there today. I finally took a picture of the Web socks. We'll disregard the fact that there are 2 stitch patterns within that sock pattern and I actually started up with the wrong one but decided against frogging because I just plain old didn't want to. They are looking nice anyway.


I love love LOVE the color of this yarn (that sound you hear is all the Ktog'ers laughing as they know what a fetish I have for purple!) This is truly my favorite shade of purple though, and the photo shows it well.

And now for the close up!

This one totally does not show the color properly but you can see the lovely stitching.

I am using Louet Gems fingering weight, and I am really happy with how soft it is knitting up - you wouldn't guess from the yarn how soft the fabric would be. I can't wait to have these as actual wear-able socks.

Arwen update: I am 16 rows into the left front. The cabling is going slow. There may have been some ripping back last night. There are cable crosses on every right-side row. Like I said, slow. But I'm slowly getting the hang of the pattern. It looks pretty but I am feeling disgruntled by the slow-ness.

Nothing too exciting...

But I finished the back of the Arwen sweater last night.


There's still a fair amount to do, both fronts plus the sleeves and the hood. And all of those have the cables. Not that cables are scary (mostly) but they definitely go slower. I'm a little nervous I might accidentally mis-cross one, but fingers crossed that I won't!

Socks & Sweaters

I actually didn't knit much over the weekend (was very busy), but I have been knitting on weeknights.

Here is the progress on the Arwen sweater so far:

I would say the back is about a third done, maybe a bit more. I'm making it 23 inches instead of 19 inches (would rather have this a little longer). I bought lots of extra yarn to make sure I had enough! So far this is really boring, but then I can knit easily while watching a movie, or reading a book! When I get to the front (with the pretty Celtic cables), I expect it will be more interesting, but slower. I haven't studied the cable chart yet, not sure if there are even any rows without crosses....but I will slog through it either way.

The Solstice Slip socks are really fun, though I haven't touched them since I got to the gusset on Saturday:

I did in fact get the hang of cabling without a cable needle, which helps. I won't pretend I haven't dropped a few stitches while trying to cable, though :/ I love the way the color is producing a sort of "tiger stripe" effect...shows even better on the sole:


I knit on the Web Socks some in the car on Saturday (because I forgot to bring the Arwen sweater, but I keep the socks in the car)...still no photos of those.

We got new dining room furniture this weekend. This is very exciting for me - finally replacing the stuff I got straight out of college. No photos of that yet either, but I will have them - probably over this coming weekend so I can get them in the natural light.

And now I must get back to knitting so I have more stuff to entertain you with! :)

Food for thought

So my next door neighbors, who put up the "Happy Birthday Jesus" sign in their front yard at Christmas (thus proclaiming themselves uberChristians) are the only ones in my vicinity who do not shovel their sidewalks when it snows. Everyone else, even the ones I don't like, clears the sidewalks. So you're taking a walk and you get to the house where one would think the occupants might care about others, but you have to wade through ankle-deep (or deeper) snow because they clearly DON'T care.

Looking forward

Time to start over on a few things:

1) Tracking knitting FO's. I'm hoping to get 20 pairs of socks done in 2008. I did 11 in 2007. We'll see - I also have sweater and shawl knitting planned, but my commute is going to get shorter. I will need to also cut back on my Internet time-wasting in order to do this...but I have a ton of yarn I need to (and want to) play with.

2) Tracking workouts. I got 486 miles of swimming in last year. I want to make that at least 500 this year, plus I am going to start keeping track of walking and biking miles, which aren't nearly as much as the swimming miles, but it's good to be able to look back on.

I don't really make resolutions, though.

Toward the 20-sock goal, I've finally cracked open my June '07 RSC kit and am hard at work on the Solstice Slip socks. I originally started in the Large size, but it was huge. I started over in the Medium, and this is much better. I need to bone up on my cabling without a cable needle though, or these are going to go REALLY slow.

Holiday Fun

Since I've only been posting about knitting FO's lately, there is a fair amount of updating to do about the holidays.

My mom came into town the Sunday before Christmas, getting here around suppertime. Even though I had to work on Christmas Eve, C was off work, and the two of them were able to do some prep. I did get out of work early, and we were able to go to church before supper. I had bought some HUGE crab legs, and they didn't quite fit in our biggest pot:


We tried and tried to come up with a solution, and finally found one:

Whatever works! The crab was fabulous....so yummy!

Christmas morning gift display:


My Bayerische socks finally made their "on-feet" debut on Christmas!

I have to admit, now that I'm away from the pain of making them - I love them.

Highlights from my gifts....


I already have a lovely stand mixer, but for jobs that are smaller, a hand mixer is more appropriate...but my hand mixer was about to burn out, and this is a very fancy one with all kinds of attachments. :)


This will come in handy for future apple-pie making (I think C already wants to make a pie...)


All sorts of fun stuff in here!


This looks amusing - have only flipped through it so far, though.


SOCK YARN!!!!
I know you all are thoroughly shocked at the color ;) This is Handmaiden Casbah, which is 80% merino, 10% cashmere, and 10% nylon. I can't wait to use it. I really need to get faster at sock knitting!


Fun shirt from my sister :)


Brand new computer!!! This thing is tiny. It's about 3 inches tall, and if I put my hand on the top of it, my hand covers it completely. I spent Thursday getting it up and running, and put a few finishing touches on it yesterday. It is going to be absolutely lovely for photo editing and blogging. I'm sure I'll do more optimization over time, but I am going to really enjoy having this.

And now for the Christmas feast!


Warm spinach salad with bacon, mushrooms, roasted red pepper, and pine nuts...


Herb crusted rack of lamb (our first time roasting a rack and it turned out beautifully)


Freshly made spaghetti tossed with fresh herbs and olive oil (and yes, we did drink that HUGE bottle of wine...it's 5 liters in case you were curious).

Hope everyone else had a great one too. I look forward to hearing about things once the craziness winds down!

Embossed Leaves

Powered thru these and got them done!


I love these. I wish the photo showed the detail better.

Pattern: Embossed Leaves by Mona Schmidt, from Favorite Socks
Needles: Size 2 Knitpicks circulars
Yarn: Crazy4Dyeing Merino Superwash Wool, Pumpkin Pie colorway
Started: November 11, 2007
Finished: December 28, 2007

Oh, and I was convinced I was going to run out of yarn. Here's how close I cut it:

In other words, not close at all. Ha.