Woot We Have Another Winner!

It seems everyone got the picture right, so I used the random number generator to pick a number and the lucky number was 10, which corresponded to Hillary‘s comment. So, Hillary, either leave a comment here or drop me an e-mail with the name of the pattern you would like and I’ll e-mail it out to you. Congrats and happy knitting!

This is just anklet number one. I completed it on Tuesday or Wednesday last week. It has a picot edge and an eye of partridge heel and toe! The yarn is some I dyed with Kool-Aid at the very end of March in preparation for Project Spectrum. It was a half hank of the KnitPicks Dye Your Own with 6 packets of lemonade. When that bath was exhausted I sprinkled 3/4 of a packet of orange over the hank in different places. I would rearrange the hank occassionally during the sprinkling to try get as equally distributed amount of orange on the hank as you can get when you are randomly sprinkling. If I remember correctly I think put the hank in my dyeing mesh collander over the same hot bath that was exhausted of the lemonade and turned up the heat a bit to steam set the orange.

This anklet was my SnB and a bit of TV watching knitting down at the very end of Seraphim when I was into the lace section that required a little less divided attention. I think it makes a fun spring sock. Too bad I don’t have the other one done as we’re having one of our spring storms today. It is super gray and actually snowing out (though none appears to be sticking at this point). It would be fun to have these socks to brighten the day today.

The Cause of my KADD…

Lots of great ideas of causes for KADD (Knitter’s ADD) were mentioned in the comments yesterday. Only Cindy and Terby hit the nail on the head for what I suspect is my cause of this bout of KADD. Stress! Lots of things I cannot control; lots of waiting for news or answers; in general, lots of uncertainty. My mind is running 100 miles an hour and as soon as something gets slightly dull or requires too much attention (like frogging or tinking) I want to toss it aside and start something new.

There are concerns taking place here in my own home, well, really here in my own body but there is also a waiting game going on in Minnesota as well. A little over two weeks ago I developed some rather severe (though not acute enough to warrant going to the ER) abdominal pain. So I have been poked and prodded multiple times and had many tests and procedures done in the past two weeks. This has of course meant lots of waiting for results. After the results of yesterday’s tests come back if there is no answer the doctor is chalking it up to stress for a couple months and then we will re-evaluate. There definitely has been a lot of it recently. My hard drive crash happened only three days before the pain started and on my way home from the first appointment about my abdominal pain I got stressful news from Minnesota.

Grandma Schueler whom I flew out to Minnesota to visit in early February took a drastic turn for the worse last week. Fluid is pooling on her lungs once again and they are thinking she may be developing pneumonia, but at this point there is no sign of her body fighting an infection – no fever, no elevated white blood cell count, etc. But, they cautioned everyone that at her age and with all the compromises to her body already her body may not even fight it. A week ago I called and said goodbye and that I would always love her and would always miss her and that if it was her time and she was ready to go it was okay to let go of this world and continue on to the next and be reunited with grandpa. I have to say that is the hardest phone call I’ve ever had to make. Now I guess she has kind of rallied. On Thursday morning instead of saying that she was sad she work up here and not in heaven she said she wasn’t sad and would get dressed. That said, mom has told me there is little chance of a real rally for her. So, it is only a matter of time. I’m on pins and needles and jump every time the phone rings and I’m not turning my cell off at night. Though I have to say I am not missing the before bed phone calls each night where mom or Amber tells me that everyone has a feeling it will be tonight. In fact, I actually got a decent night’s sleep last night for the first time in two weeks.

Last Thursday was a wonderful respite. All the road trip energy and activities mostly kept my mind off of both of the worries and it was a wonderful gift. Thankfully I’ll be having a similar distraction this weekend as Liz is coming to visit. She arrives this evening and is staying with Snow, but there is a weekend full of activity planned, including another tea at my house on Sunday. Though this time I’m accepting help from others in filling the table. We’re doing a celebration of Colorado and featuring Colorado-made food and fiber. DH is contributing a lot via his skills of cheese and liqueur making but he will also be making the scones. It’ll be a great time. We’ll even have the pleasure of her company at SnB on Monday night! Woot!

I do think the many suggestions in yesterday’s comments stating the time of the year as a cause is probably also a contributing factor to my case of KADD as well. The change in seasons makes me want to switch the focus of my knitting to things that aren’t quite so seasonal in nature or wrap up things that are seasonal. I never wear socks in the summer as I’m a sandal gal so I’d like to decide what I want to do with the Siren Socks and get those wrapped up. Wear Everywhere would be a good evening sweater well into June most years as we can get quite chilly at night due to the dry climate and I’ve just got the sleeves and yoke to finish on it if I could finish it soon. Skyway Scoop is a tank, but then again I’m pretty sure with my bust being down 2 inches and my waist down 2.5 inches and my hips down 3.5 inches since I cast-on for it last year that it won’t fit when it is done. But, then again my mom will be here the middle of next month and if it is done and it fits her she could take it home with her and I’d save myself a trip to the post office. And Seraphim I would like to have done at such time as I have to return to Minnesota for grandma’s funeral. It has been a prayer shawl of sorts, filled with prayers for grandma and memories of her with each stitch and I hope when I wear it it will be like a hug from grandma. So, that has been getting the majority of my actual knitting attention since I cast on for it, but those other projects are pulling at me and I’m a little afraid that once I get to the real lace knitting on Seraphim it will end up aging in the knitting bag like Leaf Lace (though Leaf Lace need some serious attention and deciphering of what row I’m on which is why I haven’t picked up in so long).

I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend! I know I intend to despite everything.

Project ADD

I currently have two projects active and on the needles – Seraphim and a baby hat to go with Nautical Blankie (BTW, go see Snow’s color scheme in progress) and the Flower of Life scarf. I have several others in non-active status – Wear Everywhere Pullover, Leaf Lace Shawl, Siren Socks, and Skyway Scoop, plus I still have Mitten from Holland #2 to knit. Yet I’m itching to cast-on a new sock??? I’m also sort of itching to pull out Wear Everywhere and to finish up Skyway Scoop if I can even remember what the problem was (other than the fact that I’ll probably be drowning in it now – but it should fit my mom if it isn’t scooped too far for someone without a chest). I also want to cast-on for Wobbly Circles and I want to dye some yarn. I have a few books I’d like to get bound here before the weekend too. Oh and there is the site redesign floating around in my head along with setting up a non-yahoogroup-based site for our Monday night knitting gang.

I have project ADD right now. Me and project ADD don’t often get along real well because I also have a problem of liking instant gratification and as those who finished the Knitting Olympics can attest to – project monogamy leads to fast finished projects. Now, I’ll never be completely faithful to one project, that just doesn’t work for me as I always have to have a relatively non-thinking project on the needles for knitting gatherings. Nevertheless my current urgings are totally ridiculous!

Do you get spurts of knitting (or just general project) ADD? What do you think causes yours? Does if come after the completion of a lengthy project so you are just wanting to get going on all those other projects that queued up in you wish list while working on that big one? Does stash expansion contribute to it? Does it come when you are under stress and are just having a hard focusing on anything? I’m curious…

I’ll share my suspicions as to the cause of my current project ADD tomorrow so as to not skew your thoughts on the subject.

BTW, we are getting ever closer to the 1000th comment. If comments continue apace the magic day will likely be somewhere around April 10th and as I’ve mentioned before there will be a special prize package for that special person to leave the 1000th comment…

Meet Siren Socks

I would like to introduce you to siren sock, version 1.0. I’m not sure how much I like her. I *love* the concept, but I’m thinking perhaps this is an example of the concept being better than the reality. I haven’t knit on it (or anything for the matter) since Thursday because of my unease about the outcome.

The thinking behind this one? You have waves up at the top and fishes along the sides who are swimming into sea weed… Great idea, especially for something called siren socks, right? Well, I’m not sure… Here are two more views of it…

I’m not sure if I should rip back and get rid of the sea weed all together and let them be really similar to Spearfish (though in this case the lace panels are placed to run along the side of the instep without splitting it in half). Or, perhaps I should rip all the way back to the waves and have the seaweed go the full length??? Or, maybe do the lace all the way around? If I do the lace all the way around should I alternate the direction of the lace to make it a bit more interesting? It wouldn’t be quite as easy to memorize, but it could look really neat and unusual. Or, do I explore other stitch patterns to be the seaweed? Or not extend the seaweed so much onto the ankle???

Part of me wants to cast on for another sock so I can be doing something while all this marinates in my head (along with about 100 other design ideas for knitting and other things). But I’m not sure what I want to do if I do cast on for another sock. I have a yarn in my stash I’m kind of wanting to cast-on with, but I think it will also need the US0′s rather than the US1′s…. I guess I’m in one of those incredibly undecisive modes right now.

Last night I was thinking I should pull out some of the mohair in my stash and cast on for a Misty Garden scarf from Scarf Style. I mean mohair is only okay to knit with when the weather is cold and it sure has been cold (though that’s about to break today they say) and I have an unusual amount of it in my stash. And we’ve been watching countless hours of curling and other Olympic goodness. It seems foolish to not be accomplishing something while doing that. But, then there is today’s horoscope*…

You are a person with a multitude of talents. Still, at this point, there’s more to be gained from focusing intently on the projects you’ve already started rather than from bounding off to begin new ones.

Kind of creepily accurate isn’t it? Especially when I have some design commissions going on (not just knitting though)?? Hmmmm…..

*I’m not a big horoscope person, but I always find it kind of interesting when it seems as timely and spot on as today’s did, LOL!

FO Alert!

Pattern: DK Swamp Socks (to be available soon), 64 Sts
Yarn: 1 Skein Knit Picks Color Your Own, in DK Bayou colorway, 440 yds Fingering Weight 100% Merino
Needles: 2 16-inch Addi Turbos in US 1 (2.5 mm)
Gauge: 8.5 sts/inch in st st
Recipient: Myself, because I’m greedy!
Process Dates: January 30th - February 13th, 2006

Notes: This pair of socks was an entirely new experience for me. I knit them on 2 circulars from the toe up. That meant learning a new cast-on (or two, I tried the provisional cast-on with a short row toe and then opted for the Turkish cast-on), making short row heels, and learning a new bind off technique (sewn bind-off). That said, this was one of the fastest pair of sock-weight socks I’ve knit despite two major frogging sessions between the pair (one session per sock). The gauge is a bit looser than I tend to usually use so I was using a smaller number of sts than my previous sock-weight socks so I’m not quite ready to conceed that socks soar on two circulars. Though I did like 2-circs much, much better than magic loop and may end up being a convert. We’ll see how I feel using them for top down varieties…

I wore the socks all day yesterday and have had no problems of the sock twisting on my foot like I feared would happen with the short-row heels. I did do one more set of wraps on the second heel to narrow it a bit and that did help get rid of the “ears” my heel had with the first sock. But I’m still not sure I’m a fan of the short row heels. I really don’t like that the sides of the heel don’t match (I know, how very knit picky of me) and despite picking up extra stiches at the rejoin with the rest of the stiches I had holes to patch upon completion. The short row heel will be the major deterent for my knitting more socks tow-up. I won’t say I’ll never do it that way, but I’ll probably think pretty hard before choosing to do that again despite my success with the Turkish cast-on and the reverse wedge toe. I do have some yarn from DH that I’ll do toe up so he gets the maximum leg length possible as I know that he likes long legs on his socks and I’d rather not play a guessing game.