FO: Fire Truck Scarf

 The Specs:

Pattern: Frugal Haus Knitting Fire Truck Neck Scarf
Yarn: Berocco Vintage
Amount: 1 skein
Needles: whatever the ball band recommended
For: nephew!
Notes:  Ugh. This was the project that never ended.  Too fiddly to be fun without being fiddly enough to be pleased with progress. 

I do not like how it is knit in garter stitch, as that makes it one-sided.  And it is a scarf.  I believe I have complained about this before, but time has not lessened my grump factor in this regard.

If I made this again, it would be a stockinette tube.  Still would lay flat, but would be easier to add the adornments and the like.

I cheated and used large black buttons for the wheels.  I could not bring myself to seam a wheel that was knit flat.

I ended up making an icord tube for the cab partition for the back part of the scarf.

To make it reversible, I attached a ladder to both sides, as well as truck window, headlight, emergency light, and wheels. The garter stitch part meant that the ladder rungs had to be afterthought, rather than knit into the scarf itself.  I ended up crocheting a chain up at certain parts.  I could carry the yarn across the bottom, and make both chains run up the side, so I could get two rungs with only two ends to weave in.  The icord makes for a good place to hide ends, so I was very grateful for that.

I am not super pleased with it.  It looks a bit wonky and not very polished.  Attaching the ladder sides was difficult because of the double-sided aspect and the garter stitch and not wanting to make things too lose or too taut. 

But it is for a kid who loves fire trucks, so I don't think he will much care.  Better pictures to come when I can bare to face it.  I am terrified to give it a bath and have the red yarn bleed onto the white.  Should have swatched, but I was on vacation!

Georgia On My Mind

 I have been slowly plugging away on a fire truck scarf.  I am not enjoying the process, so I have to force myself to work on it.  It is the last of the Required GiftMoose presents, so I want it DONE.  I want to mail most of my GiftMoose presents back to friends and family in the states in the next week or so, which gives me a dead line.

Fire truck scarf is knit flat, garter stitch.  Color changes to denote the cab vs the rest of the truck, and small strips of white for the rungs of the ladder.

I think, if I ever knit a fire truck scarf again, I will knit a stockinette tube.  As written, the pattern has a VERY clear wrong side and right side and that bothers me because it is a scarf.  A fire truck scarf, so most likely for children.  Which means the wrong side is going to be seen just as often as the right side.

I have figured out how to manage the ladder for both sides, but the color change for the cab is bothering me.  It is two rows of grey in a sea of red and looks great on the one side, because that ridge of garter is grey.  Not so nice on the other side.  I might do an icord tube and sew it in place. 

I am about 75% done the ladder.  So close.  And yet...

I also started a sock for a friend a few weeks ago and then got measurements and realized the sock would not fit the intended foot for said foot is giant.  So the sock has been in timeout while I brain and math and accept that I will have to frog.

Today was a Good News Day and that seemed to require happy knitting, not a project I resentfully peck away at, so happy rainbow socks came back out of time out. 

I measured our Soda Stream bottles and they are about an inch shy of the intended's foot, so I figure if I can get the sock on the water bottle and get about an inch of stretch, they ought to fit.  Since the feet are across an ocean, I don't want to knit two socks and then have to start all over.  I also don't want to knit one and ship it over and then have them ship it back so I can make sure they match perfectly.

FO: GiftMoose Socks

 The Specs:

Pattern: None
Yarn: Regia 4-Ply Color, sock yarn that is 75% wool and 25% nylon
Color: 03655, Fall, dyelot 188

Amount: 1.52 skeins, 349.6 yards, 76.95 grams

Size: Women's 8.5/8

Needles: US 0 - 2.0mm, Kollage square DPNs.

For: GiftMoose 2020

Start to Finish: 02Sep2020 to 09Sep2020

Notes: I have not knit with DPNs for a while.  I forgot how I can't have a hairband on my wrist because the DPNs will hit it.

Standard sock pattern for me - toe-up, cast on 6 stitches with JMCO, increase 6 stitches every other round til big enough.  In this case, big enough was 66 stitches.  Plain stockinette foot, short row with shadow wrap heel over 33 stitches, 22 of them wrapped.  K4P2 ribbing on the legs, JSSBO at the cuff.

Since these were self-striping, I went to my normal lengths to make sure they matched as much as possible.

I was pretty much exactly spot on.  I had recorded in my notes that I was 2 stitches into the start of the round where I increased to a total of 24 stitches when the red started on the first sock and the same thing happened on the second.  I also started the heel when I finished the blue stripe just before the heel, regardless of where I was in reference to the toe.  Same for the bind-off - I finished the black and started with the two stripe white section.  This confirmed that JSSBO takes about two rounds worth of yarn, which is not a huge surprise.

Regia is not the softest yarn, but I have found that it tends to wear very well, so I don't expect these socks to require mending any time soon.  I am slightly concerned about fit, but I think they will be alright.  I can get them on my feet, even if they are smidge too small for me and I don't find the cuffs super tight.  I often don't wash socks before giving them to their intended recipient, but I like to wash Regia (and Opal) socks with a bit of hair conditioner to soften them up a little bit.

This is the last Required pair of GiftMoose socks.  I might make one or two more pairs, just because it is September and I have some measure of time.