Finished Object: Waffleweave Socks

The Specs:
Pattern: Mostly my own, but I stole the waffleweave pattern from Thermal, at Knitty. Ten rounds of knit 2, purl 2 ribbing, two rounds of purl, then started pattern down leg. Short row heel, some sort of toe -- I don't know the name but it involves decreases, not all of them at the sides. I dislike pointy toes, I like rounded toes.
Yarn: Austermann Step with Aloe Vera and Jojoba oil. 75% superwash wool, 25% nylon.
Colors: 16, some blues and greys with an underlay of white throughout. I really like the color pattern with the stitch pattern.
Needles: US size 1s, bamboo, for the very top of the cuff; plastic US size 2s for the rest of the socks.
Start to Finish: Um.. Good question. I started sometime in the beginning of April, finished today on May 14th, 2007. I'm getting faster at this whole knitting thing, it seems.
For: My mother
Notes: I really like this yarn. It is smooth and soft and fluffy. The yarn stretches a bit when knitty, so the resulting fabric is slightly loose and nice and fluffy. If I went down a needle size, I'm sure that would not happen. But it was fun to knit with, even though I don't think the aloe vera really had any effect. But my mother will like them, so that's ok. I really do like short row heels in garter stitch, but I ought to start experimenting with other heels.

A close up of the stitch pattern:

This is what it looks like, on a foot:



The color is probably most accurate here, in the cuffs of the socks:

Random Thursday

I am done. DONE. No more finals, no more papers. I am currently waiting for grades to come in, but at this point I can't do anything about it, so who cares?

Reasons why today rocked:

• I slept until I woke up. I know, I know. But I woke me up, not the alarm clock, not the trucks emptying the dumpsters (very loudly) at 8am. This is a new and novel concept and I enjoyed it very much.
• It rained today, a pouring torrential downpour. I had already shut the windows of my car, so I just enjoyed the rain storm, thunder included.
• My riding lesson was awesome. Timmy was calm, collected, and focused throughout ... oh, let's be honest - throughout the beginning. But he was very fancy for those 10 minutes of warm up.
• I'm realizing that my confidence level has skyrocketed, as I didn't blink at Earl's .. creation of a hogback jump using the ring fence again. Of course, I still grab a few handfuls of mane as we approach that jump, but that's ok
• The baby was in a very frisky mood, cantering, rearing, and bucking. So cute to watch! She's gonna be a handful as she gets older, as she's so independent already. Lady has to call the baby back, since the baby has no problem wandering away.
• I only had one final today and I barely had to study for it. All told, I need a 95 on the final to get an A for the class and I'm pretty sure I pulled that off.
• I have 9 pattern repeats and the toe to finish up the waffleweave socks. I think that might happen tonight.
• I bought yarn! I shall share details later.
• Grey's Anatomy starts ... now.
  

Random Saturday

Yeah, so I missed random Thursday. We're gonna blame that on spending some .. 3-4 hours at the barn, a two hour Grey's Anataomy special, and Special Topics in Calamity Physics, which is my current book.

• the first Bayerische sock is completed!
• the second sock has been cast on. I'm still on the ribbing, but that's ok.
• I'm past the heel for the second waffleweave sock. Maybe I'll finish this thing by mother's day. Maybe not, given what I have to do between now and then.
  
• I have an 8am final on Monday
• I have a paper due at midnight on Monday
• I have another paper due at 5pm Monday
• I have not yet started either paper
• I have to be at work at 7:30pm on Monday
• I might be going to a paper chase tomorrow, early like
• I'm tired, my feet hurt, and I have to be at TheBoy's in an hour to go to a party hosted by his 70 year old proffessor. Apparently, everyone wants to meet me.
• I ought to try to work on a paper between now and 5pm.

Here's what I did for part of those 3-4 hours on Thursday:


It looks really easy, but that's cause Timmy is awesome.

Clearly, I need help:

This is what I currently have on needles:


Sizzle, Bayerische socks, waffleweave socks, and Branching Out.

I've got one row to go and then I can cast off the neckband for Sizzle. After that, I have a few ends to weave in and the sleeve trim to do - but I might not do the sleeve trim. The sleeves a little tight as is right now and I'm not sure how much of a problem adding the trim would cause. Though, I suppose finding out will only take an evening.

(The color, not so very correct in that picture.)

After a three hour long class and a few hours of television this evening, I'm working the toe decreases for Bayerische.

I need to stop and do some maths here - I have 46 stitches on the sole, as my sister has large feet. As a result, if I decrease as the pattern tells me to, the decreases will be in weird places. I think I might just put some of the sole stitches on the top two needles and decrease in pattern from there, so that the toe doesn't end up looking too funky. That, of course, means I need to tink back two rounds, since I forgot to think about that BEFORE I started the toe.

As I've finished Paradise Lost AND Paradise Regained, the waffleweave socks are kinda lagging behind:

(Six inch dpn included for scale.) I'm on repeat 12 of 18 before starting the heel. They move pretty quickly and I have a movie to watch tomorrow, so they should be near the heel soonish. Maybe even before mother's day? Nope, not gonna happen.

And no picture of Branching Out because I promise that it looks exactly the same as it did the last time I posted a picture. Whenever that was.

And here.. here is almost all of my stash.

From left to right in some sort of order: Louet's Gem in navy, KnitPicks dye-your-own dyed with koolaide, a skein and a small ball of Lorna's Laces, two cakes of Claudia's Handpainted yarn, some Sock it to Me Collection sock yarn, more of same, and some Opal.

The Opal is for my mother, the blue sock it to me is for Tina, the Claudia's is for ME, ME, ME, ALL MINE, MAY NOT TOUCH, and the rest is pretty much up for grabs.

And the rest of it....

I have enough yarn for 8 pairs of socks and 5 skeins of the yummy purple alpalca that knits up into the most awesome swatch ever.. About 1000 yards. AND NO IDEA WHAT TO DO WITH IT.

I really, really, really, really want to knit a shawl. A lacey, needs to be blocked to make the pattern beautiful shawl. Problem is, I would never use it. No one I know would ever use a shawl. I'm thinking that I might offer to knit a shawl and donate it as a prize for someone's drawing for something good, like Steph's Knitters Without Borders.

So, conclusions:
a) I need to buy more yarn.
b) I need to knit a few more pairs of socks for myself
c) I need to finish Branching Out
d) I need to decide what to knit next.

Any suggestions? (Donations of yarn also glady accepted. I might even knit what you want and send the knitted item back to you!)

This is not homework

Even though today's high was something in the 80s, I'm still slogging along on Blaze. I have 15 rows to go.. but with nearly 300 stitches per round, that takes a while. Maybe I can wear it to work over the summer, as I tend to freeze in air conditioning.

Soon, I'll need to pull Sizzle out and finish that. Then I can wear that one to work as well. I think after everything settles down a bit. One rough draft and a final paper for FR, one final paper for 301, one final exam for 301, one final paper for 497C, one final paper for 409Y, one book report for 176, one final exam for 176, one take home final essay for 303, and one quiz for 497C and I think I'm done for the semester. Of course, I also think I'm forgetting something.

The finished waffleweave sock:


For some reason, the sock does not lie flat. I haven't blocked it however, and it fits a foot perfectly, so I'm not too worried about it. You can also see that I've started the second sock. I'm about two pattern repeats into the 18 repeats that make up the cuff. I don't see it taking too long but I also don't see me having that much time to knit.

Bayerische is slowly coming along. See:

Because of the crossing of stitches every single round, I've had to distribute stitches in a slightly ... uneven and strange way. DO NOT LIKE. It is almost enough to make me consider two circular needles, but that will prolly never happen.

The sock is pretty there, but it totally blooms on the foot:

The color is close to true in the first picture, this one is a little washed out. It is seriously hard to get a decent picture of a sock on needles on the foot with weird numbers of stitches on each needle and NOT accidentally getting a corner of your drying rack which is currently home to some 14 bras and pairs of underwear from the last two weeks. Love the internets, but I'm not posting pictures of my underwear. (if you have other requests of things that I could also show my parents, let me know.)

I think I'm going to try to finish the waffleweave socks, then Bayerische. THEN, I can cast on a pair of socks for me.

That's part (and a small part, at that) of the windows in the Urmila's uncle's house. SO COOL.

Let's play Catch Up

Not this week, but next week, I have a paper due every day of the week. For five days of classes, that is five papers. I've avoided putting together a page count, because then I just might cry.

I started a new pair of socks, with the Austermann Step yarn, in a waffleweave pattern. I have no idea if I've blogged about these before and I'm too lazy to look it up. But here's the current state of the sock:


I've decided that I really love garter stitch short row heels. Somehow, the row gauge of garter works well with my theory of 50% of total stitches for the heel, and knit and wrap 66% of those, leaving the remaining third for the middle. I forgot to center the instep pattern with columns of purl stitches framing it, so after I knit the heel, I ended up ripping the whole heel out to center everything. I'm much happier now. (And actually, I think the foot is longer now than it was when I took that picture. In an inch or two, I should be ready to start the heel. YAY for Paradise Lost reading, which I'm currently avoiding by writing this post.) These socks are for my mother and I think she'll really like them.

I'm avoiding Blaze. I'm angry at myself for not finishing Blaze before spring arrived. (Then again, Spring HASN'T YET ARRIVED, so I'm still not late. But I don't think I'll finish in time.) Thursday night, I was knitting away on Blaze and discovered one fewer stitch than required. Well, one fewer going by the tried and true method of going around and checking to make sure there were four purl stitches between every two knit stitches. Lo and behold, I was missing a stitch. I checked and didn't discover any dropped stitches.. Ripped back a few rounds and didn't magically get the correct number of stitches. I don't know what happened, but since there aren't any dropped stitches, I really don't care. I just picked up an extra stitch in pattern and kept knitting.

Of course, I ended up ripping out about an inch worth of progress. In one three hour long class, I tend to only mange 5-6 rows of knitting and I tend not to raise my hand but just blurt things out. GAH!! I could have avoiding ripping, just added a stitch and kept on going.

While I had the thing on multiple needles, though, I did take the time to try it on. It fits! YAY! I really do need another 3-5 inches though, or the thing will become an off-the-shoulder- sweater and I just can't pull that look off.

Last night, the Boy and I were watching Firefly and I wasn't knitting, per usual. He asked why not and I replied that I just didn't really feel like it. He became convinced that I was about to fall over and die. Annoyance with Blaze, not being able to look at charts and knit Bayerische while watching TV, and not wanting to hurry my reading sock knitting along left me with nothing to work on. Also, my pinkies hurt from the double reins of Timmy's bridle and knitting really doesn't help the pain.

Now that I've wasted a good two hours, I'm going to go read ... something and try not to fall asleep. This week is going to be hellish and next week is going to be even worse.