WIP that needs to be an FO!

What's that strange, squidlike many-tentacled blue blob? It's the second of my hubby's special fingerless gloves with thrummed mitten pouch, specially designed for outdoor activities that involve standing around in the cold, then need dextrous fingers (specifically,clay pigeon shooting).
Unfortunately, I offered to knit him these for Christmas back when we had sunshine and long days... then finished one in a burst of enthusiasm, and left it languishing for months on end, whilst I pursued other interests... only to remember two weeks ago that Christmas was fast approaching. Darn it. So although I'm not really in a glove mood at the moment, I am duty bound to finish this one in time for unwrapping on Christmas morning. Having said that, gritting my teeth a few times and getting in a few good hours of gloving in the staff room at break and lunchtimes has made a big difference, and I'm now almost up to the decreases on the mitten pouch. Trouble is, thrumming is slower than knitting normally (have to stop and make the thrums!) and we are rapidly running out of days. The other thing is...
If you knit from no pattern and make no notes, your second glove can bear only a passing similarity to the first... I don't know why that thumb is so different, I think I used the same number of stitches... and I definitely did for the hand. It must be down to gauge I think... not a lot I can do about it really. Fortunately hubby is pleased with them despite their little flaws. He's fabulous. He hasn't even complained that I've given him a nasty chesty lurgy that I picked up from the kids at school... I am nursing him though. I'm not totally nasty.
Another squid-like thing: an octopus finger puppet. Why? When you have an almost-sister-in-law who's a marine biologist and you see a bag of assorted fishy finger puppets, how can you resist?
I'm torn between the shark, the turtle and the seahorse... The starfish is a bit odd.

The ups and downs of handknitted socks.

Uh oh.... hole. hmmm.... can I darn / graft it back together into a holeless, strong fabric? Let's see. First, pick up stitches at the edges of the hole. Weave in a new thread to duplicate the weakened and missing stitches. Simple, no?

No. Can I create a solid, un-holey sock? Yes. Is it neat and smooth and comfortable? No. Bugger. Sigh. I can hear a frog calling me......
Ribbit, ribbit.... Ooooooh, BIG hole. there's three or four rows of knitting gone or damaged there - no wonder I couldn't mend it neatly! Oh, well... half a sock gone in 2 minutes. Just don't think about how long that half sock took to knit.

Unravelled back to good strong knitting, and picked up again, ready to re-knit. This is back into the gusset! And I have long feet! Sigh... but... I enjoy knitting, right? So... this is a good thing?

Well, not quite. I like knitting, but I like to knit new things, not redo old ones, really!

Couldn't really spare the time, but heigh ho, any distraction...

Christmas preparations have begun... Actually I'm feeling rather smug as all the prezzies except the gloves I'm knitting for the hubby have been sitting downstairs wrapped and ready for two weeks! Where did this miraculous organisation come from? I'm not sure... It's not like me! Maybe I'm possessed? Nah, I think I just couldn't face another year of last minute xmas shopping. No more to do now! Though I still have 13 for Xmas lunch. Yes, I know that is seen as unlucky, no I'm not superstitious, but just in case the universe is I'll be setting a place for the cat. On the floor. Her table manners aren't up to being allowed near all that Turkey!

The tree looks good, though, don't you think?

What's that? A strange brown decoration half way up? What is it? I wonder...No, I didn't put her there... she climbs. It seems to have become her favourite roost. And while that's cute, the decorations are getting rather disarranged by her jumping out and climbing around! I'm going to have to redo it at the last minute before the guests come. I can't believe she can still climb up it - last time she did this, she was just a little kitten! Now she's a terribly sensible grownup cat - can't you tell?

Saved!!!

Thank you!!!!!!!!

A huge, HUGE thank you to Elizabeth, my sockapalooza 4 sock saviour! I had given up in despair of ever getting some socks in the post - so imagine my surprise when these fabulous Jaywalkers turned up from Passadena! They really are this bright - a little ray of Californian sunshine to warm up my cold cold toes!
Look at how even the stitches are - Liz, I'm so impressed. they are so smooth and even and you've obviously put so much time and care into knitting every stitch - and there are a lot of them to cover my big ol' feet! And as if the socks weren't enough:
A whole pile of goodies to go with them! Lemon verbena soap - Liz, how did you know lemon is my favourite scent? Yummy ginger sweeties, and a mix disc I just can't stop singing along to in my car.... Liz, you truly are a fabulous Saviour!
You can find Liz over at Ravelry as cutelikeliz - send her some good karma, as she totally deserves it - she's an abandoned sock pal too, and hasn't had any socks herself! Isn't she an angel?
Liz, I can't thank you enough. You've restored my faith in knitters and knitting swaps, and you deserve all of my good knitting karma for a year! (Though I could do with enough to finish my hubby's gloves for Xmas...)

Bit of knitting, bit of crochet...

This is the best photo I can get of the knitted up rowan cocoon cardi after dark - unfortunately at this time of year I don't get much daylight time at home! It's all spent in classrooms with 'orrible little kids! Somethingof a triumph today though... the 'orrible kids that I met yesterday have cottoned on to the fact that I'm not going to tolerate them doing any of the following:

• skiving the first half of the lesson
• interrupting me when I'm explaining the work
• physically attacking each other in my presence

I wonder if the 10 detentions (yes, ten!) I handed out yesterday in that one lesson had anything to do with having a better lesson today? Hmmmm....

On a lighter note, I dug out the crochet hooks and thread the other day to make xmas prezzies for my Aunts: I'm very impressed with the snowflakey-ness of this, but I can't quite believe it took me three hours to make! It is pretty though. Trouble is, now I have to make at least another three! My other Aunt, my Mum and I will all want one for our trees!

This is the pink snood in all its glory: Yes, it looks like a large pink blob, but it's lace and it hasn't been blocked. You know how it goes. It's nearly there - I did another repeat today at school, that means only six to go! I can't decide what kind of edging I want round my face - I know a fabulous pointy one that fits with this leafy lace pattern, but I don't know if I want points round my face or a straight edge. Thoughts?This is the completed second pair of saviour socks I knitted and sent out ages ago - I just couldn't get on with the cabletini pattern, probably not a good idea to have a first attempt at cables on 2.25 mm DPNs, with no cable needles. hmmm. Anyway, I was pleased with the feather and fan pattern in the end, though I was heartily sick of it by the time I got onto the second sock! I'm having a rest from socks for a while. And I never thought I'd say that!
Finally, a little piece of cuteness for you... believe it or not, she got there herself with no human assistance. She likes wool. It's a good job the drawer is so overfull, or one day I'd probably accidentally shut her inside when I closed it! Poor kitty.... As it is, she's happy as Larry. However happy he is.

I'm still here.... sort of.

I'm knitting a new cardie. I'm not sure if it'll fit me or flatter me, but hey! there's only one way to find out!

Of course, being me, I am changing the wool, the gauge it's knit to (I did get gauge, but the cardi is a little too small, so I'm knitting it looser... I'm mad. I know.) and the length. Still, knit on 7mm needles, it may be a mistake but it's a FAST mistake. We'll see. I'm knitting it in Rowan Cocoon which is soft and snuggly and gorgeous, and smells lovely and sheepy, but is so far shedding that lovely hint of silvery mohair all over me and the house whenever I knit. I'm hoping the shedding will lessen when it's all actually knit up and washed!

I'm also knitting a snood (tubular scarf / wimple / cowl type thing) in some sale yarn which I can't even identify - it's semi-solid raspberry pink and cotton, but beyond that I dunno. It's nice though, and I'm at least three-quarters done! Pics soon.

I finished and sent off a second pair of saviour socks, but part of the reason I'm a bit miffed with blogging lately is that I haven't had a good Sockapalooza experience. I knitted my pal's socks, and sent them. No socks arrived for me. I knitted a saviour pair (at great trouble - see previous post!) and sent them. No socks arrived for me. I knitted a third pair for someone else who had been abandoned by their pal, and sent them. No socks arrived for me. There have still been no socks.
I knitted three pairs of lovely socks, and each person seemed thrilled with them. I sent presents with them: hand-stitched bags and chocolate and hand-dyed roving, hand-made stitch markers. I put my heart and soul into making those three women happy when they opened their parcels. Where exactly in all this did I deserve the bad karma? Why no socky happiness for me?

I'm extra sad since this is the second swap I've done and the second wash-out. The first was the Spin to Knit swap, and though I've never blogged about it, I felt badly let down by that one too. I'm sure there are lovely swap pals out there somewhere, but I'm not sure I have enough faith to try another swap to find out.

Tell me your thoughts... anyone else had a bad swap? Did you get 'back on the horse', as it were? Shall I trust that there is good karma coming? Or cut my losses? I don't like to leave things on a low note. Hmmmmm.

Being a saintly sock saviour

FO: Monkey saviour socks for my second sock pal, finished yesterday. Now her original socks have turned up! D'oh! Having spent so long making these for her, though, I'm going to send them anyway. I think she'll love them. They're going in this bag I've made:

It's a simple drawstring bag made from patchwork fabric from my stash, with sunflowers because I've seen them on her blog and I think she likes them, and they're my favourite flower. It's made to the same pattern as this one I made to carry round my sock in progress in my handbag. I hope she finds it useful as well!
Strangely, although I've still not got any socks myself, I've been seized with the desire to make up for everyone's delinquent pals and signed up to rescue another abandoned knitter! This Lorna's Laces wool has been sitting in my stash for a while, now I think it'll be perfect for my new pal. I'm going to try Wendy's Cabletini pattern, just because I like the look of it. I've never done cables, but these look small and simple, so here goes!

I've made this pincusion from my latest craft book: Last-minute Patchwork and Quilted Gifts by Joelle Hoverson.

It's a gorgeous book I saw over at Grumperina's. There are lots of lovely projects to make, from very simple to quite challenging.

Rainbow pincushion. I love it. Quite proud of this, actually... quite fiddly, all curved seams, and small pieces. Think I made a good job of it.
When your mother goes into a toy shop to buy a birthday pressie for your one-year-old nephew, she sometimes goes a little strange... and buys you a wind-up walking Shawn the Sheep. Bless. I really don't want to admit to how cool I think this is, I'm supposed to be grown up now!

Believe it or not, today is my one-year Blogiversary, so I suppose it's strangely appropriate. Happy Birthday, blog! The wind-up sheep can be your mascot for the next year.

Looking up... and down.

On the downside, I didn't get the job. I've already bored everyone who knows me by being incredulous that they gave it to a woman who turned up to the interview 45 minutes late, so I won't even mention that here. Ooops. Sorry! But I really think I wouldn't even have bothered to interview her! I mean, I got there 30 mins early! Grrrrrrrr......

Um..... where was I? Oh, yeah! Upside: supply work has started to trickle in. Downside: I'm going to a pupil referral unit next week! For those of you who don't know what that is, you remember those kids that got expelled from school, cause, like, they can't be in class without screaming and biting people? Ever wonder where they all end up? Yeah. Fun! I think I may be going through the following mantra in my head: 'You're being paid for this. Earn money, buy wool. Earn money, buy wool...'

I'm happy because I've just finished the second sock for my rescue sock pal: they're finally done, with colours I'm happy with, and when this one comes off the blocker I can post them and make her happy! I love spreading the socky love... :-D

This is not a sock pal sock. This is a thrummed sock. My first thrumming attempt! And it's warm. Cosy feet! well, foot, actually, as I've got sidetracked as usual and haven't done the second one. It was easier than i expected, though thanks to the monster sized thrums I was using it was pretty hard to turn the heel with all that fluff in the way!Oh and the thing about thrummed socks? The cat thinks the thrums are some sort of small furry animal and keeps biting them when I'm knitting! Odd sock monster from Mars.... Knitted to my generic make-it-up-as-you-go-along heel flap pattern, top down, but I had to go back, cut off the rib and knit back up as it was too loose, in Wendy fusion with thrums made of some merino that I dyed about a year ago and was sitting around doing nothing. There's a lot of that around here!
To join in the thrummy madness, hubby has requested a pair of fingerless gloves with a thrummed mitten flap. They're going quite well...

Much smaller thrums, in white BFL, but as usual I've kind of lost interest for the moment. I'll get back to all the UFOs one day, I promise. It may be when I'm 80, but it will happen.
mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm..... cosy.......

Things are looking up...

It's been a fairly depressing time here lately.... The initial excitement that I passed my PGCE was quickly dimmed by the fact that I don't have a job, and despite combing the jobs pages and registering for supply work, I have been getting up each morning to a distinct lack of any work to do. The way supply teaching works seems to be that when a teacher phones in sick, you get a phone call saying 'go to this school NOW and teach these lessons...'. So you have to be up and ready for that call at 7am. You spend the next two hours doing buggerall, messing about on facebook or reading a book, not wanting to start anything in case you have to leap into action. Then at 9 o'clock you accept that the phone hasn't rung and you try and find some purpose in the rest of the day. It's strangely exhausting doing nothing, not having a purpose. I haven't even done a lot of knitting, I just don't seem to be able to settle at anything. I feel guilty knitting or sewing all day, cos I'm not earning money and we're skint, but I can't go out and get a temporary job, as I need to be available to take the teaching work whenever it finally appears. Basically, I've been feeling totally useless and worthless for not having a job, even though there aren't any jobs out there for me to get. Not a happy bunny. Last night, though, I got a call to come for an interview for a maternity post I applied for last week: yay! Although I'm slightly worried about teaching an interview lesson with year 10, particularly a fasttrack yr 10 group who are taking GCSE this year! Ouch! I'm going to have to work hard at this one!
(should I be freaked out by the fact that they called me on a Sunday?... not sure...)

Anyway, knitting! (what little there is of it). The last time you saw the Kauni it looked like this:

...and things have pretty much not changed since. I wanted to get different colour combinations in the sleeves, so I started with red on purple... those who have used the Kauni wool will know that red and purple are next to each other. Ooops. You guessed it! Three pattern repeats later, the purple had become red before the red had become orange and I was suddenly knitting a lovely pattern of squares in red on red. D'oh! So I got cross and threw it into a corner, where it has languisehed for a couple of weeks being used as a kitty bed...
Do you see those claws? I'm not trying to move her!
There has been a knitting struggle between me and the socks I'm knitting for an abandoned Sockapalooza pal (I've been abandoned as well! But I'm holding out hope... I've heard from my sock saviour!) - they are monkeys in Socks that Rock Fire on the Mountain... which is a gorgeous mix of colours in the ball... ...but which seems to want to pool into unattractive vertical stripes of light and very, very dark.
Not. Having. It.

I should mention that this wool had already had one chance as a vanilla stockinette sock with a different stitch count, when the colours striped prettily round the sock until I got to the instep, then this stripe appeared on the top of the foot. All the pretty colours on the bottom. Needless to say, it was frogged. I abandoned this monkey and started another with the other ball: exactly the same happened, just below the heel. I was starting to get quite cross. The heel itself was lovely: just the mix of colours I wanted in the whole sock. Pretty heel! But the socks had to go. Frog, frog, frog, and I once again had two balls of wool and no saviour socks for my pal. Grrrrrr.........
I almost gave up at this point and used a different skein of wool, but these colours will be perfect for my pal if i can just beat them into shape and stop.them.pooling.

Ta dah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Two days, and much gritting of teeth later, I have a finished, blocked, beautifully multicoloured sock with no ugly pooling. (some pretty pooling, but that I can live with!)

How?

I followed the manufacturer's instructions.

Well, not actually that manufacturer, but general advice for handpainted or variegated wool that you knit with two skeins and alternate every two rows to mix the colours up. A pain to do, but in this case, well worth every minute.

I'm even motoring down towards the heel of the second sock already! Panic not, O abandoned sock pal! You shall be saved!

Hooray for DPNs!

I can't stand magic loop. Or trying to work in the round on two circular needles. No, for me it's DPNs all the way. Now so far, I've managed on the Kauni Cardi with a 150cm bamboo circular needle, switching down to a 100cm needle round the neck, as there were a lot less stitches, and that was ok. Not my favourite thing, shifting all the stitches around on the needle, but I managed without wanting to scream. A round and a half on the sleeve and I was screaming already. So I dug out the right size DPNs, and hey presto! I'm happily sleeving.

Now, there's quite a few stitches on each needle, so this project really isn't portable any more. But then, it's now such a size and weight that it's definitely not handbag knitting any more. I think it's probably not car knitting any more either, though. That could slow it up a bit.

Do you see the pretty new stitch marker? I made quite a few yesterday. I was just looking at all of my pretty beads and thinking it was a shame they just sit in a box. I have many, many beads. I have a 35 litre really useful box full of beads. I can barely lift it. If beads were still currency, I'd be a millionaire. It's my magpie instinct: it's pretty coloured and shiny, I've got to have it.

Apart from the two balls I've just started the first sleeve with, this is what I've got left. I think I'll have plenty. I may still unravel the neck and button bands and reknit them with smaller needles: they're a bit linp, and the neck band doesn't lie flat. I think since I'm doing it in garter stitch, rather than rib, I may have to do some decreasing to get it right. Uh oh - maths!

Kauni progress - yay!

That is a grafted shoulder seam. Can you spot the row of kitchener stitch? If you can, don't tell me! I'm proud of it! Grafting something this large was a LOT harder than grafting 16 stitches on a sock toe. still, I survived! And it's now joined at the shoulder. The next step was steek cutting. *GULP*

I can now see why just the one drink would help steady the nerves. This took a lot of work, a lot of knitting time. Cutting it in half was... interesting. Still, I am beginning to see the virtues of steeks and knitting jumpers in the round. I'm not totally convinced yet, we'll see.

But cutting it did allow me to get this far! As of this evening, it has a neck band and button bands! With buttonholes! (No closeup as I'm not that impressed with them - but they are my first try!)

I had some help today.
Just so you know, picking up stitches is considerably harder with a cat sitting on your work. She seems to really love this knit, every time I put it down, there she is!

...and when I gently prise her off it, she finds somewhere else to go that makes me feel guilty!

(this is perhaps not the best shot of a patchwork bag I'm actually quite proud of! But it's clearly acceptable as a bed.)