Knitting and Drinking Don’t Mix
Knitting + Drinking = Holes in Your Sock + Lost Stitches
For my next project I didn’t feel quite ready to jump into a sweater (too much investment in yarn for something that might not work out). So making a pair of socks seemed like a better idea, very little yarn. I chose to make the Broadripple socks found at Knitty.com. When I went to Webs for the yarn, Cascade Yarns Fixation, I didn’t like most of the colors that they had in stock. So I went with an off-white color. This is crazy yarn, mostly cotton with a tiny bit of elastic. I would call it “sproingy” yarn, not that that’s a word.
I was knitting the beginning of the sock so tightly. I think when I knit a pattern, I’m concentrating so hard on getting the stitches correct, that I forget about watching the tension. This was really slowing me down, and making me sweat. Fortunately in the new Spring issue of Knitty.com, the article Lossen Up addressed my problem. After following the tips from the article, things went much more smoothly, until I got to the part of turning the heel.
I was at Webs when it was time to turn the heel, and dropped into the knitting clinic for some help. I had never done short row shaping before and couldn’t figure out how the number of stitches were decreasing in each row. Unfortunately the person who tried to help was of no help. She wouldn’t explain how turning the heel worked, she tried to tell me to make the decreases differently than the pattern told me, and said I was crazy for doing such a complicated pattern for my first sock. Having a math background, I needed to understand the math behind the pattern. She could not answer my “why” questions.
I thanked her for her help and went back and ripped out everything up to the heel flap and started over with the turning. I concentrated and followed the pattern. Once I got past the heel, I figured out the answers to my “why” questions. And I was surprised that picking up stitches for the gussets was actually not so terrible. Now I just had to work the foot.
I brought the sock with me to the much-needed girls only weekend in Ocean City with a friend from Virginia. The first night we were up late drinking and talking, and I was knitting too. I got to the point where I needed to sew up the toe with the Kitchener stitch. I anticipated this and checked out how to do the Kitchener stitch at KnittingHelp.com before I left for my vacation. The first problem was that I was supposed to have ten stitches on each needle. For some reason, I had only nine on one of the needles. I have no idea how that happened. Well I just stitched two together on the needle with ten, and now it was even. I then did the Kitchener stitch and was done with the sock. I thought I had done it well, but somehow there were two holes in the toe of my sock. It was 2:30 in the morning by that point, and did not attempt to try to figure things out. Off to bed.
Unfortunately, my internal clock (the one used to waking with two small children) woke me at 6:30 in the morning. I could not fall back to sleep. Was it the sun shining in my window, or being terrible thirsty? No, I think it was that crazy sock with the holes. I just had to fix it. I had my copy of Stitch ‘N Bitch with me and read what she had to say about the Kitchener stitch. She said that the stitch is simple, but will require my full concentration. “So turn off your music and sit somewhere quiet.” Oops, I wish I had read that the night before. I would have waited. So I took out my funky stitches and started the toe over. Much better. I’ve learned my lesson.
Funny thing about socks, you have to do two of them. Now I’m well on my way to finishing the other sock. But I really want to start my new tank top, Soleil. I’ve got the yarn, but I’m still trying to do gauge swatches to figure out what size needles I need. My goal is to finish the tank top by the beginning of June before our giant driving trip. That should be doable, right?
The Little Purple Purse
I’ve been incredibly busy and sick the past two weeks, but I’ve continued knitting through it all.
I’ve finally finished felting my little purple purse. And it was so much fun to felt. The “Ladybug” pattern came from the book Pursenalities. I used Cascade 220 in a dark purple and a light green. I followed the pattern except for changing up the stripes a bit. I found some purple/turquoise/green ribbon yarn to use as an accent. The beads came from my own supply, so who knows where they came from. My friend Sarah generously let me use her top-loader to do the felting. I probably ran it through four wash cycles, until it was firmly felted.
The size is just right to hold my wallet, Palm phone & keys. And I love how each color of yarn actually looks like several colors up close. But there are some things that I would do differently the second time around. I would check the bead placement early in the felting process to make sure they were on the outside of the purse. One of the beads switched to the inside before I was able to catch it in time. I would also string the large beads around both strands of yarn rather than just one. I would rather have the beads integrated into the fabric more. Also the whole purse twisted a bit, so now the handles are not centered.
Will there be more purses in my future? Well, of course. It was so much fun to make. I have lots of beads, and I’d love to play around with more novelty yarns too. And the best part is…Webs has Cascade 220 on sale right now for an amazing price. I think it’s time to go to webs and take advantage of the sale.
