Tag Archives: Knitting

Knitting. Love it.

My Movie Socks are Done!

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I finished them last night.  I think I say this every time I finish a pair of socks, but these may be my favorite.    I may have written that exact sentence on the last pair.  I should go check.

I think my photographer and his assistant did great today.  We did lots of Davey and mommy feet photos.

In knitting these socks, I learned that I love cotton socks.  I will knit more socks from cotton.  I guess I will see how they hold up or if they stretch, etc., but they are very comfy.  Of course those sentiments may be partially driven by the fact that when we went outside this morning to take the pictures, I was pretty sure we stepped outside into an underwater world.  It was that humid.  So cotton felt great.

Bobbles are nothing to be afraid of.  (hmm… Bobbles are nothing of which to be afraid?) Once I got going with the right knitting needles, they were a breeze.  They just require a little practice at first.  And sometimes, I would start a bobble and that beginning k1 p1 series of stitches would look terrible.  Luckily, it’s very easy to just pull that out and do it again.  Bobbles are cool. Davey calls them bumps, and he wants some bumpy socks.

I’d say that trying to get that picot edging just right was more challenging than the bobbles.  I do love a picot edging though.  I think it’s really pretty.

I love the shorter length of this sock.  I can see a whole bunch of hand-knit summery cotton socks in my future.

Now We’re Talkin’

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I wasn’t patient.  I couldn’t wait.  We went to Little Rock yesterday, and I got my size o metal needles.  These are Boyes.  The ones I ordered are Susan Bates, so it will be interesting to compare them.  So far so Great!

Don’t they look sturdy!

Davey just ran back to our computer room as fast as he could to announce “The washer is almost fixed!”  And now he’s gone.

And now he’s back!  “Mommy, we are done!!!”  A screw fell out of the dishwasher last night.  Apparently this one screw is what prevents the entire dishwasher from falling out of the frame.  Because after the screw fell out, the dishwasher just about fell onto my foot.  That just doesn’t seem right to me.  But the capable Davids have taken care of it.

So back to my metal needles.  So far they feel great to knit with.  I haven’t tried a bobble with them yet, but I anticipate strength, resistance and non-breakage.

I have to share this blog entry I read today also.  It’s from Eskimimi Knits, a blog I just discovered the other day.  If you loved the book One Hundred Years of Solitude then you have to check out these mittens that she designed (and she explains the story behind them.)  If you’ve never read this book – it’s wonderful.   These mittens are a beautiful design from a beautiful story.  I am trying to convince myself to just buy the pattern, but she is selling the yarn on etsy as well.  The pattern is free if you buy the yarn.  I am going to try to not let myself.  (Refer to my Unholy Mess blog post for one reason why!)  I love the yellow butterflies, and I love the butterfly in the palm!

She’s also celebrating her blog’s one-year anniversary and is giving  away a copy of the book!

And finally, it’s only going to be 105 today.  (as opposed to 106 yesterday.)

Bibbley Bobbley Boo

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My socks are progressing.  I am getting lots of bobble practice, and I am losing my fear of them.  Bobbles are actually fun.  Every once in awhile I get messed up on one, and it all gets to be a tangled tight mess, but I just release the yarn and start it again.

These Movie Socks have lots of popcorn!

I am not sure though if my needles are going to survive this.  Some of them are starting to look like the curved mouth on a smiley face:

Maybe since they are bamboo they are working as they should with some bend and give.  (lots of bend and give!)  I shouldn’t say this but so far I have not snapped one of these bamboo needles.  *knock knock knock on wood*.

I have one more 16 row repeat on the leg of the first sock, and then I will do  the leg on the second.

As I write this, Davey and Daddy are dancing to “The Lion Sleeps Tonight”.  Still Davey’s favorite song.  It even resulted in some “ear dancing” again.

Finally, I  had to share this picture.  I help with the Humane Society in Clarksville TN, and they also do some work with Animal Control.  Sammy (among many others) needs a home.  I have left this picture up on my computer for days.  I love him, and it makes me smile every time I pull it up.  Here’s hoping he gets a great home.

Picot! Dancing!

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Time to picot.  I love the look of a picot cuff, but I don’t much like making it – or more I am just not too good at it.   I’ve got both Movie Socks just about to the point where I need to pick up a stitch from the cast on edge and knit it with the regular stitch all the way around so that it will go from looking like this:

To this:

Well kinda like that.  It will hopefully be folded over a little better and have a better defined picot edge.  Now I gotta figure out how best to line up my stitches.

Sure like this cotton yarn though.  Feels so nice to knit with in this horrid humid hot hellacious weather.

So far it’s fun having both socks going at the same time as well.  It will give me some good picot connection practice all at once.

Last night we danced.  Davey has some pretty impressive footwork.  Those little feet just move all over the place.  Then he starts wiggling his ears with his fingers and says that his ears are dancing!

And he danced with Daddy:

Happy to dance!

Rock-a-Bye Baby socks are complete!

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I finished the Rock-a-Bye socks last night!  I was so ready to get them done.  What a great pattern though.   Some of my favorite things about this sock:

I love the 4×4 heel flap.  Taking pictures of my own foot is always fun too.  I still can’t get David too interested in taking pictures of the different parts of the sock.  Heel flap?  Gusset?  What?

I love this diagonal design and how the pattern comes to an end at the toes:

And I like all the greens in the yarn.

My photography assistant was not really in the mood for photos today but he cooperated on the condition that he get to water the flowers.  When he came outside he said, “Mom, the flowers don’t look beautiful.  I will talk to them and they will tell me that they need a nice drinky.”   Unfortunately, once he had control of the hose he wanted to water everything but the flowers.  (although I managed to stay fairly dry.)

So now it is on to pattern #5 “Movie Socks”.  They involve bobbles and lace.  I bought a second set of size 0 needles, and I am going to have both socks going at the same time.  I am knitting with a Knit Picks Comfy Fingering Yarn in Lilac Mist.    We shall see how it goes.  I hope this yarn works out ok.  Someone else on ravelry used it for this pattern, and I talked to her about it.  She really liked how it worked up.  She also mentioned learning to knit backwards to knit the bobbles.  That sounds a little scary too.

Davey and I are heading out for a little picnic in a minute.  He just brought me my drinking cup so he is ready to go I think.  Saturday we cooked hotdogs at “Plan B”.  This is what we now call the place we grilled on the 4th when all the “Plan A” lake spots were taken.    “Mommy, are we going back to Plan B?”

Here he is thoroughly enjoying his plain hotdog bun.

Here we are –

It’s hard to get a straight on smiling shot these days – but then I guess that might be boring anyway!

“Mommy?  Are you done with your blog yet?”

July 24th. Fall!

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Trying to decide what we should do today.  Lake for awhile?  River?  Waterpark later?  I guess the common denominator is clear.  Water.  We are growing weary of the heat.  However, I don’t want time to go by any faster.  At all.  So instead, I wish fall would start right now this very second on July 24.

I am almost done with the cuff of Rock-a-Bye Baby two.   Although I really like this pattern and the yarn,  I mentioned Second Sock-Itis.  My symptoms are impatience with second sock and the feeling that I have been knitting on it forever!   (although I really haven’t had too much time to knit – so that’s part of it.)

Last night we made the Chakchouka.  It turned out great.  I will definitely be making this regularly.  I found the recipe here.

First off, I have a whole new appreciation for food bloggers.  For example, the Pioneer Woman sets out her ingredients and then takes a picture.  Her shots are beautiful and inspire me to want to make everything she blogs about. I thought I’d play food blogger and try my own food shots.  It is not as easy as it looks. I had potatoes rolling around, my peppers wouldn’t stand up straight, and the ingredients just  looked like a big glob of stuff.  So I fell back to cute Davey studying the spices.

While I was peeling and chopping potatoes, peppers, onions, tomatoes, and garlic, Davey was playing with his “potato peel babies”.  (New favorite sink pasttime.) At one point, he told me:  “Mommy, please chop quieter.  My babies are sleeping.”

It’s a colorful mix of ingredients.

Then it all started to get all bubbly and mixy, and then I added the eggs.  (I think an egg on just about anything has to be good.)

We ate the Chakchouka on rice.  Davey raved about how he loves rice and sauce, but then he wanted no part of it.  I need practice on my food photography, but it really was delicious.  We won’t forget about Tunisia either.

Now I need to figure out where we go next.

The Family that Knits Together – Knits Together

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Today’s title is taken from a quote from our high school band director, Mr. Arnold, – although that was “The band that stays together – stays together.” It’s actually the caption for this:

Great isn’t it.

I have been teaching Karen to knit a sock.  She knitted the heel flap, turned the heel and knitted the gusset!  Another sock making lover (monster?) is created.  (Plus our knitting inspired Mikayla and Jadyn to knit too.)  I have been working on one with her, so I haven’t knitted much on my second Rock-a-Bye Baby.  Plus, David is putting me to work.  Knitting work.  He is lining up the jobs for me.  Ok not really, but I am knitting some photo props for a former student of his.  Today I have to get some of those size 35 knitting needles – “broomstick” needles they are called.  I am going to knit a baby hammock and cocoon.  Made a cute little hat last night.  So anyway, I hope to get back to the socks today!

And it is also the weekend of Winkie the Zhu Zhu pet.  I am new to all this so hopefully I got that right.  Mikayla and Jadyn introduced him to the pets.  We had to get him one on Saturday.  He dances and laughs with just glee when those little things are zipping and spinning down the hall.  (They race them.)

It’s been sidewalk chalk, swimming at the pool, building sand castles at the lake, zhu zhu pets, making cinnamon rolls, and nonstop play.

Here’s the sidewalk chalkers.  I think Davey was supervising from the comfort of his chair:

Oh man, and we can’t forget the “monster cage”!  Jadyn and Davey worked quietly on this for a long time last night.

A Cool Refreshin’ Drink of Water

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Davey and I have been outside this morning.  Poor David is outside too, but while Davey and I were watering flowers and taking pictures, David is weed eating and getting ready to mow.   We went outside to take some pictures of some washcloths I finished knitting yesterday.  Or they could be dishcloths or really whatever kind of cloths you wanted (except for maybe scrub the toilet cloths.)

I got the idea to do them with seed stitch.  (k1 p1 k1 p1 k1 p1 over and over.) I didn’t like knitting seed stitch with loose cotton on a size 10 needle much, but I do like how they turned out.  Pretty simple, but I liked the simpleness of it.  (Simpleness seemed more right than simplicity.)

Then Davey wanted to water the flowers.  Our flowers are certainly not going to die from lack of water.  They may drown instead.  As he was watering the flowers, he told them over and over:  “Here is a nice cool refreshin’ drink of water.”

Meanwhile David is weedeating:

And I am taking silly pictures of myself:

(gosh I am getting freckly.)

Unfortunately, these idyllic times often don’t end well.  I cropped some of the sadness out of this pitiful photo.

Luckily Davey never stays upset for long.  He shook the remaining water from the hose onto me as fast as he could. That made him feel a little better, and then he walked inside with me pretty much recovered. I didn’t take a picture, but he was happily back inside watching Sesame Street about 30 seconds later.

My Rock-a-Bye Baby socks are coming along.  I did the heel flap last night and turned the heel.  It’s a neat flap.  I think I have always done a slip stitch heel, and this was was a 4×4 rib to kind of continue the pattern from the sock.  I love how it is looking.

Ok, it’s a little too quiet.  Better go see what Davey is up to.

I never saw a purple cow.

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Knitting away on my Takeout for Two socks.  It’s hard to get a good picture of these in progress.  Hard for me at least.  I can’t try them on because the needles are at the top, and I am not seeing them going over my calves too easily.

It’s an easy knit but very fun.  Last night my highlight was switching from a 2×2 rib to a 4×2 rib.  Anything that makes me purl less is a good thing.  I try not to be anti-purl, but I can’t help but always have a happy feeling when I switch back to knit.  So for that reason alone, I guess purling is a good thing.

The other fun thing is switching colors fairly frequently.  I am not thinking about all the ends I will be weaving in later.  Maybe I should consider doing it as I go along.  Maybe…

We are going to go eat at a restaurant called The Purple Cow today.  So for the rest of the day I will be saying to myself:

“I never saw a purple cow

I never hope to see one.

But I can tell you anyhow,

I’d rather see one than be one.”

Happy Tuesday!

Two To Tango: A new Day (sock)

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Cuff number 2 is done.  I did use smaller needles and now have switched to the 3.25 for the fishies section.  My cuff didn’t have ladders.  Turns out that this is what happens when you have an ssk and then a k2tog.  It looks nice and I am kind of dumb for not realizing that this is why that happened.   Knitting a second sock can be anticlimactic, but it does seem to go more quickly, plus this pattern is so fun that I don’t really mind.  Plus I am eager to see how this works out changing needles sizes around.

I looked at sock number one again, and I may have overreacted.  The cuff has dried again and it is not looking so floppy.  (plus the no ladders) The sock is a little hard to get on, but it is very comfortable once I have it on.  It’s not so bad.

Davey has been creating as well!  He drew what we consider his first face.  David had me quickly get a picture of it.  Davey pointed out the ears, eyes, nose and mouth, and he drew each very carefully.  (The face is tilted to the side – to help you get your bearings!)

Finally, Davey helped me shell purple hull peas for the first time yesterday.  I opened up the pod, and he took out the peas.  He enjoyed it and sat with me for quite awhile.  Then he decided to find out if  Timber (our husky) likes raw peas.  He didn’t.  (and this is the dog who will eat just about anything.)