FO: Like sands in the hourglass...

I've never watched a full episode of Days of Our Lives in my life, but I always liked that narrator with his booming, authoritative tone telling me that these are, indeed, the days of our lives.

With that melodramatic start, I now present an unfussy, plain ol' stockinette FO.

Mossy Hourglass Sweater
Pattern: Hourglass Sweater from Last Minute Knitted Gifts
Yarn: Karabella Aurora Melange, 12 balls
Needles: US 7 bamboo circs
Mods: Seed stitch at wrists and hems; contrast color at inside neck lining; row gauge recalculation; extra decrease/increase on body

Verdict: Love. It. To. Death. At first, the yarn seemed clingy and didn't drape very well. But after a good wet-block, it really blossomed into a beautifully bloom-y, softly draping fabric that feels luscious and falls flatteringly. And I have used up my adverb quota for the day.

I admit, the photo is a bit lazy. I realized I wanted to blog about this sweater before moving onward to exciting things, but by the time I remembered and found someone lying around the apartment to take the picture, the sun was already setting and I knew I'd lost out on prime sunlight. Whatevs. It fits, it's soft, it's purdy.

The length worked out to perfection and I really can't ask for more considering it'll be a casual sweater for me to slip on over t-shirts and tank tops as the weather grows chillier (which it's choosing to do at a maddeningly slow pace). I lengthened the top half (the increase half) of the body in order to accommodate my, um, assets and I'm starting to see the really wonderful aspect of knitting something specifically for one's body type. The yarn...I cannot say enough about the yarn. I know 12 balls of Karabella Aurora ain't cheap, but it's highly worth it and I got a great deal on it. It feels wonderful to knit and looks wonderful to wear.

FO: Purple Overload Socks

Purple is supposed to symbolize mystery and royalty. It's also apparently connected to the spiritual seventh chakra in feng shui applications. I think I'm needing something spiritual lately, because I'm obsessed with purple.

Diagonal Cross-Rib Socks
Pattern: Favorite Socks
Yarn: Dream in Color Smooshy in Virtual Purple
Needles: US 1 circs

I definitely f'ed up the toe on the second sock so that they're not even. Whatevs. I was working on them at my parents' place last weekend and my mom wanted them for herself. I may actually cave this time. She grabbed the finished one out of my bag and tried it on while I worked a few rows on the second. Then she dropped hints like, "You know I like purple a lot" and "My feet are very cold." Sometimes I think she's the silly kid and I'm the serious mom. And then I remember I'm really not very serious so maybe we're both just silly.

I definitely will be making these socks again at some point. They're really easy and the yarn goes so well with them. I have another skein of the Smooshy but I think I'd like to try making this pattern again with a slightly more variegated yarn.

When the sock is left alone and unstretched, I really appreciate the spirals that appear. Btw, this yarn lasts forever. I did ten pattern repeats on the leg and nine on the foot and I still have enough yarn left over to make another short sock.

Now, here's some more purple. Basically, the purple loveliness of the Kid Classic is annoying me right now because I continue to try and get gauge and it will not happen. I am just going to have rewrite the pattern for my gauge and I am mad. So, lovely and fluffy Kid Classic is sitting on my bookshelf while I painstakingly go over the pattern. In the meantime, I started the Woven Trellis Scarf for my best friend. She wants a scarf. I thought I was through with scarves, but at least this one is not a lot of work for a very impressive result. Although I might kill someone when I reach the end of the fifth cord and still have to knit another one.

I also decided Mr. Smoke Shawl is going to have to deal with a partner. Part of the reason I'm finding him so fiddly is that I do not like the feel of cobweb-weight yarn while knitting. I like the end product, but it's not something I like working with. I'm terrified of snapping it, it feels more like thread as it runs through my fingers, etc. This is sad for a part of me, but the other part of me likes the fact that I know this about myself now and won't make the same mistake again. I'm going to buy another lace or fingering weight yarn in a navy or midnight blue and pair Mr. Smoke with it.

I am also sooooo close to finishing the Hourglass:

Yes, this looks like a lump of moss. It's really a finished sweater that needs a wet block and a sewing-in-ends marathon. Badness of superwash wool is that you can't spit-splice the ends, durnit.

I did the neckline hemming in a contrast color. It looks wonky but it lies flat when I put it on. The first time I knitted the sleeves to the yoke, I got two inches in before I realized I had sewn in one sleeve facing the wrong way. Dammit, I can't live with a mistake like that. A slightly wonky neckline only when folded or flat? I can live with that. Those ends are just the tip of the iceberg, man. You should see the inside of the sweater. Yikes.

Yarn Highs

Lots of knittin' going on in these here parts lately. I swatched for the Hourglass last Thursday and had so much fun swatching that I went ahead and swatched for Astrid, the lovely boho shawl/scarf that resembles spider's webs clinging together. The only difference with this swatch, however, is that the swatch is part of the FO, the first large circle:

Here is Large Circle 1 after blocking. It needed blocking because without it, the edges are too tight and don't allow the circle to lay flat. I tried to get the true color (cardinal red) into the photos, but my mean camera with its heart of cold, cold metal wasn't having it. But it did relent and let me take a detail shot.

Berrocco's Ultra Alpaca Light is lovely. I haven't worn it next to my skin yet, but it's soft to work with and didn't bleed when I tossed Large Circle 1 into a bowl of suds. Red yarn! No bleeding!

I did see how making so many Large Circles and then Medium Circles and then Small Circles would get rather tiresome and tedious. So I set LC 1 aside and told her (it has to be "her,"
her name is Astrid!) to stay put because I will make sisters to join her when I get bored of whatever else is on the needles.

Like this sock:
It's the Uptown Boot Sock from IK's Favorite Socks. The yarn colors are coming out a bit bright. The fuchsia portion is much more of a deep raspberry-burgundy color. It really looks like red wine that's been flung over grass. Although the wine getting absorbed into the soil is not a part of this image.

Has anyone ever heard of this yarn called Koigu? No? Well, let me tell you all about it. It's beautiful. So beautiful that I would squeal while knitting it up if I weren't completely sure that one of my roommates would hear me and think I was being attacked by wild pigs. It is a bit rope-y in texture, but I consider it part of the appeal. I knit oddly: I don't wind the yarn at all around my hand, I just hold it between my thumb and forefinger. And it's kinda nice to feel the ridges along Koigu as it flows between my fingers.

You know, I am so enamored of the stockinette portion of socks that I really should just knit a pair of plain ol' stockinette socks. I also realized that there is nothing ever wrong with purchasing more sock yarn. Sock yarn is meant to be stashed. It likes it. It enjoys marinating in your yarn bins while you think of a pattern to go with it. And it's so pleased with itself when you ooh and ahh as you knit it up. Yup.

I also started the Hourglass, after waiting for the swatch to dry. I've heard people say that Karabella Aurora grows like a mofo when it gets wet, but my swatch behaved quite nicely. I dunked it in cold, sudsy water, pressed it dry in a towel and laid it out on my bookshelf to dry flat. No change. Gauge? Same. Overall size? Same. Feel? Same...still soft and luscious. This is where I am now:

I'm making just a few mods to it. I'm adding an extra decrease and increase to make the waist a little smaller. I'm making the increases more rapidly than it says to accommodate the girls. And, I'm not hemming. No hemming. Instead, I'm using seed stitch. See?

What else can I say about this project? It moves so fast that I had to tink back twice when I overshot how many rows I needed before the next set of decreases. The yarn is so soft that I almost can't believe it sometimes, especially after knitting with Skye Tweed. The melange is perfect for such an otherwise plain-jane sweater. Preliminary attempts to hold it against my body make me think it might be a perfect fit: Loose and swingy, but not potato sack-ish. So far? Lookin' good, Hourglass.

In other news,

1) I am going to purchase yarn for Rannoch. It's going to happen. Yoda says, "Do or do not. There is no try."

2) My mom bought me a Korean knitwear book that has some very appealing patterns in it. She also promised to help me translate it so I can figure out what I'm doing. I'm very excited about some of the patterns and I'll post photos of the book later this week. I'm not so excited about having to resize everything because Korean fashion designers think that every woman has a 32" bust.

3) I am working on my first design. It's small. Nothing crazy. I am not jumping into design with a ginormous sweater with cables up the wazoo. But I think it's purty. I'm hoping to finish by Friday. Again, Yoda says, "Do or do not. There is no try."

The Weather Defense

Today's post is brought to you by the letter V (as in vitamin) and the number two (as in bottles of Vitamin Water consumed today).

This craptastic photo basically sums up the entirety of my life over the past four days. Ew. Apparently, this Hurricane Dean or some such weather phenomenon has been dumping the Northeast coast with a heavy, solid dose of grey. It feels like I am in the middle of the frickin' Mists of Avalon. Only without the cool medieval costumes and magical powers. Yesterday was, according to many old farmer's almanacs, the coldest day in August in maybe 90 years. It's interesting to feel literally "under the weather."

Unfortunately, whether the symptoms are psychosomatic or actually connected to science, my body does not hold up well to alarmingly sudden shifts in the weather. If one day's high temp is 60 and the next is 90, my body decides to short circuit. If one day is 90 and the next is 60, my body decides that Ice Age is not a charming animated movie but the state of my skin.

So last night, my friend hosted a small dinner party with some quiche and a good strong doctor-recommended dose of Gene Kelly:



This movie makes me so happy that I could just curl up with glee. If Gene can brighten my day by tap dancing with such joy through milky water with a temperature over 100 degrees, then I can overcome this durn cold to knit, goddammit...

These are the fronts and back of Central Park, post-blocking. They've been seamed at the shoulders and the hood is in motion. Due to aforementioned greyness of the local atmosphere, there is no achieving any sort of pretty photography with my sadly out-of-date camera. So I fudged it in honor of Gene. Black & white hides so many multitudes of sins, no? I think this is why all those film stars of old seemed to have such porcelain skin.

Also, I bought some yarn. I actually bought more than this, but this is what I will talk about today. I went to String the other day when it was pouring out and I just wanted to take refuge in some yarn. They're not going to be carrying Karabella Aurora anymore and so all this soft, petting-friendly yarn was half off. There was plenty of Aurora Bulky and Aurora 4 left, but the aran weight was only available in Melange. Which was fine with me, because this turquoise, green and brown blend was beyond gorgeous.

I decided to purchase twelve skeins and the lovely owner, Linda, asked if there were any more left of the colorway. I said there were two more left in the basket and she threw them in for free! So, basically, I got fourteen skeins of this deliciosity for about $3.80ish each. I heart String. Seriously.

I started a swatch...That's not technically starting another project. It's preparation. Yup. Not cheating. The left of the purl row is on US 7s and the right is on US 6s. The 6s give me gauge for the Hourglass Pullover from Last Minute Knitted Gifts, but I'm going to have to wash my swatch because I've heard that Aurora grows like a Chia Pet when it hits water. With the extra yarn I got (for free!) I think I might try to fiddle around with putting a big cowl neck on Hourglass.