Good Riddance

I returned the second ball of dusty pink Sisu to my LYS today. I hate that stuff. Just the thought of trying to knit the second sock or finish the first one made me shudder. I just couldn't possibly have knit another sock out of that stuff. I picked up some new sock yarn I have never used before as a replacement. This stuff is called Online Supersocke 100. Once I finish the socks I am working on I am going to have to give this yarn a try. It comes in all kinds of interesting colours. This one has purple, white and blue. The colour stated on the label is number 847.


I am getting extremely frustrated with my son Joseph's mouth. He got braces a little over a month ago. The first 2 weeks were great. The biggest problem was his complaining about how difficult it was to eat anything. That lasted about 3 days. Now I have had to make 3 emergency trips to the orthodontist in the last 3 weeks. The first visit was because he got the inside of his cheek caught in the braces and he couldn't get it disloged. He finally managed to get his cheek out but off to the dentist we went the following day. Turns out one of the wires was a bit long so they trimmed it and all was well again.

Last week one of the turbos on the inside of his mouth broke when he sneezed. The first one broke the day he got the braces but that was fine as long as he still had the second one. When the second one broke back we went. The turbos serve a dual purpose. First, they were to help his bite. The second was due to his severe overbite the turbos are supposed to help make sure he doesn't break the wires.

On Tuesday, my SnB night, I had to go back to the dentist for the third week in a row. The wire came loose on one side of his mouth so he had this long wire hanging out of his mouth. We went to the dentist then I took Joseph and Paul (DH) home, and then I went to my SnB.

All I can say is I hope this isn't the way it is going to be for the next 2 years. I don't think I will be able to take it. Joseph says I should just imagine how he feels about all this and he's right.

The Weekend Is Over Already???

How can the weekend possibly go by so quickly? We went Halloween costume shopping with Joseph. We didn't manage to find what he was looking for. He wants to be a knight this year and all we got was a cape. So next weekend we will have to go to more places to see what we can find.


Not much knitting going on here. I did manage to finish the heel on the first test sock. I hate this yarn so much I am seriously thinking of chucking it after the first sock and not even bothering making a second sock. This yarn is just one of the most annoying yarns I have ever knit with. It seems like every other stitch splits. On a positive note I do like the heel from Jackie E-S much better than the short row heel. I find it much easier to knit and I think this heel might last longer than the short row heel. Of course it is also possible this heel looks better because I haven't had as much practice with the short row heel. I'll have to give it a try with yarn that isn't as bad as this stuff.


I bought knew sock blockers in a size small. This one I bought from Grand River Yarns. The other ones I have are Fiber Trends and in size medium. Since I don't usually knit socks for Paul these two sizes should be all I need. I also bought the medium ball winder. I have the small and I have a jumbo somewhere. I just can't find where right now. I need more room for all my knitting stuff so I can find them when I need them!! Oh well, I was getting desparate to wind the Fleece Artists yarn into a ball so I decided it can't hurt to get a medium size winder since I needed to wind a 225 gram ball.

Slowly But Surely

I'm slowly making progress on the socks I am trying to design. I ripped out the red ones I started. I finished one of the test socks and I wasn't very happy with it so I decided to rip it. Now I am knitting the test socks in Sisu yarn and a dusty rose colour. I love the colour but I hate the yarn. I find it splits like crazy. I tried doing the short row heel on this sock and I've decided I don't care for it too much. I can't get the sock to fit properly. I must be starting the heel too soon because the foot portion comes out way too short. So I am going to use the heel from Heartstrings Basic Toe Up Socks Worksheet.


I also couldn't wait to start knitting with the cursed yarn I inherited from Maggie. I started the Moon Dance Stole by Melanie of Pink Lemon Twist. Since the yarn I have is limited to one skein of Zephyr, I decided to make a scarf instead of a stole. I cast on 61 sts and I'll work less repeats. So far I haven't had a problems with the cursed yarn but I've only knit about 10 rows.

I was very bad and got some Bluefaced Leicester by Fleece Artist in either the wildflowers or seashore colour. The colours are very similar and the yarn doesn't say the colour name on the labels but the colours are a little brighter in the wildflowers than the seashore. I love this yarn. This is the yarn I bought for the Scheherezade stole. This stole is also from Pink Lemon Twist. I have to get back to working on it but I can't seem to get motivated. I'm sure I'll finish it sooner or later.

I bought this mini sock blocker from Felt Up Designs. These things are the cutest things I have ever seen. It even comes with a mini sock pattern.

On a non-knitting note...I FINALLY received my laptop and printer order from Dell. I didn't get any knitting done tonight because I am busy trying to move stuff from the desktop to the laptop. I hope I will get all of it done by the weekend.

Murphy's Law

I think that whoever came up with Murphy's Law had me in mind at the time. If I pick a checkout at the store it usually ends up being the slowest one. Or someone in front of me has some problem that causes a backlog. The same thing happened with my recent laptop order. After waiting for what seemed like forever, my husband finally ordered a laptop for me. I was hoping I would have it by the next SnB. My hopes were further boosted because I checked the Dell website and it said something was being sent out to me. The nice Purolator man brought me my package. Now since I was supposed to get a printer as well as the laptop I wasn't sure what was in the box and I didn't want to open it and risk any of the contents getting damaged during the drive home from work. My husband suggested I check the packing slip. I check the packing slip and guess what? Not only wasn't it the laptop but it wasn't the printer either - it was a flat panel monitor!!! I don't have any idea how they ended up shipping me a monitor. I should find out tomorrow or Tuesday how the company is going to rectify the situation. The good news is that according to the website I can now see 2 new orders for me. Since the website doesn't specify what the orders are for I can't say with complete certainty that it is the laptop and printer but I am more hopeful today then I was on Friday.

I finished my first sock test sock. I want to knit another sock with a completely different pattern and see if I like it better than the first one. I think I will do 2 odd socks (for a total of 3) and then decide which design I like the best and then make the second socks. The heels need tweaking as well. Now I just have to figure out how to find more time to knit. It should be against the law for work to get in the way of your knitting.

Short Row Heel

I managed to get the first short row heel done last night. I used the short row heel from the Crazy Toes and Heels Sock Book by Queen Kahuna. This short row heel is in the add on section of the book. I was a bit confused at first but when I took the time to read everything carefully it ended up being fairly simple. Since this is a test for me to see how I like things, the next sock I am going to work the short row heel with the heel gussett from the same book. The one thing I am not sure how to avoid is some loose stitches. I think you can see what I am talking about when you look at the picture. I'll see if I can get it to look better when I do the second sock.

September 4, 2006

I finished the socks I started before I left for vacation. I only blocked one of the socks. Can you tell which one? As I mentioned in a previous post these socks are from the Sensational Knitted Socks book. I love this book but I wasn't happy with the construction of these socks. I find that the pattern did not explain how long to make the foot before you started to knit the heel flap. It's possible I just missed where it is in the pattern but I tried checking a few times and just didn't see it.

Because of that, I must have ripped out the heel flap 3 or 4 times before I finally had enough. I still think the socks are a bit too long for my daughter but I am hoping by washing and drying them in the machine they might shrink a little bit.

I'm trying to design my first pair of socks. This is what I have managed to come up with so far. I used the Turkish cast on . The pattern is from Traditional Knitted Lace Shawls by Martha Waterman. Now I have to figure out how to work the short row heel. I am told it's easy but never having worked it before I am not quite sure about it.
Because of that, I started another pair of socks with the same pattern. This yarn doesn't show the pattern up very well because of the different colours but I will use it as a test for the heel and if I don't like the way it comes out I will revert back to my standard heel from the Basic Toe Up Socks pattern by Jackie E-S. Either way, my daughter loves the socks I knit for her and she will wear them no matter what the heel looks like. If only I could wear the socks I knit but I find the yarn to thick even when I use fingering weight yarn. My arthritis bothers me more when I used to wear my socks so I gave my entire collection to my granddaugther.

I didn't get to block my finished Clapotis. It really looks great just the way it is except for the corners. I can't stand the way the corner curls.


Other than the curling I just love the way this one turned out. It is the best of the 3 I made. The other two I gave to my daughter. This one I am going to keep for myself and use as a scarf for the winter. The yarn I used is Schachenmayr nomotta Crazy Cotton. I love the way the colours look together and the yarn is so soft. The only drawback is the cotton makes it heavier than if it would have been wool. I would still use this yarn for another project if I had more of it.