How to confuse yourself in 3 easy steps

Step 1: Get fairly quick at right-handed, throwing, holding the right needle like a pen-type knitting, which is fine for knit, but a bit loosey-goosey for purl, and quite trying for ribbing, which you want to knit miles of for your sockapalooooza socks.
Step 2: Decide you want to learn how to knit ribbing without wanting to poke your own eyes out with a spoon.
Step 3: Look for alternatives and try them out. Continental. How EZ did it. Rilly rilly fast ribbing.

Brain: Whuh?
Right hand: Sulk.
Left hand: You want me to do what now?
Sock: Ha ha ha ha ha ahahahahahaaaa!
EZ: *turns in grave*.

Busy...

Too busy to knit, too busy to walk the dog, too busy. Work is piling me with stuff and I have two rather large essays to finish in the next two weeks, so no knitting, no baby-quilt making and no reading other than research! :(
Ah well. After this, only the dissertation to go and then onto the PhD!
Sock knitting for sockapalooooza will commence after Deadline Day...

swatchtastic

The stripes have come out really well and the Witch colourway is really nice, but I'm not sure it will be suitable for my pal! Though she does say 'go wild'... hmm. I think it will look really nice in the Monkey pattern or something similar. I'm also quite tempted by Conwy or something else from Knitting On the Road by Nancy Bush. I am having second thoughts about these patterns thought - purling in the round is something I don't enjoy, I suffer from 'rowing out' usually anyway and my purls in the round tend to be a bit loose. Maybe I will try knitting combined or continental to avoid that, would be a good opportunity to learn! But it might well take me till August to do one sock, let alone both... ribbing is supposed to be quicker though, isn't it?

She has also said she wouldn't mind knee socks, but as the red and brown is 100% wool, I'm not sure knee socks would stay up. The Witch is 75/25. Maybe if I did the whole leg in rib? Would I go blind/mad?

In other sock news, the silk Regias I made for my friend J's father fit him fine and he is very pleased with them. Phew!

is that a frog i hear?

It was:
Now it's a pile of pieces and I've unravelled a sleeve. Recycling makes me nervous! Here is the progress so far and the bit of sleeve I've got done for the grey cardi.
I know it looks like it's about to throw itself off the edge of the desk. I am reassuring it I will wear it in its next incarnation...

mmmm, sock wool...

The wool arrived very promptly, and is really soft. The brown is 'squirrel' and the red is 'scarlet', and it is pretty eye-searing. The 'witch' is very pretty, and the repeats are quite short so it should knit up nicely. Here you can see it in the skein, resting on my swift (handmade by my lovely boyfriend M and with a little light reading for an assignment in the background), and wound in balls.









All in natural daylight, with no flash. I'm hoping the red will be toned down a little when striped with the brown, it's a really nice intense colour but I can't look directly at it...
Next: swatching!

Will it be the same in person?

I've just ordered some sock yarn from Violet Green in the hope that it will be suitable for my sockpal, called 'Witch'. Of course, if it isn't quite the colour I think it is, then how awful, I will have to knit it up for myself, and go shopping afresh. How dreadful. Hee!
I've bought some solid colours as well, as I'm very tempted to do some stripy socks that are a complimentary pair rather than a matching pair, like these by Eunny Yang. It would be a good opportunity to get my jogless jogs right, though if Eunny says she can't get them perfect then I doubt I have a hope. And the last pair of striped socks I knit were 5-round stripes, and I think that was too much to carry the yarn up, but I didn't want loads of ends to sew in. Maybe 2- or 3-round stripes would be ok.

A new sock

I've started a new sock for me, mainly black regia stretch with contrasting toe of some stripy stuff I don't have enough of to do whole socks. 64 stitches around, short row toe from provisional cast on. I might try the heels with the pick-up-wraps-then-pass-them-over method rather than the knit-the-wraps-with-the-stitch method (I'm so articulate) from the tutorial here at Misocrafty. Though I've already done the toe as a double-wrap. If they look better than my usual short-row heels then I'll use that for my Sockapalooooza socks.
I still don't know what pattern to use, but I'm thinking I might go for the Monkey socks that are so popular at the moment by Cookie A. My pal says she has quite trendy tastes but doesn't specify lace or no lace, so I might have to ask!

In other knitting news, I am getting stuck in to the second sleeve for my cardigan, but I'm in several minds about the first one. The shoulder fits really well, the armhole is the right depth, but somehow my arms have shrunk. Not really a summer length, but I always have cold hands in winter. Another possibility could be to make them an inch longer and put thumbholes in them. I think I will just carry on as it is and revise my numbers for the next version!
I have two jumpers to unravel because I knit them from the Ann Budd books, they look great folded up but are rather sack-like on my straight, tiny frame. I hate unravelling a finished item that took hours to knit, but if I can't wear it, there's no point in it taking up room in my wardrobe. Just hope I can find my ends!
PS Hi 'Thelma' :)