Monochrome Argyle

I finished today the spouse's socks, the ones that were originally on my needles. I finished them using my grandmother's needles which, unlike my addis, have a stiffer cable and the union between cable and needle is not as smooth. Anyway, picture time: Regarding the swap socks, this is the Rabbitworks yarn in the "Cryptic Notes" colorway. The camera does not do it justice. It combines several hues of deep blue. I look at it and think of sapphires. And this is how it looks when combined with "Revenge" using the Pinwheel pattern: I had to add a stitch, given that when knitting with two yarns you need an even number of stitches. Also, I refuse to make a pinwheel garter stitch toe. I know the garter stitch pinwheels are what give this pattern its name, but I personally find garter stitch toes very uncomfortable. This is the toe I prefer to wear, and so I used it for this pair of socks too.

Better than nothing

At least I am past the toes. Which isn't much, especially considering that I am going to rip the few rows I've knit after finishing the increases.



I am making Pinwheel Socks. I have made two pairs so far and feel confident enough with the pattern that I will not have to worry about screwing things up. I also wanted to try it with a single yarn, given that so far I have used this pattern to get rid of scraps.

It turns out that the real beauty of this pattern lies in the vertical stripes. Using only one yarn is creating a very boring pair of socks. Luckily, I have another skein of this Rabbitworks yarn, in a pretty blue colorway called "Cryptic Notes". I hope they work well together.

Shame

Last week I posted a picture of my sock swap yarn, wound up into two nice center pull balls. Have I made any progress? Why yes, I put the yarn in a baggie:




You might have noticed that there are no needles in the baggie. That's because the needles are currently in another baggie, holding another pair of socks I thought I would have finished by now:




Yes, I know, I should not procrastinate, after all there's a deadline. I am posting this to shame myself into hurrying up.

To hell with shawls

So, way back in October, I was working with a yarn that had glitter in it but was still very soft: Lanalux. I wanted to create an object of beauty and I chose the Sheri shawlette pattern, simply because it allows you to use up all the yarn with not much waste, since it is knitted sideways. I called this thing boredom because it requires a lot of boring stockinette.

Speaking of which, all that stockinette might have worked with another yarn, but my shawlette rolls at the edges even after wet blocking and steam blocking. I don't dare to use the iron because of the glitter. Don't let it fool you. It's lying flat against the sofa but in reality it rolls on itself without provocation.



In November I moved on to another shawl, something more challenging and without any stockinette: Haruni. I used two balls of kidsilk spray and finished the second to last row. Alas, there is not enough yarn to finish the last row. Kidsilk spray is, by the way, discontinued. So the future of my shawl is bleak.



After three failures in a row (I am counting the Garden View Shawlette as a failure) my knitting mojo dried up.

But I find myself itching again for the needles, so I joined a sock swap for Spanish speakers: Swapetines. I used to participate in that sock swap, stopped for a couple of years, but now feel like it's time to rejoin them. Today I split the skein into two pull out balls:



This is 75% superwash merino from Rabbitch, in a colorway she calls revenge. I had originally ordered a different colorway, but she had ran out of it. She reimbursed me, including shipping, and then sent me a skein in this colorway free of charge. Isn't she a nice lady?

The yarn is beautiful, though these days I find myself gravitating towards browns, grays and tans. When I learned that my swap victim likes bright colors I thought it was time to knit up this pretty yarn.