A New War to Fight

Since I have gone rather berserk on this knitting thing of late (I'm presently on row 185, Clue 3 of the MS3, with Clue 4 released this morning, sigh...), I have noticed a huge new problem in my life, one that requires action both swift and thorough. There is a need to commit warfare, in fact. The enemy is insidious - having been around, if not particularly noticeable, throughout my long span living in Florida, approaching 30 years now, but has now revealed his true colors. He comes in many sizes, from teeny things less than a quarter-inch long, up to huge, the size of hummingbirds! The latter, thank heaven, stay outdoors! By now, if you're any sort of fiber junkie at all, you know that I'm talking about ...

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MOTHS!

Hitherto, they have not been of any great concern, another part of life as she is lived in the Sunshine State, where a BBQ Christmas dinner on the patio is not uncommon, and bugs of every possible description abound. They were most bothersome as they clustered about the lights beside the outer doors, as they are wont to do, and one must wend through a cloud of them to get into and out of the house after dark. There is also a frequent progress of fur babies through these same portals. "Bug" lights are of no use, so moths in the house are commonplace, if annoying in front of the TV and flying around light fixtures. When one is sufficiently annoyed, one swats, and that's that.

Now, however, there has become Stash - small as yet, granted, but certain to grow, as there is more on order, and more on the list behind that, ad infinitum. And I have become *aware* of moths in an entirely new way. Moths and wool do NOT mix, not no how, not no way! All the wool presently resides in zip-lock bags, inside a drawer inside a chiffarobe, where moths don't seem to congregate. The one "working" bag, the one containing the MS3 stole, is opened frequently, as unless I'm actively knitting, the stole goes into the bag, for protection against 6 cats, spilled beverages, and fallout from meteorites crashing into the street in front of the house. And, of course, the moths. This bag also contains, besides the stole, the charts, the row counter, the ball of perle cotton for lifelines, and the container of pearls, a large-ish loosely woven bag, filled with fresh-dried French lavender. I am told that lavender, among other herbs, repels moths, or, more accurately, causes the wool to fail to attract them, since the moths track on scents emitted by the wool (and you thought "wool fumes" was a joke!), and the lavender covers them up. Even if it doesn't, it smells pretty.


And Now For Something Completely Different

Happy Man On the Moon day, y'all!

Water Under the Bridge

Oh, my! have I been remiss in my blogging! I do apologise, and offer the following lengthy post, divided into segments, as atonement.


July 2/3


This is Chart A of Clue I of the Mystery Stole 3 completed. The sharper-eyed among you may have noticed that it's on a different needle than the previous pic. I had bought a brand-new pair of 14" Inox #4s for this project, eagerly awaited their arrival in the mail, and cast on with them immediately. By the time I got to the point of where the previous picture of progress was taken, I had fallen completely in hatred. They were horrible! They were sticky and unpredictably grabby, and I was constantly wrestling with the stitches. A very nice lady on the KnitList was destashing, and offered a bunch of old needles for sale for a reasonable price, so I bought them. Among them was a pair of 10" Brittany birch #4s, to which I immediately switched the stole. Wow! The Brittanys are smooth, yet grippy, and bent in exactly the same places my own hands would bend them. I like them as much as I hate the Inox. The stole is proceeding much more easily now.


July 4


Of all the words written regarding 'the nation's birthday' this year, I found the Tsarina's celebration of her grandfather's birthday to be the most meaningful. Russia is a poorer nation today because so many people like her family left there. The USA is a far richer nation because so many of them, and so many like them from everywhere in the world, chose to come here. Happy Birthday to the melting pot!


July 5


Here is Chart A of the stole completed, once again. It doesn't look much different from the previous picture, does it? It is, though. In fact, it's a completely different piece of fabric! What happened was, a cat decided the knitting was an extremely dangerous and fierce dragon. In the process of bravely attacking and killing this threat to domestic harmony, the knitting was destroyed past any hope of salvage. That'll teach me not to Put Things Away. In a way, I'm rather more pleased than not. I never did like the way the bottom point looked on version the first, and I fought it and fought it and fought it, every stitch of the way. Version the second has been much better behaved, and knitted up about three times faster than the first. I actually got ALL of this done in one (rather lengthy, I admit) sitting! Don't the pearls look pretty? They probably are too large, but I don't care. I like them!


July 6-10


I've done it to myself again. I follow links in blog posts. I find out all sorts of fascinating things that way, and end up in some strange places, when the links have links and so ad infinitum. (The 'net is quite possibly the greatest invention since the printing press, IMHO.) In this particular case, I saw a picture, and fell madly in love with the subject. I posted on both the KnitList and the MS3 list (which grew from just over 4,000 to 6,910 people after the Harlot blogged about it! USA Today interviewed Melanie yesterday.) trying to find more information about it. No immediate answers, but a LOT of people expressed interest in knowing the answers when I got them. The result is I am now a List Mom! The picture on the home page is the one that started it all. As of this morning, 384 people seem to share my passion. I wish this blog had as many readers!


July 11


And this brings us up to date. In between e-mails, and ListMom chores, I have been knitting, and Clue 1, all 100 rows of it, is finished! Here it is:



It's only finger-patted into shape, of course, and will look much, much better when blocked out properly. I took this photo at 2:30 this morning. I somehow believe that I will end up adding the "slow bee" button to the blog, though. I'm still way behind, unless I can complete all 50 rows of Clue 2 before Friday morning, when Clue 3 is released, anyway. Care to estimate the odds of that actually happening?

God, I feel old tonight.

Back when I was a young teenager, I had two idols, one of whom was Bubbles. I was even introduced to Bubbles once, which impressed me enormously, then and now. Today, my world, and yours, is a worse place, because today Bubbles died.

Rest in joy, Beverly Sills, as you lived.

Day One of the Shawl

1200 D1
Originally uploaded by lynnegh.

This is actually from yesterday, as I couldn't take a picture until this morning, but this is how far I got before becoming so tired that I was spending much more time tinking and frogging than I was knitting. For some reason, I just could *not* get past row 23! At one point, I had to rip it back to row 15 to catch a group of running dropped stitches - so the top few rows have been knitted at least six times. Sigh...

I do really, really like the way it's looking, though, even just spread out on the needle. The pearls are soooo yummy with this yarn!

This is a swatch for my newest project, the Mystery Stole 3. The yarn is Jaggerspun Zephyr laceweight, the color is pewter, and the beads are 4mm pearls. Melanie's supplies list calls for #8 seed beads, which are 3mm, so I was a bit concerned about how these 4mm would work in the pattern. My fears are allayed, however, as Clue #1 was published early this morning, and the larger beads will, I think, be fine.

This is my first experience with laceweight yarn, and I approached it with a certain degree of trepidation, given that it looks so delicate, and my involuntary twitches tend to be hard on things delicate. However, this yarn is very sturdy! It's also a joy to the hand, and knits up nicely.

The actual stole pattern is nothing at all like this swatch, though. This week's clue is for the first 99 rows, but it's not as onerus as that number would lead you to believe. The shape is triangular. The starting cast-on is only two stitches, and the work doesn't actually achieve the full width of the stole until the 97th row.

When my needles arrive (I hope this afternoon!), I'll start on the pattern, and do a pin-out and picture for y'all when I've got those first 99 rows done. Depending on how fast I get it done, I may well entertain you with pictures of ever larger grey blob.

Your Immediate Attention, Please!

CNN is having a poll regarding leisure activities - it's rank your top ten, and one of the possibilities is knitting. You know what to do with this -

http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2007/leisure/your.picks/index.html

so why are you hanging around here?

An Almost Total Eclipse of the Mind-Body Connection

As one ages, one's body is less and less inclined to go along with whatever wild-hair notions the mind comes up with, and add a double-barrelled infirmity on top of it, and one becomes a sloth, for all practical purposes. I am in that condition, at least for the moment, until the infirmity decides it's done doing its thing for the moment, which will happen, sooner or later. In the meantime, I suck down such nostrums as the medical community seems to think will be of assistance, and wait for better days. It's not nearly as bad as the siege of two years ago, when I was reduced to eating with a plastic spoon, as anything more substantial brought with it the probability of doing major physical damage to myself and my surroundings. There has been, in the past few days, some pretty "odd" stitching, though, let me tell you! Fortunately, though, nothing that couldn't be fixed occurred.



Since needlework has been curtailed, I've been reading blogs like mad, and also the incredible amounts of mail that the Mystery Stole 3 (see the button? It's still open for new members until July 6th. There are close to 3,000 of us now!) has been generating. I'm really looking forward to this project, as it reduces the number of sharp pointy ends to only two, and the yarn, while gossamer, is also quite sturdy. (I'm using Jaggerspun Zephyr lace-weight, which is 50/50 merino wool and silk - no picture yet, as the yarn hasn't yet graced my mailbox, though it's on the way.)


I'm in the process of doing the finishing on one of the models I'm stitching. It's going slowly because I want it to look really great, which means I have to work very methodically. Perhaps I will soon be able to post a picture.



Progress on the sock has been minimal, as six skinny sticks with a total of 12 sharp pointy ends are just a bit more than I can deal with at the moment.


Here is the progress on the Hardanger for Day 4. I know it's been many more days than one since the last picture, but this work was actually advanced just this much from Day 3 in one day. I've been hoarding the picture. Clicking it will take you to a much better version of it.






And this last bit is for Knit Tech, with lagniappe. The blue in the middle is the silk I mentioned in the "ribbons" post - though the richness of the fabric just won't photograph worth a darn (or at least I can't do it - I'm still learning this camera). The green, likewise; it's another piece of silk I found as an unbelievable bargain. Both are darker and much more intense in color than in the pic. The brocade (and doesn't it go well with the blue silk?) is actually, gasp, polyester, but it still looks and feels goooood. Oddly, it's actually a bit lighter in color, and how this could be in the same photograph, I have no idea.

What I Did Today

Lewis Hamilton rocks!

The tifosi may well sacrifice me on a quasi-altar to St. Enzo in Maranello, but I think that he may well exceed Schumi's incredible career before he's done with it all. Sir Stirling and Sir Jackie would seem to agree with me.

So what I did today was watch it all happen.

As Promised

First up is Day 3's progress on the Hardanger SAL - it's coming together quite nicely!

And now, the promised silk ribbons!

This is seven of the ten, the other three being duplicates of the present colors, but in the 4mm width, instead of the 7mm. For scale, the greenish in the lower left is 4mm, all the others are 7mm. The color names are "Victorian Rose", "Cinnabar Crimson", "Daffodil", "Spring Green", "Bronze Green", "Tiffany Blue", and "Victorian Lilac". And your eyes are not playing tricks on you - all of these colors are variegated, some to a greater degree than others, and are even more beautiful in RL than they are in this pic. They also feel soooo good! Soft and slinky and smoooooth. Just yummy! You *are* going to see these again.

In the same shipment came a small chunk of fabric - royal blue silk, seriously slubbed, and to die for! Crazy quilting material, for sure.

Have I mentioned that I have this seriously lustful thing for silk? I think it must harken back to my childhood, when I had a really seriously bad, as in major second degree, sunburn. Even 600 threads to the inch pima cotton percale was just too scratchy to be borne. My mother, in a rare fit of maternal sacrifice, gave up a beautiful 2 yard length of 45" wide lightweight silk to be a sheet for me, so I could sleep. I have loved silk ever since. If I ever become largely rich, all my sheets will be silk.

Things Creep Along

First, today's progress on the Hardanger project:

I'm quite pleased with the way this is going. It's a bit larger scale (25-ct fabric and perle #5) than I would eventually like to work, but it's still going to be an attractive piece, I think.

Second, and you knew you couldn't avoid it, is progress on The Sock. I think I've got a solution of sorts on the increases, o happy day! It's not perfect, by any means, but I can live with it.

And finally, I'm possibly speaking too soon, but it looks like our normal monsoon rainy season just might be setting in! Under "normal" conditions, the rain comes every afternoon around 4 PM. It'll rain about an inch, then clear off again, leaving the air cool and clean smelling for the evening.

The past three days, however, it has rained just around noon-time, leaving the afternoon steamy. However, steam is greatly preferred to dust. We need every drop of rain we can possibly get, regardless!

Eye candy tomorrow!

Change of Pace

So far, it seems about all I've talked about is knitting and weather. I thought it was about time to change the subject a bit, at least for a moment.

Vera Stoll is a very nice German lady who designs Hardanger embroidery, and will be starting a web-site to teach it (in German and English, I think) this Fall. In May and June, she has had designs published in "The Gift of Stitching" e-zine, and last week started a group on Yahoo to do a stitch-along/class using those two designs, plus a third freebie she's made available to the group. I'm sure she'd welcome anyone, subscriber to the magazine or not, to the group.

All this background is to introduce today's photo, which is the start of my piece. I have done Hardanger before, but I am completely self-taught, and the opportunity to have my work critiqued by a pro, for FREE, is too much to resist! There's a picture of the finished design on the front page of the Yahoo group - it's the one on the lower right.

Tomorrow you can have a sock update. It hasn't advanced appreciably, but that's because I've been spending all my time at the frog pond. It's a bit further along than it was the last time you saw it, but it's been frogged twice since then, and re-knit.

I found out today that I'll be receiving a few skeins of hand-dyed silk ribbons for embroidery, probably this Thursday, so there's eye candy to look forward to!

Herding Cats

(with thanks to the Tsarina for the title)

I've not been doing well with this blogging business, have I? I'll try and do better, promise. Part of the reason is that I haven't had anything to talk about, and, unlike some bloggers, I don't have anything waiting in the wings. I should start putting some together, perhaps...

Today, however, a rare concatenation of circumstance (I had some money, and the use of a car) led me to the Jo-ann's Superstore that I've been wanting to visit ever since it opened three years ago. I scouted the web-site first, and found several things I wanted, so was full of anticipation when I arrived.

I can't begin to tell you how disappointed I was.

There were aisles and aisles of silk flower arranging stuff, and mostly "cutesy" yard and garden "decor" stuff; a few interesting beads in the two aisles of mostly uninteresting and lower end "jewelry" making supplies; a couple of baskets I wouldn't have minded owning if the prices had been a little less unreasonable; a lot of drapery and home decor fabrics I would like to have gotten into; and so forth. The yarn department was, not completely unexpectedly, mostly devoid of anything I would want to knit, but knitting, especially in the summer, is not exactly a prime activity in the south. And so it went. They didn't have the two major things I wanted, of course.

I ended up buying a new pair of Fiskar's, a ball of #5 perle cotton, and two sets of cheap DPNs, #s 1 and 3. Sigh...

Yesterday morning I got up and frogged all the stitching I had done the night before on one of the models I'm doing. I had misplaced a motif by one lousy stitch, and since I used that motif to key off of for the rest of the work I did, it was all off that same one lousy stitch. Ordinarily I would fake it, but this particular item is very geometric, and oh boy did that one stitch off jump out. You'd think I'd have noticed it the night before, when I was doing it! It was a case of not seeing the forest for the trees, I guess. I was fixated on the small area I was working, and not looking at the design as a whole.

I finally bit the bullet on the sock, and frogged it back to the toe. I've got 1 and a half repeats of the pattern re-knit, after revisions to the "design", and will get more done tonight.

This sort of "one step forward, two steps back" has been dogging me all week, and I'm getting tired of it!

Normally, I don't indulge in this sort of thing, but Anne, over at Knitspot, challenged her readers to take this one, and post the results for comparison purposes. The week is still with me, though. Anne is an Index finger. Here's mine:

You Are a Ring Finger

You are romantic, expressive, and hopeful. You see the best in everything. You are very artistic, and you see the world as your canvas. You are also drawn to the written word. Inventive and unique, you are often away in your own inner world. You get along well with: The Pinky Stay away from: The Index Finger

What Finger Are You?

Part III - 6 PM

Yet another non-event comes to an end, with a whimper. TS Barry is downgraded to TD (Tropical Depression) Barry, and is rapidly becoming extra-tropical. The center is about 5 miles west of me at the moment, and moving north. We're under wind advisories until mid-nite, but it's calm right now, though it is raining.

We did most desperately need the rain, though - we've had less than half of our normal rains for two years in a row now, and the trees are really suffering. Most of this rain has been of the best kind, too, that soaks in instead of becoming instant run-off.

Back to indoor pursuits tomorrow, I hope!

Part II - 4 PM

Not doing so well on this update business, am I? Oh, well. We had a break in the rain bands earlier. Here's a look at 1 PM. There were occasional breezy bits, but not more than 10 mph.

Clouds have since gotten heavier, with a very light rain starting. Wind has picked up pretty smartly, with occasional gusts moving med. sized tree limbs around. Weather radar shows most of the heavy storm activity is to the north of us now - but they've promised we'll get more.

I'd post a pic of the current conditions, except a)that it would look about like the 1 PM pic, only somewhat darker; and b) my camera wants its battery recharged, so it is, and the camera is temporarily down.

TS Barry Part I

It started late yesterday afternoon with increasing cloud cover, and then shortly after sundown, a light mizzle started - too heavy to call fog, but not enough to call it a drizzle. Overnight this became heavier, and this morning could be called "rain".

This issued by the local NWS about 45 mins. ago... abstracted.

...STORM INFORMATION...AT 800 AM...THE CENTER OF TROPICAL STORM BARRY WAS LOCATED NEAR LATITUDE 27.1 NORTH...LONGITUDE 83.5 WEST OR ABOUT 260 MILES SOUTH-SOUTHWEST OF JACKSONVILLE FLORIDA.

...PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS...THE MOST SIGNIFICANT WEATHER ASSOCIATED WITH TROPICAL STORM BARRY IS LOCATED WELL TO THE NORTH AND EAST OF THE CENTER. THEREFORE IT IS IMPORTANT THAT YOU NOT CONCENTRATE ON THE STORM TRACK BUT RATHER REMAIN ALERT FOR POSSIBLE WATCHES AND WARNINGS. LOCALLY HEAVY RAIN WILL CONTINUE TO OVERSPREAD THE AREA TODAY WITH A FEW THUNDERSTORMS POSSIBLE.

...WINDS...THE STRONGEST WINDS ARE EXPECTED TO REMAIN OVER THE COASTAL WATERS WHERE GALE WARNINGS ARE IN EFFECT FOR WINDS OF 30 TO 35 KNOTS WITH HIGHER GUSTS. ONSHORE EAST WINDS WILL INCREASE TO VERY WINDY LEVELS ALONG THE I-95 CORRIDOR AND COASTAL COUNTIES TODAY WITH SUSTAINED WINDS OF 25 TO 30 MPH WITH GUSTS UP TO 40 MPH...AND WIND ADVISORIES ARE IN EFFECT UNTIL 10 PM TONIGHT. FARTHER INLAND OVER NORTHEAST FLORIDA AND PORTIONS OF INLAND SOUTHEAST GEORGIA...LAKE WIND ADVISORIES ARE IN EFFECT UNTIL 10 PM TONIGHT FOR SUSTAINED WINDS OF 20 TO 25 MPH WITH GUSTS UP TO 35 MPH AT TIMES.

Yes, Jacksonville is in the "I-95 corridor". And herewith the "View From My Front Porch" -

No wind to speak of as yet, as you can see by the clarity(?) of the tree-tops.

Move Along - Nothing to Read Here

It's been that kind of time, I fear. I have been absent from the blogosphere, have done no knitting, no stitching, have absolutely nothing concrete to present as the product of the past several days' endeavours, and am being harassed by unco-operative electrons 'til I'm ready to scream.

It all started, you see, the morning after I posted the last missive here. I woke up, and stumbled to the computer to check the mail. "Unable to find server" - not cataclysmic, or even uncommon - everyone's servers go down now and again. So I proceeded on with the morning, which involved running a bunch of errands. Imagine my surprise, to come out the side gate from the back to discover that the phone line from the pole to the house is in two pieces! One piece is attached to the house, and the other to the pole, and there's this gap betwixt the two. This might explain why the computer couldn't find the server? I did the assorted errands, and came back to the house. Fortunately, MSTC (My Son, The Chef, who provides the roof under which I reside) took that particular morning off, and was home, so I could borrow his cell phone - mine has fallen victim to having one too many cats dump over a glass of soda into it, and works fine, except that I can't talk and be heard, nor may I hear anyone else talking to me. I am reduced to texting! Gah...

Anyway, I then inaugurated the frustrating process of Dealing With the Phone Company. I called the toll-free number for service (sic) and explained the problem, and was asked if I had a dial tone. I say "No, this phone line is a DSL line for the computer. I do not have a voice land-line." The operator says "Please hold for a moment". Many minutes of elevator music. Then "This is Ms. W____. How may I help you?" So I explain everything again. "Do you have a dial tone?" "No, etc." "Oh, it's DSL! You need to talk to their service" and she gives me another toll-free number. I call and explain the problem yet again. "Do you have a dial tone?" "No, etc. But since the line is cut into two pieces, I wouldn't expect to. Isn't there some way you can check it from your end?" "Please hold." More elevator music. Same person comes back on the line, and explains they really need to know if I have a dial tone, because I don't have a maintenance agreement, and if the problem is in my house wiring, it will cost me $80 just for the service man to come to the house. I tell her that since the cut wire is between the pole and the house, I really don't think that applies. Then the thing which proves conclusively that people do NOT listen - "You mean the phone line is actually cut?" "Yes!!!!" Well, I'll send the service man out, but it would still be helpful to know if you have a dial tone. I said too bad, I have no way of finding out. She then tells me that the service man will arrive the next day, sometime between 7 AM and 9 PM. Futilely I enquire if it would be possible to narrow this down some. "No, sorry..." And so endeth the phone company communication. If I hear the question "Do you have a dial tone?" one more time, my interlocutor is going to find a blunt object of some sort buried in his frontal cortex!

The next morning, I'm sitting at the computer doing not much of anything, when all the electrics go out. I look out the window, see the electric company truck, and realize that once again MSTC has forgotten to pay the *(&^^&%*( electric bill! He informs me that he's going to pay it that morning - and shortly thereafter leaves the house with this intent. I'm wondering if the phone company guy is going to need the electric in order to do his thing, and hoping that the electric guy will arrive to turn everything back on before the phone guy arrives. As it happened, they arrived simultaneously, full of gossip regarding an apparent murder that had taken place down the road about a mile. They both do their thing, and amazingly enough, as soon as the phone wire is reconnected, the DSL is back up. And the service guy never did check to see if I had a dial tone, bless his heart!

Today, as I was returning from doing some shopping, my Rascal scooter suddenly decided to quit running. I texted MSTC, and he was able to get free after an hour to come and rescue me. I'm sure glad I didn't have any dairy or other meltable stuff in the shopping! It was hot and miserable waiting. I am so tired.

I came home, collapsed for a while, then came back to the computer. The clouds were thickening up, so out of curiosity, I checked the weather forecast. Tropical Storm Barry is coming late tonight for the weekend! It's supposed to bring a lot of rain with it, and I surely do hope it does. Might even be enough to put out the ()*&^*( fires, though possibly not, as they're only forecasting 2-3", which normally isn't enough to do the job. They did say that some places might get as much as 6", which probably would do it. Cross your fingers!

Stomping the Grape

I was going to take some time off this weekend from stitching projects, get some housework done, and just generally chill out. Nice thought, I guess. The siren song of the grape yarn lured me away. I was just going to do the toe, you understand - not go any further. I wanted to do it while the success on the Blasted Pink was still fresh in my mind. (Nice excuse, huh?) First go on the toe, it was technically a "success" but esthetically, left a great deal to be desired. Frog.

Second go, I don't know where my mind was, but it surely wasn't anywhere near my knitting needles. I have no idea *how* I did it - I really should figure it out because it would make a world-famous invisible decrease - but three sets of turns away from the finish of the toe, I discovered that I had 'lost' 6 stitches. I searched frantically for dropped stitches, but there weren't any. The Disappeared Ones did so symmetrically, 3 on each side, but totally invisibly - they just vanished into thin air! This did create a really oddly shaped toe, however. Frog.

Then the Tsarina got into a discussion of "lifelines" on her blog, which I had never heard of and had to look up - and it has changed my life forever. What a brilliant concept! I put it into practice on try #3 on the toe, placing the lifeline in the row where I started to go back up the toe from the tip (incrementing the number of live stitches each row). Placing the lifeline must have appeased the frog, because this time it went without a hitch.

Not wanting to leave the Grape in such a precarious situation, I decided to go ahead and knit the first couple of rounds on the whole sock. That went so well, I thought it couldn't hurt anything to just *set* the pattern row, could it?


I didn't want to leave *that* on the needles, either, because it might stretch the yarn permanently, just sitting there with all that tension on those stitches, so I knit out the first repeat of the pattern. Then it looked so lonesome that I had to knit a companion for it, didn't I?


Here's the sock, with the first two repeats of the pattern, and ready to start the nifty "hidden" increases my oddly-shaped foot requires.


The left side:

















The right side:


















And the top of the sock:


















I am pleased. It's not a masterpiece, by any means, but I think it's acceptably journeyman quality, which is definitely progress! I have no idea why the picture of the right side looks so strange. I assure you that the short-row stuff looks even better than the left side in reality.

Before your eyes, that icon of knitterly propriety, the Swatch.

This one is for the grape heather socks I'm starting. It's telling me that I'm knitting 6.25 st. and 8 rows per inch in stockinette. This is very good, as when I was knitting the Baby Sockie, I was getting 7.5 st. and 9 rows, so I've loosened up quite nicely. However, I'm only knitting the toes, heels, and soles in stockinette, so the Swatch is only of marginal use. I don't really feel like knitting another three swatches to take measurements of the various textures I'm going to be using on the rest of the sock. So, I'm going to use the impirical method to get these socks to fit properly.

This is really a very simple procedure. Every so often, at points where, knowing my feet as I do, I think it's needful, I'm going to try the sock on. If it goes on smoothly, so much the better. If it seems a bit tight, I'll increase a couple of stitches in the next row or two. If it's *really* tight, I'll frog back a ways and start increasing there.

However, the socks are going to be put on hold for a short while, as the mail yesterday brought to me the first two of many models I'm going to be cross-stitching for a designer just getting started in Germany. This is actual *paid* work, people! Sheckles in the travel fund. Not many, alas, but better than none. Therefore, I shall be cross-stitching for the next few days. I can't even post pictures for you, as the designs haven't been published yet. "Secret" projects!

Sailing, sailing

The Great and Powerful Wizard of Tsocks has spoken, and I have heeded. As a result, I am now happy with the completed short-row toe!

I'm sorry this picture is as blurry-eyed as I am this morning, but as you can, I hope, see, no holes, no weirdness, just nice smooth sock! It was my intention to knit a few more rows, then turn a heel, but two rows of juggling all the stitch holders and small DPNs in order to knit in the round on a pair of SPs was enough. I'm sure I know what I'm doing now, and see no point in repeating it.

So what was the magic solution? Very simple - instead of worrying about that last wrapped and slipped stitch at the other end of the WS row, go ahead and pick up the stitches for the top of the sock from the provisional cast-on, knit across them, and work that last stitch on the WS row as a knit stitch now, then continue on knitting across the stitches for the sole of the sock. Simple, obvious, once it's pointed out - and a lesson in not overly complicating things!

So instead of juggling stitch holders, I started swatching for the first "real" sock! Memo to self - do *not* fall asleep whilst knitting on DPNs: the face making contact with the sharp pointy ends of all those things is not a pleasant way to reawaken! I'm swatching again, even though this sock is knit in the same yarn as the Baby Sockie, just a different color (Grape heather), because my tension has, I think, changed considerably. As the Great and Powerful etc. pointed out to me earlier, I was knitting very tightly, and I didn't realize *how* tightly until I did the ribbing on the Baby Sockie. I loosened it up considerably, so need to re-swatch.

I will be posting progress reports on the sock, but not in nearly the detail as this angst over the short-row technique. I'm going to try to establish some sort of schedule, so knitting posts will be one day, embellished crazy quilting another, cross-stitch a third, and so forth. (Is that laughter I hear from up there in the peanut gallery?)

Be of good heart - it's Tuesday, and you survived yesterday!