Ruthless Knitting

Pattern: Just your basic toe-up sock
Size: Women’s medium/large
Yarn: Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Sock Multi (80 percent superwash wool, 20 percent nylon; 215 yds per 2 oz skein)
Yardage: About 1.25 skeins
Source: Iris Fine Yarns 
Needles: US 0 (2.0 mm) double-pointed metal needles
Gauge: No idea — I forgot to check.
Notes: By the skin of my teeth, I managed to finish my mom’s socks before our vacation ended on Saturday morning, and she agreed to model them for your viewing pleasure.

These were pretty straightforward socks. They have what I think Charlotte Schurch calls an "easy toe" in her book Sensational Knitted Socks: I began with a simple little stockinette rectangle 18 stitches wide by 8 rows long, then picked up stitches along the three sides and increased at each corner on every other row until I had 18 stitches on each needle. After that, it was just round and round to the heel.

Because I reached the heel of the first sock on the day I was taking Lucy Neatby’s sock class, I used her directions to create a simple garter-stitch short-row heel. Perhaps the most interesting thing about this heel is that it uses more than 50 percent of the stitches on the sock, which Lucy says creates a more comfortable heel. For the second sock, which I didn’t knit for a few months after the first was completed, I didn’t have her directions with me, and I’m not entirely confident that I used the same method of wrapping. Still, the two socks seem passably similar. Mom seems to like them, so I call the project a success!

Pattern: Harry by Martin Storey from Jaeger Handknits JB29
Size: 6-9 mo. (20" chest)
Yarn: Knit Picks Telemark (100 percent Peruvian highland wool; 103 yds per 50 g ball) in Lichen, Colonial Blue, Delft Heather, Squirrel Heather, Icicle, and Deep Navy; Henry’s Attic Kona Superwash DK, undyed
Yardage: Unknown quantity of leftovers
Sources: Knit Picks; Catnip Yarns 
Needles: US 3 (3.25 mm) and 4 (3.5 mm) straight needles
Gauge: About 25 stitches and 32 rows  = 4" in stockinette stitch
Notes: This little sweater is so satisfyingly cute that it makes up for the lengthy finishing stage, which involved sewing up all the pieces, knitting up the button bands and seaming them on, knitting on the collar, and weaving in far more ends than I could possibly have produced in the process of knitting the sweater.

I decided to knit Harry in the first place because I had a bunch of leftover Telemark yarn in search of a project. Unfortunately, I didn’t know exactly how much I had of anything, so I had to make some educated guesses about how many stripes I could manage of each color, and I did run out of navy blue at the end — as I ran out of just about every color. This made the decision about what color to make the collar quite simple: the collar had to be gray, because that was the only color I had left in sufficient quantity. And then I ran out of gray, so the collar is a bit on the short side. I decided to finish it off in navy to help make it match the rest of the sweater. Necessity is the mother of invention.

While looking through one of my grandma’s photo albums yesterday, I saw a picture of a sweater she made me for Christmas when I was about ten. I had forgotten all about this sweater, and I was surprised to find that it uses the exact same pattern as the Harry sweater (horizontal stripes with a few rows of "teeth" at each transition) and pretty much the same colors (several shades of blue with white on top). How delightful!

I’m visiting my parents this week, so I’m trying to get my mother’s second sock done while I’m here. Next up will probably be a sweater from the Woobu yarn that I showed in my last post. I knit a swatch that I’m very happy with; I have to see what the intended recipient thinks. The Woobu knits up like a dream, and it has a really impressive shine that somehow manages not to be garish. I’m looking forward to working with it.

I’ve finished all the pieces of the Harry sweater and sewed up the raglan seams. Now I just have to finish the collar . . .

. . . and weave in some loose ends.

The ends are many in number, but I know from experience that the task is not too bad if I just take it one at a time.

We returned yesterday afternoon from a long weekend visiting family, and in three days we’re heading out of town again. Before we do, I have a somewhat daunting list of tasks to accomplish, so I’m trying to take them one at a time, too.

Meanwhile, while I was away, this lovely Woobu (wool/bamboo) yarn arrived from Blue Moon Fiber Arts.

These enormous skeins are each a half-pound, so this should be more than enough yarn for a sweater for my friend Tina. If I can figure out how to wind these monsters, I’ll wind off some little balls that I can use to swatch. I’m looking forward to trying the yarn out — I’ve never used Blue Moon yarn, nor have I ever knit with something that contains bamboo. It will be interesting to figure out how it will behave in sweater form.