Sock yarn and August 2009

I am fairly busy these days because of the project that has nothing to do with knitting. It takes a good deal of my free time preventing me not only from blogging but from knitting as well. As soon as more of it is ready I will share all the details with you.
Today I do not have any exciting FO's or even WIP's to show you, here are some pictures of my yarn. These are 2 skeins of Regia sock yarn I got a while ago.

First is Regia Nordic sock yarn #5517. It is light and monochrome - I am thinking of making a fairly complex lacy socks with it.


And this one is Regia Nordic #5517. It has very nice green-purple modulations but it is not too bright. Given the unusual colour I would prefer to knit it with a more simple stitch. Maybe a bit of texture would create an interesting but not overwhelming sock.


Speaking of socks, what are your plans for August 2009? Do not know yet? Let me help you: Sock Summit 2009 - a great project organized by a team of well-known knitters ( Tina Newton, Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, Cat Bordhi, Leslie Cumming, JCBriar, Debbi Stone, and Claire Scott) will take place on August 6-9, 2009 at the Oregon Convention Center (Portland, Oregon). You can read more about it in the latest Yarn Harlot's blog post.

Award

I got my first award - the Brilliant Blog one. I was so excited last night that I even had a hard time falling asleep! Thank you so much, Susan, for nominating me. By the way, you should check out her blog (Knitting Alone).

Now it is my turn to nominate 7 bloggers to pass the award on. It is not an easy task considering the number of knitting (and not knitting) blogs I like. I will let you guess the number, it is a 3-digit one.

So my nominees are:

Knitting on Impulse
a Whistler-based knitter who dyes the most beautiful fiber, makes jewellery, and takes picture of the magnificent West Coast.

SweetP Knits
I have mentioned Gabes in my previous post. Her posts always put a smile on my face, maybe it is because of her beautiful knitting, or maybe it is her cute children, or maybe it is the pink background of the page? Whatever it is, reading her posts makes me smile.

Sel and Poivre
Can not quite remember how I found this blog but it is yet another blog with beautiful photography, knitting, and interesting posts.

Ysolda
This young lady is quite famous in the knitting community. If you do not know her - rush over to her blog. She got nice patterns, tutorials, and you might be able to attend one of her lessons.

We heart yarn
What can I say? I am a sucker for beautiful, clean designs and a nice mix of knitting and nature. Yet another visual candy (with reading substance!)

Anna's flying needles
Although I have never commented on Anna's posts I have been lurking around for a while. I really like things she knits.

And the last but not least ..... well it was hard to decide, so it's a tie between these 3:

Two little bunshees
Heart felt
The akamai knitter

I know I was suppose to nominate only 7 but there are just too many talented bloggers and it never hurts to spread the joy and brilliance, right?

Discovering

I really like finding out new things and the past several days were filled with happy discoveries.

Here is the first one:



Hemingway's "Super Stitches Knitting"- a gift from my non-knitting coworker. I have been looking at stitchionaries available at the bookstores and on Amazon for a while. I am not ready to design my own sweaters yet, but I would like to try my creativity and knit a scarf or a headband using different stitches. "Super stitches knitting" seems to be perfect for that. The book is divided into sections including: "knit and purl", "lace", "fair isle", and so on. It also has a section with tips and instructions on casting on, binding off, colour-work, and fixing errors (that one will be useful). I can not wait to create my own project using some of the stitches from the book and I think I know what it might be.

The second discovery was a long awaited first issue of Debbie Bliss magazine.


There are several interesting items in this magazine and overall presentation and design are very beautiful. I think Debbie Bliss magazine will be one of my favorites.

The last 2 discoveries were online magazines. The Inside Loop - UK based knitting magazine and Knotions. Both look very interesting and I will be spending some time reading the articles and choosing patterns I like.

There was actually another discovery or should I say an acquisition (yet another gift) but I will dedicate a separate post to it once I take proper pictures.

What I will be knitting tonight.

Do you have those days when a certain word, item, or a song keeps popping up everywhere? Today was one of those days for me. It started with Esya (aka Urwen) sending me these images she found on one of LiveJournal communities:

They are all part of Luisa Cerano's collection
"Look how cool these bracelets are" said she.
And indeed knitted bangles are pretty impressive. I have seen pictures of bangles made simply by wrapping the yarn around the wooden/plastic base but it was the first time I saw knitted ones. And considering the popularity of the fabric bangles these will get popular soon.

I had just enough time to finish the conversation with Esya when Gabes (aka SweetP) posted this picture on her blog:


Not only prooving my theory about knitted bangles being "cool", not only explaining that this could be a very neat way of trying new stitches or making swatches, but providing us all with a link to instructions of how to make them!

If you want to have the latest "it" object for Fall, hurry up over to See Mi Knit, pick up some leftover yarn, and get to work. You have four days left until the First of September.

P.S. Do not forget to say "Thank you" to Gabes.

Blobs

I am back to civilization and knitting. Sorry for leaving abruptly but I was hiding in Toronto for over a week and since people from whom I was hiding tend to read my blog I had to stop posting for a while.... These people are the reason why I could not show my crocheted project until now.
Here is the last picture of "almost finished" secret project:


And here are all the balls and arms assembled into 2 "blobs":


Same blobs but with the hand-made card:


These are modified Doug and Gordo from Crochet Me book. They do not look much like the original ones (I hope Kim Werker would forgive me for that) - I used a completely different size of yarn and had to improvise with the eyes and "costumes". I wanted them to look more like a girl and a boy, since they were part of the wedding gift for my two wonderful friends.

Twist Collective

It is the first day of August. I decided that this month calls for some changes and as a result my blog has a new colour palette. I like blue-brown colour combo and even though I do not have anything blue-brown in the "real" life it is a nice combination for my virtual "home".

Knitting news: Twist Collective is out! I know, I know you all are aware of it, you actually knew about this Canadian project for a while (I found out about it this morning, thanks to Lin), some of you submitted patterns, others were posting sneak peaks on Ravelry, and those who were completely oblivious to it read Yarn Harlot's blog post. But hey, I am a bit slow these days.
I had no clue that Twist Collective existed until early this morning and I had no time to post about it because I was running late to my driving lesson (told you, I am slow, I do not know how to drive, at my age!). So even if you have heard about it already, hear once again, and go check it out!


Have a great knitting weekend, everyone!

Good yarn

Take a look at these gorgeous knitting images. They are part of "A good yarn" project - a yarn store that has more than just yarn.
I was not sure which image to choose for the last-day-of-July post but this one is too funny.

Useful

My collection of favorite knitting blogs is growing - take a look at the right-side bar!!!
One of them, is Lime & Violet a great resource ran by 2 great women (Miss Lime and Miss Violet). In their blog (which is only a tiny part of the whole project) they post useful and interesting knitting-related information. Today it was this:

As it turns out they found the chart on Label-free blog - another useful resource, this time for those who like to sew. Go and check both blogs and do not forget to get Lime & Violet button.

Knitters'

No knitting pictures today. I am a very very slow knitter these days. However I picked up a copy of Knitters' magazine couple of days ago.

They have shawl patterns as well as an article by my favorite Cat Bordhi about sock knitting (what else). The issue also features several nice summer tops and since I am too chicken to knit a big sweater, a nice top or cardigan could be a fun project.
Here are some of my favorite designs. I will appreciate any suggestion and colour changes:





To see all the designs from this issue of Knitters' click here. You can also browse through past issues to find a model you like.

And I can not not show you a beautiful sock pattern by Cat Bordhi:

They are called "Spring Thaw Socks" and it seems like they are made of snow, first spring leaves, and snowdrops.

It is quite obvious that all the images in this post are taken from Knitters' website.

Contest

I LOVE knitting community (all those people behind blogs and Ravelry profiles). It seems to be a very friendly, helpful, and entertaining bunch full of stories, photographs, FOs, stash, yarn give-aways, and contests. Just today I left a comment with a question on Monika's blog and got a detailed answer via email in a matter of minutes!

Yarn contests seem to be big in the knitting world. No wonder - who can resist an addition to the stash collection? For the yarn-addicts here is a contest from Knit Witch and Amia yarn store:

Just click on the image or HERE to read the instructions.

Good luck to all of you!

Addition to my stash

July has been busy .... busy with work, trip to Toronto, meeting friends, and knitting. It was also busy with discovering new yarn stores and getting additions to my stash. If you are looking for a place to get a lot of different yarn you have to go to Toronto's Romni Wools.

I have read several reviews about the store. I also seen this picture on their website. I was expecting a big place but felt like it would be more of a warehouse and that I would not like it there. One thing for sure, the place is HUGE. It is the biggest yarn store I have seen so far. And yes, it has a bit of a warehouse-ish ambiance, but hey, they have SO much yarn that it is hard not to look like a warehouse. By the way, apart form different yarn they also carry a great selection of needles and hooks by different producers.

Seeing this colour/texture explosion I almost broke down in tears (now I know how my sister feels when she walks into an art-supply store, and why Urgwen becomes "not quite her usual self" in the bead stores). I felt overwhelmed by the beauty and shear amount of yarn. I could have not walked out without purchasing at least something, so here is my small addition to the stash:


This is a beautiful sock yarn from Araucania. I will admit that the colour combination is not my first choice but since I have been stuck on blues recently I let my sister pick the colour and she fell for this one. I doubt I would be making socks with this, I can envision a beautiful scarf or maybe a pair of warm mittens. The colour of this yarn is 501 and here you can see all the subtle details of it.

Romni Wools has the greatest selection of sock yarn. I wanted some darker and earthy colours and found this:


I am struggling to figure out the name of this one. I know it is German but would like to know how it is called.

And finally, I could have not walked away from the gorgeous Fleece Artist Suri Blue (the colourway is called Dandelion). It will be definitely turned into a shawl some time soon.


If you want to see other colours Fleece Artist makes this site has a beautiful collection with all the names.

Don't you wish you slipperS WERE hot like mine?

I finally have a finished project to share with you. Now I have 2 sexy slippers – “woot woot woot” - like my sister would say.


It took me a while to finish the second slipper, probably because I was dreading the knitting of ties. Remember, I made a mistake when knitting the ties of the first slipper and it made my knitting life so much more difficult. I did not want the second slipper look any different so I purposefully knitted the ties in a wrong fashion. But now, all of this is behind and I am enjoying my super-warm Twinkletoes.


There are a couple of mistakes (they are all on the sole so it would not be noticeable), also the second slipper is slightly looser at the back – this is what happens when you wait too long before completing the project.


And what would look nice with these slippers? A pair of matching socks. Here is a beginning of “Cablenet” in Regia #5769. I am very excited to attempt this rather difficult pattern. I would not stress myself with knitting it fast – it would be one of those “knit a bit when feel like it” projects.


Since I am sharing my progress here is how the felted purse looks like:


It is growing pretty fast and I am excited about felting it. By the way, is it me or felting is super popular today? While in Toronto I saw Toronto Outdoors Art Expo and was amazed to see several stands with felted purses. I also noticed felted items in different clothes/accessories stores. I better hurry up to learn this technique if I want to stay “cool”.

Do you <3 socks as I <3 them?

I was browsing through endless knit blogs and stumbled upon these beauties:





Meet Cookie A.
I think these socks are divine and should be worn instead of shoes for some special occasions. Go to the website and check out other sock beauties.

How far is Toronto?

Here is Palette on my way there:


And this is what I brought home last night:


I did not knit all the time while on the bus but I am happy with the progress made.
The pattern for Palette comes from one of back-issues of Knitty. I decided to experiment with yarn and used a skein of Noro(S185) sock-yarn I've picked up at Mouline Yarns.

The picture comes from THIS German website.
And HERE you can find another gorgeous picture of the yarn

Originally I was thinking of making socks, something like this beauty by The Loopy Ewe. At the same time I wanted a fun project that would be easy enough to knit on the bus, yet challenging to prevent me from dozing off. This lacy scarf proved to be ideal.

Toronto - the city of yarn and honey.

I am in Toronto and I have big plans for the weekend, specially for tomorrow: I will be having a yarn-storethon. We (my sister and I) will start with Kensington market and the one and only Lettuce Knit. After, we will be heading to the Queen street for The Knit Cafe and Romni Wools (they are having 20% off on some of their yarns!). Thank you, Angela, for your suggestion.

While in Montreal I was busy with the The Print O' The Wave Stole. Here is what it looks like for now:


I can already see the design of the stole. Can not wait to block it and see the yarn "bloom".

And this is my crochet project. I am really happy with the yarn - it is easy to work with and it makes a rather random pattern.


Time to get some rest before tomorrow's yarn-storethon.

Ravelry and errata

I discovered Ravelry. After giving it just a quick glance I understand why most of the knitting (and as it turns out not only knitting) people are using it. I will try to dedicate a separate blog post to Ravelry, for now I just want to share a piece of important information I found. Remember my Reverse Psockology socks?
It turns out there is an errata for the pattern. As Anne Pattigrew, the creator of this pattern, mentions on her blog:

it is difficult to get the holes formed by the yarn-overs the same size
because of the transition between knit and purl stitches

I remember noticing it when working on my pair but I did not know if it was "normal" or if it happened because of my uneven knitting style, after all it was my first pair of socks.
For those of you who are working on these, here you can find a different version of the lacy pattern.

Lacy links

For those of you who are learning to knit lace, here are 4 tutorials from Eunny:

Introduction to majoring in lace
Yarn and needle choices
The structure of lace
Cast ons for lace knitting

Happy lace knitting!

Defeated

There are no knitting news today. I slightly advanced on my second slipper and a bit on my new project but I did not even take pictures of the progress. Reason?

LACE

I started knitting lace and the last 2 days have been spend decoding ssk, k2sp, and k2tog(s). Inspired by my own post about the alpaca yarn, I decided to get back to my shawl, ripped down whatever I had knitted earlier, and started fresh with a 5-stitch chain.

- After the first 13 rows I had a light suspicion that the shawl did not look like what it should be

- After the 30th row, the annoying voice in my head told me to stop but I convinced it that I should keep going and that the pattern will miraculously emerge (I believe in miracles, I really do, even after last night!)

- After the 64th row I started panicking, wet the swatch, tried to pin it down, failed miserably, stretched it and looked at it from every possible angle to see the glimpses of the design.

- After yet another hour spend meditating on my swatch I said:
(I don’t think I should write down what I said, because there might be children reading this) and began looking for another …. lace pattern (did I mention before that I am very stubborn? Wait a minute; let me put it in my profile description).

- By 2 AM I learned how to do invisible cast on (KnittingHelp video), did it 2 times (again, I’ll omit everything I was saying and mumbling at that time) and knitted first 3 rows of this gorgeous stole, by Eunny.

Oh wait, there was also an incident with scissors but do not worry, everyone is alive and in good health.

Today’s plan for the evening: knit the first rows of the stole. G-d, give me strength and patience.



Meanwhile, I would have to admire the work of others, like this gorgeous Turquoise Lace made by The Daily Purl (click on the image to see the original post):


If you like knitting, weaving, and beautiful photography - visiting her blog is a must!

Don't you wish your slipper was hot like mine?

Do you remember a little secret project I started a while ago? I think it is time to share some of my progress with you. The little blue swatch turned into a wonderful sexy slipper (I have been a slow knitter recently and the second slipper is still in progress).

For those of you who do not know me or my taste in shoes, here is a picture of the sexiest shoes ever, according to Anna. And yes, I owe a pair exactly like this:

Now you can see why I use the word “sexy” when describing my new slipper. The pattern comes from one of back issues of “Knitty” and it is called: “Twinkletoes”. I slightly modified the original pattern: by mistake, I did not knit the strings same way as described on the pattern. I also did not knit the 1k1p border, since it was making slippers a bit bulky-looking. Because of this modification I am afraid that the back of the Sexy Slipper would slip off my foot (no pun intended). A loop in the back of the shoe that would hold the slipper and the straps would prevent slipping. I will definitely post pictures if this modification will be made.

When my dad saw the Sexy Slipper he asked with terror in his voice whether I was planning on wearing it outside! Sometimes I wonder what others think about me.

The new technique I learned from this patter was a "Lifted Increase/Decrease". Although the pattern provided explanations and instructions I searched some detailed instructions and videos and here are links to the most useful ones:

Wonder How To has links to every possible "How to" video. Here is the one for Lifted Increase/Decrease

Stich Diva Studio has some useful instructions with step-by-step photographs. Here is her version of LI/D. I really like the way she uses yarn of 2 different colors to make explanations easier.