The Christmas knits are slowly coming off the needles. Last night I finished mom’s scarf gave it a quick soak and hung it to dry which was enough to uncurl it and open up the stitches a little bit. It’s gorgeous; I think she’s going to love it and it should look great with her purple winter coat.

Pattern: The same chevron scarf variation I used for mine this summer

Yarns: Colinette Jitterbug in Marble, Blue Moon Fiber Arts Socks that Rock Lightweight in Scottish Highlands

I ended it early enough that I have plenty of yarn leftover. I doubt I’ll have time before Christmas with the other projects I need to wrap up, but she’ll likely get a matching pair of gloves for her birthday next month.

Lots of photos, I had a fun little interlude between loads of laundry and cleaning tonight playing with the camera around the tree and my snowball candles centerpiece on my coffee table. That said, the apartment is in decent shape now and all set for Mike to arrive tomorrow night.

It took winding 7 skeins of sock yarn to find one that would behave. This one is still pooling, it’s just doing so in a more attractive way than the others were. I would have switched up patterns, but it was easier to just dive back into the stash each time something came out a little odd. Plus as gift socks, jaywalkers are too temperamental in their fit. I did toy with a couple patterns from Sensation Knitted Socks, but fell back on a favorite old standby instead.  I’ve now got 3 pattern repeats into a pair of Monkey Socks in Sock Pixie’s La Vie en Rose colorway. This was of course all obvious procrastination so I wouldn’t have to work on the teeny-needled dad socks, nor cast on for the 4th time for my brother’s ginormous socks.

There was one other benefit from winding so much sock yarn though. I found the perfect color pairing and cast on for the chevron scarf I’m planning for my mom. She’s been itching to get mine from me ever since I started it and while this color combo isn’t nearly as crazy and bright, it’s fitting to her color sensibilities of late.  This one is Socks that Rock in Scottish Highlands striped with Colinette Jitterbug in Marble.

I’ve been neglecting the blog again. I did finally find a template that doesn’t look like ass in IE and I’ve been playing with it some behind the scenes so expect a more realistic blogroll and a new podcast-roll in the near future and some other little tweaks to the stuff hanging out on the sidebar here.

I won’t neglect the blog for long though. Tandaina posted a convincing post for NaBloPoMo, and I’m jumping on the bandwagon for a good kick start and rejuvenation in blogging again. I haven’t quite figured out how I’m going to approach the month yet, I might run into some day-of-the-week themes if the writing gets harried, but I’m mostly going to just play by ear and see where the day to day takes me. It’ll definitely be a new approach for me, since I’ve been going with the neglect and vague update route for a while now.

On the neglect and vague update front, I do have a FO to show off. I used that same fingerless mitt pattern I made before and added fingers to make a pair of gloves that match my Chevron Scarf. I realized with all the accessories I’ve been mentally knitting (because I’m just not getting stuff on or off the needles lately) that I should have at least two winter accessories that “matched”. I figure I can make a slew of winter hats in a zillion different solids to pair with the matched set of the chevron and gloves. The second glove fits a little better, I made the pinkie a little longer, and the thumb shaped a little differently and it worked better than what I’d done on the first glove, but I love them, and knitting fingers weren’t nearly as annoying as I expected them to be. They definitely get a thumbs up.

I really need to focus on getting Christmas knit to within an inch of it’s life so barring wrapping up a small project or two, these gloves will be the last selfish knit for a while. The holiday knits will be getting the forefront of the blog. There are a lot of those holiday knits to take that forefront as well, I’ve got at least 10 things on my list to make and half that list is socks. So, that’s at least 5 FOs a month for the next two months.

Other news, my car has been back in my posession for almost two weeks now and it’s behaving so far. I was also possessed by the spirit of a neat freak over the weekend (that neat freak, Peter Walsh… I borrowed his book from the library and read it in two evenings last week) and took on a massive cleaning/decluttering in my bedroom. I rearranged the furniture and cleaned out the dresser and one of the nightstands on Friday night, spent Saturday clearing out the closet and spent Sunday doing laundry. Lots and lots of laundry. Lots of stuff to the dumpster and I’ve got a carfull (9 garbage bags + other stuff!) ready for goodwill and my bedroom and closet are the cleanest they’ve been sice I moved in. I also unearthed a corner bookshelf that’s been occupying the corner behind the bed for the 7 years since I moved in and it’s just the right size to hold all of my sock yarn. So, the sock yarn stash is no longer living in the middle of the living room in a computer box.

I did come to the realization that there’s a lot of little furniture in my bedroom. The only big pieces in there are my bed and the dresser. Once my finances are in better shape, I’ll be investing in a bigger bookcase and that should give me enough room to move most of the rest of the non-acrylic stash into the bedroom. For the time being though, I’m focussing on getting more stuff out of the house. The living room will be the next attack zone and hopefully the inner neat freak will stick around long enough to tackle the middle bedroom dump zone. I suspect this topic will get revisited, since I’ve got 3o days of posting daily ahead of me. See ya back here on Thursday!

About a week ago, I finished two scarves. My chevron scarf is done now and an un-blogged bulky weight striped garter stitch scarf I started to use up a little bit of stash is also done.

The chevron scarf gets the spotlight, it was a spur of the moment impulse project back in April and the first half of the scarf went along quite quickly. It got a little bit of work here and there over the summer and once I hit the end of the first skeins it sat while I debated if the length was enough without adding the second skeins on. I finally decided a couple weeks ago to add the second skeins in and knit up another foot or so before calling it finished.

It’s gorgeous, I loved working with the Claudia’s Handpainted, and the carousel and cotton candy colorways behaved beautifully with one another. I love the drape on the fabric and the steaming I gave it to uncurl the stockinette softened it up even more.

It will be a great addition to my fall wardrobe and you’ll definitely be seeing it around my neck at amusement parks near you this fall and for many to come.

The black and white bulky scarf is completely different in nearly every way. Well, except that is was also an impulse project. The yarn was in my stash and for some reason it jumped out at my while I was going through it for Ravelry. It’s bulky weight wool ease, I’m not even entirely certain how it made it into my stash, but there it was. I grabbed it and put the needles near the computer and a few weeks later, it had practically made itself.  It will also be warm and nice for the fall and winter.

I’ve since moved on to other projects, lots and lots of socks and a major surprise object that can be used as a measure of my obsessions are going to be blogged about in the very near future. But the scarves deserved their own post.

I’ve been thinking about blogging instead of actually blogging this week. I’ve got plenty to talk about though. Mostly knitting related. It’s not that I’m not sympathetic or saddened by the horrific events of this week in the news, but if knitting is a coping method, then talking about knitting is too.

For some reason I’m becoming enamored with complex patterns right now. It’s always at the most inconvenient times though. Even if the weather isn’t cooperating, it is in fact approaching spring and summer, and for me, that means that coaster season is ramping up. I’ve got my first amusement park road trip planned for this coming weekend and a longer trip planned next month. Many weekends will be spent traveling and while I can play with more complex knitting on flights or maybe even as a passenger in the car, it’s probably best for me to stick with fairly simple projects while I’m on the road. So I should be dreaming of more simple patterns or at least those with easy to remember repeats that just look complicated. Instead, I’m eyeing things like the Austrian-patterned knee high socks in the Socks.Socks.Socks book or Eunny’s Bayerische socks or Nancy Bush’s Chalet Socks. I have this odd all-consuming itch to make teeny tiny cables on little bitty sock needles and I think that itch needs to be scratched soon.

Of course, I also want another pair of jaywalkers and a pair of monkey socks for myself, and I want to make Cookie’s Twisted Flower socks, and keep some needles free for the rest of the sock madness patterns, and make mom another pair or two, and… too many to list really.

Not that I don’t already have plenty in progress. It’s definitely time to tackle a roundup of the WIPs. And I need to show a little bit of discipline and wrap up a couple projects before I start adding more to the list. Really.

Pomotomous - these are my more complex linger and savor slow moving sock project right now. I’m still on sock #1, slowly making my way onto the foot. I’m not sure why I’m being pokey with this pattern, the repeats aren’t that difficult to remember despite being a reasonable-sized chart. It may be all the twisted stitches. I am enjoying the yarn however, so it is kinda nice to savor it and use it up slowly. They’ll get done when they get done and not a second before.

Baudelaire - These are moving along a little faster, I’m ready to do the heel on sock #2. Once I get the heel turned, the cuff can and should finish up fairly quickly. I just need to sit down and do it. I love how the first sock came out and I can’t wait to wear the finished pair. These should be wrapping up soon.

JKnits stockinette socks - The first sock that I was working on when the Harlot was here is done and I’ve started sock #2. These are going to be my trial at in-park knitting this weekend. I’ve got the go-knit pouch all ready to go and depending on how much in-park knitting I actually do, I may have this pair done this weekend. I’ll probably try to keep some stockinette socks on the needles all summer to serve as in-park knits if these work out well this weekend.

Amusement Park Chevron Scarf - This is getting longer and longer when I pick it up. I’m almost to the halfway point and I still absolutely love it. It’s quick and simple and easy to pick up and knit a couple rows here and there. If it weren’t getting so long, it would be a good candidate for in-park knitting. Instead, this will be my car/hotel knitting this weekend between parks and on the long road down to and back from Kentucky. Its another project that I think may wrap up sooner rather than later.

I also added two new projects to my needles this last weekend.

Mad Weave Socks - I’m out of the competetive side of sock madness, but I’m still knitting the patterns and this was the one released for round 4. I had originally started it in some Wildfoote that was dark purples with turquoise and pink, but that yarn will get a new life as my next stockinette pair as it was a little too dark to show off the patterning. So I frogged it and cast on with this bright and fun merino from KimiK. My last sock madness socks were sunset socks, these are going to be my sunrise socks and so far the colors are showing off the pattern remarkably well. They’ve been my bedside knitting for the last couple nights.

Also new, despite several failed and naieve attempts with other yarns, I’ve made my first forray into real lace knitting with real laceweight yarn. I got the knitpicks needle set over the weekend and grabbed the single ball of red lacy lamb I had purchased last summer and cast on this scarf from Victorian Knitting Today. I’ve done enough with sock-weight yarn now, that the laceweight isn’t seeming nearly as intimidating. I’ve made it though the first repeat of the center pannel pattern (I don’t claim to be fast) and I’m enjoying it as well. It’s an 8-row repeat done 48 times, and I suspect it will grow slowly and be a much longer term project until I clear the needles some more and increase my comfort level with both the laceweight yarn and the knitpicks needles. If this goes well, I’ve got some other laceweight yarns in the stash to play with eventually too and I’ve built up a bit more of a lace library to play from.

As for the legwarmers that I gave up on in February, they finally got frogged tonight for being too tight. I’ll give that pattern another chance later on. For now I’m far more intrigued with cables and lace than I am with colorwork. I think that’s all thats on the needles for now. All these itches and a bout of start-itis, another STR Sock Club Kit package (I really should get around to making the first kit soon too) and some more loophole purchases lately may add some more things to the mix however.

Gromit says, “Mom, get out of the window, I’m trying to stalk the birds.”

• A trend.
• A free variation on the pattern that I actually kinda like a little better than the original.
• A knitter with a weakness for anything remotely reminiscent of amusement parks. (as an aside to the yarn-dyers out there who may stumble upon this, please don’t take note of this particular obsession of mine, I’d like to have a little money left to visit the amusement parks too).
• A far too convenient shopping locale.
• A very dangerous loophole that I have yet to close.

There’s one obvious and logical conclusion that can come from adding up all of these factors.

I spent Monday evening working on the start of a Claudia’s Handpainted carousel & cotton candy chevron scarf.

And I love it!