A Milestone

I have finished two sleeves and the body and am about to join them to work on the yoke of a sweater, the same one you have seen here and swatched here. It is the Tangled Yoke cardigan from the Fall 2007 Interweave Knits (that's a Ravelry link). I am actually using the recommended yarn: Rowan Felted Tweed in Crush - number 139 and it does look like I will have plenty of yarn. Yippee! This is one of the yarns that has been discontinued and it looked like I would have to modify the sweater to have enough yarn, but luckily I found two extra balls!

I love the garter rib on the body and arms of this sweater, and just might have to do some more of it soon! I think an idea might be brewing....

Now I'm off to join the arms to the body. I know I'm still far from done, but I feel like I'm on the homestretch.

And then the button band.

And then the buttons.

Knitting with Steel

Kusha-Kusha Scarf

But my own, simple version. Cast-on, knit, cast-off.

Yarn: Habu Wool-Stainless Steel, Knit Picks Lace in Sunset.

I overdyed the merino in the hopes of getting more complimentary colors; I may throw the whole thing back in dye when I finish.

I love the simplicity, although it's not something I would usually begin. I found the stainless steel at Habu a few weeks ago and couldn't pass it up. It will be my first journey into felting, so hopefully it will benefit from the process.

Dragon Socks

I really like the way the pattern stands out so clearly when it's on the foot. It's really much better than when it's off. I stuck an eye-of-partridge heel flap along with a Dutch heel on these babies. They would have been a perfect, fast knit except that I forgot 2 fundamental elements of sock knitting.

1) Make sure your heel flap uses 1/2 of your stitches. This one was closer to 1/3 of the total stitches. No wonder the gusset decreases went by so quickly!

2) Measure the length of your foot! I cranked this one out and tried it on and it was a good inch too short. Thankfully, I have no fear of dropping stitches, so I just cut off the heel (with one snip and then unravelling the yarn, of course -- I'm not completely insane!), knit another inch or so and kitchenered the whole thing together. Again, the difference between the heel-flap stitches and the instep stitches came back to haunt me when I did the toe! In this process, make sure you pick up all of the stitches from your needles. I didn't, and have a slip-stitch column in the middle of my foot where I tried to fix my work. Usually I can pick up stitches without a problem, but something happened. I like the way it works, so it's not bothering me too much. I'll call it a design element.

I don't mind all of these things because this was a pair of socks. If it were a sweater -- then yes, I'd probably go back and refine my work. A lace shawl, definitely. Socks are meant to be worn, and worn well! No one will be looking THAT closely at the bottom of my foot. Nobody that doesn't knit, at least....

On another front, Stacee gave me the You Make My Day Award! Thanks so much!

I'm supposed to pass the award on, but I have 72 feeds currently in bloglines. I'd hate to leave anyone out, and there are so many blogs I enjoy! I don't think I could do them justice by choosing between them, and I'm not even going to try.

I'm off to catch up on the breaking news -- I'm quickly becoming a political junkie this election season!

Koolhaas

I wanted to buy the Interweave Holiday Issue the moment I saw this hat. I couldn't find it anywhere, and then -- last weekend when I was out shopping I saw it at School Products. I snatched it up immediately.
This is the yarn (again) that I dyed myself. I like this skein much, much better than the sock yarn (but then, it's aran-weight instead of sock yarn, and meant for a head instead of hidden in a boot!) with its subtle depth of color. I have enough of this yarn for a scarf and mitts, too -- yippee!