Saturday, October 18, 2008

Slow Knitting

I think I am a slow knitter. It seems to take me forever to finish anything. I know knitting on size one needles with fingering weight yarn is going to take awhile, but I keep reading about people who finish off socks like candy! I am taking part in the Stash and Burn Ravelry group Socktober challenge. You have to list how much sock yarn you have, and how much you want to knit up during October. As mentioned before, I discovered I have about 15,000 yards of sock yarn, and I was planning on knitting about 600 yards, or about 3 socks. Actually, 3 socks is probably more like 650 yards, but who's counting.

Since I joined the challenge, I finished the first sock of the pair I'm knitting for my dad, which was basically the last inch or so of the pattern plus the toe decrease, and I'm down just past the gusset decreases on the 2nd sock. Now, granted this is a sock of man-size proportions - cast on 80 stitches, size one needles, etc., but still - I'm still working on one sock while others in the group have completed pairs and pairs, or several single socks. I am either very slow or other people have a lot more time than I do!!

I will post a picture of the finished socks once I'm done. I already have a plan for the next pair of socks - they will be for my dad's girlfriend out of some Opal yarn I have, and the pattern will be more plain, not a basketweave (no dreaded purling!). I'm also slowly working on the Twilight socks for my daughter, but since I decided I really want to finish my dad's sock I kind of put the Twilight ones aside for the moment.

Off to my knitting!

Saturday, October 04, 2008

How Much Sock Yarn Does A Girl Need?

15,000 yards, that's how much!! I joined the Stash and Burn Ravelry Socktober challenge to find out how much sock yarn I actually have, and to say how much I will knit up this month. So last night I took a deep breath and pulled out all my sock yarn and added up the yardage. I found out that it wasn't actually quite as bad as I thought, although it is still a lot! I am going to try and knit three socks in October (around 600 yards) - the 2nd sock of the pair I am knitting for my dad, and the entire pair that I am planning on knitting for my dad's girlfriend. They are both Christmas presents. I took a picture of my stash (sock yarn only, let's be clear) for posterity:

As you can see, I have a fondness for Opal :} It looks like Trekking is coming in second, and I have a fair bit of Regia - although that black, gold & gray yarn I've had for probably 10 years. I can't remember what I was thinking when I bought that gold yarn, it is so not a color I would generally buy. Sorry the picture quality isn't so great - I did this last night after work, and I didn't want to leave it laying out all night. Who knows what my cats would have done to it!

Here is my dad's sock in progress - as you can see I am almost done with the first sock, hopefully I will finish it today. I ended up having to go buy a 2nd ball of yarn, since this sock is taking a lot more yarn than I realized it would. I'm knitting the Basketweave Rib from Sensational Knitted Socks on size one needles, and I casted on 80 stitches. My dad wears a size 9 shoe, so I think these will fit him pretty well. The only reason I will be able to get so much knitting done today is that my daughter is away on a choir retreat. I guess they are all "bonding" which will help them sing better together. I hope she is having fun. She loves being in this choir, so I'm sure she is having a great time. I have to go pick her up tomorrow morning, and they are about an hour away from here. Nothing like a Sunday morning drive! Due to traffic, the choir leaders decided to bus them all up together Friday night, thank goodness. But we, the parents, will be in for a mini-concert when we pick them up tomorrow, which will be fun.

In other news, I got my Harry Potter sock yarn from Simply Socks Yarn Company. I woke up one morning (Monday, maybe?) to find an email stating that the yarn was available to purchase. Before I was even dressed or had my coffee I had credit card in hand. Shipping was so fast - I had the yarn by Thursday. I totally love it, and can't wait to knit it. Unfortunately it will have to wait until after my Christmas knitting is done, which might be a while. But aren't these colors great? I ordered, from left to right: Hedwig, Tonks & Draco. I didn't much care for the other colors, but I thought these three were wonderful.

I have another pair of socks I want to knit for my daughter for Christmas, but I don't know if I can pull it off. They are the Eclipse Socks based on the 3rd book in the Twilight series. We both just read all these books, and loved them. I think I might be able to knit them while she is in choir practice - I have about an hour and a half of time twice a week. I don't even have the yarn yet or anything, so we'll just have to see. She would love them, though!