I Love Yarn Day

Apparently October 10th is I Love Yarn Day which is something new to me but what a fantastic day to explain about the sock blockers from my Wednesday post and to show you what they do!

These are the blockers in question.  The blue ones are from Knitter’s Pride and and jazzy ones were cut from a cheap plastic place mat using the bought ones as a template.

 

And here is a sock before blocking.  The pattern doesn’t have a lot of definition to it and can you see how the foot part is twisted?  The rib at the top also appears to be two different sizes, it has a “waisted” appearance.

 

And here’s the same sock after a bath and on the blocker.

 

 

The biggest difference is immediately apparent and that’s appearance.  Do you see how neat and even it looks now, how the pattern stands out?

The other difference is also a big one and you can’t even see it… and that’s fit.  This sock is a combination of cables and lace, it was a big project for me when I knitted this pair earlier in the year.  It was only my third sock using the lace technique and it was only my second sock using cables and it was my first pattern ever that used them both at the same time and the pair took me 5 days short of two months to knit.

I have had a number of people compliment me on the evenness of my knitting and how good and consistent my tension is.  And I’ve had other people jokingly call me a “yarn garotter” because of that same “even” tension!  What they mean is that I sometimes knit too tightly, hold on to the yarn in a death grip, and I do, especially when knitting a new pattern for the first time or learning a new technique.  The problem with knitting socks one at a time is that I often end up with two slightly different sized socks, the first one is invariably tighter, the second one a bit looser because I’ve relaxed a bit, both me and my knitting tension.  The socks above were finished at the end of April and never worn because the first one was so tight it was uncomfortable to get over my heel.

Enter the sock blockers.  First I soak my new socks in a product designed to care and clean the fibres, I use Unicorn Fibre Wash but there are others on the market.  You don’t have to rinse this product out and soaking the sock allows the fibres to relax again after the trauma of being pulled every which way as you knit!  Squeeze, never wring the excess water out and lay the socks on to a clean towel.  Roll up carefully and apply pressure to extract even more water, and then carefully put your damp socks on to the blockers and leave to dry somewhere.  As the socks dry they retain their newly blocked  shape.

The benefit? Not only does the pattern now look really pretty (I appreciate it more now than when I made them), but finally got I wear these socks for the first time this week.

More info and some good before and after photos can be found here on The Twist Collective.  They demonstrate on flat knitting but the principle is exactly the same.

 

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Sock Info:

Pattern: Cathedral Grove ~ available for free on Knitty

Yarn: Premier Serenity Sock Weight Prints in Violas

Ravelry: My project page on Ravelry

What’s On Your Workdesk Wednesday – 279

It’s Wednesday folks, it’s desk day.  I think I’m in a rut, my desk seems to look very similar from one week to the next, I also seem to have mislaid my little tidy fairy too which is a bit concerning I must say!

My big, blue, shiny sock blockers arrived from Amazon!  And using them as a template Andrew traced around them on to the cheap place mat and made me another pair.  Having tried both out over the weekend I’m amazed at how well the cheap $1.49 place mat ones work, despite being thin they’re easy to put wet socks on to, I expected them to be really floppy. Of course, they don’t stand up very well so I used my Cropodile to punch holes in the top of them so I can hang them up over a shower rail or something.  Both sets make a big difference to the look of the socks that I make.  I might pop up a post later this week showing the difference between blocked and unblocked.

 

As to the desk proper, I seem to be working on Merry Hallowistmas as I’m caught between Halloween and Christmas at the moment.  Even the Halloween card you see there uses a Penny Black Christmas stamp and a Martha Stewart Icicle punch, items you wouldn’t normally expect to turn up on a spooky kind of card.  The pennant paper strips and the tiny images on top of the Prisma pencil tin are all for a set of three Christmas cards (posted Tuesday if you’d like a look, and the Halloween card was posted Sunday if you’d like more detail on that too).  And my top tip of the week… see that black, shiny, glittery paper between the sock blockers?  That’s Judikins Black Diamond embossing powder embossed on to black scrap card.  I used it to punch out the black bats and the icicle strip on the Halloween card.  It’s much thinner than store bought glitter card and so was very easy to punch.  I think I’ll try that with other colours for other occasions and see how I get on.

And I can’t leave you without a sock update, this is Neldoreth, inspired by the Beech Woods in Tolkein’s Silmarillion, the most difficult pair I’ve attempted to make so far.  They’re not technically difficult as they’re just cables and twisted stitches, they just take a lot of concentration.  They’re certainly not a mindless knit if I’m a bit brain dead after work, if there’s one thing more difficult than knitting cables it’s unpicking cables!

This is what I hope these socks will look like when they’re done!

Don’t know why I’m showing you my desk?  Pop on over to Julia’s for the details, she’ll be the one with the Sangria in her hand!!

What’s On Your Workdesk Wednesday?

A very quick one from me this week as I’m in a very busy week at work and my brain doesn’t want to cooperate by the time I get home, so here’s my desk in all it glory!

The Christmas card at the back is newly made and will be blogged in a few hours, and the card at the front was made a couple of weeks ago and is there to remind me to send it to my sister for her birthday.  Lots of stamps are still out, the green case holds my Cropodile and the open drawer has pearls and gems in it.

And then there’s the socks that I finished and said I’d show if I got them done.  Pair number 12, and I manged to meet my goal of 12 in 2014 three months early, so naturally I’m making more!  My new goal is to see how many pairs I can make this year!

Don’t know why I’m showing you this?  Then head over here to see Julia and get all the deets.

Desk Day Again

Here we all are, Wednesday again, and that means the day we share our desks to the world.  I’ve had a tidy up since last week, actually the whole room has had a bit of a tidy up.  I’d like to say it’s finished but there’s about the same amount of stuff left out on the landing as there is put back in cubbies and shelves, so the appearance of tidy seems to be just that, an appearance!

 

 

There’s still a pile of stamps waiting to be put away, all the ones that were there last week are still there this week, along with the addition of a Penny Black clear Christmas set that I want to use.    The inks have been put away though, and no, my collection hasn’t expanded as some of you were thinking last week.  The paper is totally unrelated to anything and was found on the floor under the desk, the chevron patterned item is a place mat to make sock blockers with (sock blockers stretch and shape hand made socks properly), and on top of that are two project bags.  Each bag has yarn, needles, cable needle and pattern in there and they represent socks No13 and No14 for this year!  Yes I know….. quite  a feat lol!  Oh I crack myself up!  I don’t know where I’ve got too with showing you finished pairs of socks but these were completed last weekend, they’re pair No11:

 

And pair No12 are almost finished too, maybe I can show you those ones next week!  That’s it from me, head on over to Julia’s for the linky lineup.

What’s On Your Workdesk Wednesday?

Hi All – Long time no post!  It’s summer here in Michigan and in general it’s been a very good one with low heat and humidity… so we’ve been out and about, camping, kayaking, biking, meeting friends, two Vintage Grand Prix’s (race trackking!) and another one this weekend coming plus the Vintage air show we always attend.  Busy, in other words, but in a totally fun way.  So there’s been no blogging apart from Design Team commitments, and pretty much my only computing time has revolved around Croatian genealogy records as I’m helping someone look into their family history there.

But I do have a desk to show you this week, I’ve had to cover up what I’m working on but there’s still stuff to see.

 

The two Memory Box dies on top of the trimmer are new, and yes, I’m working on Christmas again!  At the back is a big pile of yarn as my local store is moving to a bigger premises and was having a big sale on all the end of range, oddments, one offs, mismatched dye lots etc that aren’t going to the new store.  So I came home with a few sock yarns and at the very back, a jumpers (sweater to the US peeps) worth of pure wool in my favourite made in Michigan brand, Stonehedge Shepherd’s Wool.  It’s a dark greeny/blue, a bit heathered too.  I’d have preferred a different colour, not so dark, but I got it for a great price and there wasn’t a lot in the store in that kind of quantity any more.

I’ve also completed another two pairs of socks since I last checked in with you all and pair No10 for the year is 75% done too.  My goal this year was to knit 12 pairs, and I’m almost there as pairs 11 and 12 are also on the needles!  After that I’m taking that lovely greeny yarn in the above photo and I’m making a start on that jumper I keep saying I’m ready to make!!

After saying we’ve had a really good summer weather wise earlier, we did have a major weather incident here on Monday afternoon that gave us an “official” rain total of 4.25 inches in a matter of hours.  Just up the road from me a trained weather spotter reported 6″ of rain in 12 hours and at Grosse Ille, an island in the Detroit River between us and Canada they recorded 6.48″.  Most of the major roads and freeways around here were inundated with water and thousands were stranded.  At midday on Tuesday the intersection of two large freeways were still under 12ft of water and police divers were searching submerged vehicles, although no one has been reported missing.  A number of people I know have badly flooded basements and a racing friend now has a totaled car as he and his wife had to abandon it and get to higher ground when they road they were traveling on become submerged by 3 1/2ft deep flood water!  We got 1.19″ of rain where we are, so the garden got a good watering, everything else in my area was unscathed thankfully.  We made headline news on The Weather Channel again though!

 

 

Hopefully you’re all staying dry and enjoying the summer, I’m off to link up with Julia.

What’s On Your Workdesk Wednesday?

This week, a rather eclectic mix of stuff but thanks for asking!  The socks take centre stage, a finished pair on the right, an almost finished pair in the middle and a just started pair on the left!

There’s also some stamps (signs of life other than knitting – finally!), including a little pile from the UK that contained that sweet Happy Hopers image as it’s busy knitting little coats for the chicks!  And the zig-zagy thing is a placemat, cause apparently you can make sock blockers out of them for cheap, so I want to give that a go.

And here’s the finished Hermione’s Every Day Socks being modeled, not by Hermione, but by me, on a very warm (84F), very humid (it had rained all morning then the sun came out) Sunday afternoon.  I didn’t keep them on for long, I’m not that mad!

So, head on over to Julia’s if you need info on the weekly link up, I’ll see you on the trail.

Happy Wednesday

Often known as What’s On Your Workdesk Wednesday!  I’ve been MIA for a couple of weeks, I was very busy at work and also a bit under the weather, nothing at all serious, just feeling a bit blah.  Nowhere near as blah as Julia must have been feeling I would guess, hope you’re well rested and on the mend now.

I have a desk but it has things on it that I can’t show you at this time, so I’ll do a quick catch up of my knitting!

 

At the front, the yellow socks are finished and represent pair No6 for this year.  On the right is a simple textured pattern called Hermione’s Everyday Socks, based on the character in the HP series of books and films, there’s an entire range of patterns for the HP characters, places, plants and heaven knows what else, I might knit some more.  The second one of this is underway at work during lunch breaks. In the middle is a new sock, a Mystery Knit-Along, the pattern was split into four and a new clue (the next section) is released on four consecutive Sundays, it’s turned out to be very pretty and fun to knit.  One that hasn’t been fun to knit though is lurking over on the left.  I started it in April and it’s based on old, traditional Gansey patterns, and to be frank, it bored the pants off me.  I can’t see it having a partner any time soon to be honest, but I do intend to finish it sometime!

Here’s a close up of a couple of them.

This one because although it may be simple, it does wonders for the cheap, self striping yarn I bought when I first started knitting socks a couple of years ago.

 

And this one because I love the colour, love the yarn (it has Alpaca in it), I love the twisted rib at the top, and you can’t see it well at the moment, but it’s a really pretty pattern.

Chin, chin.  Must knit now!

What’s On Your Workdesk Wednesday

Hello All – We’re back from our 25th Anniversary trip to Mexico and looking forward to joining in with you all again.  From what I’ve seen, the atc swap and the WOYWW crop went really well too.  If you have no idea what happens every Wednesday in blogland then pop in to see Julia for all the details.

My desk this week is looking a bit bereft as you might expect.  We arrived home from Mexico at 1am last Thursday and after a few hours of sleep I got up and went to work.  Early night Thursday and Friday (jetlag) and still dazed on Saturday, finally felt human again on Sunday and so got on with the garden, the washing and buying and planting some tomato and pepper plants for the summer.  I’ve managed a bit of knitting in the last few evenings but that’s been it on the crafty front.

I have a couple of mens cards to make, one for Father’s Day and also a male birthday card, so I’ve pulled out some scraps of blue cardstock and a lighthouse/boating  stamp set but that’s as far as I’ve got.  The other stamp set is a knitting one, I need to make a card to send along with some wool I donated to a sock challenge on Ravelry as a prize.

Also on the desk is a Christmas card I made before I left, a knitting magazine and my current sock project.  On the left is a really cool poster that my sister had made up for us for our 25th.  I’ll show it to you in full one week but basically it’s like a chalkboard with all manner of printed words on it that are special or personal to Andrew and I, including words like The Lake District where we spent many holidays in England and also were married; Turkey where we spent our honeymoon; Durham and Cambridge which are our home towns; Aston Martin where we both were working when we met; Ginetta and Triumph for our two old cars etc, etc.  It really is an amazing memento.

I’ll make this short but I’ll leave you with one photo from Mexico.  I posted some others already this week so scroll down to see more.  This was taken on the public beach in Tulum where we were staying.

 

Adios amigos!

What’s On Your Workdesk Wednesday

A mess if I’m honest.  It contains EXACTLY the same stuff as last week AND the week before, all I’ve done is add a bit to it!  I don’t know why I’m procrastinating, I’ve got stuff to do but I’m just not doing it!

Anyway, the new stuff is two lovely skeins of Alpaca sock yarn.  As I’m knitting many more patterned socks now I need yarn that can show off stitches nicely and not swamp them with lots of colours or quick colour changes, and that means solid, semi-solid or tonal yarn.  I got those two on Monday after work at another little yarn shop in the area.  Beside the yarn is a free sock pattern that they popped in the bag too, and underneath that  is a little pile of stamps that arrived on Tuesday in a little love parcel from the home front!

The other small ball of yarn is one I’ve listed for sale or trade on Ravelry, it was given to me but I can’t think of a single use for it!  Maybe someone will want it.

We had our first camping jaunt of the season last weekend when we went over to the SW side of Michigan.  We were at a race track with the Vintage racers that we’re friends with on the Saturday, it was fun but really cold, wet and windy.  Sunday brightened up and although it was still cold at least the sun was out, but the breeze right off the lake was mind numbing.  Still, at least we got out somewhere!  Roll on summer, lol!

That’s me this week.  To find out about this weekly desk lark head on over to Julia’s at The Stamping ground for all the info.

Another Wednesday, Another Workdesk

I have a desk that is scarily similar to last weeks desk, in fact, it’s  all still there, exactly where it was lat week.  The only difference is a couple of additions in the form of some Christmas stuff as I had a DT project to make.  If it wasn’t for that, it would, most definitely, not have changed an inch!

 

I should put up last weeks photo and make you do a spot the difference, lol!

I did get these done though…

 

Pair No5 of the year.  Not bad at all considering I only managed four pairs for the whole of last year, and here I am, on pair five already and only four months in to the year.  I’m quite pleased with that, my goal is 12 pairs by the end of December!

Here’s a close up so you can see the pattern which is all ribs, cables and lace.  My Ravelry page is here is you’d like all the details.  I also came across a really hand little app on the internet that tells me that I’ve knitted 1.64 miles of yarn so far this year!!  Yes, I know, little things please little minds!

I hope all of our friends in the Southern US States are faring ok after the terrible round of deadly tornadoes in the last few days.  Amazing how your whole life can change in the blink of an eye.  Thankfully all we’ve had to put up with so far has been a five hour power cut.

I’m off to call in to see Julia, hopefully I’ll see you there.