comfortstitching

needling

Life has been so grey lately.  Grey outside with grey clouds and grey rain and grey-ish light all day long.  Greyness inside, with the monotony of sorting out all of the things that need sorting.  Lugging endless boxes from the loft, only to discover more stuff we don't need and wondering why we kept it all.

My life needs a little colour that isn't coloured grey and yesterday I gave in.  Found some Cakewalk yarn in the bottom of my knitting bag and somehow ended up casting on stitches for a new pair of socks. Or at least a sock, I have a toe for now.  

These will take forever because I can only allow myself a few minutes here and there but if that's all there is, I'll  take it.

It feels so good to be knitting again :)

a socky day

I finished my Bavarian Cable socks (pattern from the book 'socks from the top up' by Wendy D Johnson) around 3 weeks ago.  Around that time we were making the most of that scarce commodity around these parts - sunny weather, so the socks just got put away in the drawer.  I completely forgot all about them until I saw them peeking out the bottom of the pile this morning, it was a nice surprise, discovering something handknit and unworn.

So I am making the most of them today by having a socky type of day.  No shoes just socks so I can stare at all the speckledy loveliness everytime my eyes look towards the floor.

Pic taken by my youngest daughter, she is getting good.

Yarn is Brooklyn merino sock from Cakewalk on Etsy

And whilst I was out of doors, I snapped a pic of my fave thing out there right now - my Cardinal De Richelieu Oops my mistake these are actually Ferdinand Pichard roses.  Perfectly speckled just like the socks :)

a finished pair

I finished knitting my first ever pair of socks :))

It would be only true to say, a fair bit of time has been spent admiring them (I've been wearing them lots).

(you can read all details on making them in this post and this one).

Outside in the garden.

Inside in the errr.. garden (various lettuces and so on being grown by my daughters in the living room).

Just relaxing and staring a little more.

And of course starting a new pair - the bavarian cable sock from the same book - whilst improvising with a small circular needle to make the cables because I don't happen to have a cable needle and wanted to start asap.  Yarn is Cakewalk in Brooklyn and I think I am going to love this pair even more.

sock o'clock

I finished my first sock!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and it's making me ever so happy just sitting here and stroking it, waiting until I finish it's twin sibling so I can wear them.  The sock took me a week of evening only knitting (or sock o'clock as I like to call it) to finish.  So if I continue at this rate of a pair a fortnight - I could have 19 pairs by Christmas day :)

Socking facts

Gusset heel basic sock pattern from the book 'socks from the toe up'.  This book and pattern were recommended to me by Amanda on Twitter and as a beginner sock knitter I would highly recommend this book to anyone interested enjoying a bit of sock o'clock.

Yarn - cakewalk yarn in cam

Knitted using a pair of 2.5mm/size 1 knitting needles - my first time doing this, the book explains how to.

I used Judy's magic cast on and finished in russian bind off, again all explained in the book

Happiness factor on finishing - 11/10

BTW - I signed up to Ravelry two years ago but still haven't actually done anything on my page, I'm hoping to start when I get a minute so if you are interested you can soon find me here.

I was so happy knitting with the cakewalk yarn that my daughter easily convinced me to buy a couple more (left to right - Brooklyn and Cherry Blossom).  She does seem to have got it in her head that I am going to be using the cherry blossom to knit up a pair for her...................mmmm.   The yarn is looking lovely displayed on this pretty dresden mini sent to me by Allison (with the cute drawstring bag) to say thank you for the honour of winning one of my giveaways from last year - isn't that nice??!

socking

I felt it was time I dipped my toes into something new, so over the weekend I took full advantage of it being St Patricks day, National quilting day and Mother's day by learning how to knit socks....  I've been wanting to learn for some time and after two days of socking I'm only wondering what took me so long.  I'm knitting the gusset heel basic sock pattern from the book Socks From The Toe Up on a pair of 2.5mm (size 1) circular needles using Cakewalk yarn in Cam.  As someone who has only ever knitted one item (my eternity cowl) in the round before all I can say is I think I will be knitting a LOT of socks from now on.