October Fest

I am officially designating October as a FO Fest. While September has been quiet in terms of blogging, it has been anything but in terms of crafting, and there is a lot of catching up to do.

First up, socks. I've been a bit of a sock addict lately, and two more pairs have sprung off the needles.

Pattern: Java (from Knitty)

Yarn: twinkle toes, by Jenny Cook

time taken: 28 August - 19 September 2011

I also finished a pair of brown stripey socks for my dad's birthday (happy birthday dad!). I used my favourite striping technique to make best use of some sock yarn odds and ends.

Pattern: generic top-down with grumperina stripe

yarn: Plymouth Yarn co. sock yarn plus some unknown sock yarn (charity shop)

Making Monday: making, baking and being at home

As is always the case, a week was simply not long enough to accomplish everything on my list, but it was good to get some things finished, and some things started, and to have a few days where work interruptions were minimal and the priorities were unashamedly domestic.There was...

: : knitting - two socks finished (but not a pair)

: : sewing - one small t-shirt refashioned and two pairs of trousers cut out ready for stitching (both repurposed from my old trousers)

: : baking - a lemon drizzle cake (from Nigella's domestic goddess book) and a delicious quiche (mushroom and leek) and home-made pizzas and a jumble fruit crumble

and playing, and meeting friends, and some trips out, including one to see this: the Tour of Britain, which started yesterday in Peebles.

And there was a wee bit of gardening (in between the showers) and paperwork and sorting and decluttering (three big bags for the charity shop), but a bit less sleep than we hoped for on account of a small person with a tickly cough but, all in all, it was a good week.

Don't forget to check out other making mondays to see what everyone else has been doing...

Making Monday: Socks (FO)

Never mind the bed bug, I've been bitten by the sock bug, and this week has mostly been about finishing these stripey foot warmers.

Now and again, I join with a small group of knitting women/mums for an evening of chatting, knitting and eating cake. After a short break for the Scottish summer holidays, we reconvened this week (thanks Beth! *wave*), and I managed to finish these off, as well as catch up on the latest news from the group, which included: 3 chickens and some bees; several children back at school; a dog bite on a tummy (ouch); camping in Scotland; circuses and pigs. Make of that what you will...

Pattern: generic top down

Yarn: unknown self-striping yarn (from Oxfam) plus pale brown yarn from stash

Time taken: 19 July -25 August 2011

As it turns out, we were all knitting socks this week. Except one, who is knitting a hat (or a sock for a head). Anyway, to get back to the FO, as usual I employed my favourite striping trick to make the yarn stre-e-tch to a make a pair of socks. I began with roughly equal amounts of yarn, together weighing 66 g (which I know is enough to knit a pair of socks in my size). I normally try and work things so that the cuffs and heels are the same colour on each sock, but there wasn't enough yarn to do that this time, so one sock has a plain cuff and heel flap and the other has a self-striping cuff and heel-flap - which you can just about see in the photos above. 

Try as I might, once I'd finished this pair, I couldn't stop, and another pair of socks cast themselves on. Java from knitty again, but this time with the twinkle toes sparkly blue yarn I had for my birthday. There's 100g in the ball, so I know I won't run out this time....

WIPs

The WIPs are getting a bit out of hand.

1. Grace is still OTN, but progress has been made. I've redone the button bands - with the correct number of buttonholes this time - and I've knitted the collar again but have a little modification in mind to make it look even better. Then there's the small matter of sewing it up...

2. The Java socks are not done. I'm just about ready to do the toe decreases on the first sock - but I need to check the length with DH's foot, and I have a sneaking suspicion that I dont have enough yarn to make two - which is a major drawback in a sock project.

3. My fingers were itching the other evening, so I cast on for a Betty (Rowan Winter Kids)in a lovely raspberry pink colour very similar to this (although it a substitute yarn) ...

4. The scarf is bimbling along. I am not expecting to finish this soon - it's my fall back project, something to grab when there's a chance of knitting a few rows here or there. The colours are gorgeous...

5. And then there's the sewing. We've been having a few nappy issues lately, and it's getting harder to wrangle the jelly bean (now almost 21 months) into her nappies because she's getting bigger, and they aren't, and there's been a lot of leaking and changing of clothes going on (particularly at nursery). For the most part we use Totsbot bamboozles - a shaped nappy made from bamboo terry, and we also have a couple of the Ella's house hemp nappy. The hemp nappies have a longer rise and fit better than the bamboozles now that the jelly bean is bigger. We love our cloth nappies, and have used them very happily for both of our babies. Given that we are hoping not to need them for too much longer, I have been experimenting. I have made a nappy!!

It makes me very happy. I'm not an accomplished seamstress (I find using a sewing machine awkward, no doubt because it is not designed for a left-hander) so I feel very pleased to have done this. Of course, things may yet unravel when we try it out for real, but so far so good. I used the hemp nappy as a template and constructed the new nappy from a single bamboo terry square and two layers of cotton flannel cut from a crib sheet/head cloth. I elasticated the waist/leg openings with regular elastic from my sewing box, and I'm now waiting for some aplix to arrive so that I can finish it off and try it out! While I had the machine out the other evening, I also got started on the pile of wipes and dribble bibs that I cut out a few weeks ago, and I ironed some patchwork pieces ready for stitching. It's satisfying to get things done...

third time lucky?

With only a few days to go until DH's birthday, the end of the purple socks (currently on my feet) gave me chance to cast on for some quick and secret birthday socks. Since Grace is having a short break in the not-quite-finished basket, I thought that 10 days or so would be plenty of time for some secret sock knitting.

Well, I might have been right, except I made a rather basic error. It's not even a beginner's error, because beginners tend to not to be quite so stupid. So, time to 'fess up: I didn't read the pattern and knitted the cuff in the wrong rib pattern, so I had to rip it and start again. And I didnt just do that once, I did it twice.

So, now I'm casting on for a third time and reading the pattern (Java) just one more time, in the hope that this time I've got it right and third time does prove to be lucky.