I’d intended to get a decent amount of knitting done tonight,  and I think I succeeded. Of course, I probably would have accomplished more if I hadn’t received Walking Dead in the mail yesterday and decided to read the first 80 or so pages of that. Still, I’m pretty pleased with what I did do. For the next little bit (I hope), I’m going to be making the Alpaca Silk Bow Scarf from Boutique Knits (out of wool). I decided not to let the intarsia part of my new scarf scare me, so I Googled intarsia techniques until I felt like I understood what I was supposed to do (if not exactly how to do it), and plunged in. I’m going back to Continental knitting and doing the Norwegian Purl, so there’s all sorts of learning and adapting going on here. I had to frog twice; once because I still can’t count, and another time because my knitting was too loose. Luckily, I hadn’t done more than three rows either time, so it was no big loss. Seems like the third time is the charm, and I’m going to quit while I’m ahead here and get some rest!

Pattern: Alpaca Silk Bow Scarf

Source: Boutique Knits

Yarn: Lorna’s Laces Greenline DK in Grapevine and Lilac

My first attempt at my Monkeys was a little off. This is my first go round knitting lace, and I’m learning by the round, but I definitely effed things up. The cuff, which is always the easiest part of any sock, was not messed up, so I frogged back to that point and then tried not the make the same mistakes again. Here’s what I had before the frogging:

As you can see, one of the holes on the fourth needle was not so much decorative as it was massive.

Luckily, this time I’m doing better. For one, I don’t have any craters in my sock. For another, I’m being consistent with my yarn overs (I was doing it wrong the first time, which is embarrassing, since I made an entire blanket that was full of yarn overs [unless those were wrong, too, but then at least they were all wrong in the same way]). Here’s the new and improved version:

Looking at these pictures reminds me that I need to learn how to use the macro mode on my new camera…

So I decided that today I would start on the Monkey socks by Cookie A. In keeping with my newfound desire to do things correctly, I was going to swatch it and then go from there. I remembered the pattern calling for size 1.5 dpns. I had no idea where to get those, but I thought I’d do the swatch on size 1 needles and go from there. So then I brought the yarn I’m going to use and the needles to work today, and looked over the pattern once more. It turns out that Monkeys are made on size 2 needles. So what I have right now is not going to cut it. I felt pretty stupid, but realized that all was not lost. I could just swatch another pattern, right? Except no, because pretty much all of the other pattern I want to make are somehow on size 2 and 3 needles. No 1s, no 1.5s. I don’t know if I just liked different patterns last night, but I’m not even sure which of the patterns I read and wanted to make even required 1.5 needles.

Luckily, I still have two pairs of socks to make (for Stephanie and Terea), and I want to prevent boredom by doing something different, so I found a pattern that requires size 1s: Spring Forward! I’m going to swatch this now and see how it comes out. Thankfully, I kept the remaining Lorna’s Laces from my last pair of Jaywalkers in my bag (I was going to use it as waste yarn when I cast on my toe). I’m using the same yarn in different colors for these socks, so I guess I really haven’t lost any time. I just hate making stupid mistakes like that.

I know that I just finished my second pair of Jaywalkers yesterday, but I really don’t want to lose my momentum. I enjoyed making those socks and the feeling of accomplishment when I finished weaving in the last strand, and I want those feelings again. Plus, I said that I would make socks for Terea and Stephanie, and I want to do that soon. Also, I know that I sometimes find sock knitting tedious and boring, so I think I’ll mix it up and make sure that I actually work on one of my many other UFOs when I need down time from the socks. I just realized that Zeeby’s bag, which I have been working on for no less than two years, is a nice, mindless project that I could easily complete while watching dvds. I have to do the same row over and over again for 11 inches, and there are no decreases to worry about, so why not?

So I finally finished my first pair of Jaywalker socks. As you can see, they’re pretty cute, even though one foot is about 1/8 of an inch longer than the other. Oh well. I need to find somebody with narrow, but long feet. Maybe I’ll have to try them on the feet of all of my tall, skinny friends. It could be like Cinderella, with socks, and a lesbian subtext!
Seriously, though, I really love this yarn. It’s Lorna’s Laces and it is self-striping, which is the greatest thing ever! I think that the stress of the last month gave me the motivation to finish the first sock and start/finish the second one, so let’s hear it for silver linings. I realized pretty early on (but not too early to do anything about it) that these socks wouldn’t fit my feet, so now I am making a second pair in the larger size given, and I hope that they’ll fit me! This pair is going to be magenta and white striped, which will look adorable on me!

Here are the beginnings of my new socks. I really like the way the first pair turned out, so I’ll stop being so lazy and do more work on these.