I think that I have finally found a sock to make. It fits my admittedly random requirements:

• It’s not popular, meaning it’s not in hundreds or thousands of queues or project lists on Ravelry
• It’s interesting looking
• It seems scalable
• People who’ve made it seemed to have really enjoyed the pattern

Once I  had to change my yarn for this project, I decided to look around at other patterns, and did indeed find one that I think I like more. So now I have a new pattern, and it took me all of seven minutes to wind my skeins into balls, so I know I have yarn of normal strength. I’m enjoying Julia Spencer-Fleming’s Clare Fergusson/Russ Van Alstyne series too much to knit a lot lately, but I’m on book five of six, so I should get back to knitting soon.

I was going to make my exchange socks out of Nature’s Palette Fingering yarn, but the two skeins broke approximately 100 times while I was trying to wind them. I now have two quart bags of microballs, and one sandwich bag of all the rest of the string that was too short to even wind. Bummer. I’m glad that I’m seeing this now, but I still find the whole thing so disappointing. I have other yarn that I could use, but I had this picture in my head of how I wanted my socks to look and now I think that this probably will not be how they end up.

The only thing that makes me feel a little better is that this yarn is not the yarn that I was excited about last week. I decided that that yarn would be better used in another project, but that this would be perfect. Stoopid me!

I’ve figured out which socks to make for my secret exchange person, and I bought this gorgeous yarn for it, but before I start, I want to knock out one other pair of socks using 1) the continental method and 2) the magic loop. I’m making nopurl monkeys. I’ve made the regular pattern before and found it a breeze, so if I have trouble with this easier version, I’ll know that it was my methods, not the pattern that defeated me. It took me a week to do two socks separately, so I think I should be able to finish the two in a similar time frame. The socks that I want to knit for the exchange are more complicated, but I feel like I should have a better idea of my skill level after finishing these socks (or not, as the case may be).

I finished my two-a-time-socks, and while I’m happy that they’re finished, things aren’t perfect. The two black and grey socks are pretty much the same size (there’s about an eight of an inch difference in length between the two socks), or at least close enough that I can live with it. The red and pink pair, though, are nowhere near close in size. I don’t understand how they ended up being so different. I finished them last night before i went to bed, hoping that the second red sock would grow overnight, but no dice. I’m not necessarily a perfectionist, but I need things to look a little better than this, so I’m going to rip out the decreases for the toe, add more rows, and then finish again. The whole thing shouldn’t take more than an hour to fix , but it’s still demoralizing.

Never let it be said that I am not talented. My specific talent would be to get completely turned around whilst doing things that should by this point be totally routine for me. I’m finishing up the two at a time socks, and simultaneously practicing my Continental-style knitting. I’m really proud of myself, because I’ve made great strides and now I’m faster this way than I was the other way. I still need to pay a lot of attention, but I am really getting this. So this pride may be the cause of today’s mistake, although I do not discount your garden variety knitting retardedness. While doing the heels of the second pair of socks, I somehow got all tangled up on sock A and then I was stuck on the needles, unable to get cleanly to either sock. Did I pick up stitches incorrectly? Did I just confuse myself? I was simultaneously knitting and helping a coworker cut the cord between herself and her 19 yo daughter, so I will condede that I was not paying as much attention to my socks as I could have been.

I signed up two weeks ago for the Sit ‘n Knit sock exchange, and now that the signup is closed, Anne-Marie sent us all the names of our recipients. I have some ideas for what I will be doing, and will probably be good about documenting it and all that good stuff, but I won’t post anything specific until the final exchange happens in April.

I will say, though, in case whoever got me decides to visit, that I am really grateful and excited and will love whatever you choose to make!

I haven’t decided which pattern I will use, but I have a WIP on one of the needles that I’m considering using, so I will have to haul booty and finish up, hopefully before the weekend arrives (I always give myself some wiggle room, so that means Sunday)!

So I found my tapestry needle. It was not, as I feared, in the bag with some project that I barely started before abandoning it. No, it was actually in my handbag! It had fallen out of the little stitch marker pouch that I keep it in, so while none of the stitch markers fell out, the two thin tapestry needles I had in it did. No worries. It occurred to me when I got home from work yesterday that I should look in my purse before getting all crazy and tearing through my knitting projects, and sure enough, I saw two shiny little needles amongst the piles of stuff that fell out of my bag. I was busy last night (what kind of freak goes to the 10:45 movie showing after working until 9? That would be me…), so I finished up this afternoon during my break. Here is the finished product.