Fortunately, Unfortunately...the socks edition

Ever read this children's book Fortunately Unfortunately? It begins:

"Fortunately, Ned was invited to a surprise party.
Unfortunately, the party was a thousand miles away.
Fortunately, a friend loaned Ned an airplane.
Unfortunately, the motor exploded.
Fortunately, there was a parachute in the airplane.
Unfortunately, there was a hole in the parachute."


Ok, here's the Ewephoric Socks version:

Fortunately, One very cold post-Thanksgiving Day, Ewephoric had on some beautiful, hand-knit wool socks .(Sub-fortunately, the color was beautiful. Sub-unfortunately, the name of the patterns was, well, unfortunate.)


Unfortunately, These lovely socks had a hole!

Fortunately, Ewephoric remembered she had extra yarn to repair it with since this yarn had been put up in a whoppingly generous skein.

Unfortunately, There are holes EVERYWHERE, and in both socks. Start over from scratch? With yarn that seems a bit fragile?



Fortunately, Poem-man and I spent the day after Thanksgiving in Cold Spring, NY.
Unfortunately, Poem-man got sick of looking at antiques and at the (awfully cold, but beautiful ) view of the Hudson River, and we had to leave.


Fortunately, On the way out of the Main Street are of town we found a YARN STORE!
Knittingsmith
Unfortunately, On the way out of the Main Street are of town we found a YARN STORE!


Fortunately, The store had beautiful yarn and an appropriate sign.

Unfortunately, Knittingsmith had sock yarn.

Fortunately, Ewephoric's stash was full of sock yarn.

Unfortunately, some Paca-Peds in the colorway "Singin' the Blues" made its way into her stash...even after Ewephoric had recently received an installment of sock club yarn.

Fortunately, Ewephoric does not feel compelled to repair the holey socks since she has new yarns to knit with.

Unfortunately, Ewephoric has lost her sock-knitting mojo and keeps turning sock yarn into non-sock accessories, even though she loves to wear hand-knit socks in the cold winter weather.

Oh, well. How will the story end?

Forging new paths.

Phew...I'm just about done with 2007 endless project #2. (This being 2007-endless-#1).

Just some buttons, button bands, and button holes to go. I think my Mom is gonna LOVE it.

So--just when I've knit as much as I think I can knit:

1) I tried some crochet. Not a bad effort. The pattern didn't come charted, and I don't know how to read crochet, so there are some mistakes, But I don't care. It's a cute pattern, the SWTC Bamboo yarn was left over from some other project, and--GET THIS--my picture got picked to be the identifying picture for the Crocus Scarf pattern on Ravelry.

May I humbly say that that is the FOURTH picture of mine being used on Ravelry as the featured pic for a pattern. Am I famous yet?

Pattern: Crocus Scarf from Knitting Daily

Yarn: SWTC Bamboo in Fiery Red--bought it in the Summer '06 from someone on E-bay.
Crocheted on: Size 3 Boye crochet hook

Time spent crocheting when I shouldabeen knitting: 1 week

2) I started a second Clapotis. Why? Well, because it was there. I need another scarf like a hole in the head. But I had this lovely Wollmeise Sock Yarn that I couldn't bear to knit for something I would wear on my feet. And I liked the intense, crazy colorway "Suzanne" enough that I wanted something simple to show it off. AND-- I fear I may have lost the first Clapotis I made. Dang. Lastly, I can knit a clapotis in about a week---or at least I did so the first time.

3) I threw a knitting shower! Woo hoo! I've never thrown a baby shower before, much less one that became a Brooklyn yarn crawl. Such fun. And here's the little jumper I knit for Tawana's knitter-in-utero.

Pattern: Brittany Jumper from Minnowknits
Yarn: Cotton Fleece in "Wisteria"

Yarn Enabler: Knit-a-way

Knit on: Size 6 Knitpicks needle
Time spent hiding my knitting from Tawana: 2 weeks

4) I knit some with boys, men, ya know, people who bear that ole Y-chromosome. Really. This PH Knitting group meets in the neighborhood over from me in Brooklyn, is run by a man, and when we met at Freddy's on Sunday, there were four women and THREE men. Poem-man might actually get jealous...

5) I am humbled in my knitting after reading this obituary in today's Times.

I definitely have NOT knit all I can!

Long-awaited debut

She's been waiting so patiently, this beautiful scarf-shawl of recent completion, to be shown off to her advantage in the blogosphere. I was a harried knitter, recalcitrant blogger, and spending my time being the busiest woman in public school show biz, but we're all ready for our debut: This was a fun, fun, lovely, lovely knitting project because the pattern is easy and creates a beautiful texture, and because the yarn color and hand is so rewarding.

Pattern: Clementine Shawlette from Interweave Knits, Spring 2007

Yarn: Wollmeise Sockenwolle in "Vergissmeinnicht" (Forget-me-not)
Yarn enabler: The Loopy Ewe, September 2007
Knit on: One 40" Knitpicks Size 3 Circular Needle

Time spent knitting when I should have been eating more vegetables: Oct. 3rd-31, 28 Days.
Size: 72 inches by 8 inches.

So, a little bit about my process and alterations. First of all, I did not knit this in the weight of yarn called for (I went for fingering instead of DKish-sportish), so it turns out to be more of a scarf than a shawl. If I were to do it again, I'd probably have gone two more repetitions wider and lived with a shorter shawl, though I do like the length I have.

The pattern calls for knitting two identical pieces, both starting from what I call the 'teardrop' ends and then grafting the two pieces together to form the middle seam. In order to be sure they actually were identical and that I would use up all the coveted yarn, I knit both halves simultaneously, one feeding from the outside of the ball of yarn and one feeding from inside the ball of yarn.. I just kept knitting until I was out of yarn--like when Lady and the Tramp both inhale the same strand of spaghetti and end up kissing. (Did any of y'all actually catch that reference?!?!?) I was dreading kitchenering the two together along some 70 stitches or so. In the end, I decided to do a three-needle bind off. I had meant to do a 'reverse' three-needle bind-off so that I'd have a purl bump row that reflected the pattern, but I couldn't to it because of where I was in the pattern or where the yarn was or something. In the end, I liked the result and the ease of execution, so I'm sticking with it!

I hate to add to the whole Wollmeise craze, but holy cow, I love this yarn. I know some feel it's splitty. I am not one of those people. Some think it's a little cottony even though it's 100% superwash merino. I say cottony in a good way--i.e. fairly smooth, even a little slick, and not itchy. And it's hard to see in the pictures, but the lapis blue of this colorway is kissed with teal green that just adds to the depth of color. I would advise you to buy Wollmeise, but only if you buy some for me at the same time or at least get the hell out of my way as I rush the e-commerce doors of any establishment that is carrying it. It might be worth a trip to Germany....