Poor Auntie

My poor Auntie Carol may end up receiving fraternal, rather than identical, socks. I haven't quite gathered the courage to actually compare the sock in progress to its finished sibling, but i have a sinking feeling that they won't match exactly. I'm trying to come to terms with that, because there is no way i am frogging any part of this sock. I'll light the thing on fire first, or feed it to the nearest aligator. Please hold me in your thoughts (since i'm running out of the left over skein and will soon have to cannibalize the second attempt to get more) while i try and think good thoughts while knitting this sock for the third time. Pictures of the socks next post, i promise...maybe even good pictures, from a real camera.

I think these socks hate me

I have very good reasons for thinking this:
1: There was a rather large, nasty knot in the second part of the skein (one that couldn't be hidden nicely)
2: This knot fell right in the middle of a heel row
3: When I cut the yarn to start the heel with another matching section, the whole thing went bananas on me.
4: The slipped stitch pattern for the heel refused to work (3 times in a row) and the sock kept insisting that it was supposed to have 33 heel stitches instead of 32...and it wouldn't listen to reason.
5: When i wound the rest of the yarn into a ball, it ended up in the wrong color order and i had to rip out the portion that i had knit (it took me about 6 rounds of ribbing to notice) and re ball the whole thing. My cat enjoyed that part, i wanted to throw the yarn and the finished sock out into the lake and watch the aligator eat them.

Reasons a pleanty why these socks hate me, the ulimate reason is right here: This is the finished sock.



This is the twin to it....notice anything a bit off? Like, how it's still yarn, and not even vaguely sock shaped? This is what happens when i get ticked at my knitting, it gets put into a ball and i sit it on my desk and knit well behaved socks in front of it. Hopefully it'll learn its lesson. If it's good yarn and behaves it might get knit up into the sock it should be. I fear, however, that it will not be enough to get the whole sock out, a trip to the frog pond may be in order for the first attempt at the second sock.
In other news I bought so Lornas Laces sock yarn off of Ebay in the Camo colorway (totally awesome, and totally unable to get accurate colors with my phone camera). Right after i ripped the shameful sock off of the needles I wound the LL into a ball and cast on. I'm glad i got a colorway i don't care about, because if i had these would be mine!! The yarn is so soft and the colors are beautiful. The only problem is that i experienced and issue with pooling when i started the St. st, which drives me nuts. Needless to say they have been frogged and are waiting their turn (not very patiently or quietly either i might add). I think i have a pattern that involves enough ribbing that will keep them from pooling. Hopefully it will work.
The cool fitted socks are going well, I'm at the heel flap (which is an astonishing 42 rows long) and making decent progress. They got to go to a major league baseball game last night and watch the Braves lose to the Devil Rays. Tonight they get to go over the my bfs sisters house for dinner and brave the pseudo nephews (one of whom likes to "help" me knit) for a while.

This is the little brother to my little knitting helper, isn't he sweet?

New Pattern

I stumbled upon a new pattern the other day on another blog, saw the link to the website (www.dawnadcock.com) and fell in love with it. They are the Shapely Secrets Socks by Dawn Adcock, and they are (so far) wonderful. I especially like that the pattern doesn't obsure self striping yarns. Hopefully this will become my new pattern for everyones socks, we'll see how memorizable it is, if not...it'll be used for the people i really like, we'll let everyone else have baggy sock ankles :-p
Yes, this is the Opal Petticoat that i was determined to keep on dpns. Lets just say they took a trip to the frog pond after being so small i couldn't get them up over my foot. I don't consider myself to have abnormal leg anatomy, they were tiny...it was time to accept that maybe a 12" circular is the best way for me to make socks that will fit a normal sized person. Sorry about the crappy picture, i'm still using my phone as a blog camera. I'm working on changing that, but for now....

New Name

Though it may seem rather silly to change the name of the blog, i decided (along with Me, Myself and I) that the other one seemed rather lacking. Since I seem to only knit socks as of late, Socks R Us seems rather appropriate, don'tcha think?
I'm afraid i'm suffering from SSS yet again, what is up with this sudden epidemic lately? I used to never have issue with finishing the other sock and now i find myself wishing the gator that lives in the lake behind my house would eat it so i could be guiltless. Then my poor Auntie would only have one sock though, can't let that happen now can we? Auntie must have warm feet (and hands, if i can seem to get mittens under control) and she must have warm feet soon. Don't bother pointing out to me that it is almost July and certianly hot where she lives....everyone needs good wool socks. And she'll need good wool mittens this winter when she makes her lovely snow sculptures. Now all i need to do is figure out how on earth to make a pair of mittens that don't look like they were intended for Andre the Giant or a baby...still working on that bit. Oh well, i leave you with a picture of the lovely yarn model (and pseudo nephew) Curtis.

On A Roll

Another (almost) finished knit item; one that isn't socks! This is quite possibly the most gratifying sweater ever, probably due to the size of the thing...and the fact that it'll look adorable on the dog its for. Thats right folks, I knit a doggie sweater for the cutest 3 pound yorkie on the planet. Here we see the sweater blocking, once it's dry i'll sew the neck and tummy portions and pick up stitches for ribbing around the bottom and leg holes. This is my first attempt at this pattern, but my grandmother adores it and has made lots of them. Including the first one for little puppy dog (Sophie). I figure since she loves the one my grandma made, she'll like this one even more, its out of thicker (read, not baby weight) yarn and is 100% wool. Nice and warm for those cold Michigan winters. For a picture of Ms. Sophie wearing her other sweater, there is one in an August 2005 post that i had forgotten about.

In other news, the "Chameleon" sock yarn wasn't to my taste (took me 4 inches on the sock to figure it out) so it has taken a journey to the frog pond. Same with the Petticoat socks, which were so small i couldn't get them past my heel (I took them off the needles), guess dpns and I are just not meant to be, oh well. Have made the most adorable little baby bootie (notice lack of plural, i have made one...not one pair) but have made pathetic progress on the second. Is there a second bootie syndrome? Kind of like Second Sock Syndrome? I dunno, but I do know that I have a "Jaywalker" sock on my needles now. Great pattern so far, must admit that i've never finished one because...well, i'm fickle that way. But this yarn seems to be perfect for the pattern so far, I'll post pictures later when it's a bit further along.