Back in the city

Well, it's back in the city at the house for me. There's been no blogging around here not because of a lack of knitting (minus a mid week no knitting funk last week), but because I've been mostly living at the cabin. It is very convenient because my cabin is equally as far from my day job at the university as my house is so I can stay out there durring the week if I want. Which is heaven in June because my parents are only there on the weekend so I have a nice place to relax and destress. I mostly watched bad reality television and ate take out Chinese food. Not very productive but occassionally good for the soul.

Since the great Sockapalooza sock disaster in my last post, most of the knitting time has been devoted to making a new sock for my pal. And trust me, getting something was once again not easy. I settled on the ominous sky yarn but getting the pattern was something else. I tried a whole bunch of designs from More Sensational Knitted Socks. The first one I tried I realized after one repeat that there was no way I was going to put up with it for two socks. The pattern was nice but I had to M1 and M1R all over the place and it was driving me batty. The next few attempts were axed because you couldn't see the pattern. The yarn is variegated in such a way that the colour changes at a lightning pace and all detail gets buried. So I ended up settling on a very simple Basket Weave pattern. It's not plain but still visibile amongst the yarn. Clearly these socks were meant to be about the yarn, not the pattern so I'm happy with that. Here they are right at the toe (I had to stop because I'd left my pal's foot measurements at home and didn't want to make them too short. However, being home with her info, I now feel foolish as her her feet are the same length as mine).

I do hope that my pal will love them. It's very hard to judge for me because they're outside my colour palette (her favourite colour list looked pretty much like my colours I really don't want list except the blue). But my mother keeps asking to have them and fawning over them so that must be a good sign. Any thoughts from people out there who like blue/brown/grey dark colours and no lace? I plan to finish this one Wednesday and the save the second sock for my road trip mid-July.

On the needles for myself for the Summer of Socks KAL I cast on for the Sweetpea Socks from the Summer Knitty with my Claudia Handpaint in the Carousel colourway. These socks are so much fun because all the bright colours keep me entertained as I knit. And I absolutely cannot say enough about the cuff of these socks. They start by casting on 120 stitches and then instead of K3P2 on the first row you K2TOG(x3)P2TOG(x2) and you get this super funky ruffle. I didn't really capture it in this picture but I'll deinfitely highlight it after the first finished sock picture. This sock I think will become a definite must knit. Here is what it looks like just after starting the gusset

Notice the coke can above modeling the sock :) I really want some sock blockers however I have now come to a dilemma. Ordering yarn without sock blockers makes it come in an envelope and I escape paying customs. Ordering with makes it come in a box and that makes me pay customs (an extra about $20). And as much as I want them, I don't know how I can justify basically doubling the price... But they are on my to acquire list. And in my search for new sock yarns the next ones high on my list of wants are: Duets, Yarn Pirate, Yartini, Tofutsies and Socks that Rock. While the rest I had heard of, in the last sneak up the Loopy Ewe had posted some Duets and the colours were amazing. It's called Duets because it's a variegated yarn but it also comes with a small amount of a solid yarn in co-ordinating colours for the heel/toe. Isn't that smart? I'll have to wait until the next time it's stocked...

But it's late and I'm off to go dream about the rest of the socks in my future and try to forget the ever quickening arrival of two babies I'm knitting blankets for that keep getting cast aside for socks...