One of my resolutions this year (#10) is to participate in Sockdown 2014. It technically goes from August to August, but I’m aiming to participate from January to December. Hopefully, I will keep it rolling after that. As soon as I started knitting, I wanted to learn to how knit socks because it seemed so cool – I still think it is so cool! Five sticks and a really long piece of string = socks. So neat!

Each month sockdown has one or two techniques, two designers, and a mystery sock. You can pick any one you want, and there are a lot of options there. This month the two techniques are lace and intarsia and I went with lace. I picked Anna by Barbara Richardson. It’s knitting up nicely! I mainly work on it while I sit and watch our oldest at jiu jitsu at night and then late night when everyone else is in bed. Gotta fit it in whenever I can!

I am aware I’m a day late for Work in Progress Wednesday – let’s just gloss over that and I will explain why I’ve had big plans but have been stumbling a bit tomorrow. 😉

I’m late to the game on this one, but it was just too cute and too fun to wait till next year!

While stocking up on yarn in November for my annual knitting marathon (every evening in November and December) at Knit Picks, I came across this pattern for Smitten, a Holiday Garland and, naturally, I bought everything I needed for it that very second. So so so cute!

From http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/smitten-a-holiday-garland

Rounds 1-8: *K1, P1 repeat from * to end of round (8 rounds of ribbing)
Switch to stockinette and begin the body of the mitten
Round 9: K3, M1R, K6, M1R, K6, M1L, K6, M1L, K3 (28 sts)
Round 10: Knit
Round 11: K12, M1R, K4, M1L, K12
Rounds 12-15: Knit (4 rounds)
Round 16: K12, M1R, K6, M1L, K12
Rounds 17-19: Knit (3 rounds)
Round 20: K12, M1R, K8, M1L, K12
Rounds 21-22 Knit (2 rounds)
Round 23: K12 and move them onto needle 1, K10, move the remaining 2 stitches on needle 2
onto needle 3 for safe keeping (12-10-12)
Work back and forth on the 10 stitches on needle 2 to make the thumb.
Row 1 (WS): Purl
Row 2: Knit
Row 3: P2TOG 5 times
Break yarn, leaving a 6″ tail.
Draw the tail through the live stitches of the thumb, pull up and secure.
The tail will be used to sew up the side of the thumb when finishing.
Continue Round 23 by attaching the yarn at the beginning of needle three and knitting all of
the stitches on it.
Rearrange stitches evenly on three needles and mark start of round if needed. (8-8-8)
Round 24-30: Knit (7 rounds)
Round 31: SSK twice, K6, K2TOG, SSK, K6, K2TOG twice (18 sts)
Round 32: Knit
Round 33: *K2TOG repeat from * to end of round (9 sts)
Break yarn, draw tail through the remaining stitches, pull up and secure. Hide tail inside.
Using the tail on the thumb, sew up the side of the thumb. Yarn can be knotted with the cast on
tail (mid-round 23) at the thumb joint to secure. Hide the yarn ends inside.
Fold the end of the i-cord to the mitten cuff and sew in place with the cast-on tail to form a loop
for hanging. Weave in (or hide) all yarn ends.

I knitted them up over the course of a few nights at the end of November. You just knit 24 tiny mittens, feel free to use whatever colors go with the room you’re putting this in or just whatever makes you happy. I used six different colors, so I made four of each. I used Knit Picks worsted weight yarn Swish in Serrano (holly red), Rouge (pink), Honey (yellow), Gulfstream (bright blue), Dublin (green) and Amethyst Heather (purple). Each mitten has it’s own little i-cord knitted into the cuff to hang! Then you knit a long i-cord to hang them all from, I also used Split Rings to mark the countdown.

 

Instead of putting candy or toys inside (we have a few advent calendars, our kids are big on counting down and we didn’t want to add any more trinkets or candy to our lives), my husband and I dreamed up 24 fun activities and opened these cute little characters in Photoshop and got to work. We printed them, cut them out, rolled them and tied them with red curling ribbon. Then we stuffed each mitten with an activity! The kids have such a blast picking out the activity for the day and since we know what they are, we can make sure we are prepared for them!

When we’re done, I’ll post pictures of all the activities we did! Here is the list:
1 – write letters to Santa 2 – make paper snowflakes 3 – make paper chain dolls 4 – bake bread 5 – make cinnamon ornaments 6 – read Christmas stories 7 – Christmas movie marathon 8 – make homemade marshmallows 9 – paint Christmasy pictures 10 – make hot chocolate balls 11 – have an M&M race (more on this later) 12 – make Borax snowflakes	13 – decorate a gingerbread house 14 – play minute it win it games 15 – make snow globes 16 – make botttlecap snowmen 17 – make gifts for each other 18 – make window clings 19 – make gingerbread and star garland 20 – try a new recipe 21 – make a huge blanket fort in the living room 22 – watch The Polar Express and drink hot chocolate 23 – play reindeer games 24 – read The Night Before Christmas

Stuff from this post: Avery Key Tags, Red Curling Ribbon and Knit Picks Swish Worsted yarn in Serrano, Rouge, Honey, Gulfstream, Dublin and Amethyst Heather.

I found these little cuties over at Mollie Makes and I’m set on making one for each wee person coming to our Easter potluck! The bigger kids will get bunnies with button eyes and the babies will get bunnies with embroidered eyes. I’m still working on them and some other little treats for the baskets, I’ll post the finished product when it’s ready but I had to share this pattern! Even if you don’t feel that you knit very well you can pull these little guys together.

Their construction is pretty simple. You knit one ear and place it on a safety pin to keep the stitches live. Then knit the second ear and just knit the first ear onto the same needle as the second. Then the base of the bunny is knitted after that so it’s all one piece, no seaming! Hooray, I totally hate seaming (and you probably do too)!

These bunnies are deliciously wonky and I adore them this way. There are so many patterns for less wonky creatures but I think there’s something about the silliness of this pattern that makes me happier than it probably should.

Three of the goals on my 2013 list are knitting related, (knitting 12 pairs of socks in a year, finishing this blanket, and knitting 13 Tiny Owl Knits patters for those of you following along at home). It doesn’t matter that I totally suck at knitting sweaters or that my guage is so often painfully much too big or much too small. When I started reading knitting blogs I was sure I’d be a brilliant knitter as soon as I could knit complicated socks. By that logic, I’m extremely brilliant because all I knit are complicated socks. Socks with colorwork, socks with lace, socks with cables, all if it! Attaching arms on a sweater, not so much, but complicated socks I can do.

I finished one pair of socks for Wee One #1, one pair of socks for my girl Sammie, one for Wee One #2’s godmother and a pair of baby socks for my friend’s new baby that I didn’t post about. Onward!

These are the ones I made for Wee One #1. The pattern is called Winter Lace Socks by Barb Brown Designs. I made them in Knit Picks Comfy Fingering in Jalapeño. He loves them and wears them to bed!

I’m most excited about these babies, they’re going in the mail tomorrow to my kitchen soul mate and sister from another mister, Sammie. <3 The pattern is called Socks of Kindness (so fitting for her). I’ve made them once before in a bright blue for Wee One #2’s senior kindergarten teacher. So so pretty. It was her birthday last week and so far this year I’ve bene negative two weeks on getting things in the post on time. At least they get there, right? These ones were knit up from Knit Picks Felici Sport self-striping in Marsh.

These are a Christmas gift that has still yet to leave the house. Terrible, right? I know, I know. In my defense the recipient has not sent ours down either haha. Hilariously, I made these as one of the first Christmas knitting projects! They are for Wee One #2’s godmother, the pattern is called Basket Case Socks and these were knit in Knit Picks Comfy Fingering in Peapod.

These little cuties are sooooo adorable, they’re painful to look at. I made a pair in pink for Sammie’s baby girl in the fall and they look just as cute in blue! The pattern is called Garter Stripe Baby Socks and I made them from very pretty yarn my sister sent me for my birthday. Nikkiiiii, what yarn is this?!

Yesterday I started a dishcloth on size 6 needles after only making socks and working on my puffs (for this) on very small needles and I felt like a vampire slayer. Not that size 6s are at all big, but most of my sock needles are toothpick-like so regular needles see huge.

I’ve been doing a pretty good job of knitting up my hexi-puffs from the leftover sock yarn at the end of each pair. I’m up to 234 now! I have listed in the sidebar and on my project page on Ravelry that I need 400 but it might be a whole lot more than that. Once I hit 400, I’ll lay them out and see if that’s even close. It’s going to look so sweet when it’s done I don’t even care how long it takes. Just look at this one!

Now…which pattern to choose next?!

P to the S – Valentiney insanity kicks off this weekend!

I may have lost count, but I’m pretty sure this is my 18th WIP, I think my last one was in October!

These socks were knit for Sockdown, month 4. They’re called Basket Case Socks and they were a pretty quick knit. I kept getting distracted by Christmas prep for the kids – first Christmas in a new country with all our stuff back home meant I needed to round up a lot of the traditional comforts for them and to be honest, that wasn’t easy. Most of November was eaten up with planning and then of course December was full of doing! I just casted on for Aramis Socks last night, so there’s not much to report on that front other than to say I’m making a dent on my first day out of the gate!

Between socks, I’m still working on my Beekeeper Quilt. I have a list of projects I really want to work on this year, but I think I will make a rule for myself that everything has to be made with sock weight yarn so I can use all my scraps for the quilt. I’m looking forward to finishing my quilt this year but I do love the look of all my hexi puffs on the table like this. When I come to the end of a scrap ball, I start up with the next in line and I love those puffs the most! Here are my favorites out of the 200+ that I have so far.

I’m nervous to admit that I want to take on another knitting challenge this year, in addition to the 12 pairs of socks for Sockdown 6 and the finishing the beautiful quilt from all these puffs – I want to do Tiny Owl Knits 13 in 2013. The Beekeeper’s Quilt is a Tiny Owl Knits project and all her (Stephanie Dosen) projects are equally adorable and full of whimsy. Dare I try it?! Someone encourage me!!

Today I am linking up with Freshly Pieced

I can hardly believe it, but Sockdown 6 has totally lit a fire under me for finishing socks within a respectable time frame!

I cast on for this pair on October 3 and I am about 10 minutes from finished – and that’s with two days of not knitting because I was doing homeschool prep one night and Halloweeny stuff with the kids the other night. Which means I managed a pair of socks in 5 days! What?! I’m going to cast on for another pair tonight! Officially that’s two pairs of socks in September and so far one in October.

The pattern is called Summer Lovin and I used Knit Picks’ Felici Fingering Self Striping Sock Yarn in ‘Mixed Berries’. I made them as a birthday gift for one of the kids’ godmothers (which totally gives it away since only one has an autumn birthday and her favorite color is purple, however she almost never reads my blog anyway 😛). Anyhoo….these will be finished up today and popped in the mail this week!

These are the beauties I finished up last week, the pattern is called Maidenhair Fern and it was a fun knit. I am totally in love with this yarn, Nova Sock that I picked up in the woods before we moved. It’s pretty and soft without being so soft it slips off the needles. My only issue with this yarn, and yes it is an issue, is that the colors are always just numbers. Pfft. Part of the love of yarn are skeins with names like Whitewater or Black Purl or Greenling, and even names that don’t sound like colors at all like Juice Box and Tree Fort and Hayride. Not numbers. Ugh.

These little beauties are going in the mail today as a treat for an unsuspecting friend – an unsuspecting friend that reads my blog! Just you wait! Haha. 🙂

Today, I’m linking up with Freshly Pieced, Yours Truly, 3 Four and Under, Free Pretty Things for You, The Trendy Treehouse, Ginger Snap Crafts, Rae Gun Ramblings, My Girlish Whims, Southern Lovely, Clean and Scentsible, Milk and Cuddles, JAQS Studio, Family, Home & Life, The Life of Jennifer Dawn, Uncommon Designs, and Polka Dots on Parade

I finally casted on my second pair of socks for Sockdown September! I just started them last night and I’m making decent progress. I think with this weekend’s little road trip (more on that when we get back) I will finish these babies off. I’m making them as a surprise for a old friend who reads my blog so I’m not telling, other than to say I hope to get these on her feet by the first week of October.

The way Sockdown works is pretty simple really. First of all, if you’re asking WTF, Sockdown is a knit-a-long (KAL) within the Sock Knitters Anonymous group on Ravelry. Essentially, every month a bunch of us try to knit as many pairs of socks that fit under the same guidelines as possible. We post cast on and bind off information and of course all the stuff in between. Every month the guidelines are 1) a set ‘technique’ (though it’s not always technically a technique) like for example socks designed for men or a specific color or cables or something like that. 2) there are a couple of featured designers each month, whose patterns you can knit and NOT follow the technique rule (obviously it’s more fun if you try to find a pattern by the featured designer that uses that month’s technique) aaaaand 3) every other month there is a mystery sock pattern, the mystery being that only one part of the pattern is released at a time as a ‘clue’ and no one really knows what it looks like!

One other rule that I really like is that you actually have two months to finish each months’ socks – as long as they were cast on in the proper month. So for example, as long as I cast on all of my September socks before September 30, I have until October 31 to finish them! At first I thought this might get me trapped in always being a month behind and then never getting a chance to catch up but Sockdowns go from September to September and August is considered a vacation month, you can finish July’s project in time.

Why? Well, other than the fun of a KAL and the public pressure to actually finish my socks in a timely manner, there are prizes! They are drawn for the day after the deadline (so September’s prize will be drawn for on November 1). So fun! Of course the more pairs of socks you finish by each deadline, the more times you are entered in the draw!

The Sockdown challenge for September is just to knit in red. This yarn is Nova Sock Print in 411, I bought it from a cute hobby shop in the woods in Ontario before we left.

Now! Onto my finished socks! These babies, my Zephyr socks, were my first ever Sockdown socks. Knit in a beautiful yarn by Alisha Goes Around, called Panoply of Peacocks Fingering in ‘Parted’. I ordered it from The Loopy Ewe and I seriously recommend them to anyone. They are a wonderful shop! Physically, they are in Fort Collins in Colorado. The next time we are in Colorado I’d love to take a drive up there!

These socks were knitted for my littlest little! I have enough yarn left for plenty of puffs for my blanket too!

I did it!! Look! My sister won like 14, but whatever, I got one!

So with the Ravellenic Games behind me for another two years, the desire to knit my face off is still in full force. Thankfully my life is actually pretty conductive to that, so away I went casting on and finishing a pair of cute baby socks for my girl Sammie. Well, they’re for her baby duh, but that baby isn’t finished cooking yet. That gives me more time to knit other cute things for her!

But those socks are finished, May, where’s your work in progress?! These lovies were cast on shortly before the Games started and I set them aside to work on my puffs. The puffs are habit forming!! After I finished the pink baby socks, I immediately used the rest of the yarn to make puffs (I only got two out of what was left) and these socks are not even done yet and I’m already thinking about the puffs I will make with the leftover yarn. Here are Miss Wee One #3’s almost finished wee socks!

No lie, she is currently wearing the finished one. She wanted to wear the one that’s still on the needles, but eventually decided the one without the pokey things would be just fine for today. Don’t you eat cereal while watching My Little Pony on Netflix with one woolly sock on – in California in August?!

Sidebar: Our cousin’s girlfriend showed me Coursera a little while ago! Have you seen this?

I will be taking Networked Life, Model Thinking and Greek and Roman Mythology this term (they are all 10 weeks long) and then Nutrition for Health Promotion (6 weeks) in January. I’m excited that each of the courses I picked all award a certificate of completion if done well!

So, as you may recall, I jumped into the Ravellenic Games (aka the Knitting Olympics) on day 6, which is a little crazy but I figured I’d be able to challenge myself to something and actually do it.

I am beyond happy to report that I did! This is my official project page on Ravlery, I knit 100 puffs for my Beekeeper’s Quilt with literally just 15 minutes to go!

Since I focused all my efforts on this one event (the Modular Relay) I will only get one medal, which is what I originally set out to do, but as I watch so many other knitters collect a zillion medals for painfully easy tasks (like knitting 5 puffs, or knitting a stack of unstuffed puffs) I’m all butthurt! Haha. Which is totally ridic, I know. I could have chosen to knit like 10 puffs for that event, and I could have made cross-event projects (like if I had made a pair of quick baby socks from the pink bamboo in my stash it would have counted for 3 events; Baby Dressage, Synchronized Stash Busting and the Sock Put – actually, if I made them as a Chrismtas gift then I would have also gotten the Holiday Hurdles event). Anyhoo, I’m setting the lofty goal right now that I will try to participate in ALL the events in 2014. So I think I need a loom lol.

As for Menu Monday this week, I’m not sure what I’m doing because it’s been so hot! Last night we had sandwiches. Yes, really. At first I was thinking I should just BBQ this week, but I’m not as great with charcoal as I am with gas and my gas BBQ is about eleventy billion miles away. Soooo, we’ll see. I’m thinking at the very least I should have brought my slow cooker or toaster oven down with me for temps like these!

I did however, order this and can hardly wait for it to get here so I can make frozen treats for the wee ones!

Behold! Here are all 62/100 of the puffs I’ve been knitting for the Modular Event in Ravellenics 2012. Total I have over 100 puffs for the actual quilt I’m making these for, but as far as the knitting olympics goes, the count is 62, leaving 38 to do by Sunday. I think I can get them done by Friday, maybe even Thursday night. If I manage to do that I will cast on for another event over the weekend.

When I decided to challenge myself to make 100 puffs I figured getting one medal would be awesome, but my sister already has 12 (in order from most recent finish line crossed; TWO medals in the Shawl Sailing event, TWO medals in the Lace Longjump, Balance Beads, Synchronized Stash Busting, TWO medals in the Single Skein Sprint, WIPs Wrestling, Holiday Hurdles, Charity Rowing, and Scarf Hockey). Some of the events overlap, so for example if you make a scarf from stash yarn to save as a Christmas gift it would count in Scarf Hockey, Synchronized Stash Busting, and Holiday Hurdles. Clearly, I went about this all wrong. Watch out 2014!!

I’d like to make a little something special for Sammie‘s little one on the way, but I think I want to make her something more grand than a weekender project. Actually, I guess I could knit something small for her to go with a bigger package. If I do, that would be part of the Baby Dressage event, and hey if I make a wee pair of socks it would also count towards the Sock Put event (or the Toy Toss event if I made a little toy).

Anyhoo, less typing, more knitting!