I finally finished the Japanese Feather socks. I’m not sure why I stalled out on these just beyond the heel on the first one (heh. I typed that as “just beyond the hell”), but I did, and they languished for ages and ages and ages, sitting all melancholy-like on the nightstand. On a whim I picked it back up a couple of weeks ago and spent some quality time trying to figure out where in the hell I was on the pattern. Once I had that, I whipped out the rest of that first sock in about an hour, and immediately cast on for the second, which just seemed to fly off the needles too. Go figure. I absolutely LOVE the way these turned out, even if I was totally incapable of taking a decent picture of my own foot. Wouldn’t figure it would be that difficult, but I swear my ankles aren’t that wide and my feet aren’t *that* short.

Psst! Photos!

Not just one, but three pairs of socks! Three!

In absolutely no particular order:
Manly brown socks in my favorite sock yarn of all time, Socks That Rock medium weight, in Obsidian

Another pair of the Leaf Lace socks from some back issue of Interweave Knits, done in Regia Silk:

And a pair of slightly too tall Opal socks, in one of those make-it-up-as-you-go-along patterns that’s pretty much my standard, except that I got a bit carried away with the tops. They’d be perfect if I’d started them out a bit larger and decreased for the calf, but, alas, I wasn’t paying that kind of mind to the whole thing, and I didn’t, so they’re the same width all the way up, so they tend to squinch themselves down below the getting-fatter part of my calf, and often fall down. Whatever. I love them anyway.

AND! Because I’ve actually be REALLY productive, here’s the back of the O sweater (B&B Pullover from IK), done in the omfg yummy soft Beaverslide fisherman’s yarn. It seemed like it was going to be a might on the heavy side, but O reminded me of just how damn cold it gets on the island, and insisted that it was going to be the perfect weight, so I have soldiered on with it. The picture looks much greyer than the sweater actually is. The body is woodviolet and the trim is shooting star. See?

Then, just for good measure…
FINALLY, the picture of the lovely skein of handspun from my Spin To Knit Pal. I did a crap job of coming anywhere near capturing the actual color (and you know if I can tell that with a red skein of yarn, I really really did a crap job of it). But it’s really nicely spun, and soft. It’s 280 yards, somewhere between sport and dk weight. Project ideas? Bring ‘em on!

(enclicken to see it close up)

There you go. Proof that I haven’t been a total slacker.

Aww, you guys are the best!

Thank you all for your comments about the Highland Chunky and the suggestions. I’m torn between doing it as written, using the Beaverslide yarn, or doing it in something lighter and doing a buttload of math (in which case I’d probably also end up adding another narrow cable on either side of the main cable, and changing the neckline a wee bit, and well… then we get into ‘entirely different sweater’ territory, which wouldn’t be a bad thing, I don’t think). Maybe I’ll just have to do both. Yes, an arctic weight sweater may not be the most practical thing, but the Booger? She lives in a cold, wet place, and she loves her some arctic weight stuff (and she’s a wee bitty little thing with absolutely no body fat). I’ve been jonesing to order some Beaverslide yarns anyway, so I’m definitely going to do that. And I’ve got some lighter stuff on hand that I might just have enough of, so I’ll swatch for that too, and see where that takes me.

I will, of course, keep all y’all posted.

In other, completely unrelated news, I just got home from the doctor. It was one of those lovely bad news/good news things. My back? It’s horked. I knew that. I just didn’t know exactly *how* horked it was. Now I know. My L5S1 disk is blown. I will be going to see a surgeon in the next couple of weeks to find out if I have to have surgery (I’m voting no on that front). I get to go to physical therapy (and maybe accupuncture if my insurance will cover it). I think the worst bit about this whole thing is that the initial injury to my back happened, what, a year ago? Year and a half? It’s been a long damn while. I’ve seen three doctors about it. The first two decided that even xrays were unwarranted and that I was fine. The first one treated me like I was just another middle-class painkiller junkie seeking more drugs (and completely ignored both my statements to the contrary and the endless list of drugs I’m violently allergic to in my charts), and basically blew me off with nothing more than a cursory battery of “can you feel your feet” type things. The second did the same battery of poking at my feet and making me push up and down with my toes and concluded that it couldn’t be a disk issue because I didn’t have any nerve damage. Alas. I have no nerve damage (yet), but I do have one fewer intact disk than I should. So yeah, I’m a bit pissy about it all. But The Doctor’s Clinic folks? They get the bonus points for a)listening, b)thinking outside the box, and c)always being really freakin’ decent to deal with. I hate doctors (hoo-ee! the understatement of the year, right there, just for you!), and will avoid them at great lengths, but I have willingly gone back to this place a few times now, and always had a good experience. Surprising, really, for a walk-in clinic in Bummertown.

Oh yeah, and while laying flat on my back all last weekend I knit a pair of socks. Pictures forthcoming.

I wondered that last week. Just exactly how long does it take me to knit one sock on my usual needles in sock weight yarn. Enquiring minds wanted to know!

I set Sunday aside to find out. And now I know. I now know that it takes me 9.5 hours to crank out a basic sock. I now know that I am even more easily distracted than I thought I was. And I now know that if I sit in one place and knit with 2.25mm needles for 9.5 hours straight that I will a)lose the feeling in my arse and b)not be able to move my fingers the next day.

Today is Wednesday. My hands still hurt. Me am dumb.

But hey! Now I know. And if you want to see a basic sock progress in half hour increments from start to finish, click here. (bump up the pic size and set it for a 1-3 second delay between pictures. – I’m working on getting it animated so it will just run with a timeline at the bottom, but I haven’t gotten that done yet). (and yeah, some of those pics are mighty blurry. sorry.)

The finished sock, with 25% more Hugo!

I just love the magic of turning a heel on a sock. That and lace blocking I think are two of the freakin’ coolest things we knitters get to do.

In my ongoing quest to have every skein of sock yarn I have on the needles (ha!), here are three of my most current socky projects (These are the travelling socks. There are several others that live at the house in various rooms, so that I always have a project at hand):

The third incarnation of the Lisa Souza Sock! in Pacific. First it was an ill-fated slip stitch rib, then it made a valliant attempt to be potamawhateverthehelltheywerecalled, and now Diamond Patch socks from… Heartland Knits? I think that’s it. They’re in the car or I’d go check.

I tried and tried and tried and tried to get the damn camera to pick up the actual colors in this yarn. It’s SOOOO much prettier than what you’re seeing here. Lots of purple in it that doesn’t show up at all. Stupid camera.

Moving on. Here we have the Japanese Feather sock designed for me by my KSKS pal, Jess. I’m digging this pattern and the yarn. This was where I was at with them yesterday morning on the ferry (note the bitchin’ car-interior-photo-studio action I’ve got going), at this point the heel has been turned and I’m almost to the end of the gusset. Woot! Go me.

And, lastly in the sock category, we have the stripey super-plain sock that I work on when there isn’t enough light to do anything else. The lovely wooden sock-in-progress-holder came from John and Dee. I have the rest of their info on a different computer, so if you need one of these (and you KNOW you do), leave a comment or send me an email and I’ll hook you up. They’re VERY sweet people, and the sock holders are soooooo wonderful. I won’t tell you how many of them I have now…

Yes, it’s a sleeve. This is another piece for Melissa – this time the Must Have Cardi in Shaba Green Peace Fleece. I’ll definitely be knitting one of these for myself. It’s about the most mindless pattern, and I really like it. Both knitting it and the way it looks.

And, finally, I’m going to totally break my own rule and talk about something work related. Just because this one had to be shared.

We ordered some new laptops from Dell a few weeks ago, and they showed up yesterday. I had to go out to my car and get my camera just to show you how totally over the top and ridiculous the packaging on these were. Four lappys, four boxes. Gigantic warehouse guy included for scale (he’s standing several feet behind the boxes).

I think that one gives overkill new meaning. At least they weren’t full of styrofoam…

So… The Trekking Jaywalkers. Not. Going. To. Happen. They got frogged AGAIN. See?:

I took them back to the bottom of the cuff, and will be reknitting them, yet again, in the same pattern as the other Trekking socks, which can be seen trekking all over the inside of my car – seen here trekking on the dashboard with their trekking partner and a rogue Sockotta interloper:

and here, lounging on the steering wheel after the long, strenuous trek across the dash (c’mon! that’s a LOT of dash!)

Blah, blah, photos!, blah, blah…

Booger’s socks, ON Booger’s feets:

There you go. Now you can’t say I never give you photos.

Which is why I haven’t posted in, like, forever, y’know?

But really, I’ve been busy! I swear! See? Look!

First off, we have the super-oh-my-god-these-are-girly socks:

followed by… yeah, suckage – the hole that I managed to tear in the toe of one of them while visiting the rest of the Beavers in Portland last weekend:

(I can fix that, though)

And then, the super-fabulous Elizabeth Collar that I made for myself:

and the one I made for O when she saw mine in progress and DESPERATELY wanted one:

Followed by the socks that I’m making for someone special for the holidaze (I’m gettin’ PAID for this pair, kids, can you believe that???)

and then, MAGNETS! A bajillion magnets! Yee-haw! See folks? my entire life doesn’t really revolve around knitting! You doubted! You mocked! HA! I showed you!

So. There you have it. And now, I truly must get back to the knitting. I have a mere 5 days to finish the sox above and the other project, which I can’t take a picture of ‘cos the person it’s for might see it. Sigh.

Sox, baby, sox. Two of them. Finished.

.

No, they don’t match. They’re not supposed to. (they are the same height, mind you, it just doesn’t appear that way in the picture). I decided to swap the main color and the contrast color for the fair isle stuff at the top, and flipped the diagonal stripe pattern over so the stripes twist the opposite direction on the second one. But they fit, they’re comfy, they’re REALLY soft, and I’m diggin it.