Sunglasses advisible

I'm certain various health authorities would recommend that you do not look directly at the photos in this post, please try to find one of those eclipse viewers from the late nineties - it's probably crumpled at the back of the kitchen drawer. Alternatively, you will be safe if you view through your car sunroof. Consider yourself warned.

Mandy advised me to try something soft, colourful and soothing as a remedy for the aptly named tangled yoke - and I always follow advice which implores me to knit more!

The last time I showed you H's sock it was Saturday and I had a little foot, about the size of my hand. It is possible that I have been knitting like a mad thing instead of taking progress pictures for they now (and yes there is a they) look like this:


Two finished Mardi Gras socks and I can say with some certainty (and a hint of singed retina) that these will see off all winter blues! H loves them.


After this I have no fear of ever knitting a pair of socks that he will deem "too bright for boys" - he choose the yarn and couldn't be happier with the result. I know this because after the photo shoot when I looked for the socks to pop in his sock drawer I found that they were here:

Keeping someone's feet warm under the end of the quilt and I don't think they are coming out for a while!

The yarn is Colinette Jitterbug Mardi Gras (with a smigin of STR Dragons Dance to give me enough yarn to complete the bind off!) and the socks were knit toe up starting with 12 sts on each of two needles, increasing to a total of 68. I did 65 rounds of the foot and then a short row heel over 40sts working to a minimum of 10 unwrapped stitches in the middle. The leg has 46 rounds in stst and then 9 rounds of 2x2 rib and a sewn bind off.

As I said, I have no leftovers, this pair of socks for a UK size 10/11 foot is all you will get out of a skein of Jitterbug.

I hope you all feel considerably more cheerful looking at them - such is the power of these socks that they actually sparked a conversation on the Tube today (we're English, such things do not usually happen). As I zipped round and round the leg of the second sock I completely failed to notice a couple of builders watching me from where they stood nearby until I wrapped it all up just before my stop; "Don't stop", said a voice, "you're making my journey go so much quicker - it's very soothing watching you". I grinned and they asked if I was making a scarf (seriously - it looked pretty much like a sock at this point!) so I explained and we talked about how long it would take to make the pair. One guy remarked that it would be quicker to go to Primark and buy a pair and his mate replied in shock "you can't say that - look at it!".

You can't get colours like this at Primark and I think somewhere in London there is a builder with a burgeoning inner knitter - keep your eyes peeled for balls of yarn dangling off construction sites!

Mapping your toes?

H's Mardi Gras socks continue to astonish me. I have now knit almost one sock and the toe and a bit of the second and they both have these wonderful pooling stripes. What is particularly impressive is that they swirl in opposite directions. Don't ask me how - the knitter, the stitch count and the needles have all remained the same and I refuse to believe that I knit that differently when it's ridiculously cold and my fingers are all pink and white.

The swirls are starting to look like one of those multicoloured weather maps - pink and bright green for the big rain storms and red and blue for the warm and cool fronts perhaps?

I would share pictures but it's late and dark so for now you'll just have to use your imagination!

I've also started the cabled yoke on my Tangled Yoke - it was going pretty well until I realised that I should have been increasing all the way across the last purl row and I need to tink back - being the woman that I am I'm hiding on the internet instead but I have to go and face the music now!

TTFN

A cure for the winter blues

I should hasten to add that today has been yet another peerless crisp clear blue winter's day - the sun has shone, the laundry has dried, the daffodils outside the front door still threaten to bloom through the frost, I felt sufficiently joyful to wash the kitchen floor etc etc. I have had sufficient sunlight and green things exposure that I cannot claim the blues as a need to hibernate in a corner with my knitting, fiercly waiting for better weather.

However, if you are still surrounded by grey clouds, deep damp chill and, dare I add it, SNOW, well first of all please send some of the snow to me. Please carefully parcelwrap the snow - after all I do live in England and therefore I know what rain looks like - and send it to:

The I-wanted-to-be-a-polar-but-now-I'm-just-grisly Bear
Wannabe-in-an-Igloo House
The least snowy village in Warwickshire
Warwickshire
UK

All damp offerings gratefully received.

Getting back to the point - I may just have the thing to brighten up your winter days - imagine yourself a little bit of Jazz, a little bit of dancing, a carnival even; maybe a Jitterbug?



That is side 1 of the start of H's socks and this is side 2:

They're toe-up (obviously!) and I'm going to put in a short row heel at the appropriate point so when I get there H will choose which side he wants on the top of his foot. At the moment that's the side with the blue and pink strip but as all the colours are doing a slow spiral around the foot at the moment we'll just have to wait and see.

It's funny that neither of my other pairs of Jitterbug socks have spiralled but I have smaller feet. It seems that a Mardi Gras spiral starts at 68sts with loosish gauge!

Of course had I started making them the Tuesday before last it would all be terribly appropriate but you can't win them all!

Although my deep and unrelenting passion for green knitwear remains - well, deep and unrelenting, it appears that the rainbow is creeping into a few other little bits and bobs.

This is part of what I can only describe as an interpretive dance of a relatively well known pattern; my version being made out of remains of Rowan cotton glace and 4ply cotton found in the stash. I was aiming for large baby sized as a possibly gift for the early April baby with the idea that it would fit over the summer but I think I'm verging on substantial toddler.

All I know is that:

1, babies grow;
2, one day this will fit a child;
3, that state of affairs will admittedly last only for about 30 mins before he or she grows out of it;
4, the yarn came from the stash and is mostly remainders of my Smoulder cardigan in a different order. This means that by extrapolation Kaffe Fasset chose the colours!
5, I'm enjoying making it - and that's really all that matters