Happy Coping Strategy

Today, while walking Dexter, I had my head bent into the wind and yet I was still blasted with painful spikes of ice crystals on my upper lip. This felt like an wanton cruelty after the brief thaw and sun of last week. The streets had cleared of snow and ice, and I was walking in sneakers, with my head up. It was a revelation! Ah! I really am this tall, there are wonderful trees and houses to see. But now it is back to walking with my head bowed to be sure that I don't slip on the ice and to get a bit of protection from the wind.

It's good knitting weather, and yet I find my creative energies are low. I'm a solar-powered creature and I need the sun. I have been working on a sweater for my father and have completed the body almost to the arms. So I started a sleeve. Not exactly a thrilling or original tale. I have something much prettier to show you than a sweater in pieces. New sock yarn:


These beauties are from Wild Fire Fibres, an Etsy seller whom I found through Joli House. Three of these skeins are superwash Blue Faced Leicester and I'm very curious to see how they will knit up and wear. The fourth is a merino/bamboo blend. Regardless of the fibre, I'm in love with the colors. Oh and the price was very good and the shipping was swift. I can commend this shop on those accounts.

Anyone else up for some retail therapy?

Issues with Blogger

Finally! A workaround. I've been trying to create a blog post since Sunday but haven't been able to log into the blog. I've navigated through the troubleshooting help pages and blogger forums and finally found a hacky work around. This is the first time I've ever had a problem with blogger. So I'm not complaining, but I do hope the issue gets fixed soon. My frustration has sort of overwhelmed everything else. I was going to show you socks... that's right.

After knitting socks for Jim and his mother, I had a hankering for a pair for myself.

These are Fancy Silk Sock for a Child of 5 or 6 years by Nancy Bush, from Knitting Vintage Socks. I used Apple Laine yarn but made them a bit big, because I've noticed sock yarn with mohair in it tends to shrink a bit. It actually wasn't too bad knitting black lace socks. There's a high shine to this yarn that increases the visibility of it. I think these socks will be lovely to wear with my black work pants.

I recently bought Cat Bordi's book, New Pathways for Sock Knitters and had some fun this week turning out the class socks.



Okay, gotta run. Hopefully a better and more interesting post next time, when I'm not so frustrated with blogger.

Passing out Awards

If life is a highway, then my weekends are like the telephone poles. You no sooner approach one and it's gone.

A nice gift this weekend was to be awarded a Creative Blogger Award from Debbie at Live and Let Learn! Seems appropriate to do awards while the Grammys (sic) are on.

Does anyone know where this one started from? I can't seem to find it at all. But I did find the rules:

1. The winner must copy this Award to their own blog.
2. Link to the blog from whence you received the Award.
3. Nominate a minimum of 7 other bloggers
4. Link to the nominated on your blog
5. Leave comment about the award on the nominated blogs.

Here's my list of Creative Blogs:

1. To Amanda at Joli House, whose blog I just discovered. Her photographs are top notch.
2. To Iza at Vegamite, Violets and Knitting, a local chum, for fearless knitting.
3. To Ruth at Wooly Headed who still manages to knit and be creative through the perfect storm.
4. To Anne at Knitspot for making creative designing look so easy. That's the sure sign of a virtuoso.
5. To Ruth at Knitting on Impulse for sheer creative power. It's a torrent.

So it's not seven, I'm creative enough to roll with a different number.

Things are picking up

I am so glad to see the end of January. We've had a lot of snow and cold in the past month and it is very nice to think that there will be an end to it. Of course, some don't mind deep snow in the least.


Today the sun is shining brightly, as if February is trying to tell us that the weather will get better. It was a good day to take pictures of handknits.

Last weekend I finished up my Noro scarf (Ravelry link):

I'm happy to call one of these my own. By now, these scarves are so well known on the internet that wearing one is sort like a badge of identification. I've also finished my mother-in-law's very simple, special-request socks:

I'm very happy with them. In the ball, the yarn (OnLine) wasn't anything special, but knit up, they are colorful in a sophisticated way. I knit in a tiny stripe of rib down each side of the sock. Just a P1, K1, P1, that I hope will give a little extra stretch to these socks that will help them stay up without binding. Also, to keep the pattern sequence traveling down the foot, I knit the heels using the other end of the ball. I especially like how one heel is in the brown/grey sequence and the other is in the blue/green sequence.

I had started knitting a sweater for my dad, but the fabric is so dense at gauge that the knit was not enjoyable. So I'm holding off till I can show my dad and we can figure out what to do. It's interesting that he doesn't just want me to knit him something else. He wants to see the sweater design first. While I'm happy he's taking such an interest, it's a bit annoying that I can't just knit what I like and I wonder if he doesn't trust my judgment.

In the mean time, I cast on for something I do like.

Oh happy bright soft and fuzzy! I love this thing! The pattern, Dayflower Daydream, is very interesting to work, the yarn is a lovely color, and it is so warm on my lap. In part I picked this pattern because it's by Eugen Beugler. He also designed Frost Flowers and Leaves, which I loved knitting so much, I did it twice. So far, Dayflower Daydream is just as fun. I appreciate that it's in the round because there are no purl back rows. Ah, just writing about it, I'm itching to get back to knitting. Catch ya later!