May Socks Done!

I finished my Rogue Roses socks. The pattern looked a little intimidating to me, but turned out to be reasonably easy. I mentioned before that the roses are done by knitting into the stitch 4 rows below. That was a lot of yarn to loop! Tension was the hardest part of this and definitely took some practice. I did 4 pattern repeats on the leg and 3 3/4 repeats on the foot. I had 38 grams (about 90 yds) of yarn leftover, so I could have easily made the legs longer if I wanted to. All in all though I think they came out quite nice. They still need a bath and blocking, but I'm waiting on an order from Woolgirl, so they'll get that probably later this week. Although I think these are very pretty, I'm not sure I love them. I'm going to set them aside for now and consider gifting them to someone special for Christmas.


Pattern: Rogue Roses by Stephanie Pearl-McPhee
Yarn: STR mediumweight colorway Gertude Skein
Size Medium
Needle: Addi Turbo size 1 (2.5mm)

RSC May 2009 Shipment

I have the May Rockin' Sock Club shipment in this post, soooo if you are a club member and do not want a peak at what arrived in my mail Friday, look away. But to distract you for just a moment I will share with all of you what is happening at Chez Peterson this week. This is my middle son Justin and he is graduating this week from high school. Baccalaureate was last night. At Coe Brown Northwood Academy, it is the night that the academic awards are given out, the artistic talents are celebrated, and the headmaster introduces every senior and shares their plans for the future. I have to say that this group of kids has crazy artistic talents. The musical selections were beautiful. The select chorus sang The Star Spangled Banner and it literally brought tears to my eyes. The art slideshow was amazing. Every media was represented and it was contemporary, relevant, moving, haunting, and uplifting. Anyway, Justin plans to attend the University of Alabama in he fall. He will major in Mechanical Engineering and will be a member of the waterski team. Go Bama!

Without further ado, here is the May shipment of the RSC!
(Pay no attention to the pictures being out of order, but I have a terrible time getting them in the order I want them. Not sure if it's a Vista thing, blogger thing, or operator incompetence.)

The colorway is Pepe La Plume and I love it! It is very purpley in my opinion and yet it doesn't really have any purple in it. Lots of magenta, mauve, dark gunmetal grey, and a hint of brown. I do have one small, meaning less than 1", section of lavender where the grey and mauve meet and mix, but that's it for actual purples.
The pattern is Fraggle Squiggle Socks by JC Briar. I have done a couple other things by JC and I really enjoy her patterns, so I was thrilled she was the designer. I was planning to finish my March socks first, but I caved and cast these on over the weekend. I've only completed 4 rows of the cuff. Not enough worth showing but just enough to satisfy my curiosity and motivate me to get those March socks finished! For a better look at the pattern go peek at turtlgirl76 or irishgirlieknits blogs. They have both zoomed through the first sock and have posted pics.

I hope everyone has a great week. If you live in NH go buy a powerball ticket. The jackpot is $220 million dollars for tonight's drawing!

Making progress

I focused my attention on 2 projects this week and made some really great progress. First up is my Rogue Roses socks. I have finished the leg on the first sock. I'm making the medium size and the pattern calls for 4 pattern repeats for the leg, which is what I did.These Rogue Roses require knitting into the stitch 4 rows below. I've not done this before and I find it quite fiddly to do. I think I'm inserting the needle backwards into the stitch so that it's more like purling, but I wrapped the yarn as if to knit. The rest of the stitch isn't difficult to do, it's getting the right tension that seem to be the trick to create the desired look. While doing these I thought they pretty much looked like the dog's breakfast, but after ripping the first couple out and redoing them a few times I decided to just leave them alone and pretend they were right. I have to say though that once the fabric settled and I stepped away from them for a couple days, they look pretty decent. See??? IF you squint, they do look like rose buds.

This pattern also has a pretty cool heel flap. It reminds me of lattice and it is created by using some purl stitches. I hope to zoom down the foot now and move onto sock 2 before the end of the week.This is the other project that gto my attention this week. It is my February Lady sweater. I started the lace section this past week and completed 6 lace repeats on the body. I love the way this is coming out. I want to finish it by mid June so that I can wear it this summer.
The next decision is whether I should do the sleeves soon or finish the body of the sweater first? The pro's - there will be less sweater to turn round and round while working the sleeves. The Con's - Will I get the right sleeve length for balance without the body complete?

Both these projects will stay at the top of the priority list this week. I felt like I actually accomplished something this week as opposed to feeling like I have knitting ADD :-)

Socks, socks, and more socks!

I have finally started my Rogue Roses socks from the RSC March shipment. There are a couple of new techniques for me in this pattern. First is this pretty picot edge. I decided to jump right in and fold at the picots and pick up a stitch from the cast on edge to knit together with the stitch on my needle. It is a nice smooth join and I will not have to sew the cuff down later. I have a little more done now and am ready to make my roses on the next round. The yarn is STR mediumweight in club colorway Gertrude Skein. The pattern is by the Yarnharlot. My goal is to finish these during the month of May for the Sock-a-Month KAL. The theme for May is Flower. Use a pattern with a flower name or fiber with a flower name and your name will be entered into a prize drawing. It was just the encouragement I needed to cast on before May's club kit arrives.



These are top secret socks from Sock Camp! It is a new sockitecture by Cat Bordhi. I won't spill any of the secret now, but this will be in her new book which will be released sometime this summer. I used Socks That Rock mediumweight in a Rare Gem that I purchased at camp.



I love this sock!!! I've had this pattern faved on Ravelry for quite some time and finally decided to move it to the top of my queue. I had expected the pattern to be difficult, but it's not. Very simple pattern and easy to memorize. This is a free pattern called Hedgerow by Jane Cochran. I am using Socks That Rock lightweight in Tanzanite.