What I did on Summer Vacation

August is the month of vacation. A month to rest, to renew, to plan, and to prepare to begin anew.  I spent the month cleaning up some projects.  I decided to combine the Sock Knitters Anonymous Challenge, Summer of Socks, 26 Pair Plunge and Stashdown for a personal challenge to tackle my pile of UFO's.  Some had been lingering a short time and some significantly longer.

These two are projects that I cast on in July.  I wanted to finish these so that I didn't fall behind on my club kits.

These are much older.

In total I had 9 pairs of socks in progress!  Let me show you what I finished!

This pair I finished today.  The pattern is Dorothy Gale Socks from the Woolgirl Wizard of Oz Club.  I started these in September of 2009. That's right.... 2009!  I knit the 1st sock, but was not completely happy with it.  The pattern is really cute, an honestly great tribute to Dorothy in her blue and white gingham dress and her rich brown braided hair, but the yarn.....?  I don't love it.  I love the dye job and the vision of it, but the fabric it created is truly flimsy. These will be house socks as I don't believe they would hold up inside shoes.  But I'm glad they are done.

This pair is Crest by JC Briar and was the Rockin Sock Club kit for May.  The colors played beautifully for me and I love the striping I got, especially on the leg.

This pair is Tiberius from the Cookie A Club June kit.  This was a new yarn for me, SweetGeorgia CashLuxe Fine, and it is fantastic.  I would absolutely buy this yarn and would recommend it.  It's a nice light feeling yarn that makes a beautiful fabric and has great stitch definition.

This is Jubilee, also from Cookie A Sock Club, but from June 2011.  These were designed using Hazel Knits Artisan sock which is one of my favorite sock yarns.  I used the club yarn for the other pattern from June 2011 and used this old Hazel Knits club yarn from my stash.  I started these in July 2012.

At some point I decided I needed a break from all the socks and pulled out this hat that I had started this spring.  The pattern is Chelsea Market Hat.  It's an easy pattern and used just one skein of Madelinetosh Vintage.  I intended to put this in "The Gift Basket" but I might just keep it for myself instead.

So that's what I finished during the month of August!  Now I'm going to work on my Vodka Lemonade sweater while I wait for some Plucky Knitter yarn to arrive.  I ordered some Traveler Sport so that I can make Rolling Rock for Plucktember.  

Ten on Tuesday

Ten on Tuesday

It's been several weeks since I've participated in Ten on Tuesday, simply because the day has gotten away from me before I could post!  This week I'm doing it first, BEFORE I get involved in the daily summer craziness.

The prompt this week is 10 Words that Describe You with no elaboration.

1. Reliable
2. Thoughtful
3. Creative
4. Friendly
5. Competent
6. Innovative
7. Confident
8. Respectful
9. Smart
10. Conscientious

So here's a question for you.....  I take pride in everything I do.  Whatever I do, I like to do it well and I want to be proud of my efforts and what I leave behind.  What word would you use to convey that sentiment?

Want to join the fun?  Visit Carole's page to join and see what other people share.

Time for a Finishing Fest

August is the vacation month for Socks Knitters Anonymous but it has turned into the "Free Up Your Needles" month in anticipation of the new year to begin in September.  I gathered up all my SiP's to get organized.....

The good news is I found all the projects that I have on my Ravelry project page.  The bad news is that most of the patterns have to be located still.  That shouldn't be a big deal as I'm pretty good at making a working copy of my patterns and keep the originals in a binder or I know what book they are from.  But I do have 9 socks in progress.  The top picture is the ones that will quality for the SKA challenge, and they are all first socks.

The bottom picture is socks from my sock clubs and I am working on the 2nd sock for both of these.  I'm not quite keeping up but I'm not horribly behind either.  My RSC club arrived on Saturday and the Cookie A club should arrive Monday.  I should finish both of these this week then move onto my older SiP's for the rest of the month.

I wonder how many of these older projects I'll be able to complete during August?

I also got the itch to start a new sweater recently.  I cast on Vodka Lemonade and have been poking away at it a bit at a time.  It's a top down sweater that begins with a collar that is 5 inches of seed stitch! 5 Inches!  Perfect for mindless knitting :-)

Do you have anything fun planned for August?

30 Years?

It doesn't seem possible, but evidently it's true! I graduated from high school in 1983 and Saturday night I attended my 30th Class Reunion!  Crazy! I had a great time catching up with classmates I hadn't seen in years as well as having some laughs with friends I am still close to.

Here I am with my elementary school classmates Damon, Tod, and David.  It was fun reminiscing about all our high jinx from sneaking off school property during recess to go to the corner store to buy candy, to hanging out at Debbie's house which was across the street and smoking on lunch break. (We only did that a couple times before getting caught! LOL) It was a fun time!

What did you do this weekend?

A Random Catch Up

I can't believe it's been nearly a month since I last posted. There has been lots going on in my life, so here's a quick post of some of the random things I've been up to.

I was late planting my flowers and garden this year :-(  My hangers and deck planters are finally nicely filled out.  My garden is doing pretty well too, except that my corn didn't come up this year and my zucchini plants have that powdery/mildewy thing again this year.  I made sure they were plenty spread out and only water in the morning.  I'm wondering now if I have diseased soil?  I don't know, but my peas, green beans, cucumbers, carrots and tomatoes are doing great.  I should be picking cukes by the end of the week!

The dogs have been into all kinds of trouble this year.  Neal had a growth removed from his foot and it has been an EPIC battle to keep his foot clean and dry.  We've been to the vet 4 times in 10 days between him pulling his bandage off, sneaking out of the house and walking into the lake, etc and so forth.  Stitches come out Tuesday!  Yippee!

Emma has found all kinds of goose poop to roll in, even though we clean it up every. darn. day.  But little white dogs who roll in goose poop and then wish to sleep on my bed at night get baths before bedtime.  She's not impressed, but she sure smells better!

Tom took off the week of July 4th and we had a Staycation.  After years of wishing we had a jet ski, we finally caved this year and bought one.  We're having lots of fun with it :-)

My favorite little munchkin came to spend a couple days at Auntie Dianne's :-)  She is so much fun!  She's 17 months old and a busy, curious little girl.  We played ball, bubbles, side walk chalk, walked the dogs, climb on everything, and played by the lake.  She's not the only one slept well at night!

I was summoned for Jury Duty for the month of July.  So far my name has not been pulled to sit on a case, but I go again next week for selection again.

Chandler and I have also been visiting colleges he'd like to consider applying to.  Last week we went to Stonehill College and Boston University.  Tomorrow we're going to University of Vermont.  He still has 8 more schools on his "potential" list, so we'll be spending a lot of quality time together in the car.

I have managed to get some knitting in too.  I'm working on a Chelsea Market Hat.  I really like the pattern so far.

I started Tiberius from the Cookie A June sock club.

And I finished Dumbledore's Christmas Stockings.  I used Socks That Rock lightweight in a millend that I had in my stash.  I'm really happy with them.  This is definitely a raven color way and I did have some dye come off on my fingers while I was knitting them.  They'll need a vinegar bath before I wear them, but that's not a big deal.  The fit is great on these and I expect they'll get a lot of wear!

They are also my first finished pair of socks for the 26 Pair Plunge.  I fell really short last year on the plunge, only completing 13 pairs of socks, but I'm going to try it again.  It's only 2 pairs of socks a month plus a couple.  Totally doable, right?

The Summer of Socks Begins!

It's time for Summer of Socks!  I look forward to this every year and usually I'm chomping at the bit, ready to go on Memorial Day.  In the past though, the SOS has followed the calendar and not started until June 21st.  This year though, the wonderful moderators decided to adjust the KAL to run from Memorial Day until Labor Day.  I love that because to me, these two holidays mark the beginning and end of summer.  It's a No Pressure year too, which I love.  Knit anything you want, including WiP's, and it counts!  Perfect!

So I'm continuing on my quest to keep up with the 2 sock clubs I joined this year.  I recently finished Petrosinella which was the Rockin Sock Club March shipment.  This pattern was a little hard on my hands and I had to take regular breaks from it, but it was worth plugging along and finishing them.

They started with a pretty picot edge and then followed by a lace and cable pattern.

The heel flap is eye of the partridge which I hadn't done in a while.  I think it's quite pretty in this variegated yarn. Then I love how the cable lines up to split and half of it runs along the side of the foot.

It ended with my favorite wedge toe.

So March is done and May's kit is here and next to be wound and cast on.

I also finished one of the patterns from the April Cookie A club.  This pattern is Tulip Socks.  I substituted Hazel Knits Artisan sock yarn in the color Pink Ribbon for these.  The club yarn is a gorgeous lavender from Dream in Color Everlasting sock, but I think that tulips and pink just go together.  I'm going to use the lavender yarn for the other club pattern.

These were pretty straight forward and an easy knit.  The one thing that really stood out on these was the toe.  The instep had more stitches than the foot so with a little clever decrease in just the right place the 2 purl stitches on the sides of the instep become a frame for the toe.  I love little details like this!

The June shipment arrived last Monday, so in my quest to keep up I'm going to cast on one of the June patterns with the club yarn, then go back and do some of the old kits that are still waiting to be knit.

Happy Summer of Socks!

Irish Coffee

I finished my Irish Coffee sweater just as the heat wave set in last weekend.  I really enjoyed knitting this sweater.  The yarn, Madelinetosh Vintage in the color Mourning Dove, is a dream to work with and the stitch definition is great too.

This sweater has some nice features.  It's knit from the top down so I was able to try it on as I went to make sure the fit was what I wanted.  I like the V notch at the neck line.  It feels like it opens the neckline a bit.

I moved the waist decreases up so that the narrowest part actually falls at my waist.  One of the curses of being "petite" is that everything needs to be altered.  I also added more increases for the hips so that it fits the way I wanted it to fit.

I also love the way the cables flow into the ribbing.  This cable is on the back as well as the front

So here it is completely finished being modeled by my lovely dining room chair.  This picture is also the best representation of the color.

Now that this is finished I'm itching to start another sweater!