distractions...

everyone needs distractions now and then, especially when you're having work days like i'm having lately. suffice it to say things are a bit hectic, but we'll leave it at that. at least when i come home i can see all the pretty green things that are popping up in my windowsill. soon enough, my pretties, and you'll be outside growing fat veggies. not today though - i scraped ice of my windshield this morning despite the nearly-May calendar date. gotta love it.



there has been some knitting, although i'm not much motivated lately. my friend lucas has been complaining that A always has new cool toques to wear, and although he's not the first one to do so, he somehow motivated me where others have not. there's something about knowing have to do something that completely stalls me in my tracks. in this case though, i mostly had fun. i used a variety of stash yarns, with a green and light brown theme fitting for project spectrum (and a bit of blue thrown in). the wave chart is from swell - yet another adventure in my goal to excel at colourwork.



the edge has a few rows of garter stitch rather than my standard rib which i think creates a nice clean effect. the top is an 8-pointed decrease. i have to say, while i do love all the colours mixed together, sewing in all the ends is a pain in the ass. luke won't get this till friday, but hopefully it'll shut him up - i mean, make him happy.



my other current project is child's first socks from Knitting Vintage Socks. After being inspired by pam and kelly, i knew mine also had to be purple. so far so good, but the shell pattern gets to be a bit of snore very quickly. i'm pretty dismissive in this post, aren't i? obviously not quite settled from the day's events. hopefully i have another FO post soon, but i can't say i won't also start a new project before then!

spring, we're so glad to see ya...

although winter is slow to relinquish it's gloomy grip on us (a foot of snow just two hours south of us on saturday!), there are signs here and there that spring is slowly making an appearance, albeit a late one. here are a few shots from today's walk along the campbell river.

feeling earthy...

Just got back from a relaxing weekend at Tsa-Kwa-Luten where my mom and I took part in the Fun Knits knitting retreat. Was a great mix of women madly knitting away, and also good workshops. More on that in a moment, but first, my start for Project Spectrum: Earth.

These socks are a variation on Yukon Leaves, which I previously interpreted in my niece's little hat. I knitted the socks toe up (of course), so my leaves perhaps look upside down, although I think I like them better this way. I was initially concerned that the four repeats called for in the pattern would make the socks too big, so I started with one up the instep with a twisted stitch cable on each side. For the leg, I did three repeats of the Yukon Leaves pattern, with a cable in between each.



The cable up the back is different from the other two - a bit bigger and with three strands instead of two. These socks fit awesome, and I'm pretty happy. However, you may have noticed a little something - see how the sock on the right is evenly variegated? then notice the sock on the left? yeah, that's right about where I was. This yarn is Sweatermaker, which is soft and lovely, and local. But the second ball turned out to be noticeably lighter, and unfortunately did this strange pooling thing whereby the dark part worked its way in a spiral up my leg. I've let it go, breathing has returned to normal, but this was my first real experience with bad pooling, and colour my unimpressed.

There will be several more installations for this segment of Project Spectrum - a brief glance at my wardrobe will confirm that it's not hard to get me excited about green and brown. Stay tuned.



So what did I do at the workshop? Learned how to spin of course. I do tend to get frustrated when things don't work for me instantly, so there may have been much huffing and gritting of teeth, but ultimately I'm pretty pleased with the result. I can definitely see it is a skill you need to practice again and again, but at least the basics have been explained well to me. This is Romney wool, by the by. And a great colour for PS.

One last bit of "Earth"? Check out the tiny tomatoes poking their heads up behind the handspun. Yummy veggies are on their way!

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