FO: Bright red socks for May

Pattern: Lanterne Rouge, by yours truly, part of a set of four Tour de France inspired anklets I designed a couple of years ago
Yarn: Cascade Fixation in really, really, really bright red, 1.8 skeins, approximately 180 yds total in the socks.
Needles: US 1/2.25 mm for the foot and heel, US 1.5/2.5 mm for the leg
Start/finish: 1 May - 28 May 2011
Comments/mods: As this is my own pattern, I certainly can't own up to it being anything less then stellar. However, I did modify a few things (and found a few boo boos in the pattern that I'll fix once RAB is over and done with). First off, I knit the medium size for stitch counts, but used the length measurement for the large size. I did this because I was worried that the lace pattern stretchiness might make the size large too loose around the foot.

I knit the pattern as written for the first sock, tried it on, and realized I needed some adjustments for the leg - it was impossible to get on! So I increased 4 stitches after finishing the heel flap (instead of decreasing) and switched to slightly larger needles. That did the trick.

Finally instead of making these short, ankle-length socks, I kept going until I was almost out of yarn. I really like how socks made from Fixation fit and feel, but I hate hate hate knitting with it. It hurts my hands like nothing else. Sadly, there are now several partial balls of Fixation in my stash (as well as a couple of whole ones!) that I may just have to get rid of.

So, I am absolutely thrilled that after five months of 2011, I have five finished pairs of socks to show for it. I'm a bit worried that June is going to throw a spanner into the works however, what with this silly 953 mile bike ride I seem to be doing. But I think I've come up with a possible solution: Aran weight socks.

To be fair, using aran weight yarn seems like a huge cop-out, on many different levels. But here's my rationale: for at least 10 days next month (and probably more like 12 or 13), I will be too tired from riding my (lovely new, see in first picture) bike up and down the myriad hills that make up this damned island, or too busy lying on a beach in Cornwall trying to recuperate (please don't let it rain!) to knit a single stitch. And I'm also going to design these socks myself instead of digging in to the pile of SISC bags waiting upstairs (deadline is early July). So that seems fair, doesn't it?

Maybe?

Bueller?

There's been a lot of spinning going on

But it's mostly been of the non-fibery type. I.e. my butt has been on my bike quite a lot in my spare moments over the last few weeks/months. There's a good reason for this...

See that point up there at the top of the map? The one with the green arrow? That's John o'Groats, the northernmost point in mainland Scotland.

See that point at the bottom of the map? The one with the red arrow? That's Land's End, the southernmost point in England.

On June 11th, I climb on my bike and start riding at the green arrow, with hopes of making it down to the red arrow more or less in one piece by June 19th. Ooof. 953 miles, baby - that's a lot of spinning.

If you're reading this, and are inclined to assist me, I'm fundraising for ParalympicsGB for the ride. My online donation page is here, more info on ParalympicsGB (who are amazing) is here, and I'll be blogging each day of the ride here.

Thanks!

The madness goes on...

This morning, my Sock Madness 5 design was released to the competitors.

Meet Argus Panoptes, shown here in Cherry Tree Hill Supersock in "Blueberry Hill". I'm hoping to release this in three sizes sometime after RAB finishes (so late June), but if you'd like to see other peoples' versions and cheer on the madness, head on over to the Sock Madness Forever group on Ravelry. Go knitters, go!

FF: Shaking Leaves

My resolution to make Tuesdays a spinning day/night seems to be working, for behold: my second finished yarn in the last month!

Fiber: Hello Yarn Fiber Club January 2011 offering, "Shaking Leaves" Finn top
Spun/plied: 9.25:1/7.5:1, chain plied
Final stats: 10-14 wpi (worsted/aran weight), 275 yds/~4 oz (~1100 ypp).

I love these colors (which are a bit greener then they're showing up on my monitor) - they remind me of the beach in Charmouth on the Jurassic Coast. I decided to spin this fiber up for a Baktus scarf (or a scarf with a similar construction), so I wanted to spin it in a way that would generate stripes of more-or-less the same width as the scarf was knit from end to end. I split the entire length of top in half, then split one half again, and spun it up as follows: 1/4 width, 1/2 width, 1/4 width. Then I chain plied the singles to keep the striping.

I've noticed of late that my spinning output seems to have shifted towards a lighter, loftier, less dense yarn, and this was no exception. I spun the singles with a short forward draw at 9.25:1, and chain plied at 7.5:1, trying not to overply. And I managed to end up with a yarn that came off the niddy noddy balanced (!) - I don't think that's ever happened before.

You can see in these photos how much less tightly plied this is then some previous chain plied yarns. Before washing I had 298 yds at 17-20 wpi. After a soak in cool water, the Finn Puffball Effect worked it's magic and I ended up with 275 yds at 10-14 wpi. Poof!

I still like the Baktus idea for this yarn. Maybe a lacy one. Or an extra lacy one. Anyone have a vote?

Early onset

In graduate school, I studied Alzheimer's disease, albeit at a somewhat oblique angle. That is to say, I studied something else in the context of AD. In any event, I am somewhat familiar with some of the symptoms of dementia, including the loss of any ability to form new memories. And I think perhaps I am suffering from some of these symptoms, because somehow I completely managed to forget that I signed up for the IKnit London (not just) Sock Club.

And when I say forget, I don't mean that it just slipped my mind. I mean that I saw an announcement of a party for the start of the club and thought "I wonder if I can still sign up for that..." Imagine my surprise when I arrived home after a looooong day to find a package waiting for me on the doorstep, and it wasn't from Adrian, as I expected. This was what was inside:

A lovely little project bag and a skein of Gorgeous Crimson Yarn - perfect for May of Project Spectrum! Plus not one, but two patterns. One for a pair of socks (Tantalus) and one for a pair of glorious fingerless mitts called Ambience, both by Janie B. At the moment, I'm leaning towards the mitts, simply because I'm working on a pair of lacey red socks at the moment. Those socks are slowly moving along - I reknit the leg of the first one adding four stitches and going up half a needle size, and they fit much better now. I managed to get through the toe on sock #2, which will be joining me on a bit of a road trip this weekend, so I hope to get them done soon. After which point, I will never knit with Cascade Fixation Ever. Again.

gratuitous yarn shot