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I don’t know who decided to put hunter’s orange, lime green, purple, rusty red and daffodil yellow (with some white space so your eyes can rest from color overload) together, it’s so ugly but I could not help but buy it when I saw it in the sale bin. I just finished writing up the outline/worksheet for the toe-up two-at-a-time class I start teaching tonight and I am pretty pleased with it.  It’s one of those “more of a formula than a pattern” type things, but I think that works really well for toe up socks since you can try them on as you go. I don’t know what is more exciting, the class, or using this yarn to make some crazyuglyawesome socks. They are either going to be the Lacy Rib or Serpentine socks from this book (which I bought for my kindle and it looks so good on it), I just need to wait until my new needles come today (I am watching the door for the mailman!) to swatch it out.

My friend Cara mentioned on twitter that she was going to knit her daugher some knee-highs the other day, which made me really want to knit some knee-highs. The thing is, B & his little brother O don’t exactly have a lot of skirts to wear with them. But then I had a genius idea (well, I thought it was clever at the very least). Soccer socks for B!

So I decided to turn my double eyelet rib socks into soccer socks for B. I started them yesterday. I thought it was time to turn the heel, but I tried them on and they could use a few more gusset rows. I am pretty sure I measured his feet wrong as the measurement I have is about equivalent to an adult size 7. Oops. That is my favorite part about toe-up socks –  it’s easier to get them just right because you can try them on at any time.

I’m planning some striping and ribbing and perhaps a little bit of colorwork in the leg. So cute! I have been wanting to use these two yarns (Dream in  Color Smooshy in Happy Forrest and Knit Picks Stroll Kettle-Dyed in Gold) together for a while. I’ve started a few projects with both, but I think this is the furthest I’ve gotten with either. I’m using this project to test out the sock worksheet I made up for the sock class I am teaching on Monday. And B is going to be the coolest tiny soccer player ever.

I ordered this yarn a while ago from stimpylab. I just love the way these yarns look with all the speckles and colors and bare yarn peeking out. When I went to order it, I had just updated some stuff in my paypal account and it somehow reverted back to my old address, which I hadn’t noticed. So the yarn went across town, and back to where it came from and finally, back to me.

The problem is. I forgot what I was going to do with it. I know I had a plan when I bought it. It has an 80s vibe, and I totally want to knit legwarmers out of it, but I don’t (and won’t!) wear legwarmers. I could knit some warm easy mittens, but I saw a hint of what might have been grass yesterday and am not in a warm mitten kind of mood.

I really want to knit something with it! ASAP! So I am asking for suggestions. What would you knit (or crochet) with it? (I have a skein of semi solid blue that goes well with it too for possible striping).

I don’t know if I mentioned it, but I am teaching a toe-up two-at-a-time sock class that starts next Monday, so I’ve been practicing my techniques so that I don’t teach others my mistakes and strange ways of doing things I either misappropriated from books or just plain made up (badly). So I started some proper toes to bring as examples, and I decided to just keep going. One was the double eyelet rib from my last post, but I’ve decided to rip back the double eyelet rib (I was only a handful of rows in) and go in with a yellow after the green toe because I <3 lots of colors. And I have some gorgeous yellow sock yarn that needs to be used. I also started a toe with the yarn leftover from my swallow mittens and that too was too pretty to not continue. So I guess I am taking a bit of a sock detour at the moment.

This yarn is next in queue to be knit. Look at all those colors! I need to take a break from crazy yarns and knit with a more subdued palette for a bit. After the Misti Alpaca though – it’s just so cheerful (and it feels pretty darn nice too).  I keep saying that, but I mean it! I’ve been working on some new mitten designs though, and most of them are much more reserved in color. Lots of blues, creamy colors and yellows. I just need to start knitting them. I am actually pretty excited about this next group of designs. I just need to get started.

I finally finished spinning all of my fiber from spunrightround (which I can’t recommend enough, it’s gorgeous!!)  for my future crazy neon stripey yoke sweater. I can’t start it yet, but I am ready to! I still need to order some solid-ish yarn for the body. I’ve settled on Tosh DK (although I’d be lying if I didn’t say I was considering Pashmina too, but I think it’s just a bit too thin) as the yarn, but am still going back and forth between different shades of dark purple-ish (I think it’s down to Thicket, Duchess and Port) But the exciting part is all finished and I feel good. I should just drape myself in skeins and call it a sweater. A deconstructed (never-constructed) sweater perhaps? I don’t usually knit large sweaters or large things in general, so I am a bit intimidated by the undertaking. I am reading this book to help me figure out how to make the awesome sweater I have in my head a real thing I can lounge around in all the time.

I think that is my favorite part about knitting (and sewing to to an extent, although it takes me so long to set up and get started sewing I don’t do it as much these days). I love that there is a medium I can work in where I have the skill set and ability to create an object that looks like what I envision in my head when I start a project. When I was in school studying drawing there was always a disconnect in my head between what I wanted to make and my output that was (and still is to some degree, although I’m mostly drawing cars for a 3 year old these days and he likes all of my drawings)  a source of constant frustration for me.

And here’s a group shot of all of the yarn I’ve spun up for this sweater. Aren’t the colors crazyawesome?

Yesterday I also did some yarn dying. I had a white skein of Cascade Superwash Sport and a partial (maybe 2/3) skein of Noro Kureyon Sock in a neutral colorway (149) that I’ve been wanting to overdye. I keep telling myself no more crazy multi-colored yarns, but then I go and make my more boring colored yarns into crazy multi-colored yarns. Yeesh. Anyways. Here are some before pictures.

And a dying-in-process pictures.

And the finished product!