The Week & the Weekend After

Hi everyone! Man, time is just flying by! I can’t believe it’s nearly the end of October already. We’re already planning Thanksgiving; Christmas is already planned (we’re going to Costa Rica!) I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. Time flies when you’re having fun! Between work, friends and church, there is no shortage of fun in my life!

Last week can be reduced to a pile of swatches. I’ve sent them out into the world and I hope that they land in a happy, published place somewhere. This week is shaping up similarly, with a couple of batches of design submissions in the works.

Seems that everyone is looking for socks at this time of year, so I’ve been playing with a few things. This combination is a little out of my comfort zone but has provided hours of pleasure! I love Knit Picks Stroll for socks; there are so many gorgeous colors and the yarn is silky soft. The solid is “Firecracker” and the hand-paint is “Koi Pond”. I love the interaction of the red-orange with the graded values of turquoise!

While we’re on the subject of socks…

It has been over a year since I’ve been able to do any recreational knitting and I’ve missed it so much. In the spring, we learned that our beloved priest, Fr. Richard is being transferred. I was pretty shattered at first because Fr. Richard has been such a powerful force for good in my life over the last year. Then, I began to realize that I was being a little selfish, that others may need a Fr. Richard too and that Fr. Richard might need to move on in order to do his best work. Anyway…long and short of it is that I could not let him move to Buffalo, Minnesota without socks.

So socks he shall have! I picked up this yarn while I was home this summer at one of my favorite little yarn shops, Handknit Yarn Studio in Hamilton, Ontario. I chose this color because it’s a shade I’ve seen Fr. Richard wear. It’s not easy to choose a color for a priest. There is very little information about what is appropriate for clergy because so much depends upon the individual order. Even then information is hard to find and I was surprised not to have found even a single forum on the subject of knitting for clergy.

I wanted them to be special but understated. I extracted this cable from the verbose written instructions in an old Beehive pattern book. I wanted the look of vintage socks without the cumbersome construction method. Obviously, I’m knitting top down and have knit a rather long (4″) cuff which adds to the vintage look, I think. I’ll use a short row heel rather than the Aladdin heel that was popularized by Beehive in the 50’s. As interesting a method as it is, creating a heel that can be unravelled and re-knit rather than darning seems a little overcooked.

They’re coming along swimmingly with a bit of a codicil. Though I love this Lang yarn, it is soft and silky and the color is sophisticated, there is an issue with the length. I remember people mentioning this defect regarding Lang yarns when I worked at Rosehaven. If you’re not familiar with it, the Lang Jawoll comes with a little spool of darning yarn tucked into the center of the skein. It isn’t well documented but it does say on the ball band that the darning yarn is included in the 210m overall length of the skein. That’s not good. Take back your darning yarn, cute as it is, and give me enough yarn on the skein to make a sock. These are my problems! Aren’t I blessed?!

I’ll hop online to find a third skein which I know I’m going to need and order it quick so I can get them done before Father leaves.

See you Wednesday!