Another Red Tree

The Preschooler and I see this one when we walk to the library.

In praise of Yvonne

Today is Yvonne's birthday, and I just want to send birthday greetings her way. Not only has Yvonne done all my finishing work lately (see here and here and then here to see how she can do it for you too!), she fixes my knitting mistakes when things go terribly awry. Just so you know, I would not advise knitting during Mad Men, particularly when Joanie smashes a vase over her worthless husband's head, because you are sure to make a terrible mistake and drop many stitches. Furthermore, I would not advise trying to fix said mistake during the Mad Men finale because all kinds of inexplicable things happen to the project.

Inspiration

It's hard to single out the most inspirational thing on Ravelry, but one of the best, knowlegable, and enthusiastic groups on there is the Socks that RAWK! group. Every quarter, they host a KAL of two sock patterns. Each member is encouraged to use a different colorway of Socks that Rock in order to showcase the amazing diversity of the yarn. It's a fabulous group, and I've gotten lost for hours looking at the photos.

For the first time, I'm participating in the quarter's KAL for the Edwardian Boating Socks. Mine are in the Flower Power colorway. I just cast on yesterday and can't stop knitting!

Wedding Weekend

I guess I should have known better than to attempt a blog post every day during the same month as my brother's wedding. The weekend, however, did feature knitwear.

The Preschooler sports his owl vest, knitted by Carla, at the reheasal dinner.











I wore, between the ceremony and reception, a little cropped cardigan so kindly knitted by Lisabe.

And, while the bride and groom haven't seen this yet, I feel safe in showing it here, since I hope they are enjoying sunshine and snorkling right now. This is Ysolda's Hap Blanket, knit in Cascade Eco Wool. Due to some problems with the chart, I eliminated the last color repeat, and changed the purl bind-off to a Russian bind-off (which was a new skill!). I love the finished project and hope that the bride and groom do too!

This is what I'm doing today

Wait, doesn't everyone wear handknit socks, sweatpants, and sparkly shoes around the house?

Seriously, today I am trying to break in the silver shoes I'm wearing to my brother's wedding on Saturday. These shoes frighten me. A lot.

Autumnal

This is what I see on my way to work in the mornings. On cloudy, gray days this winter, I'm going to look at this picture and remember the way the leaves glowed red in the morning sunlight.

It's no secret I love red.

Drive-By Pretties

Today's thoughful, analytical post has been delayed due to a sick husband and argumentative preschooler at home with me this morning. Instead, let me offer up these pictures of pretty new stash, Madeline Tosh sock yarn. The RED (hey, The Preschooler comes by his love of RED honestly) is the Tart colorway; the delicate variegated color is Mansfield Garden.

Hat Trick

When the weather turns colder and you're mired down in large projects, sometimes the best thing to do is knit a hat. I made three last month.

Windschief by Stephen West, in Cascade Eco Alpaca:

Hurricane Hat, a free pattern, knit in Malabrigo Worsted:

And finally, Habitat by Jared Flood, also in Malabrigo Worsted. In my next post, I'm going to talk about challenging myself and learning new techniques, and this project is my first foray into a complicated cable chart.

This sweater gets around!

In the spirit of my so-called Finish It Fall, Henry's Tomten is D-O-N-E done. This sweater was particularly hard for me, not because of any particular knitting technique or the miles and miles of Elizabeth Zimmermann garter stitch, but because of what it represented. I started planning the Tomten when -- and this is not something I've talked about publically because it's been painful for our little family and yet thankfully much ado about nothing -- when the then-Toddler started manifesting some autism spectrum behaviors and wasn't progressing in his language. I let the Toddler choose the yarn, thinking it would be a really stimulating activity for him to choose his favorite color of "WED." I knit on this thing through the seemingly interminable wait for evaluations and appointments. Somehow, all my stress about my child got put into this sweater.

Then we received the diagnosis of "just" a speech delay. Today, the Preschooler is a happy, healthy, quirky three year old who has "graduated" from his months of speech therapy. I think I've graduated too.

I finally finished the sleeves last month, and then handed it over to Yvonne for seaming and zipper installation. (Have I mentioned how much I love Yvonne?). The Tomten, otherwise known as Red! Red Sweater!, has gone everywhere and done everything, and for that, I am so happy and grateful.

PS: It's