How go the sweaters, Mel? And the socks?

While visiting with some NWebbers last month, I started my first pair of socks. I'm using the magic loop method, and I suspect my thoughts on it will remain undecided until I've finished the socks at least. So far, I've been a bit frustrated as I can't go back and unravel a row (as when I did several rows of purl/knit instead of vice-versa), but as Mel has pointed out, at least both socks have the same band of wrong-side stitches. Additionally, somehow I messed something up and now to get the wrong-side/right-side look right, I have to purl my entire sock. I don't mind purling too much, but still, it's very weird. I'm also using size 2 (!!!!) needles, which are very tiny, and the yarn is fine, so it's slow going even when I have time to sit and knit (which is rare). The socks are probably about an inch and a half long now, so just covering the toes.

I also recently finished a second headband and gave it to Summer as part of her birthday gift. I lost a stitch somewhere in it but could never find it again so I just added one on. And she liked it as well.

County fair is coming up (uh... next week!!!) so there's a deadline on getting the sweaters done. No blocking yet, but I'm on the last sleeve for the second sweater. I pinned it together with the first sleeve and tried it on, and I'm pretty excited about how it'll look.

No progress on my pair of socks yet.

I've finished the dark blue scarf, which is using up some of the wool left over from a cardigan. I had already made a slightly baggy beany type hat.

Next I am almost finished knitting a toy dog for a friend's birthday; one more little leg to go, then sew up and stuff it. I do hope she will love it, she's been waiting to be able to get another (real) dog.

After that I am going to knit a scarf with the Fellowship of the Ring profile picture on it. Will update once I get the pattern formatted right.

After that I am going to knit a scarf with the Fellowship of the Ring profile picture on it. Will update once I get the pattern formatted right.

Uhhh, I hope you have my name for Christmas this year! Seriously, that will be amazing, coracle! That FotR profile is a very favourite of mine. Did you develop this pattern on your own??

And all the best to each of you who is working on projects. And in the fair, Mel!

Yay for the birthday headband, Valia ... aside from the lost stitch.

After that I am going to knit a scarf with the Fellowship of the Ring profile picture on it. Will update once I get the pattern formatted right.

Please do! Did you find the pattern somewhere or are you charting it yourself?

Any progress on the socks, Mel? And how'd the county fair go?

Ditto the Fellowship questions, Auntie! Any chance to work on it lately?

Still working on my socks. Probably close to 2 inches now.

I've finally got back to knitting recently, mainly because I've been traveling a lot, and one can only do so much reading on flights before one gets restless. And TSA doesn't mind my needles, so I can take them on with me. So far I've been doing a string of cowels, mainly because I made one for a friend for Christmas, and my mum saw it and thought it was gorgeous, so I had to make one for her, too. Not sure what I'll be headed to next, project wise.

So, in short, nothing to report, other than that I've been knitting instead of quilting.

I have progress to report on the socks! They're now... 3 inches long or so.

As for the county fair, it seems so long ago and it's kinda like, Oh, yes... I did enter something, didn't I. And there were ribbons.

The cowels sound lovely, Wren! What sort of yarn did you use? Did they knit quickly?

I've been using 6/bulky yarn to do a design based off of this pattern, Mel. I changed the pattern a bit because I tended to lose count, for some reason. So far I've been knitting 3-5 rows (depending on the cowel) and then one with the knit3, yo, k2tog, then another set of just knitted rows. The knitted rows at the beginning and the end seem to provide a better roll to the edges. I'm considering reworking the math on the next one and trying to do the yo/k2tog in a diagonal pattern instead of vertical, if that makes sense. I also have found I only like the pattern in darker colors.

To answer your second question, umm...man. One cowel takes me one round trip drive to LA (so, 6 hours down, 6 hours back), but I can't knit constantly in the car, so I'm gonna guess I probably knitted at max half the time? Maybe less? It's also good for one international flight, ish, because again, I tend to get bored easily on flights when I don't have papers to grade. So I suppose for its complexity and my tendency to make mistakes because I'm changing the pattern on the fly (and don't tend to write down what I changed), they do knit pretty quickly. And they're a bit more interesting than, oh hey, look....another...scarf.

(Not that scarves aren't absolutely beautiful and lovely and I've made them myself.)

The cowls sound fun, Wren. For some reason, I've never really cared for the chunky knit fashion, so the cowl I'm knitting is taking forever (...it doesn't help that the yarn got tangled, so if I want to knit anymore I have to get all the knots worked out...). But hurrah also for having time to knit!

Yay for progress on the socks, Mel! Mine are still where they were last time... Which is actually longer than I thought as they are about 4 inches now.
And congrats on the ribbons, whatever they were for.

So my socks got put on hold to do something more interesting or, rather, several things more interesting (the aforementioned cowl, a headband, and another item). Unfortunately, all of the interesting projects have stalled with snags, with the sole exception of the headband (which had snags, but I finished anyhow; it was a (late) gift). I guess I've just hit a knitting funk lately. Any ideas how to shake it?

I recently crocheted a shawl for my boss's birthday. Sadly I didn't take a picture of it before giving it to her, but I was really proud of it. I found the pattern online and modified it a bit

It was made of of square motifs, twenty eight in all and then another eight triangle ones for the top of the shawl. Each square took about another hour to make...so I was was a lot of work. For fun I counted and altogether I put in about 40 hours to that shawl, spread over the course of two weeks. I was pleased with the end result and almost sorry to give it away, lol.

One thing I've found rather frustrating about Zambia is the only yarn they sell here its acrylic yarn. Nothing natural like wool or cotton or linen and for former reenactor me working with acryl is not so much fun. I've always prefered natural material, but it's better than nothing and I have several new projects planned

I haven't been here in a while but here is some hand embroidery i did over my summer. This is the most updated picture i have at the moment

edit: it should work now.

Oh sorry the url must have been wrong. Here is a close up of one of the leaves. I think it is called fishbone stitch.

Congrats on finishing your shawl, wrose! That's too bad about only having acrylic yarn, though.

Hi, IlF! Your embroidery is gorgeous! The fox is cute, and the detail of the leaf you've shown is impressive.

I finished the cowl, though it's still just sitting around; I need to hand it off to someone, I suppose.

Thanks Val!. It is finished now but i need to put it in a frame so it looks proper since it is fitted to a square shape rather than the traditional embroidery circle. I have also done a raccoon but the background detail wont be complete on that for a while.