Keeping up the cuteness

I won't bemoan the weather. It's hot and miserable, and I'm trying to move on. Soon it will be September and it will be 'all good'. OK, done.

To fill the time until then, I've been busily knitting and stitching in the dark coolness of The Bat Cave (what my sister calls my house). Below are some updates. The kitties felt they had much to offer and took it upon themselves to help with improving the overall cuteness of my projects.

First up, the 'before' of my Batch of Pumpkins:



And the 'after' with a nice dose of cuteness, thanks to Abner:




Onto some knitting content. I finished the first and started the second of my Dad's Christmas socks. Here's Itchey to increase the cuteness quotient by at least 10X:




I thought it would be fun to join the over 4000 other knitters on Ravelry who are already making their very own Citron shawl. It's a half circle shawl with varying rows of increases and decreases to make rings of puckery knitting. I just started it last night, using a variagated yarn of mid to dark purples. The colors remind me of blueberries. Mmmmmm.



Abner wanted to help add to the overall cuteness of this project, but suddenly became enamored with the needles and decided they'd make a good chew toy. I didn't quite care for *that* kind of cuteness, so he was removed from the photo shoot.

I feel like such a heel...

Perhaps a poor try at humor. :o)


I've finished the heel part of Dad's first sock. I've finally had the mental capacity to sit down to comprehend the instructions. It's not that they're hard, but it just requires concentration, that I just wasn't able to give it until yesterday evening.

Now, it's just the same until it's time for the toe.



Onto happily knit in the cool darkness of The Ladies' Parlour with a kitty or two...

Christmas Knitting in July

When I begin knitting a pair of Christmas Socks, I get the sensation that I'm in a little black bikini, jet skiing in the Arctic Ocean just off the coast of northern Greenland, with fine ice crystals spaying up and hitting my...

Ahem.


I've decided to try mind power to keep cool with the current hot, muggy and oppressive weather plaguing the Mid-Atlantic. I'm hoping that by imagining how nice and cold it will be outside when I present Dad with his yearly installment of hand knitted socks on Christmas Morning, it will make it feel like 32F instead of 92F. Yeah. We'll see.

I just don't like how any of the socks fit that I've knitted for myself. So, I've stopped making them for me. I've tried different patterns, adjusting those patterns, using different sized needles, etc, but I still don't like how they fit. They just feel wrong. Since I'm able to knit socks for my parents that fit them perfectly, they can benefit from my love of sock knitting.

Typically, I make Dad patriotic socks. He loves all things American Flag or some combination of red, white and blue. Part of the fun is hunting down yarn that fits the bill, but looks different from anything I've made him previously. This year, I found yarn, that by the colorway name alone, I've opted to briefly forgo patriotic.



The colorway is called Poison Ivy, and it's varying shades of green. It's just so perfect for my dad. Hard to explain, but if you knew him, you'd totally agree.

The pattern is from Knitting Vintage Socks. It's called Maddler Ribbed Socks, and is a simple (6X1X2) ribbed pattern, which is great to show off the variagated color way. You do notice, however, that I am using a patriotic row marker...

Well, the mind thing is just not working. I'm still too darn hot, but at least Dad will get a lovely pair of socks, even though right this minute, it's difficult to believe that it will ever cool off enough to need them!

Indoor Activities

I couldn't wait to get some stitching done so I could post! Ooooh, it's so fun to get back into blogging. Facebook is fun, but sometimes I just have much more to type about than a single sentence! :o)

It was even more fun to see that many of my blogging friends are still around! Boy, do I have a lot of catching up to do to read what you lovely ladies have been up to while I was away!

No surprise that with July, the three H's have come again (hazy, hot and humid), so the order of the holiday weekend was to stay inside with the air conditioning and, of course, get some needlework done.

I worked on Black Willow Farm (Carriage House Samplings) this weekend. Lately, I've been drawn towards more primative designs, which I think will look good in my dining room. I'm really liking Primative Needle designs, too (Hornbrooke Angel, and Follow Me).

Here's the before:


And the after:

Wow, it's been a while

Hello again. Nothing drastic has happened to stop me from blogging, in fact, life has happily moved on as usual. I guess I just wanted a break from the blog.

I look forward to reconnecting with all the wonderful stitchers I've met along the way.

It's nice to be back. :o)