October Photo of the Month: Doughnuts or Socks?

Nope, I couldn't just pick one photo of the month for October.

The first photo of the month happened on October 1st, when I was with my friends, sisters Melissa and Kate, in the village of Deep Cove, which is near Kate's home in North Vancouver, BC. They kept talking all weekend about Honey's and their fantastic doughnuts, and on Sunday morning we braved the crowd—a line out the door—and got Honey's signature maple frosted doughnuts and coffee. YUM! Absolutely the best doughnut I have ever eaten! I managed to snap a photo with my phone before I ate every last crumb.

I took the second photo of the month at home, right after I finished knitting my latest pair of socks. I cast on the socks back in July, when I needed a pair for car knitting and it only dawned on me in mid-October that the Intrepid Otter colorway, Acid Dreams, would make great Halloween socks. Fortunately, I finished knitting them on October 28th, just in time for the pumpkin carving party that we go to every year.

There has been quite a bit of knitting and other fiber adventures happening in my life lately, and I have been remiss in not sharing them with you. But that is about to change; I promise to be back with a new post in the next few days.

The Second Sock Conundrum

Why does it take me two months and twenty-one days to get to this point,

and only seven days to get here?

I guess I don't have second sock syndrome...

Picturing the Winter Solstice

Four times a year, on the spring and autumn equinoxes and the summer and winter solstices, I use my camera to document the activities of my day. I started doing this exactly six years ago yesterday, when the theme of the day was this:

That's right: SNOW. It was not your typical wimpy Seattle dusting, but an actual foot of snow, which made that winter solstice memorable, indeed.

Nothing quite as momentous happened this year on the winter solstice, but it was still a very happy and celebratory day, nonetheless.

I started the day by opening the 21st window on my Advent calendar.

Then I ate some Christmas Stollen with my coffee, and finished the heel on my sock—my second-ever Fish Lips Kiss heel.

Later, I joined my knitting friends for our annual Christmas celebration, with presents!

I went from knitting with friends to eating with friends. I took the bus downtown and met my two oldest friends (from first and third grades) and we ate at a window table at the Athenian Inn in the Pike Place Market.

My eyes were bigger than my stomach! My lunch was a clam chowder bowl that I managed to eat only about half of, but it certainly was good!

Next, I headed back home, and soon after, Mr. D and I went to my sister-in-law's house to celebrate the sixth night of Hanukkah with Mr. D's family. It's really wonderful having two light-filled holidays to celebrate at this dark time of year.

We ate a wonderful dinner, including, my favorite—potato latkes—and then sang songs and opened presents. Mr. D was really happy with his gift from me, a guidebook to identifying the mushrooms that he sees while hiking.

But the best part of the evening was the light from the candles in the menorah, which for me is a reminder that there is always light, even on the darkest night.

Whatever holidays you celebrate—Solstice, Hanukkah, Christmas, Kwanza—I wish you peace, happiness and light this holiday season!

Spectacular Cabled Socks

Can you believe I knit these socks? I almost can't, and yet, I did! These are my recently completed Hazel Knits mystery socks, in the Tree People pattern, designed by Heidi Nick. This is, by far, the most cabled project I've ever knit, not to mention the only mystery sock I've ever finished. It's also the first time I've ever taken apart a grafted toe, ripped and tinked back and reknit that toe for a better fit. I'm so proud of myself!

The yarn is Hazel Knits Artisan Sock in the Conch colorway. I love how it is almost the exact same color as the rhododendron blossoms that were blooming outside in my garden as I was knitting: perfect serendipity!

Spring Knitting or Spring Hiking?

This was my dilemma as I sat down to write a new post, after three weeks of not doing so. Because I can't decide, I'm going to give you a little bit of both.

First the knitting: I've been working on socks, a shawl and a hat.  None are finished yet, but the socks and the shawl are getting close.  Here are one of the three pairs of socks I'm working on, Irishgirlieknits Honey Badger. I took the photo a few days ago, so I am almost to the heel now on the second sock.

I'm going to save a photo of the shawl for when it's done, but I will show you the hat I'm working on:

As you can see it's colorwork, Kate Gagnon Osborn's En Blekksprut Beret. I am currently much further along than the photo shows; I have finished the Fair Isle portion, and just started the stripes. The yarn, Fibre Company Canopy Fingering, is yummy.

I have one other BIG project that is off the needles, but not quite ready to be photographed. I'll give you a teaser photo for now, though.

On to hiking! There is a lot of snow in the mountains, so we have been hiking almost exclusively in the foothills, and, with one exception, we have gone to Cougar Mountain. In fact, we have hiked in Cougar Mountain four times in the last month. It has been a treat to watch spring advance a little each time we go there. Here is some of what we have seen:

The view of Lake Sammamish on a gray day, but with a bit of new green beginning to appear.

Beautiful blossoms, hidden in the forest.

Salmonberry blossoms, skunk cabbages and trilliums.

Tall trees, with new leaves silhouetted against a blue sky.

Yes, It's definitely spring!

It's Time To Talk About Socks

I love knitting socks. I love wearing my knitted socks. As you can tell by the photo of my sock drawer in the previous post, I have knit A LOT of socks. But I haven't really talked much about socks here on the blog lately, so this post is to make up for that.

Plain vanilla socks are the perfect project for social knitting, and because I do knit pretty frequently with my knitting friends, I have knit a fair number of plain vanilla socks. Here is my latest pair, the Not So Plain Vanilla Socks:

These socks were knit out of a fun self-patterning yarn that really kept my interest, and I love the result.

When I first a started knitting socks, about five years ago, it was all I could do to get through plain vanilla socks, so that's all I knit for quite a while. Then, as my sock knitting skills improved, I began to branch out. First, I knit a pair of garter rib socks, based on the stitch pattern in Charlene Schurch's Sensational Knitted Socks. I've knit garter rib socks several times over the past several years. Here is my most recent pair, my Happy Socks, knit out of one of the first Hazel Knits yarns I ever purchased, a yarn club colorway, Aloha, from June 2009. They really are happy, aren't they?

Once I mastered plain and simple ribbed socks, I moved on to patterned socks. The first pattern that I knit was Linda Welch's Spring Forward, and although they took me months to knit, I am still very proud of them, and love wearing them. Here are my I'm Springing Forward socks; I really felt like I was springing forward as a sock knitter when I finished these.

Since completing those Spring Forwards in the summer of 2009, I have continued to intersperse patterned socks with plain vanilla and ribbed socks. I am finding that I always have to have at least one patterned sock on my needles, even if it languishes while I work on other projects. That is the case with my current patterned sock project, my Hazel Knits Mystery Sock KAL Socks, the Chinese Bell Flower pattern designed by Adrienne Fong. The knitalong ran from January 1 through February 28, but I'm still plugging away on mine. This is probably the most complicated sock I've ever knitted, but I am really enjoying it, nonetheless. Here is what the socks look like so far:

I've just scratched the surface on socks in this post, and I haven't even talked about my preferred sock knitting method, two circular needles, compared to the magic loop method or dpns. I also haven't touched on top down construction—again, my preferred method—versus toe-up. Those discussions will have to wait for another day.

The point of this post is just to reiterate what I said at the beginning: I love knitting socks!

Photo of the Week: Inside the Sock Drawer

89/365: Inside the Sock Drawer, a photo by jchants ~ More off than on for a few days on Flickr.

I've been seeing a number of photos of the insides of sock drawers recently, and I wanted to take one, too. This shows just a few of my 24 pairs of hand knit socks. Lately I've been thinking a lot about my sock knitting, so watch the blog for a post about socks coming up soon!

Family of Socks

Do you do gift knitting for your friends and family at the holidays? I've done some in previous years: socks for my cousin Annie in 2009 and for my friend Elizabeth in 2010. Last year, I also knitted my biggest gift project ever, a vest for Mr. D. This year I decided to knit socks for my sister-in-law, her partner and my nephew, six year-old Olin.

You've already seen the finished Karen's Crow's Feet, and the in-progress Hearts for Evi Socks when I wrote about them in October. Since then, I finished Evi's socks and started and finished Olin's, which I'm calling the Stripes for Olin Socks. All three pairs have been blocked, and I think they look fantastic! And best of all: my holiday knitting is done—as of December 6—the earliest ever!

I have also finished knitting another sort of sock project about a week ago: a Christmas stocking. Mr. D is Jewish, and so he doesn't have a special handmade Christmas stocking, like the one Aunt Helen knitted for me when I was little. He has been using one of my collection of store-bought and craft fair stockings when we do our annual stocking tradition (more on that in a later post). My knitting group decided to knit Christmas stockings as a group project, so here was my opportunity to knit Mr. D his own stocking! My knitting guru, Christy, converted Maurya McBride's Snowflake Stocking to a stranded pattern in the round, and as a result, I got to practice two-color, two-handed knitting. The result isn't perfect, but I'm really proud of finishing it—it's only my second completed colorwork project.  Here is the final result:

So, gift knitting is done, but the holidays are just beginning. I'll keep you updated about my holidays—both Christmas and Hanukkah—in the weeks to come.

Some Socks, and a Couple Bits of Mystery

It's finally time for the obligatory knitting post, so I can say this is more than just a photography blog. What have I been knitting, you ask? The answer is: socks. A while back, I decided that I would knit a "family of socks" for my California sister-in-law, her partner, and their son, my six year-old nephew. The partner has narrow, but pretty big feet—size 11, to be exact, so I started on her socks first, casting on in June. I've already written about those socks as they were in progress, but last weekend, I finally finished them. So, here, without further ado, I give you Karen's Crow's Feet:

This is the second pair of Linda Welch's Crow's Feet socks that I have knit. I love this pattern! It's simple and easy to memorize, and I think the result is spectacular, especially in this lovely shade of green, Hazel Knits Artisan Sock in the Euphorbia colorway.

Now that the Crow's Feet are complete, I have picked up my Hearts for Evi socks, which I started on September first. I'm knitting Laura Chau's Slip Stitch Ridges pattern, and it is moving along pretty quickly now. Here is a peek at the first sock in progress:

I'm knitting these in Blue Moon Fiber Arts Socks That Rock Mediumweight in the Bleeding Hearts Colorway.

A few days ago, I cast on for socks for Olin, my nephew. They are in the early stages, so no photos of those socks yet, but here is a picture of the yarn I'm using:

Definitely colors that a six (almost seven) year-old will love!

Other than socks, I finished Gwen's Garden, a pattern by Sharon Dreifuss, and one of two designs that were part of the She-Knits Mystery KAL #8. I loved working on this project! The pattern was well-written, and there were sections of it that were almost meditative to knit. In addition, the pattern included beads, and I love working with beads in my knitting.  The finished object was beyond stunning, in my humble opinion. Kudos to Sharon for a wonderful design!

There is also another mystery project that has been in the pipeline. The mystery involves something to go on one's head, but that is the only clue you will get for now. You will just have to wait a few days until I tell you about that one.