Knit Wars

Ok, so I just have to post about this. I discovered Chore Wars while listening to the Lime & Violet podcast. Chore Wars was developed to motivate kids to do their chores. It's set up like (insert your favorite RPG here) and you gain experience points by completing your chores. Well, the crazy ladies at Lime & Violet created a knitting version to motivate all us knitters! You can get XP for various knitting "chores" like stash enhancement, dyeing yarn, finishing a pair of socks or even just knitting for 15 minutes. So if you're into World of Warcraft or Dungeons and Dragons, come dork out with the rest of us. Here's the link to join and here's the original blog post with all the rules.

August is for Argyle

An update on the argyle socks...I've made it past the heel on the first sock and only have one more diamond repeat to go before finishing off the toe. I wanted a thicker heel, but I thought just a plain gray heel wouldn't look as neat and one with some color. So, I worked a fair isle pattern over the heel flap using the three main colors of the sock. The idea seemed solid and it looks cool on its own, but I fear that it may take away from the sock design as a whole. We'll see once I seam this bad boy up and try it on. I did manage to slip it over my foot last night to check for a rough fit, but with the two seams and the DPNs still in it, the measure was not accurate at all.


To put even more pressure on myself, I signed up for the Sock a Month KAL 4 and dubbed these my August socks. The goal is one pair of socks a month for August, September, October and November. For each month you complete a pair of socks, you're eligible for prizes. Today is August 16th, which means I am officially cutting into second sock time. I suppose if I can finish them tonight, then I'll be ok assuming the second sock goes a bit faster than the first. Cross your fingers.

Pati-o Daddy-o!

The patio is complete! Click here for more photos.

Patio update!

I came home to a pleasant surprise yesterday after work, some nice progress on the patio! I wasn't sure how much they'd be able to get done in one day's work, but it was definitely enough to get us excited. I'm thinking that today they can get the rest of the block filled in and maybe start on the steps or the firepit? I know there's a lot of cutting to be done to fit the proverbial square bricks into the round hole of the design, so I'm figuring on a Friday finish if the rain holds off. We lost a whole day Tuesday because it poured in the A.M.

Progress

I've made some progress on the argyle socks, although not much. I'm alternating between these and the Fibonacci sweater (pics to come soon, I swear) to help alleviate knitting pain. I'm happy with the way they're turning out. I started to worry about the size, so I ran a lifeline through (that's the green yarn still in there) and took it off the needles. It's a little looser than I'd like, but not loose enough to require frogging. These are 88 stitches around, the next pair will be on fewer stitches.


Here's a picture of the back of the knitting. It's a little blurry, but if you click on the photo for the large size, you can see how I've twisted the strands at the color changes to lock in the yarn. It's most noticeable in the white diamond by my thumb. You can also see the "flaps" on the "back" of the leg where I started knitting flat.


In other progress news, patio construction has begun. We're really excited about it, I feel like we can finally enjoy our backyard. Now all I have to do is fill in all the dog holes.....

Rock 'n' Roll Argyle Socks

These are my newly named Rock 'n' Roll Argyle Socks. Why are they Rock 'n' Roll? Well just look at my hand in the photo! Inspirition can come from anywhere. They're knit with KnitPicks' Palette in ash, blue and white and I plan to duplicate stitch the criss-crossed lines in black. I knitted the ribbing in the round on dpns, then started working back and forth for the intarsia; I added a stitch on the edge to account for seaming. I think on the next one, I'll just knit the whole leg flat instead of starting in the round. I realize now I should have taken a photo of the back, oh well.

It's really fun to see the pattern grow with each row and it's really hard to stop knitting these because I think to myself, "Oh the top half of the diamond is almost done, just a few more rows." And then, "Well that's done, but now I want to see how it looks when the grey comes back in." It is a bit of a pain to work with all the bobbins hanging off the sock, but it forces me to go slow and be patient, which is probably good for my wrists. The other nice thing about using the bobbins (which are made from a cereal box thankyouverymuch) is it's easier to manage the tangles. When I have done colorwork in the past, the skeins just sit there while I twist the yarn to lock it in and they get all tangled. Now I can lift the whole bobbin over the working yarn to twist the two strands.

And now for something completely different, the demolition on my deck. Here's a before picture, before we moved in, before I demo'd the deck, before the dogs destroyed the backyard...
and here's the after(math)...



oh, and those dogs I mentioned? Here's one of them, Miss Ruby (Loo), otherwise known as Baloo.

Finally Back Knitting

After a few marathon sessions working on my black cabled sock, knitting every day at lunch, demolishing our deck in two days plus working on a computer all day at work, my arms decided to revolt. I started getting pain in my left wrist Sunday night and had to quit. I did a little research on carpal tunnel and wrist pain in general and decided that I didn't want to end up needing surgery or even braces for my wrists. I went a full two days without knitting (!!!) and finally picked it back up last night. Believe me, the drought was torturous. Not only had I just started a new pair of argyle socks, but I got a new shipment of yarn in the mail on Tuesday! All that beautiful yarn and all I can do is look at it and pet it. The good news is that I got 4 more skeins of Merino Style to finish the Fibonacci sweater I started oh so long ago. I think working on bigger needles (size 6) will help deal with my wrist pain too. I was knitting those cabled socks so tightly it was insane. I really need to relax when I knit. I'll try to take pictures of everything (sweater, yarn porn, argyle sock, demolished deck) when I get home tonight.

In other news...I just started reading The Yarn Harlot's blog yesterday. Yes, I know I'm probably the last person in the knitting community to hop on board, but in my defense, I DID at least know about her before yesterday. If anyone knows of other good knitting related blogs I should be reading, please enlighten me. I like her blog because she's well spoken and her posts are easy and fun to read, so if you know of others like that, please pass them along.