Time has flown (FO# 15)

Wow, I never posted after my last FO!  Possibly because it's a hat, and it's been so darn hot that the thought of a hat hasn't crossed my mind since I bound off the last stitch.  But it exists, and it's hardly fair to ignore the poor thing.

As per usual, it's a crummy PhotoBooth pic, and you can't see how beautiful the yarn is.  It's from Gaslight Dyeworks, one of my favorite indies, and I'd had it in the stash for a while, just waiting for the right kind of project, and I do think I found it in this cozy, lightweight hat for autumn.  This was my beach-knitting project for this year's family vacation to Ocean City, MD.  It was simple enough to knit while watching my nieces play in the surf without paying it a whole lot of attention, and despite the fact that my hyper-sensitivity to the sun kept me from spending as much time on the beach as I'd have liked, I still managed to finish all but the last few rounds by the time I got home.

My other vacation knits remain unfinished.  I knit nearly the whole leg of a Pomatomus sock out of one of my new favorite yarns, Sweet Georgia Superwash Sock, before noticing a dropped stitch a good 2.5" back, and have been so bummed at the thought of frogging it that it's just been sulking on the end table, waiting for a miraculous fix-by-fairies. 

I knit the back of my Concur cardigan, but kind of lost steam on that one, and have put it aside for the moment.  Photos to come of that one when I return to it...


Since I got home I have been doing sporadic work on the Traveling Sweater whenever the weather has been cool enough to allow the lap-full of wool, and on a super-fun project that looks a little something like this:

More to come on that cutie soon...

As summer comes to an end, I am thrilled to look at my stash of wooly scrumptiousness and imagine crisp days and cool evenings spent creating beautiful, useful knits for myself and my loves.  I'm a little worried that I will have less time to knit this coming school year, as I'll be taking on some greater responsibilities at work while also just teaching more hours per week, but that's all positive, so I can't be too upset.  Plus, I've renewed my commitment to practicing yoga, which means a few less knitting hours per week, but more stretching and breathing to make everything else better.  I think I tend to make resolutions like this at the end of summer ("This is the year I'm going to be more organized! Read all my assigned chapters on time!  Finish papers before the middle of the night before they're due!") and now that I'm teaching instead of student-ing, it's no different.  The promise of unused school supplies always sparks my optimism.

Anyway, in the meantime, here's the detailios on the hat:
Ocean City Slouch
Pattern: Pinstripe Slouch Hat by Veronik Avery, from her lovely book Knitting 24/7
Yarn: Gaslight Dyeworks Superwash Fingering
Colorway: Bad Moon Rising
Yardage: around 300?

2010 so far:
FOs: 15

Yards knit: 3850

Well, look at that.

It's an honor to help keep that head warm. 
That's Little Miss Sadie, born on July 27.

Finally FOs 13 and 14!

I'm back, baby!  Not with a bang, but a little gurgle.  I'll take it, though.  Despite knitting my fingers to the nubs lately, I've not finished a blessed thing.  My dang project-promiscuity has been kicking in hard lately, and I flit, I float from project to project, a round here, a pattern repeat there.  Luckily nature has stepped in and handed me a deadline to finish something, albeit a couple tiny, 30-50-yard somethings.

Embarrassingly, I forgot to take a picture of my latest items!  So here's a word picture: two teeny tiny booties in shares of green, pale pink, and bright magenta, with little pops of sky blue here and there, and a little hat to match, with a rolled brim and a little i-cord knotted at that top.  Impossibly tiny.  Pretty darn cute.  They're both for my niece Sadie, who is due any minute now.  I do believe every baby deserves to have something handmade for her (or him) before s/he was even born, and this baby is nearly here, so I had to get on the stick(s) and make with the gifts!  After a failed attempt at a sweater (somehow the back was only a tiny fraction as wide as the sleeves and front were!) I set my sights appropriately low and went for a wee pair of booties and a hat. I'll try to get a picture of them in use if I'm lucky enough to meet her next week at our family vacation in Ocean City, MD.

Now to plan what I'll be knitting while on vacation!

Bootie Specs:
Pattern: Magic Slippers by SockPixie
Yarn: Socks That Rock lightweight
Colorway: Watermelon Tourmaline
Yardage: Hardly any!  I estimated by weighing these littlebits that they are about 30 yards total.

Hat Specs:
Pattern: Easy Peasy Newborn Sock Hat by Keri McKiernan
Yarn: same as booties
Yardage: around 50

2010 so far:
FOs: 14
Yards knit: 3550

a reckoning

I can't finish a damn thing.  It is so stinkin' hot here, I can't stand to knit on my Traveling Sweater - too much wool on my lap.  The Daybreak shawl got kind of boring, so I put it down.  I started a baby sweater for my cousin-to-be, and that was going well, but then my mind wandered and I cast on a pair of socks for the Socks That Rawk Ravelry group's knit-along.

Summer is so hard for knitting.  I can't wear anything wool in this heat (and I so prefer knitting with wool), so the incentive to finish something so I can wear it isn't there.  I can't work on a big project because I can't stand to have anything heavy on my lap.  And although I've seen a couple movies lately, I seem to have misplaced my movie-knitting (a big old garter-stitch shawl I started last summer) so that didn't lead to any productivity either. 

But!  I have a vacation coming up in a few weeks, and that means a well-air-conditioned condo for sweater knitting, and beach-time for some little project or another, and airplane and car knitting.  So hopefully the end of July and beginning of August will give me something to show off.

In the meantime, what's on the needles in varying states of neglect:
Traveling Sweater
Daybreak Shawl
February Baby Sweater
Charybdis Socks
and I'm thisclose to casting on for a couple pairs of Mad for Plaid socks from the new Knitty, knit out of the new Loopy Ewe solids series yarn. (I've got a skein each of Sunshine Yellow, Grass, Cerulean, Fuschia, and Smoke)