There's the socks from Knitabulls Podcast KAL, these have been a learning experience. I've only made one pair before, and then used an afterthought heel. This time I tried a short row heel, and I tried it over and over, for some reason I kept stuffing it up and ending up with an uneven number of decreases. After a few goes, I settled on good enough and knitted on:
As the colour change progressed in the yarn though I didn't like them, it looked like the foot part and the leg part were two different socks? So I bit the bullet, and have now pulled them back to before the heel. In searching for a new heel style, I discovered 'gussets' so I pulled back a bit more and knitted a gusset and short row heel, making a much neater and better fit. Now I'm continuing on up the leg and including the stripes to try and make the colour blend better - I'm not sure how many more stripes I can squeeze out of the purple yarn though.
Then I cast on a new hat for myself, the Elfunny Beret by FadenStille. The pattern states for an average sized head, of 53.5, mine is 60, which means ‘one size fits all’ sit on top of my head like a fez. I was in need of a new hat for winter, one that properly covered my ears, and use a yarn that I don’t find itchy. I generally don’t have any problems with any yarn mix, until it’s a hat, then my forehead is incredibly itchy!
Using two balls of Patons Click, from my stash (yay), I increased the cast on by 10% to 88, adding a full graph repeat, cast on with 4mm and changed to 5.5mm for the lace work. I kept getting a bit lost on the lace chart and making errors, mostly down to reading it from the iPad, and watching a movie on the same iPad-meaning I read the chart line, then close it to resume movie. It would have been a very quick knit if I hadn't needed to pull back a number of rows to correct an error, I must learn how to use lifelines.
Then an even quicker knit was the Gaptastic Cowl by Jen Geigley. I bought this yarn in Stockholm with the intention of trying a Wellie Warmer pattern out, but I wasn't happy with they way they knitted up. I immediately frogged them and found another use for the yarn so it didn't add to the stash! This will be for a friends birthday. I would definitely knit this again, as it makes for a super quick gift knit, although I don't enjoy knitting on such large needles - I used a 12mm circular. I also found it difficult to successfully hide the join of the two balls of yarn, so next time I would look for single skeins of enough length. This one used two balls of Drops, Andes.
Then more stash matching to my Ravelry queue, and I cast on the Olympic National Park Shawl, by Very busy Monkey. I had three balls of Drops Alpaca in the stash which is so lovely and soft and I think will make a lovely shawl. I have no idea what I originally bought it for!
Just incase that wasn't enough, I went for one more cast on, another shawl. I managed to match up two more balls from the stash to cast on Dream Stripes by Calliau Berangere.
There is kind of a plan in all this casting on though. The socks are a good small portable project, which now the heel is turned, I can work on anywhere, without a pattern and pick up and put down without a problem. The KAL goes until the end of November so that won't be a problem to finish them, and it will make sure they are finished! The National Park Shawl requires constant pattern watching, and is a perfect chance to give something more complex a try while I'm home to focus on it. The Dream Stripes is a really simple increase pattern, which I've cast on ready for the next travel trip, and or when the socks are finished.
I'm trying very hard to resist casting on for Christmas gifts and ending up with panic knitting, like last year! Instead I'm going to focus on chipping away at the stash, and perhaps there will be some finished objects that then become presents.
Enough typing, I've got knitting to get on with!
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Love the socks and the cowl.
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