Christmas knitting complete!

(But, well, let's just say, I didn't set myself that high a bar to clear!)

I met with my friend last night and we exchanged Christmas pressies - I think (I hope) that she liked her earrings - I always seem to be rather nervous about giving handmade things - you hope the recipient likes them on the one hand but on the other hand you want to try and communicate that they if they aren't too keen they needn't feel guilty and wear such things out of obligation! Anyway enough with the paranoia, how about a couple of FO pictures?

I'm most pleased with the way the dyed wooden beads worked on style 3 from the Bijouterie collection, the other pair gives a small amount of subtle shine - they are made from clear glass seed beads. If you want to see the Ravelry page for this project you can find it here although it's not that informative! All the pairs of earrings I've made so far have been made with findings from Palmer Metals, silver-plated copper wire from Fred Aldous and a variety of beads from Sayila. I would recommend all of these companies for their product ranges, prices and speed of delivery :o)

As a small aside it is worth me pointing out another great reason for knitting this project - it has allowed me to cross off three more points on my Knitting Manifesto, namely, knitting with wire, knitting with beads and knitted jewellery. Huzzah!

I think there is only one more thing for me to say in this post, and that is for you all to do as the nutcracker army commands you:

*Have a lovely Christmas and a wonderful 2009!!*

Adamas ist fertig!

Oh yes, Adamas is done!!! Fortunately it was finished blocking on Friday when there was actually some sun in the sky - so I decided to make some metaphorical hay while it shone :o)

Here is the shawl in all of its glory:

I am really pleased with it - perhaps that comes across without me having to be so explicit about it - oh well, nevermind. I will express my ardour further through the medium of photo mosiacs!

Here are some close-ups of various aspects of the shawl:

And here, more to give a general impression of the size of the FO than anything else, are a few modelled shots:

If you want to see larger versions of any of these mosaic photos just click through to my Flickr photostream.

So some details - this is the Adamas Shawl by Miriam Felton of MimKnits. It's been made using Adriafil Merino 2/30 cobweb weight yarn purchased from Angel Yarns (definitely one of the cheapest yarns of this type that I have found so far). I held the yarn double and knitted on one long 3.75mm circular needle. Ravelry project page is here.

Well, what can I say? This is my first true 'lace for the sake of lace' project and I love it! The pattern is beautifully simple which suits my tastes but also means that the repeats are easily memorised. I love the way the whole shawl grew out from the bottom point (out of just 5 stitches) - by the end the rows are pretty long, but they still flew by because working on this project was so addictive and I was so keen to finish it. The yarn is lovely and soft as well as being a real bargain and I think this shawl will make a lovely warm scarf without being too bulky.

I think I could quite easily become totally hooked on making lace of this type and I have already added several potential future projects to my favourites list on Ravelry. Once I've cleared a few projects from my queue I think I'll definitely be turning to lace again...

Anticipation

I am on tenterhooks waiting to find out how my Adamas Shawl will turn out. It's currently blocking and looks a bit like this (but less wonky - once I saw the photo I moved some of the pins around to try and straighten the diagonal edges):

I am quietly confident that it will turn out well (at least I certainly hope it will). I couldn't seem to quite get it to stretch to the measurements given in the pattern - mine is just over 5' wide at the top and about 2'6" down the middle - I think that should be a good size though - I would expect I'll mostly be wearing it as a big cuddly scarf anyway.

There was a slight delay in beginning the blocking process when I realised I didn't have any pins that were up to the job; that meant I had to wait a few days while the 'T' pins that I ordered online turned up.

I haven't been slacking off in the meantime though, I have not one but two finished projects to show you from the intervening period. These two go together with my Multidirectional Diagonal Scarf (as blogged here) to complete a little garter stitch trilogy.

I give you without further ado my Zeebee hat:

Knitted in James C. Brett Marble DK - 5mm needles - I messed up my gauge measurements so I knitted 5 segments instead of the 4 stated in the pattern. Pattern here; Ravelry page here. This pattern is genius - the fit of the hat that it produces is really nice - covers the tops of my ears well which I like in a hat! I, sadly, am not a genius hence the reason I miscalculated the gauge and ended up knitting 5 segments instead of the stated 4 - it doesn't seem to have harmed the finished product at all though.

Next up are my garter stitch mittens:

Knitted in James C. Brett Marble DK - 4mm needles (magic loop method). Pattern here; Ravelry page here. This pattern is also simple but effective - I had a couple of false starts with these but that's because I didn't bother to make measurements of my hands before I started and just worked on a trial-and-error basis - they still only took a few evenings worth of knitting to finish though.

I'm very pleased with my little garter stitch collection - I only hope the jacket that kick-started the whole process still fits me this winter!

I've just been swatching for my next planned project as well - news of that to follow when there is something worth reporting on! All I can say for now is that I have managed to get the correct gauge without too much trouble - phew!

With any luck the next post from me will be one which is full of pride for a successfully completed shawl. Fingers crossed!

Much news on the knitting front!

Hello again - look, look - this is my second post in the month of October! Amazing! Say hello to Mr (or Ms) Sheepie up the top of the page there!

I have lots of knitting goings on to report back on. I decided it was time for a good shake up of projects planned and projects languishing half finished and a metaphorical (and literal in some cases) spring clean of my knitting cupboard seems to have done me the power of good. I can tell because I have in fact got a finished object to show you!

Let's hear it for my latest socks:

(As Kath noted in her last comment I have gone crazy for making photo mosaics in Flickr - they do make everything look great!)

So these beauties are knitted from the Hourglass pattern in autumn Knitty, the yarn is Regia Kaffe Fassett in the Mirage Fire colourway knitted on my favourite 2.5mm bamboo DPNs. If you'd like to have a look at the Ravelry version of this info you can find it here.

I do think this pattern deserves its Knitty rating of extra spicy - it is certainly the trickiest sock pattern I've managed to complete so far. This makes me wonder whether I might have another try at Pomatomus some time as they are rated at the easier piquant level - maybe my knitting has reached a suitable level now to be able to manage them.

That's not to say that I didn't make any booboos on these socks - the first one had to be frogged twice whilst I was knitting the leg but I found that once I stopped trying to second guess the pattern and 'make sense of it' in my head but instead just put my faith in the pattern and followed the instructions everything turned out fine. A valuable lesson to learn indeed. Needless to say I am really pleased with these socks and I love the colours in the yarn too (they are slightly more subdued in real life than in the pictures) - an all round success I think!

The day after I finished the socks I cast on for my next project - one that I am very excited about:

The Adamas Shawl! Free pattern here; Ravelry pattern page here. I decided I really wanted to knit something lacy and warm and cosy that I would be able to get a decent amount of wear out of - Muir wasn't cutting it, I should have known when the yarn didn't turn out to be the colour I expected of it that the project was doomed to failure. So this is a plain brown shawl - no flowery bits (to suit my conservative tastes) - it's been really fun to knit so far. I'm using a very lightweight 100% merino wool from Adriafil for this project - I started off using it single stranded but it was just too flimsy for my liking when it was knit up and so I've started again holding the yarn double. So far so good - I like the way it is looking so far, it's going quite quickly and I am so enthusiastic about the project at the moment that I am hoping for rapid results - I'm not sure how I'll feel once the rows are lo-o-ong - but hopefully it won't put me off too much. Watch this space...

Lastly, a few other bits and bobs that seem worth mentioning... the yarn that I salvaged from Muir will be repurposed and become Firestarter socks; Thermal is no more - the yarn ended up in the bin too, it was already on its third incarnation and once I'd unravelled it again it was so pilled and tangled I decided to put it out of its misery - Thermal is still a favourite pattern of mine though so it make a comeback in a different yarn one of these days; I'm tinkering with knitting a Brea bag at the moment but might start again in a colour other than black so that the cabling shows up better; my Ravelry queue is sort of manageable at the moment - let's hope I can tick off some of those projects to make way for some new ones before the winter is out.

I'll try and keep the updates coming as well...

Back with a Bang

Sort of at least! I can't believe how long it's been since I posted last - where has all that time gone!!?? I've been feeling the blog guilt - but I've not had anything to post about really (this is meant to be a knitting-related blog after all!). But now I've got an FO and that says to me that it's high time I posted to the blog!

Without further ado I present to you a plain and boring pair of socks (hey- it's still an FO even if it isn't that interesting!):

Yup, 68 stitches around plain stockinette socks - 2x2 ribbing at the cuff, short row heel (winged it on the first sock and used some written instructions (from somewhere on the internet but I can't remember where exactly) on the second sock - guess which one turned out best!), standard toe - 2.5mm bamboo DPNs.

Those with elephant-style memories will notice that this is the same Opal Hundertwasser yarn that was on its way to becoming my Sidewinder Socks in the last post on the blog. I'm afraid to say that the Sidewinders had to bite the dust. I finished the first sock - my grafting looked absolutely dreadful... I would have been ashamed to show it to you! Once I'd finished it was clear the first sock was too tight - I couldn't even get it over my heel - pah! It didn't seem worth faffing around with a sock which needed so much of the dreaded Kitchener stitch and turned out too tight despite careful measuring of both my foot and my gauge swatch. So ... I gave up.

I really liked the yarn with it's bright stripes and associations with Hundertwasser so I wanted to do it justice - I figured that a plain stockinette sock would be as good a way as any of showcasing such vibrant yarn. So that's what I did, as you can see from above :o)

There's more I could post right now - I want to try and dig out my pictures of my visit to the Hundertwasser Haus in Vienna (they aren't that exciting but they would tie in well here) and I need to show you my latest WIP - but I'm a bit pressed for time so it'll have to wait. But not for long hopefully! Adieu for the time being.

The incipient springing of spring

Ah... what joy! The weather here in Birmingham at least has been decidedly pleasant and warm for the last two days - I've been longing for it (I feel the cold - a lot!). All of a sudden I am noticing the leaves starting to appear on the trees (especially the horse chestnuts) and daisies and forget-me-nots are back in bloom in the park - yay!

What better way to celebrate all this seasonal cheeriness than with a fitting FO? Here is my version of Elfine's Socks at last:



Details:

Elfine's Socks from My Fashionable Life (Ravelry page here)
Piece of Beauty sock yarn in beautiful, beautiful 'Sweetgrass'
2.25m needles (sock number 1 on Brittany birch DPNs, sock number 2 done using Magic Loop method)

They've actually been finished (and up on my Ravelry project page) for a little while but with their leafy lacy-ness and zingy green yarn now feels like a very good time to post them on the blog at last! As you'll see I've been practicing my techniques by Magic Looping on the second sock (necessity being the impetus here after I lost a second DPN from my set of 5) - I have to say I was quite pleased with how I got along with that way of working, I may well try it again in future. The socks are just a teeny bit tight - but wearable - which I consider a good development in my toe-up sock skills - I've had issues with my cast off being too tight in the past. These socks are definitely a step in the right direction.

My next project is also of the socky variety, but I am going for something a little bit different to keep my interest levels up:



This colourful but bizarre thing is a Sidewinder sock (Ravelry link) using my Opal Hundertwasser yarn. Ever since I saw that yarn I knew I wanted vertical stripes as suggested in the promo pictures. The yarn came with a free pattern (in German) which I could decipher easily enough but it sounded a bit too simplistic to offer a good fit - and the comments on Ravelry confirmed that that seems to be the case in practice and so I turned to Sidewinders. They are really ingenious I must say but there is one major sticking point for me... the grafting... so so so so much grafting - and that is something I'm not terribly good at! The picture here was taken at the end of March and shows almost all of the knitting complete for the first sock, I completed the rest of the knitting quickly enough but I still haven't completed all of the grafting so that I can try the thing on!! Soon, soon.

I have faced an obstacle in the last week though:



I was attacked by a hot griddle pan which has hampered my knitting (and general hand-moving abilities) but I am well on the mend now and if I can get this first sock done I should be able to start the second one over the weekend.

Send good grafting vibes!!

Long-awaited...

Or maybe not long awaited - you tell me! It has been more than a month since my last post. WTF?! There are two items on the agenda for today's post and I shall start with the most important:

THANK YOU! To Knit-Nurse and to Kath of Krafty Kreations fame for honouring, yes honouring, me with the You Make My Day Award (have a look at Knit Nurse's post here for a bit of background). Far more than I deserve I am sure especially since I have been so useless on the blogging/knitting fronts recently. You certainly both made my day by thinking of me in this way. Now I have to think of my 10 people to pay it forward to.... Hmmm, an update on that will appear soon I hope - when I've got over my indecisiveness!

The second item on the agenda is the really long-awaited bit: FO pictures of Rayne. Without further ado here they are:





So now you can see that I really have finished this project! However, I don't think it is going to stay in its finished state like this for very long - the fronts are just too big in my opinion they add a lot of bulk and get in the way (although I am very intolerant of irritating clothing - other more mellow types may not find it a problem at all) so I am going to try shortening them a bit - so the project will have to be finished a second time - d'oh!

There are lot of knitting projects that need finishing off properly around here at the moment - in addition to Rayne Mark 2 there is Muir, my Elfine's socks, the mitts and hat to go with my Multidirectional Scarf and the My So-called Scarf that I started. My goal is to have all of these things sorted out fairly soon - maybe by mid-April, thus clearing the way for a potential project that I have fallen head-over-heels in love with - details to follow on that front!

To finish off the post I'll leave you with some pictures of my recent visit to the Henry Moore at Kew exhibit - I'm so glad that, despite being so busy recently, I made it there before the exhibit closes (at the end of March) as it was really a lovely day out and we were very lucky with the weather (on 1st March).

So, I shall return soon - at least, hopefully sooner than in a month's time this time! Bye for now, Nicola

The dreaded p-word!

Yup, procrastination. I have been procrastinating over most areas of my life recently it would seem - hopefully this was a January-related affliction and will dissipate now....

Unfortunately the procrastination extends into the knitting sphere and so Rayne is still not finished - the knitting is done but it needs to have the ends sewn in and a blocking/ironing before I can really get a feel for whether or not it works as a garment!

Whilst procrastinating with my main project though I have worked on a little side project - using some of the extra yarn left over from Rayne. Without further ado then, I present the Multidirectional Diagonal Scarf in Marble DK:



A little bonus close-up:



I've been looking for a scarf that will look nice with the jacket in the photos and it struck me that this shade of yarn (James C Brett Marble DK shade MT6) would work very well. With the help of Ravelry (here is my project's Ravelry page) I found the Multidirectional Diagonal Scarf Pattern (bit of a mouthful!). Then I cast on using 5mm needles and slightly more stitches than suggested for a wider finished scarf.

The knitting went very quickly - I tended to knit one triangle at a time which was quite a manageable chunk - and soon enough the scarf was done. Huzzah! Now I plan to knit some simple garter stitch mitts and possibly also a beanie to go with the scarf - hopefully I won't procrastinate too much with those!

Playing catch-up

I'm sure people are starting to get bored of hearing how busy life has been for me between posts and how that prevents me from posting more often... I'm afraid, though, that that's just how things are around these parts at the moment. The usual demands on my time are the culprits with the added addition of a job interview (playing the waiting game at the moment) and the associated shopping (I am now the proud owner of not one, but two suits - sure I will need them at some point in the future!).

In the midst of all this I have managed to come up with an FO and buy more yarn (the latter of those never seems to be very difficult though!).





Here are my Broad Spiral Rib socks at last - who would have thought something so simple would take so long?! Nonetheless they are lovely warm socks and nice and snug because of the ribbed pattern so that's all good. I much prefer the way the striping worked out on one of the pair but the second sock is not bad either :)

So that's another WIP out of the way... Elfine's Unfinished Socks will be accompanying me off on holiday this week as will this new addition to my stash:



This is two out of the three skeins of Socrates Sock Yarn I ordered from Violet Green in the colourway Dusty Answer. I've never ordered yarn before that has turned out to look quite so unlike its website photograph... the photo I am posting here is really quite a good representation of how the yarn looks in real life - do you think it looks much like its photo on the website? Fortunately enough I actually quite like the yarn in the flesh, purples and teals/turquoises being colours I'm into at the moment so I'm prepared to let it slide, although I think I would have been happier if the yarn actually looked how I thought it would! This is destined to become some sort of lace scarf or stole, I'm not 100% sure exactly what will happen, although I will admit that I am very taken with Muir from Knitty so it might become an adapted version of that. We shall see. I plan to just pack the yarn and some needles and have a play, whether what I come back from holiday with is more than just a swatch or a tangle remains to be seen!

Lombard Street

Crikey, it really is all socks all the time round here at the moment. I wonder whether whatever I end up doing after my Masters is finally finished will leave me enough time and mental energy to work on something more taxing than socks?

For the moment I think I will have to be content with woolly footwear. Retaining my sanity whilst faced with a lot of stressful work is one of the (the?) main reason(s) I knit - it was when I was studying for my finals that I took up knitting again after a very long break because I needed something to take my mind off university and the knitting bug bit. Looking at things from that angle I think socks are the perfect knit for calming the mind - they are more gratifying (for me at least) to knit than a scarf (and a lace shawl I think would not be too relaxing even if it must be supremely gratifying), you don't have the worries associated with whether a sweater is going to fit, socks are very forgiving in terms of fit and if you end up with something you aren't quite satisfied with it's not too awful because the investment of time hasn't been too great, the last thing that an already unstable mind wants to contend with is the frustration of realising that a much coveted sweater that has eaten days of time in its creation is in actual fact not going to look as good as you thought.

Therefore, without further ado, I present to you my latest socks:









Lombard Street socks from Magknits
Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock in Sunshine from Cnyttan Patterns
Clover Bamboo 2.5mm DPNs

These socks are a case in point, in some ways I am very pleased with them - the fit is excellent I am very pleased with the way the heels and toes came out (and with the picot edge - first time I've completed a pair with this detail), I love the yarn it suits the pattern brilliantly - BUT the colour, I loved it in the skein but on my feet I'm just not so sure about it, like I said though the investment of time has not been great and I have a wearable finished product (what's the point in being too vain about socks, very few people will see or pay much attention to them unless you want them to) so I will not let this bother me and move on to the next sock knitting adventure. By the way I would certainly knit this pattern again, very nice, exceptionally quick and worked excellently with this yarn (just not in yellow!).

The next sock knitting adventure is as previously mentioned Elfine's Socks using my new Piece of Beauty yarn, beyond that I have a couple more ideas up my sleeve for further socks. I hope no one is getting too bored yet?!

Mission accomplished!

My Sockapalooza 4 socks have been completed and now sent - phew!

After all the worry caused by my own idiocy (see the previous post!) I managed to get them done pretty much on time.

I worked the second sock with 1x1 ribbing (thanks to Knit-Nurse for explaining first principles to me - much appreciated) and that did seem to improve matters as far as actually getting the sock over my heel was concerned (hopefully the same will be true for my sock pal). So then I undid the 2x2 ribbing from sock #1 and reworked the cuff of that one - thankfully there was just enough yarn left after unravelling the first attempt to rework the cuff without having to join new yarn. Finally a good block on a sock blocking device fashioned from a wire coat hanger left things looking a lot neater. Et voila!

Both socks certainly have imperfections, and, as I say, I am still concerned as to whether they will fit my sock pal (I suppose that is an inevitable problem when knitting for someone you don't know and can't call upon for a fitting), but overall I think the end result is acceptable...

I hope that my sockpal agrees!

Sock stats

Pattern: Falling in Love by Anniken Allis in Magknits Feb 2007

Yarn: Piece of Beauty 100% BFL superwash in Cuban Rose less than 1 skein

Needles: Clover Bamboo 2.5mm DPNs

The next worry of course is whether or not the socks will safely reach their destination... I hope Royal Mail can be trusted. Other than the socks my package comprised the remainder of the yarn in case there is need for alterations (there was quite a bit left but I think the length of the finished socks is not too skimpy), two prime examples of Birmingham's finest delicacies (i.e. a big bar of Bournville and a packet of miniature bars of Dairy Milk - hope sock pal likes chocolate... never thought of that potential issue...) and a selection of 'beautiful' postcards of the area:

Brum postcards don't seem to be very inspiring at all unfortunately, but I think the ones I managed to find are not too bad, one even includes the much vaunted (around these parts at least) fact (?) that Birmingham has more miles of canals than Venice... I've never checked but it's a nice idea!

And so my own Sockapalooza mission has concluded. I eagerly await (with a certain degree of trepidation) news of my sock pal's reaction and of course receiving my own socks... the best is yet to come I am sure!

Hey hey it's the monkeys

(Yeah, I know, the title of the post is hardly original - I know at least that Cara at January One has used the same gag and I'm willing to bet shes not alone either - it's just too tempting a thing to want to write when your sock pattern is called Monkey...)

Anyway, without further ado:






Monkey socks from Knitty by Cookie A. Regia Bamboo Colour in 'Jamaica'. 2.5mm bamboo needles (for consistency's sake of course... or maybe just because I have bamboo needles in the right size).

I like this pattern a lot, as I've said before. The socks could stay up a little better but I think this is more likely to be a result of the yarn than the pattern. I think I might very well have to make another pair of these in a Regia wool or something similar - I think the pattern would show up a lot better then as well.

Down to the wire

Well the birthday party starts at 8 o'clock tonight so as usual I haven't left myself much leeway before the deadline constituted by giving these away as gifts to the birthday girl, but they are done and I am pleased.

These are the Interweave Heart Sachet pattern, knitted from some form of Lana Grossa cotton sock yarn - I don't recall any details other than that I bought it from Janette's Rare Yarns on ebay - and filled with lavender flowers from another ebay seller. I didn't do anything fancy with the hanging loops; just threaded some thin orange ribbon I'd bought from the markets in Birmingham through the top of the heart using a yarn needle and tied it in a knot. I was going for the simple but effective route and I don't think I'm that far off.

Well anyway, I must be off to get on with my gift wrapping.

Keeping Promises

A promise kept indeed, and one made only yesterday...

I have an FO.



This is one of the results of me thinking that I needed some easy, mindless knitting to do while I wasn't feeling so well. It was already finished yesterday, actually Thursday I think, but I had to wait until I had my teapot back (don't ask) before I could take a picture.

This is the Kureyon Kozy pattern from Knitty, except (perhaps rather foolishly - I don't know) I used Silk Garden instead of Kureyon because I already had some Silk Garden which I had been planning to use to make a hat, but then changed my mind because I didn't like how it felt against my skin.

My level of concentration was obviously seriously depleted whilst I wasn't well because even though the pattern is very straightforward I still managed to make several mistakes - not repeating rows in the correct sequence and not doing the right quantity of repeats of things. I also couldn't be bothered to try and match up the stripes on each side of the cosy. I don't think any of that really matters though, the end result is a functional tea cosy which is pretty and colourful and I got my go at mindless knitting and that was all that I was aiming for.

So there you go: I can still knit and with any luck there should be more to come soon.

Knitting's power to confound

The combined effect of me working my butt off to meet my deadlines and the yuck weather was that I got ill (with a bit of help from the boyfriend, who handily passed on some nice cold germs). I didn't feel like doing much of anything most of this week and haven't left the house to do more than go to the pharmacy downstairs.

Knitting has been happening, but only at a background level - still it is a level that permits me having a couple of finished objects to show off soon I believe. Last night, though, I was feeling a bit more human but wanting something to do to avoid having to play cards with the boyfriend and his buddy...

So taking my cue from said buddy, who was bemoaning his lack of seasonal headgear, I whipped out the needles and took up the hat challenge.

Within the length of this

(incidentally a most fabulous film, available, among other place, here), I managed to churn out a Hot Head Hat from Stitch 'n Bitch.

The buddy, I believe, was suitably impressed. I used some black random chunky yarn left over from previous Hot Head Hat attempts (I've made two before for the boyfriend, one which he lost and the second as a replacement) and 6mm needles as I couldn't find a pair of the prescribed 6.5mm. I knit the large size and tried to knit quite loosely as I was concerned, given the smaller needles, that the thing wouldn't fit buddy's fairly large head after all the effort. But (phew!) the thing actually did fit and there were smiles all round.

Such is the greatness of knitting!

Happy New Year!

First of all: the best of wishes to anyone out there reading this :)

Second of all my latest FO. I actually finished these in 2006, on 29th December to be precise.
It is of course the Jaywalkers:









There's not much to say about the process of knitting these other than it was great! I followed the pattern without any changes - I even bit the bullet and finally figured out how to do decent Kitchener stitch (as detailed in my last post) so there wasn't any need to change the toe.

I used Regia Canadian Color in shade 4736. A very nice yarn in my humble opinion. I really like the colours and the variegation shows up the stitch pattern of this design very well I think.

In evaluation I would have to say I like these socks a lot, the fit is good especially around my oddly small ankles and heels so they are not half as droopy as any of the other socks I've knit for myself. The only odd thing is that the flipside of the non-droopiness is that I find them quite difficult to take off but that is not the worst problem in the world and worth it when the benefits it affords are taken into account :)

So once again, a Happy New Year to all and here's to a successful 2007.

And this time I mean it!

Now I actually have a matching pair of FO socks to show off! Yay!







Here are the finished Snowflake socks. I love this pattern very much, so pretty and seasonal but really not that complicated. These are knitted in Regia Silk and as a departure from the pattern I used the pointed toe which I first encountered in the pattern for RPM (NB. RPM socks still not finished...). The reason for that is that I absolutely hate having to do Kitchener stitch for toes, I always butcher it and it ends up looking awful, I know there are probably (definitely, I expect) other ways to go about a normal toe but for the time being this seemed liked an OK solution.

The yarn is beautifully soft, really comfy to wear, but I have to report I'm not totally in love as it seems to pill really quite badly - I think probably in the close up picture you can see the fluffiness that already abounds. That means, that although I had been considering sending these socks as a gift I probably won't do, cos they already look perhaps slightly past their best. Also I don't think wearing them inside a shoe is likely to do them any favours at all.

This means that, save knitting more in different yarn, these remain as a sort of padding about the house kind of sock for me. But as far as I can see there is no harm in that!