Two Down

Another week gone in the 52 Pair Plunge challenge and I have managed to get myself back on track by completing not one, but two pairs of socks which have both flown the nest.

Orlando the Marmalade Cat socks are all finished and have been sent to their new home...




and a fab odd pair of Karenina Socks which have now gone on tour with the p/hop team.



So, two pairs down, only 50 to go. I had better get back to my knitting!

Flying the Flag

I have been really looking forward to the World Cup, so when I saw this brilliant Yarnissima pattern I knew I had to track down the yarn and knit a pair for my beloved, which is exactly what I did...



Aren't they fab?! They are knit in Regia Nation Color which has now been reinvented as Regia World. The red, white and blue screamed 'patriot' and it was only after knitting them up it actually dawned on me that rather than flying the Union Jack he would be waving the French Tricolore.

I rushed out and bought something more appropriate



and in order to cover all bases...







Come on England!

Less Haste, More Speed

I can't believe we are already in to the second week of the 52PP and I have acheived the grand total of half a pair of socks. It's a very pretty sock though.

Sneaky peek...



I am knitting these for a friend in exchange for a skein of Wollmeise. Dangling Wollmeise in front of my eyes will make me do pretty much anything, except maybe intarsia. The pattern is Rumpled by Alice Yu, better known as Socktopus and the yarn is Eidos by The Sanguine Gryphon in the colourway Pyrrus and it reminds me of a certain fictional cat...



I love Orlando, such beautiful books.

Fools..

It is better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you are a fool than to open it and remove all doubt - Mark Twain

I have signed up to the 52 Pair Plunge. The challenge is to knit 52 pairs of socks in 52 weeks starting on 1st June 2010 and I thought it would be good to record my progress by starting to blog again. Any cheering from the sidelines that you are able to offer would be most welcome.

I love knitting socks, which is just as well!

A sneaky peek of a work in progress:



These are the Karenina Sock by probablyjane and are a charity pattern for p/hop. They are nowhere near as complicated as they look and knit up surprisingly fast, but you don't need to tell people that, let them think you have laboured for hours.

I will be back with an update and hopefully some finished pairs of socks

Still Here!

I was going to make excuses for having been away for so long but the only one I have is that I have been so busy! It's incredible how quickly life moves sometimes and so true that you really do have to grasp it with both hands before it slips away.

My blog station called me back following a wonderful episode on the bus...

I am in the process of knitting another pair of Canal du Midi socks for my other half and as they are a secret surprise for his birthday they are my current bus knitting project. I was busily clicking away the other morning and heard, 'What are you making?' I took my earphones out and a little girl was looking at me and my knitting. 'It's a sock' I said, 'would you like to see a finished one?' I got a very enthusiastic nod in return. 'Now, you have to remember that I am making them for my boyfriend and my feet are not this big!' I got another nod.

I have to emphasise at this point that my beloved is long of leg and long of foot and his sock is therefore, well, long! Following a rummage in my knitting bag I produced the finished sock and held it up for the little lady to see. She took a look at it, looked at me, then looked at my feet! By this time the sock had garnered quite a crowd and her reaction to my work and the size of this incredible piece of knitted fabric produced an excellent comedic moment on the bus. It not only made my morning but my day.

Yep, I'm still here and still knitting.

Knitting after Le Tour

Life is a little strange without the Tour de France Knitalong...I don't really quite know what to knit next.

I have a few UFO's lurking in the bottom of my knitting bag that I should really pick up, plus an ever-increasing blocking queue that really does need tackling, but of course I decided just to cast-on something new instead!



This is the 'With Added Gust Scarf' and will be for my 'nearly' Mother-in-Law. It is in the lovely Caber yarn by The Yarn Yard and the colours are so stunningly delicate I can't stop holding the piece at arms length and admiring the dye work! The best description I can come up with for it is almost like a muted version of Dolly Mixture sweets, full of lavenders, pinks and greens but quite dusky...just beautiful.

I hope I will be able to part with this one as the previous Gust scarf was intended as a present and didn't quite make it that far!

Le Tour - Le Grand Fin

I made it!

Did you see me riding full blast down the Champs Elysee with the wind behind me and La Asphalt Chanteuse flapping in the slipstream just before midnight?

It was a hard fought battle at the end, but with grit and determination I made it!






I am left wondering now if I have done enough to earn my King of the Mountain jersey as it has certainly been an uphill struggle at times.

I have learnt a lot of new techniques throughout the course of the Tour...

1) The Double Start Cast-On
2) Using contrasting colours for the cuff, heel and toe of a sock
3) A new heel technique (apologies that I do not know the official name for it)
4) The rosebud toe (which was later abandoned in favour of kitchener stitch)
5) Shaping through the calf to give a better fit
6) Lovely twisty cable stitches done without a cable needle

All in all I am pretty pleased! There are a couple of things that I will do differently next time, for example, I am not that keen on the way the heel sits when it is on the foot and I started the contrasting wool a couple of lines too early but, hey, this is only my fourth pair of socks.

I can't wait to see all my fellow Moutons Volantes cyclists crossing the line with their garments in hand, it has been exciting to see what everyone has been knitting and the gusto with which they and all the other riders have approached this project.

Right I do believe it is time for a well deserved glass of something very cold and slightly fizzy...Salut mes amies!