I See a Ship in the Harbor . . .

. . . and I'd like to say that this will be the last time I quote Depeche Mode as it relates to this sweater, but it's fairly likely that it will happen again. I am not particularly a fan of Depeche Mode, and I can't remember why I called this sweater Blue Monday, but I guess I'm stuck with it now.

I've only posted a couple of times about this sweater, and really there isn't a lot to say other than "I'm still knitting the body." Although I guess that there is news, in that I have reached the waist decreases! It's really cool the way the waist nips in and brings the slipped stitches closer together on each side. I don't have a particularly well-defined waist (and that's being generous), so I am a little concerned that it will pull in too much. I may omit the last set of decreases, once I get there. Right now, I've knit about 7 1/2 inches of the body, which includes an extra inch or so of additional length. Even though I've been carrying around two balls of yarn so that I can alternate skeins, it's been an easy project to travel with. I knit quite a bit in Virginia in July (before leaving it behind at my brother's house), and knit for 3 or 4 hours yesterday while flying back from Boston. I've loaded the pattern on my iPad, and at this point I only have to look at it every eleven rows when it's time to decrease. It takes a really long time to knit eleven rows, I can assure you. The pattern is also simple enough that I was able to read on my iPad while knitting on the plane, which is key on a six hour flight. I should have been working on Chevron Mittens, but I can't manage a chart and a book at the same time!

I really like that there is no visible striping with this yarn (Dream in Color Classy)--I can still sort of see the skein changes on my Black Diamond sweater, but the blue skeins seem to be more consistent. The color is very rich--I got a nice shout-out about it from a passing knitter while taking the photo above.

I'm not anticipating having another concentrated block of time to knit any time soon, maybe even less time to blog. Maybe I'll see you in November?

Two Toe Tuesday: I Like the Cashmere

My plan to get cracking on some older projects seems to be paying off (at least a little)--I finished a pair of socks this past weekend for the first time in ages. This is a pair of socks that I started in March 2009 (the blue birthday duckies), and there's no legitimate excuse for them taking so long. The first sock was done pretty quickly, and based on my Ravelry project notes, I was stalled at the heel of the 2nd sock from June 2009 to September 2010, because I lost the pattern. Which is stored as a PDF in my Ravelry account, and was free to begin with. Not acceptable.

The pattern is Duckies (Rav Link) by Samantha Hayes, and the yarn is The YoYo CashSport String, a delicious wool/cashmere blend that I got at the Loopy Ewe. It's sport weight yarn, and the socks are not particularly tall, so 19 months is a long time to knit these puppies. They may be a little short for my feet (maybe o.k. after blocking), but there was no way I was going to rip out the toes and go longer. They may be my special birthday socks, but I'd rather give them away than re-knit at this point! This pattern knit up very nicely, and I ran the eyelets all the way down the heel flap rather than leaving them plain rib--the lacy heel will look good with open backed clogs, I think. Since the yarn is sport-weight, they are little on the thick side, but my clogs are a little stretched out so it shouldn't be a problem.

Part of my "get-cracking" strategy has been to work on long standing projects a little bit at a time, and to keep better track of what I've been working on so that I don't set any one project aside for too long. It's only been a couple of weeks now, but it seems to be keeping me on track a little bit better. I keep thinking that I'm now only working on small things (these socks and a couple of other pair, chevron mittens), but I am still squeezing in some time on one of my sweaters in progress. Right now, I don't really have enough time to spend on ANY of the projects, large or small, so we'll see how it goes. Yesterday, I worked a little on the second Appliance Mitten, while I have the needles free from Chevron #3, so my goal is to wrap those up in the next week or so before casting on Chevron #3, #2. While working on whatever else I feel like, a little bit at a time, too. Whew.