Two Toe Tuesday: Hawk Monkey Edition

When I jumped into the Ravelry January Sockdown KAL, I admit that my plans were a little ambitious--two pair of socks, one of which was the Mystery Sock. The mystery sock is still in the works, but I do still like the pattern and I plan to finish them. Although I fell short of finishing both, these Monkeys squeaked in before the deadline. I'd really like to do another pair of these soon, possibly at a tighter gauge and in a yarn that is a little less busy. Don't get me wrong, I love the yarn (Hazel Knits Hometown Football Team) and the way the socks turned out, but I'm not always trying to show my Seahawks spirit. As a matter of fact, it will be quite some time before I think about football again, now that baseball season is less than a month away.



One interesting thing to note about the Monkey socks is that when I first posted about mine two months ago, there were 2,300 finished and 3,200 total Monkeys on Ravelry. Earlier this past weekend, there were about 3,100 finished and 4,100 total on Ravelry. That means that 1,600 Monkeys have been finished in the last two months--amazing. I know exactly how dorky this sounds, but wouldn't it be cool to see some sort of popularity growth curve for projects over time? Wouldn't it?

Someone's Rattling on My Monkey Cage All Day

First off, let me just say that I do realize that I've included the word "Monkey" in the title of three out of the last four blog posts, using lyrics from three different songs. It's a little weird, but it's just coincidence that I've been working on projects called or for monkeys in the last several weeks.

So the Seahawks lost pretty spectacularly to Green Bay yesterday, it was a very sloppy game played on an even sloppier field. However, I'd like the record to show that my plan was never to have these finished to wear during the game, and I did (as planned) work on them during the game. Today, I kitchenered up the toe, so sock #1 is done. I'd still like to finish sock #2 for the Ravelry January Sockdown, but I may take a break for now--the deadline isn't until the end of February, and it's a pretty quick knit, so there's time.

The Monkey pattern is surprisingly easy to memorize, I understand now why it's so popular. I kind of wish that I'd used smaller needles (tiny stitches always look better), but this sock fits me fine and they aren't really meant to be everyday, hard-wearing socks. I love the yarn, the colors are perfect and it's very nice to work with. Once I saw the stripes on the stockinette foot, I was a little sorry that I'd broken them up with the Monkey pattern.

See? Don't they look nice? Maybe I shouldn't wait to cast on sock #2 . . .

Darling, Don't You Monkey With the Monkey

I started the second new project of 2008 today, the Hawk Sawks. The pattern is (obviously, to anyone who has ever read any knitting blog) Monkey by Cookie A. There are about 3,200 Monkey's on Ravelry, and almost 2,300 of those are finished. This is an extremely popular pattern, and I've been thinking about making a pair for a long time. I actually cast on a pair of Monkeys (with a picot edge, ala january one's version) last summer, but my gauge was all off and I didn't go back to them.

I bought this yarn a few months ago (it's Hazel Knits Artisan Sock, in the Hometeam Football colorway) intending to knit some Seahawks socks, but the other million projects I've been working on got in the way. I started them today because I wanted a game-appropriate project to work on during the Seahawks' first round playoff game against the Redskins. I was a little worried when the Seahawks lost their 13-0 lead that these were bad luck socks, and I'd have to rip them out (blog entry title: This Monkey's Gone to Heaven), but the Hawks came back and I kept knitting. At first, I wasn't convinced that I like the heavily patterned lace/cable stitches with the contrasty yarn, but I'm coming around to it. If these were not team-themed socks, I wouldn't combine this yarn and pattern, but it's o.k. for football socks to be a little loud. Go Hawks!

A bonus is that Cookie A. patterns are one of the January challenge themes for the Ravelry Sock Knitters Anonymous group. This is the first challenge I've joined, and both of the new projects I started this week qualify--the other project is the Mystery Sock. I'm about 30% through the first clue, and so far I like them. I'm not sure I'll finish Clue 1 before Clue 2 is released on Monday, but I'll post progress photos once I get a little further.