I have finished my first pair of travel socks! Here are links to photos:
The pattern is the Crystalline Lattice Socks, although I’m using a different (but similarly-colored) yarn.
They’re pretty socks. I like ’em.
by Tien Chiu
I have finished my first pair of travel socks! Here are links to photos:
The pattern is the Crystalline Lattice Socks, although I’m using a different (but similarly-colored) yarn.
They’re pretty socks. I like ’em.
by Tien Chiu
We’re off to China tomorrow, and I have packed in my suitcase (oh the neuroticism) not one, not two, not three, but FIVE socks’ worth of yarn. I have been through my packing list a couple of times and am pretty confident that I have not forgotten anything a credit card won’t solve, so I’m basically happy. Tomorrow at 6:30pm the Super Shuttle comes to take us away…
Anyway, I have had some quality weaving time, so I spent the first part of today weaving up samples. Here are the first two that I intend to weave, woven up in 5/2 white cotton warp and 16/2 straw-colored linen. (I dyed the linen myself, by the way.)
(Click on the thumbnail for the larger image – the thumbnails really don’t do them justice.)
I took off and wet-finished the samples earlier this evening, and then (shortly before writing this blog post) took a deep breath and started weaving the placemats! This will be my first “real” project on Lady Di, and I want to see how well she works. Thus far I’ve woven one placemat, and am hoping to weave up all six in the first set before having to leave for China.
by Tien Chiu
Right before my vacation, too. Bummer. Oh well. The economy is buzzing along here, and people are hiring, so I’m not too worried – it took me only three weeks to find a new job the last time I looked (which was only four months ago), and I’m hoping my current unemployment will be equally short. Whatever. There’s not much I can do about it right now, since I’m heading off to China in four days, so I’ll deal once I get back. I have a nice cash cushion that, with unemployment, should be enough to take me through six or seven months of unemployment, and I doubt it’ll last that long.
Which comes to the next question: what to do with a month of free time? I am in an enviable position – I have loads and loads of yarn stashed away, so I don’t need to buy anything, and now I’ll have the time to play with it. I rather think I will start by (a) finishing my dye samples and (b) doing (of course) more weaving! I have been reading up on network twills and they sound exciting, plus there are of course the placemats and napkins to finish. I have a handpainted rayon chenille warp to put on, and another silk one.
I also want to do some sewing. After we get back, I’m going to get Mike to measure me (so I can put the numbers into Patternmaster: Celebrations) and then I’m going to try designing my own outfit using their patterns. The champagne silk and red velvet are just dying for attention, and I may dye some of that white fabric for use in outfits. I may design and weave some yardage for outfits, too. Fortunately it doesn’t take much fabric to lay out an off-the-shoulder top, so I won’t have to weave too many yards.
It will also be a good opportunity to get back into the saddle after a month or two off the bike. I imagine it will take some time to get the endurance back, but I have time to devote to it.
I would be lying if I said I were happy about being laid off, but my goodness! there’s so much to do. I think my time will be really productive.
Knitted the first part of my first sock last night (couldn’t sleep very well due to stress – sort of predictable under the circumstances) and am moderately pleased at how it’s coming out. I think I’d have preferred a color-change yarn with longer stretches of color, but it’s what I’ve got right now. We’ll see how it turns out.
by Tien Chiu
So, I spent three hours yesterday looking through the free sock patterns on knittingpatterncentral.com. And printing out bunches of them. (I am not distractable, no indeedy.) Then I spent an hour or so going through my “orphan” balls of yarn. I finally settled on four different sock patterns and four kinds of yarn, which I think will produce a most delightful set of socks. I plan to use wooden needles and smuggle them through airport security if necessary; 5″ bamboo needles are just right for sticking in a pocket, and they don’t show up on metal detectors. (They’re also about as dangerous as a ball-point pen. Stop! Hold it right there or I shall stab you with my pen!) I will probably bring a book as backup, though, and perhaps a kumihimo disk or two. (Not terrified of boredom. Really.)
Some of these “orphan” yarns aren’t stretchy (the silk/cashmere and the 100% handspun silk for one) so I will have to add elastic on the inside, after knitting (thread a thin thread of elastic through the inside part of the ribbing. No problem there.
This will, of course, force me to learn to knit from the top down. I’m a little nervous about that since I’ve always knitted socks from the toe up using my own, highly individual method of knitting socks. (I figured out how to knit them without instructions when I was stranded on a plane with nothing else to do and had forgotten the instructions at home!) But I’m sure I’ll manage.
Now, I just have to knit swatches and see how much I’ll have to adapt the patterns.
by Tien Chiu
So, it’s T minus 5 days to the China trip, and travel panic is starting to set in. Me being me, I am blithely unconcerned about plane tickets, money, passports, whether I’ll have the right clothing, whether I’ll get lost in a foreign city and be totally unable to communicate with local passersby, and so on. Those are but minor details. No, my particular manifestation of motion sickness is: four or five days before I leave, I am guaranteed to go majorly nuts on the subject of what craft(s) to bring.
In practice I know I will wind up taking my knitting, because it’s the most compact method to create absolutely gorgeous finework while on a plane, bus, etc. (I would take cross stitch, but the counted cross stitch kind – which is the only kind that even vaguely interests me – takes too much attention.) But first I have to go to my local fiber arts shop, Carolina Homespun, and spend two hours looking through absolutely everything in the store to confirm that yes, knitting is the best thing to take with me. Nutty but necessary, I guess.
I never worry about anything except what craft to bring. I guess it’s because I’m perpetually terrified of boredom.
Anyway, some of the stuff I’m considering (but will probably not buy) includes kumihimo disks and Weavettes . Not to mention sock patterns – I do have lots and lots of sock yarn, or stuff that could be used as sock yarn, which I could knit up mindlessly.