whirlpool!

Behold the finished Whirlpool Socks!



I'm very pleased with them.



I'm also rather pleased that I got them finished during Socktober!

(In other news, I have been Slacking Horribly on the Pernicious Scarf. I really need to get my act together there, or it'll have to be a birthday present, and my brother isn't going to need an Epic Poetry Scarf in May.)

Pernicious bloodsucker of sleeping men!

You tell 'em, Warwick!



My scarf is definitely pernicious, though not yet a bloodsucker. If it doesn't straighten up with blocking, I'll totally weep and wail and chew the scenery in a way that would do Shakespeare proud.

some soul of goodness

I wish I could remember more than the most obvious bits of Henry V, but I don't. Alas! Anyway, I'm quite enjoying it, and I've got quite a bit of the Disco Scarf done today as a result. I'm gonna try adding purple tomorrow! I hope I like it. On the other hand, if I don't like it, then I have purple yarn that I can make into something else, so really, I win either way.

In other news, I also spent a bit of today dismantling my Favorite Sweater Ever. In case you're wondering what would possess me to do such a mad thing, let me tell you that it was a good ten years old--probably more like twelve--and had holes worn in the elbows. I was never really going to wear it again as it was, and it deserves a new incarnation, though I don't know what that'll be. I think there should be enough to make a sweater of some kind, or a medium-sized shawl, because it was an oversized cabled sweater in its first life. Oh, Favorite Sweater. We had some good, warm times together, didn't we? Now we can have some more!

I'm going to be so sad when I'm done with Henry V! I've really grown fond of David Gwillim, silly haircuts and all. His Henry tends to be a bit understated, but he can get all riled up when he needs to. It's very effective. I liked his Crispin's Day speech a lot. I hope I like Henry VI even half as much.

MIA

Great, my smallish yarn needle has run off somewhere, and my ginormous one Will Not Do for sewing in glove-finger ends. Or sock ends, for that matter. And when I get around to sewing in Richard III ends, it won't do for that, either.

Grr. The worst part is that I cleaned my crafty area only recently, and didn't see Mr Needle. It could be anywhere! I guess what I should do now is go check the ads in the paper and see if either JoAnn's or Michaels' is having a sale on notion-y type things.

And in actual knitting news, I have finished the first Charybdis sock AND the first Exploded Rainbow Glove. Omg, that yarn is so ridiculous. I think my cousin will love them.

I guess I'd better go knit some Richard now, and finish up Henry IV.

if I were as tedious as a king, I would bestow it all upon you.

In case you're wondering what I've been up to:

Here's the very tippy toe of my mama's Christmas sock.



I've actually got this one nearly finished. I just have to do the ribbing at the cuff, and ding ding ding, I will have finished my first ever toe-up sock! This is also one of the few items I've ever made in variegated yarn where the colors and the pattern really work well together. There's sort of an Asian whirlpool feel to it. Very elegant. Am hoping to get the next one done this month, and then I can have a pair of Socktoberfest socks! I love the idea of Socktoberfest, I've just never been sock-ready in October before.

And here is one of the Exploded Rainbow Gloves. This guy is almost finished, too. I'll probably put fingers on it tomorrow. I had a bit of a crisis during my show this evening when I'd knit up to where the fingers should be, and I didn't feel like doing fingers in the semi-dark where I'd be interrupted so row counting would be completely inaccurate. If I do the fingers tomorrow morning, I can cast on the next glove and do the cuff during the show. Sensible, huh?



I took today off from the Disco Scarf. I wish it wasn't such a slog, because I still love the idea, and I think it's going to look quite nice. It's just a great big pain in the tush. AND my library doesn't have the BBC Henry V, so I'm gonna have to wait for it to get to me from another library. I've grown rather attached to those actors, and the soap-opera/miniseries feel of watching everything the same, so I don't want to hop over to Olivier or Branagh for Henry V and then hop back to the BBC for Henry VI.

I need more hands!

Ok. The Disco Scarf is waddling along very slowly. I am, however, educating myself whilst I knit it, by watching the BBC 80's versions of Shakespeare's history plays. I was going to just watch Richard III, for obvious reasons, but then I was at the library and I decided to start with Richard II . . . well, it's a damn long scarf. I'll probably be able to watch most of the comedies and tragedies, too. So far I find Falstaff all kinds of tedious, and Jon Finch quite hot.

As for other stuff: I've always thought the cowl was an odd and useless concept, but now it's got cold and I don't have many decent turtlenecks to my name. So I shall probably be knitting myself a cowl, so as to have a sort of portable turtleneck. I've got plenty of yarn. It'll be very economical.

There are also several babies and toddlers I know who could use nifty hats for the winter. Aiee! More hands, please.

sucking it up.

So I went out yesterday and bought me a 16-inch size two. (I now have an epic collection of size 2 circular needles, when what I really need is a size 3. Anyway.) The purchase was a sensible one: the process is going along much better when I don't have to struggle with all the flopping needle ends, and there's much less puckering. So yay! $14.50 well spent.

Since the Disco Scarf is not particularly portable, and I'm nearly finished with the gloves I intend to barter to my brother, I've started yet another pair of gloves. I have some ridiculously bright and colorful Trekking left over from a pair of socks, so I've decided to make a Christmas present for a certain cousin of mine who tends to dress, as I do, like a rainbow exploded in her closet. Hopefully this will not cause a riot amongst my other cousins. (If I knit gifts for all of my cousins, and say, did two per Christmas, it would take me close to twenty years. Sorry, cousins.)

The next thing I want to start is my mama's Christmas socks, because they will also be portable. I bought some variegated yarn on purpose this time, because I just want to do something simple, since the Disco Scarf is still a struggle. Of course, I can always make her something more complicated later, if the Disco Scarf really takes off. I've found two patterns I like for the sock yarn, but they're both toe-up, and I don't really have much patience with toe-up. The toe part makes me cranky, and then there's nothing to look forward to at the end except miles and miles of cuff. But I do like the patterns, so we'll see.

And eventually we will see pictures. There's not even an inch of the Disco Scarf yet, so it's not quite worth taking a picture.