Some Knitting Going On!

I do have some knitting happening! I started new projects for our trip, and things are going smoothly. I'm still working on the Green Mystery Project for my mom, but I'm concerned about length vs yarn supply. Getting the dark cloud that was a bathing suit coverup off my Singer 327, and then making my mom's shawl has restored my machine knitting mojo. I don't often show pictures of WIP, but I don't have much finished, LOL.

Last year at the Spinrite sale, I bought a 'tangled' skein of what I thought was Bernat Baby Soft, a DK yarn. It's shinier than the other Baby Soft that I have used. I thought it might be Bernat Satin, but it doesn't match the colourways. It does match one for Baby Soft though. It took me an hour or two to wind it up. Not bad work for $3 or whatever.

Inspired by the great shawl, I swatched some punchcard designs. Variegated Bernat yarns are notorious for creating their own patterns as you knit, which can be neat if the item has no shaping, and you're very careful about how you join the next ball of yarn. This time, I had a huge ball (and some smaller ones; there were a few knots I cut out) so I wasn't worried about that. I sort of liked the pattern, but felt that the yarn was a bit much for the Singer 327 when doing tuck, and the tuck sort of blurs the pattern.

I decided to use a 'real' machine knitting pattern (although I'm substituting yarn, LOL), and whipped up a blanket on the LK150 in oh, an hour! I'm working on the edging right now.

I bought some Trekking XXL last year....I blogged about it back then. I decided to finally use it, as I wanted a brainless project. I started them toe up, 64st on 2.5mm. But after a little while, I wasn't enjoying them too much. The yarn felt like twine. They were TOO mindless. LOL. I decided to make them up on the Singer 327. The first attempt was too large, the second one I thought was perfect, but maybe a touch too long. I thought they might shrink a little in the wash, even though my online MK friends said they wouldn't. I handknit the ribbing.

After washing, they did get nice and soft. However, after wearing them a few times, the foot is definitely too long. And, I noticed that the ribbing of one sock is slightly less than the other! So, I can ripped them out and re-knit them on the machine quickly, now that I have the numbers worked out....or I can reknit them by hand now that the yarn is soft and I have no other brainless project on the go! LOL. What do YOU vote for?

And finally. The STR saga continues. I cast on for Eunny Jang's Entrelac Socks. I used the needles I had been using before, which are bigger than the pattern calls for. The pattern calls for 72 sts. Now, I KNEW that 72 sts on my needles would be too big. So I increased to 66 because I knew I needed a multiple of 6 for the entrelac. But then I started thinking (because I don't do it continually) about the split for the shortrow heel. Wouldn't I need an even number of blocks top and bottom? 66/6=11; 11/2=headache. So I increased a few more sts, found a 2mm circular in my bag that I had just bought at Spinrite (I was working on these while on our recent trip), and got going on the entrelac. It's going along pretty well, although I don't know whether to slip the first st, or knit it, of each block.

But as the sock grew...guess what I saw? Pooling!!! The colours have very short runs...maybe 10sts each, so there's no way to get each block having it's own colour. Nor would it be a gradual shift of colour up the sock, like those people using Noro's sock yarn. But what has happened is that there is a diagonal pattern going on, almost obscuring the back-and-forth of the basket weave. Totally weird in a good way, LOL. I'm NOT ripping these out. I think there's enough happening between the entrelac and the pooling that I will still be happy!