FO: No Purl Monkeys

Posted on September 2, 2014 by Rayna

Sometimes, the mood takes me, and I knit. A lot. And I can finish a pair of socks in a very short amount of time. This was one of those times!

I started these socks for the indigodragonwedding…Kim and Ron of indigodragonfly got married last September and the wedding invite specifically said, “Knitting encouraged!” So I located a long-stashed skein of MCN Sock (later rebranded as Mergoat Sock) and cast these on, two cuffs on two needles, and off I went.

I knit exactly one 11-row repeat and laid the project down…to this day, I have no idea why. And while winter and spring came and went, these barely-partly knit socks sat and sat.

A few weeks ago, the spirit moved me to haul them out of my WIP tote bag and start them up again. I have said it before and I will say it again; I don’t know what it is about this pattern but it practically knits itself. I completed the first leg on a Sunday afternoon, and the entire pair in under three weeks. If that’s not a record for me, it’s darned close.

The colourway is named for a Buffy the Vampire Slayer character named Cordelia – the quote was one of many snarky ones for which Cordy was famous. It’s wonderfully variegated with several different purples running through it.

“Don’t You Have An Elsewhere To Be?”

One more pair to add to the pile for when autumn starts in earnest in a few weeks!

Pattern: No Purl Monkeys

Yarn: indigodragonfly Mergoat Sock in “Don’t You Have An Elsewhere To Be?”

Who Was It Made For? Me

Were There Changes Made To The Pattern? I don’t think so, but I knit them from memory so it’s possible.

Did I Learn Anything New? No

Anything Else? Not that I recall.

Would I Make Another?: I am sure I will…what can I say? I am a creature of habit.

So much going on…

Posted on August 26, 2014 by Rayna

And so little I can really show or write about 🙂

I have a freebie sock design completed, photographed and laid out, and being test knit as we speak. A second design has been drafted and test knitters are all lined up! A few more designs are spinning about in my head and will have to wait just a little longer.

While all this is ongoing, most regular knitting has been suspended with the exception of my indigodragonfly No Purl Monkeys. These things really just knit themselves!

Sock 1 complete!

I am actually ready to start the heel flap on Sock #2 and plan to have these done soon so they will be ready for when the weather turns. Until today’s 30 degree high, there are many that might have argued that had already happened, but I digress.

I have also done little to no spinning. That has to be remedied soon so as not to lose the consistency I have gained. Plus I really miss the soothing, zen feeling that it brings.

What have you been doing now that autumn is just around the corner?

The Quest to Finish…Something

Posted on August 11, 2014 by Rayna

A few weeks ago I looked at my list of projects that I have cast on in the last *mumblety-mumble* months and found the number to be more than a bit jarring. I seem to have “knitting ADD” lately…the minute something new and pretty comes along, I am off and my lovely WIPs are left languishing. Right now, OTN, I have a collection of three fingering weight scarves…one of which has the distinction (?) of being my oldest WIP…cast on in January of last year. There is my Colour Affection, which for some reason I never really got into, and another shawlette I was super excited about (love the pattern, adore the OOAK Tanis Fiber Arts yarn) and just put it down last fall, never to resume. On and on it goes.

Shockingly, I only have two pairs of socks on needles, one of which is on 2mm needles and I think it intimidates me somewhat….again, a pattern I adored (Margaritaville by Adrienne Fong) but it has a 72-stitch cast on, ergo the small needles. (I have little-ish feet).

The second pair is a pair of No Purl Monkeys in indigodragonfly MCN Sock (since renamed to Mergoat Sock) in “Don’t You Have An Elsewhere To Be”. I cast these on last fall for the wedding of the indigodragonfly couple, Kim and Ron. (The invitation said knitting was encouraged…I HAD to bring something!) I knit the cuff and a single repeat, then put them down to knit socks for my parents for Christmas, and that, as they say, was all she wrote.

Kim and Ron are hosting their Annual Highlands Fibre Fling this coming weekend and I figured I’d resurrect them to bring as my “sit about and chat” project. I dug them out of my WIP tote yesterday morning and started them up again.

It seems my finish-itis is in better shape than I might have thought. By dinner time last night…the leg was done.

And before I went to work this morning, the heel flap was done, the heel was turned and the gussets stitches were picked up. By the end of the evening, I am hoping to have all the gusset decreases done and be on the foot.

I am suddenly glad this is the first sock so I can have a second one on needles for Saturday.

On a not unrelated note…I wonder if this is the reason why, of twelve WIPs, only two are socks.