Today is the first day of the second half of summer for people in the Northern Hemisphere. It's all shorter days and end of the growing season from here, folks.
[ducks as rotten fruit and verbal abuse get thrown]
Still here? Don't blame me — get angry at the Earth's orbit or move to New Zealand or something. I'm just pointing out the obvious.
The obvious, if you're a knitter, is that all those lovely sweater-weather sweaters you want to wear this fall aren't going to make themselves. So if you want at least one new jacket to wear this fall, you're going to have to find some air conditioning and get started on it now.
That's precisely what I did this morning. I agonised a little (and still am, a little) over finishing some stuff that's been on the needles for an embarrassing amount of time, but in the end I decided to grab some stash and start Sway by Fiona Ellis (it's in her Inspired Fair Isle Knits book). The original is in a lilac grey with pink trim; me being me, I'm making mine in brick red with black trim, and have decided to make some modifications. If I ever get the thing done, I'll be posting photos here. Wish me luck.
The other "September is less than five weeks away" crisis I'm going through is that I started cleaning out my bedroom closet this weekend, and I discovered that moths had eaten five pairs of my hand-knit socks, plus three skeins of sock yarn that I was keeping in the same closet. That explains why, as of Friday night, I had three new pairs of socks on the go and plans for several more. I'm all for tossing stuff I don't want anymore, but I'd like it to be me that decides what goes, not a bunch of stupid fibre-eating insects.
(By the bye, in case you are smugly patting yourself on the back because you only buy cotton and synthetics, I have some bad news for you: I have had moths eat 100% acrylic gloves with plastic palm grips. They are evil vermin right up there with raccoons.)
Two of the socks on the needles are from Cookie A.'s Sock Innovation book. The last one is a free download from Knitty, but by the same designer. I like how this woman thinks. Her suggestions for resizing the patterns are reasonable and treat the reader like a grown-up.
I find my knitting goes through phases. I don't just mean in terms of colour, technique, and output, although that happens too. Right now I'm in high production gear because I need the clothes. I like to wear jacket-y cardigans to work because actual jackets are too uncomfortable when I'm going to be sitting in a cubicle all day. Last winter, though, I wore the left elbow out on no fewer than three cardigans, leaving me with just one that I could wear (I have a bad habit of propping my head up on my left hand when I'm reading, in case you're wondering how I managed that). So it's time for more jackets, even though I also need to get the first draft of my novel done. I have enough stash for [glances around the living room] three more plain coloured ones, plus one or two that are already on the needles. There is one that I bought the pattern for and would like to make in a colour I don't have in stash. Maybe that can be this fall's yarn purchase. Yeah, I know. But hey, it's mostly stash-busting!
And, thanks to the moths, it's also time for more socks, and that can definitely be 100% stash-busting. To be honest, a lot of those socks were near to worn-out anyhow, so the critters just sped up the process a little. Not that I'll be forgiving them any time soon.
[ducks as rotten fruit and verbal abuse get thrown]
Still here? Don't blame me — get angry at the Earth's orbit or move to New Zealand or something. I'm just pointing out the obvious.
The obvious, if you're a knitter, is that all those lovely sweater-weather sweaters you want to wear this fall aren't going to make themselves. So if you want at least one new jacket to wear this fall, you're going to have to find some air conditioning and get started on it now.
That's precisely what I did this morning. I agonised a little (and still am, a little) over finishing some stuff that's been on the needles for an embarrassing amount of time, but in the end I decided to grab some stash and start Sway by Fiona Ellis (it's in her Inspired Fair Isle Knits book). The original is in a lilac grey with pink trim; me being me, I'm making mine in brick red with black trim, and have decided to make some modifications. If I ever get the thing done, I'll be posting photos here. Wish me luck.
The other "September is less than five weeks away" crisis I'm going through is that I started cleaning out my bedroom closet this weekend, and I discovered that moths had eaten five pairs of my hand-knit socks, plus three skeins of sock yarn that I was keeping in the same closet. That explains why, as of Friday night, I had three new pairs of socks on the go and plans for several more. I'm all for tossing stuff I don't want anymore, but I'd like it to be me that decides what goes, not a bunch of stupid fibre-eating insects.
(By the bye, in case you are smugly patting yourself on the back because you only buy cotton and synthetics, I have some bad news for you: I have had moths eat 100% acrylic gloves with plastic palm grips. They are evil vermin right up there with raccoons.)
Two of the socks on the needles are from Cookie A.'s Sock Innovation book. The last one is a free download from Knitty, but by the same designer. I like how this woman thinks. Her suggestions for resizing the patterns are reasonable and treat the reader like a grown-up.
I find my knitting goes through phases. I don't just mean in terms of colour, technique, and output, although that happens too. Right now I'm in high production gear because I need the clothes. I like to wear jacket-y cardigans to work because actual jackets are too uncomfortable when I'm going to be sitting in a cubicle all day. Last winter, though, I wore the left elbow out on no fewer than three cardigans, leaving me with just one that I could wear (I have a bad habit of propping my head up on my left hand when I'm reading, in case you're wondering how I managed that). So it's time for more jackets, even though I also need to get the first draft of my novel done. I have enough stash for [glances around the living room] three more plain coloured ones, plus one or two that are already on the needles. There is one that I bought the pattern for and would like to make in a colour I don't have in stash. Maybe that can be this fall's yarn purchase. Yeah, I know. But hey, it's mostly stash-busting!
And, thanks to the moths, it's also time for more socks, and that can definitely be 100% stash-busting. To be honest, a lot of those socks were near to worn-out anyhow, so the critters just sped up the process a little. Not that I'll be forgiving them any time soon.