Advent Socks

This is the second year that I chose to knit the Advent socks. You knit one stripe/day during Advent. There is enough yarn for a second pair of socks. This is the perfect Advent required knitting, as it only takes a few minutes each day, and at the end you have a pair of socks to keep or gift. I chose a white accent color for the cuffs, heels and toes.

And, I did not peek until December 1st.

In my previous posts I documented the progress, along with opening my other Advent boxes. Here is the finished pair of socks, I knit 2 at a time (with DPN’s). I used an afterthought heel with a gusset. Need to modify my gusset a bit on the next pair.

And here is the comparison to last years socks, which I gifted to my husband for Christmas last year. This years socks are sitting in the to-be-gifted pile.

This year feels like much brighter colors, although you can see some of the same colors in both socks.

Looking forward already to next year! And I still have the yarn for 2 additional pairs of socks.

#TheCozyKnitterAdvent

#24-StripeAdventSkein

Lost Sock

I started knitting these socks for my SIL last week. He has large feet, so they were a lot of knitting on the foot. We went away for the weekend and I took the newly started second pair to work on. While knitting in the car, I quickly realized that I had forgotten the first sock to match. No matter, as I had the pattern and color changes easily memorized, so I started knitting the second pair. When we got home, I looked and looked for the first sock. Even my husband helped, but it was nowhere to be found. I knew that it was in the house somewhere. This befuddled me, and I had a restless sleep over a lost sock, but kept knitting away on the second.

I have plenty of orphan socks from the washing machine, but this was a first to lose one of the socks as I was knitting up the pair. I normally keep them together in the same knitting bag.

I finally resorted to my friend Becky’s all-time cure for finding lost objects. Say the following while turning around 3 times.

“Tony, Tony turn around I’ve lost the sock and it cant be found.”

I had to text Becky to say that it wasn’t working, and with her review while I was sitting in bed, low and behold there was the sock. Sitting amongst the patterned cover on my husband’s side of the bed. He had been sleeping beneath it for the past 2 nights! Luckily neither he nor the cats were stabbed by the darning needle that was still hooked in the toe.

It was like a “Where’s Waldo event. This made me so happy.

This is the 4th of my #BackyardChicken socks from #HueLoco. There is still a bag more of roosters and hens to come. The yarn is the Swedish Flower Hen. There were lots of photos, but I thought this looked the closest to how she dyed the yarn.

It is knitting up a little pinker than I had thought it would. I am trying to knit each of these Chicken socks a little differently. I opted for cuff stripes and alternating toe colors. Here is my progress thus far.

I am alternating the purple adn green stripes from sock to sock. The toes will also be alternate colors. Should have them finished in plenty of time for Christmas.

#HueLocoBackyardChicken

Counting up, 1/2 way there

I have now finished through Day 12 of the Advent box, yarn sets and striped sock yarn, I want to find a pattern for the Advent mini-skeins. School is winding down, and I think that I will have time now to start one of the Advent mini-skeins. the Hue Loco one is calling me. My afternoon is searching for that perfect pattern.

Day 9

Day 10

These were Alpaca socks that I bought at the Michigan Fiber Fest last summer. Will be very cozy for the winter.

Day 11

Koigu skein of yarn, pretty Christmas colors. Destined to become a pair of fingerless mitts.

Day 12

I have not finished the 12th Advent stripe on the socks. Normally I knit top down socks, and have my lengths down to a science. Starting at the toe is not my go-to and I am not sure where exactly to put the salvage yarn to do the after-thought heel. I am thinking mid-point of the day 11 stripe. Still muddling this over. And the Herman the German roasted almonds are one of my favorite treats!

#HueLocoAdvent

#MoonglowYarnsAdvent

#TheCozyKnitterAdvent

#24-StripeAdventSkein

Chicken #1

I finally decided to start knitting my chicken (rooster) yarns. The first one that I chose was Blue Splash Wheaton Rooster

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The yarn has so much variegation to it, that the sock pattern wanted to be fairly simple.

I chose just a simple 1×1 rib with a cable running down each side.

They came out so pretty. Saving for Christmas gift.

The contrasting heels and toes are a nice accent.

I really like this yarn and the colors. There is enough left for a pair of short socks.

Trying to stay away from the website!

#hueloco

#barnyardchicken

Butterflies

I finished these socks using yarn from MoonGlow Yarn Co.

I really struggled with a simple motif to put on the socks until I landed on the butterfly pattern. I had a bit of white MoonGlow yarn left from my previous socks.

Really happy how these turned out.

And now I am finishing working on the Chicken socks.

This past week someone decided to “gift” me with 2 boxes of yarn. No name, no note, no text or email. The yarn was a box of small remnants and a second box with more salvagable yarns (for someone), and a 1/2 finished narrow garter stitch scarf. Many not natural yarns. So this meant that I had to take an hour out of my time to throw most of it away and deliver the remainder to a resale shop. Took about an hour of time total that I don’t really have right now. It was not a pleasant surprise to see on my steps. I guess someone thinks that I would be happy with any yarn. They have obviously not seen my stash!

#moonglowyarnco

My Chickens

I have always wanted backyard chickens. I had been waiting for years until the roof got replaced, new fence put in and other things. I had even been planning a really cool Bungalow chicken coop. Now, with a full-time job, I am too busy and the occasional travels make taking care of them so much harder.

So, Hue Loco had these amazing sock sets modeled after Chickens and Roosters. You can see some of the current ones here. I really blame my S’nB buddies Mimi and Andrea for introducing me to these sets. And, I started ordering a couple of years ago. They were so pretty and I just admired them in my knitting room. Now is the time to fess up:

This is enough, and I need to start knitting them up. Next, after assessing the stock, was to choose which ones to start with. I narrowed it down to these 4.

and chose:

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I think that she did a wonderful job of capturing the essence of this lovely rooster.

The socks are knitting up beautifully. I am doing a 64 st sock, tubular cast-on with the first 12 rows in twisted 1×1 rib accent color. Then I increased 1 st each front side to allow for a 3×3 cable crossed in opposite directions, keeping the twisted rib. I will do the heel in the orange and the toes in the purple again. Depending on the yardage that I have, I may reverse the accent colors on the second sock.

And I need to stay away from the Hue Loco website!

#HueLoco

Sweetheart Part II

I had yarn left over from the Sweetheart socks that I posted in April. Was it really that long ago that I posted?! School got super busy, as I needed to cover a couple of additional classes the later part of the semester. Then summer came, with summer came Architecture Camp, and then vacation with my son and family visiting. Hard to believe that most of my summer is gone. I intend to make the best of the remaining few weeks, which includes catching my blog up.

While I have not had a ton of time for knitting and weaving, and absolutely none for spinning, I did finally finish these socks. The reason that it took so long was all the ends. It was a bit overwhelming, and I just worked on them when I had spare time with lots of light. Finished them up on Saturday when my knitting group met here in my garage.

I opted to make the toes striped and used reverse stockinette stitch. I thought that the inside of the socks was as beautiful as the right side, and wanted to embrace that.

Here are the original socks from the kit. Happy that i was able to get 2 pairs out of this. I measuredd to use every last inch of the colored yarn.

Now I have another yarn package from Moonglow that I am working on. Debating how to add the pink accent color into this.

#Sweetheartsockalong

#Moonglowyarns

Sweetheart Socks

I finished my Sweetheart socks, and could not be more pleased with them. They are so fun and playful. I have not decided yet if I will keep these or not.

I reversed the color sequence to make them a bit more interesting.

There were a lot of ends to weave in! When doing the heart section, I had woven them in as i knit, but it still required some more fastening.

And, there is enough yarn left for some anklet socks. I think that I like the rainbow in this sock using less rows better.

#moonglowyarns

#sweetheartsockalong

Sweetheart Socks

I have been working away on my Sweetheart Socks, but did not finish in February. I used size 1 needles, and 64 stitches. The socks looked beautiful and I love the heart pattern that I designed. I started with small hearts, but they just didn’t look quite right.

I enlarged the hearts and worked with a 16 stitch repeat. One heart open and one solid. On the solid heart, I added an extra row with the open center stitch.

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I knit one entire sock with size 1 needles for the colorwork, top sock. It looked too tight and did not fit well when I put them on. Before ripping that one out, I knit the second sock using a size 2 needle for the colorwork section, bottom sock. I think that it turned out much better.

I adore these colors, and the feet with have solid bands of each color. This has been a fun knit, wish that I had more time for them. I will finish soon.

#moonglowyarns

#sweetheartsockalong

Sweetheart Sock-Along

When I first saw this yarn on Instagram I was smitten and knew that I had to order it.

Moonglow Sweetheart Yarn

This was inspired by Sweetheart candies from Valentines Day. I love Valentine’s Day and the sweet hearts also.

The first option was to line up the project bag, and any accessories and share on Social Media. They have also released a pattern designed for this yarn, which I will talk about in a later post.

Where did I get that lovely bag you ask? It was one of a Christmas gift from my Administrative Assistant at school. This was the larger of the 2, and I love it. A perfect size for this project also. Isn’t it adorable. She knew that I loved cats, what knitter doesn’t.

Yarn is now all wwound up and I have started knitting and designing.

Moonglow yarn, new project bag, Signature needles, Knitz double point needle holder, Marker and beautiful scissors from Twice Sheared Sheep Advent Calendar.

@MoonglowYarn

@SweetheartSockAlong