WIPs and some blathering

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The Vest. "Assembly Required" from Knitter's Winter 2005. I have taken some liberties with yarn, color and gauge. The yarn is homespun Coopsworth from roving acquired at NY Sheep and Wool over two different years. The dark blue are the front sides and the light blue is the back. The front edges / collar will be in the multi-rose or the multi-blue. DH is in favor of the rose, I am in favor of the blue. Any other opinions?


And, socks for the smallest feet in the family. I could really get in to making socks for him -- they go so much faster then socks for any other family member. However, if genes rule then he will wind up with boats like his parents and I will have addicted him to handknit socks.

Check out this Squid hat, link courtesy of Debbie.

And now for the blather ...

I tried. I tried to get the yarn I have decided I need for what is supposed to be the newest pair of Squid Socks. Leaving work with plenty of time to get across town, buy yarn and then get back across town in time to retrieve my eldest from Hebrew school, I was unexpectedly thwarted when the store was closed. Blah.

Instead I retreated to Plan B -- hit the drug store near the yarn store and get my usual Tuesday haul of shelf stable lunch food and some sparkly barrettes for She-who-now-brushes-her-hair. Back across town I flew to find myself twenty minutes early for the retrieval. Into the back of the synagogue I slunk, and while waiting, pulled out the striped sock. Sitting in the row in front of me was another knitter, showing her partially completed blanket to another knitter-parent. I held up my sock and a quick conversation ensued with us sharing our impressions of the local yarn stores. Hebrew School then finished and the Eldest and I headed home. Hey, Knitters are everywhere.

Now to pull out the Vest and make some decisions. I would like to finish it this week and already have a replacement project lined up -- new mittens for the hair-brusher. Her old ones are too thin and the felted ones too thick for everyday wear. I am thinking ... Squid? (O.k., maybe butterflies!)

I am not faithful ...

I always have several works in progress at once and now I can share them with the world. New to the sidebar is a list of these WIPs and hopefully later this week I will figure out how to add pictures. At the very least I will document their "current" state this weekend and share it out.

Today's projects will include the striped socks for the smallest feet in the family and the vest -- for me. The vest has been in the works for years since I first purchased the roving 2 years ago. The socks have only been on the needles for about a week and I am on the second sock.

Squid Socks -- the first pair

These are the socks that started it all.

After I had been knitting for a year or so, I decided to give socks a try. I managed to make a few pair for myself and then decided that I needed to convince my adoring spouse of the Wonders of handknit socks. He agreed to wear what I made IF I could put Squid on them.

At the time I was also playing with mosaic knitting techniques and this is what resulted. The Squid are reveresed because I wanted a bit of a challange on the second sock. The socks were designed on knitters graphpaper with an old-fashioned pencil. (Actually I used a mechanical pencil so we are not really in the dark ages.) The yarn is a superwash worsted which after 3 years is no longer superwash. The pattern is worked in mosaic with short-rows used to keep the bottom of the foot the same length as the top of the foot. The size is (gasp!) a men's 11 1/2.

Why Squid?

A Squid walks in to a bar ... o.k., maybe not. A family ventures out to the Aquarium dragging a small child who does not really want to go. His parents and sister tell him about all of the neat things he will see, to no avail. Finally, one of them says, "We will see Squid." At that, the toddler's eyes light up and he happily hops in to the car.

While at the aquarium, the family sees sea otters and sea lions, sea horses and eels. The toddler insists on finding the squid. After looking in almost all of the cases the toddler proclaims, "There must be Squid around here some place!"

After recovering from a huge attack of giggles, Mom, Dad, Grandma and Big Sis finally locate a tank of small octopi and call them Squid. The toddler is satisfied and the trip is a success.

Since then, Squid have been a huge part of our lives and Daddy has many pair of hand knit Squid socks. (Socks with Squid on them, not socks for Squid.)

In the future, more will appear about the Saga of the Squid in addition to content about knitting and family.

Welcome to Squid Knits!