Supersaturated

The blue ribbed socks are done. There were some leftovers, plus I have a whole other ball of this yarn. There may be more blue sockiness in my future.

I've resurrected a WIP sock from last year.
The pattern is pretty, but also a royal pain on magic loop (and I'd imagine it's the same on double points too, only more so since there are even more joins). I simply could not abide moving stitches across the join. To be honest, I'd have to say I don't like joins at all; having to move stitches over them just makes them even more offensive to my love of continuous knitting. You mean I have to stop know? ICK! What a pain! Since I've fallen in love with the awesome little 9" Hiya Hiya circular needles, I started thinking about returning to these socks. I love the color and feel of the yarn, and I think the subtle variegation looks very nice in this pattern. So I changed needles and so far so good.

Since I have no other WIPs languishing in closets all over the house, and really have nothing else to do (*snort*), I started another sock.
This pattern is Thuja in a cotton/acrylic/nylon blend called Saucon Sock. It was in the Seasocks '08 goodie bag. No surprise from the contents, its a bit dry on the hands. It knits up nicely enough though, but green always looks good to me!

There you have it, I'm drowning in socks. So what did I go and do? Buy sock yarn, of course. In my defense, this is no run of the mill ho hum fingering weight. I finally, after many, many tries, managed to get my hands on Wollmeise:
Even in bad lighting, it's lovely. No wonder this stuff flies off those virtual shelves. Now if you'll pardon me, I'm off to knit on three socks and gaze adoringly at my new yarn.

In Concert

Well, now I can say I sang with Aretha Franklin at the Kennedy Center. We sang Precious Memories and Old Landmark with her. The highlight for me was being on stage when she sang Chain of Fools. The tech people had the Concert Hall chandeliers blinking on and off in time with the music. It was hilarious! I wonder why they don' t do that at the Messiah Sing-a-Long???

There was a lot of downtime between the choir call time (10am) and the 6pm concert, even with rehearsals in between. So there was knitting...
There was also much cramming of lyrics. Old Landmark is a bear. I've learned stuff in Russian that was easier to remember than this.

Family Night

We got together to see Ken Burns at Sixth & I Synagogue.
There seems to be a giant menorah growing out of his head, but he bore it well enough. He spoke for a while and showed excerpts from his documentaries that dealt with race in America. My favorite shot was a quick little black and white clip of a French market (it was a segment on Miles Davis in Europe). For a few brief seconds, you see a stall with a sign that says "laines a tricoter." If you looks close, you can see fuzzy little yarn balls in silhouette. I guess there was a knitter in the editing booth. We really are everywhere, muhahahaha!

New Things

I started a sock. It would be farther along, but I misjudged the gauge difference between the 1x1 rib cuff and the plain stocking heel turn and foot. A whole lot of ripping out ensued.

I also changed my blogger template yesterday. I'm having fun talking to myself on Twitter. Yup, I'm that self-absorbed.

Finished Business

I finished the stripy knee highs and took them skating.The fit's not great. The cuff needs to be tighter, maybe with fewer sts cast on or knit with a smaller needle, or maybe both. The decreases for the calf shaping started about an inch too early. I'll keep these changes in mind for the next time I decide to make crazy long socks. But I love these socks, warts and all. I wish I could say they magically improved my skating. Alas, that was asking too much. They did keep my feet warm though.

I also finished the green no purl monkeys. Finally.
I started these back in November. They did seem to take forever. They had a few things going against them.

1. They're in a fresh, springy colorway, which I'm not usually in the mood for in the colder months.
2. The colors were way more muted than I was hoping for, which did nothing for the lace pattern at all. I was a little disappointed. Of course, towards the end of the project, the colors intensified, and the greater contrast made that pretty monkey lacework pop nicely. Then I was a little pissed. But only a little, since they're just socks after all. See how much better the lace in the bottom half of the sock in the foreground looks? *Sigh*
3. Oh, did I mention I was knitting some really enormously long socks?