Making up for lost time

Sorry for keeping quiet for so long. Lots of life going on - but lots of knitting, too!

Pattern: Spearfish Socks by Designedly, Kristi
Yarn: Reclaimed 100% wool yarn from my Red Cross Sock Kit
Needles: Brittany US Size 1, 2.25 mm dpns

I love this pattern. It's well written and comes in three sizes (I made the medium). The only thing I changed was stopping the lace pattern when I finished the gusset rather than continuing it down the foot. A much better use for that yarn than the Red Cross socks languishing in the sock drawer.....

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Marriage Gansey progress report:

Hey, I've completed a full repeat of the heart design! You can now see the open heart, filled heart sequence. I haven't spent as much time on this one this week - see below for the reasons why...

This little lace scarf started out as a different lace scarf ..... It was very pretty, but I could see me taking months to finish it. I had to sit and look at the chart for practically every stitch (and I had to make the chart myself since the designer gave line by line directions only). As this is intended as a Christmas gift, I ripped it out and started a much simpler garter stitch feather and fan design.

It's already much further along than the original, so I feel I've got a chance of completing it on time. This is with some of that yummy 100% cashmere laceweight I bought recently.... I think I'll write this one up and post it on the blog, in case anyone else wants to try it. Since it's garter stitch it looks good on both sides (a plus with a scarf).

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More gift knitting! These are the Country Socks in Nancy Bush's Folk Socks. Another nice and relatively easy knit. There's an easy four round repeat of the pattern and the calf shaping wasn't too hard to keep on track.

I started these on my new Celtic Swan Forge bronze dpns, but decided I needed to go up a size. When Nancy calls for a size one she usually means a 2.50mm rather than the 2.25mm that most of my size ones are. So I changed to my Brittany Size 1 1/2s and I'm much happier.

Note the dark color? Remember my recent ranting about using dark sock yarn and my vow not to? This is stash yarn that I purchased well before that rant and it's too nice to let it go to waste. It's Knit Picks Essentials in Pine. Since the pattern is fairly simple I'm not having too many problems with seeing - it's mostly knitting by touch...

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Oh - about those Celtic Swan dpns? They're beautiful. A bit heavier than I'm used to - duh - they're bronze not wood; of course they're heavier. Not enough to really bother me.

The swirled design in the center keeps the yarn on the needle, but doesn't interfere with knitting at all.

Any advice? After knitting with them for an hour or so my hands started turning black! I had rather forgotten that bronze has this effect on me; I've got a bronze ring that does the same thing. Beyond keeping a polishing cloth handy, I'm not sure what I can do to keep them from reacting with my skin. It's not just a little black, it's a lot, and I'm worried about soiling my sock yarn.

Sigh. Ok, I'm all caught up now.... see y'all later.