Year of the sock

Anyone know if there IS such a thing in the Chinese calendar? If not, then those among us addicted to hand knit socks need to unite and do something about it!

I'm sure doing my best this year to see to it that family and friends are properly attired in hand knit socks. First up was the Rockin Sock Club from Blue Moon. Then there was the 1st round of Death By Socks, which was a whole lot of fun and has us all waiting patiently (HA!) for round 2 to begin.

Meanwhile, bring on the SockHopSwap and Sock Madness (Pics here) just to keep the fingers nimble and hope to stay out of trouble.

Then what happens...??? Miss Violet just happens to mention on the limenviolet podcast, a year long KAL that she's seriously considering joining... the 52PairPlunge where one commits to a pair a week for the year beginning April1, '07 and ending April 1 '08. I swear that if my family and friends weren't going to wind up the recipients of MOST of those 52 pair, they'd all have ME committed!!

The "icing" on the sock saga came this morning while I was cruising the blogs of fellow KALers and stumbled across Socktopia, (which is another year long KAL that's already started but still open to signups) so naturally I had to sign on for THAT one. THEN I just "happen" to see that Alison is going to be opening signups for sockapalooza 4. What's a gal to do? Oh well, as my knitting bud says... "It'll keep you out of the bars and the bingo parlors!" I don't do either to begin with, so I'm not sure that it applies, but it's all in fun anyway.

Holy COW! Here I thought just thinking about all the above that it was a fair bit of sock knitting, but seeing it all written out... I hope I haven't let my alligator mouth overload my hummingbird backside!

I best get myself off to bed where I hope NOT to have dreams of painting myself blue like Dorie and singing "Just keep knitting, just keep knitting"

Night!

It's Madness I tell ya....

Mad-Tini socks for round 2 of Sock Madness are FINALLY done! I still find the variety achieved just by using different yarns amazing! How about you?

These are Cherry Tree Hill, colorway "Blueberry Hill", magic loop on #2 addi's. Little over 26 hours start to finish with LOTS of interruptions along the way. Thunderstorm, power outage, horses escaping that had to be chased down, caught and returned to their enclosure, sleep, etc.

As if being in the midst of Sock madness and the Knit-off '07 and the SockSwapHop, along with shop samples for the shop and the design projects all aren't enough to keep the needles smokin, I couldn't resist signing up for the 52PairPlunge too! Nothing like letting my alligator mouth overload my hummingbird backside, huh?

Meanwhile, I SHOULD carry my happy little (I use the term loosely!) backside off to bed! Hubby's got us committed to helping a friend move this weekend plus I have 10 shirts here that need the embroidery done on them so they can be shipped on Monday. At least I can keep on knittin while the machines are going!!

Night!

Finishing, starting and more competition

Well, the red mystery project for SWTC out of "Craft" from the Vickie Howell collection is complete, shipped and received so the needles have moved on to their next assignment, which is out of black "Bamboo". While the first was created from a picture off a cell phone, this one is two pictures and combining the elements of each into one whole. LOTS of stitches but oh sooo FUN!!

What else have I finished? Hmmmm, the STR Red Rock Canyon travel sock is done, I made a pair of "Monkey" socks from STWC's TOFUtsies (color #723) and started a pair from SWTC's 1st newsletter. My Rockin Sock Club kit from Blue Moon arrived and I wound that and started that as well.

I was in San DIego on Tuesday to have the gooseneck hitch installed in our truck and spent the afternoon hanging out at Lakeside Knits with Clarese. We knitted, we chatted and we put together some more projects for the shop. I started the Triangle version of the Florence Scarves from Fiddlesticks while we sat and chatted. Not sure what the yarn is, I'll have to ask Clarese. She got quite a bit of new lace weights in and this particular skein was falling apart, so she'd wound it up, and the label wasn't with it. Other projects I came home with stuff for include the Alpine Boots from Fiber Trends, (Look in the what's new section from the menu on the left), and Rosebuds and Climbing Roses from the Lavish Lace book from Cherry Tree Hill and a skein of their laceweight in Wild Cherry to make it out of. I'll probably wind up making another shawl out of that as there's 2400 yards per skein.

Also in the last couple weeks, I made the Uniscarfity scarf from Magknits in the first round of competition in the Knitoff '07 and finished first in group K. Pattern will be posted for round 2 on March 17th (which was my grandmother's birthday!). All we know at this point is that we need approx 170 yards of dk weight.

Last weekend was the "Mad Cow" socks in the Sock Madness competition. LOT of competitors in that one! Had to be one of the 1st 16 to finish in each of 4 divisions to move on to the next round. Start date for round two hasn't been announced for that one. It amazes me to no end to see how different so many socks look just from using different yarns and colors. Check it out on the Flickr group!!! FIVE pages worth of pictures already!!

What OTHER mischief can I get myself into??? Welllll, it appears it isn't all that hard!!! I'd also signed up for the SockHopSwap!! Today's the last day to sign up for that one! IF you're looking for more mischief to get yourself into as well, "hop" on over and join in while the joining's good! gggg

'Til next time.....