Happy Halloween and Dia de los Muertos to all! These are the Blackberry Ridge Pumpkin Patch socks in progress done in the Blackberry Ridge brown worsted yarn and some Nature Spun orange. I added the Boo! and changed the way the feet were done. These socks are now done and I'll be wearing them to make the day more festive.



Thanks to all for commenting on the Sanquhar gloves. I used size 00 dpns instead of the size 000 dpns called for in the pattern simply because I didn't own any size 000 dpns. Yes Lisa there are 33 stitches per finger plus the 9 on the three fingers that have the little gussets at the base. I enjoyed working with the yarn and the pattern and the needles quite a bit but I did find working on them at night was tiring for my eyes. I still have some J&S jumper weight yarn in black and white which I'll use for some Sanquhar socks. DH expressed interest in a pair of Sanquhar gloves for himself but I'm not taking the bait. He already has three pairs of gloves I made him, including some gorgeous Norwegian ones from Knitting in the Nordic Tradition, which he NEVER wears.











Snickerdoodle is planning to disguise himself as a rabbit with upright ears this year for Halloween. He urges everyone to send him raisins for looking so cute.

Sanquhar Gloves

SANQUHAR GLOVES

Here we have the back and the front of the gloves. The one on the left is still wet from blocking because I was in such a hurry to photograph them.



Inside out.



The famous finger gussets - look for the black triangle the needle is pointing to. The gussets are actually salt and pepper/lice but I'm amazed I managed a photo that shows them at all.



And on my hand.




These gloves were done using the Japanese online pattern HERE with a decorative cuff from a Sanquhar pattern from an old issue of Cast On magazine. They were knit in Jamieson & Smith laceweight yarn in size 00 dpns.

I lied about the Sanquhar glove photos being ready today. For some reason they still haven't been processed at Snapfish.Tomorrow maybe? Hope springs eternal.







Here's all I bought at Taos Wool Festival this year - a 20th anniversary commemorative t-shirt with a ram and some of my favorite whiter than white Cormo yarn from Elsa Sheep & Wool.



I completely agree with everything Geane said about the current issue of Interweave Knits. Look in the comments of her October 27 entry. Why would you knit gloves on size 7 dpns? I assume the yarn is worsted or heavier - I think I'd have trouble moving my fingers with such thick gloves. I was really straining to figure out what they were talking about for the design of the one adult colorwork sweater I noticed with the photography. I will keep the Priscilla Gibson-Roberts info on intarsia in the round though.



I started a new pair of gloves that may prove to be my favorite project of the year. I am doing the colorful Peruvian Patterned Gloves from the VK small mittens & glove book with the scalloped gauntlet cuffs. I am using Nature Spun sport weight in the same colors used in the book and am fortunately getting gauge on size 3 dpns. This project is going quite fast although I'm unsure if I will give them away or selfishly keep them for myself.

Tomorrow I'll have lots of photos of the Sanquhar gloves. Sorry about the long wait but Snapfish seems to have slowed down in online photo processing. I may try Ofoto next time.



I'm now into baby projects in Nylamb (my favorite baby yarn and really soft) for my friend who is due in December. I finished the Turkish Infant cap from the Spin-Off book Tops with a Twist and tomorrow I'll start the teeny tiny infant entrelac socks from Zoe Mellors baby bootee book. I'll color coordinate the two projects so they look like they go together. I also know how well Nylamb launders so no problems there.



I just have a few more things to do and then I'm done with my holiday knitting.I'm sending one box of various goodies to a friend and her family and the Koigu cross stitch scarf goes to my mother.



Here are a few more Taos Wool Festival photos - the wool judging in the main tent and La Lana Wools.

I finished the Koigu Cross-Stitch Scarf. Thanks Theresa for recommending this pattern - I know my mom will love it. I ran out of one of the skeins of Koigu so wasn't able to finish three repeats of the pattern as the kit specified but I enjoyed the knitting and it was really nice to have a knitting project that did not require a chart. I decided not to fringe the scarf with just the one color as I like how both colors look together.



The same thing happened with the J&S jumper weight yarn I recently purchased (in skeins, not balls). I only had enough of one color to finish half of the second Paradoxical mitten but I have plenty of the second color. Go figure. I'm so focused on finishing projects it is really quite strange having to wait for more yarn when you're about done.







Here is the San Francisco de Asis church in Ranchos de Taos which some say is the most painted and photographed church in N.M. It was built between 1772 and 1816 and the massive adobe walls are four feet thick and need "re-mudding" annually by the descendants of the original builders. Georgia O' Keefe and Ansel Adams made this simple church famous. Services are still conducted but it is open to visitors. If you can manage a tour you can also see the Mystery Painting inside the rectory.







They use sheepskins to smooth down the finishing coat of sand and water on all outside surfaces of the church when they do the annual re-mudding. I tried to show the actual straw used in the adobe in this photo of DH. If you want to see some terrific photos of this church in all different lights which include the often photographed buttresses on the back exterior, go HERE.

What are your favorite knitting needles? My hands-down favorite double pointed needles are the French RCN (Rhodo-Crystal Nacre) needles which are exactly the same as Pony Pearls except the tips are much pointier. I had the foresight to buy a lot of RCNs about 10 years ago from Patternworks.



I finished the Halloween socks using Pony Pearls and their bluntness is just downright annoying. I also really liked the Balenes dpns (simulated whale bone I guess) which are now impossible to find. They do break easily which is why I only have a few half sets but had the best needle tips I've ever used.



I don't actually have a favorite circular needle. My first choice is to use needles from my Denise Needlemaster set but they only go down to size 5. I started on the Koigu Cross-Stitch Scarf today and I was having some problems using Addi Turbos. The yarn was slipping all over the place and splitting and I really had to slow down. I am now using the Denise needles instead as they are less blunt.



I found it disheartening that I couldn't find a single pair of glove needles (about 5") in size 00 or 000 for when I knit the Sanquhar gloves.



All this discussion on knitting needles is putting Snickerdoodle the rabbit to sleep.

Has anyone out there checked out the new Bev Galeskas book on felting? I put it on my Christmas list but haven't seen it yet. I'd really love to learn more about felting. I admired these great needle felted pictures at Taos Wool Festival this year.











Almost finished with the second Halloween sock - I'm making the large size and they are almost knee socks for me. Really I shouldn't make any more worsted weight socks because they don't wear as well but the jack-o-lanterns turned my head.



Speaking of Christmas, I decided to make a wishlist at Amazon and at KnitPicks for my family. Miss Waistline really doesn't need any more gifts of chocolate and if I put all my knitting wishes down it will help me avoid more knitting purchases until after the holidays. Does anyone know of any other knitting retailers online that let you make wish lists

I am relieved to announce that the Sanquhar gloves are finished. The project itself was fun but I am relieved that I didn't sit on those oh-so-nasty size 00 sharp metal dpns during the process. I am now working on the Blackberry Ridge Halloween socks and it feels like knitting with broomsticks and rope in comparison.



I am very grateful for the Sanquhar pattern online and I didn't find any typos in the charts. My gauge kept changing around while working on them (I blame the Red Sox) but it isn't terribly noticeable. Today I took tons of photos of the gloves - on my hand, inside out, finger gussets, etc., so I hope they turn out. I'll have them on my blog next week.



I also took photos of the completed Vinternatt mittens from Nordic Fiber Arts - here is a photo of the mittens in progress. I was originally worried that there wouldn't be enough contrast in the colors I chose but actually I am quite fond of the way they turned out. I made the size small (thinking they would be good for a gift for a kid) and had an entire skein of the main color left over.

Dale of Norway Baby Sweater

Here is the Dale of Norway baby cardigan, number 12406, done in 20 different colors Norwegian Sport Wool from Elann on size 0 and 2 needles (US). The good news is that I thoroughly enjoyed every inch of the cardigan and loved the colors. The bad news is that after a trial machine wash some of the yarn ends worked themselves loose with such a slippery superwash yarn. It can't go to its intended recipient so I'm going to try to find a stuffed animal it will fit and send that to the baby instead. I also have to get buttons for it.

Instead of the usual Friday pet photos today I thought I'd show some animal photos from the Taos Wool Festival - a black llama, some cute bunnies for sale, and some angora goats. Monday I'll have photos of the completed Dale baby cardigan - the colorful one with the bunnies and ducks and carrots and garden tools.







I'm doing the initials on the second Sanquhar gloves and hope to finish them by the end of the weekend. I'm getting a lot of knitting done with all the exciting extra-inning baseball games. I've decided to also make some Sanquhar socks. I have some J&S jumper weight yarn in black and white that I purchased to make another pair of gloves but I want to try socks instead.

Speaking of future projects, Mare has inspired me as usual. (She's the reason I went back and worked on the Lucy Neatby Paradoxical mittens.) She's now swatching the mitten pattern as a Paradoxical sweater! I was thinking of the striped hat on the cover of Vibeke Lind's Knitting in the Nordic Tradition done as a Paradoxical hat. I'll see what yarn I have that would work.

I've started on the Halloween socks. I adore Blackberry Ridge's yarn and their kits but the colors for the Halloween socks are brown and copper. I can live with the brown but had to substitute some orange from the stash for the pumpkins. Fortunately I have a lot of orange worsted weight yarn from making all those Bunnies & Carrots hats.

Taos Wool Festival

I'm going to try again to show some of the photos from the Taos Wool Festival. Here we have a spinning demo, some cute pygora goats, a table full of handpainted yarns and a triangle loom.

I'm almost finished with the first Sanquhar glove and will have both finished by the end of the weekend (the second one is always faster) if I do not run out of yarn. I only bought one skein each of the Jameson & Smith laceweight yarn and I'm not sure that will be enough. I will have photos about a week after that and I will try to get close-up photos of the finger gussets.



On the Japanese pattern online the pattern does not match up once you get to the fingers. There are two different alternating diamond patterns and the fingers have three diamonds so the fingers will have two of the same type of diamonds next to each other. I don't think it is terribly noticeable though.



I know there was some confusion on the way I did the thumb on a Japanese knitting blog HERE but I couldn't get the web site translated well enough by Babel Fish to figure out their confusion. If anyone reading this also knows how to read Japanese let me know. I'd love to be able to answer their questions. I believe I did the thumb the way the pattern stated - I started the salt and pepper/lice gusset for the thumb immediately when the main Duke pattern started. Sheila is also knitting some Sanquhar gloves and has a photo of her progress.



Here's the Sheep to Shawl demo at the Taos Wool Festival.









I'm having trouble loading my blog at all so I'll contact Blogger and limit photos until then.

Taos Wool Festival

All of my photos of the Taos Wool Festival turned out well so I hope you'll bear with me as I show them this week.

Here's a photo of some of the tents (and the mud).



Here is where I spent most of my money - Elsa Sheep & Wool. She raises Cormo sheep in Bayfield, Colorado (where I used to live). The booth has some terrific softer than soft knitted items and this year had some adorable Aran baby garments.




But the main reason I like the booth is the gorgeous Cormo yarn sold spun either worsted or woollen in two weights located behind the smiling woman tending the booth. In front of her are some neat crocheted flowers. I may try to come up with some knitted flowers one day. I have decided on two projects with the Cormo yarn - the Aran Sandal Socks from Socks, Socks, Socks and the Aran Island mittens from Folk Mittens. I can't wait to get started.



Debbi at TrixieChick also has some Taos photos. And Mary is starting some Sanquhar gloves - check out her gauge swatch photos HERE.

I finished the first Paradoxical Mitten by Lucy Neatby. The really unusual thing about these mittens is that they are anatomical - one side slopes down more from the fingertips than the other just like the human hand. There was a somewhat fussy three needle bind off to finish off the top shaping; you have to first put the stitches on four different stitch holders, then turn the work inside out, then put the stitches back on the needles and do the bind off. I think a simple Kitchener would have looked better even though the stripe colors wouldn't match up. Maybe I'm just lazy. The pattern said you should do the same thing for the thumb but I didn't.



The photo shows the beginning of the mittens and the colors of J&S shetland I chose - kind of a cantaloupe orange and a medium purple. I may keep these for myself. I'm probably going to run out of yarn so I may not finish these this week. I also think I'm going to run out of yarn for the Sanquhar gloves so I'll order that at the same time.









Here is the Koigu I got from Simply Knit for the Cross-Stitch Scarf although the colors are a bit off in the photo. The skein to the right has a few undyed spots - I'm not sure if this is normal for Koigu or not as I've never used it. It is really soft and I'm looking forward to getting started on the scarf. Theresa is completely responsible for me starting this particular project and now her shadow knit sweater from Shelridge Farms has my interest piqued again.



I'll start doing the Taos Wool Festival photo tour tomorrow. I should have quite a few photos so they may last the whole week. We'll see how they turn out.

THE MAN OF MY DREAMS







This is the cone hat from Anna Zilboorg's book done in Cascade 220. I really like the knitted ball on the top and the garter slip stitch border. She discusses in the book how the hats make people smile and I'm threatening to use this goofy photo for our Christmas card. Here's another photo of the actual hat.







Because it is Friday I have to include a pet photo. Here is a portrait of a man and his bunny.

Here's the Bearly Knit kit from Caroline Laudig that I won in the KBTH Virtual Conference. The pattern for the bear sweater is located HERE and I just love the colors of Campion & J&S Caroline provided. I doubt I could put together such a good colorway for the project. The colors are a bit darker in the photos. Also included in the gift were lots of fun goodies like different types of stitch markers, a stitch holder, highlighter, post-it notes, coilless safety pins, etc. I'm very grateful for winning such a terrific gift and plan to get started on the sweater next month.



Theresa had a recent post about finding time to knit. I'm luckier than most in that I have a lot of time to knit. I only occasionally do some freelance writing, mostly food stuff. I have come up with some ways to get more knitting done and thought I'd list them here.



1. Encourage your DH/SO/partner to cook. My DH is turning out to be a better cook than I am but he used to make some awful stuff. I still rave about everything he makes, even if it isn't good, to keep him cooking. Cooking can take up a huge amount of knitting time. If you do all the cooking, develop a nice list of easy-to-make healthy meals. Also, make larger quantities so there are leftovers (and days you don't have to cook at all).



2. I notice there are certain times of day I am more productive with my knitting. For me it is late afternoon and early evening. I try to honor those times and do the cooking and cleaning at the other times. For instance, I usually don't get as much knitting time on weekends when DH is home so I plan to do the week's laundry then.



3. Be organized. About every two weeks I go through my yarn and patterns and books and needles and get everything where it belongs. I used to be quite disorganized and it would take me hours to find a certain needle or skein of yarn - what a huge waste of time.



4. Find the right balance of knitting projects. I am continually working on this as I often don't have enough easy or mindless projects going. I also don't work well when I have too many projects going simultaneously. I think too many UFO's weighs heavily on my mind and can make me abandon knitting entirely. Conversely, if I'm only working on one project and it isn't going well I can stop knitting altogether just to avoid it.



5. Knit everywhere. Obviously you need mindless knitting for this purpose. I knit when we have friends over and I knit when I'm browsing blogs online. I knit when DH and I play Scrabble. Sometimes I try to think of how I can work more knitting into my life. DH loves to go canoeing and this is a wonderful, uninterrupted time for knitting. Too bad there is no water here in NM.



Today I ordered a sock kit from Blackberry Ridge Farm. Every Halloween I wish I had something related to knit and they sell an inexpensive kit for black socks with orange jack-o-lanterns that I want to make this year. I'm going to add some lettering on the top and maybe a spider on the heel if I can find a good chart of a spider.



I'm back to work on the Lucy Neatby Paradoxical mittens inspired by Mare. I am also getting back to work on Trondheim and the Vinternatt mittens are done.

Sanquhar Gloves

Here is the first Sanquhar glove after I cut it to make the hand shorter. It is done on size 00 dpns in J&S laceweight yarn following the Japanese pattern online HERE. I didn't want to do all that corrugated ribbing so I did the cuff pattern from the old Cast On Sanquhar glove pattern. Essentially it is one row of purling in black then a simple design. The Japanese pattern uses the little salt and pepper triangular gussets at the base of three of the fingers (omitting the pinky and the thumb). As you can see as you look at the tip of the middle finger, you can extend the salt and pepper fingertip pattern to make each finger the right length.

The whole time I was knitting the fingers I had the sense that the hand was too long. Remember my top ten list from September of things I wished I learned earlier about knitting?
Here it is again - note number eight on the list! Apparently I haven't learned it yet after all.

"10 THINGS I WISH I LEARNED EARLIER ABOUT KNITTING

8. If you get the impression while you're knitting something that is is going to be too short, too big, too tight, bad color combo, etc., rip it out immediately rather than wait. Trust your instincts - they're almost always right."

I knew the hand was too long but for some reason I kept knitting the fingers. In my defense, the Japanese pattern has you start at the index finger and every glove pattern I've used has you start knitting at the pinky. I think I would have figured out they were too long sooner if I'd started at the pinky.

I've been changing the heading of the blog weekly to show small photos of my previous work - the newest photos are Landra's gloves from Folk Knitting in Estonia and my argyle sock (pattern from the little VK sock book).

Here's a photo of the Dale baby cardigan in progress. I tried a different idea for the buttonband steek and just cut and knotted the yarn at each end since there would be facing covering this area and I wanted this sweater to be absolutely bulletproof. This would have worked out better if the yarn wasn't so slippery. I still like the Norwegian Sport wool (available from Elann) and would even buy more but it wasn't the right yarn for this particular project. I'll probably find a teddy bear who can wear the cardigan and send that off instead. Oh well - it was still very fun to knit.

Tomorrow I will have photos of the first Sanquhar glove. I cut through the hand to shorten them (and I get to knit the four fingers again) but you'll get the general idea. I did a more decorative cuff than the corrugated ribbing in the Japanese pattern.



Okay I admit it. I never wash swatches before starting a project. (I do swatch though... usually.) If I had I would have learned that the Norwegian Sport wool fuzzes up quite a bit after a run in the washing machine partially obscured the colorwork on the Dale baby cardigan. sigh It is also a rather slippery yarn and some of the yarn ends worked themselves loose. Considering I used 20 different yarns in the project and only knotted the yarns in the steek areas, I'm not sure I can give this sweater to the recipient. I adore my friend Lisa but she'll never hand wash a baby sweater. I am glad I decided to try machine washing the sweater before I sent it to her. I guess I'll have to knit and send a baby Aran instead.









I'm almost finished with the Vinternatt mittens (yarn pictured above) from Nordic Fiber Arts and the second one will be done tonight during the baseball playoffs. I chose the small size so I will have more smallish items in my knitting basket for kids and teens. My knitting basket holds various projects I just feel like doing - people can choose what items they like from it. It works better for me than specific knitted gifts.



I see Mare is now having a mitten attack after all that shadow knitting. She has inspired me to return to to my Paradoxical mittens and also to finish the Sanquhar gloves. The gloves are for me but the mittens will go in the knitting basket.

I made it to Taos Wool Festival after all. I was there Saturday afternoon and Kit Carson Park was incredibly muddy. As a result the festival wasn't too crowded. I took an entire roll of film of pygora goats and the wool judging competition and some neat crocheted flowers and a triangle loom and some spinning and weaving demos, etc. The photos will be ready in about a week.



DH saw Tracy Eicheim's (Woolly Designs) booth in the muddiest area but all I saw were Majacraft spinning wheels - none of his wonderful spindles. I also didn't see Marcie Dark from DFK Ranch with her Shetland fleeces. Most of my favorite vendors were there including Elsa Sheep & Wool of the most wonderful Cormo yarn and knitted items and Fire Ant Ranch where I learned how to spin about 6 years ago.



All I purchased was a Taos Wool Festival 20th anniversary t-shirt with a ram on the front (I have about 6 other t-shirts from previous Taos wool festivals) and some more of my favorite Cormo yarn. This stuff is so soft! They had it in two weights and spun worsted or woollen. I plan to use it to make the Aran Island mittens from Folk Mittens. I originally planned to buy a swift and saw some at both La Lana Wools and Weaving Southwest but we need to pay Snickerdoodle's veterinary bills instead. He did fine being alone all day. Snickerdoodle was chasing Pumpkin the cat today growling (yes, rabbits can growl) so I assume he is recovering.



The long drive to Taos netted one result - I finally finished the Dale baby cardigan. As usual the button band took twice as long as I expected on size 0 needles but it turned out well. The sweater is for my friend Lisa who is due in December. I hope she has a girl because this cardigan would work better for a girl baby I think. You can decide when you see how it turned out.



Here's my stash container for yarn odds and ends. I want to start another Spontaneous Scarf. Which colors do you think I should use?