I've been thinking of some possibilities for St. Patrick's Day socks. I really love THESE beautiful shamrock socks but I sit on my feet a lot and beaded socks probably won't work for me.









I think these socks may work instead if I find the right color green in my stash. They are the Step Dance socks from Blackberry Ridge's Elite Feet Sock Collection.



I started some mittens from the Anna Zilboorg book using Cascade 220 and size 4 dpns. I was getting 6 1/2 stitches per inch and the mittens were turning out huge. The mittens from the book really need DK weight yarn but I haven't found any DK weight yarn in the beautiful bright colors necessary for these mittens. I am going to have to re-write the pattern using 10 less stitches.



I'm off to the Academy Awards pre-show and many hours of uninterrupted knitting. Life is good.

Be prepared to be bored...







Here's the boring scarf I knit during the blackout. It is 8 stitches across, garter stitch, size 10 needles on some handspun yarn I bought on Ebay years ago. To dye the yarn I put the skein on plastic wrap, then dotted the yarn with various colors of Easter egg dye and zapped it. This technique is outlined in the Twisted Sisters Sock Book.



I'll finish the second Salsa sock tonight then I'm going to start another pair of top-down gauntlet mittens from Anna Zilboorg's Magnificent Mittens in Cascade 220. Stay tuned...

Here's the first Salsa Sock from Socks, Socks, Socks. Regia really isn't the best choice for this pattern - even with an extra pattern repeat the yarn is just too thin for size 2 dpns. I spent almost three hours working in the yarn ends because I was worried they'd come loose.

Just a quick update - we got about a foot of snow last night and the electricity has just come back on. I did come up with some "blackout knitting" - a thin garter stitch scarf out of some weird handspun handdyed yarn that I can work on in the dark.



Peaches is staying warm in her room and eating a lot to keep up her strength.

Here is the beginning of the Salsa socks from Socks, Socks, Socks just before I ripped out the heel gussets. I didn't like the way the color pattern worked there and will do something else. I think you can continue any color pattern while decreasing for a heel gusset as long as you always do the decrease stitch in the same color and you do the math to make the pattern match up properly once you're done decreasing.



I'm doing these socks in Regia which is quite a thin yarn and I added an 8 stitch pattern repeat and they're still running small. I'm also not fond of the color combo but these socks aren't for me so it doesn't matter. Once I figure out who gets these socks I'm going to duplicate stitch their initials on the heel.



Lisa asked what size my hand is. She's also going to knit some Vanalinn gloves and wants them to fit more snugly. My hands are large - long and thin - and if I'm buying gloves I'll pick a women's size large. Chris asked if the gloves are warm. Not particularly Chris but I still think I'll wear them a lot because I love how they look.



Melinda wrote in her comment, " I knitted a pair of Latvian mittens using Satakieli and sock with Koigu. IMHO, Satakieli seems to have a tighter worsted type twist like Shetland yarn while Koigu has a fluffy woolen type twist." Thanks for that good info Melinda. That must be why Schoolhouse Press recommends Satakieli for Bavarian Twisted stitches on their web site. Check out Melinda's beautiful black & white Latvian mittens HERE.



And while you're checking out inspirational knitting, Valerie finished a beautiful pair of twined mittens in her February 17 blog entry.