January & February Roundup

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It’s hard to believe we’re already at the end of February!

January

One of my first projects was knitting my first handspun-by-me project, a pair of convertible mittens. I tried to do these two-at-a-time at first, but I ended up ripping one out and just knitting one after the other — and I think the colors turned out better this way. I love the way they match but also don’t match, and the way this yarn plied up into that slow color change that I love so much.

A pair of hand-knit fingerless mittens with flaps to convert to mittens sits on a table. The yarn used was handspun and goes from reddish through tan to green as the mittens go up.


I also spun my first project on my new Kromski Minstrel, using some Malabrigo Nube. I have many more colors of Nube in my growing fiber stash, so you’ll see lots more coming up, too.

I finally finished (1.5 years later) my tweedy, cabley, wonderful sweater out of the most perfect pumpkin orange from the Farmer’s Daughter Fibers. Do I have pictures of this one yet? Nope, in fact I haven’t even blocked it yet, because no one can tell on Zoom that the bottom edge of this sweater is kind of squirrely. For those of you keeping track, this was the sweater I had to put on hold when my wrist started acting up, and I finally decided that I could handle picking it back up, slowly — and I could. I probably won’t ever knit another seed stitch sweater, though!

The back of a textured, cabled sweater knit out of a pumpkin-orange tweed yarn lays on a table, with a yarn bowl and coffee mug next to it.

And I also made a Bubble Cowl out of a combination of Canon Hand Dyes (peacock gradient minis), Local Color Farm and Fiber Finnsheep, and Magpie Fibers. I love the way the texture of the yarn combines with the texture of the stitches, and this cowl is sooo warm and cozy.

February

One of my February spins used some Hipstrings that my brother bought me for Christmas, and I’m really pleased with the way it turned out. I’m not sure what I’m going to make out of it yet or whether I’ll combine it with something else, but this was a really fun spin and I find that I really enjoy spinning on a treadle machine, because it uses both my hands AND my feet.

Two skeins of two-ply handspun yarn, with pastel colors from tan to purple to pink throughout.

A friend of mine posted a Musselburgh hat she had made, and I immediately knew I needed to make one, so I pulled out a skein of La Bien Aimée (that some friends brought back for me from France!) and knit this very strange-looking tube that morphed into a very nice-looking and comfortable hat.

A pinky-grey variegated hat in stockinette stitch. You can’t see in the picture, but the hat is self-lining.

I also spun up some more Malabrigo, this time combining two different colorways into what I’m calling Razzleberry Pie (thanks to a name from a friend who talked me through color choices). I’m currently spinning the rest of the purple to ply with a much brighter pink, and then I’ll experiment with my remainders to see what I can turn those into.

A bobbin of two-ply handspun yarn. One ply is dark purple with hints of black, and the other ply is red with hints of pink and salmon.

And lastly, I’m almost done knitting a Sizzle Pop out of yarn I indigo-dyed myself. This pattern is really intuitive and is definitely not as intimidating as it looked to start with, and I already know I’m going to make more of these. I love the subtle difference between the two blue shades.

The start of a triangle shawl knit in a leafy brioche stitch sits on the table. The main color (on the top) is a cerulean blue, and the contrast color (seen in the background of the cerulean stitches) is more of a royal/navy blue.


I haven’t really sewn anything since I forced myself to make masks in March or April of last year, but I have been thinking (just thinking!) about pulling out some of my quilt pieces, or finally getting back to some garment sewing. We’ll see.

Time Doesn't Matter, Knitting Does

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Well, it has been an amount of time (is this what I write every time I get around to writing a new blog post? Probably). I was thinking this morning about how, once I’ve missed a month of blogging, it’s so much easier to miss the next month, and then the next, and so on. In my defense, we had an election, some extra weird holidays, an insurrection, and a new president between now and the last time I posted. Also, I don’t write blog posts for you! (no offense. I write them for me.) I do enjoy a vaguely time-bound summary of activities that’s worded in ways other people might understand, though, and this helps me do that, so I’m going to catch up — probably in stages.

October

I enjoyed knitting the Sharon Show so much that I went straight into knitting the Secret Handshake. Have I blocked it since finishing it, now four months later? No. Did I still enjoy knitting this one? Absolutely.

A close up image of a pair of purple hand-knit socks with a waffled texture on the instep.

October’s socks were the Asali Socks, by Dawn Landix, a pattern I knew I would love. I missed up one (1) row, but no one will notice but me so it doesn’t matter, and they’re so waffly and comfortable.

A small cross-stitch of a red cabin with a circular walnut frame around it.

I also cross-stitched a mini Vintage Cabin by Junebug and Darlin. Did it take me another 4-6 weeks to do the backstitching? You bet it did. Did I put it in a frame and hang it on my wall immediately after finishing the backstitching? Yes I did.

November

I knit a Bandit sweater by Jacqueline Cieslak! I blocked it pretty much immediately, and then it waited for buttons for three months. Of course I still wore it — no one on Zoom knows that I didn’t trim my ends and that those things that might have been buttons were actually stitch markers — but I haven’t officially taken official photos for the official Instagram yet. I used some stash Madelinetosh that I already had but I also still preordered some of that Sugar Maple colorway from Little Skein in the Big Wool, because I have capital-P Plans to make a Plover Cardigan, so it’ll still be a Little Skein / Jacqueline Cieslak collab, just a little different.

A pair of red and tan fair isle knitted slippers with snowflake-like patterns on the top.

My November socks were these excellent slippers, which I have probably worn the most out of all the socks I made this year — mostly because it’s still winter and my toes get cold.

I also spun yarn! I couldn’t resist getting this Extremely Fall Braid from Knitcraft & Knittery, and I spun it up pretty immediately. I also (spoiler alert) knit my very first project from my handspun out of this, and I love it.

December

A pair of dark blue tweed hand-knit socks with gold accents on the cuff and toes.

I finished my twelfth pair of socks, one per month, for the entire year. This month I made up my own pattern again, and I’m pretty happy with the result. I am not holding myself to one-pair-of-socks-a-month in 2021 because I don’t feel like it, but I’ll probably knit a few pairs here and there.

A brioche knit beanie in dark blue and light blue. The brim of the hat is folded up to show the light blue contrast on the other side.

I knit my brother a hat, once I remembered to ask him if he wanted one! I used a pattern I’ve knit before — Andrea Mowry’s Harlow Hat — and also managed to use leftover yarn, which means I can reward myself with buying more yarn, right? …right?

And I picked back up where I left on my Seven Wonders pullover, which I finished in January. I stopped knitting it near the end of 2019 because my wrist started bothering me (seed stitch is not my friend), and I very carefully decided it was time to keep going on this one. Sleeve Island with seed stitch and wonky wrists is rough, y’all.

The other thing I did in December was beat my all-time-high books-read-in-a-year-since-I-started-keeping-track record, which had been set at 104 in the year 2010. 2020’s count came in just over the top at 105, and I focused a little more on reading once I figured out I could actually beat that record. Do I remember everything I read? Absolutely not, my brain is too busy just trying to survive a global pandemic. But did I enjoy reading that many books, most of them lighthearted and relatively conflict-free, usually in bed? Yes I absolutely did. I haven’t set a specific goal for 2021 yet, but I’m not planning on beating that record anytime soon. 2021 is (maybe) for digging in to much meatier books, that take me weeks instead of days to finish.

I have more updates, especially spinning updates, but I’ll write about those later. Thanks for sticking around, friends.

September Roundup

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Well, time continues to be a strange beast, but I’m somewhat reassured by having written a blog for August already, so I suppose it hasn’t been as long (and somehow still short) as I thought.

I spent most of the month finishing up my Sharon Show shawl, which I’m really pleased with and which was a really consistent bright point in my knitting. It was my first mystery knitalong, and while I usually opt out of MKALs because what if I don’t like how it turns out?, I’m super happy I made this one. It felt like I could just knit forever, and it was the perfect combination of mindless-yet-interesting-enough knitting.

I’m standing with a multicolored large shawl wrapped around my neck, laid as flat as possible so you can see the pattern.

I also knit my September Sock Squad socks, which I made up as I went along, and which I am very pleased with.

A pair of cream socks with brown speckles lays flat on a table. The socks have contrasting solid brown heels, toes, and cuffs.

And at the beginning of the month, I also knit a Wave of Change Jacket by Denise Bayron using Earl Grey Fiber Co. As usual, I have not even blocked it yet, but someday I’ll get around to it and when that happens I will definitely post pictures.

A close-up of a 4" x 4” square swatch in a multicolored bulky weight yarn.

I also spun up more Neighborhood Fiber Co and am absolutely, totally smitten with it. Still learning how to spin consistently, but this is so soft and the colors are so good, and I can’t wait to figure out what I’m going to make with it.

A skein of purple and blue two-ply handspun sits next to a mini-skein of the same handspun plied with brown yarn.

And…that’s all, folks. It’s been a weird month. It’s probably going to get weirder.