The C Side

Friday’s FO: A sock, sock blockers, hanks to balls and knitting with 9 inch sock circulars

This is the first time I have turned a hank into a center pull cake ball.

I hung the hank on the backs of two chairs, stood on one of the chairs, made sure that the yarn was coming out from the outside and used my nostepinne to wind it. I think it took about 25 minutes which was ok since it was about 450 yards.

I used my new ChiaoGoo 9″ circulars. Yes you heard that right, 9″ circulars. They are so cool. At first they were really fiddly and I considered going back to my DPNs a couple of times but hung in there enough until it became easier. I used DPNs for the heel and toe, but I am pretty certain the heel could be made with them with a little practice too.

Since these were my first lace socks, I realized that lace socks do look better once they have been blocked a bit, so I made my own sock blockers too.

And since I also knit smaller socks, I made sock blockers for smaller socks.
I made them using some foam like the packing foam kind so I think I need something more waterproof and more substantial, these feel like they might break if you pull a little hard on your sock. My daughter also decided to leave her mark on them and bit into them, so they look kind of gross now with mini bite marks all over them.

For more info on the socks visit my ravelry project page here

Wednesday’s WIP: The Leappad sleeve

Lulu was really jealous of the kindle fire sleeve. The sleeve was for my sister’s kindle. Lulu being (almost) 4 was really upset that my knitting did not revolve around her for a couple of days. She took out the yarn and the needles and said make a bag for my leappad. Well I had promised her to knit one, and the thing really does need a sleeve.

I knit the last one from the bottom up, but this one I am knitting top down. I will just kitchener the bottom or use a 3 needle bind off. Ironically halfway through this project, she decided to pull all of my DPNs out and put them back in their case. She then proudly showed me how she had ‘finished’ the project for me.
I need to get this finished because I want to cast on a pair of socks for the February challenge for the Sock Kniters Anonymous group on Ravelry.

I forgot to share the mittens

I totally forgot about sharing these

She loves them. Which makes me really happy. We went out yesterday and I realized that she was decked in handknits. She was wearing a poncho, a hat and these mittens. It is nice knowing that the things I make keep her warm and happy too.

Friday’s FO: Kindle Fire Cozy

Just a little something to keep the Fire warm and safe . I am still not 100% satisfied with the results, so I think I need to make more. I need to make more anyways for my daughter’s Leap Pad. I didn’t add a button and used ties instead because for some crazy reason I think the button could get lots of pressure in my bag and totally kill my screen. Talk about strange ideas

What have you finished this Friday?

Pencil Sleeves

What do you do when you want to knit, but don’t really want to knit? You make pencil warmers.

I am definitely not the original owner of this idea, I have seen pictures of this before, but I looked for similar patterns on ravelry and online and couldn’t find one so I thought I should share.

You can use any fingering scrap yarn you have, you really only need a couple of metres.

Size 0 DPNs. I think you might be able to get away with upto a size 2 just try to knit as tight as possible.

Cast on 12 stitches. Distribute evenly on 3 needles. Join and knit in the round until 6 cm long, bind off and weave in ends.

Repeat until you have a rainbow of cute little pencil warmers.

This also works beautifully with varriegated yarns with really short repeats, it looks like stripes.

One word of advice though, this is slightly addictive. It is a project that takes about 20 minutes from start to finish.

Wednesday’s WIP: Rainbow fingerless mittens

I finished the rainbow socks

I was kind of sad when they were all done and ends weaved in. Those rainbows really made me so happy.

What’s a ~~crazy~~ knitter to do then? Well, knit fingerless mittens of course, to go with the socks.

I am using the Adorable Kids Fingerless Gloves pattern and they really are adorable.

What are you working on?

I have found the cure for bad days

Yes I have, I kid you now!

All you need is:

Rainbow Sock yarn, this is Felici by Knitpicks
A sock pattern. I am using Hermione’s Every Day Sock sized down.
Little feet

Directions:

Knit rainbow socks

Try socks on little feet.

(Optional: Tickle little feet and little bellies until you can hear little giggles)

Try to convince the owner of the little feet that they need to take off the half finished sock now because it is not really finished.

Repeat…

The one where I almost throw throw my computer out of the window

Or perhaps it should be called a series of unfortunate events, my feed was broken and when I tried to fix that, I broke the whole blog then I restored a backup and realized I had lost all of my posts in January and when I tried to get them from the drafts I have on my phone those dissappeared too. Then I realized the theme was broken and had to fix that.
Excuse me while I go cry about it for an hour or two.

Wednesday’s WIP: A cardi for Lulu

Lulu needs a cardigan. So I am knitting a cardigan. What have you all been upto recently?

Seeds and Trees Baby Blanket {free pattern}

I love gifting baby blankets. They take longer than a cardigan and a hat, but they are satisfying to make. You might remember seeing me start this a couple of days ago. It was a rough start but once I settled on a stitch pattern I liked it was nice and easy. I used an acrylic yarn because babies leak and I want the mommy to just throw it in the washing machine. It is soft and textural. I love texture and the vertical stripes add enough visual interest to make it really pretty.

It is for a baby boy and I wanted it to look sophisticated and not scream baby so I went for a deep denimy blue. I hate the pale blues and pinks they use for baby stuff.