A little of this, a little of that

My knit-blogging of late has been a bit lax: an entire week has sped past since my last post, and that entry didn't feature any knitting. Tut, tut. I hope to redeem myself by presenting a brief overview of my recent projects.

Project 1: Square-Along

This is an older picture. (You can tell it's old because it includes two of the scarves, all bundled up with postcards, that I mailed to Eastern Europe. They've been gone a while, and I am giddy with anticipation that I might soon hear from my far away friends.)


Here you can see my first square for Larissa's "Square-Along." Although I initially hesitated, I'm really glad that I participated in this knit-along. It's another project, like my Socks 101, for Larissa's upcoming book (written with her husband) featuring knit-alongs. The "Square-Along" gimmick was that all the participants knit 7 X 7 in. squares following Larissa's recipe and using sock-weight yarn. Then the squares were all sent to Portland so that Larissa can sew together the sample for her book. Any extra squares will be included in a blanket/blankets for charity. I sent two squares (the second is pictured below). I was simply thrilled when I saw Larissa's picture on Flickr where I can identify my squares amidst a bunch of other people's. Yay!


Project 2: Sock it to me!

I am making another sock.


This has been a nice portable project, and, hopefully, the resulting sock will fit and I will be happy enough to finish a mate for it. The pattern is kind of out of my head and based on Yarn Harlot's sock recipe in Knitting Rules! (which was a rollicking good read). You can see that I've made a decent amount of progress since the picture revealing my sock's humble beginnings. I am currently only a couple of inches away from the toe decreases. Can you stand the excitement?

I am beginning to understand why some people collect gratuitous amounts of sock yarn. This is fun, and look at all the purdy colors...


Other Projects: Hopes and dreams for my knitting future

Knitting and fanaticizing about future knitting go together. The next two projects on the docket are both for sweetie pies in my family: a scarf for my Grandma Tennie and a cat hat for my little niece. I now have yarn for both and have started devising patterns based on altering other people's patterns. I don't yet have pictures because I don't like the results of my experimentation thus far. But knitting group is this afternoon, and I may take another run at my grandma's scarf (in my fantasy it's covered with lovely rambling reversible cables). We will see.

Oh, and please don't ask about the fishes. They are in timeout.