About the Sock Yarn

In one corner of a tightly packed closet, atop a narrow bookcase teeters a stack of storage boxes filled with enough yarn to make 63 pairs of socks.

63. I know. I counted.

And that doesn't include the several yarns in the fingering to DK range that could eventually be made into socks. That's just the stuff that was bought expressly to make socks.

I made 9 pairs of socks this year. So at my current rate of knitting, I have enough sock yarn to last me seven years.That's assuming I continue to knit socks at the same rate, which is by no measure a certain thing. I'm planning more sweater knitting, which means less sock knitting.

Three years ago, before I started hoarding sock yarn, these bins held the yarn for sweaters-in-progress. They held needles and notions. Now, to make room for the sock yarn, all those things have been crammed into nooks and crannies on bookcases, which are bowing under the weight of everything I ask them to hold.

2009 will be the year I stop collecting sock yarn as if it doesn't count towards the stash. I'm sure I'll still buy some here and there, and I've "budgeted" to allow myself to purchase new sock yarn after I've completed three pairs of socks. After. Not before. The storage closet has no more credit to extend.

Last year, I granted myself two exceptions in my personal rules. I said that sock yarn didn't count, as long as I paid cash for it from my weekly pocket money allowance. And I said that the rules didn't apply to Stitches and to The Fold's annual New Year's Day sale. This year, sock yarn counts, whether I pay from my weekly allowance or from gold that rains down from the skies.

Will there be an exception for Stitches? Still debating that one. I may leave it an open question until I see just how many pairs of socks I manage to knit between now and September. But my usual splurge mentality for the Stitches marketplace has started to come under heavy scrutiny, too. So we'll see, I guess.

Pushing It

I've got a lot of projects OTN again. And I'm pretty darned sick of all of them. Not because they're bad projects or boring or not something I'd wear, but because they have been hanging around FOREVER.

All week long, I've been dwelling on that. It's not good to have pleasurable things take on the shape of a burden.

So I've been talking about not casting on any new projects until I clear all existing projects off my lists. Socks are the exception to that rule, of course, because I need mindless desk knitting and something portable for my purse. But, not including socks, look at what I have OTN:

1. Catherine Parr.

This was cast on November 2007, one year ago. The sleeves are done. The body, knit in the round, is done to the armholes (where the fabric divides), and another three inches of the back is done above the armholes. This one is probably 80% done, except for a little knitting and some math for the neckline.

2. The Crapghan.

Remember this butt ugly thing? It's 2.5 balls away from completion. It's crocheted, and crochet hurts my wrist, so I can only work on it in the tiniest increments. Takes a long time to crochet a bed-sized blanket in five minute increments.

3. Fulmar.

I'd rate this at about 30% done. And you have no idea how much I wish that number was larger. I love this project, but it requires thought, and I can't always think about my knitting.

4. My Husband a/k/a the Cardigan.

The back is knit. That's it. I got stalled by the sleeves, but after a Stitches class this summer, I have a new way of short-rowing the cuffs so that I ought to get a decent result. I hope. 30% done.

5. The Fair Isle Bag.

Love the colorwork yarn on that one -- Plymouth Outback Wool. Nice wool, great colors. I wanted a true black yarn to go with it, and ended up with some Berrocco single ply that irritates my skin. So like the crapghan, I can only work on this one in short time increments. Maybe 10% done.

6. The Pink Sweater.

Started out as a vest, but I have enough yarn to make sleeves. We'll see how long those sleeves end up. Should be at least bracelet length. I'm nearly done with the front, so we'll soon discover just how long the sleeves will be, as that's all that remains to knit. Around 60% done.

7. The Kyoto Sweater.

I cast it on. I knit a few inches. I realized I would need to rewrite the entire pattern. And there, I stopped. Sometimes I get tired of not being able to knit patterns as written. Not even 5% done.



So that's four sweaters, a cardigan, a bag and an afghan. Catherine Parr, the pink sweater, and the afghan are all in the home stretch. I could conceivably finish all three before the end of the year. I thought about trying to knit my dad another vest in January, but now it looks like it will be Fulmar all the way, with the Kyoto (after I rewrite the pattern) for braindead days.

And even then, there will still be the cardigan.

Sheesh.

Definitely time to ignore the call of new projects. I may not achieve perfect completion of all these items before casting on something new, but if I push it, I can clear out a lot of them and make substantial progress on the rest.

Goals Report

It just occurred to me that I never reported on February goals. I need to set some March goals, too.

1. Finish pink socks.
Done! Already have worn them with my favorite pink cotton sweater, which is definitely not warm enough for this time of year. Don't care. Sick of winter. Maybe if I start wearing my spring clothes, the weather will take a hint.


2. Two balls on Catherine Parr.
Done! Actually, I knit two plus maybe a quarter of a third ball.


3. Finish orange felted clogs.
I ended up frogging these because I was unhappy with the way the yarn looked. I bought a beautiful multi-variegated Mountain Colors yarn that looks like a fall forest. It has to be knit double-stranded, and there was only one skein of it, so I picked a complementary orange Cascade 220 to knit with it. The orange swamped the other colors, so I ended up frogging it. (But I did find a felted slipper-boot pattern that will let me use both skeins, so there will be a second go at this yarn.)



Hmm. March goals. I'm knitting more regularly than I have been, but I still find myself knitting in spurts and snatches between other duties. It's hard to judge how much real knitting time I'll have. So this is a shot in the dark.

1. Finish the Socks That Rock Sapphire socks.
Easy enough. It's plain knitting, so I pick away at them while I'm reading.

2. Finish the Malabrigo hat.
It's about half done now, maybe less. It's a fast knit, but the pattern changes in almost every round, so it takes some concentration.

3. Finish the current ball of yarn on Fulmar.
I just started a ball, so this is a lot of knitting. Each ball is a touch over 300 yards of yarn.

4. Knit Catherine Parr to the armpits.
That's about another two inches. I think I can manage it, as long as life cooperates somewhat! Once I have this to the bottom of the armscyes, I intend to put the body on stitch holders and knit the sleeves.

So there we have it. My two big projects should advance some more, and I have a couple of little things for variety. That out to get me in like a lion and out like a lamb!

What about the rest of you? What are your plans for the month?

Happy New Year!

Did you think I died? Crawled under a rock somewhere and committed harikiri with some aluminum straights? Was kidnapped by yarn-hoarding aliens who smelled the sheepiness of my stash from twenty light years away?

Yeah. It was beginning to feel like that for me, too. The combination of work and the holidays really did me in.

There has been a little more knitting in the past few days. I'm grateful for that because it does help me stay on an even keel, and my stress level has been pretty high. I can't show pictures of my minimal knitting progress because my photo software and my new computer don't play nice together and I haven't had time to sort that out, but I have managed to knit most of the rest of a clapotis and part of a sock. So this past week saw more knitting than the three or so weeks before that combined.

I'm setting some January goals -- these aren't new year's goals so much as new month's goals, something I do routinely when I have my act together. Here is the knitting list for January.

1. Get life back in balance so knitting is a part of the routine again. Working out, too, which leads to --

2. Get back on the skinny-4-stash plan. Holidays + stress + change in meds = weight gain. This is not the result I want.

3. Finish the clapotis. I'm probably two repeats from the decreases, so the end is near.

4. Finish one pair of socks. I have three pairs currently OTN. Two is plenty -- one pair to sit on my desk, and one to carry along.

5. Frog the Butterfly. And how many times in life can we say that sentence? I've done everything I can to wiggle and stretch so that the yarn will be enough to complete the garment. But I'm officially admitting defeat here. I have maybe 50 yards more than the pattern calls for. I've altered the pattern and spent hours with a sketch pad and a calculator, but at some point I just became aware that no math in the world is going to make the yarn stretch far enough for this pattern. So I'm frogging it. It will be knit into a vest or something some day.

6. Make some progress on Fulmar. I think I've knit about four rows since Thanksgiving. I'd like to finish the front, but may not make it that far. But any regular progress would be an improvement -- even just one pattern repeat per week would be enough to satisfy me.

7. Dye Lady Eleanor and her matching hat so that they actually do match. Then weave in the ninety million ends and reblock the hat. It would have been nice to be able to wear this lovely heavy wool shawl over my coat today. (Current temperature: 7 degrees, with winds gusting and more snow falling. ...sigh...)

And I think that's enough for one month. Especially one month where my real goal is to get my life back in line.