One piece of finished Tessellated goodness

There's nothing so delightful as knitting Fair Isle. Unless it's finishing Fair Isle and contemplating it while on the foot. Unless it's knitting lace. Or, perhaps, a cookie dough blizzard, or the knowledge that one is in a fine library and doesn't need to leave it for a week. Or maybe a eating a cookie dough blizzard while wearing newly finished Fair Isle socks, sitting in a library (next to a fireplace) with a lace project in the wings?

Let's face it - there are many delightful things in the world. One of them came off my needles yesterday. Another one jumped onto my needles after church today. Even for me, this is not a sock to start during Sunday School.

Vital Statistix (sock 1):

• Needles: 2.75 mm, US 2
• Gauge: 9 spi
  
• Yarn: Purple - ArtYarns Ultramerino, Purple; KPPPM Periwinkle P451-83, and Louet Gems Linen Grey.
• Pattern: More Sensational Knitted Socks, Tessellated Socks

Oh, I like this sock. It fits nicely. It feels cushy. It's a tremendous improvement from the tourniquet I made over 15 years ago. I can hardly wait for November.

I cast on another pair of socks for mom this morning. She likes wearing red, white, and blue on holidays ... and so, for her, from Coldwater Collaborative's Regia yarns, we have an appropriate sock.

And lastly, another bookshelf shot.

Tesselated Sock #1

I am a happy camper. My Work In Progress has two colors, isn't a tourniquet, and is moving along nicely. I am doing some pattern adaptation on-the-fly, but am really looking forward to seeing this sock on my foot.

My desk is clean (deep surface clean, that is ... the drawers are still scary), school starts in two weeks, and our air conditioning works. All is well in my little corner of the world. Except for camera focus, which is really the small stuff.

Scatterbrained?

I'm having a scatterbrained day. Take a large amount of pollen, blend it one allergic lady, add two children not native to the house, editing work, knitting, and attempting to use photos from Flickr in my blog ... and you have a scatterbrained me.

For one thing, no pictures are showing up. How can one have a running commentary if there are no visible pictures? Maybe you can see them. Maybe you can't! (I certainly can't. Maybe here will work? If anyone knows what I did wrong, holler!)

The first photo is of a Shetland wool batt. I'm not sure if it's supposed to look this way. No matter ... it's been spun. But if you know batts, do tell what you'd do if your batt looked like this.

Tucked in here somewhere are pictures of my spinning bobbin and a penny, my shawl blocked out on dental floss (a nice lifeline) to see if it really was large enough to start the edging (twasn't ... I did 30 more rows), some yarn that has been recycled from a baseball, and another portion of a bookcase.







I would have some pictures from the fair, but I didn't go. I didn't even knit. Four rows of a baby sock wiped me out, so I slept. The family entries did well, however. Puer came away with the tallest weed (10 ft giant ragweed, anyone?) and a very unappreciated-by-the-judge 3rd place ribbon for my Lazy Kate. Filia walked off with blue ribbon mittens and a Reserve Champion sweater, and I got lots of blue ribbons and a Champion ribbon on Puer's gansey. No comments on the Holey Shawl , just a blue ribbon pinned to it. I had to chuckle when the ladies taking the entries expressed concern about putting a pin through a fichu (is it strong enough?) but casually stabbed my shawl with no worries whatsoever. (I haven't looked yet to see what the pin did.)

Bleak House wasn't at the library, and I finished up Martin Chuzzlewit faster than I'd expected, so I was stuck without planned Serious Reading Material. I pulled Tom Jones off the shelf,and dove in. So far, so good!