Bad blogger... no biscuit!

Still no action with the camera.

I'm almost finished with the first red sock for my son. Sadly, I turned the heel too early. So now the sock is destined for my younger son instead of my older one - I bought enough Regia to make socks for the whole family, so this just means a slight rearrangement in the queue.

Still coughing. So annoying. I got sick 16 days ago... shouldn't I be symptom-free by now?

Long time no post...

Felled by a nasty summer cold, I spent the past nine days snurgling, sniffling, and attempting to sleep.

In the midst of all this, I did manage to graft my first Sidewinder sock... and it fits! and looks lovely! (No pictures yet. I still haven't had time to work out the camera-download-uplink sequence.)

I also ordered some 16" circular needles from Knitpicks and two balls of their new cotton sock yarn, Risata, in green. I started a sock from Sensational Knitted Socks (the 5-stitch repeat, toe-up Yarn-Over Cable.)

Nothing exciting has been cooked recently.
I haven't finished any books, either.

Ungrafting or degrafting?

Yesterday I realized I was making excuses about why I hadn't picked out the messed-up grafting on my Sidewinders.

You see, while grafting is tedious and time-consuming, I neither hate it nor fear it. I reserve those emotions for its close cousin: picking out grafting. I had some experience with this when I made my second sock. The first toe turned out fine (I was just blindly following directions), but something went wrong on the second toe and I had a nasty mess to pick out. If I look really closely at those toes, I can still tell which came first and which came second!

And then yesterday I had an unexpected hour of freedom: no children, no urgent errands, nothing to occupy me but the men's quarterfinals of Wimbledon and my Sidewinder. So I very slowly and carefully unstitched my stitches during each commercial and change-over. It took me the entire hour to undo five grafted stitches. (Federer won. So did Djokovic.)

I'm off for a weekend at Mystic, where no complicated knitting will occur.

Early Morning Knitting

I had high hopes of showing you a finished Sidewinder; alas, my enthusiasm for the sock overcame my common sense and I tried to graft the long seam late at night. I was about 5 arduous stitches into the process when I realized I had the right sides together, rather than the wrong sides. At this point I abandoned the poor sock and went to bed.

At 5:30 this morning, I was awakened to handle an overflowing diaper.

Since I do, occasionally, learn from my prior mistakes, I did not attempt to unpick my grafting this morning. Instead, I put another 20 rows on my son's blanket, which is in garter stitch and therefore requires fewer brain cells.

I think it's all blanket knitting for me today: even two mugs of tea can't shake the fog out of my brain.

Welcome!

Why a blog?
Well, the short answer is that I got sick of being called "sadly blogless" by everyone around me.

What will I post about?
My three current passions in life: knitting, reading, and cooking. (My other passions include math and my family, but those aren't likely to make the blog.)

Currently reading: "Blood and Iron" by Elizabeth Bear and "Rainbows End" by Vernor Vinge.
Currently knitting: a Sidewinder sock, a blanket for my older son, and a Little Leaf Lace Scarf
Most recently cooked: a lovely salad with arugula, toasted pine nuts, roasted beets, a few cherry tomatoes, and a little blue cheese crumbled on top. Dressed it with a homemade dressing of olive oil, rice wine vinegar, salt, and pepper.