What's This???

The first pair of socks on the left and #1 purple splendor on the right.
Can you believe it? I obviously have some "work" to do on lighting. I am excited that a picture finally transferred! Now I know that the heel on the single purple splendor sock on the right looks like I must have mutant heels. I don't. It's a function of how I just plunked the sock down and snapped the photo in an attempt to attempt the process again. So now, onward!
I actually have been knitting on the second purple sock--about 3 inches so far and the lace pattern in a little better. The goobers are smaller. Next socks will be plain ribbed, I am sure about this. Work has been busy this week, so knitting time has been minimal. Next weekend, I will be on vacation, so I should have plenty of time for knitting, especially on the airplane.

Bah on the Pictures!

I am frustrated! I spent a great deal of time working with the picture posting problem. I know there is probably a simple explanation why my test photo is grey! Has anyone used Picasa? This is the program that blogger uses for posting pictures. I followed the instructions. I need tech support!
I will try again when my frustration level has receded a bit.
Yesterday was guild afternoon. Knitters of the North. I assumed the role of Charity Coordinator. The current project is knitting teddy bear sweaters for our July "Teddy Bear Picnic". We will have the Police and Fire departments attending this picnic at which time we will be donating 4o very cute teddy bears, all with hand-knitted sweaters. I started my bear sweater yesterday and have the front completed. There *will* be a picture when I get the photo loading stuff worked out. More about charity knitting in the future...
I am almost finished with the sock. It has so many goobers, but I will wear it proudly. I will immediately start the twin. I will not succumb to the dreaded SSS because I am determined that the second sock will show improvement. Positive thinking.
The current interest is socks and teddy bear sweaters. I admit that my attention span is way too short. So, besides socks, I am resolving to complete UFOs over the summer and not get sucked into the new project black hole. That and a lot of other resolutions.

This is the quilt I made for my Mom's 85th birthday: March 14, 2004 

A Special Visit

Divided entry for those interested only in the Knitting Content: see below!

Family Content
My son and his wife from Juneau are visited last week! (DS#2 and DDIL#2). Not to be confused with DS and DDIL who live here in Anchorage. This is the younger son, the little trouble-making, tech-supporting, air-traffic controlling, cold-water scuba diving, piano-playing, fast-swimming person that we all miss since he lives an airflight away. We always have been a "close" family; we have always been each other's friends. After all, I stayed home most of their growing-up years to be a home-schooling (non-knitting) mom. Life changes. I miss my "boys" but am happy to trust my DDILs to care for them!
We had a blast: lots of shopping, lots of good food and conversation. So blessed to have some hugs from far-away! We will see them again in a few weeks in Portland! Both the DDILs like to knit, so that is always a fun topic of conversation. For Mother's Day I was given a lovely skein of hand-spun, hand-dyed 50% silk/50% merino yarn from an artist in Sitka. Pictures to follow. The yarn wants to be a shawl.
Speaking of Mother's Day, we were also blessed to have breakfast with DS and DDIL before going to church. And I received a lovely corsage and a goody bag of lavender bath products! DH gave me a large Hummel figurine! I have lots of pictures to post.
Knitting Content
I have been really, really bad. Bad = new yarn. Sock yarn.
Yarn like "Lorna's Laces", "Regia Stretch", and "Lang's Jawoll color". I have definate plans. Well, maybe more indefinate than definate. All I did was go to get some wood #5 dpns last night, and what do you think was going on at a LYS? They were unwrapping bags of yarn. The owner showed me this because I said "You guys have such a nice assortment of sock yarn". She immediately told me about the fabulous stretch yarn and how nicely it worked up. I couldn't resist. I will have a pair of stretch socks before snow flies! (Remember, this is Alaska. Not a comment for the faint of heart!) Why did I need a pair of #5 dpns? For a baby hat. Co-workers, cousins, etc are all having babies fairly soon. I tried with aluminum needles, but maybe because I am still a new knitter, whatever, I have a problem with yarn jumping off slick metal. Now I own crystal palace bamboo...love it. But something bad happened over the weekend to my crystal palace bamboo #1.5s. I discovered a tip broken off! In the kind process of "no problem, I can fix this" (from DH when I asked where in the monster garage I could find sandpaper) the needle became quite short. Warning: if you attempt to insert a dpn in a power drill and hold sandpaper at the end while the power drill saves on "elbow grease" you must use extreme caution. Crystal Palace bamboo dpns are not that durable. For my household, there should be a warning on the label: Caution: do not attempt to use these knitting needles with electric drills. This will invalidate the warranty. Well, I now have a much shorter needle with odd points, but still useable. Needless to say, the finish is gone, but maybe I can come up with some non-power solution for that.
So I was only dead in the water for a short time: my Purple splendor socks are still in progress. I am inching down the foot on #1. I can hardly wait to wear them. I am hoping the lace will go better on the second sock. It's not hard at all, but I keep messing it up, miss-counting or something.
Other than that, I have not gotten in too much trouble. I am enjoying the Yarn Harlot's book. I also found the Winter 2003 Interweave Knits at the LYS with the pattern for the flower facecloths. For a view of these, go see Poor Miss Finch and what she made for Mother's Day.

Purple splendor socks

I can't wait to post a picture. Tech support arrives on Wednesday. Tech support may be way too busy to get my photos posted or we may decide to ditch the whole blog and move it to typepad... who knows? I may have to figure it out all by myself.
In the meantime, good news: doggie therapy is quite recovered from her output escapades of last week. She finished her antibiotics today! We have normal output, and back to doggie kibbles instead of gourmet meals. I will put the rice cooker back in the pantry!
Purple splendor lace socks are coming along fine. It's a rhythm of lace. I hope they fit. I have made so many mistakes, but I don't care enough to frog. (The second sock will be better, I can feel it.) The way I see it, if anyone gets close enough to my legs to pick out the mistakes in my purple socks, we have a bigger problem than the mistakes in the sock.
Other than that, I am doing quite a bit of cleaning up, cleaning out and organizing of my "stash" as well as other paperwork type stuff. Not much knitting going on here. I did look at this today. Hard to beat the prices! Knit Picks or Elann? Choices, choices. Oh, wait. I'm not buying anything! I keep forgetting. For those who need help with the stash problem, read this.