WIP Wednesday: 14th August 2019: Cracker joke

Hello! Today is WIP (work in progress) Wednesday, my weekly look at what is currently on my needles. If you'd like to join in, let me know what you're working on in the comments section, or post a link to your own WIP Wednesday blog post.

What goes black, white, black, white, black, white? It’s either a penguin rolling down a hill, or it’s all my current knitting projects!

First up for black and white projects is my sock snake, which is nearing completion. At first I had predicted that I would need the snake to be about 34 inches long, but that was way off, and, having done some maths, I’m now aiming for a much more reasonable 26 inches. The marker is at 20 inches, so there really isn’t much more to go. Once I have a tube of the correct length, I’ll add a pink toe, then go back and add in the other toe, two cuffs and two heels and will have a pair of socks. I’m not sure whether or not I’ve really enjoyed this project, but it has been great summer holiday knitting as it requires precisely no thought once you’ve done the maths to work out how long to make the tube. I’m knitting these socks for my Marathon Sock KAL, which is ongoing in my Ravelry group and on Ravelry. Full details can be found here. The zebra-striped yarn is from Paintbox Yarns,* and was donated for review purposes. Paintbox Yarns have donated several balls of sock yarn as prizes for the KAL, so to be in with a chance of winning a ball, get knitting some socks!

My second black and white project isn’t one I can share, beyond this little peep of some black and white striped stocking stitch. Keep your eyes peeled later in the year to see what these stripes become.

What are you working on this WIP Wednesday?

*Affiliate link.

FO Friday: Whale Hoodie

Hello, and welcome to another Finshed Object Friday. The FO for this week is a cute little hoodie that I've made as a gift for a friend's new son who made his appearance late last year.

Last year I was sent some samples of Paintbox Yarns Baby DK* for review purposes, and knew that the soft yarn and gentle colours would be perfect for a baby garment. I'd been sent four shades of blue, and some red, and from those I picked out three shades of blue that looked lovely together, and added a little Sirdar Snuggly DK from stash to add some neutral stripes (and to make sure I had enough yarn - baby yarn comes in 50 g balls, and I wasn't sure three balls would be enough. Hoods take a lot of knitting!).

I was a bit behind the game with this baby, who arrived at the end of last year, so I decided that I needed to make a 6 month size garment rather than something smaller. I opted for a modified Rainbow Child, which is a good basic top-down seamless hoodie that I have made before. I decided against adding the pockets or the i-cord edging on the basis that babies don't really need pockets (although they are cute) and I don't like all the extra knitting i-cord edges entail, especially when I'm knitting to a deadline.

I restricted this project to weekend-knitting only project, and, as ever, expected to finish rather faster than I actually did, partly because I messed up the hood decreases and had to rip back, and partly because I underestimated the amount of time it would take to knit the hood and pick up all the stitches for the egding.

I finshed the hoodie with some whale buttons - it was either those or rainbow stars, but I'm saving those for something for my daughter.**

The finished garment is really cute, and looks like it should have plenty of growing room, so should get plenty of wear.

This hoodie is defintely not the end of the baby projects as I know lots of people expecting babies at the minute, including a set of twins!

Have you finished anything recently?

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Rainbow Child Ravelry project page
Pattern: Rainbow Child by Tiny Lovely Knits
Yarn: Paintbox Yarns Baby DK* in 737 Midnight Blue, 732 Washed Teal and 761 Baby Blue, and Sirdar Snuggly DK* in 303 Cream

*Affiliate link.
**I really need to sort the button box! I'm sure I have other suitable options, but couldn't find them.

FO Friday: Mind the Gap socks

I feel like it's been ages since I shared any sock knitting on the blog, but that doesn't mean there haven't been any socks on the needles: my Finished Object Friday post today is all about my Mind the Gap socks.

You may remember that I cast these socks on for my Little Bobbins Knits Christmas Eve Cast On, an annual event organised by Little Bobbins Knits, and my very favourite sort of knitalong: cast on some socks on the same day, and post about them and share photos of them on social media as and when you can. These socks were cast on on Christmas Eve 2017, and finally finished on February 16th, when I had a mad blitz of an evening getting them done.

This yarn had been in my stash for a long time, possibly over 18 months, but I had been a bit scared of not doing the yarn justice in my earlier sock-knitting days and had always selected other yarn over it. But by Christmas Eve, the yarn's time had finally come. The yarn is based on the London Underground (the Tube) Map, with each colour representing a different Tube line. The yarn is pretty spectacular, with twelve different coloured stripes (and, rumour has it, each dyelot has a different stripe order).

I decided that I would knit the heels, cuffs and toes using a neutral contrast, and a Fish Lips Kiss heel to avoid distorting the stripes around the heel and got to work. I had originally planned to use West Yorkshire Spinners Signature 4 ply* in Black for the contrast, until I realised that there was black in the stripes, and there was a risk of a black stripe ending up next to the contrast, so opted for the same yarn in Milk Bottle instead.

I knitted the first sock over the Christmas holidays, finishing it early in the new year. The second sock took longer, but the time I spent on it was very enjoyable. I decided that I wanted to maximise the amount of yarn I used, but didn't want offset stripes, so I reversed the direction I was knitting the yarn in for the second sock.

A minor added complication about using the two yarns together was that they knitted at different gauges. To compensate for this I knitted the cuffs, heels and toes over 64 stitches and the leg over 68. This meant I had to increase and decrease stitches as I moved between sections, which was less than ideal, especially as I forgot for the second sock and somehow ended up having to knit the heel three times. I did get there in the end though!

And here are the finished socks. I love them, and their crazy bright mismatched nature.

I have enough yarn left that I should be able to knit a second pair using the stripes for the legs and something else for the feet, heels, toes and cuffs. I'm quite looking forward to doing that, and they might even match (or not...).

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Mind the Gap socks Ravelry project page
Pattern: Fish Lips Kiss by Sox Therapist
Yarn: West Yorkshire Spinners Signature 4 ply* in 10 Milk Bottle and Mind the Gap by Trailing Clouds

*Affiliate link