Here you can see one finished and the other well on its way
And here they are! A pair of hand knit socks. I was surprised at how simple socks are, things like short rows, turning the heel, picking up stitches for the gusset... all sounded so scary but were relatively simple. Not to say these two are without flaw though, I will have to get much better about my measuring, but for a first pair of socks I'd say they're perfect.
I recently finished a good deal of hats to be sent to a children's hospital in Maine. I mailed them to my sister who brought them to the yarn store that was running the collection. When my sister came to visit me she said that they liked them and that she had a surprise for me. The surprise was three cones of yarn and a request to knit afghans for Afghans. This in and of itself would not be a dilemma but I didn't have any instructions before I started and begin knitting up an easy feather and wave pattern from Seven Day Afghans which I was pretty happy with. After spending two whole days on this I finally read the instructions on the website where they state that afghans should not have lace patterns as these will not insulate properly. While I had been concerned about this initially seeing it in print made me realize that as much as I loved the results this blanket was not going to keep someone warm enough, and that's kinda the whole point. So, alas and alack, I took the whole thing apart and started again but with a mock fisherman cable pattern from the same book. Two repeats of the pattern in and it started to look too lacy too!! So I rewrote the pattern and will be showing the results as I get a little farther into it.
While the afghan is slow going I've at least had some success lately. This little ipod sock came from a great pattern on Smariek Knits and is an easy and fast project. I believe these and other adaptations of ipod socks will be making a strong showing as Christmas presents next year along with other knit goodies!
Obviously I have a knitting addiction. Now that that's out of the way, look at my newest baby!
Lace Leaf knit hat, WEEEE!!
My first successful lace knit project and I could not be happier or prouder.
The first of my "knitting for myself" projects, this hat calls for a coronet style cable band joined to the rest of the hat, it's supposed to be rolled up as a brim but I found that to be a little chunky, so instead i flipped it inside out and left the band down. My friend Marti pointed out that the shape of it now resembles a hat from the 20's or 30's and I like to think that's all part of its charm.
Which means I have been involved in "Hat Knitting Frenzy Part II." During the first part I knit 10 hats in 14 days for a children's hospital in Maine. Then I took a brief hiatus to make my Mom's birthday present (shown in bottom picture).
Once my Mom's birthday presents were done (the matching hat, scarf and mittens you see below) I decided it was time to make a hat that would go on my own head!
I've been obsessing over Ravelry and Knitty.com, great knitting inspiration and the sources of all the patterns you see here, and I printed out a couple different hats that I was dying to make for myself. Although admittedly some of them will be for 30 years from now when I'm able to handle the complexity some of the patterns call for. 
When I said curling up in bed with my knitting I wasn't kidding. This was when I had the flu that's been going around, and since being vertical wasn't feasible I spent most of my sick time in bed with my knitting watching seasons of Friends. 
My Mom's finished hat!
Before anyone starts to worry about the hat extravaganza, or how many heads I may have that I would need this many hats, let me explain that I've been knitting for kids in a hospital in Maine. My sister let me know that there was a knitting collective so the kids could go out and play with hats on their heads rather than towels. This turned out to be the perfect project for me, since I love to knit hats but have run out of heads to knit them for, so ta-da, a whole new crop of heads needing hand knit hats!
So far I have knit nine hats (my roommate decided she needed one so I knit one up as an early birthday present for her). My latest is the above pink cable knit wonder. I was lucky enough to find out that one of my friends is a knitter extraordinaire and she shared the joys of cable knitting with me, this was my first cable knit project and I'm pretty amazed at how it turned out, figuring out how to do the shaping at the top without a pattern caused me to curse a lot and get a headache, but it has no major holes and is in fact hat shaped!
