FO: Rhiannon Knee Socks for Mandy

(click for bigger)

These have been done for awhile too, although not since August, like Sam's. More like late-September/early October. These socks will be showing up for Mandy at Christmas, which I feel a little bad about since everyone else has had their socks for awhile now. But it is a more appropriate time to get knee socks....so I guess it all works out. And now for the really satisfying part of finishing them:

1. Charade socks for Brian
2. River Rapid socks for Jennie
3. Vinnland socks for Van
4. Millicent socks for Sam
5. Rhiannon socks for Mandy
6. Spiral boots socks for Leila
   
7. Socks for Mom
8. Socks for Stepdad
9. Something sockish for Dani (possibly booties?)
   
10. Indestructible socks for Jon

On to the knitting specs!

Yarn - maybe 3 1/2 skeins of possibly Lang Jawoll Cotton (49% new wool, 35% cotton, and 16% nylon)? I'm really not sure about the yarn. It's a great thing black and green tweed with a strang of gold running through it, and I know I picked something with a decent amount of cotton in it so that Mandy's legs would bake in the socks. I'm pretty sure that it's Lang Jawoll because it came with reinforcement thread (which I totally didn't use), and I think that brand does that. Note to self - take better notes.

Needles - addi turbo 1's, same as Sam's

Pattern - Rhiannon by Cookie A. Again, I didn't actually read the pattern, just references the charts (noticing a pattern with this?). Here are the mods...well the one's I'm aware of and remember making:

• worked it toe up with a short row heel. Woo! Toe up 4-eva!
  
• according to Mandy's measurements, I bet the calf shaping got tweaked a bit. I ended up increasing every other row about 2 inches past the ankle
• I didn't knit foldover cuffs, just ribbed ones
• I threaded elastic thread around the top edge of the cuffs to prevent them from falling down, like Leila and Sam's reportedly have been doing (Note to Leila and Sam: check out the inside of Mandy's socks to see how you should fix yours, if you so desire).

Updates abound!

Oh, knitting blog (and the odd reader who may or may not be perusing this), I have so many exciting things to tell you about! I'll keep it short and sweet though and get straight to the point, though.

1. Knitting News
I started the last of the need-to-be-knitted-ASAP socks of the sock queue, and I'm making pretty quick progress on them. They're Rhiannon knee socks that are destined for my sister's best friend's sister, Mandy, who is awesome, and very much deserving of such cool cabled knee socks.


I'm finding the cable charts way easier to memorize than the lace chart for the Millicent knee socks I just finished, even though the snaking side cables are worked on a different number of rows per repeat than the main cable which can be tricky to keep track of. More proof that cabling comes a lot more naturally to me than lace knitting, I guess.

2. Face News


Check it out! My super-fancy new glasses finally arrived! Aren't they awesome?? I've wanted a pair of white framed for awhile now, although I'm not really sure why. They fit well, I love them, and feel like it was totally worth it to splurge on literally the only thing I am guaranteed to wear every day for the foreseeable future.

The coolest thing about them, though? Definitely the back/top. See?


3. Best Souveneir Ever News
After hanging with Jon's family last week, we went to New York to visit Tamar and whisk her away to the house her family owns in the Hamptons (yes, THOSE Hamptons. How badass is that?). Our many adventures frolicking along the seashore will most likely be detailed by my esteemed guest blogger, Jon , so stay tuned for that. The reason I'm bringing this up is that at the beach house, we stumbled across the following book:


Quite a title, right? Intrigued, we starting reading it and found out that it was a Cold War era novel written in the most heavy handed style possible in the mid '60s. Let's just say that it really should have had a subtitle along the lines of "Or, Why ICBMs Totally Suck and Endanger the Free World." This just about sums up the tone of the book:


Seriously, though? Grab a copy of this if you ever get an oppurtunity. It has characters named Skipper and Pixie! And sometimes the characters use the term 'balls' as an exclamation of skepticism and/or disbelief, which Jon and I totally have adopted wholeheartedly. Here's an example of how best to use it, in case you're interested:

Me: You know you really need to watch your portion sizes.

Jon: My portion sizes are fine! I don't eat that much....

Me: Balls, man! In the last three hours, you've eat four sandwhiches! Unless you're in the Olympics, you can't possibly be that hungry.

Jon: Touche.

4. Cat News
Last but not least, I have a video for you! During his last trip to the vet, Fatty was deemed truly deserving of his nickname and we were warned that he was in danger of becoming diabetic if he gained much more weight. So we decided to take action! We've spent a good portion of the summer acclimating Fatty to a harness, and then holding him out on our landing, in order to prepare him to start being walked on a leash. Recently, we've made great progress on that front.