Cold Feet, Warm Heart

Remember I mentioned that I finished some secret Christmas knitting while out of town las week?  Well, there I was, minding my own business in a huge yarn store when I ran out of knitting.  What's a girl to do?  Okay, I admit, I may have promised myself that I could get some new yarn if I finished that Christmas project while I was there, but I'm sure you'll agree that either way, I had full impunity.

Maybe it was the sparkly dusting of snow all around in Spokane, maybe I was seized by a whim for something s bit special, but there it was, right there in front of me:  The just right, light-colored, glinty yarn that I was in the mood for.  It's Scholler + Stahl Fortissima Disco, color 04.  Get some for yourself, or somebody glittery you know here.

I love my new "Magic Carpet" sock pattern so much in its original yarn that I wanted to see what it would look like in a light color.  I was right to love this pattern, even if I did make it up myself.  Totally addictive knitting: Challenging-but-not-too challenging at the beginning, and changes to simple but satisfying for the rest of the piece.  The slip stitch pattern makes it easy to count rows, and you don't even have to look at the pattern unless you want to.

Get a load o' them sparkles, will ya?  I bet you know someone who needs socks like these. 

I, for one, have decided to parlay Phillip's complaints that my feet are cold all the time into a Sock-Making Justification Project.  Imagine the sock yarn stash this could afford me:  Documented Foot Frigidity.  He's always saying it: "Get those offa me - they're cold!"  By my calculation, that means I'm allowed all the sock yarn I want;  I'm doing it for him.  Sigh. The things we put ourselves through for love...
 

Comfort and Joy

The Catkins project falters at the threshold of its very inception.  I made a tactical error in the color choices, resulting in my old friend "not enough contrast".  This error seems to be one of my greatest hits.  Sometimes I worry it will end up on my tombstone:
 
"Here Lies Mary, who failed to choose colors with adequate contrast."

I knew something was wrong from the start, but my powers of denial being what they are (epic), I plowed ahead anyway.  Good thing I started small with a sleeve, which I only knitted halfway up before admitting that it was flatly All Wrong.  I know what to do - it just requires a visit with my new pals at Toots LeBlanc to sort it out.  Logistical bother, nothing more.  But disappointing, nonetheless.

Other things went sideways for me yesterday, as well.  A gargantuan project at the day job has completely derailed, so there I am further unfulfilled. 

Casting about for solace in the knitting pile (I used to call it "the knitting basket", which has long since overflowed and now fools no one; not even me) I picked up the Knot Garden.  Sleeve two is well underway, and greeted me like a good book I'd forgotten to finish.  Close as it is to completion, I gave it a few more rows.  I just wanted something to show for the day, even if it was only one more set of twists.  

It feels good to sit with an old and patient friend.  I lightened up, beginning even to fantasize about wearing the Knot Garden to Madrona in February.  Could happen.  There's only this one sleeve to go, after all.  At times like these, even the possibility of completion helps. 

Thin as I am spread at the moment, tangible progress is more precious to me than usual.  And there it was, waiting for me with the reliability that only knitting can offer.  Knitting is dependably there to give solace in a world filled with failure, both real and imagined.  Making one stitch at a time is proof and reinforcement of our ability to do something right, hundreds of times at a stretch.  The world can be cold and the people in it mean and petty.  But knitting will never blame us for things over which we have no control.  Knitting doesn't care if the laundry is done or not.  Knitting beckons us to be still, and focus on one small thing at a time. 

Tidings of Comfort and Joy, indeed.
 

Salix caprea

And it came to pass that in that week, that the socks were sent away for tech editing, leaving our heroine at leisure to begin Something Completely Different.

And by Completely Different, I mean different from pretty much all my work, to date.  Different in that there are no man-made colors in this project.  Different in that it's a yarn with less elasticity than I would normally choose, and a lot more halo.  And probably a lot more drape, as well.

I give you "The Catikns Cardigan":

My initial swatch told me what I needed to know in terms of guage, but not much else, so I'm starting small, with a cuff and sleeve.  I'm thinking that any surprises this yarn has to offer me will appear before I start on the major acreage of the body.  My observations so far:  YUMMY.  This DK is a 50/50 blend of Alpaca and Jacob.  The gray on the skein is 60/40 Romeldale and Angora.  The former is soft and fuzzy, but with a fair bit of backbone, and the latter is absolute butter.  You already can see the halo on the skein, and it hasn't even been worked or washed.  It was that gray fluffy one that really inspired me first:  The minute I touched it, I thought of Pussy Willows.  And since "fuzzy" isn't normally the way I roll, nor is "undyed", I think this project is going to have a lot to teach me.

Lint roller, anyone?