Archive for the ‘Friday Favorites’ Category

Friday Favorites: Personal Sock Favorites

Now, before I start my list of Top 10 socks, these are not necessarily ones that I have knit, but ones that I covet and are definitely on my list of to-do socks.  They are all pretty well known, well-tested, and well-written from the notes of others that have knitted these lovely socks.  These are in no particular order, because I can’t ever decide which I like best.

Here goes!

  • River Rapid Socks – very aptly named, it looks like 2 rivers intertwined, and I think it’s just a beautiful design.
  • Duckies – Nice lace ladders that just really caught my eye.
  • Nutkin – I recently got some Dream in Color Smooshy in the aptly named “Bark” with the intention of knitting these socks.  I sure hope that the yarn isn’t too dark to show off the beautiful design, but I am super excited about this.
  • Hermione’s Everyday Socks – I knitted these for my mother, and with alllll the other sock patterns out there, I would knit these again in a heartbeat…I really like how they look after having been worn, and they were easy peasey to knit.  Fun, easy, on-the-go pattern.
  • Diagonal Lace Socks – These are toe-up.  Intimidating as hell.  I try and try to figure the start out, but my eyes glaze over and I give up before too long.  I will master it one day though, because I do remember a day in time that I said I could never knit socks…and well, here I am posting about my to-do list for my favorite socks.
  • Charade – this looks like it will be great in solid, variegated, or self-striping yarn.  Very pretty and very popular!
  • Earl Grey – Yarn Harlot.  Man socks.  Classy, my FAVORITE man socks that I have seen to date.  Don’t need to say anything else, me thinks.
  • Clandestine – Cookie A love.  She is just amazing.  The rest are Cookie A socks…there really is not much else to say besides she is a sock goddess, and I really look forward into delving into her amazing books head-on.
  • Monkey
  • Hedera – This is the sock that almost became a pair in my beautiful Panda Silk, but since I am so anti-gauge swatching (which has to change), it never worked out.  But this pair of socks WILL BE MINE, and hopefully soon.

Right now, I would love to be knitting one of these.  But…the munchkin comes first and I am knitting him a pair of normal ‘ole 2×2 rib socks.  He is so excited about it, I would be an idiot not for it to infect me and make me want to get these done for his sweet kid feet.

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Friday Favorites: Favorite blog post ever

I love Alana from Never Not Knitting.  She has a great blog, a great collection of patterns, and a fabu podcast.  But this blog post beats all others.  I think it’s just the cutest things, from the darling model and her expressions to the captions and descriptions…not to mention the DARLING pint-sized knits that Alana is oh-so-good at!

So, please check this post out to see just an example of Alana’s cleverness and creativity.  Her podcast and other blog posts are clever also, but this one just is a personal favorite!

Thank you, Alana, for the laughs, the creativity, and sharing your talent with all of us!

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Friday Favorites: Helpful links from Lion Brand

OK, yes, a day late.  The flu has knocked me on my butt.  I have most of a post sitting there for 3 days now that I have to totally redo because it doesn’t exactly fit context-wise anymore.  So I hope to get that updated tonight also, but for now, Friday Favorites!

I recently received an email from LB that talked about some helpful information they had on their site.

Yarn by Weight Class

Yarn Laundering Instructions

Dictionary to Knitting and Crochet Terms

About Yarn:  How much do I need to make a _____? (This link takes you right to the PDF version of this which is a little easier to read and ready to print!)

Of course some of it is LB specific, and they do hawk their wares on those pages, but it’s their website, right?  It still has some wonderful general information, LB fan or not.  And if you have ever worked with LB yarns, it gives you something to gauge the information with.

Thank you Lion Brand!

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Friday Favorites: Designers

Gorgeous, huh? Thanks to Frankie for permission to use her photo.

There were a couple that I wanted to do first, but when I thought about how I reacted when I first saw this designer’s patterns.  Frankie Brown was originally brought to my attention via the Knit Picks Podcast, and I was FLOORED when I saw her Ten Stitch Twist pattern.  Please go check her out.  She has some amazing designs, and they look like they would be a blast to create.  As soon as I can afford some long-stripe self-striping yarn (she used 14 balls of Kureyon, eek!) I am going to create this masterpiece.

I think the most commendable thing about Frankie, though, is that she offers her patterns for free but asks that if you like her work to please donate to the Children’s Liver Disease Foundation.  A clever designer with a big heart.  How much better does it get than that?

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Friday Favorites: Sweaters

I am trying to resurrect this.  This will be anything and everything knitting-related that has happened or brought to my attention for the last week.  Make sure you follow-up on these posts, because there will be links to techniques, pattern and book highlights…you just never know!  Some will be free, some will not be free, but whatever I put here I feel worthy of sharing!

Bear with me please while I try to decide how I want to do this.  To limit myself to shorter Friday Favorites, I think I am going to do categories or themes.  Otherwise I could really go on and on.  I will tag my Ravelry favorites with FridayFavorites for the ones that I put up here as Friday Favorites, so you can see all of them at once.  Don’t know if that helps, but there you go.  I am jawsie on Ravelry.  Feel free to add me if you would like, also!

So, without further ado, this week’s Friday Favorites!

Since it is still winter and will be for a couple more months here, that will be where I head on this week.  Here goes nothin:

Gretel – Cost:  $5.00.  Simple sweater with nice detailing at the top of the front, with side buttons.  Knit in the round from the bottom up.  I love, love this sweater.

Waiting for Spring Sweater

Audrey in Unst – Cost: $5.00.  A vintage-inspired cardigan with lace detailing at the top of the sweater.  It was originally designed as a shorter-length sweater, but I have seen others that have made it longer and it really is a flattering knit.

Honeybee Cardigan – Cost: $6.50.  Once again, a shorter sweater, this one actually a cropped one that looks SUPER cute as is on certain bodies.  I have seen this one made to go past the hips and those FO’s were the ones that really made me fall in love with this one.  The lace pattern taken all the way down on the longer versions is so beautiful.

Leaving – Cost: $8.00.  This sweater is gorgeous.  You have the option of creating this as a cardigan or a pullover, and both are equally beautiful.  I lean toward the cardigan just because I am more of a cardigan gal.  The center back and front have a leaf motif, as do the cuffs of the arms.

I think I am going to stop there.  This is new to me but I want to have a blog that is full of content, not just excuses and bitching about how I can’t keep my focus on any one project.  I am kind of picky when it comes to purchasing patterns because there are so many amazing free patterns out, but I am all about supporting our knitterly designers, and I will do so when I really love a pattern because I want them to keep creating these beautiful knits!

So bear with me…if you have any ideas to make this blog more interesting, one you would read, or content I can add, I would appreciate it.  As far as I know nobody even reads this, so I liken it to talking to myself as I do while I sit here (crazy much? haha), but it is also a diary of sorts just for me to keep track of my knitting and why I am/am not finishing projects.

So if you are out there, let me know!

Until next time,

J

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