Random

And there it is.

Yellow!

And next up is a second yellow for 11 rows.

And that is how random works.

Of socks and blankets

I spent the afternoon yesterday working on Amy's blanket.  It was interesting.  You know how they get to the point where the inside batting lets go and clumps up.  That is where this blanket was.  I opened one side to take that out.  It was attached on 2 places and I had to leave some batting attached so that the outer fabric stayed whole. The stuffing is free and out of the bag so to speak. 

Today I have to get the new inside ready.  I got a polyester duvet to go back inside and oddly enough, it is slightly larger than this vintage blanket.  I have to cut off a few inches from one side and about 10 inches from the other.  In some ways, this is going to be the most challenging part of this project.  

In knitting, I had some fun, but still no yellow.

I was kind of hoping for some yellow, but randomness does not yet include yellow.  Yet.  It is entirely possible that the next sock could be all yellow.  There is also a starling sameness to the number of rows.  There are only 2 thin stripes with most being between 7 and 12 rows.  

It a weird sort of fun but fun all the same.  There will be more socks and blanket work today.  Time to get some tea and get moving with the day.

Letting go

I was starting to worry that 4 of my colours were just going to repeat and that the last two were not going to make it in.  True randomness let's this happen.  

It's a bit hard to see but I am working with my darkest yarn, Gentry Grey in Kroy.  The colour it is next to is the dark green.  This is the smallest contrast of all the yarns.  The only colour that has not made it into the sock is yellow.  

I am really enjoying knitting this way.  It is a bit challenging to let go and just let things happen but it's a good time of year to to practice accepting what ever comes.  

Have a great knitting day.  I plan to.

The Adventure Begins

Advent socks are begun!

I picked my yarns 

and am aware of some 'holes' in my sock yarn collection.  I could have used a purple or a royal blue to replace the dark grey black and I wish my green had been a brighter teal.  I did think about using a multi colour but my multis in those colours are striping multis and that just didn't feel right.  These are all commercial yarns so that I can wash and dry my socks in machines.  If I was using hand dyed yarns there would be so many more options but that defeats the dryer drying.  These yarns may not be spectacular but I already have them, and they are all good quality yarns.

Since I couldn't  find a regular dice, and since Keith was at work and couldn't give me his 12 sided dice, I used a random number generator to begin.  I numbered my colours, from 1 to 6, yellow, green, turquoise, red, black, orange.  First roll of the dice said 2, so toe number 1 is green.  I meant to only do the toe, but it felt kind of fun.  Roll 2 gave me 6 and 7, so orange, yarn 6,  for 7 rows.  I still felt like knitting so on to another roll. That gave me 4 and 9 so red for 9 rows.  

And so on.  You should try this.  It's a fun way to approach knitting a pair of socks.  I am going to keep good track on my Ravelry page as the rows and numbers grow and change.  

I am knitting for a bit this morning and then I will get to work on my other advent project.  So many things to do.  I love Christmas.

 

Advent Adventures

This morning, to accompany my tea, I am digging in yarn.  I can't think of anything more delightful than this except possibly for knitting.  

I am planning to do some advent knitting to make some socks.  Mijn Wolden did some chaos socks for Socktober where she shook a dice to choose the colour of yarn and then shook again to choose the number of rows to knit in that colour.  It was fun to watch so I thought I would do that for my Advent socks. 

And that is why I am digging in the sock yarn today.  

This is my entire sock yarn stash  except for this.

This is what I kept close at hand in case I needed to knit socks and didn't want to dig for some.

I am a wee bit picky about socks.  I love strong contrast and have a very clear idea of colours as I like them to be put together.  YMMV.  It is a thing that I think is pretty individual to each of us, so your way of putting colours together may be quite different to mine.  The idea of using a dice to make the choices for me, is the tiniest bit scary.  Still, I learned a lot about colours as I knit the Flea sweater this year. Letting go can be fun.  

Step one is to pick 6 yarns. Or maybe it should be 6 pairs of yarns.  If I do pairs, there should be a strong contrast between the two yarns.  If I do 6 single skeins, there should be good contrast between all of them.  Then I have to number the yarns or pairs of yarns from one to six for a regular dice.

Next, I have to talk to Keith.  He has a bunch of dice, the fancy gaming kind.   I am going to use a 12 sided dice for my row counting dice.  

And then I have to knit.  Today the goal is two garter toe squares.  

I do have another advent goal.  Amy gave me a blanket to fix in the spring and December is the time to focus on it so I can give it back to her at Christmas.  Knitting for me may take a back seat for a bit except for the sock knitting.  So it goes.