The Joy of Sox

or "How the west was won". Or is that something else?

Anyway, I've discovered that I'm not entirely rubbish at knitting socks! Yay for me! More on that later; a magazine review, a toy and finally some Martha progress.

First of all, you may have noticed that my knit project tracker images have changed a little (see the sidebar to the right). Thanks to Celia Ng's significant other, Chris, I can now choose my own colours! Props due to Chris! (did I just say that?). If you'd like the code for your own blog, please, please, please, save the images to your own server. I suspect that someone(s) have been hotlinking some of my images and it pushed me over my bandwidth limit for two days. Five more days like that in June and I get kicked for a week :( - so please, please, please don't be a bandwidth thief! Public service broadcast now finished.

UK Knitting magazine: a review. Having taken a leaf from Queer Joe's ample book, here comes a personalised and opinionated review of the July 2005 issue. Remember, feel free to disagree with me at any/all point(s).

Fuchsia - a cropped l/s bolero made slightly worse by the addition of bobbles all over the place.
Point Edge Wrap (book extract) - garter stitch shawl - nice and simple but with some lace interest - quite good.
Poncho power - a crocheted poncho for kids - would you like to try and get jam and mud out of those tassels?
Heat Wave - cross-back halter top with lace bodice - really nice and simple, elegant knitwear
Accessories - to be fair, some of them look like hairballs. I think they are supposed to be flowers!
Hippy - a fair isle cropped tank top with a frill - - I'm just stunned into silence really.
Papaya - cropped peplum cardigan with a curved hem and ruffle - would probably look great on a 12 year old for Ballet class.
Blue Haze - a cotton aran-weight fair isle s/s top - I really like this and could actually consider making it.
Vanilla Pod - Irish moss stitch and cable baby jumper - really nice, good, baby wear.
Anarchy - I think it's supposed to be a scarf but it looks like several dead caterpillars sewn together.
Sky - v-neck tank top with lace bottom edging - again, I could see myself making this, but they spoilt the look with a knitted bow - why?
Ultraviolet - crocheted evening bag - simple, I would make it.
Ballet Class (book extract) - really lovely girl's ballet wrap cardigan. Now why can't they do that for use grown up girls?

Overall - could do better. I'm glad I cancelled my subscription now. It's a shame, because I was one of the first to subscribe right from Issue 1. There seems to have been some kind of editorial change ever since they went monthly. I just don't seem to like the styles anymore.

Now, on to the knitting.

The Lotus shawl is going slowly (but that's because I'm increasing four stitches every 2 rows)



I've done the decreases on the back of Martha



And I made this in three days!



As for the socks, imagine two rounds of 2/2 ribbing in dark blue sock wool. Imagine two socks on two circular needles, knitted from the top down. Now imagine me taking a photo of it!