FO-Summer Sweater, just in time

My sweater is finally complete! According to my mother, who saw the FO yesterday, it is unlike any other sweater she will see. She may be correct, but I would point out to you, if not to her, that there are a number of knitters who have knit similar sweaters with high ribbed collars, set-in sleeves, ribbed cuffs and a ribbed waist. Probably not so many in Louet MerLin though, as it does not seem to be as popular yarn as say, Cascade or Madelinetosh. This sweater is very similar to ankestrick's Romy or even Stefanie Japel's Short-Sleeved Cardigan with Ribbing (but with set-in sleeves instead of raglan, long-sleeves instead of short, and without the purled stripes. Yeah, just like it!).

I am particularly happy about the shoulders, as while I wish the Contiguous method were the one for me, I'm not completely happy with the shape of the shoulder caps with that method. Until someone figures out how to fix the pointiness (which no one else has remarked upon), I guess I will stick to The Tailored Sweater Method. It's fiddlier, but gives me the results I want.

A few notes to remember:
-the sweater was knit on size 5 needles, and the ribbing on size 4.
-the waist bind-off was with Jeny's incredible stretchy bind-off. I'm not sure that was necessary. For the button band ribbing, I did a regular bind-off on size 6 needles. For the sleeves, I did a regular bind-off on size 5 needles. I got lazy, and I haven't noticed any problems.

You can supposedly throw this yarn into the washer and dryer, but I'm not planning to. I'm just hoping it doesn't shrink remarkably and I'll be happy. The MerLin is very nice, but not very wooly (it's merino wool and linen, isn't that an interesting mix?). The upside is that I don't find it to be the slightest bit scratchy, aside from the stiffness of the linen, which I expect to lessen as the sweater gets more use.

Now, onto the future! I have five skeins of Madelinetosh Tosh Chunky and I plan on reknitting Owls with it. After that, I have three skeins of Madelinetosh Pashmina, and five skeins of Dream in Color Smooshy, so I'll have to decide on which project, exactly, I want to do. I'm on a yarn diet this year, and unfortunately it seems that I'm knitting so slow it won't make much of a difference. The rate of decrease in stash is very slow. Well hi there.

Trash, treasure

Awhile ago I knit my mother a pair of socks. They were from the then-new Alpaca Sox yarn, and I knit them double-stranded in the Coriolis pattern. She liked the colors and found them comfy and warm, although more like a pair of shoes because they were so stiff. Anyway, that was years ago. The bottoms started getting worn, and holes finally developed. And she wanted to fix them.

When I first started knitting socks, I had not learned to appreciate nylon and thus, had started with Fly Designs' Monarch yarn (it is 100% merino and very soft and squishy). I am not a fast knitter, nor do I have much time, what with homeschooling two small children. The socks did not last long. I held onto them for years, thinking I would darn them. My mother-in-law even gave me an antique darning mushroom for Christmas one year, which strengthened my resolve to fix those holey socks. And eventually, one day, when the kids were down napping and I didn't have anything else to do and I could concentrate, I sat down to darn.

The finished results were ugly (I have no pictures to corroborate this fact, you'll have to take my word at it). They were bumpy. The socks felt quite uncomfortable there, despite my finest efforts and the fact that I'd saved the leftover sock yarn for just such occasions. Nonetheless, I held onto my old, holey socks for a few years, until last year in fact, thinking I would eventually get around to it. But last year I gave up hope, decided I would never enjoy wearing darned socks, and threw them out.

Alas, what a tragic mistake. Let's fast forward back to my mother with a pair of holey socks. She wanted to know how to fix them, so I pulled up videos on duplicate stitch and how to weave to fix holes in socks. I gave her the darning mushroom, needle and matching yarn. She patiently sat darning, an entire afternoon, her pair of socks. And now the holes are woven over, filled. She's delighted. And she wants me to send her all of my holey socks, because the way the patches feel do not bother her.

On one point I'm relieved to know that holey socks will have a second life (we have approximately the same shoe size, so this works out wonderfully). But at the same time, I'm a bit horrified that I'm giving her my cast-offs, my trash, to use a harsher word. I've knit her a number of pairs of socks, and she wears them all but on the hottest summer days so I know she gets use out of them (unlike my mother-in-law, for whom I've knit three pairs and I've never seen her wear a single pair). But still.

My mother would look at it from a practical standpoint and see that we both gain--I get rid of holey socks I can't wear, and in her viewpoint, she gets a new pair of socks. She used to only wear sandals (we live in Southern California so this is not terribly unusual) but ever since she's been accumulating handknit socks, she's been wearing clogs so that she can also wear said socks.

Now if I only hadn't thrown out all of those years' worth of holey socks. She would have been set.

The Best Vacation Ever

Last month I had the Best. Vacation. Ever.  Hubby and I took a cruise through the Inside Passage of Alaska. We looked at glaciers calving. We listened to nature guides and national park rangers. We hiked and floated down a river in Skagway, did a really awesome hike in Juneau (and since it was on my birthday, I think it was also the Best Birthday Ever), and took in the sights in Ketchikan (Totem Heritage Center, Salmon Fishery and Married Man's Trail, which coincidentally, was from a residential area to what used to be the red light district). Then we'd get back on the ship, get dressed and have nice dinners. 

So I've decided to share some vacation photos. First we have a picture of a moose nibbling the shrubbery in an Anchorage backyard:

 And this is a picture of the Hubbard Glacier, with a boat in the picture for reference:

 These were some of the gigantic dandelions we saw in Skagway:

 and this was a ptarmigan in the Canadian Rockies:

 More of the Canadian Rockies:

 We passed a sign while hiking in Skagway:

 Here's a close-up of the post. A bear used it as a scratching post, you can see some of its fur stuck in the gouges:

 This is a bald eagle flying overhead. It was amazing how loud its wings were:

 The next day we hiked up to a summit of Mount Roberts. This is when we reached the snow line:

 These are pictures of bear prints on the trail we took.:

 And this is a picture we did not see until we had finished our hike up, go figure. Part of the trail

 There are very pretty stained glass decorations around the pier by the cruise ships:

 and totem poles here and there:

 This one is a replica of another, and in front of the Totem Heritage Center:

 A wall decoration and a boat:

 Look closely at those totems in the picture. The one on the right was commissioned by a woman who'd married a white man (that's a white man with a top hat on the very top of it); the ones on the left I think were to commemorate the tribe meeting white men for the first time. They used a picture of Abraham Lincoln as reference. These cracked me up.

The week after we got back, Hubby got so sick he was bedridden for days and I was extra busy. Things are better now, and thus, I can post.

And last, but not least, I think because these pictures were taken with my cell phone,

A picture of a bear print with my hand as reference,

 The insane number of shoes I ended up packing for said Alaskan cruise (high heels for formal nights, lower heels for "smart casual" dining nights, sneakers for exercising in the fitness center, hiking boots for hiking, Crocs for hot tub/swimming situations, and Birkenstocks for general hanging out on the boat):

 Another picture of a giant dandelion, this time with Hubby's hand as reference. A man's hand. And look at the size of that thing. In Anchorage at 11pm it was still light, so all of that extra sunlight sure seems to prolong the growing up there.

Ptarmigan, the tasty state bird of Alaska

We didn't actually get to eat it, but we were told that ptarmigan is very tasty.

City moose

Just wanted to post a picture of a moose nibbling on someone's hedges in downtown Anchorage.