Friday Knitting Blog (12/30/2011)

And away we go, last knitting blog of 2011.  Lots of links in this entry, brace yourself. 

Here (down a way actually; I'm chatty tonight) are the last socks for the year. I originally started them back in August immediately after Sock Summit (ahh, Sock Summit) but ran into size issues. They were just a touch too small for me, and considering how much I spent on the yarn (between $25 and $30 ~ I got me some fancy-ass yarn at SS),  and the relatively fanciness of the pattern, there was in way in hell  these were going to be for anyone but me. Click on the pictures to make them bigger if you like. 

Project Specifications
Name: Turquoise Gothic Kai-Mei (link to my Ravelry project page).
Pattern: Kai-Mei, found in Sock Innovation by Cookie A.  This is the 2nd pattern I've made from this book, but certainly not the last.
Yarn: Merilon Sock by Black Trillium Fibre Studio (I got it at Sock Summit, and I haven't seen this color, Turquoise Gothic, on the etsy site, but I haven't looked really hard).
Needle: US 1.5 or 2.5 mm if you do metric (I really do prefer it myself).
Total time: August 19 to December 27, so like 4-1/2 months; however, they were in time out from about August 21 until December 11, and then it took me a couple of weeks to finish them up.

First picture is the outside of the right sock and the inside of the left sock (these ones are foot specific). 

 The outsides of both socks.

 The insides of both socks. 

The blue things that are holding the socks so nicely for photographs are sock blockers. Most socks don't really need to be blocked to shape per se, but if you're taking pictures, the blockers  help make everything look good. If you make socks for gifts, what I like to do is put them on the blockers, spray them with some water, and let dry on the blockers. When they're dry, slide the blockers out and the socks are nicely presented. Not a necessity, but I like gadgets. These came from Knit Picks and they're about $14 for the pair. There are also tutorials on line for making your own out of things like place mats (the thick plastic kind you use for kids). You can also spend an absolute crapton of money on really fancy wooden ones, but I've yet to go that far. Yet. 

And now for the last finished object of the year (I'm about 99% sure it's the last; I don't know that I'll crank out anything between now and tomorrow night, but it's too early to say).  It's a baby hat.

Project specifications: 
Name: Enzo's Sock Yarn Hat (he's bald; it's winter; he needs a hat; I know his head size).
Pattern: Charlie's Sock Yarn Hat (link to free downloadable .pdf)
Yarn: Red Heart Heart and Sole. (Cheap at any big box score. The toddler size took almost an entire 50 gram skein; it's sized from newborn to adult, but if you go much bigger than the 3rd size of the pattern, you'll want 100 g of sock yarn).
Needle: US 2, 3 mm (the bigger of the 2 sizes that claim to be US 2). I bought the needle I used for this for the Sheep Heid (I'm getting to that very soon), and I liked this needle more than I wanted to. It's an Addi Lace, and it was lovely. Properly slippery, pointy, smooth joins. Just expensive, about twice the price of needles I typically use, but they make a 3 mm diameter 16 inch length circular needle, which is not easy to find.
Total time:  A couple of evenings. 

So there you have it, the final projects from 2011. At some point in the near future, my darling daughter is going to make me a photo collage of all my projects for the year, so there's that to look forward to: A year in knitting round up, if you will, and I'll have to set some project goals for 2012.