Mindless Knitting

Saturday was Sit & Stitch; this time, we met at a different location. After meeting at the Rotary Center for the Arts for WWKIP (World Wide Knit In Public) Day, we decided that, for the summer, we’d meet there instead of our usual coffee shop. There’s a nice, grassy area, shade for those who want it, and a coffee shop (and washrooms) in the Center.

Because I really didn’t have much on the needles in the way of mindless knitting, I cast on another pair of socks for John.

This time, the yarn is Lana Grossa Meilenweit Bosco, 80% wool, 20% polyamide. The yarn is nice to knit with and I’m quite pleased with how it’s looking. As usual, I’m knitting on 2.25 mm needles with a 72 stitch cast on.

There are two small changes from my usual “pattern”. I’m using a different cast on, Nancy Bush’s Estonian Cast on (you can find the video here) and, as per her suggestion in the video, after the cast on, I knit one round then purled one round before starting the k1, p1 ribbing. The other change I’ll be making, when I get that far, is to make the heel flap a little shorter than the 3” I usually do for John’s socks. I was observing him one day and realized that the heel flaps on the socks he was wearing were a little baggy. That tells me they’re too long. If I shorten the heel flap by about 1/2”, they should fit better. We’ll see.

I’ve also been working on the Haruni shawl some more. I’ve now finished 3 repeats of the pattern and it’s looking, and feeling, really good. Finally, this yarn is playing nice!

The Shetland Christening Dress has also seen a small measure of progress this past weekend. It’s coming along slowly, unfortunately. Even though the first skirt is now in the garter stitch section, it’s so fine that I have to pay close attention to what I’m doing, and that is not the definition of mindless knitting. The second skirt hasn’t progressed at all; I’m in the final lace section, but with the move and the subsequent chaos, it’s been moved to the back burner. There’s no way it will be ready for this year’s Armstrong Fair, but there’s always next year, right?