WIPs

"Works in Progress" or WIPs, or I guess correctly WsIP but that's awkward, are distinguished from UFOs or UnFinished Objects by being, nominally, still being worked on as opposed to buried in the stash and blocked from sight and mind out of frustration.

Lemme tell you, the Grasshopper socks were getting close to the UFO transition. However, I finally got my groove on, and we're continuing.



While I am normally a "process" knitter - one who knits for the act of knitting - I think for this particular project I'm leaning towards becoming a "product" knitter - one who knits for the end result. Simply because, with all the frogging and fiddling already, these socks have gone on too long, and now that I've FINALLY got a reasonable gauge going - they're getting boring because they're going to go on a lot longer because I'm determined after all that, I want the knee-high model, dagnabbit.

It's a good thing I love everything about this pair, assembly aside. I love the STR Silkie yarn. I love the colours, and I love the way it was knitting up with kindof an impressionist-watercolour look to it. I like the lacey stitch, now that I've got the trick of it. I just want to get 'em done now, though!

To take the edge off, I started something completely different:


and was pleasantly surprised. This is the first 10 rows of Megan Jackson's Beach pattern from the May PickUpSticks Sock Club. I was intimidated by the pattern, which includes two very complex looking charts, but it's written out row by row and I got through the first 10 rows of the first chart without a mistake. I enjoyed it much more than I thought I would, and it was the perfect foil to the two-stitch Grasshopper, and strangely, easier to manipulate.

And finally, faithfully providing my couple-of-rows-before-bed distraction:



The Seasilk Stormwater is slowly growing. The trick to making this piece livable is threading in a pre-emptive "lifeline" EVERY repeat of the pattern, or actually I'm doing it every half repeat. The pattern is the perfect mix of a variety of stitches but with a short enough repeat interval that it's now been committed to memory and is manageable. But if I drop one stitch - it's gone, and it's being ripped. So, I just run a length of cotton yarn through every 8th row and the most I'll lose is 8. So progress is steady.



So those, along with my still-neglected homework, are my weekend plans. Happy Canada Day!