Neon Sock Update

Wow, I can’t believe it has been almost a month since I started knitting the Neon Socks!  eek!  My knitting has slowed down a little the last month.  I’ve been working on my sweater as well.  And we have been super busy on the weekends, so not much time to knit.

But I do have an update on my socks this week!  I finished sock #1 about a week ago.  I’m really not crazy about this pattern.  The leg of the sock is fine, its just the foot of the sock that I’m not particularly crazy about.  And the heel was my first attempt at a short row heel & I wasn’t crazy on how it came out.  And the fact that knitting the heel was stressful!  LOL

So first up is the heel:

My Sock Knitting Tools

For Christmas I received some very useful presents.  I totally love them and wanted to share them with you.

First up is my pattern protector and pattern magnet.  I love this!  I use it all the time!  When I’m sitting at the couch knitting I can prop it up because it has a strap that you can snap to the outer part of the pattern case  so that it stands up on it’s own.  And you can even write on the anti-glare vinyl  using a wet-erase marker.  This way you can write little notes & not ruin your pattern.  When you are done, you just wipe it away!.  This is just awesome for me!  And the pattern magnet I love because it is just so easy to stop knitting and know exactly where I left off.

Change of Plans…I’ve been given The Liebster Award

I was ready to do my blog post today when I noticed I was nominated for an award!  I know!!!  It’s crazy!  LOL  I’m very honored to have been nominated for this or any award for that matter!

The award I was nominated for is the Liebster Award.  From what I have read it is given to blogs that have less than 1,000 followers to help promote and support them.

I’m truly honored!  I started my blog almost a year ago with really no expectations & I’m thrilled at how much I love it!  I have connected with other fabulous bloggers!  I have learned a lot & expanded my horizons because of my blog!  I’m always grateful to everyone who stops by to read my little blog and always excited when someone comments or likes my posts!  It is such a fascinating thing to me to be able to connect with others with the same interests & that are from all over the world!

Sweater Update

I finished the back piece of my Ragg Jacket sweater!!  yay!

Now the question is, this is 100% acrylic yarn.  I have heard that you can’t block acrylic.  And I have heard that you can.  So which is it?  The research that I’ve done says you can block it if you use steam.  I guess I will try to block it with a steamer.  I don’t have one so my experiment will have to wait until I go out and buy one.  LOL  I wonder if I can use my iron, it has a steam setting…. Anyways, I hope I can block it because it seems to me like it needs to be blocked.

Here is question number 2:  Do you block each piece as you finish or do you wait until the whole sweater is completed & finished and then block the whole thing?  I again have heard both on this.  To me it seems like it would be easier to put the pieces together if each one has been blocked.

For now I will just continue working on the left front since I don’t have a steamer just yet.

Neon Socks

Since my last post  I recieved 2 requests for socks in the beautiful Neon yarn I purchased.  So I decided to start working on the first pair.  I’m using the pattern that I found on Plymouth yarns website that actually is for these socks.  It is their basic sock pattern.  This actually worked out because I was wanting to knit a basic rib sock anyways.  But the thing is, this pattern has the heel done in short rows.  I’ve never done short rows.  I’ve heard them mentioned in blogs & pod casts, even while I was in my LYS.  And I knew I would eventually come across a pattern that calls for short rows.  So, here I am, ready to start the heel & I am sooooo scared!  LOL  well, not really scared, but just worried that I will not do it correctly & have to rip everything out.

I read the pattern over & over and I kept asking myself where is the heel flap!  Am I missing something?  Did they forget to put it into the pattern?  Oh boy!  I’m telling you, last night I just put my little sock down & started working on something else.