Of course right after I finish a post about my WIP’s and how I need to finish them before I start anything new, especially with the socks, I get in the mail my second installment of the Vintage Purls Summer Sock Club. Of course the pattern and the yarn is sooo stunning that I immediately had to cast-on!

I love these colours and I love that to socks don’t match instead are exact opposites! I did make some minor changes, I really, really hate garter stitch like really hate it so I replaced that with plain stockinette I have othe plans for the cuff to add texture just you wait and see! And it was kind of okay that I started this sock because of how these ones are looking.

Yep that’s the “sample socks” I really need a new name for these. I have about 4 or 5 rows till I start the ribbing which will be done lickety split. Most likely I will finish these tonight. My mind is already on which pair of sock I will start next and what pattern to do them in. these are the current options:

Knitsch(a new NZ dyer who also goes to my knit night) in pewter. I really like the feel and texture of this yarn and the colours are just well YUM! I’m not sure on what to knit with it though.

Fibro Fibers Nightfall yarn in blue, I love this yarn so very much it slowly fades from blue to black through out the 50g skein and is already wound into center pull balls. I have a design idea in store for this one but I’m not sure I’m ready to really sit down and hash it out maybe. Jen who runs Fibro fibers is amazing and I want 90% of her yarn I got this also in a bottle green and I want the deep purple and the aqua too. She also has denim and tomato coloursways that make my mouth water and I want to get them in the sock in enough to do a striped cardigan.

Yberry’s Street woman, this is just wow what a combo of colours none of which I actually like that much on their own but together just WOW!!!! This yarn just keeps nagging at me and telling me I should knit with it and I know that I should but what? Part of me thinks it needs to go back in the stash to be kept for later to be used in a shawl.

What do you think what should I cast-on? do you have a favorite toe up sock? comment and let me know

So as I mentioned in the previous post I want to finish 12 things this year, they don’t all have to be UFO’s, some are things I have planned on knitting for years now. I was talking to My dear friend Toshi the other day that one of the shawls she liked was also on my “To Knit” list and she expressed interest in actually seeing the list so I thought I would post the list here for you all to read. I won’t hate myself if I don’t finish all of these but i would like to do some of them at least!

1. To finish my wedding shawl! DONE!!!!

2. Finish my Baudelaire socks (sock one complete toe of sock two complete)

3. Finish secret socks for special someone (sock one done halfway up the foot of sock two)

4. knit at least 2 pairs of socks for Ryan

5. Knit one pair of knee highs for myself!

6. This will be the year I start my Rogue

7. Knit Sprossling

8. Knit another Rose Of England Shawl(this one for myself)

9. Try to work out a few of the patterns that are floating around inside my head!

10. have fun!

One of the first things I noticed when we moved into our current flat is that I was going to needa good solid way of storing my stash. Originally we had found this really cool pvc pipe and nylon hanging basket storage thingy that used to be Ryan’s. I thought yes that’s perfect absolutely perfect! At first it was, then I bought more yarn, and more yarn and mooore yarn! The weight of all that yarn slowly caused the frame to torque and twist, while the bags started to rip I started to have to put less and less stuff in the baskets and instead on the floors next to it!

This is what it looked like!

I knew it was time for a new system but what? I started to have a look around and besides your generic large tupperware boxes with lids I wasn’t finding anything I thought would work well. Then I was browsing one of my favorite stores, Plastic Box, which is a lot like the container store in San Francisco, when i found something that would work! There were these stackable baskets that were partially open on one side and seemed really sturdy. The best part was they were affordable! So I started out getting four of them and was able to turn that previous picture into this!

I would still like to get two more of them so that I can put all my UFO/WIP’s in one instead of staking them on top of the whole thing and also so I have one to put needles, gauge rulers, and other assesories into instead of having to put them in random places with the yarn. they also have stable ways to conntct them next to each other! While I was in an organizational mood I made my embroidery threads go from this.

to this.

I love being organized it helps the creativity flow so much easier. When you want to do something with something everything is all right where it should be!