Old is New

These socks are kind of infamous. Or at least, they are infamous in my own mind. I wrote a post about these socks a while back, a long while back when I was still subbing and trying to kill time on one of the fantastically boring days in an English classroom where I was mostly just watching my own life slide past me and the kids were working independently. Well, it was about these socks, and another project that's still in Time Out.

These are Meida's Socks by Nancy Bush knit in Louet Gems Sport in a color that I think is called "Thistle." I lost the ball band.... Anyway, the yarn was bought for my Siberian Iris Socks (back before they had fully finished developing into Siberian Iris Socks.) Plans changed and I ended up using a different yarn. This yarn, while wool, is very tightly plied and knits up more like cotton than wool. These properties make it perfect for Meida's Socks which are knit in sport weight cotton. The fact that I had the perfect yarn for a project I did not plan on meant that I cast on with more zeal than common sense. I ran out of yarn on the second sock a few inches from the end, got cranky, tossed the project in the corner, started another project with the same coincidence, zeal, and lack of common sense as the socks, ran out of yarn on that project a few inches from the end, and got more cranky. I'm pretty sure I didn't knit for a few days after that. After I moved, I needed a new project, or in this case, an old project that needed ripping. The only thing I modified about these socks was to make the leg portion half as long, and voila! I had enough yarn to finish. These went very quickly in sport weight yarn, and they'll join the rest of my stash of wooly handknits for when fall finally arrives.

And now for the good stuff. I am mostly a knitter as opposed to a crocheter, and I think I always will be, but I'm not enough of a snob to let it get in the way of things I really want. Crobots being one thing. Alicia Paulson's Sunshine Day Baby Afghan being another. I really, really, really love this afghan, and I've been planning it in my head for a long time. One of the things I love about it is that the neutral colors in the background make it feel very fresh and modern and less like grandma's leftovers (which is not to diss grandmas. I have one. She crochets. Enough said.) Almost immediately, I knew that I wanted to make my afghan with colors inspired by the Rocky Mountains, particularly those in the Aspen region of Colorado. The colors of Aspen almost more than any other thing about the place really effected me. The bright blue sky, the dual colored aspen leaves, the white snow on hard granite mountains, and the red earth with sage and wildflowers. I went to the LYS today with hope in my chest and stumbled on the most perfect yarn for my project. The yarn is Stonehedge Mills' Shepherd's Wool, a yarn whose soft squishyness would have made me want to stock up immediately, even if it was not a Michigan company. Get ready. Granny squares here I come!