Most of the action is taking place on Ravelry, so get on over there and join the threads if you’re participating!

I had grand plans of posting my progress every day. It’s now day 4, and you can see how well that turned out. :)

But, I have been knitting every day!

Thank you, Samantha, for drawing all over my pattern.

Took me 2 days to get through the corrugated ribbing, and I did the year band yesterday (Sunday).

I found one mistake, but I’m not telling where it is. (I was too far along to fix it, and you have to look really hard to see it). :)

Then there’s this little problem of gauge. This is what happens when you wait 3+ years in between gloves:

I can’t figure out how I was knitting so loosely back then! I’m hoping this one will stretch out a bit as I go, and now that I’m on the main pattern, I’m definitely loosening up, since there’s no purling. This cuff does fit my wrist much better than the other one though. Hopefully when they’re washed and blocked, I can get them match a bit better.

Well, here it is. The start of my ripple blanket.

I’m using my Lion Brand Cotton-Ease stash on this. I stocked up when they discontinued it, then of course (as with all discontinued yarns that I stock up on) they brought it back. I figured I’d probably have a lot of baby and kid things to knit with it, but I haven’t really been doing that.

I’d been wanting to try out the crocheted ripple blankets for awhile, and what better than a stash of Cotton-Ease to start with?

It’s going to be a HEAVY afghan. But I like heavy blankets.

There’s no deadline for this, it’ll just be on-again, off-again, as I work on it between other projects. It’s fun picking out what color comes next!

They are from Fearless Fibers. If you want a set, and there aren’t any in the size you want up on her site right now, send her a message, and she’ll likely have a set ready for you! That’s what happened with me. I just asked when there might be some women’s medium blockers available, and a few minutes later, had a message back saying that she put up a set for me. Another minute or so later, and I’d purchased them! Talk about quick customer service.

They are much thicker than the typical blocker. They smell divine!

They make my socks look so good, I haven’t taken them off of the blockers yet.

Here are my new socks! I’m calling the pattern “Crosshatch,” which may not be too original, but that was the first thing that popped into my head and stuck when I saw the way the slip-stitch cables cross back and forth. It really reminds me of doing crosshatching in art class.

Details:
Started: June 25, Finished: July 7, 2008
Pattern: Crosshatch by Me!
Yarn: Tofutsies, color 728, 1 ball (with tons leftover)
Needles: US1 Brittany Birch DPNs

As soon as my test knitters have confirmed that the instructions are correct, the pattern will be available for purchase at Ravelry.

**Updated 8/1/08: Pattern is now available at Ravelry!**

1. New sock pattern: Pattern is written, and being test-knit. Had some issues with the instep pattern, but hopefully it’s correct now. Test knitters will confirm soon I hope! Knit, girls, knit!

2. New socks: My pair is done. Need to take photos. LOVE love love the color. They make me so happy. Wishing I had a sock model handy. Emily’s feet need to grow so I can use her. :) Grow, feet, grow!

3. Sock blockers: Got a set from Fearless Fibers, as recommended by Dave. Just waiting on the shipment to arrive! Faster, mail, faster!

4. Ravelry: I got one of the hotly-demanded tote bags. NYAH! Also ordered the Frogged & Ripped Pint glasses, and a button pack. Again, faster, mail, faster!

5. Next project: I’m crocheting! I’m making a ripple blanket, using This pattern. I’m about halfway through the second row and have realized I’m doing it wrong. I’ve picked up stitches through only one of the loops, instead of both of them. But it’s not that bad that I’m going to rip it out. I’ll just do it right from the next row on! I’m using up my mass quantities of Lion Brand Cotton-Ease. Should be a very colorful blanket. Crochet, Natalie, crochet!

6. UFOlympics: I think I’m going to cut off joining on Friday of this week. There’s already so many people (which I think is great!), too many more and it’ll be too hard to keep track of things. I really want to create a spreadsheet/scorecard of some sort to track who finishes their events. Type, Natalie, type!

7. Sold 20 skeins of the Lana d’Oro yarn. Shrink, stash, shrink!

I have decided to finally get a set of sock blockers.

Recommendations please! I think I’d prefer wood over plastic.

Time to get rid of some yarn that I am just never going to knit.

20 skeins of Cascade Lana D’Oro in Lichen (219). A few skeins have been wound into center-pull balls and knit/ripped/rewound. $50 (includes shipping).

20 skeins of Cascade Lana D’Oro in Wisteria (218). $60 (includes shipping).

I’m willing to break those up into sets of 10 skeins each.

There’s a few others in my “trade/sell” page on Ravelry. If you’re interested in any of them, make an offer!

So far, the new sock pattern is working out!

I chose this stitch pattern to combat the pooling that I knew the Tofutsies would do.

But it’s still pooling. The pattern breaks it up a bit, but it’s still pooling.

I still like it though, so I’m going to forge on!

It’s giving some “substance” to the Tofutsies yarn too. Tofutsies is a little thinner than most other sock yarns, and this pattern is helping to give the sock some body.

My dishcloth binge is over. My dishcloth cotton is all knit up (that means I’m allowed to buy more when it’s on sale now, right?), and my wrist is starting to heal.

It wasn’t happy with my marathon-cotton-knitting.

I got 6 dishcloths out of the rest of my cotton:

Clockwise, from top left: Just plain garter stitch, garter & eyelets, Garterlac, and the Ballband pattern.

Then after all that, I had just a little of 3 other colors. So I went for the Ballband pattern again, and just knit until there was nothing left to knit!

Next up on the needles: a new sock pattern!