Fall Knitting!

It's finally feeling like autumn and I love it!! This is my favorite time of the year, when I get to bring out all the hand knits. I wear some of them all year, even when it is really too hot for them. But its this time of year where I've always got a shawl and hat on. Most of my gloves are fingerless to allow for typing and knitting. I've been known to, when its too cold for fingerless, put on a small pair of cheap gloves and put the hand knit mitts over them. I still get warmth for my fingers but get to wear the comfy hand knit.

We've been moved into the house about a month now. We're still settling in. My bed has been set up for a few weeks now. This past weekend with help from a friend we were able to move my dresser and desk up to my room. Solid wood furniture is heavy and we've already decided that we're hiring movers when we move out of this house, whenever that may be. The living room is pretty close to being set up too. The one thing left that I need in my room is a bookcase. The boxes left in my closet are boxes of books and yarn. I know where the important books are so I can get to them easily enough: the knitting books and what I have of Brandon Sanderson's work. I've been listening to the Hobbit on audiobook lately. Once I finish, I'm going to pick up listening to Way of Kings again.

My crafting lately seems to be focused on purple and orange. It suits, considering that Halloween is this month. I've finished my shawl from my last post. It's about the only thing I finished in September. I absolutely love it and have worn it a bunch lately. But it is a smaller shawl (perfect for wearing in the office) and I'm used to larger shawls like my Seraphim.

After the shawl was finished, I picked up knitting on a pair of socks I started last month but haven't finished yet. I'm using an orange variegated yarn for them. I have enough of it so that when the socks are done, I can cast on a Hitchhiker and use the rest of the yarn up for that shawl. I've decided that my hand knits need to come in sets: shawl/scarf, hat, mitts/gloves and socks. I need that item bonus for wearing the full set, you know. :P

For the purple set I now have the shawl and a pair of fingerless mitts that I made last year. I have the hat in mind already. It's the socks that make me pause. The yarn I used for the shawl is Knit Pick's Stroll Tonal in their discontinued colorway called Royalty. When I use it all up, I can't get more. I have 3 skeins left. There is a shawl I plan to use a skein to make for a friend. That leaves me with two. The question then becomes do I want to use it for just shawls or use a skein for a pair of socks too? If yes on socks, I have a pair of knee high socks in mind. For my orange set, I'm still working on the shawl and socks. I know the pattern for the fingerless mitts I'm going to use. I actually have a very limited amount of orange fingering in my stash and it makes me sad. I love orange. I'm not sure about the hat yet. The one in the purple set is a beret but it doesn't have to be. I'll have to do some thinking on other hat patterns I want.

I'm still weaving, of course. I'm always weaving. My focus right now has been to get scarves done so I can get them listed on etsy. Especially with winter coming and everyone thinking about new things to wear to stay warm. I have four done already. 2 houndstooth, 1 checkerboard and 1 plaid. I've warped my loom for a second checkerboard. this time in a light and dark purple. I really love how they look together. Speaking of weaving, I have an experiment I'm going to try when the yarn and the reed for my loom get here. The experiment is to see how well I can weave horizontal stripes. The trick is to use a fingering weight yarn for the warp and a worsted weight yarn for the weft. I've ordered the yarns for all of the houses. Once they get here, I'll get started. I'm really excited about trying it. Because if it works, then I can weave Doctor Who scarves as well.

I hope you have a wonderful crafty week!