Nancy Bush' infant silk socks - however, not so silky

My cousin's girlfriend is pregnant with their first child. When I saw somebody's version of the Infant Silk Socks by Nancy Bush on Ravelry I thought they were very girly and all in all perfect. Mine will be baby pink because that's what I had in my stash - and because we know they expect a girl :)


Back in the days when this pattern was originally written, infants must have had huuuuuge feet...

Lerwick

Today I got up at around eight and had my breakfast in the downstairs dining room. Not long after, I headed into town. I must say that a rain jacket and my new waterproof shoes were needed right away. Regardless of the weather I really enjoyed strolling along without much to do :)

Wet, but not at all too cold.


From my book about Shetland I knew that Commercial St. would be the place to go if I wanted to go shopping. Every time I saw signs of knitting - either knitwear or yarn - I went in. I spoke to the shop owners about fair isle knitting lessons and they were all most kind; they phoned around to see if anybody knew more than they did. This one lady at The Spiders Web gave me the name of somebody who supposedly teach knitting at the school in town. I went out to her office in the other end of Lerwick - Shetland Arts at the Bolt Shopping Centre. Unfortunately she was on holiday but will be back Thursday. I left a note with my phone number, and her friendly co-worker promised to let her know about my visit. I also went to the tourist office, and again I must say, people here are very friendly and most helpful. And no one seem to think that knitting is weird or out of fashion :)



On my way back I stopped a few times and took some photos.



Not many came to the park today :)



It stopped raining and the sun came out.



A knitter's survival kit.

Shibui KAL - done!

As mentioned, I finished the Shibui KAL socks on the train yesterday. I cannot tell you just how much I love this Shibui Sock yarn; I love knitting with it and wearing it. Actually, I even think it's too good to be given to somebody else. The colours, the feel.... in my head all I hear is "me, me, me!" :)

Pardon the quality of the pictures. The yellow light with red just isn't a good combination.



I'll take this new pair of socks for a walk today.

Getting here

Right now I'm sitting in my room at the Alderlodge Guest House in Lerwick, Shetland. My things are unpacked and the tea is perfect, not too milky.

Earlier today, I traveled from Aarhus to Copenhagen by train - I sat in the 'quiet zone', which I enjoyed very much. It gave me the opportunity to finish my Shibui KAL socks... yay! (More on that later). From Copenhagen I flew to Aberdeen (with a bunch of very drunk Russians around me - this one guy was so wasted that in the case of an emergency, well, sorry dude, but you're on your own. Why do they let people on board that are unable to take care of themselves??).
Aberdeen Airport. What can I say.... A very small airport that smelled of meat pies! But I did see a man in a genuine fair isle pullover! :) Unfortunately I didn't think of taking a picture until much later

Aberdeen Airport - probably not at its busiest hour.


After a somewhat long wait, I left Aberdeen (and the meat pie smell) and flew to Sumburgh Airport. On my way to Aberdeen the plane had two rows of seats on each side of the aisle. On my way to Sumburgh it had two rows on one side and one on the other - the gate was merely a corridor with a bench. Everything seemed to be getting smaller :)


It looks a bit foggy but actually it's just a greasy window.

When I arrived in Sumburgh the car rental people waited for me. And this very nice middleaged lady drove me up to their office (it was some sort of red trailer in the middle of nowhere). I filled in the necessary papers, paid, and took off. I must admit that I was a wee bit nervous because this was my first time driving on the left side of the road. Moe did all the driving in England, but somehow I think it helped a bit that was used to that though I didn't do the actual driving back then. Anyway, I did fine. No weird manouvres and no one got hurt :) And because I had brought Brirgitte (aka our GPS) the Alderlodge Guest House wasn't too hard to find.

Tomorrow I'll go visit Connie (who I know only from Ravelry) at the local yarn store. It will be so good - I just know it :)

Shibui KAL

Lise and I love Shibui Sock! I bought some of this lovely yarn for both of us, and right away Lise suggested that we should do a Shibui KAL.

Here's a little appetiser for you.

The pattern is called Cornucopia - I found it on Ravelry. I really love knitting these socks; the pattern and yarn are so good together.
However, if you decide to knit a pair of Cornucopias for yourself, please note that there's an error in the pattern; stitch pattern, row 4, "Repeat from *yo*" is incorrect. Instead of yo, k2 and you'll be laughing all the way to the very end :)

Stripes for Moe

I finished the socks for Moe. It took forever because 1) one of the colours went missing, and 2) I knit a completely different (and all wrong) heel on the second sock, so that had to be frogged and knit again. But now they're done and he really likes them. The socks look good on him too :)


Another 90 g disappeared from my stash - yay! :)

Cabled V-Neck Slipover - Debbie Bliss

Two years ago my sister-in-law bought 20 balls of yarn because she wanted to knit a pullover. Her first. Unfortunately it was too much for her since she didn't know how to knit at the time. In the meantime she has learned how to knit and purl (that's really all there is to it, right?), but the pullover is still a much too big a project for her.
She then asked me if I would knit something for her with the yarn she bought back then - of course I couldn't say no. She chose the Debbie Bliss pullover from the Vogue Knitting, fall/winter 08 edition.

I keep telling Moe that my face is not photogenic enough to be included in these pictures but apparently he doesn't listen to me :) oh well.

The yarn used for this pullover is a cotton/wool/acrylic blend called Kreta. Not quite soft enough for my taste but it was actually alright for this type of project I think. The whole piece was knit with two strands of yarn. Though it does give the pullover a nice touch, it also makes it a bit heavy.

Speaking of weight. I forgot to weigh the little sucker - I was so busy finishing it, wrapping it, and giving it to my SIL that I forgot all about yarn usage. Silly me. A good thing you can weigh the yarn you have left instead :)
The pullover weighs 800 g.

About the pattern. There's an error and I sort of noticed but thought to myself that I was probably being a little too smart, so I desided to follow the pattern to the letter. I shouldn't have. When the pullover was almost finished I found the error mentioned on the Debbie Bliss website. You probably know where things went wrong, just in case you don't: it's the cable itself. At the very top the pattern said: "blah blah hold to back of work" where it should have said: "hold to front of work".

At one point I thought about re-doing the cable but then I decided not to. Much easier ;)

I like the result, and on the way home from my SIL's birthday she sent me a text saying: "the pullover fits perfectly! Thanks! :)". Mission accomplished.

Making arrangements....

I'm about to tire you with some more Shetland stuff, so here's your chance to get away in time ;)

I've bought the plane tickets, booked a room for 5 nights at a B&B in the centre of Lerwick, I've contacted a car rental agency, and I've told Connie from Lerwick when I expect to come visit her at the LYS. I have even tried to make a small list of the things to see and places to visit while I'm there. Moe has agreed to lent me his camera and I have located my rain jacket. I sort of know where my pasport is and sooner rather than later I'll do a quick search for the GBPs we have lying around in the house (a couple of days ago I found a tenner in the car - weird). This should mean that I'm as ready as you can expect me to be, right? :)
Obviously I'll bring my needles (and a little yarn too) and my running gear (still training for the Hamburg Marathon).
It's been around ten years since I went abroad on my very own. It will be strange somehow, but also nice. I need this - you know, to recharge.

Have I forgotten something? Are there places I simply have to visit? Are there knitting related events I cannot miss? Let me know :)