lai-wah sock | PDXKnitterati

I did it. It didn’t take long at all. Why did it take me three years and four months to finish these socks?

I did graft the toe of the second (left) sock. It’s not that I don’t know how; it’s that I knit socks so rarely that I always have to look it up. But I did, and it’s done. It looked enough like the right sock (draw the yarn through the remaining 8 stitches) that it wasn’t worth going back to re-do the first one.

These are a heavily modified adaptation of Cookie A’s Kai-Mei socks. My Chinese name is Lai-Wah, so I named them for myself. You can see a description of the changes on this three year old blog post, if you’re interested.

Now what should I knit? More socks? Another shawl? I want a relatively mindless, portable knit…

may be even better than birthday cake. No calories!

It’s my birthday later this week, and I wanted to have this shawl finished to wear. Done! I’ve decided I’m not a fan of knitting with laceweight yarn, but the result is so lovely. The pattern is the EZ 100th Anniversary Gull Wings half circle (Rav link). I knit this on Hiya Hiya sharps, size 4. Loved the pointiness. Didn’t like the slipperiness; not enough control for this loose knitter. But I was afraid to change needles in the middle of the project, for fear of changing gauge. When I went to bind off, I used a larger needle anyway, so I went back to my Lantern Moon ebony in a size 6. Just enough texture to keep the slipperiness at bay.

I did most of the binding off at Waterfront Park the other night, which is like Portland’s living room. (Some would say that Pioneer Courthouse Square is Portland’s living room, but I like the view from this one better.) The Portland Symphony plays a free concert to open the symphony season, and it always ends with the 1812 Overture and fireworks. A lovely evening.

It’s a party!

But I digress. Here’s the shawl, just off the needles. Kind of scrunchy and unimpressive.

I wet blocked it on my ancient cardboard cutting board in the back yard. The radius is 26 inches, so the diameter is 52. Heh, math.

It was so warm out, the shawl kept drying out before I was done. I couldn’t find a spray bottle, and the sprayer on my iron doesn’t work. So I turned the hose on it after I finished pinning it out. Gently. With the spray nozzle. Pointed up in the air.

It dried really quickly! I gave the rest of the yarn (47 grams out of 100) to my friend Claudia; she doesn’t mind knitting with laceweight and the color is great for her. Now I’m finishing my 3 year sock.

I took that picture yesterday, and now I’m down to the end. Do I graft the toe, or do I finish with my usual “run the yarn through the needles and pull tight because I’m too lazy to look up kitchener stitch”? If I kitchener, I’d have to undo the first one and do that, too; I want them to match. It might be a good exercise, though. What do you think?