Productive Weekend

Well, around this:

Being in the house all weekend, and trying to be in the chair with me as much as possible.

As well as sleeping in the house, which means I haven’t been sleeping in my own bed, since Jim took that shift Wednesday and Thursday nights…

Although I did sleep in the spare bedroom after trying to deal with being in the living room the first night. Much more comfy, although Brandi does kick. No big surprise there…

And around this:

That’s what they both do in the chair, except they wiggle and squirm and in general make it difficult to knit.

She likes to stick her nose in whatever you’re doing. She also doesn’t like not being the center of attention, so just when you really get involved in something – here comes a nose or a paw or a tail.

But she’s so cute. We keep losing her in that chair though, she just blends right in. Camo dog… she vanishes in the twilight too.

But I did manage to get some knitting done.

Much of the chair knitting was on this:

It’s the Six Sox for December. Yes, it just came out. But it’s small and simple and easy to put down when someone decides their ears need more attention than my sock.

As usual, I’m modifying. It calls for 72 stitches, and the chain pattern is an eight stitch repeat. I used 60 for the ribbing and increased to 64 in the last row. Made the heel flap a little smaller since I had fewer stitches, and am decreasing to 60 in the foot area to make it fit better. There will be one more chain around the foot right before the toe starts, and I’ll twiddle the spacing on 4 of them to make it fit the number of stitches I’ve got. It should be totally innocuous.

I’ll also do a short rowed toe. I just like them better than standard decreased toes. Means a little longer stretch of grafting, but grafting doesn’t bother me so it’s not a big deal.

The biggie for the weekend is the Russian Prime.

It’s up well into the yoke area. You can see there are two steeks. Actually, there are three but you can only see two in the photo. There’s the neck:

And the armhole:

These are what EZ referred to as “Kangaroo Pouches”. The why will be much more clear when I get to the scoop part of the neck, but you get the idea. First you put some number of stitches on a holder, then you cast on your steek stitches over the top.

Then just keep on knitting:

If you’re doing a row with two colors, do long tail with one on your thumb and the other on your index finger. For a single color you can do backwards loop, since you secure it before you cut. The neck center is small enough to just go on a marker, no thread required.

I was hoping to cut the arm holes this weekend, but that’s not going to happen. Hopefully some time this week.