As I mentioned in my last post, I've been making an effort to turn over my stash, and trying use up more yarn than I usually do before making another purchase. I've gotten to the point, now, where I'm down to a few colors of my stock tabi yarn, and I'm trying to decide how to proceed.

I've been trying to fill my shop for the holiday season, but it's tough to feel motivated to do that when things are soooo sloooow during the anti-knit season. I've been sticking with it, making breaks for my own projects and experiments, trying not to burn out, and have made pretty good progress. I'd hoped to have more listings, but I still did better than I expected.

It's now to the point where I should start ordering more yarn, but I'm a bit stuck on colors, even after looking at color and fashion predictions for the fall. I know I need some more traditionally feminine colors (purples, pinks), and came to realize that I need more greens (which I'm totally not feeling), earthy tones, blues, and yellows.  

I just need to shake up the whole set, and that's tough for me. I've spent the past few weeks poking at the Pantone Fall Color Report, and it really gave me a place to jump off, and I encourage anyone currently struggling with color to check it out. What colors are looking for this winter and fall?

Don't do a thorough arm workout on days you're working with very tiny needles!  It's good for preventing repetitive stress injuries and awesome for toned arms, but it's wicked difficult to knit with shaky hands. 

Good thing the socks are for me! :)

For the past three weeks, we've been bouncing back and forth between my mom and stepdad's and our house.  They live about 4 hours away, but needed help after my mom's surgery.  

She's doing great and I think we're home for good, now, but GAH.  I feel like I haven't gotten anything done.  i actually did a few more color sketches last night when we got home just so I could feel like I've done something.

Since my shop hasn't been updated in awhile, I may put the socks I'm making for myself (luscious hand-dyed yarn) on hold for a day to knock out my last idea.  When I've got ideas in my head, I tend to lose steam if I don't make some progress on them, and I'm full of ideas.  I've written them all down, but it's not the same.

I'd really like to get 50 items in my etsy shop before the end of the month, but I don't know if that's going to happen.  Guess we'll see!

I posted awhile ago about knitting some socks for my MIL's birthday.  I finished them last week and presented them to the lovely lady earlier in the week!

Black alpaca Simple Luxury socks done!  I would have finished them earlier, but we've had so much going on that they just kept falling behind.  I'm so happy with them, though.  The yarn is probably the nicest alpaca I've knit with in awhile, and they're delightfully silky soft.

I planned on making a green pair next, but realized that my mother-in-law's birthday is at the beginning of next week.  She mentioned that she'd like a pair for that, so I need to get cracking on that.  I have some fun self-striping sock yarn that's got a lot of red in it that I plan on using.

Anyway, here's the long awaited black socks.  You can find them listed here, in my etsy shop.

I've been playing ring around the rosie with the supplier who I buy my alpaca yarns from for the past few months, and I finally gave up on Tuesday.  My refund is being processed and I've already placed another order with another supplier.

About a year ago, my favorite tabi yarn supplier dried up and I had a mad scramble to find a new source.  After that, I apparently learned my lesson and have spent a few hours each week keeping tabs on prices, shipping times, etc.  I'm very glad I did because it was much less painful to lose a supplier when I had another two lined up and ready to go.

I originally ordered only three colors (green, blue, black), but I decided to rethink the colors with this second order and I have black, gray, olive, and a lovely, soft lilac on their way.  I'm going to pay back twiddletoes for some of the lilac because I have a few women in my life who will love a pair of socks out of it over the holidays.

So we'll see how this goes.  I've been itching to play with more alpaca, and the brick/rust red that I ordered retail just isn't doing it for me, for some reason.  I'd like to have some blacks, grays, and greens ready for Father's Day.

A few weeks ago, I got notice that a bunch of yarn that was backordered was on its way to me.  I've been waiting and waiting and planning, and it still hasn't arrived.

I called and it turns out that it won't be shipped...and they haven't refunded my money.  I've spent several hours trying to rectify the situation, and it's pissing me off more and more.  I'm itching to knit more alpaca socks, but I'm tired of making them in blue!

I'd like to make a black pair, definitely, and maybe I'll start on a green pair for my brother for the holidays.  I'm craving alpaca and I can't have it.  I'm even shunning a lovely yak blend that I was itching to use.

Gah!  The frustration.

As I mentioned in my last post, I'm working on knitting up some wayward yarn from my stash.  I just finished a pair of gray tabi (size L) out of the wool/acrylic blend, and my mind just took the gray and wandered the entire time I worked on them.  I wanted so badly to pick up and knit another pair of socks that it made it very difficult to finish.  

It's not that common that I finish a pair and immediately, like within two minutes, dash to pick out yarn for a new pair, but that's what happened today.  The new pair will be gray with a few hot pink stripes.  I hate to list two gray pairs in a row, but I can't let this one go!

While looking for my next project, I ran across six balls of a wool-acrylic blend yarn.  I vaguely recall receiving it a few years ago from my mother-in-law, and it's been stuck in one of my stash boxes since then, awaiting a project.  

I did some experimenting with it, knit a couple of swatches, and found that it actually had a pretty hand and excellent memory.  Both of those qualities made me automatically assume that it'd knit up into nice socks, and indeed it did!  I'm actually pretty impressed and listed the pair in my shop.

They're a bit less, price-wise, than my 100% natural fiber socks, which is probably a good thing.  They're also easier care than most of my current listings, and I hope both appeal to people who've been put off before. 

I have two more colors that need to be used up, and I hope to get to them in the next week or two.  It's great to see my item count climbing!  Of course, it'd be nice to have to work my butt off to keep things stocked, but I might actually reach my goal of 50 items by the holiday shopping season.

Spring is here and my motivation to knit, as it always does, is waning a bit.  Sitting in my craft room with the windows open isn't an acceptable substitute for laying in the grass with the cool breezes, warm sun, and catching the occasional whiff of my blooming iris.  I've been spending as much of the days outside getting my garden started as I can, and trying to do as much work-work as I can on the screened porch with my laptop.

In the evenings, I have so many other projects that I want to start, so I'm having to carve out designated knitting time.  I still love doing it, but I find it hard to make time for it when I have so many NEW things to do.  

I wanted to get the lace piece I started for grandmother done a few weeks ago, but that's been, sadly, delayed greatly.  I took an hour last night to work on it and made good progress, so I'll probably do the same today.  I can't wait until it's done!  I keep playing with it while I'm knitting it because it's so soft and flowy. :)

I did finish a pair of socks for my mom, and have decided that they're going to be for her birthday.  I ended up not being able to resist buying her this double oven mitt (and towel) set from TheGivingTree.  They have ducks and will soon have guinea hens, so I thought the frolicking birds were hilariously appropriate.  Well, maybe not hilarious but definitely a bit funny. :)

And to finish this essay off, here are mom's socks: