So far behind I've been lapped three or four times

I've got to apologize for being so far behind on my comment replies. I will be working on them this week after a short trip Monday/Tuesday. I've had off and on cold/sinus/lung stuff going on the last month and I've been self-indulgent and choosing working on knitting over replying to everyone's lovely thoughtful comments. I do appreciate them and I will be replying next week.

In the mean time, there's a couple of things before we get to knitting content. I still haven't heard from fuzzbutt so I have decided that it is time to give Turtle the first choice of the two prizes and choose a new second winner. If fuzzbutt turns up later on I am sure I can find something around here (pauses to take in the complete disaster her knitting area has become) somewhere to make up to him/her not waiting any longer.

So, I've already asked Turtle to choose which she'd like. And gotten a third random number from the online integer generator. The new winner for the other prize is edina. I have already e-mailed her to let her know. Thanks again to all of you for giving me so many great ideas to try for finding more knitting time.

I've had a lot more knitting time since I've been lazing about in an attempt to stop feeling like I am suffocating. Of course the periodic naps have cut into it a bit so there's not as much to show for it as I'd like.

I did manage to get my Cluaranach knit back to where I had it before I had to rip back and I think a couple of rows further on.


I also managed to finish the Barbie Dress at last.
While working on it I had a little epiphany about casting off circular knitting. I realized that by using a darning needle to draw the yarn on the path I could make the end just about invisible. When I do them normally, no matter what I do I end up having to futz it a bit to "hide" the end but it doesn't usually work to well. I started with one stitch left to knit on the cast off line. I've got some photos of how I first did it but it didn't come out quite right because I went the wrong way through one of the stitches at the end. I redid it and it looks pretty good now.

I'll try to get some how-to photos up soon in easier to see yarn so I can remember how I did it next time I'm doing a circular cast off that I want to have look as pretty as possible.

Lastly, I finished the first of my January Rockin' Sock Club socks in the Serendipity pattern in the Dragon Dance yarn.
It wasn't really easy to see until I was finished but the heel is about 2 rows too deep for my foot as well as too wide at the bottom.
The too wide is what makes the little pokey ears. I'm not sure if it would do that over fewer stitches but the same row count, but even with my high instep there is enough extra material there that I can take out a couple of rows just fine. So when I knit this pattern again I will do the heel with only 7 unwrapped stitches in the middle and also over 2 fewer wrapped stitches. I also won't use the star toe because it doesn't fit my toes too well. There's a ton of extra sock over my small toes and my big toe feels crowded.

Fortunately I think it will fit the person I decided to gift these socks to pretty well. So I started the second sock. When I get to the lace pattern section I'm going to start half way up so that the socks mirror each other. Same with the toe, I'll do it with ssk instead of k2tog when I get to it. We'll see if these "clever ideas" look like they'll work out once I start working the lace pattern.