Rebellious Mushroom Hunter

I started the Swedish Fish socks using some of Cathy's stash. Already I have knit this sock up to the heel, ripped it out back to the cuff, and started it again. The fit wasn't quite right, but the ripping was worth it. I'm going to have a really cute sock.

Tosh Sock in Baltic and Warm Maize

In a burst of energy, I also finished off two pairs of socks. First pair are the Woodpile Socks using my skein of Spun Right Round in the Bug Jar color way.

The second pair are the Vanilla Latte socks in Stray Cat Socks' Blue Moon color way. This is the second time I've knit a pair of socks in this color.

After finishing the last two pairs of socks, but still making ripping decisions about the Swedish Fish, I started a new sock. I'm still deciding what pattern it will grow up to be. I was so desperate for a sock to knit that I just cast on 64 stitches and worked a 2x2 rib cuff. I figure I can find a pattern to match.

Dragonfly Fibers in the Mushroom Hunting color way

Has anyone else cast on with wild abandon? I've never cast on without a plan before and I feel like a rebel.

Trials, Tribulations, And A Lack Of Guacamole

It's been a week, let me tell you! On Monday Connor got rear ended in a three car accident. We are thankful that he wasn't hurt, the car still moves, and the guy who caused the accident took fault. Then on Wednesday we learned that we were the victims of credit card fraud. We are thankful that it was caught early, we aren't on the hook for any fraudulent charges, and the very nice customer service man had a new card sent to us faster than their usual time frame. But the worst was yet to come! Yesterday we went to Chipotle and they were out of guacamole! There is no upside to that.

Ok, all kidding aside, it's been a little rough. In between the trials, I've been doing my best to insert some fun into each day. For example, last week I learned how to film a time-lapse of myself painting. I posted it on my @audrynicklin instagram page.

A post shared by Audry (@audrynicklin) on Apr 28, 2018 at 11:55am PDT

After stressing over what new paints to get, I bought a silly amount in order to redo my travel painting palette. (As I mentioned in my previous post, my current palette won't dry, so it doesn't transport well. I've switched the travel palette from M Graham to Daniel Smith watercolors.) It all arrived and I made a new swatch rainbow.

Bottom left is the new pallet, the top right is the old

Then Connor and I went to the ocean and I challenged myself to paint (with my new palette) the seals that like to sleep under the wharf. I'm not sure how successful I was as it turns out brown seals on brown wood looks a lot like indistinguishable brown lumps. I still had fun. And better yet, I was able to figure out some things that work about my new palette and some things that need to be tweaked.

Seal or lump? In a way, seals are just brown lumps.

I've also continued to knit on my socks.

Both of these are second socks. Yay!

Even though it's been rough, I'm thankful that my creative mojo isn't gone and that I've had snippets of time to indulge my interests.

These Boots Aren't Meant For Walking

This past March was a "put one foot in front of the other" kind of month. With a combination of family health scares and a pile of difficult tests, I ended up pretty stressed out. It's taken me a week or two to start feeling better. But rather than focus on the negative, let me show off some things that helped lift me up.

1. I have made a new pair of baby booties. The last pair I made unfortunately didn't fit the recipient. After seeing the tiny baby feet in person, I decided to make up my own pattern. They look weird without feet in them, but I'm pretty sure that with small feet inside them, these new cowboy booties will look much cuter.

2. I finished embroidering the lower 48 states. What a job! I'm not anywhere close to finishing this quilt, but I feel pretty darn good about how far I've gotten. I've ordered some new embroidery floss and plan to quilt the remaining background with longitude and latitude lines. (Alaska and Hawaii will be added too!)

Toughest coastline embroider: Maryland

3. Yarn! My Plucky I ordered at Stitches West arrived. I initially felt it was too dark, but it's growing on me. Then a fantastic package from Wei Siew arrived. She sure did spoil me. Dark Harbor, Bleeting Arts, and Fiber 2 Go?! She also sent a few other unpictured goodies.

4. I finished my Groovy Socks and have cast on two new pairs. Vanilla Latte socks in Stray Cat Socks's Blue Moon color way and Woodpile socks in Spun Right Round's Bug Jar color way.

5. Just today I decided to paint a scene from the TV show Riverdale. Connor and I recently finished it and I really liked the design for Pop's Chock'lat Shoppe. 

How has life been going for all of you? Have you focused on anything to help keep you sane?

Accidental On Purpose Sock Matching

I'm still knitting away on socks. I'm happy to report that the Peeta socks are going well. I've had my Dad try them on twice and it looks like it is the right size for him. (Phew!) Although as I'm knitting, I keep feeling like they are giant. They are much wider than I would knit for myself.

I'm entirely sure I don't have enough yarn for both socks, so my plan is to use another color for the heel/toe. It turns out that was easier said than done. Despite my robust sock yarn stash, I had trouble finding a color that I liked alongside Abstract's Alfalfa color way. I've narrowed it down to either this skein of Malabrigo Sock in the Chocolate Amargo color way or Whimsical Colors Silk Whimsy in the Darkened Forest color way. Any thoughts, fellow knitters?

Left: Malabrigo Sock in the Chocolate Amargo color way; Right:Whimsical Colors Silk Whimsy in the Darkened Forest color way

I've also continued on with my The Big O sock, although it's only seen action while I've been sitting in the passenger seat of the car. It's also looking more and more like this pair is going to match. I can't begin to tell you all how hard I tried not to have them match. It just so happened that when I finished the first sock, I finished the color progression. 

Ok, ok, in the interest of full disclosure, I DID rip out two rows of the sock blank to make the socks match. But having two socks that almost match is far worse than having two socks that don't match at all.

I've also finished weaving another scarf. This one was supposed to be for me, but after finishing I wasn't sure the colors were "me." Connor was quite happy to lay claim to this scarf.

Spun Right Round Merino Worsted in the Holy Crow color way 

No Moss On This Rolling Stone

It's been another busy week at the Bear Ears household. Connor and I have been working hard to get the daily comic site up and running. It's been quite a job, but we have split up responsibilities and are making lots of progress. One of the things we successfully managed to do was get the banner to line up correctly on the site. (It was a feat, I assure you.) I'm not sure when we will be ready to show everything off, but I think that this year will be the year I finally have a daily comic website.

I've only been talking about having a daily comic website since 2010...

Of course that is not all that has been going on. This past weekend we celebrated a friend's birthday. We hiked, picnicked, and painted. I hadn't touched my gouache paints since last July. It's silly really, but I had painted a hideous painting, lost my confidence, then switched to watercolor because I couldn't bare to try with gouache again. Well, this time around I decided that I wasn't going to tape the edges to make it nice, I was just going to paint and if it was ugly, it was ugly. It ended up turning out quite nice, so I'm a bit sad that I didn't make the edges nice and straight.

I decided to paint a smaller composition rather than a whole landscape. I think that helped me from being too overwhelmed to try again.

I've also managed to finish my Haleakala Socks that have been on the needles since January. It's funny, when I cast them on I immediately didn't feel like knitting them because I just wanted to knit good old vanilla socks. What finally got them knit was the fact that I wanted to wear them. Of course it is too hot to wear them now, but they are ready for when the weather cools again.

I have also woven another scarf. I think woven scarves are going to be a constant theme in the blog for a while: I'm clearly obsessed. When I took the class in February with Deborah Jarchow, she talked about how she could do a scarf in an evening. I thought that was crazy talk, but on my third scarf, I was able to do it in an evening. I was sore afterwards, so I might not try to do that again...

So, what projects could I possibly be working on now? Well, my The Big O socks are moving along quite well. The first sock practically knit itself and now I'm on to the second. I did have to get creative with the heel. I didn't want to lose the lovely color progression that was going down the leg, so I took some yarn from the other end of the sock blank to knit in a heel flap.

I've also cast on another sock. This pattern is called Peeta Socks and I'm using Abstract Fiber O'Keefe in the Alfalfa color way. The pattern is heavily charted, so I haven't gotten too far since all my brain cells are being used on the comic website. It's still nice to have a slightly more complicated pattern on the needles.

I've already mentioned scarf weaving, but I couldn't end a post without showing off what I've got on the loom now. I'm using the yarn I bought at The Black Squirrel: Spun Right Round's Merino Worsted in Holy Crow. I'd seen 783Nora's Cosmic Wonder Dust Scarf on ravelry and knew I wanted to weave a scarf with speckled yarn. Mine is a bit different because I'm using worsted weight and she used fingering, but it is still looking pretty neat.

Whew! I can't believe all that got worked on in the last week. I've been highly productive and I hope I can keep it up. Despite the great momentum, that little voice in the back of your head that tells you that you aren't good enough has moved from being an occasional thought to a constant, loud shout. I've been drowning it out by listening to the Your Creative Push podcast. I highly recommend it. If you don't know where to start, I quite liked episode 203 and 220.

Does anyone else have any strategies to keep that "your not good enough" voice at bay?