Thoughts on Gifting

I'm currently in the lab working on a DNA extraction. My samples are incubating at 37° C for another 16 minutes, which is long enough to blog but not long enough to get any real work done. Hurrah!


Favorite pose of knitters trying to photograph socks, causing passers-by to stare at the crazy lady.

I knit myself another pair of socks on the fly a couple weeks ago (but am just now getting to blog about them). They are knit with Claudia Hand Painted fingering yarn in the colorway "Walk in the Woods," which just jumped off the shelf at me last time I was at Spinning Yarns in Dover. It basically told me to take it home and knit it up into some socks for myself. Plain socks with a bit of added interest. And then I saw these (Ravelry link) and well, I couldn't resist. It fit the bill. I call them "Hederesqueties" after (I think) a mispronunciation of a Decemberists b-sides album off of Picaresque ("Picaresqueties").

I have another pair of socks on the needles, Vinnland in Kureyon sock. Everything that has been said about this yarn is true, ranging from the bits of foliage spun into the yarn to its roughness and un-smooshyness. But I really don't care, because of the colors! The glorious colors! I love watching the yarn go from orange to orange with a bit of maroon to orange and maroon halfsies to mostly maroon to full on maroon to maroon with a bit of pink, and so on.


Woo! Noro!!

These will be worked with an afterthought heel, which I'm hoping will fit over my ginormous instep/heel with the addition of a couple of extra rows before the decreases. I read about this technique somewhere in the blogosphere and then promptly forgot where it came from. The technique lodged itself in my brain and I'm hoping it works. If not, I'll have to frogarama and add a gusset and all that. I'm hoping I don't have to because the stripes are so nice! and even! I'm not trying to match these stripes (it was enough trying to get two balls of the same size), I'd just like not to run out of yarn.

If that wasn't enough, a friend of mine asked me, way back when, to knit her a wedding present of two pair of fingerless flap mittens ("hobo gloves") for her and her fiancé. I originally wasn't feeling this knit, probably because it's almost May, not a time for gloves. I love to gift my knitting but I also love to gift knitting on my own terms. You want socks? Cool. I'll knit you socks in a funky pattern and yarn that I have on hand that I think suits (or that you helped pick out). But when knitting is requested, even for a present, it turns into a chore instead of a joy. Anybody else resonate with this? How do you reconcile a love of gifting with people who request gifts? Or am I just Ms. Nasty-pants?

All that being said, I whipped through a pair last week and will probably knit through the other pair this week, so enough bellyaching from me when I actually sit down and knit. And the pattern is pretty interesting, while being mostly straight knit, there are increases here and gussets to shape there and some wicked business getting fingers on top that I do enjoy. If she had wanted garter-stitch scarves, this would be an entirely different entry (probably mostly about why procrastination is biting me in the behind) but she didn't. Which is marvelous.


Yes, this is what my lab looks like. Messy.