Are we there yet?

I finished the Whitby socks!

They look very comfortable, and I just wish my work shoes were big enough to accommodate such thick socks, so I could wear them to work and maybe neutralize my boss's occasional remark that, for all of my knitting and talk about knitting, she never actually sees me wear any handknitted goods.

I also finished and mailed off various little Christmas items last week. I thought I would be good for a while and try to stick with stash yarn, but my intentions were not so much foiled as trounced and shaken down for lunch money by 1) the sudden appearance of Colinette Jitterbug sock yarn at my LYS, and 2) Eunny Jang's Anemoi Mitten pattern. I can't really complain though...working with them both is enormously satisfying.

The socks are from the ball band pattern, but with a reinforced heel instead of the plain one described.



For the mittens, I'm using Jamieson's Shetland DK with 2.25 mm needles. The fabric feels so dense that I'll be slightly disappointed if the mittens turn out to be anything less than bulletproof (not that I plan to test that).

The struggle with the stash reminded me of S.A.B.L.E.* and a possibly related concept, the stash asymptote (has someone else has already come up with this?). My recollection from school of the asymptotic curve was that, no matter how far it went along the axis (or function, or whatever), it never actually touched that line. In this case, the line (of course) would correspond to the point of actually having all the yarn one could ever really, really, really need want.

Shameless plug: Instead of Advent chocolates, why not have Advent knitting videos? Check out the collection of knitting videos Silver Arrow Knits! has been compiling.

*Stash acquisition beyond life expectancy, i.e. more yarn than one can expect to use in a lifetime.