A Finished Object! Hooray!

I finished DH's scarf last night. I should really wash it - it turned the needles red. I'm thinking that's a bad sign for colorfastness.

After that, I ripped out and restarted the navy blue scarf for my cousin several times. I settled on a Parallellogram pattern - here. It's really hard to see the stitches while you're working on it, to see what row you're on. And I don't like the plastic needles I'm using. I think I might have to switch to some metal straights. The plastic are so not slippery and the yarn is so not slippery that getting the stitches to move from place to place is like pulling teeth. It's a darn good thing the yarn is bulky and that the parallelogram pattern takes up about 15 rows.

Not one to keep from casting on, I also started the scarf for my dad. I decided to go with mistake rib for him. It's on 10 1/2's - I am using straights for his and it turns out that I really like the needles. They're not heavy on the ends like so many of them tend to be. They're Susan Bates' with the little plastic doohickeys on the end. The pattern itself goes pretty fast because every backside row is purl across. It's nice to just whiz through that. I like the yarn too. It's from Grandma's stash - green mystery yarn. I thought it was acrylic, but it's not squeaky, but soft-ish, so it might be wool. Who knows. I guess I could try felting a swatch, just to be able to give some good care advice.

We went to B&N tonight too and I got a nifty book of stitches. It has nice big, well lit pictures of the stitch patterns. I can't speak to the directions, but so far it looks like fun. I've been pondering a pattern for a scarf for my mom. I might try something a little lacey.

I also got this one: Stupid Sock Creatures by John Murphy - it's intriguing. I don't know if my tasts run quite the same way, but it looks like it has interesting information on sock-creature-construction. I'm fascinated by all of the "softies" out there on various blogs - it amazes me how people just whip them up when it's such a chore for me to cut out fabric and drag out the sewing machine.

I'm really jonesing to start a sock, though. I have this yarn - Catania Color 100% cotton in a discontinued color, purples and greens, and it's paging me. I'm spending spare time daydreaming - just a simple stockinette sock with a ribbed top, or jaywalkers, or, or....who knows!