Before I get to the socks, many people wanted me to keep them updated about my family’s cat Rip.\u00a0 Well, in very early October, Rip needed to be put down.\u00a0 He really was not doing well.\u00a0 My family misses him of course, but they are glad he is no longer suffering.\u00a0 They appreciated all of your wonderful comments.<\/em><\/p>\n

While knitting the first pair of Christmas socks in a 4×4 rib, I realized that if I didn’t get any sock blockers, I was going to have awful photos.\u00a0 The socks were too narrow for my feet, so I asked Cristi, the turtlegirl<\/a>, if she’d make me a pair of\u00a0 blockers.\u00a0 Cristi usually puts rulers on the blockers, but I didn’t need that, so she asked if I wanted anything else.\u00a0 Well, I had a ladybug tape measure and a beehive pincushion (see below), so I thought something keeping with the “good bugs” theme would be cool.\u00a0 Cristi did dragonflies, and I couldn’t be more pleased.
\n<\/a>
\nSo, the first pair of Christmas socks, which I finished in August, can now have their FO pic on the blog.
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\nThe yarn is Fleece Artist Merino in Lily Pond. I knit on 2.25 mm (size 1) needles, which with my tension the FA yarn made for a very<\/em> durable fabric. I don’t think I’ll do that again. Plus, on size 1 needles, the Eye of Partridge heel took 42 rows for 21 picked up stitches. I’m somewhat surprised that the gussets worked out as well as they did. But they are DONE!<\/p>\n

I also finished the second pair of Christmas socks in a K3,P1,K1,P1 rib for the leg and a stockinette foot. These turned out nice in Fleece Artist Seawool in Burgundy.
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\nI wasn’t enthralled with the Seawool; it felt a little artificial, but the knit fabric turned out very nice. So that’s IT on the Christmas socks. I have one hat to knit for a gift. I already knit a hat, but it is too small for the recipient, so I ordered new yarn. The too small hat should fit a grad student in lab who is a size 0 and grew up in Phoenix, so she finds northern California cold. She’s agreed to a photoshoot if the hat fits, and then she can keep it.<\/p>\n

I have to show you my bottle cap pin cushion (the support is a bottle cap from a 2 liter soda bottle) made by Very Big Jen, which I bought at her etsy shop, Schmaltzy Craftsy<\/a>. It is so cute! (and I’m usually pretty immune to cute) I haven’t been able to stick any pins in it yet. So it currently functions as a objet d’art<\/em>. With the dragonfly sock blockers and my ladybug tape measure, the trio makes quite a nice little “good bugs” grouping. Good bugs, of course, are those bugs that eat the bad bugs that bite me (or provide the world with food by pollinating plants and eating crop pests–I suppose that’s almost<\/em> as important as eating the bugs that bite me).
\n<\/a>
\nAs for bugs biting me, let’s just say that when asked what sort of insect repellent he uses, M says, “I stand next to my wife, and they are too busy biting her to bite me.” Nice.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Before I get to the socks, many people wanted me to keep them updated about my family’s cat Rip.\u00a0 Well, in very early October, Rip needed to be put down.\u00a0 He really was not doing well.\u00a0 My family misses him of course, but they are …<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":741,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[16,35],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/farm4.staticflickr.com\/3024\/2968909200_321d932c4b_o_d.jpg?fit=%2C&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7pEGF-2G","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.molecularknitting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.molecularknitting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.molecularknitting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.molecularknitting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.molecularknitting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=166"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.molecularknitting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":524,"href":"https:\/\/www.molecularknitting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166\/revisions\/524"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.molecularknitting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/741"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.molecularknitting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=166"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.molecularknitting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=166"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.molecularknitting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=166"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}