Flint Knits

About a year ago, my friend Allison hosted a bitchin holiday party (mulled wine, anyone?), and I noticed that her house shoes (socks + flip-flops) were kind of … well, sad. So I obvs offered to knit her some slippers. I don’t think she recognized the irresistible power of the Craft Challenge when she haltingly asked whether I could, maybe, make the slippers look like elf shoes?

Fuck yes, Allison. I surely can.

12 months later,  I give you: Elf Shoes.

[ravelry link]

Liberate your inner pixie, sprite, jester, imp or grinch! These puckish slippers are knit in the round and fulled to fit. They feature turn-down cuffs, short-row heels, and a curly elfin toe shaped with short rows and i-cord (Yvon of Storm in the Attic invented this super-clever toe construction, which can be applied to any sock or slipper).

The pattern comes in sizes from infant to adult wide. Foot length and cuff height are customizable.

Baby Elf Shoe - photo ©Adrian Bizilia

MATERIALS:

• 1 skein Cascade 220 (100% wool, 220 yards) in Main Color (MC) (Larger adult sizes may require a second skein)
• ½ skein Cascade 220 (100% wool, 220 yards) in Contrasting Color (CC)
• Set of five US size 10.5 (6.5mm) double-pointed needles
• tapestry needle

Would you like to make Elf Shoes for yourself and/or your loved ones?
DOWNLOAD THE FREE PATTERN!

Adult Elf Shoe - photo ©Adrian Bizilia

Big, big, heartfelt thanks to the knitters who tested this pattern and provided valuable feedback; to Adrian for her sweet stump shots and for figuring out the infant math; and most of all to Yvon for her badass toe innovation.

With apologies to my niece Claire, who is all that is perfect and joyful and full of goodness and light. And who, judging by this picture, has a healthy mistrust of acrylic fibers.

Enough! Enough with the babymaking, I say!

It must be a late twenties thing, because I swear to blog that all the straight ladies I know who didn’t get knocked up as teenagers (and even some of them who did) have had babies in the last 3 years. But now, for the first time in what seems like forever, I appear to have a brief and shining window of time where none of my friends is pregnant. And while I love my friends dearly, I will not miss the long conversations about hemorrhoids, or choosing the right doula, or the embarrassment of inconvenient breast leakage.

I have to admit, though, that I will miss knitting teeny tiny gifts for teeny tiny newborns. They’re so cute, and so satisfying, and so fast!

And so I give you the last of them. The last of the wee handmade infant duds.

pattern: Offset Wraplan, by Sara Morris [pdf]
yarn: Knitpicks Shine Sport, in “grass”
needles: US 3 and 5
[raveled]

pattern: none, just a hat and some tube socks with leaves attached.
(If folks want a tutorial, I’ll post one–let me know)
yarn: Knitpicks Shine Sport, in “leaf”
needles: US 4
[raveled]

And that’s it! The end of the teeny tiny knits for the foreseeable future.

But stay tuned for totally adorable toddler clothes, obvs. And I think Claire might need a collection of knitted cephalopods…

The Failure: I didn’t win that contest. I didn’t even make it into the semi-finals! Since I had waaaay more votes than everyone else (thanks, guys!), I can only assume this is because I didn’t follow the rules (big surprise). When one of the people organizing the contest sent me a Flickr message inviting me to submit my picture, I just did it. What I did not do was bother to read the terms of the contest, which apparently include a rule declaring that photos must be head-to-toe. Fail!

On a happier note, Laurynn (who just knit a thong, by the way) is the lucky winner of a $20 woolgirl.com gift certificate. Woo hoo!

The Success: The stripey/pooley Charade sock? Turned out gorgeous.

Just a tiny bit of pooling around the instep, which I think I can live with. In fact, I was so thrilled by how lovely Sandra’s pattern is in variegated yarn that, instead of knitting the second sock, I immediately cast on for another pair in a different variegated colorway.

The Robot: My niece Claire had her first birthday this week, and she obviously needed a wildly inappropriate gift from Cool Aunt Pam.

pattern: Bender Bending Rodriguez, by Soph Viklund
yarn: Plymouth Dreambaby DK and Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Baby 
ravelry link (includes list of my mods to the original pattern)

If you aren’t familiar with Futurama, Bender is a foul-mouthed, cigar-smoking, poker-playing robot who bends metal and is fueled entirely by booze.

Perfect for an infant, no?

Fortunately, Claire’s parents are Futurama fans, and were thus superjazzed about the gift,

and her grandparents don’t watch the show, so they just saw a cute robot toy,

and Claire herself discovered immediately how flingable wee Bender is, with those long, grippable arms and legs.

So everyone wins. Happy Birthday, Claire!

If you haven’t entered the contest for the woolgirl.com gift certificate, there’s still time! Go! Go!

Big thanks for all the kind responses to the February Lady Sweater!

If you’re interested in making a version that’s more faithful to Elizabeth Zimmerman’s original, several folks have made larger versions of the original baby sweater, by doing some serious math. I mentioned Jenny’s in my last post (could she be any cuter?), and you should also check out this super-gorgeous version. In fact, I just found out that Ravelry has a whole discussion going on about how to re-work the math for an adult size, with a few pictures of finished ones. (Shoulda known–there’s a Ravelry thread for everything.) And someone even made a grown-up version just by using superbulky yarn and the original pattern.

EZ’s original baby sweater is, of course, fucking brilliant in its construction. It has a lot of increases over a small number of rows, to create a rounded shape that will suit a wee baby’s round body. The pattern I wrote, on the other hand, is just a basic top-down raglan. This construction means that, instead of fitting a baby’s round body, it’s made to be fitted across an adult’s shoulders and upper back, then drape all swingy-like down from the bust (yeah, no, I could not get a job writing for J. Peterman). If you’re familiar with top-down raglan construction, you really don’t even need the pattern, just this one-sentence command: “knit a top-down raglan using EZ’s gull stitch pattern, with a row of 40-45 increases just above the bust.”

Finally, some folks have emailed because they’ve had problems making the raglan increases work. The issue seems to be around the phrase, “mark the next stitch.” This is not the same as “place a marker.” Rather, you mark the next stitch you knit. You can either place a marker on either side of that stitch, or slide a split ring marker through the knitted stitch, so that you know to put a m1 increase on either side of it for the raglan shaping. If you’re good at reading your knitting, you don’t even need a marker–just increase on either side of the same stitch each time. Hope this helps! (I’ll also go clarify in the pattern itself.)

I do actually have other knitting projects, too! I just started a pair of Sandra’s Charade socks in some Wollmeise sockenwolle that Kris sent me a while back.

But I’m not sure I love the striping. Should I embrace the striping? Or frog it and find a better pattern/yarn match? I beg you, be ruthless in your advice

Monkey: We hereby dub thee … Ramona Bananapants.

First of all, it just rolls of the tongue, doesn’t it? Ramona Bananapants. Ramona Bananapants.

Second, it evokes a lovely kind of sexual/gender ambiguity: I mean, she’s Ramona! But she’s got a Banana in her Pants! (Take that, heteronormative gender fascists!) And, since Ramona lives on a queer grad student’s shelf where she regularly fondles (and, let’s be honest, humps) an ironically framed photo of Michel Foucault, it just seemed right.

Unfortunately, while Blogless Canadian Rebecca (yes, that’s her real name) chose the winning name, her entry came after the official deadline. SO, she is the proud winner of bragging rights and a small consolation prize.

The Woolgirl gift certificate will go to the runner up: the fabulous Heather, who suggested “Snatch” as a nod to Ramona’s vaginer-like countenance. As Ryan pointed out, sexually-themed names were clearly the way to go in this contest.

But don’t feel bad, Blogless Canadian Rebecca! I mean, no one remembers who got the crown when Vanessa Williams was robbed.

Thanks so, so much to everyone who entered those hilarious, adorable, thoughtful, and clever names. This was my favorite contest ever.

Oh, and I finished a pair of socks. Yeah, that’s right. A PAIR.

pattern: Nancy Bush’s Child’s First Sock in Shell Pattern, from Knitting Vintage Socks
yarn: Koigu Premium Merino, color #2504, from Yarnzilla
needles: 2.5mm Addi circulars

modifications: skipped 1 pattern repeat; substituted eye of partridge heel + wedge toe.

If you’re a sock knitter who hasn’t made this pattern yet, Do It. It was one of the most satisfying sock-knitting experiences I’ve ever had. That might have something to do with the yarn, though — semi-solid Koigu has never let me down.

And I only waited 8 months in between the two socks! (Laura is my sister in this — see her salty recipe for how to defeat Second Sock Syndrome. Or check out Megan’s strategy for embracing it.)

Happy Hump Day, all! I’m going to go spend mine with Ramona and Michel.
If you know what I mean.
(Know what I mean?)