What’s on my needles: February/March 2023

If I had to give a theme for this WIP update, it’d be “I Miss Scandinavia.”

Self-striping socks

I’m still not super adept at knitting socks, but I do enjoy the portability of projects this small and the utility of it — even if it’s not a project I reach for all the time. The yarn I’m using is a stunning hand-dyed sock yarn by Garnlycka I picked up when we took a day trip from Denmark to Sweden on our vacation last summer. The colourway is “Vissen Lüktart,” which, according to Google Translate means “withered sweetpea” in Swedish (unless you forget the umlaut — then it means “musty smell”). I’m eager to see how the shifting colours will stack together.

This is not the first time I started this particular sock. I was merely a few rows in when tragedy struck and my beloved mini-circular needle snapped in half. Sadly a common occurrence with wooden needles.

Fortunately, I had a spare (with the intended purpose of working on two separate socks at once); and the manufacturer, Lykke, has a 5-year guarantee on its needles, if you break one, just fill out the online form with proof of the broken piece, and Lykke will replace your dearly departed needle for free. My replacement circ showed up only a week later!

Jenny Sweater by Petite Knits

Petite Knits is a prolific knitwear designer from Denmark, with a catalogue loaded with hygge-worthy knits for all ages, and I saw several Petite Knits being worn out and about by Danes when we were vacationing. Her Jenny Sweater pattern features rows of smock stitches making a raised diamond pattern and uses fingering weight yarn held double with mohair.

I’d been hanging onto this cute pastel yellow yarn that I also got in Sweden — the shade is called “Sommersol,” which translates to “Summer Sun” — waiting for the right inspiration to hit. My in-laws gifted me with a skein of Polkadot Creek Suri alpaca mohair for Christmas in the shade Spice, a lovely yellow-orange colour. It was the perfect pairing with my Swedish yarn, and I thought it only fitting to make a Petite Knits design with them! Even if the ribbing took me ages.

What’s still on my needles: Vintage Snood redux

Speaking of ribbing taking an eternity, I’m still plugging my way through the snood for my Gramma, done with fingering weight in a 2×2 rib. The stitches and the thinness of the yarn mean that it works up extremely slowly by my standards. I have yet to get the hang of speedily switching between the knit and purl positions like some knitters can. Gramma had mentioned that when people tried making her a new snood in the past, it always ended up too thick — which sounds to me like they didn’t use a fingering weight like the original snood.

I’m adamant to finish this in time for her 80th birthday at the end of the month, and given the frozen hellscape that is Alberta, she should still get another month or two to get some use out of it!