Collectively, we knitters have achieved Gold Medal Circle status at SO for 2014, 2015, and 2016. Let’s do it again for 2017. I’ll keep the running total at the top here. End of 2016: $7,050.

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For my brother Mark, whose July birthday was always a big deal. I think about him a lot.

I am hoping that many $2 dishcloth pattern purchases may add up to nice donation to Special Olympics this year. At the end of the year I’ll report the totals in this blog, and, minus a small Paypal fee, I’ll donate it all to this cause.

Your help is appreciated. Tell your friends.

The cloth is a simple one, with a splash of color and design attention paid to the details at the edges and loop.

Thanks for helping me make this gift by purchasing a copy of the pattern at Ravelry.com.

Buy it by following this link: Link to Ravelry pattern page. You’ll find a “buy now” button to click there. The pattern is called “Sinkmates”.

Thanks.

– Lorilee

Leeside Hand Warmers is a new pattern available for $4.50 in two sizes. Note: If you receive my newsletter you’ll be getting a $1 off coupon tomorrow, on Monday, May 5.

It’s worked in the round from the cuff toward the fingers with an afterthought thumb. Pattern is charted. Half of the rounds are stranded color work with two colors which can constrict the fabric, so be careful with tension. To mitigate that, it is mostly worked in k2 x p2 ribbing which restores some elasticity.

It requires about 20 grams each of four colors of fingering weight yarn. I used The Plucky Knitter Primo Fingering.

Although designed with four colors, consider working in a plethora of colors, or in two colors only, or add some mystery to the knitting by using contrasting self-striping yarns.

If you want to knit the Meander socks, the pattern is now on Ravelry.com.

Click here to go to Ravelry to buy it now. $5.50 | three sizes. Those who were signed up in time to receive their April newsletter from me can now use the code for their discount. Attendees at the Carodan Farm SoXpereince retreat this weekend can do the same. Thank you.

I used Blue Moon Fiber Arts Socks That Rock Lightweight shaded solids for the main color, and oddments of The Plucky Knitter Primo Fingering for the contrasting vertical strands. Find some technique help here.

This pattern uses text and charts in the form of Stitch-Maps.

In a little over two weeks I get to play with knitters and see wild horses on Chincoteague Island. Carodan Farm hosts their annual SoXperience Retreat there, and I get to teach! I am so excited. Carodan Farm is a farm that’s a wool shop, or a wool shop that’s a farm. I’m not quite sure how they do it all, but I hear lovely things and can’t wait to get there to experience it all with a bunch of knitters willing to learn new things.

From the event name, you get the idea that the focus is on socks. I love that. And I love that I get to teach Vertically Stranded Color Work which works great on socks as well as anything else.  You can read more about the event in this link to their newsletter. Here. Won’t you please consider joining us in Virginia?

This has been on my schedule for a while, but just a couple weeks ago I decided to design a sock just for the event, so students can apply what they learn using a pattern (in case they don’t quite dare to wing it). Students get the pattern free, and afterward I’ll put it up for sale on Ravelry.

It’s a straightforward top-down sock, except for the stranding bits. The photo here is a bit misleading. See the patterning extending down the heel flap? Well, I decided a standard reinforced flap might wear better, so that is how the pattern is written, and it will include a photo of the second sock done this way. Clog wearers can make  modifications if they like the pattern on the heel.

I used Blue Moon Fiber Arts Socks That Rock Lightweight ‘Every Day Grey’ for the main color, and oddments of two colors of The Plucky Knitter Primo Fingering for the contrasting vertical strands.

My first collaboration with The Plucky Knitter goes live tomorrow (March 9). This ought to be fun! I hope to see many of you sporting these skirts in the coming months. The colors she has selected are stunning. I’ll be knitting one for me in “L2” color combo. This will take a little longer than the one knitted for a runway model, but I won’t mind. Maybe we can knit along together.

Read all about it over on the Plucky blog, two posts dated March 7.

If you are working on yours, find some tips here.

Students from my Vertically-Stranded Color Work classes may be interested in a new pattern I just posted on Ravelry. “Mosey Over” is a hat pattern that uses the technique. In this case, the contrasting vertical strands are harvested from a skein of Cascade Yarns Casablanca, a self-striping yarn I found lovely to work with. One skein’ll do it. The contrast yarns are knitted in as you work. Plus, look at all the pretty colors!

This pattern uses written instructions and is also “charted” using JC Briar’s Stitch-Maps, a website I also find lovely to work with.