The votes are in and it’s a win!

While I have been traveling to Kansas (there’s no place like home…), swamped at work, and not posting on my blog, many of you have been VOTING - and for that I sincerely thank you.  My Fjordland socks won the Summer of Color contest!  Check out Allison’s post to see all the winners! I really have my mother to thank for this win.  While in Kansas, I mentioned to her that I entered this contest and wanted her to vote for me.  She said “oh, email me the info and I’ll have the members of my quilting group vote. Lots of them admire the socks you knit for me.”  I’m not sure if she contacted just quilters or the whole Fabric & Fiber crowd at Sun City Texas….but I think every single one of them voted – plus a few bridge and bunko players, to boot.  If only my father was a big emailer, we could have engaged the golf contingent, too!  In fact, when it became clear to me how many votes Mom was rustling up, I got off my duff and emailed everyone who might possibly be not annoyed by an email asking for a vote.  It was pretty fun, actually.So fun, in fact, that I’m moved to sponsor my own contest.  If you voted for Socks 12 in the Summer of Color contest (be honest, folks, you know who you are!), leave a comment on this post to enter to win a pair of socks handknit by me for you.  I’ll conduct a sock interview (putting my reference librarian skills to use) and we’ll come up with a yarn/pattern combo that is to your liking.  Enter by midnight on Tuesday, August 17 – I’ll use a random number generator to pick a winner.  Make sure your comment leaves me enough info so I know how to reach you (shoutout to Sun City)!

In other knitting news, I think I doubled the length of the butternut scarf (this was my airplane knitting).  This isn’t a great photo because it’s hard to take good photos of scarves in progress, but here it is:I also started a new plain vanilla sock in a self-striping yarn, suitable for knitting while chatting with family.  I made it to the heel by the time I arrived home (it’s almost done now but I have no visual documentation!): I also scored a beautiful skein of sock yarn at Wildflower Yarns in Manhattan – this is Berroco Ultra Alpaca Fine (50% wool, 20% alpaca, 30% nylon) in color 1275, which has the most wonderful name: Pea Soup Mix.  I haven’t worked with Ultra Alpaca Fine before: I hardly knit a stitch this past weekend, though, because it’s berry season (my favorite farm).  When berries are in, you pick:  And when the berries are picked, you make jam: I branched out some this year.  In addition to the usual raspberry-blackberry jam, I also did a blackberry-peach combo (with cinnamon and lime) and something called Peach Melba jam (which is 4 parts peach to 1 part raspberry and results in the most amazing pinkish orange color).  The peaches this year are so good, one of the few benefits of a too-dry summer (my favorite peach place).  I got on a roll on Sunday and finished about 3 dozen jars.  Mmmmmm.

And that’s enough for today!  Now, I’m going to settle in with my Simply Sock Yarn colorcards and think about which 4 colors might work best in the Mad for Plaid socks.

Thanks again to the 114 people who voted for Socks 12.  If I ever run for public office, I’m hiring my mom to be my campaign manager!