wants vs. needs

This girl wants yarn... I'm a yarn stasher. I'm also a yarn snob [officially now, since I was labeled by another knitter and not just my own family members]. In any case, stashing snobby yarns is what I do. It's my mode of operation to spot a delicious yarn, lust from a distance for just a short time, and then pounce. Thus was the course of events when I spied this in early February:

The Plucky Knitter Merino Cashmere Nylon Fingering in "Special Fella".
(Plucky's photo better captures the color.)

Since my own special fella, Mr. SheepishOne, has a birthday in March, I figured that I had just enough time to knit up a pair of squooshy Retro Rib socks for his special day. I had them done just a week before the deadline, and like a giddy school girl awaiting Santa's arrival, I couldn't wait for his birthday and gave them to him early.

What this girl also wants is more time to knit. I have two different sock projects on the needles at the moment. The first, at 50% complete, is Mockery Socks. The other is Stems. Both have 4 row repeats to their patterns, which keeps me on my toes, since often I set a sock down mid-row so I can see to the needs of one of my children.

Mockery was decided upon by the Malabrigo Junkies (Ravelry) for a sock KAL during Malabrigo March. I've had a skein of Malabrigo Sock in Chocolate Amargo for a while, so pulled it out of the stash and cast on. I had a few problems with this sock out of the gate, but they were all absent-minded mistakes that I had made. Almost always I use a size 2 needle for socks with a fingering weight yarn, but this Malabrigo Sock is a very light fingering and to get gauge I had to pull out my rarely used size 1's. Size 1 dpns make me feel like I am working with toothpicks, and my experience with them is not stellar: I've broken an entire set, one by one, so they make me a bit nervous. However, the Mockery pattern is a lovely one, and effective yet simple. Unfortunately, I've only been able to access the pattern through Ravelry, so those of you without a Rav account will need to sign up straightaway.

Stems -- only about 25% complete -- is my first Project Spectrum 4 knit, and most likely the only for this direction of PS4. I'm using Dream in Classy Smooshy, Happy Forest colorway, and though I'm enjoying the color variances of the DIC, I don't like the hand. In my opinion, the yarn is pretty stiff when knit, but maybe that will change with washing. As always, Charlene Schurch is a pattern writer master, and I find that anything I choose to knit from her books is always fabulous.

What this girl needs is food! Lots of you have responded to my previous post begging for family-tested recipes -- even the lurkers! I appreciate the time you take to e-mail me your tried-and-trues. Please keep sending them. Remember, there's a giveaway to entice you... And to play fair, here is one recipe I keep in rotation, ingredients always on hand in the pantry: Sticky Coconut Chicken. Mmm, mmm, good!