Happy, Knitty 4th!

Happy 4th of July to all my American readers! I hope everyone is enjoying a couple of days off and spending some quality time with knitting, pets, family, or any other grouping or occupation you particularly enjoy.

Mr. Batty and I mostly stayed around the house, with the exception of a trip to the local game store, a trip to a restaurant, and a walk to the bakery. It's been very relaxing. Not much in the way of fascinating pictures, I'm afraid, but we both very much needed the quiet time.
We did not make it out to see the fireworks. We did watch the HBO miniseries about John Adams, though, and it just so happened that we'd gotten to the Independence episode on the 4th, so this worked out very nicely.

In other news, the recipients of my knits are away from the Internet, so I can now show you the socks I've been working on -- Marlene, by Cookie A. Fun socks. Not the best lighting (it's crazy bright out), but you can see the pattern.


The color is very slightly variegated, the stitch definition is wonderful, and I'm loving this project -- it's knitting up a bit more slowly than expected, but then again, I've been distracted.


Last Sunday, I started Abrazo from knitty. I've had my eye on it for a while, and it knit up incredibly quickly -- I almost finished it last Sunday, but then got distracted by work. I'm loving the outcome, the yarn is dreamy soft, it's black (yay, black!), and I did the cabling without a cable needle. New skill, how cool is that?


Details:
Pattern: Abrazo
Needles: US #10 and #11
Yarn: Malabrigo Chunky
Color: Black (it's a deep, rich black, but it still shows the cables, yay!)
Size: I knit the length for the small size and the number of stitches from the medium size to compensate for the thinner yarn -- Malabrigo is thinner than the actual yarn I subbed it for
Comments: Great quick vest. I need to block it to even out the crochet edgings around the neck and armholes. Note on doing single crochet: It's surprisingly difficult to get the knit stitches/crochet stitches ration quite right. I used a hook that corresponds to the smaller needle size, but still had to skip the occasional knit stitch to keep the edge from flaring.

Modeled shot coming up after I block this vest. I think I'm addicted... I can't stop knitting vests!