Now that we’ve purchased our subscription, I can let you all know that the sKNITches Cinema Club is open for enrollments for the period Jan-Apr.

You won’t be disappointed, here is my haul from the last club.

I first came across sKNITches at The Loopy Ewe and immediately bought up four skeins of their self-striping Syncopation.

Then, a few months ago, a friend tipped me off that the sKNITches Cinema Club was open for subscriptions and I jumped.

September: I am the Arm

The Lowdown:

The Theme:

It’s a Cinema club, so each month’s yarn and goodies is based on a different film. Each month comes with a popcorn box (very cute touch), a little movie poster and a row of ‘admit one’ tokens.

September’s film was Twin Peaks Fire Walk With Me, October was ET, November was Cast Away and December was Little Shop of Horrors.

The theme was really cohesive and you could tell that sKNITches worked really hard at making everything that was in the package was related to the theme and it really made the club a lot of fun.

The Yarns:

September contained a GORGEOUS colourway called ‘I am the Arm’, made up of a range of reds and black on a 70% superwash, 30% silk base. Just fantastic.

October was a self-striping colourway called ‘Phone Home’ made up of brown, pink, white and blue on a superwash merino base.

November’s base was 50% superwash merino, 50% tencel, in a great beachy colourway called ‘Wilson’ made up of browns, sand and blues.

December’s was a self-striping colourway called ‘Feed Me Seymour!’ on a superwash merino base.

November: Phone Home

The Goodies:

Four months meant four gorgeous skeins of yarn and associated booty. The first month contained a stitch marker and some popcorn shaped mini soaps. The second month contained a glow stick, reeces pieces, and a wee halloween candy bowl/container. The third month contained a set of seaside tea light candles. The fourth, my favourite month, contained a pair of walking, chattering teeth, a wee venus fly trap (no one tell Aussie Customs, though), a candy cane and a little flower stitch marker

The Price:

The club cost $165, plus an extra $7 for postage to Australia. It’s one of the more expensive clubs that I’m currently a member of, but I do think it was good value.

As I mentioned, you could tell that a lot of thought and effort went into the packages each month, plus they were posted with delivery confirmation.

Two of the four yarns were what I would consider premium yarns. Actually, the silk content of ‘I am the Arm’ bumps it up into the luxury yarn category for me. As someone who dyes self-striping yarns, I think that the superwash merino being self-stripers makes them premium yarns, too.

The extras were nice. I really love the popcorn boxes and they’re being recycled into our fathers’ Christmas hampers this year (along with movie tickets and treats) but the rest? I LOVED the final month but I wasn’t that keen on the candles and the rest of it was kind of disposable, to me, but they really came together into a fun package that has been the highlight of my mail box each month.

November: Wilson

The Conclusion:

For my money, the club was great value.

Any communication I had with sKNITches was prompt and polite and very professional. The range of yarns was a delight to experience, the colourways were appropriate to the films they were supposed to represent (although Pants thought the Wilson colourway should have been more… volleyball coloured - I’m glad it wasn’t!) and the extras were thoughtful and interesting.

The fact that one of the colourways was self-striping and it’s more or less the perfect club for the Spiraling crew.

When do signups for the next one open?

Five skeins out of five.

I designed this little pattern for a swap over on Ravelry’s OTF group. We’re making stockings, popping in a few little treats and posting them off to each other for some festive cheer.

They’re just a very simplified, easily adaptable sock pattern. I wouldn’t suggest using this heel on a real pair of socks, but it works very well for something decorative.

This pattern looks great in a variety of sizes, from the smallest lace weight stocking to put on a gift to the larger sizes to hang on the foot of a bed with something nice tucked inside.

You will need the yarn of your choice and a circular needle or DPNs in the size recommended on the label, plus a tapestry needle to close the toe..

For my sample knits, I used the following:

2 g of Dream in Color Baby and 2 mm / US0 needles (green)

89g of Cleckheaton Gusto 10 and 10mm / US15 needles (black and aqua)

10g of Malabrigo Worsted and 5mm / US8 needles (red)

4 g of Tempted Good Grrl and 2.25mm / US1 needles (navy and purple)

Using long tail cast on, and leaving a foot or two of yarn in the tail, co 24 stitches.

Join in the round, being careful not to twist your stitches. Mark beginning of round.

Knit 20 rows.

Make a basic short row heel as follows:

Row 1: k6, turn work, slip 1 purlwise, purl 11, turn work
Row 2: slip 1, k10, turn
Row 3: slip 1 purlwise, p9, turn
Row 4: slip 1, k8, turn
Row 5: slip 1 purlwise, p7, turn
Row 6: slip 1, k7, turn
Row 7: slip 1 purlwise, p8, turn
Row 8: slip 1, k9, turn
Row 9: slip 1 purlwise, p10, turn
Row 10: slip 1, k11

Return to working in the round. Don’t worry too much if you have small holes in your heel, it won’t see too much wear and tear and you can sew up the holes later.

Knit 15 rows. Your round will end in line with the middle of the heel.

Make toe as follows, with twelve stitches on each needle, N1 will have the round marker in the centre.

Row 1: knit to last three stitches, k2tog, k1
Row 2: k1, ssk, knit to last three stitches, k2tog, k
Row 3: k1, ssk, knit to end
Row 4: knit

Repeat rows 1 – 4 twice and rows 1 – 3 once more.

You will have 12 stitches in total remaining.

Graft stitches together using kitchener stitch, or simply bind off and sew the two sides together.

There are two ways to make the hanging loop:

1. Pick up two stitches beside the cast on tail and knit an inch or so of icord (length dependant on the size of your stocking), loop it around and secure it to the inside of the stocking.
2. Cut a length of yarn twice the length of the cast on tail, thread it through the stocking beside the tail and braid an inch or so (length dependant on the size of your stocking), loop it around and secure it to the inside of the stocking.

Notes on personalising your stocking:

• You can use any yarn you fancy, just use the recommended needle size.
• Try striping two different colours of the same yarn.
• Try knitting the first few rows with a novelty yarn before switching to your main yarn.
• Knit two rows, purl two rows for an interesting effect.
• Use it as a small canvas to try a new technique, like intarsia or duplicate stitch.
• Try a small cable on the leg of the stocking. Remember that the cable will draw in the rows, so you may want to shorten the leg and foot by a few rows.

Enjoy!

This work is licenced under a Creative Commons Licence.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m a sucker for indie sock yarns, I CAN NOT GET ENOUGH of them. I actually have around two hundred pairs of socks in waiting (ie. skeins of sock yarn) sitting in my not-stash, being regularly fondled, but there’s definitely a place for the commercials.

I’m unashamed to admit that I have a whole 55l plastic crate dedicated to commercials, from our beloved Patonyle to Online Supersocke, Opal and plenty of Regia.

The Regia Color 4-Ply is a thin fingering, I got 17 wraps per inch, compared (again) with 16 for STR Lightweight and Shibui Knits Sock, 13 for STR Silkie.

The Low Down:

The Swatch:

Using 2.25mm / US size 1needles, I achieved 10 stitches and 13 rows to the inch.

The Knitting:

It’s not the softest to the hand, but it’s comfortable to knit with. Stitch definition is wonderful.

The First Wash:

Yarn didn’t obviously soften or change in any way. Stitch definition is still excellent.

The Wearing:

Absolutely no complaints, after several hand washings and wearing in shoes, there is no noticable wear.

The Price:

I can’t argue with the price. I have sock yarns that have cost me in excess of $30 for a pair’s worth but you can generally pick up Regia yarns for around the $10 a skein mark, cheaper if you catch them on sale.

The Conclusion:

This is a solid, no frills yarn. It may not have the prestige or flat-out yumminess of some other yarns out there, but it’s good value.

Highly recommended for patterns where too much exciting colour will obscure the lace or for gift socks where you’re not sure the recipient will hand-wash, great for use with a CSM.

Four skeins out of five.

STR Silkie, available from Blue Moon Fibre Arts, is a 3 ply, fingering weight yarn, with one of the threads made up of a blend of superwash merino and bombyx silk.

It’s not a huge amount of silk. Let’s be honest, at 19% it doesn’t have the same luxurious cachet as a high percentage silk yarn, but it’s surprisingly soft and delicious. The silk takes dye differently to the superwash only plies, it’s far less saturated, giving a nice heathered effect that I believe goes a long way towards counteracting the horrid pooling that STR is known for.

I purchased my skein in Jade, which has a few shades but is a more tonal colourway than most of the STR stable, which will also help with pooling. My pattern, Zara, made up of a broken rib, also helped to break up the colour runs.

I wear a size 7 shoe and like my socks with a short cuff and had 42g / 1.5oz left over from my pair, which is more than enough for a child’s pair. The yardage, at 329m / 360yd, is a little on the short side, but the yarn is thicker than most fingering yarns in my stash, I got 13 wpi for the silkie, making it closer to a sport weight, compared to 16 for the STR Lighweight and ShiBui Sock and 17 for Regia Color 4ply.

The Low Down:

The Swatch:

On 2.25mm, US size 1 needles, I got a comfortable 9 stitches and 13 rows to the inch.

The Knitting:

People have reported splitting issues and irritations with this yarn. I knit these magic loop on a single knit picks circular needle and I didn’t have any trouble at all, it was actually a pleasure to knit with, soft on the hands and easy on the needles.

The First Wash:

Upon washing (hand washed in cold water with a wool wash and dried flat out of the sun) the yarn immediately bloomed and took on a very slight halo. It doesn’t negate from the look of the socks at all.

The Wearing:

They’ve worn really well, with very little pilling, fading, shrinking or stretching.

Reports on Ravelry indicate that the fabric has a tendancy to shrink and full, but with gentle washing and, admittedly, gentle wearing, I haven’t had any problems in the weeks since they were completed.

The Price:

At $24 for a 100g / 3.5oz skein, it’s at the upper end of the mass-produced indie sock yarns (is that a juxtaposition or what?) and I probably wouldn’t have bought it if I hadn’t been involved in a group order over on the Aus Knitters group on Ravelry.

However, once I started knitting with it, and even more so once I saw and wore the finish product, I really think that this one is well and truely worth the money.

The Conclusion:

I pulled out a few other hand knit socks while I was researching this review, including the same pattern in a few yarns and it has just further convinced me that this yarn is worth spending my money on.

It’s soft, easy to knit, the colour is gorgeous and it’s a nice treat to knit something as commonplace as socks with a beautiful yarn that has a touch of silk in.

Four and a half skeins out of five.