Of Stripes and Checks

It wasn't much of a fun weekend -- that will come in a few days, when we head to Nashville for a friend's wedding. Rather, it was a very productive weekend -- lots of accomplishing tasks that I'd been putting off for a while. But I managed to sprinkle some fun in too--JT took me to see Cabaret on Sunday -- that was great! I'd never seen it.

And I finally got to put this to use:

This is my grandmother's checkerboard cake pan. I have fond memories of making checkerboard cake with her when I was a kid. When I was visiting my grandparents in August, I asked if I could have the pan -- they're downsizing in preparation for a move. Grandma dug through the cupboard and found it intact, and sent it home with me. Grandma, here's showing you that it's not going to waste:

Checkerboard cake! Made for Knit'n'Nosh on Friday night. I made a maple icing that wasn't too good, but it was thin enough that it didn't detract from the rest of the cake. The cake itself was delicious! (Recipe from the Fanny Farmer Baking Book).

And, in between doing chores at home and helping friends paint their new palatial apartment, I did take a few knitting breaks. It helped that there were good football games on. You know I love the football knitting.

So I finally finished these:

Crazity Stripity Socks
Pattern: Used Wendy's Generic Toe-Up for toes and heels, then a 4x2 rib on cuff and top of foot
Yarn: Vesper Sock Yarn, Strange Little Mama colorway
Needles: US1 Addi Turbos, done on 2 circs
Size: To fit a woman's 11W. (72 stitches around)
Comments: This was my first foray into self-striping yarn. If I'd been thinking about it, I would have cast on for the first one at the beginning of a color repeat and not in the middle -- it was hard to get the stripes to line up. They don't match perfectly, but they're close enough. I was glad I had enough yarn.

In fact, I had enough left over to make a secondary gift for this friend, who just found out some happy news:

She's expecting.

What a happy little sock family! Just perfect for Socktoberfest!