The Olympic flame was extinguished last night and with the Games’ conclusion also came the end of the Ravelympics and the Knitting Olympics.

How did I do?

Well, the failure first. This is not a sweater:

That would be the left front panel of Hey, Teach, my Knitting Olympics project. I had several problems with this sweater, mostly relating to gauge and my inability to find it and to my understanding of the schematic of the pattern (and thus where Rudi and I ought to be measuring). The good news is that the lacy portion ought to fit just fine. The bad news is that I’m not convinced the same is true of the skirt — which ought to be longer — and the ribbing — which now looks pretty but which is probably too tight for the sweater’s design.

I need to block it and figure out what’s next — starting over, severe blocking, or cutting it and making it longer at the other end.

On the other hand, I went three for three in my WiPs-Dancing category of the Ravelympics, finishing three projects that have been hanging around my neck for far too long:

My mitts no longer have dredlocks inside:

My red scarf will be ready to send out next fall when the next request goes out for the Red Scarf Project:

(Yes, it really is surprisingly skinny, but it’s going out as-is anyway…)

And this is a long-awaited project for someone who reads the blog. She knows about it, but it’s unfair for everyone to get to see her finished present before she does. So you’ll just have to stop by next week when the finished object can be revealed:

For the time being, I will merely note that I used up every T-pin in those three containers during the blocking process, as well as several needles that inadvertently had been put in them. And I still had to resort to raiding my bulletin board and the one in our kitchenette at work for that handful of push pins you see to block the thing.

Generally, I’m quite pleased. I eventually will have a beautiful sweater and will have learned a lot in the process. And I have three finished objects that I’m quite proud of and happy to be done with. And, really, who could ask for more than that?

Remember when your math teacher assured you that you’d use arithmetic in your life all the time and you really didn’t believe him or her? You thought you’d use a calculator or your fingers or whatever.

Well, your math teacher was right.

When measuring a swatch, when you align your first stitch at the 1″ mark and count until you get to the 4″ mark, you are NOT in fact measuring a four-inch section of your knitting.

That’s important to remember.

Apologies, math teachers everywhere…

It’s time yet again for the Winter Olympics, one of the rare moments when sport and crafting intersect.

I am taking part in two knitting-related events during the next 16 days. One is the Ravelympics, where I will be working on finishing some languishing projects in WiPsDancing as part of Team Madness in Progress (a team made up of those of us who will compete against each other in Sock Madness next month). These will be smaller projects that I’ve allowed to sit untouched for far too long — things like weaving in the ends of the mitts I’ve been wearing since October 1 and the crochet border on Mum’s birthday shawl.

The other event is the Yarn Harlot’s Knitting Olympics, where I’m hoping to make a sweater out of the 1200+ yards of Blue Moon Fiber Arts WooBu (a merino-bamboo blend) I bought at Sheep and Wool. (It’s the blue-grey yarn in the photo below.)

ETA: Here’s a better shot of the yarn:

The question, though, is what to make with it. I have it narrowed down to four choices:

1. Hey, Teach!
2. Rosalind
3. Shalom Cardigan
4. CeCe (This is Rudi’s least favorite of the bunch because he’s concerned I will hate knitting the lace…)

Any thoughts on what I should spend the rest of the month knitting? Or what would best good on me?

I have competed in both knitting events before and have had a lot of fun with them. I’m hoping that taking part in both of them will lead to twice as much merriment and a lot of finished knitting come the extinguishing of the Olympic flame.

The grammar question I raised last week elicited a lot of comments, so I thought maybe we’d see what you all have to say on another topic:

Many of you have collections of one sort or another — books, yarn, music, movies, games, art, ephemera, memorabilia, etc. How do you keep them from taking over your space? How do you store and/or display them to their best advantage?

Rudi and I have started seriously considering this question and we’d love to hear how others have dealt with it. Share your thoughts in the comments.

One of the fun things about a knitting community is that you can participate in knit-alongs, where you and a bunch of other people work on the same pattern (or sometimes on different patterns attached to the same theme) at the same time.

This month, the Sock Knitters Anonymous group on Ravelry is doing a knit-along of a mystery sock, where you knit a portion of the sock each week until the final clue is released at the end of January.

The designer of the sock, Debbie O’Neill, uses beads and texture to create what is, so far, a really fun sock.

Not surprisingly, the sock looks better on my foot than it does laid flat, but I just cast something new onto the circular needles I’d have to move this sock to in order to easily demonstrate that, so you’ll just have to wait for a finished sock to be modeled.

In the meantime, here’s the front:

And here’s the back

The yarn is ShibuiKnits Sock in the Sky colorway and I’ve enjoyed working with it quite a bit thus far (even if there are some weird pooling issues with this particular number of stitches in the round). The beads are Cobalt Matte (although they look purple) and were not as intimidating as I would have thought.

Check back in early February for a finished pair (I hope).

I’m feeling kind of tired tonight and all the posts I want to write require activity — either the setting up of photos or the writing of other posts that have to come first. So you’re getting a sort of placeholder post instead.

I cast on a sock tonight. It’s the first new sock I’ve started since September and I felt a bit rusty for a few rows.

It’s a lovely sky blue color of yarn that I won in 2008, and the design will feature beads of either pink or purple. I’d show you a photo so you could weigh in, but that would require action and energy. So, tomorrow, maybe…

Tonight, it’s enough really just to have knit for a while…