Slippers for a Yeti

In a couple of weeks, I will be heading to San Francisco to visit my sister and meet up with some friends. As a housewarming gift for my sister, who just got a house, I decided to make her a pair of house slippers from Knit 2 Together, which I bought for an awesome price of $5.50 on Amazon!

The pattern in the book calls for some of my favorite yarns - Manos del Uruguay or Rio de la Plata yarn. However, I decided to use some Japanese yarn I got from a swap instead. The yarn feels like a virgin wool yarn, which would be good yarn for felting. For the life of me, I could not get the same exact gauge, but I used it anyway -- it was close enough. The pattern gauge is 8.75 stitches per 4" of garter stitch using 3 strands of Manos/Rio yarn on US13 needles. I tested the gauge of my yarn using double, triple and quadruple stranding and US 11, 13 and 15 needles. The closest gauge I obtained was 8 stitches per 4" of garter stitch with US 13 needles and triple stranding.

The slipper was a quick and easy knit, although picking up and working stitches from the sole was a little awkward at the toe and heel. As I was working the last 4 rows of the second slipper, it suddenly dawned on me that maybe the yarn is superwash. Even though I don't read Japanese, I should have done a spit-felt test! Oh well, if it doesn't work out, I'll leave the slippers in a forest for Bigfoot. Time for the washing machine!

I'm also planning on knitting my sock fanatic sister a pair of socks. She has lots of socks organized very neatly in OCD fashion in a drawer, but she's never had a pair of hand-knitted socks. She has never asked me to knit her a pair either. I haven't decided whether to knit a pair of argyles or a pair with a skull motif. My sister loves argyle socks, but I don't know if I'm ready for knitting argyle socks - plus, I'm having a hard time finding a nice pattern. Since the age of 13-14, my sister also has had an inexplicable (in my mind) obsession with all things skull. I'm leaning towards the skull thing, but either way, I'm sure she'll be pleased.