Progress report

I am still slogging away on the vest for my husband, unfortunately without much enthusiasm. I finished the back and am doing both fronts together and am about halfway done with them. This many cables has gotten to be torture and it definitely won’t be finished by Chanukah, which is tonight. Meanwhile he has gained weight. I don’t want to measure him again because this is supposed to be a surprise and I have no intention of ripping and restarting it anyway so I am knitting with my fingers crossed.
To cheer me up I needed some portable knitting so I started Chain Link Socks, the new pattern from Six Sock Knitalong. It took me a while to decide on colors but I had some Opal sock yarn in black and grey from Stitches East and I picked up some Lanett in red in Brooklyn and began. This is a slip stitch pattern that forms chains and I love it. I am trying to only knit the vest at home and limiting the socks to work and the car so I finish both.
This town has a knitting group called Keep You in Stitches which I belong to but never go to. It only meets once a month at the library and usually conflicts with the step class at my gym. But last night I made more of an effort because they were having a demo of mini stocking knitting and I wanted to see if I could learn any new techniques. The best way for me to learn is by seeing something demonstrated. It turned out to be a simple top down sock but I did use double pointed needles instead of my usual two circulars. We all made the little red and white sock on the left. This was only the second time I attended in about a year but the other knitters all seemed very nice and I will have to try to attend more frequently.