forgot those

I nearly forgot to show my mermaids socks! one was knitted  very quickly, because I needed it for a demo on sock knitting a year ago. the other ball.... matured in a shoebox, together with another started pair!:) the dark red I started with a ball of schoppel zauberball is still in there; it's only done to the beginning of the first leg of a toe-up. but the handdyed mermaid was already finished halfway, so I decided to free it - and here it is:

 unfortunately the pumpkins are not home grown; I've never had much success with them, not even in the polytunnel:( the footlasts I bought are too small for my shoesize "violin case", that's why the socks look a bit "empty"... but they fit me very well:) I dyed the flat balls of sockyarn whole in a dyebath with food dyes. when the yarn was dry, I thought there's way too much white (of course, the yarn only took the green on the outside and the inner core. I wound it in the other direction and put it first into some blue and then into some leftover purple, which resulted in this blend of colours. I call them mermaid because of the colours, but the pattern is traveler from Janel Laidman's book "the enchanted sole", one of my favourite sock books. I changed it slightly, because I don't need a pocket on my socks, and the star toe was just to show them at the demo.

the cable pattern is nice to knit and not difficult. I added a glass drop bead in the last cable - the original shows more, but smaller beads!

I missed my chance for sunny pix yesterday - today it was rather grey and a bit hazy, but the asters are out and I couldn't resist them:)            (I would like a few more colours, but didn't find any nice ones at the local garden center:()

this sorbus has lovely autumn colour, too - I forgot to take one of the witch hazel, which has the most brilliant yellow leaves just now, with a rusty tinge along the edges.... apparently the birds prefer my ripe rhamnus berries to those of the sorbus, because those stay on the small tree well into winter! unfortunately they seem to have discovered this source last year - because in the years before they never fed on them, but this is the 2nd year in a row that I can barely pick a bowl full for my dyeing....