FO: Strawberry stócaí

I finally finished the socks I started a few weeks ago. I'm happy with how they turned out, but that is a long time to be using 4-ply yarn on 2mm needles. I tend to show affection through gestures rather than by being verbally or physically affectionate - I'm sorry you didn't get that job, here's some chocolate! Congratulations on your exam results, I made you a thing! - so if I ever make you a pair of socks, you can take it as a sign that I harbour a great deal of affection for you.

The pattern for these is Mock Cable Socks from Toe-Up Socks In A Box. I used Wendy Happy 4-Ply, which I've not seen since getting it. I think using heavily variegated yarn for cables is against The Rules of knitting, but I think they turned out well in spite.

A photo for This Is Knit's photo competition: a wip or fo in a 'uniquely Irish' setting, though some of this is Irish by context. Here are my socks with my copy of Harry Potter agus an Órchloch, along with my foclóir (because having school-leavers not be fluent in a language they've been learning since age five is an entrenched part of Irish culture), and a bar of Butlers (the most Irish of chocolate) which I bought in celebration of getting an interview for a PhD in Edinburgh (emigration being a proud Irish tradition). Bonus Irishness: The socks are a birthday present for my mother, and there's nothing and no-one more Irish than the Irish mammy.*

The foclóir (a gift, not my school one) even has beautiful old Irish font. Would you ever look how lovely it is :)

 *Dear Americans, the Irish mammy is completely different to the Jim Crow mammy stereotype.

Costumery: Steampunk something!

I went to a Steampunk night in The Sugar Club on Friday! It was lots of fun, and I got to dress up, and if you ever get a chance to see anything with Foxy P. Cox in it you really should.

I didn't leave myself a whole lot of time between deciding to go and the event, I think my costume was a decent effort.

I photograph awkwardly. This was the best one.

I made the blouse + collar from this Threadbanger tutorial. It sits a bit funny because I used a men's shirt, and men's shirts for some reason don't accommodate hips, WHAT IS UP WITH THAT. The sleeves hit my arm at a funny length, but that was the longest I could cut it due to the length of the slit for the cuff to roll up. The collar was loose enough to scoot itself around my neck, too. Perhaps I should have bought a blouse, designed for people with child-bearing hips and stubby little fore-arms. I also could probably have used a few more tea-bags to stain it a slightly darker brown. Overall I'm happy though, I'm going to hang onto it for use in future costumes.

The rest of the costume doesn't have much backstory. I bought the corset in Camden Market two years ago, and borrowed the boots from my sister.

For make-up, I used the Steampunk Airship Pirate tutorial by Hollywood Noir, but chickened out of doing such a dramatic style, and didn't have the right colours for a lot of it, and ended up looking like a non-descript goth. But I think that's acceptable for the circles who'd go to a steampunk night anyway.

Not very good photos because I was running late. I am a walking planning fallacy.

I think it's a good baseline costume, I might try to build on it for Hallowe'en. Threadbanger have a tutorial for making goggles, and it's above my current ability but my goodness, this working robot arm. If nothing else, I now have a just-in-case costume other than "pirate, I guess".