I hear that the Sock Summit crew has begun preparations for next year's convention. It's got me thinking about socks. I don't have one on the needles right now and it makes me feel like something's missing. I feel this quite keenly when I'm feeling down. It might be a little bit of a compulsion to bust out with the sock knitting when faced with bad news. Not having a sock on the needles feels a little like not wearing enough armor.

So the other night, I busted out one of my boxes of sock yarn and chose my next pair of socks. There was Lorna's, there was Colinette, some Blue Moon Fiber Arts, and towards the back was some Trekking XXL, which I think I'm going to do some socks from the toe up, some simple stockinette stitch. Those are my favorite.

That said, I still haven't knit much of the sock yarn I bought at the last Sock Summit, but I sincerely doubt that it will prevent me from attending the next one.

Dear Madonna,

I hear that you're producing directing the movie, "W.E." which loosely involves Wallis Simpson and her relationship with King Edward the nth (forgive me, I'm American and I lose track of British Kings after the second or third). I think it's a fabulous idea and look forward to watching the trailer on the intertubes. Hopefully, I can get babysitting and get to see the movie in an actual theatre (but please, for the love of god do not release it in 3D). I'm a sucker to period films, so consider me a ticket already sold. Anyway, I was hoping you could do me a solid and answer a burning question for me.

Was King Edward the 8th (I'm sorry, nowadays he's known as the Duke of Windsor) a knitter (I finally got around to looking him up on Wikipedia)? Yes, I know, it's a fool of a question, but you see the Yarn Harlot has inserted this idea into my head that King Edward the nth loved fair isle sweaters so much that he acutally knit them himself. She mentioned it in her book Stephanie Pearl-McPhee Casts Off: The Yarn Harlot's Guide to the Land of Knitting -a great read, I swear.

I believe that there just isn't enough knitting in cinema. Sure, every once and a while we get a glimpse of a grandma knitting, or of that girl who used to be on the cover of Interweave Knits starring in a movie, but really that isn't enough. And think of all of the man knitters out there? Isn't it about time they get a little cinematic love too?

(you can blame theYarn Harlot -she's the one who mentioned this as a possibility)

Now I know this isn't some crusty biopic, that you have some interesting device that revolves around an auction of some sort, so I'm hoping that at least maybe you could include some kooky dream sequence, perhaps? I'm telling you you'd get millions of knitters all lined up to see the film, just to see the King of England surrounded by knitting bobbins, trying to read a chart. Extra bonus points if he fixes a dropped stitch.

Thanks Madonna, you rock.

Yours truly,

Angela P Hockabout

Knitluck.com

Pea Vines Shawlette Photo from KnitSpot, pattern available for sale at knitspot.com

Mostly Knitting dropped two stitches many rows to insert a forgotten buttonhole. That's some fearless knitting right there.

Knitspot has some lovely lace shawl patterns. The Les Abeilles is pretty enough to make me cry. The photo to the left is of the upcoming Pea Vines Shawlette.

Mirror Mirror has summer knits in action. Being in San Francisco I just don't know what summer really is anymore.

My Bit of Earth has a finished baby vest.

and Knitters, knitting in bumpy cars. I mean, I've heard of people knitting while driving, but this is ridiculous.

RosieBlogs has a nice round up of the new Rowan Magazine Number 48. Oh, how I want an excuse to buy another Rowan magazine, but I still have yet to knit something out of one, which needs to be remedied soon.

I was searching for some knitting goodness when I came across this beautiful pattern by Butternut Woolens and it has me hungry for winter. Keep in mind that I haven't experienced a true New England Winter in nearly 20 years. But if anything was going to make me nostalgic, the River Scarf was it. It only takes one skein of their thick and thin. Sometimes I wish it was a little chillier in California and I would feel more justified to knit this scarf. It looks like it would keep you super warm.

The yarns are lovely and in fact the Falkland Superwash Sock is on sale!

Last night I came across this beautifully knit shrug made by Worsted Knit. It's a pattern from Fitted Knits, which I'm sorely tempted to purchase right now!

Here's what she had to say about the results:

Now, orange and turqoise is not the kind of combination I'd wear every day, so I was a bit suspicious, but then I thought that something really eccentric in my closet is not so bad, either! So I cast on, knit, cast off and was very happy with the results.

Apparently, I'm not alone. In California, unemployment is up to 12% seasonally adjusted for June.

So I'm wondering, are there other unemployed knitters?

Here's what I've found.

Crazy Aunt Purl has been talking a little bit about being unemployed. I'm hoping it turns into another book. It's made for some interesting reading in the last couple of weeks. I've really been looking forward to her updates.

Diary of a Klingon Knitter is also coping with unemployment and it seems he's even using knitting to cope. He's moving his blog to tumblr, which I will be adding to my feed.

CJ Arabia says

So now that I'm unemployed I'm going for my bachelor's degree ... in knitting!

Here's a group of people using knitting to cope with unemployment.

Which brought me to Stitch Links, a fantastic site that endeavors to understand how the needlearts help people deal with stress and illness.

Hazwoolwillknit was lucky enough to only be unemployed for three months, but started an unemployment blanket. Hopefully for her it will stay unfinished. :)

Deraveled is in the same boat as me, and it happened recently, so go over there and show her some knitter love.

We're knitters and we need to stick together. :)