Prep- work

In preparation for the cactus sweater, I've decided to cast on and do a practice swatch or two to practice two-color knitting, since I've never really done it before. I've been doing some research on different methods of holding yarn, and wrapping the floats and things like that, and it all kind of makes sense, but with out me trying it first, and with no one here to show me how to do it, I really won't know what I'm doing until I do it. It's also been kind of confusing reading the instructions- left hand this and right hand that, since I'm a left-handed knitter I have to keep reversing the directions in my head, and I'm still not really sure if I'm a continental knitter or an English style knitter. I hold both the working yarn and the working needle in my left hand (that's your right) if anyone wants to clear that up for me. Even just having someone show me how they do it right handed would make learning a new technique easier, I could see how they do it and translate it to lefty style. Unfortunately, I don't have a local knitting group, and I don't know anyone else who knits. So the moral of the story I guess is "Practice makes perfect".
I have the yarn ordered for the sweater and I'm halfway through work on a felted pumpkin for the fall season festivities, using leftover yarn from my cinchy hats. The pumpkin pattern I found on Knitty, it's written by Jordana Paige. I've only ever felted once before (intentionally that is, I lost a beautiful merino sweater I had bought to a serious lack of good judgement), incidentally also a pattern from Knitty- the Fuzzyfeet felted slippers, which, with a little fiddling, ended up fitting pretty OK. I wear them quite often in the cooler months. They're about to come out of storage.
I'm still waiting on needles for the comfy socks, they should be here soon. They're the new colorful wood ones from Knit picks. I hope they're as good as advertised.
I almost forgot to mention, after much deliberation I decided (but not on an empty stomach) to not pad the padded footlets, after I had already padded most of the heel. This involved much frogging and seperating and wrapping of yarn, and then much re-knitting. It was too fiddly for something I wanted to knit up quickly for someone else, and while I'm sure they're great walking around in stocking feet, I'm not sure how they would wear in shoes, and I want the recipient to be able to wear them however she likes. I have a portion of the foot to do and the toe of the first sock then I can start the other. I 'm hoping to get two footlets out of one skein. If that's the case, I'll make a pair for myself from the second. If not, well I've been intending to make a pair of mismatched socks ever since I saw the Charmed Knits book. ^-^