Saturday, February 10, 2007

Boundary Waters Shawl (So I didn't spin the yarn for it. So sue me.)







Since I dyed that Crystal Palace Laceweight Yarn last weekend, I decided to try it out for the Boundary Waters Shawl rather than to try to spin something. True, it's more green than blue, but it's interesting knit up. I have a thing about wanting to do both of the shawls from the pattern book I had been carrying around for so long. I understand these patterns may be re-issued in the Fall of this year so others won't have such a tough time finding them. I didn't pin this section out very tightly as it's on a small circular needle and I didn't want to have to go to a longer cable yet.
I'm half way through the 4th pattern repeat for the Wedding Ring Shawl so Boundary Waters is a nice break for me. I suppose I could work on the Peacock Feathers Shawl but for some reason I'm not really interested in it at the moment. You know how you start a project and just loose interest sometimes? Well this shawl gave me trouble for awhile and I had to pick back 4 rows of work. That's enough to leave a bad taste in your mouth believe me. They were really long rows too. Besides, when I have time I knit on the Flower Basket Shawl and the Shetland Tea Shawl. They are much more satisfying and I can even knit them when I'm not 100% awake and still not screw them up too bad.I know I am breaking my own rule "Never knit when on drugs or stupid." but sometimes you get so bored that you just go ahead and break the rules. What can I say? Bad knitter, no chocolate!
This leads me to a question. One of the persons responding to this blog asked about a easy lace to knit as a beginner. "Anonymous" wanted a suggestion. It's been a long time since I knit something a beginner might consider easy so I was wondering if anyone else has a suggestion they want to post here for possible easy projects? Can anyone suggest their favorite lace-related book a beginner might like to use? It might help this newbie out.
Also see above a picture of the WRS on my Inox needles. One of the things I've disliked about knitting on gossamer weight yarns is the problem of getting the stitches over the transition point between where the cable is connected to the needle. The yarn's tend to get "hung up" at the join. In order to mitigate this problem I've knit looser, I've tested a bunch of different needles and I have decided to keep the yarn bunched up on the needles as much as possible so that as little of the work ends up on the cable as possible. This will work for the center at least. It won't work once I pick up all the way around the center to do the boarder but I will just have to put up with the irritation once I get to that stage.
Also see above a really pretty colorway in "Andrea" by Schaefer Yarn. Same yarn as for the Peacock Feathers Shawl, it's 100% silk, Approx. Wt:3.5 oz/1093 yds. It's from the "Memorable Women" color concept and this one is "Margaet Mead", the famous anthropologist. It says the gauge is 8st/in and they want you to dry clean it. Ha Ha Ha to that. It's going to be a shawl and it will be hand-washed and like it!
I will not buy more yarn before Stitches West, I will not buy more yarn before Stitches west, I will not..... you get the idea.
Until much later! Good Knitting!