It's been awhile since I posted but I have at least finished one project. My inner Crow is happy to have finished "The Saigon Scarf" which is by Badcatdesigns . Very pretty pattern that is free on Ravelry . I used the hand spun 2 ply lace weight yarn I spun out of fiber from Spritely Goods (alpaca, merino, firestar and angelina, colorway Palo Verde) and this is the first time I've added beads with a crochet hook. Please forgive my crappy photos. The yarn is really a very vivid lime green but I just could not get shots that reflect the lovely color or sparkle in this yarn. For anyone looking for a nice lace project that is both interesting and fun, this might just be the one. Think Xmas gift. It's well within the reach of a lace knitter with a few easier projects under their belt and will not take too long to knit since it's a scarf rather than a stole. I love the designs from Badcatdesigns. Her instructions are very clear and the patterns leave lots of room for a knitter to make it their own in terms of yarn choices. There is a lot to be said for clean but flowing lines in a design and there is just enough variation in the patterns to make them interesting. I have also purchased the Hecate Stole and the Corfu Shawl from her and I'm going to go buy Mimosa as soon as I finish this post. I've spun a lot of fiber lately and though it's sometimes a challenge to find projects to use the finished product on, many of these patterns would look good with what I'm making up :-)
Just below the shots of The Saigon Scarf, I have a small amount of "birdseye" lace knit up on US 0. I'm using the 2 ply yarn made from the Madder dyed BFL from "A Verb for Keeping Warm" I am making a stole from a Japanese knitting book "Vintage Knitting in Tradition". There is a picture of it from my May 9th blog posting. It's on page 26 and the caption is "Cloches a travers les feuilles". I don't speak French so I went to Babelfish. What I got is "Bells through the sheets" WTF? My sister speculates it actually is more like "Bells in Layers" or "Layered Bells". Translation is very dicey at best. If anyone out there has a better guess pleases give us a hint :-) Since I'm in "Crow" mode, I went and bought two more shawl pins from Romi (Fascination with bright and shiny objects? Oui!) . The copper heart is a sentimental favorite but the "bobby pin" type shawl pin works really well with light weight lace. For a woman who almost never wears her shawls, I have a lot of pins LOL! Lastly, this is some lovely Wensleydale wool from Black Bunny Fibers . It's the second installment for the Team "B" fiber club members. This colorway is "Waltz". It's shinny and very strong, almost like Mohair with long staple but unlike Mohair, I don't have any allergy reaction to spinning it. Looking at it, I have no idea what to do with it in terms of lace. I could try to spin it and make it into something other than lace (Yeah, right!) or I can just give in and admit that whatever I make with it, that lace will always remind me of a snow cone at the circus. I have only 4 more rows before the crochet cast-off for the International Shawl so I hope to finish it off this week and will post pictures once it's done. For those of you in the Bay Area, this up-coming weekend is Lambtown in Dixon. We plan to go (big surprise) but I really don't need more fiber or yarn....... (to be continued)
