In The Works (Slow Progress)

Lately, I have only been posting when I finish something but I'm so slow that there are long gaps between posts so, with fleegle's encouragement, I am putting up an "in progress" post of things I'm actively working on. These three projects all use different weights of yarns and different size needles.The variety helps not only with boredom but to ease up on my hands.

At the top you have Wisenflor or "Violettes". This is another Herbert Niebling pattern that has been re-printed in English by Doilyhead I'm knitting on US 3 with "Shimming" 100% Tussah Silk from A Verb For Keeping Warm in the Royale colorway. At 218 rows, it will make a good sized circular shawl though this would not count as one of my "favorite" knits. I'm not crazy about the center of this lace. There is another version of the pattern with a better center out there but I somehow settled on this one. Still, I'm half way through the pattern so I will finish this one eventually. The yarn is great at least.

Next up is Fruhling which is another Niebling pattern. I'm using a silk thread to knit this one which was custom dyed for me by the folks at Verb in the "Tidepools" colorway. Kristine offered to do this for me because I wanted to knit the larger Nieblings without ending up with an Afghan instead of a shawl and most of the yarn at Verb would be too big. Fruhling is a 370 row pattern and I knit the center small leaves using US 0000 and then switched to US 000. I will continue with this size needle for the bulk of the shawl but I may switch to US 00 needles towards the end if it looks like it will not lie flat. I wish the pictures were better because this yarn has subtle color shifts in it. It's fantastic to knit with too:-)

The last picture is of another retirement shawl I'm making. The co-worker asked me to make something that was like "Legends Of The Shetland Seas" so I spun a standard lace weight yarn out of Lisa Souza Cash/Merino roving in the "Mahogany" colorway and I'm knitting Hazel Carters Sampler Shawl again. I knit this once before out of a Yarn Place yarn but my hand spun yarn is heavier and will fluff up a bit because of the Cashmere. I'm using US 0 needles but plan to block it aggressively when I'm done.

That's it for now! Maybe next time I post I will have actually finished something!

Sampler Stole Finished (finally)

You have all been very patient waiting for a few pictures of the Sampler Stole now that I finally got around to blocking it so here we go :-) My lovely model is my niece who got to help me out before we left to go to Yarn Place so I could give it to them as a store sample. The first two shots are in daylight so you can see what it looks like in natural light. The rest are shot with flash. For those in the Sunnyvale area of California, Yarn Place is moving their storefront so they have everything in the store on sale ! And yes, that is a Mummy Kitty tee shirt she is wearing. Don't ask. Since I was at the shop, I got to get a look at fleegle's Spider King and her Red Lyra. The are spectacular! Her Lyra has no binding at all since the yarn she used has more elasticity than mine (mine has a very little bit of binding in the area of the arch around the flowers"). Too bad they won't let people take pictures at Stitches but I can't wait to see them hung up on display. That's it for now! Hope you are all having a great weekend :-)

Night Blocking (Sampler Stole Crawl)

I finally got around to blocking the Sampler Stole on my hands and knees using foam tiles, blocking wires and lots of pins.Bocking at night means that it will not be dry until some time tomorrow unless I get impatient and hit it with the hair dryer :-) I once again showed that I can knit an entire stole and still manage to screw up the grafting on the edging. Other than this, I think I did OK. Once I get a few shots of it off the wires, it will go to Yarn Place as a shop sample. and I can go back to knitting the Princess Shawls edging. Whew. No more stoles for awhile. I am still knitting on the "International Shawl" and there was some difficulty in and around row 105 just as fleegle predicted. Stuff just wouldn't line up as it should but I finally got through that patch and will continue on. Not the prettiest fixes but they will just have to do. My sister always warned me that patterns for knitting almosts always have errors in them but finding them while you are knitting lace really is not fun even with poor fleegle leading the way. I will try to get pictures once I make a little more headway. I am on a spinning jag so I started in on the Blue Moon merino/silk I got at Stitches West 2007. Yes, I held onto it for a year but that's nothing compared to some other things I have waiting to be spun. I plan to finish a few more things and then I hope to start a whole new slew of projects all at the same time so I can have lots and lots of variety. I have to make a decision about the two projects that are just sitting there, WRS and Shetland Tea Shawl. This weekend I'm going to pick them both up and try a few rows to see if I can kick start to finish them. It would be really nice to be able to get them done so I won't feel any guilt with new projects . Until my next post, have fun with whatever you are knitting!

It's not all beer and skittles sweeties. (So bored with edging I could scream)

It's been awhile since you heard from me but I took a little break to catch up on my trash-novel reading and to go through my clothes closet to purge it of things I will never wear again on pain of becoming a hopelessly outdated fossil. Still, I have not been totally idle. See above, the edging that is now half way around the Sampler Stole. It would be further along if I didn't keep looking for something else to do. Did I mention that finishing a project is not always as much fun as starting one? Still, it's good discipline for me to plod on since I have decided that I only get to start back on the Princess Shawl after I finish this stole. Under this you can see one of the things I worked on to distract myself from edging Hell. I had to force myself to stop knitting on the "International Shawl" because the center is a Niebling and it's way too much fun. It's up to row 79 and you can begin to see the next set of leaves starting as well as the base of the first flowers. The ball of fiber is some Polworth that I got at Deep Color when it closed it's retail store front.I loved the colors in it and it is quite soft though not as soft as a merino. It's been wet and cold out here and that always makes me want to stay home and spin so I started in on this using my Schacht single treadle wheel. It looks pretty on the bobbin and I had never tried any of this fiber before. I think I'm just going to ply the Polworth and pray I have enough yardage to make something pretty. I only have 4 ounces of the stuff but it works up nicely and feels sturdy. I got my Estonian Lace book in the mail and it's very interesting. I feel some swatching in my future will be in order to figure out what I want to come after the Myrtle Leaf section in the International Shawl. I also got a magazine on E-bay as you see above. It has only 3 patterns in it that I wanted but it was not very expensive so I was lucky. It's the tablecloth I really fancy and I am spending a little bit of time interviewing my yarn stash for a suitable candidate. I'm going to try to resist buying lots of new fiber and yarn this year and try to knit from my stash. I hope Stitches West 2008 will be focused more on obtaining new patterns, books or tools etc. I am allowed to buy sock yarn for my sister as I'm wearing out my hand knit socks she made for me. Socks That Rock make a particularly nice sock yarn so I hope to get her some of that. Of course if I fail, I will be forced to wear a hair shirt. But at least it will be a lace patterned hair shirt :-)

Thanksgiving/Knitting (Why does that shawl smell like turkey?)

Yeah, I know it's not a picture of lace but it is what has been taking up time today. My sister and I have been enlisted to do Thanksgiving for our little neices since our sister-in-law is out of the country for her job this week, and this is one of two large pans of dressing.When you have to help out at Thanksgiving, it's not always about you and the lace knitting. People expect turkey, dressing, pies. You get the idea. Still, it is possible to slip in a little bit of knitting while ordering Xmas presents on-line and running out to get that last minute bag of sugar or flour. I'm slowly getting there with the Princess edge (20 points), the Sampler Stole edge crawls along and has those annoying color transitions I suspected would happen (I'm going to leave them however because it's for the folks at Yarn Place) and I have started the other end of the Legends Stole. Not working on Salmon Queen right now. That's for after Thanksgiving I think. For those who noticed that the Peacock Shawl has gone missing from my pictures, I took some good advice from Laritza and asked someone on Ravelry who liked the shawl if she wanted to have it to finish. It is now on it's way to Australia. I'm very happy about that and now can concentrate on my remaining projects without that albatross around my neck!

As I type this, apple pies are in the oven, pumpkin pies are next, and the year just rushes towards it's demise without pause. Time for me to slow down a bit and try to enjoy the holidays. My knitting always slows a little this time of year and it gives me a chance to think about next years projects. I wonder if you have noticed, as I have started to notice, that my taste in lace projects has been changing? It's going to be interesting next year. Happy Thanksgiving!

Slave to Edging (Border for Sampler Stole Done)

Three blog posts in a row. Why you ask?

I'm going to be knitting edging for awhile. Edging for Boundary Waters, Edging for Sampler Stole and if I'm not careful, I will end up finishing Legends of the Shetland Seas just as I finish the edging for these two and then I will have to do that as well. Finishing off work is obviously one of those things that is the hardest for me to do. Still, I will not start anything new until the edges are done so it gives me incentive. I have several projects I want/need to start so enjoy these posts because it will be awhile before you will hear from me as I slave away on the edgings. Hence three blog posts in a row. I didn't want to leave you without giving you something to tide you over :-) Much Later!

Sampler Stole & Legends of the Shetland Seas (Progress of a Sort)

Though I have not touched my Wedding Ring Shawl of late (I just sit at my computer and admire missalicefaye's shawl instead) I have not been totally idle. I have been doing some spinning but have stopped for the time being so I will have more time to knit. Since some madness seized me and I joined the "Spun Stitches" spin/knit along, I have started yet another stole. But these stoles go quickly as you can see from the progress on the "Sampler Stole" by Hazel Carter. At the top of the page you can see the first repeat of "Legends of the Shetland Seas". Yet another stole by Hazel Carter. I am knitting the Legend Stole out of hand spun yarn I made from Lisa Souza fibers. I plied BFL with Merino in the "Petroglyph" colorway and got a yarn that ended up being 36 WPI. I'm using US 2 needles to knit it and the colors are very earthy and quite subtle. I did not skein the yarn but wound it straight from the bobbin with a ball winder. I put a toilet paper roll that I had cut down to fit over the core of the ball winder so that my yarn will not get all messed up as I use it. If I left the ball alone, it would eventually block the yarn, but I don't have that much over twist in my plied yarn so it's not difficult to knit with and the stole will have to be blocked anyway so what the heck! As for the "Sampler Stole' I have completed the 162 row border and will now pick up the reserved stitches at the other end and do it all over again. It goes very quickly and I really want to get this done so I can give it to Yarn Place and then focus on my other shawls. I feel a little guilty about not working more on the WRS but I still hope to work more on it this weekend. I hope everyone out there is having fun knitting. I know I am. Have a Good Evening!

Samper Stole (row 55 of border)

Still Knitting on the Sampler Stole. I'm up to row 55 of the border and there are 162 rows in all . I don't know if this happens to anyone else, but I find the odd dropped stitch from time to time even though I tug on my lace periodically as I knit to try to catch them early on. It happened on my WRS center and it happened with this one too. You can see it in the top shot at the bottom of the picture. It's the third diamond counting from left to right. I have picked it up and will just have to"tie" it in place and hide the ends. No way am I going to rip back to that point! Once again, not perfect but not too bad. Does anyone out there have any experience with trying to starch Shetland Lace? Sharon Miller had described doing it but if you store the lace, you have to wash it out and re-block it since you don't want the buggies to be attracted to the starch. As if the wool itself was not already an enticing little snack for moths. A word to the wise. If you Xerox /enlarge a chart from a book like I did, don't forget to check for color-coded changes in the chart symbol instructions. This pattern had several and I didn't transcribe them to my copy so I had to pick back a few rows when I realized that my stitch count was off. I should have looked more closely a the "legend" that explains the stitch symbols. In some rows, the symbol for Sl1,K2tog,psso was supposed to be K2tog at the beginning of the repeat so the stitch count would come out correctly. I guess knitting lace is always a learning experience :-) I added a shot of the un-pinned stole center so you can more easily see the color shifting of the yarn. What exactly is it about variegated yarn that has me hooked so bad? After all. Lace shows to better advantage when your eye is not distracted by shifting colors, or so it is commonly believed. Yet I still like those color changes. Guess only time will tell if I am disappointed in the results. Until then, I'm enjoying the knitting. Good Evening to all!