Splish Splash

My lace shawls have been taking a bath...in nice warm sudsy water...before being stabbed with long skinny wires and stretched to the limit. And since it's been so hot and dry around here lately, the stoles were bone dry in record time. The end result: 2 shawls (Coral Lace, Hanami) are already finished and a third one is soaking even as I write (MS3-Natural). Oh boy! I had to block the shawls one at a time because I don't have enough blocking wires to do 2 at the same time. I probably would have done them individually anyway since these projects fit on my guest bed and it's so much easier on the creaky old body to use the bead instead of the floor in the family room.


First up is a Coral Lace Shawl that I started last year sometime and cast-off earlier this summer. For some reason I just didn't get around to blocking this shawl which is kind of sad because it turned out beautifully and is the perfect summer accessory. The pattern is the Lavender Linen Lace Shawl out of Nancie Wiseman's "Knitted Shawls, Stoles, & Scarves" book (pp.62-64). I used one 2 oz. ball of Jaggerspun Zephyr 2/18 laceweight yarn (50% wool/50% tussah silk) in the coral colorway and US 4 (3.5mm) Addi-turbo needles. My final dimensions after blocking were 64" x 30" (published dimensions were 61" x 28").


The finished Coral Lace Shawl is very light and airy. You would hardly know you had it on it's so light! I think if I were to knit this again I would go down a needle size as I think the YO holes are a bit too large. The simple leaf motif and bottom-up construction would make this a wonderful 1st shawl pattern for someone wanting to venture into lace knitting. It would be just as wonderful knit from a fingering or DK weight yarn too, for those not quite ready to try their hand with the skinny stuff.



The next shawl up for the swish and stretch treatment was the Hanami Stole. Knitting this stole was challenging because of the fine silk yarn I chose and blocking proved to be equally as challenging. Threading the blocking wires proved to be difficult as I had no eyelet row separating the body of the stole from the edging. Even though I picked up very small bites, the finished stole ended up having a lacy loopy look to the edges. The looseness of the edge was exacerbated by the fact that I did not employ a slip stitch on the 1st stitch of each row. I usually knit the 1st stitch on garter band so as to maximize the stretch of the final shawl and it works well with stretchy fibers. With silk...not so much. Ah, another lesson learned.


So here's the scoop on this shawl: The pattern is the Hanami Stole by Melanie Gibbons of Pink Lemon Twist. It was knit out of 2 strands of 2/28 smooth silk in the Melissa green colorway from ColourMart.com using US 2 (3.0mm) KnitPicks Classic Circular needles. I knew this yarn was much finer than the Alpaca Cloud used by the designer and that I would need to add extra repeats to make sure my stole was long enough. Her final dimensions were 19" x 70". Mine turned out to be 19" x 58"-- a little short despite the extra repeats of the basketweave section plus a bunch of extra rows I added after the transition chart.

After blocking I could see that length wasn't the only "special feature" of my silk Hanami. The final ruffle never did ruffle with this fiber. The center portion of the stole, which is stockinette with very few eyelets, wants to curl at the edges already. Not that I'm surprised-- you should have seen the whole stole curled in from end to end before it's swish and stretch session. It looked more like a stalk of celery than a lace stole! The bottom line: A lovely lace stole pattern, not my favorite mind you, but still a good knit. One thing is for sure-- next time I'll stick to merino or baby alpaca when knitting this stole and save the silk for something else. Live and learn >:-(

P.S. I'll upload more photos to my Flickr site tomorrow

I've been busy!

I've been a busy girl this week! First, I've been trying to finish some of my many UFO knitting projects. I have blocked this Coral Lace Shawl yet, but here's a couple of pictures in it's unblocked state.

Up next are the Flamingo Pink Stripe Jaywalker socks! I finished knitting the 1st sock last night and have cast-on for the second. I figure I needed to get the next sock up a running as it will be the perfect thing to get me through my step-nephew TJ's high school graduation exercises tonight. TJ is a great kid and he attended a magnet school, so the graduation is a bit better than your usual event (my nephew Christopher graduated from the same HS 2 years ago), but the crowds and commotion and my ebullient brother can be a bit much for this old maid to deal with.

We've had my step-niece Tammy staying with us all week, so Mother and Daddy and I took her to Cades Cove in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park on Wednesday night for a picnic supper and wildlife watching. Tammy has never seen anything like this before (my brother & his wife recently adopted Tammy and her sibs from the state foster care system). First we saw the horses from the riding stable where my mother worked her "Pied Piper" charms on a couple of the beautiful critters. In the next field there were a flock of wild turkeys.


We visit the Cove in the evening because that's when the deer come down out of the mountains to feed on the meadow grasses in the cool of the day. We stopped at our favorite pull-out to eat our usual picnic of Subway sandwiches. As we sat there we watched 8 or 9 deer come down into the meadow right in front of us. Then as we continued along the 11-mile one-way loop road we came across dozens of white-tail deer, including a number of yearling bucks and a pretty spotted fawn. We thought we were doing well in teh wildlife viewing department, but then we were delighted to come upon a mother bear and her 2 cubs in a wooded area. Unfortunately I wasn't able to get a decent photo of the bears, but Tammy was delighted to see "Smoky Bears". The bear population has grown in the park, so you are more likely to see bears now than when I was a kid. But I still feel the same excitement today as I did when I was younger when I see a bear in the Park. To see a mother and cubs is the best treat of all!

Another FO!

While I'm waiting for the next clue for the Bugs KAL to be posted, I am keeping busy by finishing as many of the UFO projects on my list as I can. I figure I need to either finish or frog these projects so I can feel unencumbered when I start more new projects. This requires great effort on my part since I'm a journey, not a destination person. You know what I mean, there are some people who are all about getting things done. It's about getting finished as fast as possible--perfection is not required, and "smelling the roses" along the way is just a waste of time that slows one done from getting done! Then there are folks like me where its all about the journey--the adventure of picking out a project and finding the perfect yarn, even if it takes several tries. The joy is in the knitting and finishing, while highly desirable, is always optional and rarely on a forced time-line to completion. Interruptions for new projects or other endeavors like gardening, or trips, or whatever, are always welcomed.

Yup, that's me--the journey. But sometimes a woman just needs to free up space in her knitting baskets and finish a few things. I have a few new KALs that will be gearing up soon, so now's a great time to finish a couple of shawls and some socks. I spent the past several days working on Nancie Wiseman's Lavender Linen Lace Shawl from her Shawls, Stoles and Scarves (or something like that) book. I cast-on sometime last summer as my 1st project using Jaggerspun Zephyr. At the time it was the skinniest lace yarn I had used, and I didn't like the drag and lack of spring in the yarn. I'm still not especially fond of Zephyr, but I have to admit it's perfect for a light summer scarf or shawl. I used the Coral colorway for this project, and it's is a delightful oversized triangle scarf. I cast-off last night but will wait to wet-block it until the weekend when our houseguest departs.

Another thing I've been doing is catching up on my group email and "cleaning" things up on my blog. I the process I discovered the KnitList has a webring, which I promptly joined. I found the easiest way for this limited web-techie girl to get graphics on my side bar is to upload them as a part of a message on the blog, then copy the location in html to the template. I'm sure there are more savvy ways to do this, but hey, this is working for me. So I've got a couple of buttons added to this message, which a just a utilitarian thing. I'll post more interesting pictures later once I get them off my camera :-)

Waiting, Waiting, Waiting

I spent most of last week with my Addis flying to catch up knitting on my Bugs Shawl, the KAL most of the others have been working on for a month now. I'm all caught up and the next clue hasn't been posted yet so I'm waiting, waiting, WAITING!!! Not knitting on the bugs yesterday felt a little sad, but two days with no bugs is awful! I don't want to appear impatient, or insensitive to the busy lives of Mindy and her team of test-knitters, or any such unladylike behaviors, but please HURRY!!!
I probably shouldn't be whining as I could be doing other things, like sending graduation announcements to my long-distance friends and family, or attacking that list of Thank You notes that need to be written, or even getting my paperwork in order to start job-hunting, but that's not what I feel like doing. I feel like knitting BUGS! So yesterday I knit some on my flamingo pink striped Jaywalkers (2 more inches before I can start the toe decreases on the 1st sock). But I was having a very bad fibro day so I switched to knitting on a long-standing ufo, the Lavender Leaf Lace Shawl from Nancie Wiseman's book that I'm knitting in a Coral Zephyr. I have promised myself to finish the ufo shawls I have piled into baskets surrounding my recliner.

I wasn't up to working knit-on sideways edgings in fuzzy mohair (fir cone)or alpaca (Shetland Tea Shawl) but the LLLS was a perfect minimalist project. Actually this is a good beginner's lace shawl project. It starts at the bottom point and progresses up toward the top/neck line so you can easily knit the shawl as small or as large as you choose. That was a great option for me as I had one ~600 yd. ball of Jaggerspun Zephyr that I will knit until I have just enough left to do a garter stitch border before casting-off. I figure this will be a good-sized triangle scarf or a small shawl and just right for spring and summer accessorizing.

So, since I'm not knitting on Bugsy, I spent a little time catching up on my favorite blogs. In the process I found a nifty online retailer for sock yarns called, of all things, yarn4socks. They have tons of cool hand painted and hand dyed yarns at usual market prices. Oh I fell in love with several! In addition to a great yarn seller, I also found a nifty KAL called Summer of Socks 2007. The deadline to sign-up is soon, but the start day is in late June. As a part of the KAL there will be some competitions with prizes, none of which I'm likely to win, but I decided to join in the fun anyway. The start time should come close to the time I'll be finished with the bugsy thing. So here's the blog button. I'm in!

Finished, Finished with, and a Fresh Start

Now that I have finished my dissertation and everything required of me for graduation, it's time to get to work and finish some knitting projects. I have decided my UFO list is entirely too long and must be dealt with one way or another. I started things off by finishing the Lilac Socks. I am *thrilled* with how they turned out! I love both the pattern(Jeanie Townsend)and the yarn(Cherry Tree Hill). I also love how I can actually take a crisp, clear photo of my wonderful new socks with the new digital camera I received as a graduation present. Check out that detail shot taken with the Macro lens--Wow!

And speaking of digital photography, I had to shoot the latest flowers in my garden--a hot pink single peony and Spiderwort (a wonderful shade-loving wildflower/perennial). The spiderwort blooms last just one day, but there are oodles of them. The plant is a great investment too--you buy just one and watch it spread all over the place. I dug out a bunch of divisions early last spring and could have done the same again this year if there had been time. The fascinating part about spiderwort is that the plant completely disappears once It's done with it's late spring/early summer blooming. By August there will be no trace of it visible to the eye.



So, back to the knitting front and finishing things. I finished chart A of the Spring Things Shawl and started knitting on the next lace section on Chart B. I was hoping to like it better, but didn't. That's when I decided it was time to get real with myself. Life is too short to knit lace shawls from patterns you don't love out of yarn you aren't all that crazy about either. I KO'd this project from my list and ma moving on to better things.

While I was at it, I also KO'd the Branching Fern Socks KAL from my list as I never did get around to knitting the socks and am not in the humor to start them right now. I did decided to go back and pick up my first Zephyr project, the Lavender Lace Shawl from Nancie Wiseman's Shawls and Scarves book. I got kind of bored with it and didn't love the yarn, so I put it aside last fall to knit other things. Now that I've resumed work, it's not so bad. The bright coral Zephyr is pretty and the yarn is in much better condition than the white I've been knitting with (which was sort of ratty if you ask me--more like a mill end or second than full-price 1st quality stuff). The LLS pattern is quite intuitive so it's easy to knit with only a rare peek at the charts. I'll use it as my portable project for now. I also found the Ribbed Cuff Socks and finished off the toe of the 1st sock. I'll cast on for the 2nd sock and also tote it for almost brainless knitting.

With all the finished and finishing going on, it's also time to start something new. Yes, it's time to go Bugsy! Mindy posted the 1st clue for the Bugs in Your Garden Mystery Pi KAL. I grabbed some size 4 dpns and the "Screaming Watermelon Pink" ColourMart Cashmere I had in the stash and cast-on for a shawl. The twist in tehis Mystery KAL was the choice to knit a shawl or a top-down sweater. The idea of a sweater intrigues me, but I'm not in the humor to do all the figuring to get a proper fit and I don't have any suitable yarn for a sweater. I will take notes though, and consider knitting one later, but for now I really had my heart set on another Pi shawl so that's what I'm doing. The first clue included ladybird/ladybug lace motifs so I'm already a happy camper!