KAL Progress Report: Knits from the North Sea

The Lace Knitting group at The Yarn Haven has almost doubled in size with the beginning of our Fall KAL featuring projects from the new book Knits from the North Sea: Lace in the Shetland Tradition. I have already made my thoughts about the book more than clear so I won't repeat the rant. My challenge was to edit the instructions in the book to meet the needs of group members. I have newbies, beginner, and intermediate/advanced intermediate lace knitters with a varying range of knitting expertise, thus my task has not been exactly easy.

The KAL group has had 2 meetings thus far. My 2 novice lace knitters chose to knit the simplest scarf--Carol's Peaches--but were struggling with the mohair yarn the 1st night. They weren't present at the second meeting so I'm concerned they may have been scared away. I hope not. All the beginners except one (she's an expert knitter, just new to lace) are knitting the Cockleshell scarf at my suggestion. Every knitter has struggled with some aspect of the pattern. The multi-chart pattern has been confusing as has the unclear language of some of the chart symbols/pattern instructions. AT least one has abandoned the Cockleshell pattern for a more suitable beginner lace scarf pattern (not in the book). The two knitters who have started the High Country Wrap are also finding it very challenging/frustrating but are soldiering on. One chose to use the size 1 needles recommended in the pattern (I didn't know about that until she had already started) but was having a bit of a go at it and was considering switching up to a larger needle. I have two more newcomers planning to join the group at our next meeting later this week. One decided in advance to knit something else for her project. Smart lady :-)

I'm making progress on my Cockleshell scarf. According to the book I'm done with the first side and halfway through the second side. Of course this is not nearly long enough to be a scarf IMHO so I still need to decide what I want to do to extend the pattern--just keep knitting the same lace rep or change it up to a Seaman's-style scarf with a rib knit center section. I'm leaning towards the latter but I'll make the final decision when I get there.

While this pattern books lacks much, I still love knitting lace and mentoring others in the art of lace knitting. After all...

LACE KNITTING ROCKS!!!
KNIT ON!

Trick or Treat???

Can you believe that October is over??? If you ask me, it's really some kind of cruel trick, especially considering we've had no real "Autumn" to speak of. Here in East Tennessee we've had nothing but record drought and record high temperatures. Today, on Halloween, my rose garden looks more spectacular than it has all year. Go figure? The little sticks of lantana that I planted back in May have grown into an enormous hedge where, this afternoon, I had my first little Trick-or-Treater come to visit. Isn't that a spectacular photograph? I was stunned by the beauty of this Monarch butterfly perched on the lantana.


I haven't posted in a week (blame Ravelry), so I have lots to say. Of course I can't resist a beautiful baby, especially when that baby is my great-niece. My nephew, Tyler, and his wife, Mary Katherine, had their first child back in June while Tyler was in specialty training with the Navy. He graduated last week and is on leave for a few days before he has to report for duty at Pearl Harbor (I know, rough assignment--Hawaii!). I don't they were in TN more than a day before making a bee-line to our place so that great granddaddy Plaas and great aunt Kristina could get their hands on baby Isabella. Oh she is just too cute for words! She totally looks like her daddy...everything except the red hair :-) She has the same tiny ears, and cheeks and chin, and....there's a lot of Plaas in that child. Bella loved my Father...she couldn't take her eyes off of him, which simply delightful to us all. I was thrilled to get this especiialy good picture of Bella with my Mom.


I've been doing my fair share of knitting this week too. After excessive agonizing over what should be my next lace shawl project, I finally cast-on. The funny thing was I pored over a long list of "wanna knit" shawls for weeks only to rather spontaneously jump in an cast-on for a mystery KAL (Mystic Waters) after liking the image on the 1st chart. I didn't think about it much, I just grabbed some purple cashmerino I recently acquired from ColourMart and started knitting. I'm not quite finished with the 1st clue and the 2nd one was released today, but I'll catch up. So far I'm quite pleased with the outcome :-) You never know with "mystery" knitting... bwah-ha-ha-ha


I couldn't focus exclusively on the Mystic Waters Shawl because I was busy with a lace scarf project I volunteered to do. I love Sandy, the owner of my closest LYS, The Yarn Haven. She has been so gracious to me and I'm thrilled she opened her shop in a location that is literally just across the street from where I live. I want her to do well. So when I dropped in about 2 weeks ago I was thrilled to discover she had added Madil Kid Seta to her lace yarn section. But when she showed me this viscose thread the vendor had persuaded her to buy as a carry along fiber for the MKS, I had serious doubts about it's "marketability". So, in a moment of spontaneity I volunteered to come up with a lace scarf design using both yarns and knit a shop sample for her. If folks could see how they could make something wonderful with these fibers, then I knew it would sell.

I left the shop with my offer open and the next day Sandy emailed me back to take me up on it. I was quite excited and went over to pick up the yarn. I bounced a few ideas off on her at the last FNKC meeting and went home to finalize my design. It was to be for newbie lace knitters, something easy to knit, yet pretty enough to make for holiday gifts. The picture here was taken after 2 days of knitting. I used size 8 needles and the yarns together were bulkier than my norms, so my body protested with screaming pain in the forearm. I had to slow down for a few days until the flare subsided, but even still I had the scarf finished in only 11 days. It could easily be knit in a week as I'm not a particularly fast knitter (I'm good, just not fast ;-)

I took the finished scarf to Sandy this afternoon. We were both thrilled with the outcome. I'll post my details and photos (hopefully) tomorrow. I still need to finish writing the pattern up. I promised to deliver it on Friday when I head over for the next FNKC gathering. This was so fun and I was pleased to be able to do it just because, not for money or to get anything back for myself--well, other than the sheer joy of doing a good deed for a really good person. That's the best part of all :-)

Bugs and Spring Knitting

Is this not the cutest KAL button you've ever seen? The knitty gang over at EZasPi are gearing up for this years' spring KAL which is a sequel to the Pi shawls we knit last year. Last spring the Mystery Pi KAL had a garden theme where folks could choose from flowers, veggies or just green foilage lace motifs to create their own unique circular shawl. Mindy, the wonder designer, has been coordinating these KALs and has done a marvelous, mammoth job of keeping everyone going in circles. The Garden KAL was my 1st pi shawl and after that I started the Shetland Tea Shawl from A Gathering of Lace (which still needs an edging). I went back to triangles and rectangles for awhile, but now I'm ready to knit another pi shawl. This time the group decided to use Bugs in the Garden as the theme since most of us really like ladybugs, butterflies, dragonflies, etc. I have no idea what Mindy and her helpers have come up with this time, but we're supposed to get our pre-start instructions on yarn selection, etc. sometime in the next week or so. I'm still debating on what yarn to use, but I'm awaiting further instructions from our fearless leader before deciding to knit from my stash or buy something new.


It's a good thing I still have a little time before the Bugs KAL gets under way as I have to finish my Lilac Socks and the Spring Things Shawl first. I still haven't cast-on for the STS for real, but I have ditched several swatches. I'll try again later this week, but right now I'm totally smitten with the Lilac Socks. I'm working on the instep of the 1st sock now, and I swear the thing gets prettier with every row! I *so* love this Cherry Tree Hill yarn! I never thought that I would be happy to see the Knit n Purl close, but with it's absence and the opening of 2 new LYS, I now have ready access to yarns I never would have seen at the KnP. I've learned that each yarn shop has it's personality and each owner buys what they like, or what they and their customers like, but if the owner isn't interested in a line of yarns you are pretty much out of luck. And right now I feel pretty darn lucky!

Happy Dance

This has not been a good day for making measurable progress on anything. Well, that is unless you count wading through about 30+ e-mails progress, which doesn't count when the Big D needs a revised Chapter 5 like yesterday! But I have this ugly sinus/trying to be a migraine headache and I have been cooped up in my house for going on 5 days now, and...well I could just scream about now.

In that big pile of e-mails was the monthly newsletter from my new LYS (just across the street) the Yarn Haven announcing the arrival of the new Addi lace needles and lots of new lace yarns. It's the 1st of the month so my meager allowance is at it's fattest, so the temptation was just too much. I grabbed my Get Out of Jail Free Card, er the dog and the car keys, and I did a happy dance right on over. The owner, Sandy just grinned when I walked in the door. She said she just knew I would show up in the next day or so and she was so right. I've been wanting the new Addi lace needles and was sort of waiting for Jinka, the owner of my other LYS Loopville, to get them in since I told her I would buy some. Well, I stopped by Loopvile last week and she didn't order them, so I was thinking I would have to resort to ordering them online. Well brava to Sandy for saving me the grief.

Apparently Sandy has had quite a few people ask about lace yarns in the last month, so she decided to give it a whirl. Don't you just love new shop owners who only want to please you and try to get whatever they can for you ;o). In fairness to Jinka, Loopville is located in a very small place that is just overstuffed with yarns and everything so space is at a premium, whereas Yarn Haven is in a big, very open space with lots of room for displays of nothing but lace needles. I love both shops and patronize them just about equally thus far. In addition to the lace needles Sandy acquired signed copies of Lavish Lace with pricey yarn packs to match, plus NZ Artisan yarns of Margaret Stove fame, plus lots of fancy handpainted lace and fingering yarns from Cherry Tree Hill, plus some great yarns from Crystal Palace that I've been itching to try. Talk about doing the happy dance, just fondling all this stuff made me happier than Zoloft could ever achieve. LOL

In the end I limited myself to 2 sets of needles, a 4 & 5 in 32" lengths. I use size 4s more than anything it seems, and I needed a 5 to knit the FiberTrends Estonian Lace Shawl which I think is up next on my list of "wanna knits". I have the KnitPicks circulars in the smaller sizes (2 & 3) so I don't need to buy the pricey Addis there, but I'm not convinced about using the KP Options so I'll buy Addi lace needles in the bigger sizes.

Deciding which yarn to purchase was not so easy as I wanted them all, naturally! In the end I decided to go for a couple of balls of the new Panda Cotton from Crystal Palace. This yarn is 55% bamboo, 24% cotton, and 21% elastic nylon so it's stretchy, kind of like Cascade Fixation. I chose a subtle ombre of blush pinks they call rosewater which should knit up nicely into this great sock pattern, Early Spring Sock, that I saw on their website last month. This is a totally new adventure for me, knitting with elastic yarn, but the Panda Cotton should be perfect for padding around in in Tennessee summers. I'll keep you posted!