The Mermaid Stole

This was my go-to knit when I was feeling the wedding stress. I started this stole with a kit I bought in Michigan in June, and added many other yarns from my stash in the process to flesh it out. The original idea was to knit a scarf, but I decided to go with a shawl/stole width.

There are all sorts of yarns and materials in here: rayon, nylon, sequins, wool, cotton, silk, etc. There are several ribbon yarns and novelty yarns. I skipped the fun fur, however. I'm completely in love with the glitz in this project.

I decided to call it the Mermaid stole because all the blues and glitz made me imagine the sort of stole a mermaid might knit for herself. It would be made up of everything found in the sea and on the beach.

I cast on 150 stitches on size 13 circulars, and after the first row went to size 11's. Every row was a different yarn. I left a long tail on each end with each yarn, about 18 inches in length. I would have been okay with leaving a 12 inch tail on each end. Then I switched back to size 13's to bind off.

I braided the tails together, three at a shot, and made them about 6 inches long. To continue the mermaid theme, I strung bits of shells and some whole shells into the fringe. I really like the effect, but the shells do add a good bit of weight to the stole.

I really enjoyed the garter stitch non-stress of this. It was sheer fun to combine the yarns in different ways to get different effects. In fact, I enjoyed it so much that I bought more yarn and novelty yarns in creams, greens, and browns to make a lap blanket in this same style. Haven't cast on yet, but will soon!

Thank you to Maria for being my model! (We finally got a good sunny afternoon for the shoot!)

Noro, Addi, Brittany, and Bling

This is yarn, and it is fun.

In Michigan I hunting for Noro Silk Garden and was greatly successful. This was the biggest score. I got yarn for Noro Striped Scarves and to knit a Lady Eleanor stole someday. You can see the start of the first scarf here. This is my current travel/grab-and-go project.

Another major purchase was several Addi Turbo needles in sizes I couldn't find locally. I like the Addis a lot, but they are a little pricey for the budget. I also saw some Brittany sock needles in the 5" size and got a couple sets. I don't know if I will like the shorter size but I thought it would be worth a try.

On the way to the checkout, I saw Wendy's new sock book and it jumped right into the basket. Outstanding!

Now this is the yarn that came with the scarf kit I purchased. There are several balls of glittery ribbon yarn in there, some sequins, and a very shiny yarn that is quite slick and likes to slip off the Addi Turbo circular. I have added in a lot of odds and ends of yarns that I have around the house to make a garter stitch scarf knit sideways. The scarf is knit on Size 11 needles and I'm using everything from bulky ribbon to sock yarn. It is going to end up much wider than the originally planned scarf; it will be a good stole width. There is a lot of bling in this and I'm really enjoying it, more than I anticipated. I've been picking this up just to relax with, but not as much as I wish these days. Three more days to the wedding!

Practising

As I said last week, a new roving was selected to start spinning. I didn't want to go with my luxury fibers yet, the alpaca I got for Christmas, or the lovely fibers I got a few weeks back from Margene. I want to get some more experience before I leap in on those. So I went with 8 ounces of Ashland Bay roving; this is either merino or Columbia. I can't find the tag when I want it. It is extremely soft and drafts very easily. Needless to say, this is certainly outside of my color comfort zone. Lilac shades just are not me. There are also blues and pinky reds in this as well. But the softness of the wool is making up for any doubts about the color.

I am trying my best to 1) spin smoothly, and 2) spin finely. I'm trying to get something that will be no heavier than fingering weight, with the goal in mind of knitting a shawl with this, once it turns into a two-ply. It's going to take a good while to spin up all eight ounces.

I've joined up on a number of spinning groups on Ravelry. I've found that the learning possibilities are tremendous. It's like belonging to a massive spinning guild, with all kinds of experience to draw on. I've already had my spinning improve just from using tips I found there. Another great reason to be on Ravelry!



I try to do a few rows every day on the Express Lane sock, the second sock. It's coming along slowly but very steadily.

Then in the evening I work on the Maplewing shawl. I think I'm on Row 25 of the first section. On row 40 there is a decrease of about a hundred stitches, which should help the project to speed up. I really like the way the pattern is shaping up.

Lovely, lovely yarn!

12 Rows and a Milestone

I've been working away on the Maplewing Shawl. I'm currently on Row 12; those 600 stitch rows take a while! Now, thought, I've got enough of the pattern in to start seeing how the stitches and yarn overs work together. I'm getting even more anxious to see the pattern as it develops. And the yarn is fantastic! This is a beautiful blend of color that I really get into. Note the second lifeline. As much as I'm enjoying knitting this, I really don't want to have to rip back multiple rows of 600 stitches! And while I'm not going to use a lifeline on every row, I am going to use one every ten rows or so. Maybe less. It's all a matter of what I'm willing to redo, if it becomes necessary.

A milestone has been reached! I have finally finished spinning the singles of Sugar Bunny Boulevard roving in "Romance" that I started so long ago. Actually, almost two years ago to the day. I didn't realize it had been that long; shame on me. But possibly tomorrow I will start plying it. I have two bobbins of singles and I intend to do a two ply yarn with it. Then we will see what will become of it. Socks? Scarf? Cowl? Maybe mitts? Whatever it is, it will be the first project knit with my own handspun.

Milestone it may be, but Little Cat is still thoroughly bored.

600 Stitches

The Great Patio Redo is moving along. This is what it looks like now. Tomorrow the roof is scheduled to go on. I think we are going to be very happy with this.

I've finished the first Express Lane sock. Well, to be exact, I've left the cuff stitches on two spare DPN's until I finish the second sock, so that I can make sure the two socks match length wise. So I started the second sock, struggling again with the toe-up cast on, only to find that I had forgotten to cast on with the smaller needles I used for the foot. There's a lot of toe-up cast on practise going on around here, in case you haven't noticed. The second sock should go faster (if I remember to follow my own notes) than the first, since I've worked out the details now.

Then again, it may be a while before I spend a lot of time on the sock. I've succumbed to the lure of Knitspot's Maplewing shawl. I just kept gravitating back to it time and again and finally went over the edge. I ordered the Merino Laceweight from The Woolen Rabbit, in the same New England Red that the original shawl was knit with. I was so eager to start, I wound it up on Sunday and cast on immediately.

I had everything perfectly planned out. I cast on with a US 8 circular, so I could have the cast on nice and loose before shifting to the US 5 circular. I had plenty of stitch markers for the cast on, placing one every fifty stitches to keep track of the 600 (!) stitches I would be needing. Once cast on, I had plenty more stitch markers to mark each pattern repeat. I was taking my time and congratulating myself on how well the attention to detail was making this a piece of cake.

Except that I couldn't finish the first pattern row. I'd started row 1 after casting on 500 stitches instead of 600. Nothing like a little humility.

So far I've finished four pattern rows. I've already run a lifeline. There's no way I want to cast on 600 stitches again.

This is the most complex pattern I will have ever knitted. There is patternwork on every row. I'm feeling pretty confident, though (watch out!), since the Knitspot group on Ravelry should help me if I get stuck anywhere. Too bad they can't count stitches for me, though!

And if I need a break from lace, this came in the mail today. There simply isn't time to knit all the patterns I want to jump right in on.

Oh, I love the blue!

It was a good week. I didn't get as much knitting in as I had hoped to, and that's usually the way these things go. I spent a few extra hours napping -- hey, if you can't have the luxury of a nap while on vacation, what's the point? And there were a lot of activities not really condusive to knitting. (Sorry, I don't knit in the jacuzzi, although I'm sure it's been done.)

I worked on the qiviut for most of the plane ride and associated airport waiting. It's not too far from Tucson to Houston, but I did get several repeats of the pattern done. This knitting worked well for the cramped quarters of an airplane seat.

The next day we were shuttled out to Galveston to board our ship. It was still dismaying to see so much destruction still evident in Galveston. Broken boats still littered the side of the roads and damage to homes and buildings was very obvious. But on the whole it didn't look too bad. Nothing like it must have looked right after the hurricane.

Once we got on the ship, the qiviut cowl was abandoned. The blue of all the Caribbean water was overwhelming, and for a little while I worked on the Glacier scarf. The yarn was melding itself into all the shades of blue surrounding the ship.

But the scarf didn't hold my attention for long. I spent most of my knitting time with Icarus and the Malabrigo lace. The yarn feels warm and yummy and I couldn't stay away from it. I knit on this all the flight back home. The blue lace reflected itself in the waters as well. I'm so glad I started this project and took it with me. It was nothing but sheer pleasure to work on.

Trip pictures and adventures aplenty, so stay tuned if you enjoy that sort of posting.

I've Been Soooo Good!

I've been to the LYS twice this month and haven't bought any new yarn! However, I have to admit that nothing I saw really grabbed me by the neck, if you know what I mean. I ran there to get some needles and other notions for the current projects. There were no new books in stock either, so on the whole I got out easy.



We are getting ready for our winter vacation. Neither of us is able to take any time off at Christmas or New Year's. Well, I could take some time off, but it's an unwritten rule in our little group that none of us takes off at the holidays. If it's your regular day off, then you have the holiday off. If it's your regular work day, and Christmas falls on it, sorry. Your turn will come again in a couple years. It was the fairest solution we could all come up with. And yes, my work days were Christmas and New Year's this time. And it's a very busy several weeks for Joe; the rest of the staff gets the time off but he can't. He actually is pretty indispensible at times, at least as far as church duties go. So come January he has to take the time off that he couldn't over the holidays. And he gets to pick where we go and what we do. Someplace very warm...



The suitcases are out in the spare room and we are tossing in clothes and all those other odd items that one takes on vacation (backpacks, water shoes, toothpaste). Of course the knitting was among the first things selected. Sometimes I think the project choices are harder to make than the clothes choices. Projects need to be relatively simple, but some detail is necessary. They must be small enough to transport easily. Not all scarves, not all lace. Excuse me. I think I'm taking all lace.

The lacy qiviut neck cowl has been waiting for such a moment as this. It will be the first project of choice on the airplane. Small and not too complicated, it should help the time pass.

The second choice is this scarf, Tiennie's Old Shale scarf pattern. The yarn is Pink Carrot sock yarn in blues and grays. (In fact, this very skein of mine is used for Ravelry's feature photo.) I'm calling this my Glacier Scarf. Can you see why?



This is a close up of Mendenhall Glacier in Juneau. The scarf makes me think of the beautiful colors in the ice - without the dirt and grit, of course. And I was worried that I wouldn't be able to identify Alaska with any of my other Alaska-purchased yarns after I finished the Monkey socks! Silly me.

The Glacier Scarf has been my at-work knitting, and given how busy we have been it's not surprising that so little has been done on it. I hope to get a good part of this done during our trip. At home I've been knitting on another toddler sweater. This is Sam's Delight from Kid's Knitted Sweaters and More. It is knit from the top down (duh) and will be knit in the round once the yoke is finished. The yarn is Cascade 220 Superwash, and it's a much truer red than the camera shows. It's a very easy knit and good for evenings watching NCIS. And House.

Then, in case I get tired of knitting neckwear, I've started up again on Icarus. This time I'm using my Malabrigo laceweight. I love the softness of this yarn! I've gotten the shawl started so that I don't have to fiddle with the cast on while on the trip.

I'm anxious to spend more time with this, but I'm still trying to get the Christmas decorations put away before we leave on Friday. Okay, I'd like to at least get the stuff all gathered up and out to the garage before we go. But I'm very proud of myself -- I'm not stressing over it and I'm making a point to not get so tied up in housework that I'm neglecting to walk each day and fix some healthy meals. So I'm doing pretty well on the New Year's resolutions, except that I still haven't started spinning again yet. At this point it won't happen until after we return, but I am still determined to get going on that again. I have such lovely fiber in the house and I really want to knit something out of yarn I've spun myself.



Before I forget, I have to publicly thank Kathy for the yarn she sent me in return for a knit hat I sent her for her charity drive. Pink lace weight, no doubt to become little girl lace scarves someday. Thank you, Kathy! And thank you to all my regular readers for starting out another year with me!

Talk to you when we get back.

Shades of LittleLace

The LittleLace Saga (see sidebar) took place in a number of locations, the primary being Arizona's Grand Canyon. Last weekend, to celebrate our anniversary, Joe and I traveled back there again, and this time to also debut the Cherry Leaf Shoulder Shawl. Certainly an appropriate place for me to photograph more lace!

When I first saw the multicolor yarn Roxie, generous soul that she is, had gifted me, I thought that it was the perfect Arizona yarn. It is all the colors of the canyon, and then some. It blends perfectly with the towering rock walls and stone crevasses. I followed the pattern in Victorian Lace Today precisely, except that I left off the crochet on the top edge. Just a personal thing. The pattern was easily memorized and involved enough to keep me from falling asleep while knitting it. It was in the sleeping category for a while, when the lace mojo disappeared, but in the general melee this summer to finish up WIP's I finally saw the return of the missing mojo. I am very happy with this light shawl and will get many years of enjoyment from it, I'm sure.

And here's my sweetie, messing around with his new pair of binoculars. How many guys would agree to photograph their wife on a crowded Sunday afternoon at Moran Point at the biggest Arizona tourist attraction? Especially if said wife was wearing a wool shawl on a hot, sunny day? I think he's a keeper, even if I may be a little "touched" from the heat and the wool. Have a great weekend, everybody!

Little Blocker Cat

What do you know? Mommie finished the Cherry Leaf shawl. And she's blocking it on the bed in the spare room.

I like to sleep on that bed. I think it's my own bed. Nobody bothers me there. Now Mommie's got all these pins sticking up on the bed. And my blankets and pillows are gone.

I guess I will help Mommie block the shawl, so she can hurry up and put the pillows and blankies back on the bed.

Mommie and Daddy are going away for the weekend. She says that she will have pictures of the shawl next week. And I'm going to sleep on my bed all weekend long.

On the Needles, or, I Think This is Still a Knitting Blog

There are a number of small projects on the needles these days. After finishing the Moderne Baby Blanket, I don't think I'm going to want a major project for a little while yet. So here's what's working:

About a year ago I started playing with some Louet Euroflax, casting on for a Moss Grid Hand Towel from the Mason Dixon Knitting book. I lost interest in this for quite a while, but lately I've been seeing a lot of patterns knit in this yarn. So I've resurrected the hand towel and I'm picking this up at work when things get slow. I'd like to work on this and see if I really like the linen yarn before getting into a big project using this.


Also in my take to work bag is the beginning of an entrelac scarf. I'm using Laura's pattern for this and using the yarn Mary of The Wool Palace sent to me a while back when I was a lucky number commenter. This is Schoeller + Stahl Limbo Color in the colorway 2539. This is becoming a real practice piece for me. I'm using it to practice knitting backwards; if I'm ever going to do a really big entrelac piece someday, like the Lady Eleanor shawl, then I'm certainly going to need to know how to do that. I've also been practising knitting continental style, in preparation for doing some colorwork one of these days. All in all I've been having fun with this.

Sitting at home is my little knitting bag with a new sock in it. I'm sort of using the Basic Sock Recipe from Stephanie, as found in "Knitting Rules", but what I'm really trying to do is knit a sock without referring to a pattern. I want to learn to trust my own knitting and get confident enough to just pick up yarn and knit without thinking about it. This is just a simple project to pick up and go to appointments, car trips, etc. The yarn is Austermann Step in color 09, a lot of browns in it just like an Arizona winter.

I cast on for a Traveler's Stocking from Nancy Bush's "Knitting on the Road", but the Panda Wool just didn't let the pattern show through. It got frogged after several inches and the yarn put away for another project in the future. I still want to knit the pattern, but after researching Ravelry I've decided that I will probably do it in a light colored solid yarn to show the stitches off.

I've really been concentrating on the Shoulder Shawl in Cherry Leaf Pattern from "Victorian Lace Today". I've got fourteen of the fifteen pattern repeats finished. Since I've still got plenty of yarn, I thought about making it larger than the pattern, but I've decided now to make it the size the pattern calls for and use any leftover yarn for another project.

Finally, I've cast on for another little project, but I won't show you that one until I get something worth taking a picture of.

It's spring break this next week and I'm getting swamped with college kids this weekend and the next. I'll still be posting as time permits, in between maintaining a 24 hour kitchen. Have a great weekend, everyone!