Tag Archives: lace

singles and shawl progress.

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alpinebob1

Bobbin 1 of the Hello Yarn romney in Alpine.

bob2alpineprog

alpinebob2

Bobbin 2, first in progress, because I thought I was going to stop, and then, in the second picture, finished. This stuff spins itself. I may cheat a little bit and ply later tonight instead of letting the singles rest a full day, We’ll see.

heathershawledge

The wedding is next Saturday, a week from today. I decided on two leaf pattern repeats (I think the last time I blogged about this, I was thinking about doing three), and this morning I began the edging. I’m 8 rows into 34, and I absolutely love how this is turning out. If I work steadily on this over the next few days,  I won’t have to stay up late and risk making stupid, bleary-eyed mistakes. My goal is to block this on Wednesday night, so that it has ample time to dry before I deliver it to the bride on Friday.

While I was working on the romney and the shawl, Boh was standing guard at the window:

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He really is a surprisingly long dog — I marvel at his length whenever I find him at the window like this, paws up on the radiator.

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Apparently surveying the backyard is pretty exhausting work. (There is loud snoring drifting towards my desk from the bedroom.) May your Saturday be as productive and restful as Boh’s!

banditry.

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hshawl1

H’s wedding shawl (an ishbel/springtime bandit hybrid inspired by brokeknits) is coming along. Yesterday I finished one repeat of the leaf pattern, and decided to do another. I have plenty of yarn, so think I am going to aim for 3 leaf pattern repeats before I begin the edging.

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I know I’ve written about my lace anxiety here, and I wanted to take a moment to say thank you to all of you for your encouraging words and happy thoughts. You’re right — it isn’t so bad! (And I’m saying this after spending much of yesterday morning ripping back about an hour’s worth of work to find an error.) You heard it here first: I like lace knitting!

hshawl4

The wedding is in 2 weeks, and I’m aiming to have this ready to block by September 1. Back to it!

dillweed/milkweed.

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pickles

Dillweed. (In the pickles. These are half-sours, from The Joy of Pickling.)

milkweed

Milkweed. (Shawl by Laura Chau.) I’m only 8 rows in, but I’ve decided that although I am way more comfortable with written directions, I’m going all-chart, all-the-time on this one.

I went back to the LYS having the sale yesterday to get a smaller hiyahiya needle for my vanilla socks. Either I didn’t get the right size earlier in the week, or my gauge loosened up a bit in the switch from 2 circs to 1. While working hard to ignore all of the yarn on sale, I decided to treat myself to an addi lace needle for the milkweed shawl, and already I’m glad I did. (My size 4 knitpicks harmony tips are otherwise occupied at the moment, and I knew I wanted sharp needles for this project.)

vanilla emerald

I didn’t spend a super long time knitting yesterday, but I made serious progress on this sock — I think the hiyahiya is growing on me, and while I’m not sure how well these needles would work for more complicated socks (duller tips and not a lot of give on the needle because the cable is exactly the right size for the stitch count, rather than a bit smaller), these may become my go-to stockinette sock needles. Also, they are QUIET. No clicking, clacking, or fiddling.

gussetheel closeup

Also, (drumroll) my first true gusset heel! I worked the heel turn on 2 dpns and then went back to the hiyahiya. Have I mentioned yet how fantastic Socks From the Toe Up is (today)? No? I continue to recommend checking it out.

One more:

soulwindowsplying

Consider this a plying teaser. I plied for a few hours yesterday, and there is still quite a bit of yarn left on the bobbins, which I am taking as a very good sign in the yardage department. Still aiming/hoping/wishing for sock weight and yardage! Stay tuned…

28thirty weather.

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I had forgotten what a tease spring can be in certain parts of the country. Clearly I need to just enjoy sunshine and flip-flop weather when it comes, and stop expecting that it will stick around. The only positive thing I can see in today’s rainy yuckiness (and the week’s similarly cold and rainy forecast) is that I may actually finish my 28thirty in time to have a weather-appropriate day to wear it out of the house. I’m past the left elbow now, and steadily approaching the wrist!

leftsleeveclose

leftsleevealmost

Soon. Very soon. I still haven’t found my reading mojo, and I wonder if this sweater is holding it hostage. I mean, I’m getting my regular reading done for class, but it is time to tackle my writing projects for the semester, and while I’ve acquired quite the pile of library books, I seem to find other things to do (like scrubbing the top of the stove) when I should be systematically note-taking in order to get a handle on my papers.  Sigh.

As part of yesterday’s “cleaning trumps reading” mentality, I washed a bunch of handknits, and thought you might like to see them drying all over my apartment — above dog level, of course.

washing-handknits

washing-handknits21

Also, while making a quick, mission-driven stop at my LYS to pick up a specific yarn for a future project, I impulsively snatched up a copy of the Spring IK, as the Whisper Cardigan has been calling my name on Ravelry. I dug through my stash, and discovered some gorgeous Knitpicks Shadow in Redwood Forest that I bought on sale last year sometime.

whisper-excitement

This will be perfect for spring! I’m not quite ready to cast on yet, but when I do, I think I’ll be using some of the more popular mods — ribbing the sleeve cuffs and keeping an eye on sleeve and body length, and ribbing the lower edge of the body to limit the rolling. I have a few other projects to focus on before I start this, but I am excited about this sweater!

Time to devote my attention to (a) my mug of coffee and (b) preparing for my first class. Hope your week is off to a good start!

resistance = futile.

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This applies both to massaman curry and the WEBS anniversary sale. First, the curry:

curry

curry2

curry3

The boy has been raving about this particular massaman curry paste from one of the Asian grocery shops near his house. Last week he brought me my own container. Yum. I made a regular four-serving batch, as directed by the instructions on the curry paste, complete with tofu, potatoes and onions, and these are my leftovers! I have been eating this all week, and it is delicious.

Today marks the start of April, but it also (and more importantly?) is the first day of the WEBS anniversary sale. As this blog post’s title implies, I’ve already clicked the “complete purchase” button, and a healthy dose of eco-wool (for a hemlock ring blanket, an owls sweater, and maybe linden or shalom), as well as some classic elite silky alpaca lace (ishbel is building my lace confidence) and some jo sharp dk wool (for bracken) should be en route to my doorstep soon.

Speaking of ishbel, my version has graduated to “blob” status. It is too big to stretch out all pretty on its circular needle, so here it is in a big heap.

ishbelblob

I’ve finished the stockinette portion for the large size, which means it is time for lace. Wish me luck!

ishbel.

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ishbelprog

ishbel-prog-2

The stockinette portion of Ishbel is absolutely flying! Talk about a satisfying knit. No visible progress to report on my 28thirty sleeves, but I am dutifully working on it at home.  It has taken me twice as long to upload photos for this post because I’ve been simultaneously eating half of one of these espresso banana nut muffins:

muffins

Soon I’m going to heat up some cheesy Sweet Potato Spoon Bread leftovers for lunch:

sweetpotato-spoon-bread

Both of these recipes are from Supernatural Cooking, the most recent cookbook from Heidi over at 101cookbooks. My kitchen binder of internet recipes has a healthy selection from her blog, and this cookbook does not disappoint — I’ve enjoyed everything I’ve made from it, and the book itself is gorgeous. Also, one more plug for those muffins — they use white-whole wheat flour, natural cane sugar, less butter than you’d expect, and yogurt. I was expecting the white-whole wheat flour to yield a pretty dense, dry muffin, and I was happily surprised with the result. These are light and moist, and I will certainly be making them again!

Boh is pouting because he can’t have either of these treats. I promise I’ll take him on a longer W-A-L-K today to make up for it.

Have a great weekend!

longer…

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sleeve-is-longer

This sleeve is slowly lengthening. Why is it that the closer I get to completing this sweater, the slower my progress looks to me? This project is no longer appropriate for bringing anywhere except a designated knitterly gathering, both because of its size and because of the way I feel like my arms flail about as I tug on cables and untwist the sleeve along my way towards magic looping to the wrist. Whining aside, I love this and cannot wait to prance about in it. (Yes, I said prance.)

Because I have a serious problem with project monogamy, and because I had a lecture to attend yesterday, I cast on something new.

ishbel

It is true; I’ve caught the Ishbel bug. I’ve been resisting the urge to knit this for some time now: Lace is hard! Another fingering weight project when I still have socks on the needles? And then, after viewing many a lovely Ishbel, I saw this one over at brokeknits. I bought the pattern immediately.

I’m using some gorgeous slightly variegated deep purple Yarn Pirate fingering weight, and I’m hoping to successfully combine the small and large sizes — large st portion, small lace version, to use all the yarn. We’ll see how that goes!

A few more Boh pics that are too sweet and silly not to share:

boh-under-blankets

We may have fallen asleep here together on Monday night…

boheyesclosed

Someone is very pleased with his cookie. Time for me to get back to work!

Rusted Root…

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5 summers ago, I rode my bike across the country. There is a lot I can say about how formative that experience was for me, but that’s not why I’m mentioning it today. We had a soundtrack, and “Send Me On My Way” by Rusted Root, was central to our experience crossing the plains of Kansas. If you start humming the opening guitar solo and then picture miles of corn and wheat, peppered with the occasional towering white grain elevator, you’ll get it. Promise. Anyway, about three weeks ago, I decided that I needed my very own Rusted Root. I was traveling cross country for a wedding (by plane, not by bike) and needed a good airplane project. I haven’t picked this up since I returned, because the lace panel requires more concentration than I’ve been able to commit after some long days at work. Perhaps blogging about it will encourage me to knit at least a few rows later tonight?

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I’m using the recommended yarn — Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece — and needles (size 5). I was so excited to start this that I drove all over town for the right needles. My LYS was out, but I managed to find some pink metal circulars at an out-of-the-way JoAnn Fabric store. I ripped out the first 6 rows several times as I worked to perfect the purlwise YO, but it moved quite quickly after I figured that out. This is my first lace project, and I love these beautiful leaves! (This is not my first sweater project, but I will save my Coachella story for another post.)

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In the mindless knitting category, last night I cast on for the Baby Bib O’ Love from Mason-Dixon Knitting. Some dear friends of mine have a daughter who will be celebrating her first birthday next week, and I think this will brighten her breakfast experience. This is knitting up very quickly, so I should be able to get this in the mail on time. (Yarn is as recommended – Peaches and Creme worsted. I’m using some mismatched size 6 vintage needles from a lot I scored on Ebay. They match the yarn!)

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More technology questions — where do I get those cool widgets (whatchamacallits?) that let me share my progress on my WIPs in the sidebar?