Oh dear, it's been a while. A long while.

I was going to post a note on the project I'm working on, but then I realized that it has been ages since I posted in the blog, and should probably do so!

I finished Twu Wuv ages ago. It is now one of my very favorite shawls, and I wear it with lots and lots of different things in the summer. It goes beautifully with all my jewel tone and bright clothes!

Right now, I'm about halfway through Fox Paws. I started it way back in December, when I was traveling to DC for the holidays. I figured, "Oh, I can use up FIVE balls of the Knitpicks Palette I have, and it shouldn't be too hard because it's not lace and not beaded, and there's no stranded color work! Nice and relaxing for vacation knitting!"

Oh, how naïve.

See, when I decided on this pattern, I was in a state not unlike that of a new mother. My cat, Lucy, a.k.a. Woogie, was very sick. We had a feeding tube inserted in her neck shortly after Thanksgiving because she wasn't eating. I was getting five hours of sleep a night, constantly in a state of anxious worry, and spending most of my time outside of work sitting on a couch and feeding a helpless little creature, hoping it would be healthy. Because of this, I was not attentive to the difficulty rating of the project. I failed to read the Yarn Harlot's post about it that said it required CONSTANT VIGILANCE. In short, I underestimated that bad boy BIG time.

Progress was, needless to say, very very slow for a very long time. While Woogie was sick, I rarely had the spare brain cells or time to work on something so complicated. Eventually, though, we had to put her to sleep on the day before Easter. (Although tests never confirmed it, X-rays near the end indicated cancer.) While a day hasn't gone by that I haven't missed my little girl, not taking care of a sick cat has meant I've been able to do more of the things I did before she got sick. One of those is working out, and another is knitting.

Xandy Peters came out with a rewrite of Fox Paws shortly before Woogie passed, so when I started it back up again, I gave that new version a shot. To my surprise, I found it made the pattern MUCH easier to follow, and although I've done my usual "oh crap, a mistake--I can't deal with this now, I'll get it later when I have more time" thing a few times, progress has been much better. I am now more than halfway done with it, and ENJOYING the knit.

I chose three earthy shades and two vivid colors that worked well with them. The five colors are (to describe, not name): beige, rust, gold, plum, and forest green. I think this gives it a rich and slightly exotic look that will go well with a lot of clothes.

I've been thinking, though, that after this, I want another lace shawl. I need to find a good, bright orange yarn, I think. I love orange, and still don't have an orange shawl. I'm thinking something semicircular. I haven't yet decided on lace weight vs. fingering, so I may just look through all my favorited patterns on Ravelry and then decide!

Mawwaige is what bwings us togethah today.

I missed you, lace!

I haven't done a lace project in a long time. The last thing I posted about here was my stranded mittens. They were challenging, yes, but they weren't lace. Since that time, I've completed three other projects:

• A new South End Knitter's Hat to replace the one I lost on the subway (not as warm as that one, and not as good a size, *sob*
• The Cowl What Feels Like Kittens (a simple braided cowl, a one-skein project to make use of this divinely soft baby alpaca yarn I bought during the North Shore Yarn Crawl)
• Yet another Super-Natural Stripes baby sweater, this time in spring-y green/yellow/purple for my friend from high school, who's having her first baby next month

So, that's four projects in a row that did not involve lace at all, and only two of which were actually new patterns for me. I've been thinking for some time now that I'd really like a bright sunny yellow shawl, and figured now would be as good a time as any to start one. Yellow is one of the few colors of Knitpicks Palette I don't have, so I knew I would have to buy some new yarn. That meant that I had no constraints whatsoever in choosing a pattern--I could use any weight, any amount of yarn.

I decided to do a semicircular shawl, since I've found that shape to be really good for me. It covers enough of my arms to keep them warm, without having to be really long as well (triangles tend to be either really long at the point, or too small to cover my arms). After browsing through Ravelry, I settled on Tru Wuv by Mawelucky. I adore the combination of rounded shapes and delicate points in the pattern. It's very ornate, and I really was looking for something that would allow me to flex my lace-knitting muscles more than I have since finishing my full-size Aeolian.

It seems there aren't a whole lot of yarn manufacturers who do a solid-or-lightly-heathered vivid sunny yellow lace yarn. I found what appears to be the perfect option, though: Fyberspates Gleem Lace in Sunshine. It's BFL and silk, so it has a nice combination of spring, drape, and shine. Plus, it's exactly the right shade of sunny yellow I was looking for! 

This pattern is VERY challenging. The actual knitting isn't so bad, but reading the pattern is confusing. I usually work well with charts, but the directions that go with the charts are spare, and the charts themselves can be a bit baffling. I am going to try to be diligent about making notes to show what's confused me, and explain what I figured out. So far:

1. Casting on, there's no reason you need a provisional cast-on, since at no point that I see do you unravel it. Yes, you are supposed to have three stitches before the first marker and two after the second marker. The border stitches go back and forth between two and three on each side throughout the shawl: on each row (right and wrong side), you add a stitch on the two-stitch-side with an initial YO, and decrease a stitch on the three-stitch-side with a final SSK or P2TOG.
2. For the setup chart, ignore the indications to place a marker: these are actually the same markers you placed when you were picking up the stitches on your...not really garter tab, but...stockinette-ish tab? Anyway, the markers shown on the setup chart are already there. Also, in the square where the "place marker" symbol is? That's just that: place the marker, it's not a stitch.
3. Don't pay attention to the column counts at the top and bottom of the charts. Those numbers don't actually apply all through the chart. You don't start out with that many stitches! At the beginning of the  transition chart, for example, there's a lot of empty space in those columns, indicating NO stitches there. 
4. On the transition chart, unlike the setup chart, you SHOULD place a marker every time it says "place marker." You are not placing one marker between pattern repeats, but instead you are going to have two markers per pattern repeat, plus another at the beginning and at the end of the row, with just one stitch between that marker and the marker indicating where the border stitches are.

I think that as I continue, the charts will make more sense to me. This pattern is really a test of "trust the charts," combined with, "...but make sure you know what the chart is actually saying."

Help! I'm stranded!

No, I'm not stuck somewhere--I just finished my first stranded knitting project! I did the Daisy Mittens pattern on Ravelry. I'm really excited about how well the mittens came out. I found a couple of irritating math errors in the pattern (like telling me to add six stitches to 54 and  then knit a chart that was 58 stitches around with no uncharted stitches), but other than that, it was pretty straightforward, and a good first stranded project. It took me a little while to start getting comfortable with the process of holding one color yarn in each hand and knitting with both. In the beginning, I was twisting my continental stitches. Once I got that straightened out, though, it wasn't too bad. I got accustomed to the rhythm of it.  The tension could probably be better, but it's not awful. There's some stretch, and things aren't horribly puckered.

My mother has now requested a pair of mittens, and she assures me that unlike a shawl, the mittens are something she'll actually wear. OK, I'll do that for her. She might not be able to wear them until next winter, but that's fine. I'm going to see her the first weekend in March, the weekend after her birthday, and I'll talk to her about colors and patterns then.

I've cast on for another South End Knitter's Hat. I was so dismayed when I dropped the one I'd made previously on the red line! I just hope that it managed to make its way to someone who needed a nice cozy hat, and who really enjoys that one. The one I'm making now is light grey with silver sparkles, made from two strands of Knitpicks Stroll Glimmer. I hope that the gauge will end up OK. It's fine if the finished product is a little smaller than the last one. I think this color will be really nice for wearing with my peacoat or my long wool coat, when I want to look a little more smartly dressed and it's not utterly frigid. The Fur Hat of Doom still reigns for the frigid weather.

Also on the to-knit list is a baby sweater. One of my friends from high school is pregnant and due in June. It's their first baby, so I really want to make sure to knit her something nice. I might even go so far as to try a pattern with some stranding! I need to pore over patterns this weekend. I know she really wants a girl, but she's also definitely NOT the powder-puff-pink type. I'll probably stick to the safe bet of bright cheerful colors. My friend is Indian, and most of the Indian folks I know appreciate bright colors. I might have to see if there's anything particularly geeky I can do. A baby TARDIS sweater? I'm sure such a thing must exist somewhere.

Has it really been over half a year?

Oh dear. July. July, when the shawl I'm wearing at this very moment was still just in the planning stages. That was the last time I posted here. I am ashamed. *hangs head in shame*

So, what's new in my wanton world? Well, er, I knit this shawl! It took me ages, even though I don't feel like I ever put it down for more than a week at a time, even with several setbacks (I'm looking at you, broken needles over Thanksgiving!) and frustration. The thing is, it's a big shawl, it's laceweight yarn, and it involves both nupps and beads. The full-size Aeolian is NOT a fast knit! I finished it around New Year's Day. I still haven't managed to take a GOOD picture of it, but I hope this will suffice for now.

Since I last posted, I have had very bad luck with shawl pins. The one from Designs By Romi that I'd had for years--since I knit my first Aeolian shawlette--disappeared. The first part I lost was the stick, and I just replaced that with a darning needle with a beaded stitch market on the end. It was working well enough, but then I lost the curly pin part, and that was that. I couldn't order a new one from Romi, since her shop was closed while she finished a book. I got one from Nicholas and Felice on Etsy instead. Then that one disappeared when I was running errands one day. ("That sank into the swamp...") Finally, I ordered a couple new ones from N&F. This time, instead of sterling, I got the cheaper copper and aluminum. They aren't as delicate or as shiny, but they ARE lovely. Hopefully, they'll stick around.

The latest news in my knitting is big news indeed! Well, it's big news to me, anyway. I've finally taken the plunge into colorwork! Yes, after getting All The Knitpicks Palette Ever from my friend a couple years ago, I finally did the sensible thing and started to learn Fair Isle. I'm making a pair of the Daisy Mittens on Ravelry, in a deep rich red and teal combination. It's not easy. I'm really not used to working on DPNs anymore except for the three-needle hexipuffs for the Beekeeper's Quilt, so that's a challenge. An even bigger challenge is the fact that I've had to train myself to knit Continental. The palm side of these mittens alternates yarn colors with every stitch, for the most part, so having one color in each hand is much faster than dropping one to pick up the other with every other stitch. All in all, I feel like a totally clumsy n00b! Even so, things are beginning to pick up, and I've done 15 rounds of the colorwork pattern on my first mitten. I'd have done more, but I restarted a couple of times. The first time, it was because I'd dropped some stitches and was having a hell of a time trying to pick them back up again, since I'd managed to screw up the pattern because of it. The second time was when I decided to swap out the orange yarn I'd started with for the teal I'm using now. I like the color combination much better, so I think this was a good decision. Also, I'd been twisting my Continental stitches at the beginning of the pattern on my previous attempt (oops), which I have since corrected. It's really exciting to be learning something so new to me in knitting, and I can't wait to post pictures.

Hopefully, it won't be so long before my next update!

Flying through the lace

Relatively speaking, it doesn't feel all that long since I last posted here...and guess what? I finished another shawl in that time! Yes, it's on the small side. Yes, it was simple. Yes, it used fingering yarn instead of laceweight. But it is an entire shawl, complete and lovely: the Leaf Evolution Shawl. I'm afraid I don't yet have any good pictures of it post-blocking, but you can see it unblocked here, on my Ravelry page. I decided I needed to use up some of my Knitpicks Palette, and after much dithering, came to the conclusion that I could just knit a lacy shawl in wide stripes. I actually based this on one that someone had done in the KPP, using four different colors, so I wouldn't even have to think about where to put the color changes and how much I'd need. Alas, it didn't really use up as much of each ball as I'd hoped. I guess those four balls are destined for use in the Beekeeper's Quilt! I've already done one striped hexipuff in those colors to "commemorate" this shawl.

The past few days have been pretty hexipuff-centric, knitting-wise. I love having an in-between-projects project that's simple and portable. I brought materials for making them to the knitting group I went to last night, the first meeting of the new on in Assembly Square.

I AM starting to get the urge to knit something more complicated and fine again, now. Already. That's a bit of a surprise. I think I am going to...repeat a shawl. Yes, that's right. Ms. Never-the-same-thing-twice is probably going to make another Aeolian. This time, I'll do the large laceweight version, and I'll use my pretty purple Winter Lace yarn from Mountain Colors that I got when Windsor Button was going out of business. It's a subtle enough variegation that I think it will look lovely. Now, do I use the same beads I used before, or do I get new ones? If so, what color? The peacock beads would go well, but I've also thought about some pearly-looking ones. The problem is, I don't want to have to wait a long time to get started, so I can't take forever deciding on a bead color, sourcing them, and waiting for them to ship. I should decide quickly, I think. I'm interested in seeing how this yarn knits up!

Proud as a peacock

Every time I write in this blog, I feel like I should be apologizing. I am SO BAD about it. Well, to be fair, it's a knitting blog, and for most of the last year plus, I've been bad about knitting. I never got to the point of thinking about giving up knitting, mind you. Never. I was always just in a state of "I know I need to fix that problem and get back to it, but I just don't have the wherewithal right now."

I started my Peacock Feathers Stole in February 2013. I finished it the other day. It took me OVER a YEAR to finish that project, and it's not like I'd been working on any others. Well, the hexipuffs for the Beekeeper's Quilt that I made while at the festival I go to in the summer don't count. To be fair, a big part of the reason why I spent so much time "on a break" from knitting was that I was in the process of planning and having a wedding and honeymoon. Even after that, though, I procrastinated picking up my knitting again. Even after I picked it up, when I encountered other problems (i.e., messed up and couldn't fix it easily), I procrastinated MORE on getting back to it. But finally, I set myself to the task and finished. Here, my friends, are some pictures.

As you may be able to tell, I blocked it incorrectly. Not terribly, but I do want to fix it. The edge is finished with a crochet bind off that creates lovely little scallops when you pin out each chain. I pinned out the points of the feathers, but failed to pin out the scallops. Oops. Even so, I'm bloody well wearing it. I've had two people ask me what it would cost to have me make THEM one. I answered them, "To be honest, it would cost an arm, a leg, and your firstborn."

Now, I am working on something new! I decided I wanted to make a shawl that used only the Knitpicks Palette yarn I got from my friend Nadira, because I have (yes sir, yes sir) three bags full of it sitting in my closet. It was a little tricky because of the fact that I only have about 230 yards of each color. After a lot of looking around, I happened on a project someone made of the Leaf Evolution Shawl that used four different colors, each in its own wide stripe. They even used the same KPP that I was planning on using, and it only took them one ball of each color. I decided that this looked lovely, and that I would follow their notes for where they changed colors to do the same thing. I chose a dark reddish brown, a light beige, a light blue, and a medium brown-tan. Those colors will go in that order from top to bottom of the triangular shawl. I like this color combination. It sort of reminds me of desert and sky. It's also unlike any other shawls I have, which was a requirement for me! I'm really enjoying it so far. The chart I'm working on now is extraordinarily simple, especially after the Peacock Feathers Stole. It's a very short chart, repeated numerous (I'm doing 16) times, with very short pattern repeats. It feels almost mindless after the PFS, and  the fingering weight yarn feels heavy after the lace yarn I used for that!

I am a pathetic, pathetic knitter.

I have not written in here since March. March, at which time I was dutifully working at my Peacock Stole. March, at which time there was still more than half a year to go until my wedding.

The wedding that ATE MY BRAIN.

OK, so it as mostly the wedding planning that ate my brain. Even when I wasn't actively working on it, it was a loud enough background noise that I had a hard time doing anything as complicated in my spare time (what there was of it) as fixing knitting boo-boos. Consequently, the only knitting I've done in AGES was when I worked on my hexipuffs on my summer vacation, just for something to do with my hands while chatting with fellow festival-goers and while riding in the car for the long trip there and back.

But now it's SERIOUS autumn. It's time for Stitches East (where I'm not actually going this year). It's not long after Rhinebeck. I think all that knitter-juju in the air has finally started getting to me. It might also be the fact that I'm pulling out all my shawls, my hat, and other knitted stuff to keep me warm again. I've been finding myself thinking longingly of yarn and needles again.

Last night, at long last, I picked up the Peacock Stole again. I saw that the problem that had led me to set it aside for months was more of a problem and less of a problem than I remembered. It was more of a problem in that the yarn had broken, and less of a problem in that I had put in a lifeline only a few rows back. Whew! I frogged, did a Russian join, and started working again. This morning, knitting on the bus, I dropped an annoying couple of stitches. Somehow, this started getting worse, until I slammed on the brakes (of the knitting, not the bus). I let most of the pattern repeat I was working drop off back to the lifeline, except for one stitch at the beginning and end, just to keep the markers in place. That left me 22 stitches that I put onto a stitch holder, and then started re-knitting them from there. I've almost got them back up to the current row now, and have no doubt I'll be whizzing along again this afternoon.

An old and dear friend who moved away to Ohio (who's also a knitter) is in town right now, and my husband (HUSBAND!) and I are having dinner with him tonight at 7. Husband probably won't get into town until well after 6, because he is now working out in Western Mass. This leaves me with lots of time after work. I will probably spend it in looking for a coat at the Garment District, and knitting--either here in the Kendall area or in Davis Square, where we're going for dinner. Yay! I missed you, knitting!

Just a quick update

I'm still plugging away at the Peacock Stole! I've finished the first two charts (on the first side of the stole), and am working on the third. I was proud of myself this past weekend: I'd dropped half a dozen stitches while knitting on the bus on Thursday, when we jerked to a stop. On Saturday, while at the train station and waiting to take the train to visit my parents, I managed to fix them quite neatly. I had to take some time to figure out exactly where in the pattern those stitches fell, and how they lined up with the row above, so I could figure out what I needed to do with them. It was a little fiddly, but it ended up looking just great. It also made me glad that I use lifelines: the stitches were only able to drop about three rows!

I need to meet my fiancé at his office after work today, so we can head out to our friends' house for dinner. I'll probably get there a bit early, and get some knitting done with a cup of tea at a café while I wait. Yay, a few moments stolen for the stole!

The state of the knitter

Oh dear, I see I promised pictures in my last post! Sorry to have dropped the ball. Here's a slightly blurry but not horrible picture of the finished Camping Shawl.

  So, what's happened since then?

1. I started the Peacock Stole. Multiple times. Most recently, I re-started it again last night, after a hiatus of well over a month. Damn it, I thought I'd gotten past that being a problem for me! I messed it up but good, though, dropping a number of stitches through a bit that had all manner of YOs and decreases and double decreases. I then tried to fix it on the bus just after it happened, which turned out to be a bad idea. When I took it out again last night to see if it was salvageable, I realized that I just did not have the mental fortitude to face it. I ripped it all out, and cast on again. Annoyingly, it took me a while to get the hang of my provisional cast-on again, but I've now completed eight rows and am doing well. Knock wood.

2. My dearly beloved LYS, Windsor Button, announced that it's closing! I was devastated by the news. There are other yarn stores in the Boston area, but really, they have been the most convenient, with the largest selection of good yarn. There's still Mind's Eye in Porter Square, but it's a bit more of a pain to get to than it should be for something that geographically close, and the selection is small, though I'm fond of the owner, who's very sweet. There's also that place on Newbury Street, but I remember it being rather overpriced and not much fun. I'll miss WB a lot. I imagine I'm likely to do most of my yarn shopping at Stitches East from now on. And that's only once a year. I did get a couple of balls of Mini Mochi during their going out of business sale, at least. One is a sort of jungle-ish colorway of greens and browns and turquoises. The other is, believe it or not, pastels--the bright Easter egg sort of pastels, though, not the pallid wimpy kind that look so awful on me. I also got a skein of Mountain Colors Winter Lace yarn in a nice combination of purples.

3. Today, I seem to have acquired All The Yarn, Ever. At least, that's how it feels. A knitter I know, a fellow belly dancer and MIT employee, had purged most of her stash last year. I don't remember why I didn't take anything from her. Was it because she said she was mostly using worsted weight? That might have been it. Still, she did have three very large bags full (yes sir, yes sir) of Knitpicks Palette in a multitude of colors. I may end up using some of that in alternation with the Mini Mochi to stretch it out a bit and make a couple of small shawls. I also got a couple balls of Knitpicks Dancing from her. It's not really something I'd use to wear, but I figure it can always go towards the Beekeeper's Quilt. I also got a book on geeky knits (a Princess Leia hair hat! Hobbit feet socks!), a technique DVD from Elizabeth Zimmerman, a color-coordination wheel and chart, a lace stole pattern, and a yardage guide. Oh, and a yarn holder (the plastic jug with a hole in the lid kind), a ball winder (which I'll probably give to a friend), a bunch of assorted stitch markers, some seam clips, and a drop spindle with some roving (which will probably also go to a friend). And I have to carry all of that home. Oy. Good thing it's not heavy, though it is awkward!

I still haven't made a decision about a wedding shawl. I suppose I ought to do so. Part of me is very reluctant to put that kind of pressure on myself. My dress, by the way, is FABULOUS. :)

No pics today. Pics tomorrow. Hopefully. :)

I guess that good knitting can make for boring blogging. "Still working on the shawl. No problems so far. One section down." All the interesting stuff to talk about comes in the planning phase and in the "ARGH! What did I do wrong and how am I going to fix it?" phases. With the EZ 100th Anniversary Camping Shawl, I had none of the latter. None. Zero, zip, nada. It's almost mind-boggling to me that I should get through a shawl without some sort of catastrophe: forgetting a crucial portion of a pattern, having my needles separate from the cables and losing a bunch of stitches, or just messing up badly and having to drop back to a lifeline in order to fix it. In the entire course of this pattern, the only problem I had was that when it was time to start the edging pattern, I realized I had two extra stitches on my needles. I could not for the life of me see where they came from, since the pattern before it had ended perfectly, and the eyelet row looked just fine. Since I didn't see any errors, I decided just to decrease an extra stitch at the beginning and end of the first edging pattern row--SSSK and K3tog. Easy-peasy, and it looks perfect. I finished it the morning after Christmas, at my parents' place. I blocked the shawl last night before dinner. Did you know that 105 T-pins are really not enough? Nope. Even if I'd used a blocking wire for the top edge (as I probably should have, but I didn't want to deal with sticking it through), I wouldn't have had quite enough pins to block out the edging in little rounded scallops. I ended up blocking each "wave" into three points instead. It kind of reminds me of part of a snowflake, somehow. Heh...camping in the winter! I was going to try to get pictures, but it's getting late in the day, and the light isn't as good as it could be anymore. I will attempt to get some good ones tomorrow, though, and will post them to Ravelry! Next up: Peacock Stole! And maybe after I go wedding gown shopping on January 5th, I will know whether I'd like to make a wedding shawl. Oh, yeah, that's right. I never actually mentioned here that I got engaged, did I? My boyfriend formally proposed a few nights before Halloween--just a week and a half after my last post here! I've joined the "With This String, I Thee Wed" group on Ravelry. Yay!