rope. tree. fan. spear. snake. wall.

Sunday, June 01, 2014

progress on various

Right! So May was reasonably productive, I think. AliĆ©nor is cast off and end-tucked, but not yet washed or blocked, and I need to figure out who the best person is to help me photograph it. Also still need to finish writing the pattern and get test-knitters, but - ulp - that means letting other people see the pattern and - ack - possibly CRITICIZE it, oh noes! This is not a thing at which I excel. Anyway, this is how it looks, unblocked and folded on a chair, in bad light. Either my camera or my computer screen is falling down on the color, but in real life it's a nice plain blue. The color name is Cornflower, and as it was a limited edition color I can't even find an image on the Fyberspates site. Oh well, one of a kind and all that. 

Next up: also cast off and end-tucked but not yet washed, blocked, or properly photographed and also not documented at all for some reason, nor even properly named, is a wool/alpaca sweater that combines ribbing, cables and lace. I bought the yarn at Webs when I went to Rhode Island with Mr Husband, lo these many years ago. It's Elsebeth Lavold Classic AL which I think might be discontinued. I had intended to make a cardigan from a Schachenmayr booklet that I'd bought at some point - they didn't name the pattern either - but as it happened, the pattern as written wanted thinner yarn and redoing the math turned out to be more than I could be bothered with. Also I wanted to try out this new contiguous method of knitting, so hm, modifying this super-simple pattern was actually more work than redoing the math on the Schachenmayr thing. Which I guess goes to show that it's not only my kids who work very hard to avoid doing any work. Anyway, it will be nice and warm this winter, though the yarn is somewhat hairy and I'm a little worried about pilling.

Further progress on last month's acquisitions: the Resilience Top that I was going to make with the Drachenwolle yarn I bought, well, that is also too thick for the pattern, but I do have this Wollmeise Laceweight that should to the trick. I also found some fabulous buttons (not as many as the pattern requires, but I don't like making buttonholes, so I would have reduced the number of buttons anyway) at a little vintage et cetera shop handily located between my office and my bus stop. That is still waiting to be cast on, and will probably be waiting a good long while, all things considered. So it's not exactly a WIP, is it? I guess the point of this paragraph is look! Buttons!

The Giant Clam Closing Forever laceweight from Dye For Yarn is well on its way to becoming a featherweight cardigan. I already have one in Wollmeise Laceweight, with a lace front panel, and another in progress in light purple silk, so I decided this one needed something to distinguish it from the others. Hence th butterflies. It's still mostly plain stockinette, so I can knit most of it while reading, with the occasional rows of lace so I don't die of boredom.

Then there's the Windspiel shawl in the cobalt silk, which is making limited progress but I do love the pattern and the result thus far. The yarn is quite splitty and requires attention, so this makes excellent podcast knitting.

And of course all of this had to be set aside for a week so I could do another fabulous test-knit for the always-fabulous Yarnissima. It's for a publication so I can't really tell you anything except that my version is red and it has been extra super fun to knit and these will be my socks for feeling like a movie star while slouching around the house this coming winter.

And that's all that is currently going on, knit-wise. I'll post better photos when I have them.