Brandywine Shawl

I finished my second Brandywine Shawl this past weekend. This time around it was a lot more relaxing to knit compared to the first time when I had to use lifelines every few rows because I had to rip it back so often. I found using the chart much easier than using the written instructions.




I used two skeins of Claudia's Handpainted Fingering weight in Mountain Sky and size 7 needles. I love how it turned out. And the best part...It's for me!



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Work in Progress

Brandywine Shawl by Rosemary Hill using Claudias Handpainted Fingering in Mountain Sky.




- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Second Verse, Same As the First

As I was knitting over the weekend, the old Herman's Hermits song sprang to mind, "I'm Henery the Eighth, I am; Henery the Eighth I am, I am," because I kept thinking, "Second verse, same as the first!"

I'm on the second of the main body pieces to this star sweater, the twin to the piece I've already finished. I'm on the downhill slide (not for the whole sweater - just for this bit), seeing as I am now decreasing the stitch count on every RS row instead of increasing. Here are some pictures of the "first verse" and my progress on "second verse":

Once I get this "second verse" done, I'll start on the side pieces, abbreviated versions of the front and back pieces. I'll have to ask my brother (musician & librarian) for appropriate terms to use for those: should they be "third & fourth refrains" or maybe "DC al Coda"??? I haven't looked at sheet music for many years, so my musical terminology is very rusty...but I digress.

Overall I am enjoying this project, especially since I waited so long to start and VK had already posted the pattern errata. I really feel sorry for anyone who bought the original 4 to 5 balls of yarn the pattern called for, expecting that it would complete the entire project! I understand that pattern errors happen, but how in the world do you mess up the amount of yarn by half? However, one thing I'm not loving are the bits of detrius that are in the yarn. This Summer Tweed yarn is 70% silk/30% cotton, and it has a unique feel in the hand. It's hard to explain, but it has a tendency to stick to itself a little bit when you are pulling the yarn through a loop while making a stitch. It's not annoying, just different. What's annoying are the pieces that look like cotton plant that are woven into the yarn. Here's a picture of what I just picked off the surface of a new ball in about one minute:














Maybe I'm too (nit) picky, but I am really surprised that the company's manufacturing process couldn't do a better job of eliminating this plant waste from the raw cotton before spinning. I've never seen anything like this before, even in yarn that was hand spun, so I have a hard time believing that a major yarn manufacturer can't get it together. I've bought other yarns from Rowan and they were wonderful, but I'll probably do a better job of looking over the yarn for imperfections before I buy from them again. Because that's a "second verse" I could do without.

How Do You Do What You Do?

My DH says I'm a focus freak - well, not in those words exactly - but he often teases me on my ability to focus so intently on what I'm doing that I shut out all distractions. For example, when I drive I tend to focus on where I'm going and the path I need to follow to get there, plus my fellow drivers, etc. I don't gaze around me at the scenery, looking at different buildings, landmarks, etc., unless those are part of my directions I use to help me get to where I'm going. So if I'm riding with my DH, it's not unusual for me to suddenly say something like, "Wow...when did the (such & such) restaurant go out of business?" My DH will look at me like I'm a moron and reply that it's been gone for 6 months.

However, when I knit I can't just sit and knit in silence. I have to have some distraction or else it's just too quiet and (gasp), dare I say it, boring. There is a small voice in my head that just squeeked, "Maybe you'd get more knitting done if you sat in silence," but I just ignore it. I used to knit and watch movies, but I found that I concentrated too much on the movie and not enough on my knitting. I still knit while watching some sporting events, such as Arsenal football, or MotoGP racing. But I really enjoy listening to an audio book while reading.

I started listening to audio books when I found that listening to music just wasn't motivating me enough to work out. I'd play the same album over and over until I got sick of it, then move onto another album. I'd listened to an audio book in the car before (on vacation), so I gave it a go and it really worked.

Now I find I check out more audio books from the library than paper books, with the exception of knitting books, of course. :) Obviously there are so many wonderful books out there that are converted to audio format, but my two favorites for listening & knitting are:

• Duma Key, by Stephen King (love this book - listen to it over and over)
• the complete Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling, partly because Jim Dale has such a great voice

Work progresses on the star sweater (I'll show pics in the next post), and my "count every RS row" method is helping me avoid repetitive re-work. I am sure when I'm knitting in public, people must think I'm a counting freak, stopping at the end of every other row to count. No, I'd tell them, I'm not a counting freak...I'm a focus freak.

One Step Forward, Two Steps Back

As you know from my last post, I've started working on the Star Motif Sweater from Vogue Knitting Spring/Summer 2009. Yes, I correctly called it the "Star" motif, not "Snowflake" sweater like my last post. Although in my defense, it does look like a snowflake. Well, the reason for this post title, is that I've been suffering through a series of knitting snafus trying to finish the first diamond piece.

Apparently I've lost all ability to correctly read a chart. Well, it's really more accurate to say that I suffered through a period of probably 20-30 rows that I could not get my count to come out right. Like all lace I've ever worked, all WS rows are purled. Naturally I didn't notice my mistakes on a RS row until I was nearly done with the next RS row and I found I didn't have the correct number of remaining stitches to finish the row. I didn't bother using a life line because it was readily apparent within two RS rows if I had messed up.

You'd think after doing this for 5 or 10 rows that I'd realize my approach wasn't working. Either I need to focus more (e.g. no knitting while watching TV) or I needed to count my stitches after the end of a RS row. Nah...why would I want to do something intelligent like that??? Amazingly, the lace knitting is going so much better now that I have pulled my head out of my...eh...never mind.

On a completely different note, I've been spending some free time these past several days classifying patterns at Ravelry. When I viewed my checklist tonight, I see that they have it closed down temporarily. Hopefully you were able to get in on the classifying goodness (geesh - sound like my brother the librarian) and that we all win one of the amazing prizes!

Done and Done

So I've been very bad about blogging for the past month - in case you noticed! I've been busy being engrossed with things like this:

FIFA 2010 World Cup

and things like this:

and spending too little time doing this:

(please note that this picture is not a good likeness of me while knitting - my posture is not that good...)

Why, you my ask, am I not knitting more??? I can't help it; I find that there are so many things vying for my attention in the summer, even when it is 95 degrees F with a heat index of 105+ (for any non-Americans, that's almost 41 degrees C) . I can't ride my bike during the winter, and we've had so much rain this spring that when we've had a gorgeous weekend, I want to go riding. Throw in the need to do yard work, especially due to said cursed rain, and there isn't enough time for everything in the summer.

Thankfully I have two things saving my knitting: the baby shower deadline for the baby cardi, and the Rowan Summer Tweed yarn I rediscovered in my stash (color is Powder). First, let me share with you that I finished the baby cardigan, and my DH even picked out the perfect froggie buttons (they are so cute!):

After finishing up the pieces, weaving in all the ends, blocking and picking up to knit the collar and button band/buttonhole band, it seamed up pretty quickly. After we got our power back at the house, that is (AGAIN with the rain - stupid thunderstorm). This was my first experience with button holes, and naturally I finished them before running out and picking up the latest Interweave Knits magazine with...an article about how to knit better button holes.

Once the baby cardi was done, picking up that unfinished Dragon Scarf with the itchy Shetland wool seemed as appealing as cleaning cat puke off the basement floor. That's just not going to happen in these temps. So I rummaged through the stash until I found the eight hanks of Summer Tweed yarn and latched onto it. I originally bought this yarn several years ago for an off the shoulder baggy sweater, which for some crazy reason caught my interest. After ditching that idea, I went searching through my knitting books, magazines and favorite online pattern places to find something. Either I didn't like what I found (no, I'm not picky) or I didn't have enough yarn. I finally decided to try substituting this yarn for the specified yarn in the Vogue Knitting Summer 2009 magazine, called Star Snowflake Sweater. Hey, my yarn is called Powder, the pattern is called Snowflake...it's fate, right? Here's a picture of the pattern, yarn and my progress to date:

Let's hope my yarn conversions are up to snuff or this might end up being one big lacy swatch!

Smarty Pants

I recently showed Tia my progress on the baby sweater, which unfortunately (like my blogging) has been impacted by the need to do work-related items like conference travel, non-billable work, etc. Anyway...when she looked at the back piece, she asked how I worked the stripes because there were very few loose ends. I told her that after a couple of rows, I got the idea to carry the yarn of the non-working skein up the sides of the piece, keeping everything neat by wrapping the active yarn around it. Here's a picture showing what I mean.

So Tia asks how I learned to do that, did I see it in a book, and I said, "Nah, I just didn't want to weave in all those ends so I improvised." She looks at me and says, "Well, aren't you Miss Smarty Pants!" Now, I don't usually think of myself as all that clever, so that made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. That feeling continued as I worked through both front pieces and as I started into the first arm.

Unfortunately, I now have first-hand proof of why wiser knitters caution against smugness and too much confidence, lest the Knitting Gods (or Goddesses, if you prefer) strike you down and wreak havoc on your knitting. The night I completed the second front piece, I decided to push on just a little bit more before calling it a night. I got out the pattern, read through the arm instructions, and cast on the required number of stitches for the ribbing. I finished the ribbing and once again looked at the instructions. They called for one increase on either side of every 4th row repeated 6 times, followed by one increase on either side of every 6th row repeated 3 times. "No sweat," I thought, but I was getting sleepy and decided to quit for the night. The next day when I returned to my little sleeve, I proceeded blissfully along with my color changes, sans increases. I was such a "smarty pants" that it wasn't until I had 8 inches or so of the sleeve done that I checked the pattern again and noticed my failure to incorporate any increases! Riiiippppp!

Next time when someone tells me I'm a knitting smarty pants, I'm ignoring them.