Let's Start at the Very Beginning

I've been told by my good friend Julie Andrews that it's a very good place to start. So, let's see. When we last left off, knitting wise, I was slowly but surely chugging along on this:
Between that point and the time I finished it, I reached a point of frustration. You know, the stage when you feel like you've been working on the same project for ages and it just won't finish itself? That'd be nice. If a project could just finish itself. Obviously in my case that didn't happen, and piling it on my head seemed like a more viable solution than actually getting it done at the time.
Luckily, around May 25th I found the mojo necessary to finish the edging charts and get the whole thing blocked. Just in time for my trip to Scotland (woohoo!).Isn't blocked lace awesome? It maintains to be my favorite part of the process. Okay, how about some details?

Pattern: Springtime Bandit
Designer: Kate Gagnon Osborn
Yarn: 4.5 skeins of Artyarns Supermerino - Sapphire
Needles US #8 Addis
Time to knit: laughable. I began March 15th and well...yeah. May 25th.
Level of Love: High! Very wearable, warm, colorful, and squooshy!
Mods: I added 2 extra repeats of the leaf motif--that's it!

And here are some of the FO shots!So there you have it! This project got a lot of wear during my trip and will continue to do so now that the weather is getting cooler again. I'm glad I'm finally getting to share these projects with you, there are many many more in my FO arsenal waiting to be seen--stay tuned!

Meet Ishbel

Welcome to round two of my belated project sharing! This one is a little on the larger side. With that said, let me introduce you to Ishbel:

Hello, I'm a gigantic lace project!

The details:

Pattern: Ishbel
Designer: Ysolda Teague
Yarn: Misti Alpaca Lace 2 ply
Needles: US #7 Addi Turbos
Time to knit: 6 days(...?!)
Made for: Mrs. P
Level of love: Total adoration (and exhaustion)

A closeup of the vine detail.

In short, Ishbel was a deadline project knit for a close friend's mother. She initially asked if I'd be able to complete this shawl back in July explaining that it would be needed for an event on February 20th. "February?", I thought--that's AGES away, of COURSE I'll have time by then! Well, leave it to me and my knack for procrastination to wait until the absolute last possible moment to start this project. It was begun on Sunday, February 8th and completed late Saturday, Februarh 14th. Yikes. Over 40 hours of knitting was put into making this wonder, and I must say, it gave me quite the sense of accomplishment. My roommate verified that it was the most she'd ever seen me knitting in a 6 day span of time. That's a lot of knitting.

I had never worked with Misti Alpaca Lace before, but I had heard lots of swooning over it by other knitters (always a good sign). The project was requested in a neutral color-- Ivory, grey, or black. Since I'd already completed an ivory shawl, black won hands down. Until this project, fingering weight yarn was the lightest yarn I'd used, and I couldn't really imagine knitting with anything any lighter. Right. At many times I had to adjust my tension due to fear of breaking the yarn mid stitch (that never happened) -- a tad on the nervewracking side.

Looking back, I'm certainly glad I have the experience of 2 ply under my belt, but boy did it slow things down! The end fabric was absolutely to die for--one of the softest materials I've ever felt. How so much warmth can come from something so lightweight and dainty, I'll never fully understand.

Ysolda's pattern, as per usual, was absolutely fantastic and easy to follow-- I will definitely be making this again (but maybe in the smaller size). That said, however, I will NOT be doing any more crazy marathon knitting in the near future. As a knowledgeable fellow knitter said to me:

"A stopwatch is for athletes; not knitters".

Well spoken.

Sneaky.

So we're just going to go ahead and not acknowledge that I've fallen off the face of the earth for the past month. Step one in pretending it never happened? Introducing yet another surprise project!

Yeah, I have a PhD. in Sneakiness.Yup, that's a Shetland Triangle you see!
Yarn: a little less than 1 skein of Malabrigo Lace. Yummm.
Needles: 47" US 8 Addi Turbos
Time to knit: June 26-July 19
Level of love: Off. the. charts.

Today was the day of my fantastic roommate's bridal shower and afterwards I was able to snap a few pictures of her wearing her new item. Seeing as Jamie's the one who got me re-interested in knitting (hear hear!), making a special project for her was the least I could do. I had purchased the yarn on a whim during a trip home; when I brought it back with me, I specifically remember Jamie handling [lusting after] it quite a bit. Little did she know that she'd get it a few months later.
In other news, I love the pattern. No really, I love the pattern. I absolutely will be making this again. The only thing that didn't work like clockwork was my first attempt on the bind off (waaay too tight). 2nd time around, I ended up going up to size 15's to make sure it was loose enough to make those characteristic points. As for modifications, I only did one extra repeat than the pattern called for, but it stretched to a decent (and wearable) size due to the size 8's. Oh, and as if this a shock, the Malabrigo was heaven to work with.

So there you have it! What's yet to come? Perhaps another hat (shocking?), a fun filled trip to an Alpaca farm, and finally learning to spin? Ohhhh the possibilities!

Lets Play a Game

A game called........."Guess what I finished!"

For starters, it involved these...

and these...

and this.

No luck...?




Oh who are we kidding, it turned into this:
Oh, and this
Success!
(more details to come soon)

Dramatic

I'm hitting a bit of a knitting wall, and here's why: I'm currently trying to finish up my Forest Canopy Shawl by May 11th for Mother's Day. There's just onnnnnnne problem--it's taking FOREVER! Does anyone else run into this rut? I feel like everyone else whips out lace shawls like it's nobody's business. I find it very discouraging that with every other row, my project just grows larger and larger. Now, none of this would matter if my mom were into smallish neck scarves, but unfortunately, I managed to track down one of the shawls that is much more her style. The verdict? Very drapey & dramatic and of course.... large. I tried out my hand at this style with jovial results. heh.

Sorry mom, I borrowed your glasses too...

After my silly photoshoot (and after being asked about my peculiar lipstick) I took an actual account of how much larger that shawl is than forest canopy. Yeah. It's quite a bit larger...

Sigh....

I currently have 13.5 pattern lace repeats done and I'm guestimating around 17 or so to make this bad boy large enough. I definitely understand that blocking will do wonders, but making sure I don't run out of yarn will be my biggest concern. Wait scratch that, attempting to finish this shawl during finals week is my biggest concern. Anyway, updates to follow.

It should also be made known that my mom did make the larger shawl pictured. When asked, she speculated the creation date to be around 1976; exact date/time will remain a mystery to us all.

Spring Break!

Soooo...I was expecting to fill this post with super crazy pictures of me wearing my PowerPuff girl costume (congratulations to those who rocked the 90's trivia). However, the thing about themed dances is this: sometimes everyone and their mom dresses up, and sometimes they...well....don't. This occasion was definitely a "don't". And luckily my best friend and I checked out the scene before arriving as Buttercup & Brittney. Thank god. I will post a photo of me in that costume at some point, but for now I am empty handed

I've been pretty occupied with the list of itinerary that I'd mentioned prior, but since my last post was a little lacking of knitting, I've decided to spare you the details of Boston's awesomeness. Instead, I'll show off what I've been up to!Enter the Forest Canopy Shawl. This pattern = perfect for airplane/subway knitting because the pattern is so simple it can be easily memorized. In the end, this little number will be gifted to my fantastic mom (along with knitting [and every other crafty thing known to man], my mom has her own chain maille jewelry business! If you do click, disregard the ginormous picture of my face as well as the blinding glare off of my fake engagement ring. heh.)
The story of this shawl goes back all the way to January. My mom had bought 5 skeins of Debbie Bliss Cashmerino baby and, after a few failed attempts at finding a good scarf pattern for herself, she generously donated the yarn to me. Little did she know that I was going to be making her yarn into a shawl for her! Initially it was going to be a secret, but (as I learned with Jamie's vest) it's too much hassle to hide a project from someone you live with. Production on said shawl came to a halt after knitting 7 repeats on needles that were to small. Ugh. It is officially the largest gauge swatch I've ever made. I switched to size 8's (much better) and knitting commenced!

Now, lets check out the shawl's view out of the Harvard "dorm" windows!What is that stately looking brick building you see? Is it a library? A science center? Admissions? a bank? A museum? NO! It's still the dorms. Seriously.

Turning our heads, we have yet ANOTHER view!If you can bring your eye past the extensive courtyard (seriously), you'll be able to see the scenic Charles River! Yeah. That's what I saw out of my dorm room too. No wait, the view out of my freshman dorm room looked like this:I kid you not. That's not a lake or a historic river either. I took that photo out of my freshman dorm window when our campus FLOODED due to the heavy snowfall we'd gotten that year. In fact, that's almost exactly what campus looks like now. I guess I will eat my jealousy and instead continue to enjoy my time surrounded by redbrick buildings, crown molding, hardwood floors, and a YARN SHOP that's two feet away here at Harvard. sigh....