Willow Cowl from Sin City Knit Shop - Day 2

Going for the gold...

Well, you know, that didn’t turn out too badly.  It was tedious going, picking up that cast on edge, and I’m not quite sure I lined everything up perfectly.  In hindsight, I think it would have been smart to pin it in quarters like a hem. As it was, things didn’t quite match up at the end and I think the two sides were a little slanted on either side of the fold for the last inch.

Still, the edge has that lovely scalloped look that we all want from a picot edging. It also has a sturdy quality that will help it lay nicely.  As I mentioned, the way this cowl is structured impresses me.  It’s built to ripple nicely into almost concentric circles, thanks to an alternation of yarn-over lace and stockinette.

I’m using the first rows of yarn-over lace to build my continental yarn-over skills.  Often, when facing KTOG or YO, I default to my usual English throw style, but I’ve decided it’s time to improve my continental toolbox beyond the knit stitch.

I find I’m enjoying the little bit of sparkle in this fiber.  Normally I don’t go for the shiny stuff.  I don’t even use frosted lipstick or nail polish.  But this hint of gold somehow works, and it doesn’t feel like it will end up itchy.

Lace Cowl from Rainbow Yarn & Fibres - Day 2

Holy yarn-overs, Batman!

Nice big needles always make for gratifyingly speedy knitting.  Some days you just need to see results, you know?  At a time when other things in my life are inching along—and that’s not a bad thing, I get that—it is nice to see this cowl taking quick shape under my fingers.

I find it interesting that I chose a beige yarn.  Lots of times I choose bright jewel tones, because I feel those match my cool coloring.  Only lately I’ve been working my way through Carol Tuttle’s Dressing Your Truth videos and my personality is definitely coming through as a  Type 3 (Rich  Dynamic), which features warm colors.  Me? Warm undertones? Really? Maybe it's an age thing.  I thought I’d sail through the process with some nice clear guidelines, but I’m only getting more and more confused as I go along.  Have any of you been through this “Beauty Profiling” course? I suppose it shouldn't surprise any of you that I seem to defy classification...

Ahem.  Back to knitting.  One thing to watch on this pattern—yarn-overing into a purl.  It’s a tricky business, because there’s an extra half-round involved in getting the yarn to where it needs to be.  If you don’t keep an eye on the tension, you’re going to get a much larger hole on one side of the stitch repeat than on the other.  

Watch your tension: a good rule for life and for knitting.

Wavelength Shawl from Holley's Yarn Shoppe - Day 4

For. Ev. Rrrr....

Forever.  That’s what it felt like to get these last two repeats of the pattern done.  The yarn-overs still refused to play nice with the stitch markers—please, someone invent a solution for this! 

And the Curse of the Top Down Shawl?  It’s still following me like a black wool cloud. No matter how generously I plan, no matter how much of a head start I give myself, the final segment of some all top down shawls always feels like an endless sludge to the finish line.  Sore shoulders.  Cramping fingers.  Backaches.  Posts that are three and four days late.  Ugh.

Previous times, I have episodes of knit-worthy TV shows like Outlander and Smash to binge on while knitting excruciatingly long (400 stitches!) rows.  This time, it was just me and the conniving Underwoods pounding our way through season two of House of Cards.  When I hit that final stitch last night at 11pm, it was as if the storm finally passed.  I actually look forward to knitting again.

Which is good, because I’m not completely done. I’ve got the edging pattern to do now, but for some reason that doesn’t feel quite so bad.  More like the home stretch.

I hope. Stay tuned.

Wavelength Shawl from Holley's Yarn Shoppe - Day 3

What is it with yarn-overs and stitch markers? Why can’t they get along?

It seems I’m always working with a pattern that places a yarn-over next to a stitch-marker.  I can see why it happens—sections of lace design are often separated by lines of yarn-overs—but it’s so frustrating when the stitch marker sneaks under the yarn over to mess up my stitch count.  I suppose I could try using larger stitch markers, but I hate how they feel in my hands, sticking up off the needles to poke at my fingers and palms.  Knitting is a highly tactile experience for me.  I don’t like anything that interferes with the pleasure of the yarn and needles in my hands.

I’ll admit, it’s been a problem in this section of the pattern.  It helps that I can line up certain design elements to see if I’m in the right place (an excellent reason to use charts for lacework).  The best solution I have found is to go back over the needle before I begin a wrong-side row and make sure the marker is where it is supposed to be. That means either after the yarn-over in rows 22 and 30 or before the yarn-over in rows 26 and 34.  Complicated, but necessary.

Things don’t line up in neat rows on this pattern.  The lacework columns of yarn-overs wiggle a little bit as they run up the center section.  I’m sure it will block out nicely—lacework never looks good in the knitting, but acquires its true beauty after a bath—but it’s troublesome right now.  I never know if I’ve truly messed up.  Luckily, I’ve never been off by more than one stitch, and that feels like a small enough error that if it is a mistake, it won’t be noticeable.

The rows are getting longer...I can feel it.  Can I escape the Curse of the Top Down Shawl?  Only the next posting will tell.

Uliuli Wai Shawl from Needlecraft Cottage - Day 2

Stockinette Start...

There’s a lot of stockinette involved in the top section of this shawl.

On the one hand, better at the top—where the rows are shorter—than at the bottom.  If the bottom half of this involved this much stockinette, I would need some pretty compelling television to get me to the end.

I decided to use all this purling—for as every good knitter knows, every wrong row in stockinette is all purl—as an opportunity.  While I have mastered continental knitting, I have never mastered pick-style purling.  Here’s my chance to “pick” up my purl speed.

After a quick tutorial from a young knitting friend who is quite a fast purler, my brain grasped the concept.  My fingers took another hour or two to catch on.  While I still can’t continental purl without looking (an essential skill for knitting in front of certain television series), I suspect I am faster than I was. 

My victory will be short lived.  The next section involves a fair amount of yarn-overs, and I have yet to mastered the continental purl of a yarn-over stitch.  I’ll probably have to go back to the throw style for these rows.  that won’t be all bad—there is much more variety in the trellis stitch than stockinette, and I’m familiar with it from the endless feet of trellis in the Lady Fern Scarf.

And if all else fails, the color is still just so darned pretty to look at!

Darjeeling Shawl from Yarning for Ewe -

What I like about Ewe...

As I start this Darjeeling Shawl from Yarning for Ewe, it has occurred to me how this piece reflects a variety of my knitting preferences.

I’ve made no secret of my displeasure with triangle shawls that start at the narrow end.  Those final rows feel insufferably long, and the bind off becomes a test of my all-too-lacking patience.  This has a bit of that, but not entirely.  The triangle you create is only the center of the shawl.  Further on in the pattern you get a fascinating lace trim that goes around the two sides of the triangle (called the “legs”—I looked it up).

Pondering my resistance to the “point-up” shawl (the opposite of a “top down” sweater, I suppose), I did come up with a silver lining.  With only a single stitch to cast on, you get underway right away. I’ve done shawls where step one was casting on hundreds of stitches, and that’s no fun, either.  At least this way you’re off and running from the very first minute you pick up the needles.

It’s a good thing this is a marvelous feeling fiber, because even the lovely loopy yarn overs at the end of each row can’t save me from the monotonous yards of garter stitch.  I’m desperately thankful for my continental skills here.  And just as grateful there’s no purling involved—I’d be no end of grumpy if I had to create this triangle in stockinette.

Still, I stitch on.  I’ll probably look back fondly on the simplicity of this first section while my brain is hurting from the lace pattern.