6 in August

Finished projects, that is. For despite having underestimated the amount of yarn I had left, I managed to finish my grey and fluffy scarf last night!

I cast on for this over a year ago, when I desperately needed something easy to do on an airplane. I made it narrow enough that I could do it back and forth on DPNs, which were plastic so they wouldn't set off the metal detectors. But once that holiday was over I put the scarf away in favour of other things that were more urgent. Since then, I've brought it out occasionally and worked a few repeats, but up until the last week or so I haven't really done much on it.

Because I'd knit the second lace border back when I started it, I was able to use up every last scrap of the ball of yarn. I also got to learn how to graft garter stitch. Not nearly as bad as I thought it'd be.

Next up, working on Weaving Friend's mitts, since the weather is thinking about getting cold enough for her to wear them. I told her I'd have them done by the October revel, so I may not work on them exclusively...

Mmmmm, kidsilk

I've spent the last 2 lunch hours working on my grey fluffy scarf, as predicted. I've discovered one problem with it, though - I can't work on it outside as it blows around in the slightest breeze, making it very hard to knit. I love it, though. It is soft and snuggly and everyone wants to pet it, which is perfectly understandable! I really need to get a set of kitchen scales. The ball of yarn was 25g to start with, and I'd love to know how much yarn I have left. I'm perfectly happy to just knit until the yarn is gone, but it would be nice to know how long my scarf is going to be!

IKnit Day is coming up a week on Saturday. And I'm planning to take as little spending money as possible. Sound crazy? Here's the thing. Last year I went to the Knitting and Stitching Show. It was lots of fun, but I came away feeling disappointed because I didn't have enough money to spend on the really lovely one-of-a-kind things, and so instead I bought mostly blah and mediocre things. Stuff that will make nice grey gloves for the husband someday, but not the kind of thing you save all your pocket money for. And actually, of all the yarn I bought last year (9 balls, if I remember rightly), I've only used 2 and given away one. Not a great track record, really. My most used purchase was the WIP tubes that I keep my socks-in-progress in. Money may be a little better off, but I can't really justify spending £hundreds on cashmere laceweight with spun-in Swarovski crystals for an evening wrap. Lovely as it might be, and much as I might want it!!!!

So this year I do have some yarn money saved up. I will be going to the show with the intention of buying one ball of yarn to make husband-socks, one skein of either laceweight or sock yarn, and possibly some needles. And my other spending money will go on yarn that I really, really love and want, like perhaps more Posh yarn in a future sale. I am trying to be practical in my yarn-buying, however difficult and not-fun that might be. Although in truth, having a stash consisting only of yarn I love and will someday wear or gift is fun in its own right!

May have finished something else

Like this lovely hat, for instance!

John Lewis were having a clearance sale on Noro Silver Thaw, down from £7-odd to £3. So I bought one skein to see how it knitted up. Rather nicely, as it turns out. I had about a foot left once the hat was knit and seamed, although I did intentionally make a bigger cuff than necessary.

Now that I've scratched the startitis itch, it's back to the WIPs for me. Think I shall work on my grey fluffy scarf next.

Surprise project

I picked up my new glasses on Friday, and as ever, had the initial adjustment phase to get through. This meant no socks and no laceweight, ruling out pretty much all of my current WIPs. Of course, I really don't do chunky yarn, which was all I could focus on. So, I made my own chunky yarn!

No, I didn't start spinning. Although I'm planning to get into that soon. I took 4 skeins of Rowan Tapestry, a single-ply DK weight yarn, and held a strand from each together to create a much chunkier quasi-plied yarn. And it was great. I now have a new, muted, autumnal scarf with a kick-ass fringe (modelling courtesy of the spouse):

I love it. I also love that it used up 4.5 balls of a yarn I was desperate to use up. Just one ball left, and I know what I'm going to make with it.

I still can't quite focus on small stuff, but I'm working on a garter-stitch hat with an aran yarn. It's pretty funky stuff and knitting up quickly. Hope to finish it by the time my eyes are working properly again!

First day off is going well

For I have just finished my Charcoal Monkey Socks! They are snuggly and warm, and fit just as well as the last pair. I am very happy.

One less WIP, and one more finished project for the Ravelympics. I have about 4 days left in which to finish my Pomatomus Socks. Better get slogging! (Also one more pairs of socks for Summer of Socks. Woohoo!)

the other bits of the weekend

Not so nice, in places. I got up on Sunday morning and decided to knit my sock while waiting for the spouse to wake up so he could get the spare mattress down for a blocking mat. Imagine my horror when I unfolded the finished sock of the pair and discovered a clothing moth crawling on it! Ick! Needless to say, I squished the little bugger. And the one I found on my favourite skein of sock yarn. And the one I found on the curtains. :(

This unpleasant discovery prompted an emergency shopping expedition for zip-top bags, cheap cotton cloth and citronella and cedarwood essential oil. I spent most of the morning and early afternoon going over every single skein I've got and bagging them all individually with citronella. The rest of the afternoon and evening was spent rewinding all of my Posh Yarn to check for any damage or creepy-crawlies, since that's pretty much all I've got that's irreplaceable. So far I haven't found any signs of munching or infestation *fingers crossed*, so with any luck I caught them in time. Once all of the yarn is safely packed and inspected, I've got all the stuff to make herbal sachets to put inside our winter coats, woollen clothing and SCA garb. And then once that's done, I'm going to make bowls of repellent potpourri to put all over the place! Happily, spouse likes the scents of all the herbs I'm using and so do I. It's a good thing, because the place is going to smell like Neal's Yard before long!

Other stuff - I have some new acquisitions to show, once I have time to take photos of them. I also have one less WIP outstanding. After finishing the shawl, I thought I'd look at my half-hexagon again. And I've decided that the needles I was using were much too big for the yarn, so I've ripped it out! I'll come back to the yarn once my stash is back under control and not under the shadow of the moth monster. I may pick another pattern, though, because having just done rows on Swallowtail that were 300+ stitches across, I'm not sure I can handle rows that are more than double that. It took half an hour to do a row of plain knit stitch on 300+ stitches! I'd never finish the bloody thing!

This means that I might *crosses fingers* end the year with no WIPs. I am ever hopeful!

May I present...

...one finished Swallowtail shawl! Cast off last night, spent today blocking, wove in the ends about half an hour ago.

This is my first lace shawl, and in fact my first laceweight lace anything. I am feeling very, very pleased.

Specs:
Pattern - Evelyn Clark's Swallowtail Shawl
Yarn - slightly less than one skein of Posh Yarn Eva 2-ply
Black seed beads from my local bead shop.
Time elapsed while knitting - 4 months. 75% of the knitting was done in the last week and a half, though.
Mods - didn't make the nupps. Replaced some of them with beads, though not all, and added beads to the peaked edging. Used a "slip two together knit-wise, knit one, pass slipped stitches over" decrease instead of the recommended double decrease because I need things to be symmetrical.

Thoughts:
I love this pattern. In all likelihood I will make more once I've recovered from the shock of knitting most of a shawl in a week and a half. It's a perfect way to use a small skein of expensive laceweight. It's small, so definitely not a "wrap-around in the depths of January" shawl. More of an extra layer of warmth for a formal evening thing. Or perhaps an event where one might meet a knitting celebrity. I'm just sayin'. :D

I like the yarn/needle combo. Yes, there was enough yarn left over that I could have added repeats or gone up a needle size or two, but I don't like stockinette stitch that is too open looking. This is pretty much perfectly how I like it. My knitting got slightly tighter as I got less scared of breaking the yarn and once I started using a metal needle instead of a bamboo one, but it didn't make a noticeable difference in the finished piece.

Blocking is amazing. It gained about 4 inches in all directions once I'd done the deed. I went for a full soak and pin rather than a pin and spritz. Really glad I did, because there seems to have been quite a lot of excess dye on the yarn. It's definitely colourfast, but I had to rinse it several times after the initial soak. I probably could have stretched it a bit more, but with the silk content of the yarn I didn't really want to risk it.

The scariest part of the whole experience was trimming the tails of the yarn once I'd woven them in - I didn't want to get the shears anywhere near the lace!

Definitely going to be making more lace in the future. My only problem now - how the heck do I store it?