Warm Woolen Mittens

Once upon a time I could whip out mittens
without even thinking about it, I mean in the dark while watching a hockey game on a pond in the glow of the headlights of a truck...but then we moved from the frozen north down here to St. Louis. My kid is still wearing shorts in December 'cause "It's not cold enough for jeans yet"! And I stopped making mittens and started knitting lace....

So now that I've set the scene...I get a call from the beastie's school - if I can run by with a couple of samples the jury for their show in November will be there and would consider me for entry. Which is funny cause there'd been talk of this for a while but nothing definitive. So I grab some samples and hustle over. I throw in lace scarves, and shawls and shawl pins and as an after thought a sample of mittens and socks. So they say the lace is lovely but what they'd really like to see......more MITTENS!

So I run home and pull out "Charts for Colour Knitting" by Alice Starmore. I got this book years ago and I've always had good luck with it - and this pair of mittens fairly jumped from the "Eastern" section of the book onto my needles. But then a funny thing happened - I've been knitting lace for 3 years and my fingers didn't cooperate with my brain and it took me forever to finish the first mitten. The beastie was right - I had become a "One Trick Pony"! I wonder what else I've forgotten how to do...cables...beading...sweaters.......

Really Red

How's that song go - it's either midnight blue or cherry red? It's definitely cherry red!!!This is the Sophia pattern from the new book Haapsalu Sall! I used an all over knitted on edging from Nancy Bush's Estonian Lace Knitting! Final dimensions 10 inches x 60 inches, and used approximately 45 grams of fiber. The fiber is a 2/28 blend from colourmart - it was 60% merino/20% silk/20% cashmere! It had great color retention (considering reds bleed like crazy) no knots or joins in the cone and great stitch definition. I used a US size 4 needle, although I think I may go down to a size 3 next time...let me know what you think! I'm going to have a hard time giving this one up! It will be going to the beastie-boy's school for an auction in November!

ColourMart 2/28 Cashmere

Okay - earlier this year in a fit of self pity and loathing I hit the ColourMart site - 'cause no matter what's eating you (or you're eating) cashmere has medicinal properties. I got this cone of green called Artichoke. It's my favorite shade of mossy green with a hint of yellow. I also got a copy of Haapsalu Saal! Happy dance, love this book, so many stitches, so little time. So knitted up a panel and added a "Modern" edging from Nancy Bush's book Estonian Lace Knitting and here's a scarf. The boy beastie says it's "Grinch Green" which I guess is okay since it's holiday knitting. It looks very much like the Queen Silvia shawl I already did, but the Saal book has variations on the stitch pattern which is kindda cool!




Technical stuff - used 50 grams of 2/28 cashmere. Used US size 3 needles, and was happy with the results. DID NOT go up a needle size when I did the edging. DID NOT slip the first stitch of each row, instead did 3 stitches of garter at the beginning and end. Liked picking up in the bars better than the slipped stitch. I love the way the cashmere blooms in the nupps - they look like little peas!

Then I bought these cute little bags that come with a sachet of lavender from my friend CarolP! Now I have a perfect gift - and it's already "wrapped" and the lavender should keep MOTHRA at bay! And did I mention that she's also made me several "Lace" keeper bags! I'll try to get shots next time I've got an empty one! Now before y'all yell at me again - these items are not on her webpage - you'll have to beg, or whine (whining always helps - she has kids!) or blackmail (not likely cause she's nice) or just try dropping her a note on her site - she'll get back to you! Or she'll kill me on Monday when I see her at the Ladies of Lucerne Knitting group that meets at the Straub's on the corner of Clayton and Clarkson (between 1 & 4)!!!

IBOL

Okay - the boy beastie has finally gone back to school! Oh my gosh - I spent an average of 4 hours a day - 5 days a week driving to...golf...hockey...football...martial arts...weight training and conditioning...and occasionally I sneaked in the rare moment of knitting! Seems that his workout plan works much better than mine - but then again if I did his workout I'd be DEAD and chubby!

So I'm sitting around reading at around 1 am this morning and found this site. It's called Iraqi Bundles of Love (IBOL). Now there's not much time to participate, but check it out and respond by SEPTEMBER 8th! That's the last day you can ship and have it arrive on time. Seems the guy actually gets to leave his current assignment soon - and packages mailed after September 8th will be returned. Yes there is no ship info on my blog - the man requests that you leave him a comment on his blog page and he'll in turn respond to you personally and tell you where to ship.

Click this link - IBOL

As to knitting - well there will be a ton of pictures but here are two that I've got right now. The pastel on top is one of mine and the darker one is from Birgit Freyer and it's called Imaginary. Both are knit using JoJoland fibers! And did I mention that my new copy of Haapsula stitch patterns just arrived? Must finish current projects - Must Finish current projects - MUST FINISH!!!

Oriental Impressions Scarf

This is the Oriental Impressions Scarf - I got it from Ravelry where it was free! On top of that I used the remainder of the "Venus" colored 2/28 cashmere from ColourMart. This was still the same cone from the "Ravinia" shawl - and guess what - I still have enough left to get halfway thru another scarf! I used a size 2.75 mm needle and about 400 yards of cashmere. It ended up being about 57" long and about 10 inches wide. It's soft and airy and it's the exact same color as a fresh peach!

The scarf is pretty enough on it's own - but I added a border that was knit at the same time as the scarf. So you cast on using a provisional cast on for the border. Then do enough repeats of the pattern for the width of the scarf plus 2 more repeats. Now turn the work and pick up one stitch in each of the edge stitches of one pattern repeat. Take the previous stitches and bring them over the last stitch on the needle (kindda like a nupp) this gathers the corner! Now pick up one stitch in each of the next edge stitches and when you get to the end gather the last pattern repeat. Pull out the the provisional cast on and you're ready to start. You have two sides of the shawl and the body ready to go!

Rants and Raves

This was my christening shawl from Heirloom Knitting by Sharon Miller...it started and stopped, I ripped and reknitted, it was tiresome, tedious and devastating to my ego - how can I, who knits complicated lace patterns during hockey games, fail to grasp a shawl made in FEATHER AND FAN (collective gasp!). So as the song goes - you gotta know when to walk away....and when to run! I also confess to having started this project in this particular yarn because I think it's rude to plunk your tush down at a knit nite at a yarn store and not use yarn from that store! Or is this just me? See told you there would be lots of ranting!

Continue with the Estonian Leaf and Nupp shawl from Lace Knitting from Estonia (by Nancy Bush). Don't get me wrong I think it came out great - but I had read all the hype about baby camel being super soft - but cashmere is still softer! I will say that it seems "sticky" much like a shetland wool - and it is extremely light weight and warm! And I loved the color (mostly cause it seems to match my ever greying hair!) But still going to go with the cashmere! I seem to be having a problem with most of the shawls in this book being short...well short for me! So I continually seem to be reworking edgings!

More ranting - not knitting related! How can this administration promise better health care when the clinic I regularly use has you wait 15 days for a "well visit" and a scrip for maintenance meds - and don't even run the tests you know you're going to need and they always request until after you've had the visit which is timed to less than 10 minutes! This system is hopeless understaffed, and the last time I checked it takes a little bit of time to educate a doctor! I don't know if it's the insurance industry/or failure to have coverage that is the issue!?

And as promised here's a rave or two! First one is not knitting related - Hey Al - yesterday the boy beast was taking apart the fairly new tv downstairs - ripped off the power supply and there sat an oozing capacitor - where I heard "YES - I knew it was elephant snot"! Seems the boy beast had a class with Mr. Al when he was 7 where the oozing goo was referred to as elephant snot - and he still remembered 7 years later! Teachers have such a profound impact on kids! Also how weird is it that my 14 year old can fix a television (supervised by his dad - who had to buy the parts! - okay and a lot of the actual work but they are doing this together and hardly fighting at all!)

Here's my Cameron Shawl (by sharon miller) - like the shawl - love almost all of her designs! But I really really can't say enough about this new fiber combo from ColourMart! I'm using the merino/silk/cashmere blend in a 2/30 weight! My swatch washed up prefectly (dawn/mediumhot water, two rinses and rolled up in a towel - then blocked)! So of course I bought more! The picture is what's on my needles - but I can't find the swatch to take a picture! But where ever it is...it's perfect!

Queen Silvia

Finished blocking the Queen Silvia shawl. This pattern can be found in Knitted Lace of Estonia by Nancy Bush. I used Modern 16 - Round Lace Edge from the back of the book, and added 2 extra repeats to the pattern. That means for the mathletes out there it ended up with 30 x 13 edging pattern repeats plus the 4 corner points. Finished size is 27" x 60 inches while it's still pinned out! I really enjoyed this pattern - especially the 5 stitch gather! I had a bunch of trouble with this one while swatching and then realized that you get a much clearer stitch if you make one small change. On the row before you do the "gather", take each of the stitches to be gathered and instead of just purling the stitch, wrap the yarn around the needle twice before you take the stitch off. Then on the next row lift the 5 stitches so that you get rid of the extra loop, this give you 5 perfect and very large stitches and makes the process so much easier...this is probably clear as mud until you try it!