I’m WELL into the shawl that I was going to start while traveling for TNNA in Impulse of Delight Blissful BFL, and I want to show it to you and get some opinions.
With this piece I was trying to play with the movement of stitches, having both subtle curving motion and clean decrease lines that come to a point. The texture of this yarn required something a bit simpler (a motif with a lot of movement – like Hidcote for instance – would have been lost in the 2 ply sproingy hand of the yarn), but not so simple that it was boring or I wouldn’t have even wanted to finish it.
So the color got me thinking about waves and the thing I love most about waves are the tessellations and the way they blend together as they move. So this motif grows as you work the shawl, just as waves grow as they get closer to shore. You begin with a motif that has 2 “waves”, then they flow into motifs with 3 and on and on until the shawl is complete (haven’t figured out exactly where I’ll end it yet or how, but I’ve got some ideas.
So here’s the kicker. This motif doesn’t really ever repeat across the shawl. Because it is always in flux, the whole pattern will need to be charted out. If I do the standard where I have edge stitches, one wedge, center stitches, second wedge, edge stitches, the charts will have to be big enough to cover your couch for them to be legible. Under these circumstances, considering that the wedges are exactly the same and there are 3 center stitches, do you think it would work to just chart one wedge and include instructions to work the edge stitches, repeat the wedge once, work the center stitches, repeat the wedge a second time and then work the edge stitches? I LOVE the piece, but the pattern is already giving me headaches. I just want to make sure it’s as clear as can be without sacrificing usability and readability. What do you think?
M
For those who were curious about where to get the yarn from yesterday’s post, Karida responded that she’s got a shipment en route to The Loopy Ewe, but until Sherri gets it in stock, the best place to get it is from Knit Happens. They’re located in Virginia, but Karida said they ship daily worldwide, so give them a call.
M
I love this yarn with the same fierce passion that I normally reserve for the hatred of anything pink. The fact that this pink yarn has garnered as much love as it has should tell you something. It’s AMAZING! It’s destined to grow up and become a shawl, but for now it is much petted.
And because someone will ask, it’s Neighborhood Fiber Co.‘s Penthouse Silk Lace in the colorway “Kalorama Circle”
I got a bonsai tree today… FTD.com shipped it to me (and very well packaged, might I add). I’ve always wanted a bonsai, but when I was ordering it despite the fact that they had plenty of more traditional bonsais, I was overwhelmingly drawn to the dwarf jade because it reminded me of my childhood.
Growing up, we had 2 gigantic terracotta pots flanking the front door, with HUGE jade bushes. Every time I walked by the pots, I would break off a jade leaf and rub the smooth liquid that leaks out around on my fingers. To this day, I associate the clean, green smell with carefree innocence. I loved those bushes with a fierce propriety, even to the point of getting really mad when I found bugs on the leaves. Didn’t they know it was MY plant?!
Hmm… I guess I was a bossy bitch even back then 😉
M
We got these couches from Kim‘s yard sale when she and Ryan moved cross country to law school (incidentally, they just moved back, but to Idaho this time). I think we paid $40 for the whole set – couch, chair and ottoman. And they replaced our $10 third of fourth hand sofa that we purchased when we moved from our first apartment (which had a sofa included). I remember them being a great step up and being very excited to have real couches, and now I am here getting really twitchy about them still being in my house and hating them more and more every day.
I do know about freecycle, but my experiences with freecycle have been less than lovely, so I’ll list them on Craigslist instead. But we told a friend that he could have them, so I gave him a deadline to get them out of our house after which I will be listing them on Craigslist. Unless anyone local needs some comfy couches? My biggest gripe is that there is not a lot of seating for the space they take up. While our apartment has ceilings tall enough to mount a regulation basketball hoop with room to spare, the footprint is pretty small, so floor space is limited. The couches are comfy though, and I’m giving them away for free if you can come haul them away.
M
1. I have joined the iPod nation. While C got his first iPod a month or two ago, I got mine as a birthday gift to myself in preparation for the long flight to TNNA. The verdict? I love it. I listen to it at work, I listen to it on the train home, I listen to it while walking around. I listened to it the whole flight, even while reading and I’m sure it’s the reason I didn’t have a headache from the constant buzz on board the airplane.
2. That new yarn from Louet that Stephanie was talking about? I bribed Nathania and Sandi to order me some with their Louet purchase. I may have promised the blood of a first born child…. I have 3 skeins of it coming, and you can bet your sweet ass I’ll be showing you when it arrives. Also, somewhere Stephanie has a picture of me in my hot red dress posing with her Adamas shawl.
3. Speaking of Purlescence, Nathania‘s little girl Elinor is absolutely adorable!
4. My brain is a frenzy of knitting related ideas and plotting. The short break I took from knitting to rest my aching hands proved just what I needed, and now that I’m a goodly way into the shawl knit from Ruth’s wonderful BFL hand-dyed yarn, I’ve got 50 million lace ideas percolating. Add to that the Magpie yarn that Shannon Okey is dying for me, and the beautiful new silk laceweight I got from Neighborhood Fiber Co., and I foresee another spurt of productivity.
5. Screen printing ideas are beginning to build up too and if I could just get a few free days or evenings I think I could eek some of them out of my head. I got a big package full of different Gocco ink colors and a package full of cards and envelopes from Paper-Source. The big deterrent, though, is my cluttered living room. We got a futon that we have yet to assemble, and my birthday chair from IKEA, but our old couches are still sitting in our living room in addition to the new stuff. So I don’t have nearly enough flat, clear space to really go crazy with it. I have to get someone to take our couches quickly.
M
The thing I love most about TNNA is that no matter who you’re talking to, no one has a problem with you talking about fiber. It’s like coming home. When you say “left leaning decrease” no one cocks an eyebrow at you, and no one says “Is that from a sheep?” when you say mohair. It totally makes the blisters worth it.
Although my trip was short (fly in late Friday night, leave early Sunday morning), I schmoozed, fawned, petted, and had many a private little freak out. In the past, when I’ve found myself standing around with people I’ve admired for years just chatting and laughing, it has freaked me out a bit. And made me feel a little like the other shoe was about to drop, but this year I felt more at peace, more a part of things, and less an outsider (which has nothing to do with the wonderful people I met previously and everything to do with me and my insecurities).
I saw some old friends and made a whole ton of new ones. And the best bit of awesome the weekend produced was that the owner of Yarnzilla, Linda, came up with the title for Freakonomics! Her brother wrote it. How cool is that!?
I would normally give you a link-fest, but frankly I’m not in the mood. I did however meet Jess, Casey and Mary-Heather from Ravelry. They were awesome. I even got flipped off by Casey and his Malabrigo-made Bob finger puppet.
Really, what could be better?
M
I am at work…. where it is 85 DEGREES in my office! SWEET MERCIFUL GOD! Someone kill me. My brain cannot function and there are only so many layers of clothing I can strip off before it becomes inappropriate attire for the public.
M
A half day of work combined with an afternoon flight across the country don’t make for a very stress-free Mim. Too crazy to really blog, but I made a commitment (to myself) to blog every day this week, so here it is.
I’ll try to blog as much as possible from TNNA, but I’m not sure of the internet situation in my hotel room.
I’m getting close to being done with the body of Coraline and ready to unite it with the arms. I discovered that I was going to cut the estimate close on yardage and would probably have to rip out my swatches to make it work out, but when I put on the sleeves. The length they are is right now is rather unflattering for my long and gangley arms, so I’ll take off a few inches from the sleeves and make them truly 3/4 length.
So I’m thinking about TNNA (and planning for TNNA, and dreaming of TNNA, and obsessing about TNNA) and most importantly what I should pack. I don’t really want to haul more than a pound of yarn around and have knitting that takes over my whole lap and has arms that are flapping in the breeze and falling into the laps of the people next to me. I would also like to be consolidated into only one carry-on bag, which will include my laptop, my clothing and a ton of business cards. So Coraline is out, even though I could probably finish the sweater on the trip.
So I pulled out this lovely stuff. It’s BFL laceweight (a heavy laceweight) in the colorway Blue Skies from Ruth at Knitting on Impulse. I’ve got plans for a new shawl pattern to publish and this is exactly what it needs. So what could be better knitting for a flight to Columbus and back than a lace shawl! Relatively little yarn, only one needle, and it compresses into a fairly small space without complaining. So again I find that EZ’s adage from Knitter’s Almanac holds true, that nothing is quite so good for a summer trip than a lace shawl.
M
