FO: Haruni

As you probably guessed, I finished my Haruni shawl a couple of days ago. I just can't get over how pretty it is.

Actually, I'm astonished that this is a free pattern (yes, I said free, you just have to log in to Ravelry to get it). It's a clever combination of a couple of common lace motifs, easily worked in a single skein of laceweight yarn. Ok, enough gushing, here are the specs:

Pattern: Haruni by Emily Ross

Yarn: Malabrigo laceweight in colorway Paris Night - less than 1 skein. I had enough left over that I didn't worry about being able to finish the edging but not so much that I felt like I should have done an extra set of repeats in the main pattern.

Needles: size 4 addi lace circulars and a size B/1 (2.25mm) crochet hook for the edging

Mods: absolutely none. The pattern was delightful as written.

Working those big leaves at the end was a ton of fun. Don't get me wrong, I could happily knit fern lace (the main body pattern) all day long but the designer seemed to know the perfect moment to switch gears and knit something new. None of that feeling you get with some shawl patterns when you burn out on one motif a repeat or two before it's time to start the next one.

This particular color of malabrigo has proved quite tricky to photograph accurately. It's a deep blue with washes of blue-green and subtle splashes of purple. This showed up perfectly when I was looking at this pic in iphoto but the color looks a bit washed out now that it's up on blogger. You'll just have to take my word for the fact that it's really lovely in person.

For all that the pattern looks frilly and complicated, it's really quite an easy knit. It might even work as a first lace project for an adventurous knitter, but it's interesting and clever enough to keep more experienced knitters engaged, too.

What, I haven't shown you the whole shawl yet? How about this:

But you know I'm much more likely to wear it like this:

You've probably noticed a couple of changes to the blog lately, mostly in its layout and design. I'm having fun tinkering with blogger but it's a slow process. Now that I've figured out how to put my own images in the background (you may recognize the handspun that became Coraline) my next goal is to put up FO lists, since I love clicking through those on other people's blogs. Here's hoping I can get to that this weekend (and figure out how to include pictures with the links).

Sneak Peek

I finished a little something yesterday (and blocked it, too!). Here's a sneak peek before I get some FO shots this weekend:

Happy Friday, everyone!

Dilemma

The DH and I are getting away for a mini vacation this coming weekend. We're popping out to New England to see my parents on Saturday and Sunday and then we'll take Monday for ourselves to relax and walk along the ocean.

Naturally, now I'm wondering just what knitting I want to bring along on the trip. I'm as guilty as the next knitter of over-packing (at least when it comes to knitting) whenever we go anywhere, so this time I'm trying to be responsible. But what to bring?

I've been working along on Audrey in Unst:

(Yes, I do seem to be on a bit of a Gudrun Johnston kick, don't I?) I had such high hopes of finishing this one before we left on Saturday so that I could wear it on the trip. But even I now acknowledge that that is never going to happen. 

So, this sweater has some nice, mindless knitting to do on the sleeves and then picking up for the button bands - nothing too onerous but not quite trip knitting in my book. 

Plus, before I can knit the cuffs on the sleeves, I'll need to finish this so I can reclaim the needle:

I've finally jumped on the Haruni shawl bandwagon. I'm about a third of the way through the final chart and probably will have several rows left to go by the time Saturday rolls around. But once I finish them, I'll have miles and miles of crochet bind-off. That sounds a bit too fiddly to try on the plane/in the car but for now I'll keep this project in the "tentative" list.

Well, that pretty much takes care of the two things I am currently knitting. What about the February Toddler Sweater? That's definitely a possibility. And I'll probably be able to finish it on the trip.

So what I am really thinking about? Two things. First, knitting up a Koolhas hat in this:

Some Dream in Color Classy in the grey tabby colorway. This hat is destined to be a gift for the husband of the recipient of the Aestlight shawl I knit a couple of months back. I think it's safe to say that this project is definitely coming along - small but interesting. Perfect.

But what I really want to knit is Juneberry, from the new St. Denis Magazine. I have a skein of Zephyr silk/wool laceweight that would be perfect for this. Do I have to finish Haruni first? It's lovely and I'm enjoying knitting it, but trips are special circumstances, right?

What should I bring?

Just in time for summer

Last week I finished Kerrera - just in time for the temp to hit 90 here (we were back down in the 60s today but, sadly, this sweater isn't exactly work-appropriate).

Pattern: Kerrera by Gudrun Johnston

Size: 34.5"

Yarn: Domy Heather from Old Mill Yarn (I picked it up at Maryland Sheep & Wool several years ago). This is a fingering weight yarn that I held double in order to get gauge. One nice bonus of using a lighter yarn held doubled is that the whole sweater is incredibly light for a piece that size. Hopefully that will help prevent everything from sagging too much.

Needles: size 8 and 9 Addi lace circulars. The pointy tips on the Addi lace needles were incredibly helpful on the double garter sections.

As you've probably seen on ravelry, yes, the double garter sections do take forever. That said, it's kind of fun and the result is a really nifty texture.

Mods: Absolutely none. I got gauge with my swatch but, as you'd probably expect, the finished piece didn't behave exactly as expected. My row gauge ended up a bit looser than I'd expected. Thank goodness I'm on the tall side, so everything worked out.

This is a fantastic pattern! Normally when you get a pattern, all of the instructions come with a long string of numbers. Here, the designer provided all of the numbers in a table so that you just had to plug the numbers from the column for your size into the actual instructions. It's much clearer and easier to follow.

The sleeves involve a really nifty technique: a set-in sleeve worked with short rows. The fit is amazing. My only issue is that the stitches at the edge of armscye are a bit loose and you can sometimes see the shirt underneath. I'll probably go back and run a crochet chain around the inside of the armscye in order to close up that edge.

That said, I'm really happy with this one.

The ants go marching one by one

That's really all I can think about whenever I knit Cookie A.'s Kai-Mei sock pattern (this is my second go at it). I just love watching the little lace pattern march across the top of the foot. Something about that progress makes these socks seem quicker to knit than any other pattern. Actually, this is a speedy knit all around - the leg is only moderately high and 3x3 ribbing knits up very quickly. And of course, once you get to the foot, you're done before you know it - the lace is just that fun.

Pattern: Kai-Mei, from Cookie A.'s fantastic book Sock Innovation
Yarn: Shalimar Yarns Zoe Sock in colorway Sprout (I used about 2/3 of the skein on this pair)
Mods: Absolutely none. Just make sure that you have the errata for the pattern (available here).

There is only one part of the pattern that calls for discretion on the part of the knitter and I think it's work a quick note. Cookie doesn't tell you how many rows to knit on the heel flap; she just says to knit for 2 1/4 or 2 1/2 inches. That's great since you can customize for fit, but remember that the lace pattern panel is 15 stitches wide. In other words, a heel flap with at least 17 slipped stitches along the sides will work best. That gives you one stitch for the edge of the heel/bottom of the foot and one stitch to put with the decreases that travel across the foot.

This really is one of my absolute favorite sock patterns and I'd knit it again (and again, and again) in a heartbeat. Actually, I just might have to do that since I've worn holes in the heels of the pair I made for myself last year. As you can see, I exercised an impressive (at least to me) degree of self restraint last week when I put these in the mail and sent them off as a present for my grandmother's birthday.

I wasn't the only one taken by these socks. Nayyir came out to investigate the photo shoot.

The little guy, while quite shy in many respects, really likes hamming it up for the camera. I think he'd make a great model, don't you?

Catching up

In between getting the apartment settled and jumping into a huge new work project, I managed to finish my mother's day present. Better late than never, right?

Pattern: Brandywine Shawl

Yarn: Handmaiden Camelspin (50/50 camel/silk) - one skein

Needles: size 6 for the body and size 8 for the applied i-cord bind-off

Size: I worked 23 edging points before the final chart. I didn't measure, but the long end of the triangle is around 5' long. 

Once you get past the first chart, this is a very straightforward knit (the shawl is worked bottom up from that bottom point). When I was in between work projects and had plenty of time on my hands, I found the main part of the shawl a bit boring. That said, as soon as work picked up again, this project became a relaxing break. 

I can't say enough good things about this yarn. The drape is fantastic and the color just glows. 

That's all for now. I've got a couple more knits that are almost done - I just need to take care of the ends and snap some pictures. Hopefully I'll have more to share later this week.

Falling behind

I totally missed mother's day (sorry Mom!). Actually, I called both my mother and my grandmother (and visited with my MIL the day before) but my Brandywine Shawl is still not done.

I wish I could say that I have fantastic knitting shots to share with you but this is all I've got:

You might have noticed that the background is a bit different. That's right: the DH and I moved to a new apartment a little over a week ago and boy, has it been an adventure. First of all, the new building is fantastic, the management is friendly and responsive, I can walk to work, we're much closer to more public transit, and the entire complex is non-smoking! But it took us 7 days to get electricity in the new apartment.

That's right. 7 days. I've transferred service online in every other move we've made and never had a problem with it until two Saturdays ago when I walked into the new apartment, flicked the light switch, and nothing happened. I called the power company and discovered that the previous tenant never cancelled service but just stopped paying, causing the power company to come out and physically turn off power (and meaning that they had to come back and physically turn it back on) - not something that they do during the weekend.

So we bought some battery-powered lanterns and camped out over the weekend. I called the power company again on Monday to discover that when service gets disconnected for non-payment, the online ordering functions don't work, but there's no mechanism to inform customers of that fact. I went ahead and placed an order for new service and was told that it would be another 1-3 business days before someone could come out and physically turn power back on. 

On Thursday, after three days of calling for updates and pleading with the power company to please turn the power back on, we learned that a technician was finally coming. Nothing happened. I called again on Friday morning and was told that my first order for new service had been cancelled and that they started up another one (with another 1-3 business days timeline) because the technician couldn't find the building. It's a big residential complex - the only one for several blocks on this stretch of the road - and easily found with google maps. At this point, I burst into tears and turned to the DH, who had taken a half-day off from work to see if he could help with the power company, and asked him to go speak with the building management. An hour later, we had power. 

Note to self: don't listen to the utility company - just go to the management office first.

Anyway, I've been knitting away at the Brandywine shawl. But mostly I've been unpacking and working on a last big work project. That's almost done so I'm looking forward to a week and a half of mini-vacation before jumping into a busy summer.

Hopefully I'll have some fun knitting pics to share soon!