Wednesday, March 21, 2007

What, again??


So, what did I do last night after I got home and finished dinner? Did I sit down with my beloved PR2 and work on the edging? Nah.... I decided it was too large to schlep back and forth to work and that I needed another smaller project. heh. I wanted to try the next shoulder shawl from VLT - the cherry leaf shawl. I dug around in my weaving yarns for something variegated and came up with this lovely rayon/silk slub (that I have two big cones of!) and started right in. Well, sadly my eyes were just not up to reading the tiny chart in the book and I messed up right away. Made a copy of the pattern and tried writing in stitch counts so I wouldn't get lost. Didn't work. Phooey - I wanted to watch this movie and get started on the new shawl. After about 45 mins of frustration I gave up, ripped back to nothing and started another Syrian shoulder shawl.
I have had a few minutes to work on it this morning at work and got a few rows done. I borrowed one of the cameras here and took a couple of shots, one against a light background and one against a dark background, hoping one of them would show the colors correctly.
Under the office fluorescents, the bottom photo looks closer, but I don't know about in natural light. We have rain today, so it's grey and ugly outside. Bummer. Anyway, I just knew you all would be thrilled to see more pix, right? {G}

Monday, March 19, 2007

Pi Are Square progress

I made up an edging pattern for my Pi Are Square shawl and am off to a great start. The edging is only 8 sts by and 8 rows so it goes really fast. I've gotten quite a bit done in just 2 evenings. I think I'll take it to work with me tomorrow since I haven't anything to do. :)

Here is the full shawl view - this is my Calif King size bed and the shawl is just off the needles - not blocked yet. I think it will be plenty big enough for me. This was my first big project with my handspun and I really enjoyed knitting it. Lots and lots of soothing garter stitch. Mmmm... Not that I was stressed or depressed or anything like that...

Above is a long view of the edging - big, very big YO holes. :)

And here it is close up - REALLY big YO holes! (LOL) At first I was afraid I wouldn't have enough handspun to finish the edging, but now I'm sure I'll have plenty. May even have enough left over for a cap or wrist warmers.

Sunday, March 18, 2007

Victorian Lace Today - Syrian shoulder shawl

Yes, DONE!! Well, not done as in washed and blocked, but definitely off the needles. Ends woven but not clipped, mistakes repaired - sort of. :) My handspun yarn is thicker than that called for in the pattern, so I truly got a shoulder shawl for a larger person. Good thing, since the recipient is a larger person, as I am.
The shawl is spread out over the bottom half of my Calif King size bed and takes up a good portion of it. I imagine it will be quite a bit larger once blocked. I intend to do that in a couple of weeks - I need the bed to block it on and it has to be dry and removed so we can sleep in the bed.
I've folded back a corner here - which side is supposed to be the "right" side? The attachment of the edging leaves a definite line of sts, two rows of them in fact. I like both sides, so I suppose it really doesn't matter which side winds up showing.
Fleece from NZ Southern Alps natural colored Romney ewe, washed by me and processed by Wooly Knob into easy spinning roving. 1st skein spun at my friend's house in Burbank on my Joy, the rest spun at home on the Reeves frame wheel. It took 4 full bobbins of singles plyed up and I had only a very small amount left over. Plenty of roving, tho, so I can make lots more of this yarn. The color is very hard to photograph - a warm grey leaning towards light tan.

Thursday, March 8, 2007

Syrian progress



I have not had much work to do at work lately, so my Syrian shoulder shawl has been coming right along. I plyed up another 400 yds last Monday (took a sick day), but it wasn't dry until Tuesday. I was only a few rows away from the end of the base triangle, so yesterday I started the edging. I've only completed 2 repeats so far, but it should go fairly quickly. I'm not sure if I have enough yarn spun up to finish the edging, but I have plenty more of that roving.

I took the entire shawl off the needle and put it on a piece of string. As you can see in the bottom photo, this will be a sizable shawl for a norman sized person. I'm 5'9" tall and the shawl is wider than my wingspan. It is at least 36" from point to long edge and should block out much larger. My yarn is quite a bit thicker than lacewt, but that just means I get bigger things with the same number of sts. :) I appologize for the poor quality of these phtos, but they were done at work with one of the company cameras. It didn't have a macro setting for good closeup shots, so I'll have to take another picture when I get home.

I've been shopping for a new car the past 2 weeks and I'm just exhausted. I really ddin't want to buy another van, but I'm afraid that only a van offers enough cargo area for my walker and spinning wheel at the same time. Of course, the back seat is reserved for my Cherry dog, and I do need space for a chair and some fiber... I've been to almost every dealership in town, but I still need to visit the other Toyota lot to see the boxy Scion and I want to look at Honda Elements. My walker is 40" tall when folded up and takes up quite a bit of space. I just tie it to the back handle in the MPV and still have loads of room, so I guess I will probably wind up with another van. I just hope I can find one with a more comfortable seat than the Mazda!

Well, I have knitting to do and novels to read, so I'll write more later.

Friday, March 2, 2007

I'm William Gibson??

I am:
William Gibson
The chief instigator of the "cyberpunk" wave of the 1980s, his razzle-dazzle futuristic intrigues were, for a while, the most imitated work in science fiction.


Which science fiction writer are you?

This has been a very slow week at work and I'm going crazy(er) trying to find stuff to do. Today I spent about 5 hrs bouncing around blog-rings looking for something interesting. As you see, I didn't find much.

I took the Syrian shalwette to work after I mangled it last night trying to pick up a lost YO 3 rows down. ARGH!! I had to drop down 5 rows of 10 sts to fix it and it took the other 3 hours of today. Then when I knit the next pattern row, I put K2togs on the left side where the SSKs belong. I had to tink back to the middle and do it over. <> Nomatter - tonight is pizza night and I can hardly wait.

So, kind reader, I leave you with yet another senseless quiz:

I am:
a plastic sword (with fell runes injection-moulded into the blade)
Waving this bad boy around may, on too many occasions to count, have saved a trusted colleague from "going postal".


Which office supply are you?