As The Yarn Turns

Lace in My Pi

Well my Shetland Tea Shawl from A Gathering of Lace has finally reached the first lace pattern at 150 stitches. (By the way, in my last blog I called it a Shetland Lace Shawl but the name is actually Shetland Tea Shawl.) Now there are some people who are either finished or close to finishing their Pi Shawls. I'm not one of those people. In fact, if you're in the knit along and think you'll be the last one knitting your Pi Shawl, don't fear. I'll probably be right there with you. I don't normally have a lot of knitting time and lace knitting time when I can concentrate is usually even more limited. Then when I do sit down to knit, the cat and ferrets are likely to try and help me knit. They can be SO helpful. The cat of course thinks all string-like materials are her personal toys. The ferrets love tunnels and as far as they are concerned, a cone of yarn is just a small strange looking tunnel or at least a fun thing to roll around on the floor.

Even so I feel like I've made good progress. I did have to rip back when I realized I had a brain lock and made the wrong kind of increases going up from 144 stitches to 150 stitches. I'm sure you know how it goes. You stare at it and stare at it hoping that you will actually like these huge yarn over holes that have nothing to do with any pattern. Then you concentrate real hard trying to convince the shawl to fix itself. Finally you give in and rip back. I don't use a lot of markers in my lace knitting but I love life lines. You can frog away and know that you will be able to pick up your stitches at the life line. So right now I'm about halfway through the shetland fern pattern.

I just realized that I never mentioned the details of my shawl other than the pattern. I'm using some camel lace weight yarn on a cone that I have in my stash. Way back in the archives somewhere I played around with it trying to decide what to do with it. When the Pi Shawl Knit Along came along, it seemed like the perfect yarn for this. It's a really nice yarn once it gets washed up. Now I'm kind of lazy. I don't wash my coned yarn before I use it. I just do a lot of swatching and washing the swatches before I start. Especially for something like a shawl, exact gauge isn't that crucial. I started off swatching with a size 6 US needle and then tried a size 9 US. Both just looked way too loose to me after they were washed. I just know that I would snag the shawl the first time I wore it and rip it to shreds. That's just me. I attract accidents like that. So I went down to a size 3 US which looks just about right after washing and blocking. So the goal for this weekend is to finish this first lace pattern and get started on the next.

Ribby Cardi

I also got some knitting done on the Ribby Cardi. I'm almost up to the armholes on the left front. So hopefully I can finish that up this weekend too.

There's another little project I need to finish up so I guess I should get cracking. It's cool and rainy, a perfect weekend to stay in and knit.

by Sydney  |

Ready, Set, Knit

Yesterday was caste on day for the Pi Shawl Knit Along. My lace swatches had been made. I gathered my lace books and started the caste on. Then I started the caste on again, and again, and... Well you get the picture. I've made one lace shawl before this one but never a circular lace shawl. So this was my first experience with Emily Ocker's circular caste on. It's probably a lot easier if you've had more experience with crochet than I've had. It was a struggle for me at first. Emily's caste on was conquered, though, and the shawl is at 72 stitches, ready to be increased to 144 stitches.

I had pondered doing my own lace design but finally decided to do the Shetland Tea Shawl from A Gathering of Lace and save the designing for my next shawl. So far it's going well but I haven't gotten to any of the lace patterns yet.

Remember when I said I wanted to get close to finishing the Ribby Cardi before starting the Pi Shawl? Well I didn't even get close. I started on the left front but life got in the way and this is as far as I got.

Now I know some of you have lots of works in progress but when I get more than three, I start getting nervous and spend too much time shuffling through projects rather than working on projects. So it's time to start finishing some. I'm off to knit.

by Sydney  |