As The Yarn Turns

Shawls and Errata

I really like the edging on the Shetland Tea Shawl. It's a wide edging but very nice. A rough estimate of the before blocking, unstretched size with the edging is about 50 inches. It should be plenty big once it's washed and blocked.

Several of us in the EZasPi knit along chose the Shetland Tea Shawl as our project. When we were all just starting, there was a lot of discussion about the errata for this project in the Gathering of Lace book. The subject of the errata came up again recently. If you ever decide to do the Shetland Tea Shawl and download the errata, beware. The errata most likely will not make a bit of sense. First the discussion of the errata for the Diamond Madeira pattern will not match the "corrected" chart. In fact the "corrected" chart looks just like the one in my book. The Beechleaf Edging "corrected" chart also looks identical to the one in my book (rows 2 and 4 are correct). Now I have the hardback version of the book, second printing, so I don't know how much difference that makes. I know they were/are coming out with a paperback version so perhaps some more errors slipped into that version. I also checked the errata for a few other patterns. I did find a few legitimate errors mentioned in the errata, but many didn't make sense. My solution was to put in a lifeline and knit the Diamond Madeira pattern and Beechleaf edging as originally presented. So far, it looks like the picture in the book. My advice if you're knitting something from this book? Check the errata against the pattern, the charts, and the pictures,and see if they make sense. If not, contact the designer or just forget about it.

The other thing that can be confusing are the instructions to move the marker to the right on certain rounds. For this shawl, those occur on the rounds that start with Sl2tog-k1-p2sso. What I did is complete the previous round, then move the marker one stitch to the right before starting the round. That makes a centered double decrease and keeps the vertical line of stitches in line (pointed out with the arrow in the photo above). I used those vertical lines of stitches to orient myself while I was knitting. I knew I needed a knit stitch or a Sl2tog-k1-p2sso at that point. If I didn't have one, I knew made a mistake and needed to tink back. I'm a minimal marker knitter. I work better if I minimize the number of markers I use and just read my knitting while I work. .

I'm off to knit more edging. I leave you with Phoebe investigating the trash can.

by Sydney  |

Weekend in the Country

Sometimes you just have to get away from it all, and that's exactly what we did this weekend. We visited some friends who live near Lebanon, Tennessee, far from the big city . We usually go up the Natchez Trace to the Nashville area since the Trace goes right near our house. Besides it's a beautiful drive and you are guaranteed to see some kind of wildlife on the drive up. Our friends have the Flatwood studio and woodworking shop near Lebanon in a nicely isolated location. With the beautiful weather, fun crowd, and nice location, we completely forgot about time and everything else in our lives. It was just what we needed. Here's a picture of the group playing in the shop, minus me.

The other nice thing about the trip to Tennessee is that it gave me plenty of time to finish those last six rows on the Shetland Tea Shawl.

I am now officially on the edging. Only 110 more little points on the edging to go. The directions called for breaking the yarn before starting the edging. Since I am knitting from this huge cone of yarn, I decided to start the edging without breaking the yarn. Well that was exactly what I was going to do until our cat Katie decided it would be better if I followed the directions exactly. While I was busy getting ready to cast on the stitches for the edging, she was busy breaking the yarn for me. Yes she is still alive and the edging is coming along nicely in spite of its rough start.

In other news, the Yarn Harlot's book, At Knit's End : Meditations for Women Who Knit Too Much has now arrived at my local bookstore and I have it in my hot little hands. It's a great little book that fits perfectly into your knitting bag, or any bag for that matter. I like to just pick it and read a page randomly. It's a fun book that is full of quotes and humorous observations.

Until next time...

by Sydney  |