My knitting hangover

Thursday night I bound off the Wings of a Dream shawl, and it finished blocking Friday morning. I'm wearing it to my cousin's wedding this evening, and I will have pictures for you after that!

I had cast on Wings of a Dream way back in February, planning on giving myself plenty of time to finish it for the wedding. Of course, I only finished it the day before the wedding, and I only achieved that by working on the shawl nonstop for the past week and a half or so. And now... I don't want to knit a thing! I have a knitting hangover.

I'll just keep away from the yarn for a few days and once the aching in my hands subsides, I should be able to knit again. Hopefully!

~Joyuna

Finished Aeolian shawl!

It is finished! I finished it, in fact, the very night before meeting up with my knitting buddies, for the first time in three months. My timing is impeccable.

Here's the full progression of the shawl:

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Last leg of the Aeolian Shawl

I can see the finish line... I've been running a marathon and I'm almost through it.

I started my Aeolian shawl exactly two months ago and now I'm on the final rows. It's taken more yarn and more time than I expected, but it's also going to be way bigger than I expected. I'm so excited.

I had about 600 yards of handspun silk already spun for the shawl, and I thought that was going to be plenty. However, I modified the shawl to be a little bit bigger than the shawlette as written, and consequentially the shawl turned out much bigger than the shawlette.

I ended up dyeing a little bit of tussah silk roving I had, to use at the end of the shawl.


The color doesn't match the rest of the shawl, but it goes with it. It's interesting because the tussah is a lot 'hairier' than the bombyx silk I used for the rest of the shawl. I've just started knitting with the tussah, and it's already starting to fuzz up. I don't mind, it's just interesting to see the difference between the two types of silk. It may also be that in the past year I've been learning to not put so much twist into my handspun yarn.



I've also added a few beads to the shawl - not nearly as many are as in the pattern, but a few here and there. It looks nice, but I think if I beaded the whole shawl I might have to strangle myself with the yarn or stab myself with the crochet hook.

I just have a few rows to go, and I'm aiming to finish it ASAP. I am marathonning this sucker. Wish me luck.

~Joyuna

Update: Wings of a Dream stole

My main 'interesting' project (ie, not stockinette) is the Wings of a Dream shawl. I plan on wearing it to my cousin's wedding in September, and as the date approaches I'm working on it more and more. I just went shopping for the top and skirt I'll be wearing with it -- I'm getting very excited!

The shawl is progressing nicely. I'm about halfway* though the first wing, and the pattern is getting "easy" for me. Easy doesn't mean I'm not looking at the chart... But I can knit it in front of the TV, glancing at the chart at the beginning of each new row.

*'Halfway' as far as length goes. As far as stitches, the number of stitches increases each row so I have a lot more knitting ahead of me.


I'll be wearing a blue halter top with it and a long (I mean long) silver skirt. I brought my swatch to the mall with me for reference, so I know everything matches. :)

I adore this shawl, and I can't wait until it's all done. The cashmere-silk yarn is so soft, and it should get even softer after I wash and block it.

~Joyuna

Japanese Feather and Fan shawl, finished and modeled

As promised, here I am wearing my Japanese Feather & Fan shawl with my vintage shawl pin from One of a Kind Wisconsin's eBay shop. I wore it out to Father's Day dinner tonight along with my Lelah tank top.

On Ravelry: Shawl and top

~Joyuna

Finished Japanese Feather and Fan Shawl, and delicious cake

Huzzah! An FO!*

*FO means 'finished object' in knitter parlance, and refers to, well, a finished knitted or crocheted item :)

Ravelry page
Started: April 12, 2009
Finished: June 15, 2009
Yarn: 1 skein Buffalo Gold #12 Lux (45% Bison, 20% Cashmere, 20% Silk, 15% Tencel ), colorway Pine; 1/4 skein Knit Picks Shadow (100% merino wool), colorway juniper heather

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Binding off...

Good news: I am binding off on the Japanese Feather and Fan shawl!

Bad news: I have been binding off for the past four days. And I'm still binding off...

Truth be told I haven't been knitting for a whole lot of time these past four days, but this is certainly the longest row I've ever had to knit. I had been knitting this shawl wildly for the past week or so, but the bindoff is killer. Besides having 350+ stitches, the bind off pattern goes like this:

Cast on 2 stitches.
P1, P2tog, turn.
P2.
Repeat last two rows until all stitches are bound off.

So each set of two rows, I am binding off one stitch. Which means, this bindoff row is essentially four times as many stitches as my last row!! That means...
1400 stitches!
Can you believe it? I'm not sure if I'll ever get this shawl done!



~Joyuna

MORE LACE! Wings of a Dream

This is the Big Shawl Project. The perfect yarn, the perfect color, the perfect pattern... but such a big project, such a mammoth task, who knows if I'll ever finish it. Here's hoping.

Ravelry page
I've finished the center section of this Wings of a Dream shawl, a modification of the mystery stole Swan Lake. I only knit a small piece of the center section, because I want the wings to be the main focus of the shawl.

I started this shawl... let's see... the first of February, and now it's May, and I still have a long way to go. I've just started the first wing section. I should be working on this at a little quicker pace though, because I received some inspiration in the mail (see earlier).

It's a necklace called Verna, from The Pebble Collection. I fell in love with it as soon as I saw it, and it matches perfectly.

It's pale silver-blue pearls and sterling silver. I hope to wear the necklace, along with the finished shawl, to my cousin's wedding in September.

The shawl, by the way, is 55/45 Cashmere Silk fine lace weight, doubled, from Colourmart. It's totally luscious, and was way cheaper than you'd expect. Cashmere silk... more than enough for a shawl. I think I'm even going to have enough left in the 150g cone for another shawlette, probably an Icarus to give as a gift.

Of course, before I start that Icarus, I have to finish this shawl. I have too many projects going, I know. What's an ADD knitter to do?

~Joyuna

Handspun silk, part 2 - Aeolian Shawl swatching

I've fallen in love... with a swatch. (!!!)

Generally I, like many knitters, am not a fan of the swatch. It wastes precious yarn, it wastes precious knitting time! But I force myself to swatch for lace work, so I know I'm happy with the needle size I choose. I'm not a fan of lace that's too airy - that is, I would rather the only holes in my lace fabric to be the yarnovers. Fingering weight on size 8 needles? That isn't lace to me. That's just holey fabric.
Unfortunately the result is I have to do some shawls on size 2.5 (3mm) needles... Heh.

Anyway, here is the new project I was talking about. Behold... the swatch!

I love this swatch. I adore this swatch. You cannot know how excited I am about it. It's for the Aeolian Shawl from Knitty. I have 634 yards of lace-fingering weight singles (thick and thin, as you can see), itching to become a shawl. I've actually mentioned it before, at the bottom of this looong post. Click below for more info on this swatch and the yarn.


----
It was spun from 2 ounces of hand-dyed silk roving, from Enchanted Knoll Farm. It was dyed in every natural color you could imagine - greens, blues, browns, even a hint of yellow and some other colors. The colorway is called Wood Elves.

I was originally planning on plying this yarn with some wool, but the silk is just so luscious on its own. So, after testing it on the ball winder to make sure it was strong enough (there were three breaks, but I think it's safe to say that the rest of the yarn will hold up to knitting), I came up with this:



So I knit my swatch, and blocked it, and out came this ridiculous drapey colorful swatch. I cannot wait to start on the shawl, but I'll have to finish the Japanese Feather & Fan shawl first. I think I have about a third of the yarn left with that, so it shouldn't take me too much longer.

If you're not familiar with the pattern, take a look at it right now. Here is Aeolian on Ravelry. The Aeolian Shawl is sheer gorgeousness, and what else could we expect from Elizabeth Freeman, the designer of the Laminaria shawl? Sadly, those are the only two patterns she has released so far. I eagerly await her next design.



This is gonna be fun.

~Joyuna

What I'm working on: Japanese Feather & Fan Shawl

Lately, with starting up the shop and all, I haven't really been blogging about what this blog is supposed to be about: Knitting! Truth be told, I haven't been knitting all that much lately. Between school, the shop, and everything else going on my knitting productivity has sharply decreased. I have been working on a pair of socks, as well as this: The Japanese Feather & Fan Shawl. Rav

I promise I'll take a better picture later, post-blocking. Really, the pattern is absolutely gorgeous and it looks much more complicated than it actually is. This pattern is for a curving semicircular shawl in eight sections. Because I'm using my one tiny skein of Buffalo Gold Lux bison yarn that I won in a raffle, I deleted one section on either end, which should reduce the yarn consumption and give me more of a true half-circle.

I only have 330 yards of buffalo yarn, and I'm not sure how far I will be able to stretch it. Hopefully it'll end up as a Swallowtail-sized shawlette that I'll be able to wrap around my neck, enjoying the feel of the yarn and looking fabulous while doing so.

The first 50 rows went by in a flash, as the first few sections of center-outward shawls tend to do. Now I've got quite a few stitches on my needles and each row completed is an epic achievement. I'll keep you posted as to whether I ever actually finish it, and how big of a shawl can you REALLY make with only 330 yards of lace yarn.

~Joyuna

Surprises in the mail

I just received a lovely surprise in the mail today. It was a spindle from Spinsanity.

I had made a post on a Ravelry discussion board that I didn't have the best luck with my spindles holding up, because I keep dropping them on the ground. And Shannon from Spinsanity sent me a Ravelry message offering me a new spindle (with extra glue to hold the whorl on)!

I can't recommend Spinsanity enough. Their spindles are beautiful, reasonably priced, and those little keychain ones are downright adorable. They sell fiber too. And who can argue with that kind of customer service, offering me a new spindle without my even asking? Please check them out.

Once I've spun through the sample fiber you can see on the spindle (I'm not sure what it is - something soft and slick. Might be bamboo?), I'll start working on the bags of alpaca fiber I got from Columbus' Alpacafest last year. I got over a pound of the stuff wandering around the different booths, from Windy Lane Farm and Rodger's Reserve Alpaca Farm (large amounts of suri alpaca in bags for $4 each!). I'm going to take the 6 oz of deep brown suri that I have and hopefully spin it into a shawl. I like the Ethereal fichu (Rav page). It's beautiful, and it's knit from the point up so I can use as little yardage as I may have.

I also got some blocking wires in the mail (I got a Jo-Ann giftcard for Christmas, plue a 40% off coupon = great deal). Inside a comically large box (you should have seen me trying to bring it up to my room) was a tube containing a yardstick, a whole bunch of long stiff wires, a couple flexible ones, and a bag of rustproof pins.
Most excellent!

So, I blocked my Swallowtail again, which was in dire need of a re-blocking after spending a couple unfortunate days caught in the rain (Ah, England). A disaster has also befallen my shawl. The cat, you see... well...



I fixed it up as best I could. I'm no expert at darning, and I didn't even attempt to preserve the lace pattern. I only tried to save the stitches from laddering down and away into oblivion. This, I think I accomplished. Only time will tell, I suppose.

~Joy