My love story continues...

My love story with KnitPicks that is :) I just got their latest newsletter and it features this gorgeous cardigan:




Having looked at many a fair isle sweater/sock/mitten (scroll down a bit on this last one) lately I've been wanting to try this technique too. I could of course start with something simple like a mitten, but I'm not functioning that way LOL.

This cardigan uses 28 out of 30 colours of the Palette sampler package. I've been wanting to get that for the longest time and this sounds like the perfect opportunity :)

Edited to add: I asked KnitPicks about the sizes of the cardi... 36"-52"... which is great because that's what I need with my rack :) Guess I'll be falling off the stash-along wagon soon... haven't fallen yet, but the fall's imminent.

Another cardigan I like from KnitPicks is this one, although I do not really like the way it seems to "weird" at the armholes...

That's it for now... back to drool a bit more over that cardigan...

YAY for me...

Some of you might have seen the little bar thingy to the right that says I'm done with my Olympic knitting project, but so far I hadn't posted about it.

So here it is:

I'm done!!!

And I have been done since Sunday around noon. I started the previous Sunday around 10 in the evening. I've had to change yarns as the one I picked was very adamant that it would NOT become the shawl. I think I knit and ripped the part til the shoulder pattern about 10 times and out of frustration threw the yarn across the room and picked the first ball of anything lace that I came across.

It was some Henry's Attic laceweight yarn that I bought of someone this summer. She dyed it with Koolaid and it is this gorgeous crushed strawberry color. The yarn, once knitted up, feels great too... You take a handfull and squeeze it and it feels like squeezing a sponge!!!

I love the faroese style too. You can indeed do anything and it'll stay on. On Sunday I tested this by jumping up and down and dancing all over the place (no worries... no neighbours were home).

The shawl has been keeping me warm in the office... too warm actually LOL.

Some pics now...

No it is not flying or hanging from a wall... the pic was taken on the black carpet in my dad's computer room... I just rotated the pic so that it'd look right side up... forgetting about the tiles in the background LOL.

This one is taken from a different angle. I’m still amazed at the magical shape you get by just “adding” extra stitches in a couple of rows.

Close up

Obligatory shots of the shawl draped over my mom’s chair

Okay, as I’ve been done with this shawl for a couple of days I’ve got another FO, but forgot to take a pic of it. Remember that pale lilac lace sock from a few posts ago??? It’s done too. Now I need to cast on for the second one and knit it. I used a star decrease for the toe as I’d tried doing that Kitchener stuff and it is just too much hassle.

Then on Tuesday, my St Valentine’s order from Schoolhouse press arrived (I’m specifying that it is my Valentine’s order for Stash Along purposes J)… Icelandic Unspun in Denim. This really feels weird… it is indeed not spun and has a funky feel to it. Not yucky funky, just funky funky hahaha. Oh, and it doesn’t like any resistance whatsoever when you work with it. The yarn broke twice in the first row I knitted with it. I’ve now learned not to “control” it by lacing it through my fingers like I normally do with yarn.

Oh, and you know what had me really flabbergasted???? With the yarn comes a note explaining that the yarn is not spun or dyed… does that mean that in Iceland they’ve got blue and pink sheep wandering around??? The yarn also comes in pink… If yes, then I want a blue and a pink sheep. Now that I’m thinking about it… if they’d have babies, would they be calico blue/pink or lilac????

Here’s a pic of the blue sheep goodyness. Oh, in case you’re wondering I’m knitting the Faroese shawl from GOL with it. So I’m using the required yarn hahahaha. The blue is a bit less intense in reality. It is more like a mucho washed pair of jeans.

Guess that is all for now.

Cheers Eva - who's given up trying to get all the fonts look the same size on this blogger thing... It starts to p!ss me off

PS: Fleur Maxwell, one and only Luxembourgish Olympic athlete, I'm rooting for you tonight!!!

Wanna listen to Annie Modesitt???

On the KnitCast website you can listen to an interview with her. You do not need an iPod to be able to listen to the interview. I just clicked on the link and listened to it with my media player. It was really interesting :)

Cheers

Drive by posting...

Just a small one...

Today I went to Créativa. This is a craft fair held in french speaking countries all over Europe. It was in Metz, France. France is a bit "behind" on what is popular and what isn't. So they're all about scrapbooking and beading and treat it like it is the newest thing since the invention of the wheel. I did get some beads to make some earrings.

Oh, and they do have a LOT of cross stitching, but the prices are crazy. The cheapest Mirabilia chart we found was at 18.75 EUR (22.40 USD) and the most expensive at 80 EUR (95.30)!!! Yes for a SINGLE chart. The lady was insulted when I told my friend that I could get her the same one through the internet for about 15 USD.

I did buy one kit... I hope I don't get kicked out of the stash along for it though




Next up a FO... 2 mitts... for my friend Cheryl... 1 skein of Lorna's Laces in Flames used (actually still have 22 grams left over). I bought this skein while in Portland, OR in November. Pattern used: Lady Fingers by Pink Lemon Twist and available on her blog :) I did make a few changes though. The main one being the scalloped cast on.




This is my first top down sock. I'm making them using some cotton blend Meilenweit from Lana Grossa that I got last year. The color is a lot paler in reality... sometimes it looks pale lilac and sometimes pale grey. I'm working at the heelflap right now.


Another sock. This one toe up. Tweedy Meilenweit. For my friend Anne Martine.






That's it for now... off to nuke some food and start my Olympic Knitting :)

Cheers y'all

Olympic Training update...

I've done some of my olympic training for my shawl.

The following results have been gathered:

Indigo Zephyr yarn: 0 points. It just wouldn't give me the "fluffyness" I expect of a faroese shawl. I've never seen a faroese shawl in real life, but I have this "image" of them being fluffy without being made out of mohair or one of those other long haired yarns.
To be honest I feel this indigo Zephyr is destined to become some beaded shawl. I have tons of beads, but no beaded patterns :) I know there's a pretty famous book out with beaded shawls, but I don't have it. It's funny last year I was in Maryland in May and anywhere you would look where they'd sell books I'd see at least a copy of it. As I didn't know knitted lace back then I wasn't interested in it. Then, when I was in Oregon in October and I WANTED the book BADLY... I couldn't find a single copy of it!!!!

So off I went to find some other laceweight yarn that would be used in my Olympic efforts. I have several colors of Zephyr, so those were all out. Next I have a couple of skeins of Helen's Lace and even 2 skeins of Cherry Tree Hill yarn too. Those were out of the running too as I didn't want any of the (harsh) color changes in my shawl. So the sole solution was my stash of Handpainted Yarn. Luckily I have quite a stash of that too :) Although most are single skeins so not enough. When I got to the bottom of my box with yarn I found 2 skeins of the Stone Blue colorway. In the picture it looks pretty bright, but in reality it is the color of well used and washed blue jeans :) The color is absolutely perfect!!!

Next I got some needles. The chart calls for 3.75 mm (US 5) needles. The finished size of the shawl sounds a bit small to me, so I decided to use size US 7 (4.5mm) needles instead. I dislike garter stitch though. I made swatch number 1 using stockinette stitch... hmmmm me dislikes the result... no fluffyness. I thought and thought about it and decided to give the garter stitch a run too. I think I found the exact ingredients for the fluffyness I was looking for :)
So now I'm all set... just sad that I won't be home for the start of it on Friday night.
PS: sorry that this gets posted after the start signal of the games... Blogger messed it all up once again...

Picciepoo:

I've made up my mind...

I’m going to knit Sivia Harding’s Follow the Leader Faroese shawl. I got it as a payable downloaded pattern from www.knittingzone.com

It looks gorgeously wonderfullatastic… I’ll probably be using some indigo zephyr for it.

I’ll get a picture up once I’m back home.

Cheers

PS: sorry about the size of the letters LOL. I send this message through the email thingy and so I didn't have a clue about the size of the letters :)

Name change...

I've found a new name for my blog. When I started my blog I was in a low point of my life and I wasn't very inspired.

Right now I was fiddling around with my pooter as I'm trying to create a button -- this is very hard for someone who's totally drawing and photoshop challenged LOL. I was fiddling around a bit and suddenly I was thinking of making a photo of some skeins, sweaters and socks and tada... I didn't get a button, but a great name for my blog :)

cheers again..

PS: still don't remember what that great post was supposed to be about...

I've got a great mind...

it is just very fickle on retaining information.

Last night at 11.33 I had a great idea for a post, but given the time I decided to post it this morning. And of course, for the life of me, I can't remember it!!!! I don't even remember the subject I wanted to post about. I just had this great catchy title to go with it... it is all gone... sometimes I really hate sleeping LOL... it seems to wipe the hard disk in my head clean :)

I'll just try and not think about it for the next few hours. It might get back to me...

have a wonderful day y'all...