The lace “thing”

Tags

Freja, Happy go Knitty, Knitting, lace, socks, stress

Must stop looking at lace shawl patterns on Ravelry… sooo pretty…

Must.stop.printing.out.patterns.for.lace.shawls…

Must knit lace shawl…

Must.stop.knitting.lace.shawl.

Must.stop.breaking.needles.ripping.out.lace.shawl.

Must.stop.getting.angry.with.self. (deep breath)

Why, oh why, is it so hard to break into lace? (sad sigh)

Let’s start again.  Small.

Lovely Freja socks.  In beautiful Happy-go-knitty yarn.  A delightful sister act from the Dehmer sisters.

This is hopeful.  It “only” took me half a sock to finally get that this pattern is actually a simple lace design of very regular stitch pattern… ;P

I do not know what it is about lace.  I find it very difficult to get the ‘hang’ of it.  I know it’s simple.  I know the steps are logical.  But somehow, it takes me quite a few repeats to finally cement it in my brain!

I shall conquer lace yet!

Magnolia Maluka

Tags

free pattern, Knitting, lace, New Zealand yarn, shawl, Spinning a Yarn, yarn

Sometimes, you meet a yarn so lovely that it simply has to come home with you.  It has to be knitted immediately.  Without hesitation.  Without distraction.

I found such a yarn recently.

It’s called Silk Merino Luxury, in the Magnolia colourway.  Don’t you think this yarn is coloured just like the beautiful magnolia blossom?  On screen, I found it mouth-watering, and of course, it had to be mine!

I’m so pleased that Spinning a Yarn is producing a fingering weight in addition to her normal 2 ply laceweight.  I’m not much fond of laceweight, but fingering is another matter!

When this luscious silk/merino yarn arrived in my letterbox, it was even more beautiful than I expected.  It told me it needed to be a shawl and refused to be put away into my stash.  But which One??  So many shawl patterns to choose from!

I spent quite a bit of time on Ravelry perusing all the options.  The requirement was that I had to be able to knit it from one 400m skein of yarn.  I wanted lace, but not too much lace (because I’m not that great a lace knitter yet and I really don’t want another fail on my hands). And it definitely, absolutely, could not have too much garter stitch (because I’m one of those people who isn’t fond of garter stitch).

Then I found this.  And really, how could I not begin right away??

It almost makes me weep.  The perfect match of pattern and yarn.

The pattern is easily memorised, and it’s quite addictive to knit with each 12 row repeat taking only about five minutes.

I like the fact that you knit the border first – this means I can work out whether the length is what I want before I start the stocking stitch inner body.  As the original pattern only calls for 200m+, and I have 400m, it means I have plenty of yarn to play with to make the shawl bigger if I need to (within reason).

And now, if you will excuse me, I think I need to pay attention to a certain lace confection…

Sudden Death

Tags

Interweave Knits, Knitscene, Knitting, lace, Little Wool Co., New Zealand yarn, Summer, Vogue Knitting, yarn, Zealana Kiwi

So here I was, humming along with the last of my winter knitting, when the weather performed Sudden Death.  It is suddenly really warm*.  It’s not meant to be warm at this time of year.  It’s still meant to be cold, and yet, I find myself reaching for cotton and skirts, and scratching in my wardrobe, looking for non-existent summer cardigans…

*I know this phrase is relative.  But I do think it has been much warmer than usual for September in NZ.

Where are all my summer weight things?  Sadly, I wore out my favourite summer top last season, and all the others are let’s say, a little dated (it’s embarrassing to say how long ago I bought them – they feature cropped lengths that I no longer find comfortable).

So… time to get out the lace weight/fingering weight yarns and search for a pretty new cardigan and summer sweater to wear this summer.  When faced with this predicament, I find it’s often easier to search through my hard copy issues of magazines (do I hear a gasp from the “e-philes” among you!?? hehe).  Ravelry just did not bring up what I was looking for, even though I refined my search terms down to specifics.  Besides, it’s fun to sit in comfort and browse at leisure, something I cannot do sitting in front a screen.

I spent a day of looking and researching.  This is where Ravelry does become useful – I have a look at how others have knitted the pattern and whether it looks good on the same body shape as mine.  And I have hit upon a list that is rather long, and I know I won’t get to knit them all, but they’re all so nice it’s hard to choose!

First up, the lace cardigan from the Noro Knitting Magazine:

Image courtesy of Noro Magazine

It looks easy enough.   In summer, lace is good.  It’s also a relatively economical knit, needing just four balls of the Noro Taiyo Sock.  I don’t know if I’ll use Taiyo, but something like Noro’s Silk Garden Sock or Kureyon Sock is sounding good at this stage.  Having said that, I’ve just had an exciting alternative idea, but I won’t share just yet…  I need to swatch to see if it will work first.

Next up, the Prudence Pullover from the Fall 2012 issue of Knitscene is looking nice.  It looks like something I would wear, minus the bobbles.  I have a lovely soft grey sportweight yarn in my stash that would go perfectly with this.

I have until now, rejected the idea of wearing tunic-style tops.  However, the Counterpane Blouse from the Summer 2010 issue of Interweave is very appealing.  It’s nice and long and floaty… it would go well over a cotton tee.  I’m not sure of which yarn to use though.  Need to do more thinking around this one!

Interweave’s Spring 2009 issue has long haunted my wishlist dreams.  This issue is chock full of lovely designs!  Time to finally knit myself a Diminishing Rib Cardigan me thinks!  It will double well as workwear.  There is a nice black crepe yarn in my stash that I think will suit this pattern.  The Parker Cardigan is also a potential, as is the Millefiori Cardigan.  Actually, having seen how flattering Millefiori is for so many people, I suspect it will go on to my ‘must knit’ list!  The Whisper Cardi is another classic, but I’m not sure…

And what of the ones already in my queue:  the classic Minimalist Cardigan from Interweave Fall 2007?  Or the Lace V-neck from Vogue Knitting’s Holiday 2009 issue?  Or indeed Flaming June from last summer’s Knitty?

There are some yarns I have in mind as “must knit this Summer”:

My beautiful balls of Zealana Kiwi (Cotton/Merino/Possum) Laceweight:

More Zealana, but in Kiwi Fingering:

Perhaps this lovely merino/angora/silk from Woolyarns:

And, most excitingly, a bit of Little Wool Company‘s Wool/Silk/Mohair:

You’ll notice that the number of patterns and the yarns I highlight do not match up. That’s because I suspect as much as my greedy little needles want to knit all the things, I won’t be able to get through more than the four yarns I highlight above!

There’s always gift knitting and designing that get in the way… but who knows?  Maybe I will be able to knit more!??

Now to narrow down the candidates in search of WIP No.1!

 

The Cables and Lace Hoodie

Tags

Alpaca, cables, FO, Knitting, lace, New Zealand yarn, yarn

Sometimes a project seems to take forever to finish.  16 balls of yarn: one back, two fronts, two sleeves and a hood later, I finally found myself with a set of pieces that were ready to be sewn together!

Last night, I sat down to start the sewing together.  I forgot how much fun seaming is.  :-)  I stayed up to 1am because I couldn’t put this down until the very last stitch was done… and now, the hoodie is finished!

They’re terrible photos I’m afraid.  It is very difficult to photograph this thing – even more so when they’re self-taken.  I’ve tried to give you an idea of the sizing and detail as best I can!

I’m really pleased with it as I’ve made quite a few modifications to get it to fit correctly and look how I wanted – among other things, I changed the cables as I didn’t like the original puffy ones.  The details are Ravelled here.

This is a lovely warm addition to the winter wardrobe!! I used a naturally coloured New Zealand alpaca yarn that came from a small producer and that I have been saving for the right project.  This is one of the reasons I kept the knitting in pieces and didn’t knit the body as one.  I felt that the seams would contribute some structure in case the yarn decided to stretch.

So… what’s next?  Well… there’s this very pretty fresh green chunky merino…

I’ve wanted to do something with it for ages.  It’s hand-dyed by Happy Go Knitty and I think I’ve just settled on something cute.  More on it later!