Shawl!

It's done!!!

It may take a while to get better pictures, but now you can all at least have an idea of what it looks like. :) I should have bought blocking wires - the edge is a bit wiggly. Oh well, it's Shetland, I can re-block it as much as I like and it'll be fine.

The specs:
Pattern: North Sea Shawl from Folk Shawls.
Yarn: Jamiesons Shetland Spindrift in "Twilight." (I think I bought 8 skeins and I have 3 left over - perhaps I miscounted?)
Needles: Knitpicks Options #5 - so useful!

If anyone wants a closer look, I'm planning on wearing it to Taos!

Update: I unpinned it this morning and put it on. I'm in love. I want one in every color. I love my alpaca Flower Basket Shawl too, but it feels very fancy and delicate. This feels like a lightweight sweater that I can just wear around the house every day. Next up, another comfortable wooly shawl, perhaps the Wool Peddler's Shawl from the same book.

Update

I'm halfway done with grafting the two ends of the North Sea shawl together. It's taking forever! Tonight I'll sit down on the couch with a movie and finish it, and then weave in all the ends - fortunately Shetland wool is nice and sticky so it shouldn't be too hard. And then, blocking!

Shopping!

Psst!! For anyone who hasn't heard, today is the 14th Birthday Sale at Shuttles! 15% off everything! Get yourself down to Table Mesa and check it out!

Update: I'd been meaning to pick up a copy of One Skein, so I got that, and then how could I resist Bearfoot on sale? This is the "Evergreen" color and it's gorgeous. The blue stuff is "Mohair Kiss Ombre," for another Misty Garden scarf. And they were giving away copies of "My Little Knitting Book," which has a chart for inventorying your needle sizes, and Kitchener stitch instructions, and all sorts of handy reference info! Yay Shuttles. :)

Intrepid knitters!

Today was the Boulder Knit-Out!

Unfortunately, first it rained, and then the wind picked up to the point where the roving I was spinning actually blew away, so we didn't have a huge spectator turn-out and we had to pack it in much earlier than anticipated. But it was still a good time: I met lots of nice new people, including Michaele and Amanda and several others whose names I don't remember. Fortunately, Jenifer documented the whole event with pictures at her blog. You can see me in one of the pictures spinning on my drop spindle, which I pulled out when my fingers were too cold to knit, and it got the attention of a few local kids who all seemed to be much more intrigued by spinning than knitting. It's a shame about the weather; hopefully it'll be better next year and we can all stay out longer. I was thrilled to win one of the door prizes, and picked out a skein of bright red O-Wool. I'm not sure what it'll become - a hat, perhaps? - but it feels like it'll be very nice to work with. And on the way home, I stopped at the adjoining farmers' market and bought some honeycrisp apples! It must be fall!

Only 8 reps left on the North Sea Shawl and I can't wait to finish it... but for now I'm taking a break and plying some merino. Props to everyone who made it out to knit today and I hope to see you all at future events!

A good day for socks

My prize yarn arrived today! Ruth also included this cute ceramic jack o'lantern, and some yummy chocolate, which was only saved from immediate consumption by the fact that I just ate two cupcakes at the department picnic. (Oof.) Thank you Ruth! I can't wait to start some Trekking socks. But right now my needles are occupied:

Regia Silk, in the "Oblique Openwork" pattern from "Sensational Knitted Socks," which is knitting up very nicely even if it's hard to photograph. I love all of the patterns in this book because they're so nice and stretchy for socks, and it's easy to plug them into my standard sock pattern.

I'm looking forward to a cool, rainy, autumnal weekend filled with knitting, tea, and watching the U.S. Open finals. Perfect!

I may already be a winner

... in fact, I am! Thanks to Ruth for awarding me some snazzy bright Trekking! I'm looking forward to turning it into happy bright wool socks for winter. :) The Regia silk socks are well underway, but I haven't taken a picture yet because I am lame. Sorry 'bout that. But right now I am STARVING so I have to run off to lunch!

More than halfway

I've been working almost exclusively on the North Sea shawl for the last week or two, and look: I've finished the first half and the center panel! The pattern then calls for putting that bit on a holder - hello, fabulous KnitPicks Options needles - and knitting the main pattern all over again from the other end. Then there is a lot of grafting. I'm about nine rows into the other side, so it'll take a while, but I'm hoping to have it done in the not-too-distant future.

I'm afraid I've ripped out the very few rows of the pink-orange-purple StR Jaywalkers and decided to do something different with it, though I'm not sure what yet. Thanks to the cool rainy weather, I was feeling more mellow, and decided to save that yarn for sometime when I need a pick-me-up. Instead, I've switched over to the gray Regia Silk I bought at Mew Mew's a while back. I opened up Sensational Knitted Socks to look at the pattern I want to make ("Oblique Openwork"), and it fell open to her provisional cast-on technique. Which is brilliant! I'd always just made a crochet chain and then picked up from there, but she does this clever thing of crocheting over the needle, and it worked very nicely.

Lately I've been working my way through the Enchanted Forest Chronicles and the Cecelia and Kate series (same page). They're tremendously fun books, if you like books about princesses running away from home and rescuing dragons. :)