Finished Lace Chevrons scarf

I sat up until late trying to get this thing done. I was miffed to find a knot in the second skein of yarn, something Noro is famous for, but thankfully the color scheme was not interrupted. However, the color changes were not exactly the same in both skeins. One had a patch of a dark blue-green color, while the other had a grayish spot. Go figure! Here's a picture with part of the color sequence:



After I wove in the ends and skein splices, I briefly washed it, blocked it, and stood back to admire it. The colors are quite nice, albeit some of the changes are rather abrubt due to high contrast. I'll let it sit on the blocking towel until it's dry, and then it will promptly be packed in the cedar chest for safe keeping. Come Autumn, I'll have a nice little accessory.

And until I move, I'll just keep my knitting to one item: the cabled sweater.

On color

At the most recent Wednesday night S&B meeting, I was talking to the group about my choices in color. The Noro scarf that I'm currently working on is coming out in a beautifully ordered symphony of color, but they're all quite drab. Black, gray, brown, soft purple, wheat, etc. But hey, I like drab colors! They suit me. I'll say it once and I'll say it again: I'm a plain Jane kinda girl when it comes to colors. About the loudest things in my wardrobe are my hiking jacket (electric purple -- my other choice was laser red, but bright reds make me look jaundiced), and my bright green Peace Fleece sweater. That's a lesson for you that color on your computer screen and color in your hand are two different things entirely. Most everything else in my wardrobe and yarn stash is gray, green, brown, black, navy and maroon.

I commented on the fact that I'm having to learn how to wear color. Beverlee, that wise woman, made a very astute remark that because I lived and worked in the Nevada desert for a while (10+ years), I am probably influenced in the way I see color and I choose them as they make me feel comfortable. All those drab colors are home. A million shades of brown (earth, dried up plants, deer, rocks), quiet sages, gray and purple mountains in the distance. Thinking carefully, I realize that her words held a lot of truth. Ever since I've lived in Virginia, I notice that I am sick and tired of seeing green about 3 weeks after the trees get their leaves. It's nice at first because I've been staring at naked brown trees all winter. Then it just turns into sensory overload.

I'm not going to stop trying to learn how to wear brighter, more vivid colors, but I certainly won't feel bad about wearing what's comfortable, either.

Started Lace Chevrons scarf

I was so excited to start a new project, but when I looked at the pattern for the Traveling Vines scarf that I found online, I thought that it was just going to be a tad too skinny for my taste. Although I really love the leafy design, I'm the kind of girl that prefers some substance to her scarves. So I dug around in my pattern book and decided to lift a pattern from my Plymouth Indiecita brushed alpaca leaflet.

I cast that lovely Noro SG onto size 9s and have worked 2 repeats of the lace pattern so far -- not bad! The first color change is just now evidencing itself. I can't wait to see what the next one will be. The beginning is black, fading to gray, fading to...? One day, I will save up enough money to by several skeins of Noro somethingorother for a sweater! I will.

And technically, this is my first lace project. Yay me! There is no longer any mystery held in those pesky SSK and PSSO abbreviations.

Irish Hiking Scarf Finished

At last! Another finished object!! This scarf has been going on for what seems like forever. The center pull ball of yarn I was working from slowly deflated into a more pancake-like shape, and that's when I had enough. So this weekend, between working various jobs and packing, I managed to get the scarf completed. It's pleasantly long, able to wrap around my neck a cozy couple of times.



Now that the scarf is done, I would love to make a sweater from this same type of yarn. I all need to do is find an appropriate pattern, something light to mid-weight, cabled or not. I'll keep the color card from Meskills safely tucked away until I find that perfect pattern.

So what's next? Since the cabled sweater is quite an intense project, I'll be whipping up yet another scarf. Yes, another one. I don't know how I'll manage to wear them all, but I do try. I have 2 skeins of Noro Silk Garden from MI that have been languishing in my cedar chest. I was going to make mittens out of them, but the high silk content meant that my ribbed cuffs were rather -- limp. (Don't you hate that?) Mitten #1 was frogged and both skeins were rudely thrown back into the chest. Hopefully the second time around will do the trick!

Box of yarn

This morning I came into my office to find a mystery box sitting in my chair. In it? Yarn, of course. Juli had dropped off the yarn shipment for her Lopi barter-cardi. *gulp* I better get busy! Winter feels like it will never end, but I have a sneaking suspicion that once the Lopi hits my needles, we'll have +80 degree temperatures in no time. I guess I can always come into work and knit in one of the refrigerated storage rooms this summer...

This has been a very slow week for knitting, so there's not much else of interest to post. Project Linus blanket countdown: 10 more squares needed! This weekend will certainly be a knit-a-thon for me to make up lost time during this too busy week. Off to a meeting!

Rabbit Preview

Here's a quick update with a prelim shot of the toy rabbit, sans scarf. I've only got about 1/3 of the scarf knitted, and hopefully I can finish it this weekend.



I'll post a picture of the rabbit with scarf when I list it under the Finished Objects list.

Are we there yet?

Last night at my knitting group, I was able to get the toy rabbit stuffed, sewn, and embroidered. And he's damned cute! Except for the fact that his poor little bum is naked. What self respecting rabbit would go without a tail? I've got to make a little pompom to fix that situation. Also, the "scar" from the neck definition cinch isn't overly attractive, so I'm going to knit a cheery scarf as a cover-up. Almost done...

Oh, and so is winter. I hope. We keep getting these warm teaser days which always seem to be followed by snow and/or freezing temperatures. Man, I'm tired of being cold!! So as a little reminder to myself, here's a bit of Virginia springtime, on it's way. And the dogwoods around here do have buds!



On a related note: last Saturday I went to a quilting store to buy fabric for my quilt. No, I don't quilt myself, but I bartered with a friend of mine at work who quilts but doesn't knit. I said I would make her a Lopi cardigan in exchange for her making me a queen sized quilt. I bought a little over $150 worth of fabric for it!! Quilting is just as bad a habit as yarn is. This morning, I got to preview one of the squares, and I like the way it looks. It will probably be done just in time for the new house! Only a few weeks until we close.

In two weeks, there will be pictures of rabbits and more, I promise!

Rant

Do you ever have those days where you're mad for no good reason? And then every little thing that goes wrong seems like a catastrophe? Well, today is one of those days. Work has been quite trying this week because of all the power outages we've been having. (I work on a computer, so having no electricity really puts a crimp in my job.) My town is not known for having a well constructed power grid, and it seems to have problems when the wind blows too hard, it rains, snows, or sometimes the power goes out for no good reason. (Go figure.)

I've been so busy in the evenings after work that I haven't had time to relax. Pack, pack, pack! Clean, clean, clean! No knitting, no reading, not even a bad TV show. And I don't even watch TV! (We don't have cable, and of the 3.5 channels we do get with an antenna, I don't consider Survivor or The Apprentice to be quality programming.) Tonight is my weekly knitting group's meeting, but I'll be stuffing and sewing the toy rabbit. I'm desperate to knit some cables on my not-so-Lush sweater. A large bowl of cookies-n-cream ice cream wouldn't hurt either.

Started Lush Cables pullover

I'm trying to squeeze in as much knitting as possible before the moving chaos begins in earnest, so I started my last sweater for the winter season. It is the Lush Cables pullover found in the Interweave Winter 2004 issue. No Lush yarn for me, however! I have a fairly new crocheted sweater I made from Lamb's Pride that I absolutely destested, so I have removed one sleeve and unraveled it to begin resurrecting it as a cabled sleeve. At first feel while still on the needles, this will probably be a dense sweater, but I don't mind. The yarn color is Aubergine, a lovely burgundy-eggplant mix. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I have enough yarn to finish the sweater. Either that, or I hope I can find another skein in the same dye lot or a different but matching dye lot. The cabling is pretty intense, but I think the finished product will be worth it. I managed to get about 6" worth of the first sleeve done and I like it. I can't wait to see what it looks like off the needles and blocked.

Toy rabbit update: one of my knitting friends brought in her box of embroidery thread so I can give the rabbit a face! And hopefully Don, from the Wednesday night group, will remember the stuffing. I'm counting on his daughter to remind him!! The pitiful limp body just sits at the bottom of my knitting bag and waits. I'm also starting to think the poor rabbit-to-be needs a name...

At your service

Our small little Wednesday night S&B group is finally beginning to shape up. I believe we had about 8 people in attendance, plus one... Our newest members are Beverlee and her service dog Lennox: a Standard Poodle. Beverlee is a multitalented individual, having a Ph.D. and Ed.D.; she is a knitter, a spinner (wheel and spindle), has knowledge about dyeing yarns, and of course breeding, raising and training Standard Poodles as service dogs. What a wonderful addition!

She brought along some samples of yarn she'd spun and dyed with Kool-Aid, as well as a small bit of Poodle yarn. Very interesting stuff. A strange soft, dense yarn with a lanolin-like feel. Seeing as how Poodles are water dogs, it makes sense. Beverlee says her Poodle yarn sells very well on Ebay.

As for actual knitting, I managed to get all the pieces for the toy rabbit made up, but I still need to obtain stuffing to finish it off. In the meantime, I keep trying to work on my Irish Hiking scarf. I haven't had much free time in the evenings these days and with a move to the new house coming up, knitting time will probably be getting more and more scarce. At least I've been working down the size of my stash so I won't have so much to move!