Wednesday, December 29, 2010

On the Needles

I noticed that I've been getting lazy about showing things that I'm working on. A few of them are big projects, and I always try to wait for them to be photogenic before I post something. Sometimes they aren't really photogenic until they are finished, though. Here are a few candid photos of what I have on the needles, right now.


The latest shawl in progress, the Bridgewater shawl by Jared Flood. It has a garter stitch square for a center (very meditative and enjoyable) that is knit diagonally from one corner to the opposite corner, with increases and decreases along the sides to shape the square. Then you pick up a border around the edges of the square, and knit a lace border. I'm at that part of the pattern, which is why it looks like an amoeba. I admit I haven't been working on it much, of late. There are a couple of other things that are taking up my attention.


One of those is a plain stockingette cardigan in black and boysenberry stripes. I had some black worsted wool in my stash, but only half what I needed to make myself a sweater. Of course I immediately thought of using it with another colour, doing a nice wide stripe on a basic cardigan, and got some yarn in this beautiful boysenberry colour to cast on. I'm using EZ's percentage system from Knitting Workshop, and making a steek up the front to cut apart into a cardigan after knitting the body. I am also going to use her formula for circular set-in sleeves to see how that works. And I'm "complicating matters" with a v-neck, as she puts it. "The techniques are simple, but would gum up directions for your first circular set-in sleeve to an intolerable degree." I do love complicating matters.


The other large project I'm working on is another cardigan, the Traveling Sweater that all the Blue Moonies are in love with. This one is a more interesting construction: short row wedges that form a circle of ribbing, with sleeves and upper-back knit separately and attached. I am just past one-fourth of the circular ribbing. It's simple enough, and the yarn is soft and lovely wool/bamboo. I'm still enjoying it, but I might be cursing 2x2 ribbing in another week or three.

Well, those are the big projects. I will show you the smaller ones, too, one day soon. Maybe even a finished one. Well, I can dream, anyway.

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