Loom Play

I mucked about with my loom yesterday.  I tried to resolve my troubles and discovered other troubles with the warp which led to tring to fix that which then created yet more trouble.  So I cried uncle.

and am rethreading the reed and heddles.  Most of what I cut off will be recovered in one way or another.  

The other interesting thing I did yesterday is to check out Interweaves sale on weaving downloads.  For the last several years, Interweave has made and sold DVD courses for those who don't like or cannot easily get out to courses or if a course doesn't fit your budget.  I have a Spinning for Lace course with Margaret Stove, a Drafting video with Abby Franquemont, The Gentle Art of Plying with Judith MacKenzie and Knit Free Sole Socks with Anna Zilborg.  It would be very pricey to see all of these wonderful teachers but here they are, waiting for me.  There are a ton of great things online for free, but it is nice to have a program with a quality instructor doing what they do best.

I picked up a beginner weaver course with Tom Kinsely and I picked up a Doubleweave Basics video. It's hard to beat the ten dollar price tag, even for my sadly beleagured Canadian dollar.  There is a Weave Structure Bundle that I would love to have and other technique videos that would be wonderful additions to my stable of learning tools, but even at ten dollars, I have to stop somewhere.  I am still at step one in weaving and all those other many wonderful things will get sorted out as I go.

There are a whole range of downloads available that are on a special price right now.  There are a couple spinning ones that I would love to have, but like I said, I have to stop somewhere.  Check it out because the sale isn't going to last forever.  

I'm going to give my hand a rest today.  It's a sneaky thing, but even holding the heddle hook to pull the thread through is hard on my hand right now.  Sneaky because it doesn't feel like it should be.  I probably wasn't listening carefully enough to what my hand was telling me and while it isn't sore, it is tired.  So to rest.

Good thing I have all these cool new video downloads to watch!  

Feeling much better.

My hand has been feeling better, so much better that I decided to try a little something.  

Spinning has also been affected by this injury, but I have still been meeting my spinning buddy to chat while she spins.  We have been talking fibre and sources and Ply magasine, so it still counts as spinning time.  

Yesterday, I decided to try my hand at knitting for a bit.  And I do really mean a bit of knitting.

l

See that letter l ?  It marks where I was on this section of the First Point of Libra Shawl.  I had 9 rows to knit to the pointy end of the section and every two rows, there was one less stitch.  I did it a little bit and then would set it down, spread over the course of two hours.  By keeping the stitch count low, and the demands on my hands low, it didn't ache or even feel the injured place.  There was a sense of tiredness after each of the longer rows, but even at the end, when I was down to 5 stitches, I set it down for a bit to rest.   And yeah, that 9 wee rows told me what I wanted to know.  That I might feel good, but the tendons aren't ready to knit or do significant work.  This time, I am hoping for complete healing even of the injury from last fall.  That was mostly good, but lingered in the background some days and would pop up on occasion. This time I want it all gone.

So however long that takes...

Things are getting better.

Things are getting better, but I am not about to mess this healing up by using it too soon.  It's better not cured.  I am at the point now where I don't wake up in the night in agony.  Big relief.

The weekend was busy, and yet torturously difficult.  The World Women's curling was on, as was the first Formula One race of the season.  I watched and enjoyed both, but it was hard not to mourn all that good knitting time I was missing.  It was fine, but by the end of the day, I was going just a little stir crazy.  If I had one, I would be ripping my styrofoam cup into itty bitty pieces.  If I had an older beer bottle, I would be ripping off the label.   

On the upside, it gave me time see if I could address what needed addressing on my loom.  I played for a while with some success, but I think I still have a problem.

These are before, 

And this is after.  I am trying to correct the place with the three strands which are wrong on the warp by using a repair heddle.  I inadvertently also repaired the double pair right beside it, which made for another whole kettle of fish.  The two repair heddles so close together may be the source of my trouble now with that long thread not being woven.

Today my goal is to dive back in and see what else is going on, and fix it.  If I cannot sort it out today, then I may just cut off this whole end and re-warp it correctly.  That re-warping isn't something that I can do in a single day and it would stress my hand too much to even try.  But I think I can take it bite by tiny bite and make a little progress.

My other plan for during this time of not knitting, is to go through photos.  First step is to get all the photos from my little laptop, which still works but has no wireless and has defeated all our tries to get wireless back.  Then I have stacks and stacks to scan. I would like to get a set of the highlights to each of my boys.  I have long wanted to do this, and now seems like a good time to start.

I'd much rather be knitting or sewing or embroidering, but at this point, smart money says heal first.  So I will.

The Blue Tape

This is where we are at.

It helps to force me to not use my thumb.  I do have a proper brace coming but this is helping.  On the upside, I am getting much better at using my left hand for things like the mouse for the computer, pouring coffee, drinking coffee.  Not going so well is eating with my left hand, though if I work hard enough for long enough, I know I can adapt.  

I'm going to go on a bit of a stash dive today.  I have hardly touched yarn all week and I miss it.  I am going to get out a particular pair of yarns.  I have had this pair for a while now.  

 

Somewhere, on my laptop, I suspect, is a photo of these two skeins, curled together in a ball like a kitten when it sleeps.  The gentle variations in the Adam and Eve become magic against the glow of the Shibui Silk Cloud.  I have a hankering to feel these yarns.  To touch them and run my hand on these.  But not to knit them.  That will take a while.  

With nothing else to do yesterday, I made a run  for groceries so my breakfast today is going to be my very favourite thing, oatmeal with peanut butter.  Who needs sugar when  you have these glorious things together?   

Absolutely no knitting

Since I have nothing interesting to post today about yarn or fiber or wooly things, I am going to tell you about my breakfast.

My grandson Marcus always tells me 'I yuv kashoo' meaning of course that he loves what he calls kashoo.  What he really loves is buckwheat.  Even as a wee tiny boy he could eat two big bowls of his kashoo.  Often he would finish up his sisters too.

As an adult, whenever I tried it from my average grocery store buckwheat, it formed this gelatinous mass, that may have tasted okay, but looked awfully grey and gluelike.  Enter My Marcus' mama and buckwheat from the European grocery, where you can get the same brand that she purchased in Ukraine and wow, what a difference.  The stuff on our average store shelf is partly ground.  The stuff she always has is whole grain and clean.  There is nothing grey or glutinous about it.

And it is so simple to cook.  But it in a pot to boil for 5 minutes and then just let it sit till it is cool enough to eat, usually another 10 minutes or so.  All the water is taken up by the buckwheat and what remains is a wonderfully nutty delicious breakfast.  Or other grain substitute.

Today I had mine with raisins and a little bit of molasses for sweetness, with a sprinkle of cinnamon.  

I know. But in a world of no knitting...

Not Stopping

After having a nice time thinking about yarns for sweaters for Keith, in a casual I get to go yarn shopping sort of way, I realized that I do have 8 balls of Remix in that soft Patina colour that I made his original sweater from.  According to my notes, I thought it would be a great colour for Brian and snagged more skeins.   They are of two dyelots though, but again, according to my notes* there is no visible difference.  Time will tell in the knitting.  That is going to be a project for next fall.

However, realizing I had the yarn in my stash did not stop me from going shopping.  He did say grey and this Patina colour is a more browny colour.  It's a nice excuse to see what is in store, isn't it?

I saw some lovely things.  My adventures yesterday were to Jo's Yarn Garden in Stony Plain, not too far from where my wee house was.  It is a truly lovely store full of very special things including Rohrspatz & Wollmeise and Colour Adventure yarns but also is my localish purveyor of all things Briggs & Little and Custom Woolen Mills to boot.  It is a place of the most basic of yarns to top end delights. I did have a very directed trip though, and only came home with some very pretty new sock yarn to make a sweater for Cassie.

I know I shouldn't choose to make a sweater for her over my little boys, but she does really love to wear what I make her.  She has such fun with clothes, even if she loves superheros more than princesses And why not I say.  And she does love purples.  Each time she sees these socks, 

she just has to pet them and admire them.  Then she says how she just loves purple.  I suspect she is wanting a pair of purple socks, but I know that my little girlie needs a good sturdy school sort of sweater.  She is tiny enough that I won't mind knitting one of of sock yarn still.  Those days will be gone soon enough!

I did see so many other stunning yarns, some really lovely alpaca and silk and some seriously wonderful silks and cotton blends.  I could have knit a dozen different shawls out of the lovely things I saw.  But, I'm kind of in sweater mode.  I do have shawlish plans, but I already have they yarns.  

Next trip I'm going to my other localish yarn store River City Yarns.  They have carried the Remix before though I am not so sure about now.  It really doesn't matter if they do or not.  I will enjoy the trip and the meander in the world of yarns. Not gonna stop.   

*I had Ravelry notes.  I 💗 this and can hardly believe it.  But I had Ravelry notes!

When you can't knit you...

Go looking at yarn.

I think.  I spent a fair bit of time meandering the internet yesterday, looking at various yarns and filling shopping carts with delicious things.  It's a sort of fun sport, because really, I do not need more yarn.  Well, not for most things anyway.

Today, I actually have a commission of sorts.  Keith said this morning, 'Now there is a sweater"  The Weather guy on CBC's Edmonton morning show, otherwise known as the TV camera in the radio studio show, was wearing a nice basic sweater, v neck and it was grey.  Keith said that it was a man sweater for the ages, no stripes, one colour, plain.  And then he said he wished that he could find the sweater I made him a few years ago because he would probably wear it downstairs, where it can be cool at this time of year.  

It was a great sweater, using Jared Flood's Brownstone pattern using Berroco's Remix.  At the time, he wanted the sweater for golf, and asked for that kind of collar.  He found the collar just too much to wear it for golf, and I think he wore it most often in his car, while driving with the top down.

He didn't realize it was missing till we were talking a while ago, and I told him I could change the collar if he wanted.  He went looking and nada.  He thinks it was in his car, and he can't remember seeing it since his car was stolen a few years back. 

He may or may not have asked for a sweater.  Nonetheless, he is getting a sweater. I asked him if he wouldn't like wool, because I have a couple things here already that would make nice warm plain sweaters, some Briggs & Little and some Cascade Eco+, in the quantity I would need for a sweater.  BUT  he said no wool.  Which is a little sad, but not really.    

 It gives me something to look for when I am out and about meandering.  I will look at other non woolly blends, but for the same reason as that first sweater, Remix is a contender.  

So shopping.  With a goal.  I like that.

Since Friday

I don't clearly recall watching TV as a child, but I do recall as an adult.  There has never been a time where I did not have a book or a something in my hand while watching TV.  

I crocheted or hand sewed or embroidered.  Or read.  Mostly reading through the years, while watching TV.  Anything, but I never just sat and watched TV.

And this weekend, that was all I could do.  Wednesday I hurt my thumb while carding the batts.  I took it pretty easy Thursday with only the spinning but that was it.  Thursday night was horrible and night has been horrible since.  My thumb cramps up badly every couple of hours and I wake up in pretty serious pain.  I would have gone to see a doctor on Friday afternoon but he doesn't have office hours.  I didn't think it was an emergency room type problem.  

I was wrong. It was. There will be doctoring today.

My previous injury isn't bad, though I think it is greatly irritated and affected by this one.  But considering the worst is my thumb, I haven't been able to do anything.  But watch TV.  

Without something in my hands.  I am going nuts and not so slowly either.  I tried going through books on my shelves.  I love meandering through the knitting books, the miniature books, the crochet and quilting books, just for fun, but books are heavy.  I couldn't read or hold a book for very long.  I did try the Kobo ereader, but even that has weight and caused some problems.  

Heck, I can't even decently clean.  Holding a broom or mop or the duster is a problem, and using my left for these jobs ...I am so not ambidextrous.  This part doesn't bother me much though.  I can leave cleaning, no problem.  But everything else.

Let's just say that my Audible and Acorn subscriptions were in heavy rotation but my hands were still free and restless. As am I.

This pretty much describes my weekend.  Starts slow and in control and then at about the 1:50 mark, it goes nuts.  

I'm just going to hope that there are not too many knitting free days in my near future.  

 

Singles complete!

And then there is that day where you finally get to to this.

There is a pouffy bit where I just called it quits.  I could have made another metre or two of singles, but when the bobbins get full, the Victoria really struggles.  I was tired of fighting.

The big ball

is done.

Two really full bobbins of singles.

Up next, to N ply or chain ply these.  That's a lot like a really long single crochet stitch while applying twist at the same time.  The last time I did it was a lot of fun, so I am looking forward to trying it again. 

Past Time to Start

I began the day in high hopes of getting lots done.  Well, it did not happen.  As soon as I picked up the needles to knit, my hand hurt. All I managed was one round. I think I slept stupid the night before. It did not mean the day was a waste.  I had tons of fun.

I have a large bag of Corriedale that is ready for carding.  It's about a half a fleece, plenty to do something significant, handspun.  My not being able to knit opened the day up to pull out my drum carder and see what I could do.

I have had the carder for almost 2 years.  I bought it from a fellow Raveller just before I moved from the west side.  It lived in my car for months sheltered in a box.  As soon as it could, it went to a safe place in the garage here and then, finally to a lovely cart to sit on and to work from. It has its own very proper spot in my study.  I meant to give it a whirl sometime this winter, and still it sat.  Carding seems like such a huge step. It intimidated me a bit.   I mean, it might...What?  It might what?  I have told myself that the worst it could do was need to be tossed, and I could then work with the other two big chunks of fleece I have.  I have been meaning to give the carding a serious go for months and I made time yesterday.

Before I started, I wanted to take a good picture of what it was in the before.

The fibre has a lovely crimp, right through the whole of it.  I watched a few videos to bolster me.  I particularly liked the video I linked to, because the shot shows the fibre going into the carder and he does it without any fanfare at all.  Such an unhurried take on carding, a simple put it in, like this and a way you go, approach. And I did.

And off the carder. Pretty great isn't it?

And a side shot.  It's the most impressive light airy pile of fibre.  I did that.  Well, the carder did that, but I was there.  

I ran these first batts through twice more just to make sure that the fibre was nicely even and that all of it was equally airy.  Next time I will run some through a third time, just to see if there is a difference in how light and airy these batts can be.

I stopped after this point.  I don't have any place to put a huge number of fluffy batts right now and I think I would rather card as I spin.  So three is enough to be going on with.

I would spin it all right now, but all my bobbins are filled.  The spares I had, are full of the Big Ball singles. I did do some spinning yesterday and I am now back to the last couple feet of blue roving. It would be so nice to get this done.  The plan is to N ply them, to maintain the lovely bright colours.  

I would dearly love to knit today, but as I did the last batt of fibre, I realized my thumb hurts.  It is a bit better this morning, but I am only going to do easy light things with my hands today.  So spinning or plying day.

The other thing I am going to do today, is pay attention to my loom.  That too has been sitting there waiting.  I have dish towels that need some doing and it is past time to start.

At the start of the winter, I set myself a goal of carding some before winter's end. When I was working in the spare room back in January, the Corriedale stayed out to be worked on.  And it has begun.  I may have left it to the bitter end of winter, but I did meet my goal to begin.  Well past time to start but it is a start. 

Almost

The debate is about to begin.  Is it long enough?

Generally, the answer is yes but there is still the ribbing to go.

But we are there.

And that is pretty darn awesome.  I always feel that way at this part of a project, almost more so than at the end of a project but when a project is wearable, you have to say goodbye to making the magic. I'm not quite ready to let go this magic.

According to the pattern, there ought to be a very long ribbing, but I'm not so sure that mine will be.  I have to see how far the black yarn will take me and with the ribbing yet to add, I really am very close to having made one of the longest sweaters yet. I'm not really in need of a dress, and a tunic and a dress are pretty much the same neighbourhood for me. What I really need is a sweater, so the shorter ribbing is likely.

Time to go ribbing.  Isn't that grand?



 

Little Mittens

Yesterday was a very special day.  It was my Carter's 4th birthday.  Because Carter is such a sweet darling boy, Carter deserves a pair of mittens from Grandma.

A pair of mittens for small kids doesn't take much.  Not in yarn or time.  I pulled out the good stuff, some balls of Drops Big Fabel (I wish there was more on the market) .  I did consider some Briggs & Little, but I think Carter and his momma will like this supremely superwash better.

 

I'm knitting these fairly tightly.  I think that is better for a good snow proof mitten, and I am also knitting them a bit big, for a 6 year old rather than a 4 year old.  They are okay for now, and with spring mere days away, they will get much more wear next winter.  Bigger is good.

And before you know it, voila, a sweet pair of mittens for my peanut.

Happy Birthday to my sweet little boy. Best giggle ever.

Brier Knitting

It was the closing weekend of the brier, and I am afraid, knitting got a little out of hand.  On Friday's post the picture showed I was just starting the third section of colour.  

That is Friday.  A quick glance will look like I haven't done all that much,

 only I have.  I am on the last colour of yarn.  

That mottled grey section is a section of serious work.  It is about that point in a sweater body where I start working increases across the back to give a me a fit that looks nice.  It is where the stitch count goes wild, you might say.  By the time that grey section is done, a significant number of stitches have been added.  It's a lot of knitting and by the time I get to the end of the increases, the stitch count is where most people get nosebleeds and whine about the number of stitches.  

I however am made of sterner stuff and never whine about stitch counts, cough cough.  

No more increases though.  This last section is all a straight tube of knitting.  I have 4 balls of the darkest grey colour which should be ample to take me to the length I want.  I aim to have at least a half ball of yarn left of that darkest grey to modify the sleeves.  I want to take out some of the black on the sleeve cuffs because I don't have enough of the black to make the entire bottom hem black plus I also need a bit of black for the placket and neckline edge.  The black is not the colour I thought I would be short of at all.     

Curling is such a great thing to watch while you are knitting.  It is broken up into time to watch shots closely followed by shot talk and setting up and things where you can pay attention to your work.  Not sure what happens to other knitters, but when it gets a little more intense,  I knit faster and faster and then, wham, the end is complete and I can knit at a more reasonable pace again.

Much of this sweater ended up being brier knitting and I want to thank all the curlers who helped me get here with such speed.  If it happens that I don't get this sweater complete this week, it's good to know that Ford World Women's Curling starts this weekend.   And it is also good to know that I have the next sweater all wound up and ready to go.

Explaining a wish

I was visiting my family last week to take my youngest sister, who is now 50 out to dinner.  As we left the dinner venue, I said I wished her everything I found in my 50's.  That probably needs some explaining, since so much of the last 5 years was so difficult.  But I do stand by it.  

When I was 49, I was at the lowest point in my life.  It was connected to a job I never ever wanted to do, but the job came to me at a point in my life where it worked, where it fit my life and gave me a sense of stability that I lost after we left farming. I was very very good at my job, good at that kind of work, because it fed my need for things to be ordered and have the right place and the right purpose.  Over time, I felt trapped, trapped by obligation to family, to Brian, to many people that I really liked.  I gradually lost confidence in my ability to be anything else until I lost all hope that there could ever be anything else.  When I write that out now, it sounds so mild, but it was so very, very dark.  Being without hope is the hardest thing.  

 But in spring of my 50th year, I came to knitting.  I found it wasn't just knitting, it was KNITTING.  For some reason, knitting is where my brain always needed to go.  I found and still find, an endless well of creativity, and joy, and goofiness, and light and air, so much so that I wonder how I used to breathe.  I found strength and belief in myself and the power to change my world.  The whole structure of my inner life changed.

And that gave me the ability to change the rest of my world. Life got so much better and oh so much more fun.  Through it all, my dear Mr. Needles, stood stalwart, supporting me, building me stuff, listening to my endless yarn talk.  He was happy that I was happy.  Isn't that just the greatest thing?

 Yeah, in the middle of my 50's Brian became ill and in very short order, passed away, but if that had happened to the person I was at 49, I would not be sitting here chatting today.  Simple truth.  That person could not have withstood the pain.  Even as it was, I very nearly didn't.  But I did, and there it is.

When Brian died, I knew that I had knitting.  I knew that I had something to hold to and I knew that as long as I had something that I really liked to give me strength, I would somehow get through the hard parts to something else. Don't get me wrong, the loss looms large daily, but I know how to handle it now and how to walk that path of sorrow.  Sorrow is always in my eyes and my heart and is there for anyone who cares to know me, on my face, as much a part of me as knitting.  There are parts of that journey in time, I would not live over again, not in a billion years and I would not wish on a single soul.

But what I wish for my sister, for everyone really, is that they find something that feeds that inner you the same way knitting feeds me.  My 50's were the highest of highs and the lowest of lows, but at 60, I feel like I left that decade stronger and more sure of who and what I am than I have ever felt before.  I found my inner light and as silly and new agey as that sounds, that light sustains me.  Maybe most people don't find these things so late in the game as I did, but I have a feeling I am not alone.   

I wish that for my sisters.  For all of you.  Find that thing that lights the inner you and find a way to live it.  Everyday.

Great Days.

I had the loveliest day yesterday.  For the last several years, a doctor's appointment, was a trip to the west side of Edmonton and consumed the better part of a whole day. The only saving grace was that I usually scheduled it to be on a day where I was in Sherwood Park already spinning.  It meant that my knit group attendance was limited and it was hard to re-establish a healthy routine. She was a good doctor, but it was time to change.

I went to my new family doctor and in less time than the previous drive, one way, I was home again.  Instead of a whole day gone, it was merely a blip in a day of getting groceries and the mail.  What used to be major is now routine and that is such a relief.  Plus I don't have to drive all the way through a major city to do it.  Huge relief.

I did all my little errands in under two hours, and then came home to knit.

I made a chai tea latte with my spiffy new frother from my niece's tea party (Steeped Tea frother.  Works great) and watched curling and had a wonderful afternoon. 

And this morning, I awoke feeling so bright and cheerful.  The sun is not quite up when I get up, but it is light enough that I don't have to turn on lights to make my coffee.  Spring is so close.  

That makes me really happy, till I think of daylight savings time, and how next week, it will once again be dark when I get up in the morning to make coffee.  I wouldn't normally worry about it and just live life according to the sun but the world around me marches to the beat of a different drummer, so I cave too.

Still, spring is coming and even stupid daylight saving measures cannot change that.  Sun will soon be hitting my bookcases full force in the morning and I look forward to it.  

This morning I took the time to enjoy the morning light while I have it and just knit to honour the tremendous privilege I have in this world.  I have sunlight, I have knitting, I have coffee and I have the time to chose these things.  How lucky is that?

Today is going to be another great day.  I am certain of it.

More and More Sweater Like

I've spent time the last couple days working on the sweater and have almost finished another colour.  

I wanted to finish it before I showed it off again, but when it is time to set it down, I set it down.  It's at the point that this last ball has only strands running around like a skeleton skein but it will probably knit 3 or 4 more rows.

I am hopeful that the black and red that separate each main colour will fall at a place that works, not something awkward.  Where it falls, it falls though.  I have not one scrap more of that colour and moving the colour change up would only make it worse.  

I gave it a real quick try on yesterday.  It's a little hard to tell exactly, without the yoke being blocked, but it looks pretty great so far, I think.  

Thing is, even if it doesn't, even if it falls so short of what I think it can be, even if it verges on looking like a disaster,  I am going to be thrilled with this sweater and will wear it.  I wear everything I have ever made (that I still have) even when it doesn't look like it did in my head before I knit it.

This sweater is warm at the neck and that is exactly what this house requires for coziness.   There are 3 layers of DK and more, weight yarn in the yoke.  If I am absolutely serious, that warmth is the only thing that really matters. It could look like complete garbage and I would still wear it if it kept me warm where I need warm. 

Only I don't think this will.  I think it is going to look good.  I think it is going to look striking, really striking. I think it already does.

I can't wait to move on to the next colour.  It's a marled grey up next, but first, comes that punchy black and red.  Even that little stripe is fun to knit.    

I know I can knit about a ball of yarn a day at this point, and though I don't know how many days of full knitting of a ball I will get in, I do know that the number of balls at the bottom of the bag is decreasing fast, looking more and more sweater like every day.

On a First Point.

Yesterday was an odd day.  I had things I had to do, and then I got to sit around and wait for the next thing.  While sitting around waiting, I managed to get in a bit of work on this.

This is of course section one of the First Point of Libra Shawl.  I am getting very close to the end of section one and I can't wait to start section two.  I may have missed the mystery knit along, but I still get to enjoy the show, so to speak.  I love this fun and funky construction.  Why do it the same all the time?!

Aren't the variations in this yarn beautiful?  They look pretty evenly coloured in the skein, but I adore the subtle variations.  In a perfect world, all yarns would have this slight colour variation, but The nice people at Sweet Georgia would be exhausted by that.  But that would mean that everything was the same and it would not then be a perfect world.  So I will work with what I have and enjoy it to the fullest. 

Just a few more minutes of knitting and I will be at the point of this piece, and then on to the much larger centre triangle section.  That triangle section will be knit from another hand dye, Hat Trick Semi solids from River City Yarns, a compliment to their Hat Trick and Touchdown lines of special sports hand dye lines.  You can see the soft variations in the colour.

It is grey but not all dark. I can't wait to see how this knits up!

I love the way it is all working out.  Beautiful yarns and beautiful project making something to keep me warm.  That's a really nice thing isn't it?

Looks Like a Sweater

And there we are.

It almost looks like a sweater.

Over the weekend, while visiting, my only knitting goal was to correct the row that needed correcting.  I had a strong feeling that if I didn't this sweater was going to sit and perc in a corner for a while.  

When I got home, I knit a couple of rounds and then thought it would be a good idea to measure the depth of the yoke.  I am short from underarm through to general neckline.  It is a darn good thing that I did measure before I knit all the way to the end of the yoke patterning.  It was perfect as it was.  The trouble with that perfection was that there was still far too many stitches on the needles.  In the course of two rows, I had 4 decreases to deal with and I had to make them look good.  I chose to do a centered double decrease in the centre of the main colour part of the last motif.  I think it worked like a charm.  

Anyway, I picked up all the body stitches and am knitting my way down.  I'm just doing a few short rows on the back to give it a nicer more natural fit on the backside (short rows push the back neckline higher), but I am pretty much on the way.

It's a lot of knitting yet till this sweater is complete, but all the hard parts are done.  Only side seam shaping remains and that is easy enough to do.

There was a snowstorm so I went traveling!

A quick trip to Saskatoon in the middle of a snowstorm netted me something lovely.

Prairie Lily carries Remix Light and now, so does my stash.

A few years ago, I knitted a sweater from Remix and it quickly became a mainstay of my wardrobe.  What sweater wouldn't when you can machine wash and dry it.  When they brought out the Light line in the same blend of fibres, I was thrilled.  This might very well be the best summer yarn ever.

I have an idea too that magically appeared when I was looking at patterns online one day and the same idea came to me when I was looking at this soft range of colours.  She had lots of the gray so that will be my main colour.  The yoke of the sweater is going to be a darkening colour gradient that may or may not be separated by a band of the darkest blue.

I know what i want it to look like.  I have to swatch now to see how that idea will look.  

The other thing that the quick trip to Saskatoon dealt with was to finally get the Christmas presents to their homes!  I forgot them at Christmas and with the snowstorms Western Canada had last weekend, it was perfect for winter gifts.

The guys opened their hats first, and then the girls got into it.  Ms Birthday girl opened hers up first and with the guys having put their hats on, she put her tea cozy on.  It actually fits really nice as a hat.  Even sister Kathy beside my dad, who got the largest of the hats  (They have me doing it now) tea cozy, found she could get real style if she rolled the brim!  They are trying to make pouty mouths for the picture, but they laugh too much!  Anyway it was a lovely weekend, and baby sister, Glenda has now joined us among the really big 0's.   

That rapidly decreasing yoke

That rapidly decreasing yoke and I are not on friendly terms right now.  Not at all.  I am seriously miffed at it.  

I got to the round with two decreases and everything seemed to be going great.  I had a vision of finishing by the end of the movie I was watching.  As I started the next round, everything fell apart.

Apparently my decreases are wrong.  I have stitches that look like this, 

when they ought to look like this.  See?  I know.  It is subtle.  Two stitches of black where there ought to be one.  Any other time you could do a quick row below correction and go on.

But not in colourwork.  In colourwork, particularly this, where the decrease needed to take two black stitches down to one, and where I put my decrease instead, mean that there simply isn't enough of the main yarn te ease in to make nice stitches.  What I have here, results in the blorfy bit extra in the stitch of the row above.  It only appears because the row below is so tight.  Taking back the row to make it right is going to be the better option, certainly the only nice looking option.

What it means is that this very large project is accompanying me on my travels.  I cannot leave it behind to stew in its own juices because if I do, it stands a very good chance of being consigned to the pit of despair, aka that corner of the WIPS where things sit till I 'feel' like correcting them.  And I really want to see this sweater through in one fell swoop. 

Stopping mid stream with problems is too often what happens to good sweaters around here.

Like my Granito, which is sitting, forlorn

since August of last year when I had to start knitting on very large shawls for gifts.

Like a sweater for Amy that has been sitting because it is in the wrong yarn.  I am fixing that next week.

The right yarn appeared and is waiting for me at the store.  This one has to happen next because.  Just because.

I have a strong sense that if I get this one lone round tinked and corrected, everything else will go smoothly.  Right?

Right.

But there is always more to see

And do!  After yesterday's sorry tale, I bring you a much cheerier story this morning.

 

I have finished motif number 3 and am on the last of the 3 motifs in this lovely design.  What brings on this sudden speedy bout of knitting, you ask.  A rapidly decreasing yoke is the answer.  

There is more to it than that though.  On this last motif and through to the end, there are only two colours in my plan and not needing to manage that third colour changes everything. Plus the design is very simple here, having come down to alternating two colours by two stitches or four depending on the row.  Simple pattern, faster knitting.

I am very much looking forward to the end of the yoke though.  Much as I  enjoy this process, I am looking forward to the plain knitting on the body.  The Brier starts this weekend and curling and plain knitting make for ...plain knitting and curling.  And just after the Brier ends, there is world Women's curling followed by World Men's, and World Mixed Doubles curling way far in late April.  Which is after the Formula one season begins in late March.

It's a good thing I have sweaters to knit.  Always more to see. Always more knitting to do.