Sock Monkey Blanket

Yesterday was mail day and I had a package arrive.  Ok a box, but really it was just ordinary.  Keith and the mail lady both said that can't all be yarn, can it?  It is a two foot by three foot by two foot high box so under ordinary circumstances it wouldn't generally be yarn.

I told Keith he and the lady at the post office could laugh if they wanted when he delivered my apologies for the size of the thing.

Bahahahahaha I don't care!

But it is.  All yarn.  This was something for me after all.  What else would I purchase in quantity?  

In the spring when I finished the Sock Monkey Blanket, 

I was so charmed by it, that I was determined to knit another.  I started looking for the yarn immediately but it wasn't available just then.  I started seriously looking in May.  Daily for a long long time.  The charcoal wasn't available. And I kind of gave up a little bit ago and ordered a heathered denim blue.  I personally like the way the heathered tones look wrapped with the cream and photographic evidence on Ravelry shows me it is pleasing.  So fingers crossed.

Anyway,  Sock Monkey Blanket number two is under way.

Hönestrik.

I came across a new word today.  Early this morning, I was looking at interesting designs for the sweeater in the Mulespinner dark gray that I am working on right now, and it popped up on a particularly interesting hem pattern on this sweater.    

Hönestrik.  Isn't that a great word?    But what does it mean?  I could find pictures easily.    

The first thing I noticed was the brilliant colours.  It reminded me a lot of the way that Kaffe Fasset used colours in the 70's (I AM a child of that period so yes, I remember everything Kaffe besides just his knitting, his art, his needlework.  Sigh.)

I could see parts that were influenced by fair isle and by traditional Scandinavian knitting, but the essence of it, the real meaning of it eluded me.  

"Hønsestrik - a Danish knitting style from the 70’s, which literally translates into “Chicken Knit”. Hønsestrik is done with bright colours on a double pointed needle, so no purling is needed. The technique seems to have found inspiration in fair isle patterns, but with the Hønsestrik patterns resembling every day objects, animals and people to a greater extent. But besides the very bright colours and naive patterns (which I think look adorable on kids, maybe not so much on grown men with beards…) Hønsestrik is really all about making a political statement and challenging the norms of society at the time." - Knitted Cakes

Read this blog and it's wonderful posts.

Anna Bauer's website has a list of European sellers of the books.  It is not available in English and is not listed on Amazon.  But it is entirely possible that I might purchase a book and learn to read Swedish  for Chicken Knitting.

I am not sure which part I like the best.  The colours.  The rebellious roots of it.  The sheer and utter joy it gives me to look upon it.    

Hönestrik.  It might be true love.

Overwhelmed

Sometimes when I knit, I get overwhelmed by how significant a thing I am doing.  Right here, in front of my eyes, here in my hands,  I am making something that will keep me warm and comfortable. It is more than that though. 

Sometimes when I knit I am reminded that there is such strength and beauty in this simple task.  Knitting isn't a quick fix.  Knitting takes time and deliberate purposeful small moves, over and over and over again, till your sweater or socks or shawl is complete.    

Sometimes it is the color of the yarn and the way that light shines on it and from within it.  Sometimes it is the earthy, heathered sheepy natural colors. 

Sometimes when I am knitting, I am reminded of just what knitting did for me personally.  I worked.  I went home.  I had so few friends and knew so few people that I couldn't have held a Tupperware party because I did not know enough people to call.  I had a caring and supportive husband and three healthy kids and a decent social life with a few friends.  On the surface I had everything.  But I didn't have me.  Somewhere along the way I got lost and didn't exist.  Knitting helped me find myself again.  

Sometimes when I knit, I am reminded of just what change knitting brought to me and I am overwhelmed. Knitting sometimes is a very deeply emotional, spiritual experience.

I know that a lot of people cannot understand how anyone could feel this way about something like knitting.  A lot of people put it down to over sentimentality and being just a little flaky.  I am okay with that.  

It doesn't matter what anybody else thinks or feels about my knitting.  It really only matters what it means and feels to me.  

Oh my.

There is a moment when you do a deep stash dive, looking for the yarns your hands are hungry to work with where you just know you have to stop or you will have your entire stash sitting in the livingroom.  I faced that yesterday.  I even put some back but I left out enough, if I used every scrap of yarn here for four different sweaters.

I pulled out the Custom Woollen Mills Mulespinner Two Ply that I started the search.  This will absolutely knit me a sweater that is super warm and that can be worn even through the toughest household tasks.  It is a good stable strong sturdy wool and there is nothing warmer on the planet. (According to me)

I have two cones of the darkest gray and what you see here of the lighter colours.  That makes slightly more than two sweaters worth of goodness right there.  One dark gray based and one with a gradient look of some kind or other. 

I started working with the dark gray yarn immediately.  

I planned a very simple, plain sweater, but I think something else is going to happen.  Looking at the other mulespinner yarns and the gorgeous  contrast between the two grays, there might be a little colourwork making an appearance.  A sturdy sweater for at home doesn't have to be plain does it?  And if the colourwork is only a band across the upper chest or maybe some lice on the bottom two thirds of the sweater?  That isn't too much is it?  Probably not the lice though. My goal here is to bang out this sweater.  I am chilly and I want warm. 

Lots more yarn happened before I started knitting though.  

I pulled out the yarn leftover from my Undercurrent.  I think I know what I will do with these.  There are two and a third balls of the gray mulsepinner, a mid gray gray to the two above, and three balls of Noro Silver Thaw.  If I knit two complete sweaters out of the stuff above, there would be enough left to add to this yarn to create a great whatever happens sort of striping sweater.  

I took out yarn for a fourth too.  I have no idea why

 other than it is pretty.  It is a Brown Sheep Nature Spun Sport in a sweet multi tone cherry, my favourite red. 

I did have some other yarns out, but I put them back for now.  I could flood myself if I let me.  The stash closet doors are still open though.  Later this afternoon, I plan to fill my inspiration cabinet with pretty things because my goodness, do I have pretty things.  Sigh.  There still is time for a few sweater accidents to tumble their way out of the stash closet.  

In the mean time, I am just going to knit.

Gettin' Giddy

Once that lovely sweater of Amy's was blocked and the buttons were on it, I swear by all that is, that it was the prettiest thing I have ever knit. 

Aaaaand I have no pictures of it.  And so it goes.  My finished objects list still like I don't know how to do it rather than a carefully curated line of things finished proeprly.  It just makes me laugh at how often I forget a final 'good' photo.  

My other cohort, Scott and Amy and all three of my boys were here yesterday.  Isaac is taller than I am now.  Sigh.  I knew it wasn't far off but golly gee.  And Carter grew a couple  more inches.  Like a weed that boy is and missing his friends in school so much.  And my sweet Emmett, who up till now has let his cousin Jane do all the talking for them, is just full of words and things to say.  He also plays a mean bouncy balloon game.  The schools foor all my grandchildren have now had at least one case of Covid in them, so Scott's kids are schooling at home again this year, but the school supports have been really marvelous. They worked hard over summer and Amy said it is a lot better than last year.  

So here I sit, house clean, almost no dishes because we were really ready this time, and I have nothing to do.  I will probably knit on the Thriepmuir sweater though the shawl has been beckining after a few days pause.  But mostly, I think I will do that twice put off stash dive.  

I just can't wait.  Diving is one of the things that make me giddy.  I have some ideas for shawls and scarves, and I want to keep out some mohair colours to think about.  There are lots of interesting things out and about that people are making with mohair.  And as much as getting the warm woolies out to knit with, there is some laceweight that I would like to get out so that I can wind it at leisure.  

I am going to keep my camera at hand so that I can take photos of what I pull and show you some of what is going on in my head.  I am getting a bit giddy thingking about it.  I just need to refresh my coffee and I am off.

Nailed it.

I had a bit of a dead line and I made it.  

This pretty little sweater is done.  It is a fine and delicious thing and I am so very proud of it.  I only have blocking and buttons left.  

As soon as practice two of the racing is done, the blocking will happen so that there is lots of time for it to be nice and dry for tomorrow.  I will take pictures of her wearing it before she goes home.

In funnier news, do you recall the sweater I knit for Keith earlier this year?  Well, it went down on a pile of clothes and was never worn.  I didn't think he liked it very well.  Now that it is colder, Keith was saying he needed to get another hoodie so he had something to wear when his hoodie was getting laundered.  I asked him where his sweater was and he looked at me kinda funny.  So, next morning he came up sweater on.  And the next day.  And the next.  

At least as good as a Hoodie.

He likes it.  He really likes it.  

Maybe Two?

If I do this right, and I really really hope I do, I ought to be able to finish two things this week.  Of course one of them has been sitting waiting for no good reason and will now be finished in a bit of a rush because of it.  But two things done in a week is stellar.

Scott's family is coming for brunch on Saturday.  Amy's sweater has been waiting for finishing since she tried it on for me earlier this summer and if I don't have it ready now, it will be Christmas till she gets it.  After finishing the bed mittens, I took stock of the sweater and what needed to be done.  

The sleeves needed doing plus button bands and neck band.  It will take longer to pick up stitches for each of these things than it will to knit them.  The sleeves are only 5 and a half inches plus the ribbing.

I have an inch or so of stockinette to go on sleeve two before the ribbing.  It isn't quite where I had hoped to be after a full day of work on it, but I didn't knit so much as I hoped.  Oh well.  I have already had a good go at the sleeve this morning, and I think I will be just fine.  I still have tomorrowif I need it.  Buttons, blocking and finishing ends won't take the whole day.

I have been working with Harrisville and Jamieson's Ultra for so long, my hands had almost forgotten the delights of Madelinetosh.  It is such a beautiful blend of wools and I so dearly love the colours.  Maybe when I do get to that stash dive, there will be some diving for my own favourite Madelinetosh stash.  I have Tosh DK in sweater quantities three times over just for me.  

The landlord and I had a big realisation last week.  It was particularly difficult for the landlord.  He has always maintained that he loathes coffee from single serving machines.  He tolerated my old Tassimo.  He said he would tolerate it if I got a Kuerig to replace the Tassimo.  I wanted a Kuerig because I wanted to be able to refill the coffee pods in a more enviromentally friendly way and because the frothy milky drinks are no longer available here for the Tassimo.  In fact, it is hard to find Tassimo pods out here at all.  I really enjoyed the freshly brewed coffee no matter what time of day it was.  Taste is everything.  So we had a keurig and life was good.  

Last week the machine died.  It wasn't heating the water hot enough to make a coffee happen.  We played with it a few times and tried various things with occasional success, but when electricty is invloved, occasional success is not a good thing. The coffee maker well and truly died last Friday.  Keith didn't want to go back to Vegreville just for a coffee maker so he said he would get one for me Monday. No biggie, right?  

Saturday morning dawned and we made a pot of coffee in the regular coffee pot.  

  Almost before the cup was done, Keith was saying he was going to Vegreville.  He said it was to buy some lightbulbs, but he did come home with a coffee maker.  Just sayin'.  

It seems we have become a household of pod coffee snobs.  Oh dear.  Oh well.  

It should be noted that of all the pod machines, the Keuring is not the best.  I have had coffee from Nespresso machines and that is really dramtically, differently good.  It is really great coffee, plus the pods are recyclable, though not refillable at home by me.  But the taste is the best coffee I have ever tasted beside it being prepared in the Turkish way as I had in Kyiv.  

I finished a Thing!

I finished a thing!  I am a wee bit shocked that I did but wow.  I finished.  I had almost forgotten what that feels like.

I finished my wristwarmers from Cat Bordhi's Pure Garter Stitch Mitts.  They yarn is Urth Uneek Worsted and I don't seem to have a colourway noted.  Sorry about that.  This is what it looked like at the start.  

They do look different on each side, which makes them kind of funky, but it is just part and parcel of the way the yarn was dyed.  It isn't nearly as brightly coloured as I thought it would be, but it is pleasing in it's contasts and warm brandy undertones.   

They look a bit strange don't they, but then, they just popped off the needles when I took the pictures.  I wore them to sleep last night and they look more like real people hands now.  

And I won't be stash diving today either.  I have company coming on the weekend and I have a sweater to finish and send along home with them.  

I think it is just button bands and possibly the sleevelets, but that ought to be very doable by Saturday afternoon.  The bigger problem is buttons.  I think I have some tiny pearl buttons set aside for this somewhere.  It is the somewhere that kind of scares me.

At Play

I think I am going to do a stash dive today.  That generally means there will be a bit of knitting, but there will also be a lot of fooling around.  

I am busy knitting things and I have plenty of sweaters to work on, but I have a strong almoost burning desire for warmth, workday warmth.  I have been thinking about that a lot the last while, haven't I, but as the snow approaches, as the cold falls, it becomes not just a want.  It becomes a need.

There are certain yarns I want to pull out.  The big cones of Custom Woolen Mills Mulsepinner Two Ply are coming out for sure.  The Regal so I can assess that pretty pattern and the colours I have versus what the pattern needs and probably the Cascade Eco + that I have, both green and red and maybe the cream as well.  I could always make a cabled something or do something with those ever entertaining twisted stitches of Maria Earlbacher.  And I will probably take out the Mission Falls.  I bought the Mission Falls for Brian so many moons ago, but I kept it for me because it is such a lovely yarn to work with.    

To be truthfull, I would take it all out and keep it out if I could.  Wouldn't it be nice if it could all be displayed like my own yarn store right in my room?  But...and it is a big one, I know how much effort that lovely tidy yarn store look takes.  

I also want to pull out a few yarns for small things.  I made a Huj Tub a while ago with some delicious Eden and a skein ofm Shibui mohair and it is glorious.  I wore it all last winter and I wore it almost daily even through summer.  It is just the perfect thing to wear when your neckline is chilly that first bit in the morning.  I have a bunch af mohair colours and I have a bunch of Socks that Rock that could work perfectly for warm fuzzy simple to knit cowls.  I have some Noro sock yarns that would work wonderfully too.  

As much as I will pull out yarns to work with, I don't really need to go into it for any real reason.  I have all kinds of stuff out that I would happily knit with.  I can take out what I want when I am ready to work with it.  A stash dive really isn't required.  

But sometimes, just sometimes, I just want to play in the yarn.  Opening my stash boxes is like opening shipments of yarn back when I worked at the store.  That is what I am looking for today.  I am looking for the sheer joy of yarns, for the colours, for the feeling of it in my hands, for the glorious cozy, warmth and goodness of yarn.    

A little of this, a little of that

I knit a lot this last weekend, even though Sunday, I knit almost nothing.  My hand needed a break and I am now smart enough to give it one, instead of powering through.  

I knit on this delicate little popover for a while.  I envision a kind of capelike sleeved thing.

Knitting that is like knitting lace without knitting lace.  It is fluffy but so very light.  I wanted a light top layer, simple in construction and plain, letting the yarn do all the talking, and yet now that I am a bit farther along, I am wondering if this shouldn't have some lace effects as it gets longer.  It is still close enough to the start that I could plan or do an all over  lace on the front or do a lace panel that gets wider starting just after joining for at the under arms.  I have also been thinking about 'striping' like the Shakerag Top, by using two strands of yarn.  I have plenty of yarn so it is worth thinking about.

I also entertained myself by going through the WIPs and knitting on my wristwarmers.  A good day of work would finish the pair I think.

  

  

The pattern is from Cat Brodhi's Family of Fingerless Mitts ebook.  It is simple to knit and brainless to fit perfectly.  I may just keep working on these today.

But I also took myself on the journey to the edges of the Shetland Shawl.  I chose something that wouldn't be too wide.  I think it's already there.  I also want something where I won't need anymore yarn.  I have three and a half balls and deep in my lace there is one more skein of cream.  I think.  

This edging is called the Doris edging and comes from Heirloom Knitting by Sharon Miller.  It may or may not match the pattern pefectly, but it is lovely to look at and is kind of fun to knit.  It isn't a long repeat and has a lovely kind of regularity to it.

I am about a third of the way down side one and it feels nice to be at this point.  It is also warm to work.  The whole thing sits in your lap as you flip back and forth working off one stitch at a tme.  It is cozy and warm and I am getting really excited about wearing it.

I may be hitting the sewing machine again.  Plenty to do there and I may just play around with my knitting.  It depends if I can talk Son3 and his kids into coming for a weekend visit.  Worth a try and something to look forward to!

A Little String of White

A little string of white to brighten your day.

Well it sure brightens mine!

I am wondering though, if one garter stitch ridge is enough or if wiser heads would do two or three garter ridges.  I am going to hit the books and see if there is anything that talks about the strength of that edge.  

And I am going to have to pick an edging.  

So close and yet, so far, far away.

So close and yet, so far, far away.

I thought I would make it yesterday.  I had nothing else much to do.  Not a lot of housekeeping tasks, some good videos and coffee at hand and not too many rows left to knit in the pattern.  I really thought I would make it.  Plus I meant to keep knitting till it was done.

But no.  I got to the end of a program and was about to put in another and I realized that while the spirit said I could do it, the eyeballs were tired and so was the brain and that leads to only one thing in knitting.  Trouble.  So I went to bed with a round of purl, a round of pattern stitch and another of purl to go.

I have no idea how many stitches there are on each side right now.  I did think about counting, but there is a point where counting makes it harder to go on.  To be clear, I am not there yet.  I think that has to be a higher number for my pea sized brain.  No, the cable of my needles isn't letting me count safely.  There are too many stitches on it and I worry that stitches would slip off.  That would hurt right now, even with a fairly well mannered sticky yarn.  You never know what could go wrong dropping stitches at this point.  I will wait till I am actually knitting.

I was thinking about it and once the pattern rounds are done, I am going to do a couple rounds of plain knitting to make a nice crisp cream edge to work with as I knit the edging stitches off.  That will hide any ugly joins and those times you need to work extra rows in a corner and things like that.  

What all that means, pattern work and spare cream rounds, is that the chance of me starting work on the edging today is probably zero.  And that is a good thing.  I don't quite have my edging choice clear just yet.  

I have till tomorrow.  No rush.

In spain

Feeling Tall

Well, the jacket was in the running.  For 3 whole rows.  And then my hands were tired.  This isn't a particularly bulky yarn.  It rates an 'Aran' on Ravelry, but it is a very dense yarn.  In yards per pound it is dense.  It does bloom when you wash it.  I know this from my swatch so that is what I am waiting for on this jacket.  Anyway, I did put the jacket down after the 3 rows.  

And picked up the Shetland shawl.  I worked on that quite a bit, to the point that I have about 6 rounds to go plus the purl round I am working on.  That does inspire me to keep going, keep sticking with it, keep focusing on this one huge project.  

Truth is, I can't wait to wear it.  The thing about big shawls is that you can snug them around you and hunker down.  Can't you just see yourself with them with a good book and tea snuggled on a sofa on a chilly afternoon?  That is how I see me in this shawl and I mean for it to be me.

Lots of people say they can't see themselves in a  shawl.  I can see me in one, but I have a feeling that I do not look like a person who wears shawls even when I am wearing shawls.  Persons who wear wraps and ruanas and shawls are usually tall end elegant.  I am not these things.  I am the polar opposite of tall.  And elegant.  If there was something farther in the opposite direction than that of elegant and tall, that is me.   I am tall but only if by tall you mean that I wear my tall short and wide. When I wear a shawl, I feel warm and cozy and ... tall and elegant.  

And that kind of works for me.

Jackets in the running.

About 2/3s of the way through every round on my shawl, I start hating it.  And then I start a new row and feel an upsurge of joy that the border is almost done.  Still, I need a break.  I am working on something different today.  

The jacket, as is.  I have been picking this up for a few stitches here and there this past week, but I don't think I did more than a single row. I'm going to devote the whole day to it, though. It is sunny out and nice enough for October, but the cold is not far off, no matter what anyone hopes.  I have another ball of green and then it is on to the gray.  

I wish the gray was darker, but they sent what they had and I guess that will do.  It will hold its own appearing in a block of colour .  Occasionally it crosses my mind that I could do this just a wee bit different and block one side higher than the other, but I keep just doing the knitting nice and plain.  Sometimes I think about knitting the change with stripes, but I don't  know.  Just the block change works.  Maybe.  

Happy Thanksgiving

I really hoped to be able to tell you that I had started the last colour of yarn on my shawl.  I pushed for that all day.  I got close.  I am only a round of purl and half a pattern round away from it.  It was just not meant to be.  

What is meant to be is that I am starting to think about what lace edging I will use.  I had been thinking about a fairly significant one all along, since the centre square of the shawl is not huge.  I thought using a nice wide border would cap any short coming it may have in the size war, but now, I don't know.  I think I won the size war.  I have plenty of yarn. I took care of that battle.

So now it is just down to the outermost lace. I will be thinking a lot about this the next week, as I finish up the border.  

But for now, for this morning, I just want to say out to the whole wide world how thankful I am.  I am thankful, forever thankful that so far, through this difficult times, all my sons have been able to stay working. My daughter in law was laid off for a bit, but she is back to work now and the outlook for winter is good. I am thankful that none of us has gotten sick. I am thankful that we have all had enough to get by on.  

I am thankful that back in the day, I accumulated a stash of unusual size of lovely yarns, for almost every purpose so that I can knit as much as I need to even though I wish I could knit 24 hours a day just to do all the things I want to do.  I am thankful that I have enough that I can buy almost all the books I want to read and watch by streaming or buying all the movies and tv shows I want.  Almost.  I am thankful that I can afford these things.  I am thankful that I can afford an occasional bottle of Bailey's.  

I am forever thankful that I have enough that I can live in a nice warm house and stay comfortable and dry no matter what the weather is.  I am thankful for the occasional power and water outages to remind me of how lucky I am when it is on.

I am thankful that the landlord is so gosh darn cheery about running errands for me like grocery shopping and picking up my packages for me.  Life would be much more difficult if he did not.  

I am thankful for coffee, that warm elixir of mornings and that porridge remains a thing when I am hungry.  I am thankful that I came to understand the joy of wool socks and that mohair exists and that if I wanted to have a nap in the middle of the day, I can.

It is Thanksgiving weekend here in Canada.  I wish all of you a warm and cozy Happy Thanksgiving.

Where Inspriation Takes You

What to knit next is turning into a real quandry.  I don't mean next as in immediately after I finish some WIPs, I mean next as in what to start new next.  Which may happen slightly after working on WIPs, or as may be, slightly before.

I came across a really lovely pattern for my pretty Quoddy Blue Regal from my epic adventure.  The Agate Cove sweater from Knitwise Design on Ravelry.

copyright Knitwise Design

It has the sweetest little thing going on in the colourwork and it is designed for Regal.  I could do the blue for the main colour, some white that I have for colour C for the second strongest element, the welt, and I have no idea what to use for the third colour.  I was going to use Grey because i have some of that on hand, but it would put a darker colour where darker doesn't lie in the desgn.  I think I need a medium something.  I may have a enough Horizon Blue Regal for it.  It would be perfect if I did.  I really don't want to have to buy more yarn.  

I have also thought about doing it in a different yarn and saving my pretty blue for another sweater.  I have options.  I have some Custom Woollen Mills Mulespinner Two Ply that could work.  That would be three different grays for that yarn.  Cascade Eco, knit to be more firm would be okay.  I have cream, deep forest green and red.  A bit too Christmas possibly.  I think I have a skein of rust left from a vest from long ago too.  Red, cream and rust might actually work.   I may have to try that.  

I have been working with my desert island yarns lately.  All the yarns I just wanted to work with for the sheer joy of the feel or the colour, plus my epic adventure yarns.  The trouble with that is that what I need are just ordinary work day sweaters.  

I don't want to wear Myrtle to clean bathrooms. I will wear her on days when I am working with yarn or sewing days.  I wouldn't want to wear a sweater made of   Madelinetosh or another hand dyed yarn to bake bread.  

No.  I need some ordinary sweaters too.  Just simeple knits in yarns that are simple and relatively easy and inexpensive  to replace.  It is also entirely possible that a couple good aprons to wear around the kitchen and when I am cleaning would help too.  

Eco could be a good option.  I have tons of it.  I have no particular design in mind for it, though I may have when I bought it.  I bought the red for a Bountiful Bohus sweater from Big Girl Knits a very long time ago.  But using Eco+ for Agate Cove might get me exactly what I am looking for.  

It wouldn't be a bad idea to dig out the green Eco + as well.  That too would make a great workday sweater, maybe a hoodie perhaps.  Both replaceable within my market.

Inspiration may give way to need and that isn't a bad thing.  Inspriation is only ever a starting point.  I never really know where I will go from here.   
 

A matter of size.

There is nothing I dislike so much as a shawl that is too small.  A shawl needs to be the right size to sit nicely around your shoulders and stay in place.

One of my biggest shawl sadness came from my lovey Tuscany shawl.

I needed another skein of yarn and one more repeat of the pattern to get to perfection.  It is lovely, but it is just too small.  It has the double sin of not just being too small but it is also too large.  

Another was my Mizzle shawl.

It is lovely and it looked great with a crisp white collar above it.  Sadly, it was not quite wide enough that I could pin it so it stayed sitting at my neckline.  

A good shawl needs to be big enough that you can wrap it forever, like my Lillia Hyrna,

Which I can wrap fully around my neck three times and is just the warmest thing, or a shwal needs to be small enough but long enough like the Victorian Shoulderette

That is is exactly perfect and right to pin at your neck where it forms a lovely little collar.

Let's talk about the size of this thing.

Without stretching or pulling or anything, just laying it out as it is, from needle cable to what should be the center of this piece, this shawl measures 30 inches.  All scrunched like this.  30 inches.  Even if it remains all scruched like this it is already 60 inches wide, measureing to what is probably a straight side edge.  Across this giant,  corner to corner, a little math says it is at least 84 inches tip to tip.

So not too small.  I think this one is aiming for the 'wrap entire human populations' in it size.

Of Small Talk and Superpowers.

I have no idea what to write today.  I only know there is a powerful urge to write.  Sometimes I think writing it down is what saves me.  The things I write are not important, just ordinary things in  my days and yes, knitting really is my days, but the writing is the other big thing in my days.  Occasionally, I think about using those lists of questions, but it usually ends up that you already know those things if you read the blog for anytime at all. 

The lists of questions are just a kind of small talk anyway and if there is a thing that I am not good at at all, it is small talk.  I loathe large parties and events because of it.  I am not good at it and the older I get the more out of practise I am.  

I read once that in Finalnd, they do not really have small talk.  I get that.  They are a nation where it is cold and conserving energy counted.  Small talk could be seen as a waste of energy to an emerging people living on the very edge of habitable space on the planet.  If that is true, I should be Finnish if not Canadian, I think.   

While this blog appears to be short, there has been masses of writing going on that was not worth the publishing.  That mass of writing took care of my need to write, so now, freed from that need, I am going to head off to do the things of the day.  

Which takes me straight back to that list of questions.  

162. If you could have a super power, what would it be?  My superpower would be that I could clean my entire house including dishes and laundry with one twitch of my nose.  Like Samantha, from Bewitched.  Yeah.  I sure do wish that was my superpower.  

Oh well.

Knit, knit, knit.

After a day where.   there was almost no knitting, there was a lot of knitting!

I knit on my coat and made good progress.  I have only two balls of green left before I go on to the grey. No photo of it at the moment.  It will get its own post a little later.

After a few adventures trying to find my button box, I finished finished finished my Myrtle and wore it too. I am very pleased with it.

The closer neckline is exactly what I wanted.  The wide oval of the original is not my favourite.  I have to open one button to slip it on, which means I may hove gone a wee bit too close.  Oh well, changing the button, whihc is just for looks, is not any kind of big deal at all.  For tackling the very scary (for me only) knit from the bottom, I am giving myself an extra pat on the back.  I admit though, that there were many many times where I wished I was knitting from the top so I could give it a good try on and see if I was in the right general neighbourhood.

I knit a little on my big Shetland shawl.

This grey is the first one where the change was a bit more forceful and punchier.  But the lace?  Oh my goodness how this lace looks in this darker tone.  It is just smashing all my expectations.

And then this.  It was all kind of rolled up in a bag and I was a bit worried.  There did not seem to be any needles in it and I had not written down what size I was using.  But the tips were  there, just tucked inside stitches.  It was a relief.   

I made good progress on this.  It was really just barely begun though there may be one small technical glitch.  The seafoam and the turquoise don't have quite the perfect amount of contrast.  When I take all the colour out, I ought to be able to clearly see the line between the two and they pretty much disappear. 

You can see them, but only just and only if you know what you are looking for.  Sigh.  They looked so perfect on the shelf and I really don't know if I want to replace the yarn wiith not from the epic adventure yarn.  And even though the price of Briggs and Little is seriously great, do I really need to have 800 metres of yarn in my stash with no vision for it?   

I am going to give it a day or two to think about this.  I am very strongly leaning to just let it go and work with what I have.  It is hard, when you know perfection is out there. Hahaha, when I went to the website just now and was looking for a dark heathery grey, my first grab was Seafoam.  Again.  

I spent a lot of time between rows of colourwork looking at what I want to knit next.  I have some fun ideas but no firm plans.  Firm plans might not happen till the project is on the needles!

But the day is wasting and it is time for me to go have some fun!

In spain

Slippery Slopes

I dreamt of slippers last night.  Possibly my feet were cold, but in any case, I dreamt of slippers.  The slippers I dreamed of are not quite what I am doing at the moment but they may well be what I do this afternoon.

It seemed right this morning that when my feet were still cold, that I sit down and put bottoms on the socks I had planned to reuse as slippers.  These socks may have been knit with slipper making in mind, but the sadly discontinued Big Fabel sock yarn is too good for just slippers.  They needed to be socks first, it seems.  The bottoms are done for so it is time to make a change.

I am giving sheepskin a shot today.  These are from the scrap bags I purchased on my epic adventure at Egli's Sheep Farm not too far from Dryden On.  If you are ever going by or need a something wool, and don't make it yourselves?  These guys can take care of you.  

These are bags of scraps, some smaller scraps some larger, and I knew that somewhere in there were some that I could do a full sole with.

I cut the soles out roughly and dug out the awl from the set of screw drivers, pullers and stuff Keith bought me, and started poking holes.

Pictured is sole one half one, though in truth it is complete and is on my foot at the moment.  So far so fair.  This is a test pair and if it works ok, I will make a sole and then knit the 'sock' to go on top.  I expect that to be rather like Anna Zilbourg's method for knitting replaceable soles on socks. 

Something different today.  I am saving the knitting for this evening.

Aslo note to self:  Find the plyers to pull with.  That would speed the process a lot.