Rose Bolero - Finished!

 

I finished this up last weekend.  I didn’t have enough yarn to work the picot edging, but I did have enough to work a single crochet around the armholes just to give them a neat finish.  I had to undo all of the joining I had done of blocks to the body, but not the joining of blocks to blocks.  When I got the last block attached I had a gap of 12 stitches between the last one and the first one.  Oops.  So I pulled the thread and all the blocks came off.  Then I counted out intervals of 18 stitches, plus two that had 19 stitches, and marked them with locking stitch markers.  I then finished joining all of the blocks to each other in a long strip (per the pattern instructions) and joined them together into a loop, being careful not to twist the loop when I joined.  With the wrong sides facing each other I joined the loop of blocks to the body using the locking stitch markers.  Once that was done I started joining once more.  This time everything worked out.  

Pattern:  DROPS 126-8 Rose Parade by DROPS Design

Yarn:  Fiesta Yarns La Luz Multi in Rose (June Flower of the Month colorway)

Hook:  D (3.25 mm)

Goblin Kalari - Choosing a Color for the Edging

 

I had finished the knitting on the body of my Goblin Kalari some time back and had even started working an edging with one of the skeins from the Santa Rosa trio, but I just wasn’t feeling it, so I set it aside to let my subconscious ponder it.  Today I decided to try a couple of other combinations.

I think I like the orange.  It has a bit of a Halloween feel to it, which is totally appropriate.  I’ll give it a shot and see how it looks.

Pattern:  Kalari by Ambah O’Brien

Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Kiri in Goblin Ombré 

Needle:  US 6 (4.0 mm)

Woodsman Shawl II - Cast On

 

I needed another mindless knit for work knitting, so I pulled this skein out of my recent stash.  I made a simple boomerang shawl for my sister with this colorway, and I so loved the color that I purchased a second skein to make a shawl for myself.

Pattern:  Improvised (Boomerang shawl)
Yarn:  SpaceCadet Yarns Oriana in Woodsman
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Kentia Wrap - Cast On and Three Contrast Skeins Done

This is a recent release from Ambah O’Brien.  The recommended yarn is by Koigu, and went with a kit, which includes a pencil set of 10 mini skeins plus a main color.

The shawl is composed of mosaic sections alternating with slip stitch sections, which results in a wonderful texture as well as color play.  It is a very addicting pattern to knit.

Pattern:  Kentia Wrap by Ambah O’Brien

Yarn:  Koigu KPM and KPPPM

Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Rose Bolero - Attaching the blocks

After sitting sealed up in a plastic project bag for the last eight years, I finally pulled this project back out and am almost done with it.  I had set it aside after making one of the crochet blocks for the edge.  For some reason I just didn’t feel like making seventeen more.  I actually ended up needing nineteen to make it around the edge.  Amazingly enough the other eighteen that I made in this past week matched up size-wise with the one that I made eight years ago.  The pattern calls for joining all of the blocks and then joining to the body of the bolero, but I decided to join the blocks to the bolero individually first, and then joining the blocks.  I am doing a single crochet join for all of my seams, as I like the way it looks and I didn’t feel like doing a lot of sewing.

My last six blocks are drying.  They should be dry later today and I can finish this up this weekend.  In the process of finishing this bolero I have re-discovered that I enjoy crocheting.  I may have to do more, even though I can’t read or really watch TV while doing it.

Here are my last six blocks.

Pattern:  DROPS 126-8 Rose Parade by DROPS Design

Yarn:  Fiesta Yarns La Luz Multi in Rose (June Flower of the Month colorway)

Hook:  D (3.25 mm)

Reverberation Shawl - Two Colors Done

 

I finished up color 2 yesterday.  I was not able to complete the entire section as written in the pattern.  You can see in the picture the tiny bit of the green that I have left over.  At the end of the first color there are 114 stitches on the needle.  You continue increasing with the second color until you get to 130 stitches.  That is an increase of 16 stitches, and each repeat of the pattern gives you 4 stitches, so that means 4 repeats to get to 130 stitches.  Then the instructions state to repeat the pattern 7 more times - 28 rows total.  I’m two repeats or 8 rows short.  I had seen a comment on one of the project pages on Ravelry about making sure you get gauge and yarn chicken.  I did not do a gauge swatch, but am using the recommended needle size and am knitting pretty tightly (and am not seeing any rowing out on my wrong side, yay!).

For this pattern I’m not concerned with the fact that I had to cut this section short.  It is easy to shorten a section to adjust to yarn usage, so I’m not sweating it.

Pattern:  Reverberation Shawl by Debbie O’Neill

Yarn:  Sweet Georgia Yarns Tough Love Sock

Needle:  US 3 (3.25 mm)

Reverberation Shawl - Cast On and One Color Done

 

Having finished up a couple of projects I obviously needed to cast on something new, despite the fact that I currently have twenty WIPs on my Ravelry project page.  This one is The Loopy Ewe Advent Kit from 2019.  It was a bit of an odd one in that the bags had no numbers on them, you could open them in any order you wanted to, or all at once.  I can’t remember for certain what I did, but I probably opened them all at once.  It came with a pattern, the Reverberation Shawl by Debbie O’Neill.  Here are the mini skeins, which did not come with any labels at all, no yarn type, no color names.  I deduced from other clues that the yarn is Sweet Georgia Yarns Tough Love Sock, and I think the order in the picture is the order that I’m going to use them in (going from left to right), although I reserve the right to change my mind.

The Advent set also came with some notions:

Pattern:  Reverberation Shawl by Debbie O’Neill

Yarn:  Sweet Georgia Yarns Tough Love Sock

Needle:  US 3 (3.25 mm)

Bifrost - Finished!

 

I finished up my Bifrost scarf last week, it took me just under a year (I started it November 14, 2019 and finished it October 6, 2020).  It was a fun, mindless knit, and I enjoyed the colors.  The yarn has a nice feel to it, a bit rustic.

Pattern:  Bifrost by Cate Carter-Evans

Yarn:  Infinite Twist Helix Treasure Cakes

Needle: US 5 (3.75 mm)

Adventurous Beach - Finished!

 

I ended up making two shawls, one each out of each half of the Advent set.  This is skeins 1, 14-25.

This is skeins 1-13.

I suppose that I could have mixed the triangles rather than matching them, so that each shawl used all 25 colors but I think I had just gotten so used to working with each half set of colors separately that it didn’t really occur to me until later.  I’m not sure how I would have paired them up if I had done it that way.  By doing it this way I have two fades, and I really like fades.  I did think about putting all four triangles together into one huge shawl, but the thought of trying to block that just made me want to go hide.  Even blocking these took a lot of floor space and most of my blocking mats.

Pattern:  Adventurous Shawl by Ambah O’Brien

Yarn:  Sunshine Yarns Classic Sock in the Beach Tones Advent Set

Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Adventurous Beach - Four Triangles Done!

 

I finished up the fourth triangle today.  While knitting this last triangle I pondered what I would do with them when they were all done.  I considered joining them all together to make one shawl, but I realized that shawl would be huge.  Too huge.  So I came up with the idea of two shawl, each using half of the Advent set.  But instead of just joining the two triangles I decided to use up the leftovers from each pair of triangles to add some length between the two triangle with rows of garter stitch worked on the bias to match the bias of the triangle edge.

Pattern:  Adventurous Wrap by Ambah O’Brien

Yarn:  Sunshine Yarns Beach Tones Advent Set

Needle: US 5 (3.75 mm)

Garden Variety MKAL - Finished!

I finished this up this past Monday, although I didn’t block it until Tuesday.  It was a lot of fun.  I enjoyed the construction and the color work and the pattern was extremely well-written.  It is huge, about two feet wide and eight feet long.

Pattern:  Garden Variety MKAL by Lisa K. Ross

Yarn:  Miss Babs Yummy 2-Ply

Needles:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Shimmer & Shine - Finished!

From a temporal perspective, I find knit on borders fascinating.  When you first start them you don’t seem to be making much progress, then suddenly you are halfway done, and then you get to those last 10 or so repeats and everything seems to slow down again.  I finished up the knit on border this past Wednesday and blocked it right away.  It is huge, but so light and floaty.

Pattern:  Woollsia by Ambah O’Brien

Yarn:  Sundara Yarns Extra Fine Fingering Merino

Needles:  US 5 (3.75 mm)