Pesto - Finished!

This was definitely an experiment.  After the short row shaping I had an entire skein of yarn left over, and you know how much I hate having leftover yarn, so I decided to add another layer of lace.   For my first, unsuccessful, attempt I repeated the lace pattern, but only over half the number of repeats.  I then joined that strip of lace to the shawl and finished off with the eyelet rows.  I should have known it would not work.

But one of the beauties of knitting is that you can always rip out and start over again.  I also noticed, to my horror, that I had missed a yarn over in the eyelet rows right after the lace.  So, I ripped and started over again.  But first I fixed that missing yarn over, pulling a stitch all the way up.  It did result in a strip of three tight stitches going up the shawl, but I figured I could address that when I blocked.  This time when I added the extra lace I decided to be a bit smarter about it.  I went ahead and finished the main body of the shawl with a repeat of the eyelet rows rather than the I-cord bind off that the pattern called for.  Then I picked up stitches right below the purl row and knit the extra lace down from that.  I went for a very simple lace pattern that would increase my stitches, hopefully to the point where they would lay flat when I blocked the shawl again.  By picking up stitches I also gave myself the flexibility to keep trying until I got it right.

If you look closely, you can still see where I picked up that extra stitch, but it is much better than it was.  I may work on it some more.   Overall, I am happy with how my experiment came out.

Pattern:  Peridot Necklace Lace Shawl by Alina Appasov
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Verve in Pesto
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Pesto - Short Row Shaping Done

After finishing up the short row shaping, I have 4 grams left of skein 2 and all of skein 1.  The short row shaping was fun, instead of doing a wrap and turn, or even a shadow wrap, you just turn the work and slip the first stitch.  Then when you come back through you do a slip, slip, knit with the stitch after the slipped stitch, or a purl two together, depending on whether you are on the right side or the wrong side.  I want to use as much of my yarn as possible so I am going to cast on 165 stitches using skein 1 and knit the lace portion again, then I am going to attach it to the neck edge, probably by just knitting the two together.  The pattern calls for an I-cord bind off, but I might just repeat the eyelet rows instead.

Pattern:  Peridot Necklace Lace Shawl by Alina Appasov
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Verve in Pesto
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Pesto - Lace Part Done

I finished up the lace portion of my Peridot Necklace Lace Shawl, which I have renamed Pesto, after the yarn color, cause I am silly like that.  As I was working on this yesterday it occurred to me that I had another 4 skein gradiance set that would look good in this pattern so off I went to dig it out of my stash.  Now, you have to understand that while most of my stash is cataloged and organized and in nice plastic containers there has been some overflow in the last year or two which has accumulated in piles in various places around the house.  The latest pile up is in the room that would be a formal dining room, if we did any formal dining.  I dug into the project bag that I thought I had put the yarn in and came up with another set.

This is Gr-orange on Tinsel Toes, and after some thinking I realized that it must have been a Sip 'n Stitch Tea Club shipment.  I dug into another project bag and found the original set that I was thinking of.

This set is Pineapple, which is one of my favorite snacks, and was also a Sip 'n Stitch Tea Club shipment.  The yarn is Verve, which is the same yarn as Pesto.  When I turn this into a shawl, I will start with the first skein, the dark green, and end with the yellow.

Pattern:  Peridot Necklace Lace Shawl by Alina Appasov
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Verve in Pesto
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Peridot Necklace Lace Shawl

Yesterday the second shipment in The Unique Sheep Gourmet Club arrived, but I didn't get a picture of it.  There was a recipe complete with spices for Ratatouille, a package of Basil seeds, a Basil Pesto recipe and this yarn.  The color is, of course, Pesto, the yarn is Verve, and I just had to find a project for it and cast on.  The pattern I settled on is Peridot Necklace Lace Shawl by Alina Appasova.  It is a crescent shaped shawl that starts at the bottom.  There are, as with all things, both advantages and disadvantages, with this construction technique.  The advantage, of course, is that the rows get shorter rather than longer.  The disadvantage, of course, is that cast on.  327 stitches.  I started out doing a long tail cast on using size 8 needles (the larger size was recommended for the cast on and bind off).  But after incorrectly estimating the length of the tail that I needed, twice, I decided to switch to a knitted cast on using size 5 needles.  After the cast on, the pattern starts off immediately with lace, and knitting lace directly after the cast on row proved tricky.  After running into trouble on the second stitch I decided to knit a row first and then start the lace pattern.  But first I had to count my stitches, again, and figure out how many I had lost - it turned out to be three.  I fixed that and happily knitted away.  The lace pattern looked trickier than it actually was and I memorized it quickly, but reading the lace was a little bit tricky and somehow I got off in the pattern and when I reached the end of the stitches I was not at the end of the row.  So, I went back to the start of the row and carefully checked the pattern to figure out where I had screwed up.  I did find it, somewhere between the halfway and two-thirds way point, and marked it with a split stitch marker, and then I went to tink back and discovered that some stitches had slipped off the needle.  Sigh.  Fixed that.  Tinked back.  I hate tinking centered double decreases.  Got back to where I had made my mistake and picked up the pattern again and when I reached the end of the stitches I was at the end of the row.  Success!  I stopped there for the night.

Pattern:  Peridot Necklace Lace Shawl by Alina Appasov
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Verve in Pesto
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

A Taste of Things to Come

Now that I am almost caught up with my backlog of crochet blocks, here are a few things waiting in the wings.  First up, of course, is the March 2013 Crochet Block, Ferris Wheel by Donna Kay Lacey. The yarn is Verve in Earth and Coal.  Check out that cute little spinning wheel stitch marker!  I rarely use stitch markers, and when I do they are pretty plain, but I have a whole tin (not an Altoids tin, but a Newman's Own Cinnamon Mints Tin) full of pretty stitch markers that I have received as part of kits and clubs.  One of these days I am going to make some jewelry out of them.  I'm thinking a chain-mail necklace.  I've always wanted to try chain-mail jewelry and even have a kit I picked up a couple of years ago at Bead & Button.

Yesterday I received two packages from The Unique Sheep, which went a long way towards making up for the rough week that I had.

This is the first shipment from the new Gourmet club.  The yarn is Back to Basics 2, a worsted weight Merino that I have never tried before, the colors are Lemon Balm and Laurel.  Along with the yarn were two cute cookies cutters, two cookie recipes and a pattern for a double knit pot holder.  I've been wanting to try double knitting and this might be just the project to get me started.  The pot holder is also supposed to be fulled, which is something else I have never done before.  And I am seriously thinking about making some cookies today...

I also received my yarn for the next Unique Sheep Knit Along - Treasure Island.

The colorway is Tranquility on Luxe, with gold lustered raspberry beads.  I will probably not be knitting along with the rest of the group because this is another circular shawl, well, actually I think it will be octagonal - pieces o' eight - get it?  But I will probably modify the shawl because I have decided that I don't really do circular shawls anymore.  Been there, done that, they are lovely to display and there is one living on my piano, but I don't really wear them.

Some time ago, when I pulled my Evenstar shawl out and placed it on my piano on permanent display

 I vowed that I would make another one to wear so I ordered a set of Eos from The Unique Sheep.

The colorway is Midnight Delight, and it is a set that is specially dyed up for the Evenstar shawl, which is why that skein on the right is fatter than the rest, that one will be the outer edge.  I still haven't completely decided on my design modification, but I am thinking about making it a circular cape, so keeping with the circular theme, but making the neck area bigger, and obviously not working it as a circular shawl - that would turn it in to a poncho, which would not do for this design.  I have seen some beautiful dresses made out of this pattern, especially this stunning one by FadenStille, but am not sure I want to tackle something quite that challenging.

You will no doubt have noticed the constant thread running through this post.  All of the yarn is from The Unique Sheep.  With furloughs looming on the horizon, my disposable income is going to being pretty sharply reduced, so I have been cutting back on the clubs as well as yarn purchases in general, but The Unique Sheep is exempt from the cuts.  Yes, I love them that much.  Zen Yarn Garden is also partly exempt.  I am sitting out the latest Fickle-Zen knit along,but I did sign up for the next Butterfly-Zen knit along.