Linger Later Brioche Cowl - Finished!

I've been wanting to try out Brioche for a while now and this afternoon I finally did.  The yarn is from the Space Cadet Space Monsters club, a yarn club that features heavier weight yarns.  I don't usually knit with the heavier weight yarns, but decided I wanted to stretch myself some so I joined.  This was the August 2019 yarn, Linger and Later.  One was the club shipment and the other was the complementary colorway that they dyed to go with it.  I ordered the complementary color right away, but then they sat in my stash while I tried to figure out what to make with them.  I knew that I wanted a cowl, and I wanted something that would show case the yarn.  This afternoon I finally realized that a Brioche cowl would be perfect.  I searched Ravelry for a simple Brioche Cowl and found this.  Super easy, super fast, very addicting.  Here is the other side.  I love that Brioche is completely reversible.

Pattern:  Beginners Brioche Cowl by Lavanya Patricella
Yarn:  SpaceCadet Elara
Needle:  US 9 (5.5 mm)

Oranjestad - Finished!

I finished up this shawl a week ago, exactly, after some concentrated effort.  It was very bunched up on the needles towards the end.  Blocking was fun, I put blocking wires though all of the picots, and blocked pretty aggressively.  I finally got some pictures today.

It's actually kind of hard to tell which is the right side and which is the wrong side.  Big shawl.  Drapey.  Fun colors.  Easy knit.

Pattern:  Oranjestad Shawl by Lavanya Patricella
Yarn:  Uschitita Merino Singles
Needle:  US 6 (4.0 mm)

Oranjestad Shawl - Color B Done

I pulled this project back out yesterday so I could knit and read (Book 8 of the Saxon Tales).  I had actually gotten to the point where I was about to introduce Color C before I set it aside to work on some other projects.  I blithely worked two rows in Color C, and then realized that the first of those two rows should have been an eyelet row.  I really did not want to tink back 400+ stitches in each row, so I grabbed my Circular Stitch Holder from Clover

and carefully threaded it through the last row I had worked of Color B.  I bought these from The Loopy Ewe when I had a store credit I needed to use and didn't really need to buy any yarn.  I've used them as stitch holders but this was the first time I tried using one as a life-line.  I'm happy to say that it worked perfectly.  Once I had it in place I pulled the knitting needle out, pulled out the two rows I had just worked, and put the stitches back onto my knitting needle to start again.

Pattern:  Oranjestad Shawl by Lavanya Patricella
Yarn:  Uschitita Merino Singles
Needle:  US 6 (4.0 mm)

Oranjestad Shawl - Color A Done

I have been working pretty steadily on this shawl while reading.  I have been reading Bernard Cornwell's Saxon Tales, which are the source for the series "The Last Kingdom" although they changed enough that it was confusing to be reading the early books while watching the series, so we stopped watching the series and kept reading the books.  We had a similar experience with Game of Thrones.  We will watch it, eventually, after it is complete.  We doubt the novels ever will be finished, which is sad, because he created a very rich world (with some very twisted people in it, I really wonder about authors sometimes).  We've also read the Expanse novels, which made the TV series easier to understand, because that first season was pretty confusing.

Color A in the shawl is Unknown.  Seriously, that is the name of the colorway, although if you didn't know what it was you might have a hard time determining the name from the label.

The top label is the band from Color A.  The k is easy to pick out, but the rest?  Color B is Sugared Violets, which is easy enough to read, and it is dominated by purple, my favorite color.  I've been striping it in for a little while now, but have now cut Color A and am only working with Color B.

Pattern:  Oranjestad Shawl by Lavanya Patricella
Yarn:  Uschitita Merino Singles
Needle:  US 6 (4.0 mm)

Oranjestad Shawl - Cast On

This is one of those crescent garter stitch shawls.  I don't usually knit with single ply yarn, but I really loved the colors in the original shawl so I tracked the yarn down and then a very nice Raveler gifted me the pattern (it was in my queue and on my wish list) as a thank you for my creating a progress tracking chart for Ambah O'Brien's Adventurer Shawl.  This is pure mindless knitting, except for the beginning and ends of rows.  I have the pattern set up in knitCompanion, complete with repeat rows - I'm getting pretty good at setting those up.

Pattern:  Oranjestad Shawl by Lavanya Patricella
Yarn:  Uschitita Merino Singles
Needle:  US 6 (4.0 mm)