Nightmare Before Christmas Sally Shawl - Finished!

I finished this shawl up on May 4, so two weeks ago.  I didn’t get any blogging done last weekend.  I am happy with how it came out.  At this point all of the mini-skeins from this Advent set have been knitted up into shawls and I just need to finish the borders on the other two.  Because of the way the mini-skeins were designed/dyed I ended up with four shawls - two of the garter stitch boomerang shawls, and two of the Over the Moon shawls.

Pattern:  Improvised Garter Stitch Boomerang Shawl

Yarn:  The Unique Sheep 4 Ply SW Merino Fingering and Dream in Color Smooshy with Cashmere

Needle:  US 4 (3.5 mm)
 

Nightmare Before Christmas Sally Shawl - Border Started!

I finally received the yarn for this border last week.  It took a bit of time to get here.  It was mailed from Loveland Colorado back on April 6, went from Loveland to Denver on April 7, left Denver on April 9, arrived in Richmond Virginia on April 16, and was delivered to me on April 17.  Usually my packages from The Loopy Ewe get here quicker than that.  But in any event, it did make it here safely.  I really like the color, it is Black Pearl, and it does have a sort of pearly quality to it.  It is quite interesting.

Pattern:  Improvised Garter Stitch Boomerang Shawl

Yarn:  The Unique Sheep 4 Ply SW Merino Fingering and Dream in Color Smooshy with Cashmere

Needle:  US 4 (3.5 mm)

Nightmare Before Christmas Sally Shawl - Body Done!

I finished up the body last weekend.  Now I have to decide on the border color.  I have a color that matches the last mini-skein fairly well, but I’m worried that it won’t be close enough  and will look wrong, so I looked for other options.

I have also been thinking about just working a black border, so I went to the Simply Socks Yarn Company web site to get some, and they don’t carry that color in their simply sock yarn any more.  So I went to The Loopy Ewe web site and found a skein of Dream in Color Smooshy with Cashmere.  It isn’t solid black, but I think it will work.  The colorway is called Black Pearl.

Pattern:  Improvised Garter Stitch Boomerang Shawl

Yarn:  The Unique Sheep 4 Ply SW Merino Fingering

Needle:  US 4 (3.5 mm)

Nightmare Before Christmas Sally Shawl - Two Skeins Done

I have also been making progress on my latest mindless project that I knit on at work, completing the first two skeins of the mini set and starting the third.  I like the color block thing that is going on here.

Pattern:  Improvised Garter Stitch Boomerang Shawl

Yarn:  The Unique Sheep 4 Ply SW Merino Fingering & Kiri

Needle:  US 4 (3.5 mm)

Nightmare Before Christmas Sally Shawl - Cast On!

When I got home from my 10.5 hour day on Monday I knew that I was going to need another simple project for my work bag, so I caked up another six mini-skeins from the Nightmare Before Christmas Advent set.  This set was inspired by the character Sally.  There were two skeins that were labeled as Speckle even though they obviously were not so I guessed, based on the other skeins in the Advent set, that they belonged here and assumed that the number on the label was correct even if the name was wrong.  The dark red skein at the top is the one that I was hoping to use on both this shawl and the Speckles Shawl, but it doesn’t really go with the Speckles Shawl.  I was casting this shawl on just as I was signing in to my year end review with my supervisor.  She mentioned that she had sought feedback from my peers (the other Chief Engineers) and that someone had mentioned my knitting in meetings, and that folks might think that I wasn’t paying attention.  Fortunately she didn’t think it was a big deal, but she did feel that she had to mention it.  Some years ago a previous supervisor actually wrote me a disciplinary letter regarding knitting in meetings.  I explained to my current supervisor why I knit in meetings and when I’m reading documents (it helps keep me focused), and also mentioned that I was knitting in our meeting.  I’m retiring at the end of the year, so I really don’t care at this point.

Pattern:  Improvised Garter Stitch Boomerang Shawl

Yarn:  The Unique Sheep 4 Ply SW Merino Fingering & Kiri

Needle:  US 4 (3.5 mm)