Fiori Di Sole - Finished!

I finally finished Thursday night. Charts F, G, H and I are the hardest. The crochet bind off is also a bit tricky. It is all chains and slip stitches, but slip stitching 5 live stitches from the shawl together can be challenging, especially when you are working with a 2.25mm crochet hook and lace weight yarn - I don’t think I would try this with silk.

For the bind off I held the working yarn in my left hand, and had the end of the knitting needle with the live stitches also in my left hand - sort of as if I were knitting continental. When chaining the live stitches together I would slip the bunch onto the crochet hook, wrap the yarn around the hook, rotate the hook so that it faced down towards the bottom of the stitches and gently pull the yarn through. I generally did not pull through the live border stitches and the stitch on the crochet hook all in a single move, but instead did it in two steps. It can be a bit tricksy, especially when you have stitches that were yarn overs on the next to the last row, and a couple of times I did lose the yarn, or the live stitches leaped off the crochet hook.   They were a pain to pick up, and swearing was involved.

When pulling the yarn through the live border stitches I would gently hold that bunch of stitches with my thumb and middle finger, keeping a slight tension on them so they stretched out a little. That seemed to make it easier.

It took me an hour to pin because of all of those crochet chain stitch loops.  I ran blocking wires through the two outermost loops and then went back and pinned out each loop, removing the blocking wires as I went.

Here is a beauty shot.  The shawl is an absolute dream to wear, soft, light, wonderful drape.

Pattern - Fiori di Sole by Rosemary (Romi) Hill
Yarn - Serenity Lace, by Zen Yarn Garden, color - On Fire
 
While I have been focusing on this shawl, it isn't the only thing I've been up to.  I have two more Fiesta Yarns pullovers on the needles, Barcelona and Caribbean.  I am almost done with the body on the Barcelona pullover, but have only just started the Caribbean pullover, which is my third Camp Loopy project.  I will get lots of knitting done on those two pullovers today as we are taking Stephen back to Virginia Tech - 8 hours of knitting in the car.  I have also been continuing to organize and catalog my yarn stash, and have made great progress.  Of course, organizing the yarn is only one small step in getting my studio organized, there is also the fabric stash and all of the sewing patterns, not to mention the books and magazines...but I will get there.

Fiori Di Sole - Chart E - Finished

Five repeats of Chart E completed, finally.  Actually it wasn't too bad, the chart was pretty easy to memorize, but wasn't too boring.  Now on to chart F (and then G, H, and I and then it will be done).  I started this shawl on January 1, 2011 and it has been sitting around far too long.  I need to finish it so I can cast on another lace shawl.  I think the next one I knit will be Moonfleet, which is the first Unique Sheep KAL that I signed up for.  The yarn is all wound into a nice cake and the beads are sitting with it, along with a knitting needle.  The yarn and the beads have actually been sitting in the same spot for months.  Now that I have knit so much of this shawl, I am a little sorry that I didn't add beads, some nice red beads would look great accenting the points of Chart E, and maybe outlining the petals of the flowers...

Fiori Di Sole - Chart B

I have been a busy girl this weekend.  I finished my Avira shawl and my Mystery Socks and Chart B of my Fiori di Sole shawl.  I was so happy to be able to get back to this shawl.  I love the yarn, love the color and love the pattern.  When I first looked at the charts I thought that this would be a fairly difficult knit but so far it has been pretty easy.

Fiori Di Sole - Chart A

I fell in love with this pattern the moment I saw it and knew that I had to knit this in Zen Yarn Garden's Serenity Lace.  This is Chart A, and I know that it doesn't look like much yet, but it will.  The colorway is On Fire.  The designer is Rosemary (Romi) Hill of Designs by Romi and I have recently become a fan of hers.  She has done a series of seven small shawls inspired by the Seven Sisters, also known as the Pleiades's, which I shall also be knitting.

Tools of the Trade - Zen Yarn Garden - Serenity Lace

I cannot keep my hands off of this yarn.  I first discovered Zen Yarn Garden yarns last year during the Year of Lace.  The yarn for the Wisteria Garden Shawl is Zen Yarn Garden Sea Lace.  That shawl was my first lace shawl, and that yarn was my first lace yarn.  I wanted more Zen Yarn, so I went to her web site and signed up for the email list.  I bought two skeins of the Serenity Lace last year when I first caught the lace bug.  I think that they were my first lace yarn purchases outside of the Year of Lace club.  I couldn't resist the name having both Buddhist leanings and being a fan of Firefly.

The yarn is 90% superwash merino and 10% cashmere.  It comes in 1200 yd / 4 oz skeins and is very reasonably priced at $38.00 a skein.  It winds up easily and knits like a dream.  It is very soft, with a very high fondle factor.  The colorway on the left is Fig Tree, the colorway on the right is 14kt, and the one in the middle is Into the Fire.  The yarn has just the right amount of twist, which gives it a springy body that makes it feel alive in your hands.  It also has great stitch definition as can be seen in the close-up of the center panel of the Phoenix Rising Shawl.

A wonderful yarn, beautiful colorways, great price, great customer service.  What more could one ask for?

Phoenix Rising Shawl - Body Chart Started

I finished the first repeat of the Body Chart.  I charted the left side to make it mirror the right.  The yarn is a real dream to work with and I love the colors. 

Phoenix Rising Shawl

 

As if I need another project on the needles, let alone another lace shawl, but I am really excited about this one.  It may partly be the title, Phoenix Rising.  The Phoenix is such a powerful myth, and one that I can relate to.  This pattern was originally part of the 2008 Year of Lace, but I didn't join YOL until 2009, so I picked up the pattern when it became available to the general public.  Then I had to find the perfect yarn.  Fortunately I discovered Zen Yarn Garden's Serenity Lace, and in the absolute perfect colorway - "Into the Fire."  The last task was finding the perfect beads - they are red transparent with a gold luster.

One mod to the pattern (do I ever not mod the pattern?) - I charted the left side to make it symmetric with the right - there's that symmetry thing again.  The design is by Sivia Harding.