Tea Rose Shawlette - Finished!

I spent most of Saturday knitting the edging and finished up the last couple of repeats Sunday morning. I will confess that I did not understand the directions for the knit on edging. The chart indicates that you start on a right side row, but when I tried to follow the directions it looked like I would be starting on a wrong side row. In the end I knit an extra right side row with yarn overs as established, but no patterning. I then turned the work so the wrong side was facing and cast on my 13 stitches. I knit that first row and k2togtbl with the first live stitch from the body. I then turned the work so that the right side was facing and started with row 1 of chart F.

I was also unable to figure out the directions for working the edging at the central spine. Thanks to my extra row I had extra yarn over stitches before and after the central spine stitch. On the 18th repeat of the edging chart I joined the last stitches of rows 2, 8 and 16 to those three stitches, and did not join any of the other even rows to the body.

When I got to the end I again had one extra stitch after finishing the 35th repeat of the edging. I did row 1 of the chart and then bound off all stitches, doing a k2togtbl on the last stitch of the edge to the last stitch of the body.

Blocking was a little bit of a challenge because of the edging.  I didn't want points, I wanted round flowers.

I used pins on this one, no blocking wires and used two pins on each of the flowers on the edging to open it up without distorting it.  That is the body of my Crimson Lake under the shawl in the first picture, waiting for sleeves.  After finishing this shawlette I went back to work on the first sleeve and will probably try to finish up both sleeves and and get the pullover completed before I cast on another lace project.

Pattern:  Tea Rose Shawlette by Julia Temiseva
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Luxe in Tea Rose
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Tea Rose Shawlette - Chart E Done

And am I glad to be done with Chart E.  I was starting to get tired of Daisy Stitch, although it is a pretty stitch from a texture perspective.  Now on to the Never Ending Border, also known as Chart F.  I had to use the flash to get this picture, but the color isn't too off.  The ones that I snapped of the first two clues came out really pink.

On another topic, Fred did something really sweet this morning.  We were both in the kitchen and he walked up to me and gave me a head butt and body rub.  This is the first time he has made any demonstration of affection without prompting, and no, there was no food involved in the exchange.

Pattern:  Tea Rose Shawlette by Julia Temiseva
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Luxe in Tea Rose
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Tea Rose Shawlette - Chart D Done

The infamous Chart D is complete!  It wasn't as hard as I feared it would be, although it did take a fair bit of concentration.  The lace pattern is repetitive, but with all of the yarn overs it was trickier reading the lace - you can see how squiggly it is.  On to Chart E, which is the same as Charts A and C, so easy peasy, and then the knit on border.  And finally a not so bad picture.  It is still light out, although it is overcast, so I did have to turn the overhead light on, but at least I did not have to use the flash.  The color in this photo is pretty close to true.

Pattern:  Tea Rose Shawlette by Julia Temiseva
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Luxe in Tea Rose
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Tea Rose Shawlette - Chart C Done

Five repeats of Chart C and another not so great photo taken at night with the flash, but at least I pinned it out this time instead of taking a quick shot of it on my daybed.  I first completed Chart C on July 14, 2012 and the second time was on July 25, 2012.  Now on to Chart D.  I've already done 3 rows and this time I think I will make it through.  It is a bit tedious, with lots of yarn overs and p2tog tbls, but not insurmountable.

Pattern:  Tea Rose Shawlette by Julia Temiseva
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Luxe in Tea Rose
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Tea Rose Shawlette - Chart B Done

Another not so great photo taken with the flash last night.  I first knit Chart B on May 28, 2012 and then again on July 15, 2012.  The pattern at this point is not that hard, my issue the first time around was that the lace was not open enough.  On Charts B and D there are a number of instances where you have to do a yarn over between a knit stitch and a purl stitch or vice versa, and wrapping the yarn in those scenarios has always been a little problematic for me.  Add to that the fact that there is lace patterning on both right and wrong side rows and the situation becomes even trickier because those yarn overs don't always lay nicely and now you're trying to work something like a purl 2 together through the back loop through one and you just have a recipe for frustration.  But I'll worry about Chart D when I get to it, for now I have Chart C to work, which is just more rows of Chart A, and that is a very easy stitch pattern.  In fact it looks like a variation of the Daisy stitch, except instead of working a purl 3 together, yarn over, purl 3 together in the same 3 stitches, you knit 3 together, yarn over, knit 3 together in the same three stitches.

Pattern:  Tea Rose Shawlette by Julia Temiseva
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Luxe in Tea Rose
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Tea Rose Shawlette - Chart A Done

Here's hoping that the third time is the charm for this shawlette.  I received the pattern and yarn on April 7, 2012 as the second shipment of the Unique Sheep Smell the Roses Club.  I knit Chart A for the first time on May 7, 2012 and for the second time on July 15, 2012.  I've never gotten past Chart C.  This time around I scanned the pattern to pdf and imported it into my Knit Companion iPad App.  More and more I find myself using the app when knitting lace.  It is just so easy to read the charts, you can make them bigger with just a flick of your fingers and you never lose your place.  This is not the best picture, taken with flash, but I want to be able to start Chart B and I won't be able to get a decent shot until the weekend.

Pattern:  Tea Rose Shawlette by Julia Temiseva
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Luxe in Tea Rose
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Tea Rose Shawlette - Chart C

I finished up Chart C for the second time last night, and frogged the whole thing this morning.  I just wasn't happy with the way it was coming out.  I think I need to go up a needle size because my fabric is pretty dense and I wasn't using much yarn.  I'm going to give it a rest for a while and come back to it later when I can approach it  fresh.  It isn't as if I don't have plenty of other projects to work on.

Tea Rose Shawlette - Charts A & B

Yesterday I was on the second to last wrong side row on Chart D when I came up a stitch short at the center spine.  I checked my work and could not find my mistake.  I have found this shawl a bit of a frustrating knit because of the lace stitching on the wrong side rows.  I wasn't happy with the way my yarn overs were turning out and I didn't like the switching between knit and purl stitches with yarn overs on the wrong side rows.  I just felt like I was fighting with the knitting and that is not a good place to be.  So, I took a deep breath and frogged back to the beginning of Chart B.  I picked up my stitches, adjusted my method of doing the yarn overs on the wrong side and tried Chart B again.  But I still felt that I was fighting with the knitting, especially when I was doing the ssk stitch on the right side rows.  After a couple of rows I frogged the entire thing, re-wound my cake and put the project in a time out while I finished the first sleeve of my Raspberry Mocha Pullover and started the second.

Last night I pulled out the pattern again and pondered it, then I fired up my Knit Visualizer charting program and tackled charts B and D.  For Chart B I replaced the sl1 k2tog psso with sl1 p2tog psso.  It does change the look of the clue, as you can see from my photo of my original Chart B.  You lose the lattice effect, but you still have the rose buds, and I no longer felt like I was fighting with the knitting, the lace pattern flowed, the knitting was easy and that is how I like lace to be.

Tea Rose Shawlette - Chart C

Last night I decided that I needed to finish some of my works in progress so I pulled my Tea Rose Shawlette out of my unfinished pile.  There is a subtle variegation in the pink of this yarn, which you can just make out in the photo.  Chart C is an easy one and a lot of fun to knit, but now I have 20 rows of Chart D to knit, which has lace patterning on both right and wrong sides.

Pattern:  Tea Rose Shawlette by Julia Temiseva
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Luxe in Tea Rose
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Tea Rose Shawlette - Chart B

Now that I have my time sensitive projects underway I decided to get back to one of my other works in progress.  I do love The Unique Sheep yarns and patterns, and picking up one of their projects does feel a bit like coming home to me.  I had set this one aside after working a couple of rows of Chart B because, quite frankly, that chart is just a bit of a pain to knit.  There is lace patterning on both right side and wrong side rows and it contains one of my least favorite lace stitch combinations: a yarn over to a purl stitch.  I have my own way of doing these that does not involve wrapping the yarn around the needle.  Instead I start the yarn on the far side of the needle, bring it across the top and purl the stitch by coming up under the right hand needle tip rather than across the top.  This resulting purl stitch is reversed (leading edge on the backside of the needle rather than the front side), which then slows the next row down as I switch the orientation.  A bit of a pain, but it does result in more uniform yarn over holes.  The next chart is a repeat of Chart A, which was actually a fun chart to knit.  But Chart D looks to be a variation of Chart B.  Sigh.

Pattern:  Tea Rose Shawlette, by Julia Temiseva
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Luxe in Tea Rose
Needles:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Tea Rose Shawlette - Chart A

This is the second offering in the Stop and Smell the Roses Club from The Unique Sheep, and if you missed this round, it has been so popular that they are offering a second.  I have already signed up.  The yarn is Luxe, the color Tea Rose.  It has been sitting in one of my project bags (no, I am not going to tell you how many I have) beckoning to me.  I finally wound it into a ball this morning, so that I could start on it tonight.  The design is by Julia Temiseva.