Minty Leaves and Maelstrom

Minty Leaves Socks
Originally uploaded by sunasak

Yay for the long weekend. It's enabled me to finish my Minty Leaves socks (they only took 9 days, so I was zooming on these, at least for me). I enjoyed these a lot, and am enjoying wearing them today! I had a lot of "business" at the yarn shop on Saturday, so I got a lot done in between people's questions and such, then yesterday I had a lot of time to knit while awaiting some out-of-town guests, and then while listening to conversations with them and their chatty (yet adorable in their own ways) daughters (7 and 10). I just had to knit 20 minutes this morning to finish.

So, I think I talked about the yarn already. I got a very tight gauge out of it, which makes me think I'd like to get some more yarn from this base to make socks that call for more stitches around--I like to make more intricate patterns, but with my loose gauge, I have trouble getting the socks to fit me. This Perfect Day Beat Sock yarn is something I'd definitely get more of. And I like the semi-solid effect, too.

The pattern was a lot of fun, and it looks better than I thought it was going to, other than the gusset pick-up on one side having a funny line--I guess I had never picked up on purl stitches before, and should have done a slightly different method. At least they match, since I did both socks at the same time! And it was fun to just knit nothing but the socks for a week. I was a monogamous knitter.

Well, I was actually a little unfaithful yesterday, because I was in spired to start a new project, the Maelstrom shawl (it is available on Ravelry, but only there as far as I know). It's a new pattern--mine was just its second project, but there was a LOT of interest in it at my LYS. I had seen it in the new patterns listing on Friday, and when I came to the shop on Saturday, Pat already had printed a copy and was waving it at me. Then another patron came in all excited about it (however, she is making so many other complex things right now, I doubt she'll get to this one). It's an easy knit, but I love the way it looks--like a hurricane from above.

I am not sure why I am making so many easy shawls these days, but I am fine with it. At least this one has more complexity than the Silky Kerchief. The pattern goes on and on--the author is very precise, and includes both written-out and charted instructions, so it would be a good project for a less experienced lace knitter.

I chose my brand new yarn that just came in the mail on Saturday. I have 1400 yards of fingering weight wool from Knitivity--Ray dyed the two hanks at the same time, so they match really well. The colors are very muted browns, blues and reds (the red is very muted). He called it "Mountain Cabin." I like how it blends with the decor of my media room, so I am hoping to use the shawl as a lap afghan. I'm not sure how big it will come out. The sample for the pattern was knitted, I think, with a slightly thinner yarn and on a smaller gauge, but I could be wrong. I'll just have to see! At any rate, I am enjoying how easy the yarn is to knit with, and the pattern, which has enough to it to keep me interested, but doesn't require constant attention to the chart, either.

Of course, I started a new pair of socks as soon as the Minty Leaves were finished. I just have to. I am making the pattern that came out for the Loopy Ewe's first anniversary, last year, but from a different yarn, a self-striping bamboo blend from Twisted Yarns, called Organic Stripe. The colorway is called "Batty," but it really doesn't look like a bat. It has gold, green and purple, but muted variations. I think the pattern will show up really well in this color. So far, this yarn really feels nice, too.

I hope to get more knitting done the rest of the day, though I have some work to do (I am a contractor, so no paid holidays for us!). Nor for the lawn maintenance dudes. I see a neighbor getting their lawn cut. Gee, those guys deserve a break, too, but I know they need the money.

Little News

I hope to have more interesting fodder tomorrow, but for today I will just say that I am well into the gusset on the Minty Leaves socks, which are very delicate and even a bit small (that is some THIN yarn I am using), but they will fit nicely. This time I did the picking up for the gusset correctly and don't have to rearrange the stitches. I see where I messed up last time, and won't do that again!

My hands were hurting last night, so I didn't knit much. I have been reading a lot, mostly about knitting, but that doesn't make for interesting photos. I think I am percolating ideas, then a lot of writing will gush forth from me. Maybe even, dare I hope, something interesting! Even I am getting tired of daily reports on how much I have knit.

Oh yeah, one brave thing I did today was comment on the Yarn Harlot blog, which is something I try to avoid doing--so many people comment that I feel like anything I'd say would be said by someone else. But, she was SO good and didn't say something snarky to a woman who insisted that her knitting was crochet. If I was an author of numerous knitting books and someone did that, I am so afraid I'd ask them, "And how many books on knitting have YOU published???" She actually said NOTHING. So, there is some ignorant person wandering around Canada who will never get far if she plans on crocheting anything.

Minty Leaves Weekend and Silky Kerchief "Pattern"

Minty Leaves Beginning
Originally uploaded by sunasak

I didn't feel like starting much of anything this weekend, so I did what I would call "comfort knitting," which means I worked on socks the whole time. The picture shows how far along I was on these socks by Saturday evening. By last night, it was double this, plus a little. I am almost to the heel.

The socks are Leaves of Whimsy, which were in the Knitting Pattern-a-Day calendar and also are available here

Apparently you have to buy some other product to get this for free. Or you had to buy the calendar, like I did. It's a simple leaf pattern where the patterning goes all the way down the heel, so it will be good with my usual clogs and Birks. I am using a very fine 100% merino yarn from Perfect Day Yarns, called Beat Sock. It is very tightly spun, in fact, a bit too tight in spots. Near the beginning it was unwound for a bit, but it's settled into a tightly twisted consistency. It's fine to work with, just tightly spun. It's acid dyed in pale mint green that seems to be a reasonable choice for leaves. It looks great on a leg or hand, not so great all folded upon itself on the needles. It's lace and needs to stretch!

It's been nice to take a rest from knitting that involves a lot of thought. I'll have to move on to the lace top soon enough.

Silk Kerchief Shawlette Pattern

I have received a few requests for the pattern to the Silky Kerchief shawlette That's a bit easier said than done, since I rather winged it, but used printed sources. If you are dying to make one, here's the closest I can get to a recipe (I will add page number for the border when I can look it up):

Yarn: 2 skeins any color Noro Silk Garden Sock, one skein of the neutral S269. I used S87 for mine.

Main body: Silky Kerchief

This is easy as long as you know how to do a provisional cast on. Just make this but keep going until you run out of one of your skeins of yarn. Make sure you reserve a whole skein of your colorful yarn for the border--I ran out because I used a little of mine in the main body.

Once your main body is done, attach the border using standard knit-on border technique (when you get to the inner edge, knit last stitch together with one stitch from the body of the shawl).

I used a garter stitch border that made little cubes, which I found in Knitting beyond the Edge or Knitting on the Edge by Nicky Epstein. I will look that up, I promise. It is near the back of whichever book it is in.

When I got to the center, I was overjoyed to see I was at a pattern repeat end. If I hadn't been, I'd have done four rows in one shawl stitch instead of two for a few rows until I got to a good edge.

On the center sttitch, I did a series of short row wedges that each ended with a [K2tog, YO, K1] so the eyelets would continue around the corner. I just ended each row one stitch sooner until there were three stitches left, then knitted back to the end and repeated. This turned the corner. You could do any kind of wedge that you like, or simply do the 4 rows per body stitch thing for a few rows as you approach the center, then try 6 in the center, then 4 rows per body stitch for the same number as you did approaching the center, keeping the pattern going. As long as you have a reasonable amount of additional rows, it will be OK. No, I do not know how many constitute a "reasonable amount." It just needs to lie flat as it goes around the corner. Ideally, you'd have a point or a valley in the center. But, it would probably look fine if the pattern just kept a-goin', too.

When you get near the end, try to aim to have the edge be at the end of a pattern repeat. You can fudge by knitting 3 together on a couple of rows. The garter stitch has enough "give" that this won't show.

Well, that's how I did it. I winged it, what can I say? I think it looks fine, even if it wasn't very scientific.