Seaweed Shawl

Back in early December last year, I decided to spin up some blended alpaca and silk tops that I had bought on a whim. I wanted something more than a standard 100g skein so I added in 60g of merino in lichen green and indigo blue left over from other projects.

I had a fancy to knit a lace shawl so I spun as fine as I could manage and over 5 weeks, produced 160g of approximately lace weight yarn. Really it was anywhere between cobweb and sport weight but primarily lace to light fingering weight. I was still pretty pleased with myself.

I liked the look of this but felt I might wear it more if I put it through a blue dyebath. So I did.

It was then saying “ocean” to me, so I went looking for patterns that also spoke of this. I settled on “Ocean Scarf” by Eunny Jang but had trouble getting the pattern. So frustrating! I persevered though and found the chart for the body of the shawl eventually. I knitted a couple of repeats of the main pattern and then reluctantly decided I wanted it wider, so I frogged it and started over with an extra motif. Yes, much better.

Yes that is a provisional cast on because I wanted to try my hand at a knitted on border. This was confusing for a bit but fine once I figured out how it worked. Very happy to have conquered another technique. I used a border called “Normandy lace” but expanded it to get a double zigzag to echo the main pattern.

Somehow I ended up in a very tight game of yarn chicken. I had kept records and calculated carefully but must have lost count somewhere. In an attempt to avoid having to reknit the last section, I swapped to slightly smaller needles halfway through the last border.

It was tense there in the last stages but I won!

Having thoroughly proven again that I enjoy lace knitting, I invested in a set of blocking wires which happily arrived a little before I finished. Here she is all pinned out, waiting for the afternoon sun.

I was so pleased with it that I couldn’t resist trying it out even before sewing in the ends. It has come out pretty much exactly the shape I wanted and i love the pattern.

I actually think of it as the Luidaeg shawl, but not everyone has read the Seanen McGuire’s October Daye books

Rosewater Beret

Long time no post. I’ve been working on presents that I can’t publish yet, things I don’t normally post here like gardening and brewing. Also, fiddly knitting. This is the most difficult lace pattern I’ve knitted yet. It gave me a bunch of trouble until I found a needle arrangement that worked for me. I started on a circular with magic loop, which was fine for the rib band but I quickly got muddled after I started the lace. I moved to the only dpns I had of the right size, which happened to be slippery metal ones. I was better able to keep track of where I was at with the dpns but the weight of the work+needles dragged a bunch of stitches off the next needle in line. Horror. Picking up dropped stitches in lace knitting isn’t easy! A clever friend suggested using one needle per pattern repeat, and lighter, more grabby bamboo ones. She even loaned me the needles. This worked much better, and looked pretty amusing.

Here it is finished, but not yet blocked:

Steam blocking over a tailor’s ham shows off the pattern. It’s by Tin Can Knits and the rose motif is inspired by the art of Charles Rennie Mackintosh.

And on. The fit is good. I made the rib band bigger than the largest size by 8 stitches but the rest is to pattern. I’m not happy with the gathering at the top of the crown, but it’s a nice warm hat and pretty. Very warm actually. This is 8ply yarn and is thought to be alpaca, or alpaca rich (It’s from Bendigo Woolen Mills back room, unlabelled clearance stock). I’ll need proper cool weather to wear this comfortably.

I’m amused that this photo inadvertently shows evidence that I do actually possess eyelashes, they are just too fair to be seen usually.