New Work and new laptop

My wonderful BIL John gave me his old HP laptop which he nicely had wiped clean of his stuff, and it is just fantastic! Better than any of the cheapo ones in my computer past. Yay!! It does everything I want and more, which I have not yet figured out. I am back in bidness! 

OK new work. A second Pointless Scarf in light blue to match my light blue pullover which coordinated with nothing in my whole wardrobe... until I saw that my Fuss Free Cowl from last year had a lot of light blue yarn in it. Yay!

Then I looked at my collection of scrap yarn and thought: it is time for a scrappy project.

 This was mega fun to knit and barely made a dent in my scrap collection. It is 50" by 8" and cozy and soft. After finishing the scarf I added an I-cord edge, which ripples, darn. O well, it will be tucked in my coat, so who cares?

And then I thought, here it is Socktober and I haven't knit even one pair of socks! Fear not, I have new sock which I dyed yesterday and it is drying right now.

I ordered new yarn which is fingering but on the plumper side, which will make super cozy socks, and new dye Purple Pop which is really purple. Sigh, so happy. That pink was another attempt at speckle dyeing and while it fell flat and is not speckled, it will still be usuable as variegated. The greens were toned down as ALL my previous greens are screaming green, which I do love, but don't blend as well with some of my commercial yarns. And I needed yellow/orange, also not screaming. 

So glad it is cooler now and autumnal. On to sock knitting!

    

A bunch of FOs

  I've avoided posting because my laptop is slower than a snail in molasses.  This little scarf was inspired by a Youtube video podcast from It is a Sarah.   I saw the scarf that she had knit in separate triangles and I had to make one of my own, contiguously, meaning picking up from the previous triangle to knit the next one. I emailed her pictures of mine (which took only a day and a half to knit) and she featured it in her podcast the next week. Didn't mention my name but you can't have everything.

Next we have the Truffle Shawl variation #6, this time in fingering weight which I really love.  The purples are my hand dyed yarns and so is the lighter aqua.

I recently purchased some lovely pullovers (Walmart!!!) and dyed the yarn to match for shawls. I have another pullover in purple with which this shawl works perfectly. (never end a sentence with a preposition.)

So I thought I might as well make another one for my red pullover. This is Truffle Shawl Variation #7.

 My sister Brooke suggested the I-cord tie, genius!

Shawl Season

 Ojos de Dios scarf.  This scarf was inspired by the Lubushka Cowl pattern to which I added a lot of red and lengthened into a long scarf.

 It has occured to me finally that here in Tennessee it never gets cold like it did in Illinois (really??) and that led me to switch to making lighter weight garments and accessories. So I am using more fingering weight yarns and finer sport and DK weights. These take a bit more time to knit, on much smaller needles, but are just wonderful to wear all year long. Our church has great AC and I would have been chilly all summer, but for the shawls I have worn. 

All merino in sport weights, size 3 needles. 

 My second shawl of this update is called Autumn Transitions. I have used mostly Merino Bliss 175 and some merino sock yarns. It consists of bands of garter ridges followed by five sets of slipped stitches on a stockinette base. I used a softer graduated palette in keeping with the season.

 Just for fun, here is the backside of the Ojos Scarf, lots of ends to weave in, which I finished!

Cherry Frappe Shawlette

 Cherry Frappe Shawlette

Silk and Merino. I am continuing to use my  stash yarns, ones I have been saving for something knit worthy.  $45 + shipping (US only). Email or text me.

 The pink and the multicolor are both 100% silk and the red is 75% Merino and 25% silk, so this is a pretty fancy and yummy combo to knit. 

 I tried something different today, taking pictures with my tablet instead of my phone, because I have an older phone with a very small amount of memory and I constantly have to delete pics in order to take new ones. The tablet also makes it very easy to post to Instagram which is where I hope I will find the audience who is interested in knits and who will purchase what I am making. 

 I keep working on this design, making tweeks,  changing sizes, needles, yarns and color to make the best possible design, before I write out the pattern. I am getting closer to that final version.

 While I have been focusing on fingering weight yarns, this one is DK and went a little faster and grew more than the fingering weight ones. I think the pattern will remain the same for each weight of yarn, but the needles and finished dimensions will change.  If I use worsted or chunky, it would grow accordingly.

 FYI, I knit the main body of the Shawlette and then go back and pick up stitches along the bottom edge to make the rows of eyelets and pico bind off.

Pointless Scarf

 I'm calling this scarf pointless because I curved the back which is usually a point of the long triangle. It's not that the scarf is not worthy. I used all leftovers like Chroma fingering and Stroll fingering. It is knit sideways, tip to tip, increasing or decreasing every fourth row. Garter, and size 2 needles.

 I love the color shifts, and such soft colors too. Delicate and feminine. $45 plus postage. Emailme.

Mitered Picolette Scarf

  

The Mitered Picolette Scarf may be my fave scarf to knit. It offers endless opportunities for variations, and works for lots of different weights of yarn. With this one I was commissioned to knit warm and pastel, think brown based colors, autumnal greens golds etc. 

Great! I'm in that mood these days anyway, so I was off to gather everything in my stash that matched the brief. 

My design begins with a mitered square/diamond:

 I used a crochet chain provisional cast-on so I could remove it later to knit the wings without picking up stitches. The turquoise yarn is undone to expose live stitches for each side. For this section I used slipped stitches for texture and color.

 What  I particularly like about this scarf is the way it lies on the back of the neck. No bunching. And it's not too big or bulky, because the yarn in this case is Malabrigo Rastita a DK and Merino Bliss 175 a Sport weight. After the body of the scarf is knit and blocked, I will pick up stitches along the bottom edge to make a border of eyelets and picot stitches. 

Ready to fly!