Tag: shawl

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Aqua Butterflies

So this story begins in my favorite “second hand” store, the Scrap Exchange in Durham NC. (Second hand is in quotes because most of the materials are new, just pre-owned).

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Okay guys, this is too far away to see detail…

I introduced my parents to the space a couple visits back, and now it’s always on the agenda when they come down (Hi Mom and Dad!), and they visited back in January. So naturally we visited the store.

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Too close, you can see the focus issue…

Checking out the yarn bins, I hit gold in the greens bin with this Malabrigo sock yarn for $5. It had never been caked, and it still had the original $18 price tag. I snapped it up, and I got super excited.

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I guess it’ll do. Dear Reader, please do not try to zoom in!

I should mention that the ‘rents were visiting to help me move. So when I was unpacking I obviously wasn’t originally interested in finding my swift and winder, but still somehow I managed to cake it up within the first two weeks or so of moving, and then looked for a shawl pattern to match it with.

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On Ravelry I found the beautiful Dancing Butterflies shawl, by Carfield Ma, and it felt like a match.The pattern is well written, and working it up was great! I did have to alter it near the border since I only had the one skein available. I played multiple games of yarn chicken  before finally finishing it maybe 10 rows before expected.

Then came blocking, where I was able to block it to a rather huge size, but it did show me that I was not loose enough binding off, so I got curly edges. Not that it matters, because I now have Butterfly Wings!

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I take all my photos with a camera and tripod, and this is one shoot where I should’ve asked a passerby to stand in for focusing… Lessons hopefully learned!

I love this shawl, but I’ve found myself only reaching for it when I’m wearing blue or green. Good thing that makes up so much of my wardrobe!

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Diving Deep Shawl

This might be one of the quickest yarn-buying to final project finishes that I’ve had so far…

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I bought the yarn in January from Me & Ewe in Austin TX as part of my “buy yarn/fabric as souvenirs” initiative to help me stop buying stupid trinkets I don’t need and instead come out with things I’ll treasure. My backpack from last year’s fabric purchase is most definitely my most used item in my life.

It’s a fine single ply yarn that is a merino wool and silk blend from a spinner in Texas. The colors remind me of a tropical ocean under moonlight, or rather what I think that would look like.

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Then I got into a stage of my home life (at the time) where I realized that I couldn’t accommodate nearly every craft I’m fond of in my tiny hole of a room (only slightly bigger than a walk in closet) except for yarncrafts, which had easily accessible supplies and very little footprint.

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So I got to searching Ravelry, bought this excellent pattern called Pearla Beaded Lace Shawl (though I chose not to bead it) from ByTheLilyPond.com, though I did purchase it on Ravelry.

I found it a pretty quick knit, and very intuitive to knit after a bit. I knit it all from looking at a computer, moving a rectangle around in Adobe Acrobat and scribbling a small key on the page so I wouldn’t have to continually scroll up and down, which made it easy to knit wherever I was. I’d most definitely make this shawl again, and I’ll consider it for the next time I go to a new place and buy yarn!

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And I finished in early April. Between it and my NOLA Shawl I can wear a shawl with pretty much any item of clothing. Which is great! I love unusual accessories!

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NOLA Shawl

A while ago I told you about my fabric I bought in Seattle, and how that was going to be a thing when I traveled.

I’ve not yet done anything with the Seattle yarn, but I was lucky enough to go on a road trip with some friends last March and bought some lovely tencel yarn in a gorgeous colorway.

We visited four cities on this epic road trip, but New Orleans was the one that hooked me on the trip. I study hurricanes in my real life, so I am fascinated in part because of the geological conditions, but the fact that I hear a lot about it from my favorite food blogger who moved there, and see pieces of it (even if they might be fake) in shows like NCIS NOLA, I was pretty interested. So even though this colorway is not quite indicative of the NOLA people know, it is definitely more my style and wearable in my life. Though I did waffle over some Mardi Gras colorways.

This is not the first time I fell in love with these particular colors together. A few years ago when I was beading as much as I breathed I bought a bunch of beads in that colorway with the intention of making a necklace for myself, which has still not come to pass. Maybe soon? But I consider this colorway Van Gogh colors, since they really remind me of Van Gogh’s sunflower painting.

Officially this is yarn from the brand Prism, and its called Delicato, 100% Tencel, and this is the colorway named Sierra.

Back to the shawl.

The yarn was so soft and I was looking for a low key distraction at the time, so I decided to use it right away. I looked at a bunch of patterns, and ultimately decided on the Good Day Sunshine shawlette pattern from Knitty by Amanda Bjørge.

I really liked the pattern. I didn’t take notes as I went (story of my life), but I seem to remember having to fudge some parts of rows to get it lined up, but I don’t know if that was a careless mistake on my part or if it was the pattern (probably the former). Overall, easy to knit up and the lace kept things interesting!

And then I knit for a month or two. I finished the shawl just before a wedding I attended in early March, but because I had made an outfit with sleeves for that I didn’t need a shawl that night. Until a week or two ago, I haven’t really worn it, but that is not without precedent.

A few years ago I made the Knitty Wavedeck shawl from Kate Atherly which gets worn occasionally, but not enough to be called often. It doesn’t help that with the DK yarn weight it feels more like winter, but we haven’t gotten much winter weather, and that it ended up being more of a shawlette. And shawls are less conducive as scarfs when biking when they need to be attached to something to prevent them from falling off. I’m debating keeping safety pins with the Wavedeck shawl so I can pin it to my clothes before I start bike riding.

With this fingering weight one it’ll get more fall and spring wear, and has already proven so! I wore it three times this week, which was great. I wish the weather agreed with me wearing it though…

Shawls are so pretty, but I need to get more in the practice of wearing them. Especially since I love knitting them!

This was finished in very early summer, and other than a project I started knitting and abandoned for time, I haven’t really been knitting. I got a little bit of a start when I saw Blade Runner 2049 (so pretty) with these socks that I’ve been knitting since I saw Deadpool in theaters. I think I’m calling them my movie socks, since they’ve seen me through about 6 movies, both ugh and awesome!

What are you all knitting up right now?

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Cornflower Shawl

Guess what’s off my needles! (Hint: It’s in the title.)

I finished the shawl!

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So the full details:

This is the Wavedeck Shawl by Kate Atherly in Knitty Winter 2014.

I did get a little impatient, and I skipped a few rows of edging and zig zags, but it’s the first non-sock pattern that I didn’t end up making big changes to! Normally I don’t like the way that its bound, or I’m too impatient for long sleeves, etc. But not this time… partially because I would have no idea what to do in order to change things, but mostly because I love it just the way it is.

This was Christmas yarn from over 3 years ago… I picked it out when we moved my brother into college as a freshman, and my parents kept it for me until Christmas. The yarn is Debbie Bliss Prima, which is now discontinued I’m afraid, but its a nice thick DK or thin worsted, as it almost worked out for me. Part bamboo and part merino, so its just warm enough, but not overly warm.

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It felt like it took forever, but I think it was a February and February alone project, which is nifty. I like finishing projects within a month of starting them, and bonus points for actually getting pictures and posting about it.

I was going to take a picture with my coat on, ready to go to school, but when I went outside to take these and a few other sets of pictures, I realized that it was too warm to do that. Despite all the melting snow that I cropped out of these pictures, it was quite warm.

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But the way that I’ve already fallen in love with wearing it is with my shawl pin. So woot! A use for my shawl pin!