Lace and Bulk

As I mentioned in my last post, I'm on a mission to make myself more scarves and use up some of my single skein stash. The Strangling Vine Lace scarf was my first...now I've added a couple cowls. Cowls are so easy and quick. With these two I've used up 3 skeins of left over stash.

The first cowl I made from a pattern. It's a super simple ribbed lace weight, close fitting bit of awesomeness. I had super soft lace weight left over from from the Seraphim shawl. Yarn so soft I knew it would make a great cowl...super cozy.

The Stats:
Yarn: Elann Peruvian Baby Silk
Colorway: Abergine
Needles: size 7 Denise circulars
Pattern: Cashmere Cowl by the Purl Bee




The second is a cowl I made up. I had a single skein of Super Bulky yarn and I wanted a bulky weight cowl. Lots of texture, big enough to be somewhat close fitting but open up enough to be worn loosely. I took ideas from a bunch of patterns on Ravelry and put them together for "A Bit of Bulk" Cowl. I like it but will have to try it out in the Boston winter to really see. I added ties to either side so it can be worn open or tied close.

The Stats:
Yarn: Lion Brand Thick & Quick
Needles: size 15 Denise Circulars
Pattern: My own experiment

Lace Scarf from the Stash

Yesterday I finished a lace scarf for myself. I realized not long ago that I like wearing scarves and most of the ones I have are store bought. There are a lot of beautiful lace scarf patterns, they are usually pretty easy to memorize the pattern and they are small portable project I can stuff in my purse. I have stash lace weight I need to use...so why not make myself a bunch of scarves. This is the first but there will be more...

Stats on the first:

Yarn: Knitpicks Shadow
Colorway: Raisin (no longer available)
Needles: Size 5 Addi Lace Turbos
Pattern: Strangling Vine Scarf by All Buttoned Up
Finished Measurements: about 70" by 8" wide
Notes: This yarn was left over from the Serendipity - Mystery Stole 4 that I started in September of 2008 but finished this past April. (That stole was entered in a local fair and won a blue ribbon). In order to make the blocking a bit easier, I blocked it doubled, folded in half. The pictures show it doubled so the actual scarf is lacier then it appears.

More pictures to come...but here's a close up of the doubled over lace fabric...so pretty :)

Swap Package Received

I just received a lovely swap package from my partner Neila in the Ravelry Starbucks and Yarn swap group. Really cute package so I thought I'd share:

October WoolGirl shipment

Latest Woolgirl Shipment arrived last Monday. If you haven't gotten your package...there are SPOILERS below!

Sorry for the bad pictures...I get home after the sun goes down and of course I couldn't wait to open it when there was better light.

This package is so pretty. "Birch" colors and the accessories have browns and orange. Fall but not the typical fall colors. I like both of the patterns that came with it but I'm not sure I can picture them in the variegated yarn.

I can't really start this anytime soon, anyway. I have time to decide what to make and in which yarn.

Here's another picture of the package contents. The painted cards that came in it are gorgeous! I can't imagine being able to paint like that...

Picot Progress

I'm knitting madly on my Recycled Picot & Ropes Cardigan. The back is finished and the I'm knitting the two front pieces at once and they are about 65% done. I love how it looks but I'm a little sad because it'll definitely be a summer cardigan. It'll be too cold to wear it by the time it's complete....it being October 31st after all.

The yarn supply is dwindling quickly now. After what you see in the picture (which I'm hoping will easily take me through the rest of the fronts plus have two balls left over) I only have 2 large balls left. I'm thinking about knitting the sleeves top down so I can stop and leave enough for the picot edge that will run around the front edges and around the top collar. I was planning on 3/4 sleeves but I think I'll cut it back to 1/2 sleeves (if not shorter) to make sure I have enough yarn. I'd really hate to run out...it's not like I can just buy more. What a disaster that would be!

Doing the sleeves top down I don't think will be too tough. Reverse the shaping....but...these words may come back to haunt me later. Haunt me...lol...it's Halloween...

Here's a couple more close ups. I'll reiterate the fact that these picot's are TOO CUTE!!!

Recycling

While in Maine a few weekends ago (collecting my blue ribbons from the fair!) my mom and I took a trip to Goodwill. I was in search of some sweaters that I could unravel and re-knit. I bought a couple. One 100% wool sweater that is all washed and waiting for something...not sure what I'm going to do with that. And, the one above...a 50% cotton 50% linen old Land's End sweater. Both sweaters were $4.99 each. Good deal for the amount of yarn you get.

This is my second sweater unraveling project. I unraveled one from my closet 1st...for the no pressure practice. It went OK....this one went better. It came apart much easier and I got much more usable yarn out of it.

I started itching to make a sweater for myself when I found a sweater pattern in an old Interweave Knits magazine. The pattern is called Ropes and Picots and it was in the Winter 2008 issue. I totally didn't even notice it last year...but with the new recycled DK weight yarn sitting in my stash I couldn't resist.

I'm up to just past the bottom of the arm pits on the back. The sweater is really simple but has very nice simple detailing. The picot edge is so cute that I want to put picots on everything from no on.

I may or may not dye the finished sweater a darker color. I kind of like the natural color but I know I'd get more wear out of a darker sweater. I'll see what I think when I get it finished.

Recycled Sweater

Yesterday (and for about a three years before yesterday) I used to have a cabled store-bought sweater hanging in my closet. It was from Old Navy and very pretty but I just didn't wear it anymore. So I tried my hand at recycling.

There's a group on Ravelry called Thrifty Knitters and they have a whole page of tutorials, links and resources on this type of thing. I found one that made it look so easy. The author's "Show that sweater who's boss" was very inspiring.

The above yarn was all reclaimed from the aforementioned sweater. I got about 12.5 ounces of 50% cotton 50% acrylic DK weight yarn. It's white...so now I'm thinking of experimenting with dyeing it myself. There's an article on Knitty on dyeing plant fibers which looks interesting. Kool Aid also seems easy, but I've gotten conflicting reports on using Kool Aid to dye non-animal fibers. So more research is required...

Clearly, another blog post on this topic will be coming :)