skein

Mitred Crosses blanket progress

It's progressing! 

I wanted to finish all the squares with crosses in this month, and some of the garter filling rectangles, which I've done.

I have 54 garter stitch ridges to knit, then I start joining. I'm going to wash this and wet block, in tows. The Noro has been lying around for years, and it's a little thicker than the Cascade, so blocking will help iimprove the look of the blanket too.

After blocking I'll join the rows together and probably knit I-cord around the edges as in the pattern.  Hopefully this will be finished next month!

Meanwhile, as I'm going to be starting the Westknits Mystery shawl KAL on Monday, I'm going to try to work on my Hamamelis this weekend. Cria's second sleeve is estblished, good tv knitting.  A nice simple knitting weekend ahead of me!

Knitting catch up

Some weeks I make good progress, and I knit, knit, knit and manage to knit lots and lots.  Other weeks I stall, don't do as much knitting as I want to and end up with no progress to report.  This is one of those weeks! 
I only have four things on the go, but all four seem to be crawling along or neglected,

 

My Lorna's Laces socks have stalled on sock number one.  I think it's because I'm trying to get a bit done on my Mitred Crosses blanket, want to get this one finished.  That's plodding along too!  I have knitted all squares though, and ahve to knit the side fill in garter rectangles.  Once this is done, it's seaming, which I'm going to do in separate rows, washing each row strip, blocking it (not that this needs a lot of blocking, I'll just stretch it gently to even it up a bit) and then seaming the rows together, and knitting the i-cord edging. 

The Hamamelis shawl is nearing completion, too. I'm on the border now, which is a garter stitch border with the odd purl stitch on the wrong side for textural patterning.  I love this yarn, Knitwitches Seriously Gorgeous Camel and Silk.  Wish I could capture the colour a little better, Sea Steel is a perfect description.  It's not blue!!

And Cria ...  well, it's progressing, but slowly.  I've bought a few extra balls of yarn, but its a different dye lot, so I will use these extra balls for the pocket lining and the cuffs, and possibly the garter stitch edging if I have to.  I've put the body stitches on hold whilst I knit a sleeve (to the cuffs) so that I have an idea of how much yarn I'll have left over from the sleeves, for the rest of the body.  I've tried it on, and it's not that great a fit at the top.  I ought to have started with a smaller size for shoulders and sleeve tops.   I'm hoping that if I pick up stitches around the neckline, decrease down and tightly cast off that that will pull the garment up.  I dont' like the tops fo the lseeves, either, too big IMO.  In fact, when i asked Mr C to take a photo, he asked me to stand sideways 'so that I can take a photo of the puffy sleeves'.  Urgh.   I've adjusted the  sleeve count to the next size down, and have started the sleeve decreases straight away, rather atha a few inches along.  I've also eliminated the purl seam sticth.  Wish I had done this on the side seams too, but I'm not pulling it all out now. 

 

And that's a dark, dull teal, not blue! 

I can't wait to get this off the needles, as I have yarn for another from this book, Chickade. next in line! 

Magrathea Shawl

Pattern: Magrathea

Started: June 7th

Finished: July 1st

Needles: 3mm

Yarn: IKL Dyed by Gerard, the first (not just) sock club yarn.

Mods:  I didn't have enough yarn fo the smallest size, so knitted three less pattern repeats.  I could have knitted just one less pattern repeat and increased the stitch count for the final border. which would have used up nearly all of the yarn.

The shawl is slighty asymmetrical.   I had no idea how to block this one out, so ended up doing a crescent shape which worked fine.

Cery pleased, lvoe the colour.  My plan is to knit each club yarn up as it arrives and I won't be knitting socks with it.  July's yarn yas been wound up today, and that's going to be another shawl.

 

This is my sixth shawl for 11shawls 2011, and I haven't even scratched the surface of shawl patterns! 

 

Striped Baby Cardigan

Pattern: Striped baby cardigan from baby cashmerino 2

Started July 8th, finished July 15th, apart from buttons, which I had ran out of (of course).

Yarn:  baby cashmerino, in denim and natural. about 1.5 balls of each,

As I've mentioned, this is for a new baby (well he's two weeks old today) but he was huge, and I reckon that he might fit into this now!  He weighed 9lbs 12oz and was 57cm in length, about 22.5".  I saw him at 8 days old, and he was like a 3 monther!

I knitted the body in one piece,  dividing at the armholes for back and two fronts.    Sleeves were initially knitted separately, flat, but as soon as I started trying to seam them and sew them in I realised that it was a big mistake, so I reknitted them top down in the round. 

When I next knit this pattern I'll do as above wiht one more modification: I'll do modified drop shoulders, so I shall just cast off for underarms and then knit straight;  it will be a lot easier for sleeves to just pick up all the stitches and not bother with short rows and trying to keep the stripes lined up.

I usually knit this with very light colours, but am pleased that I chose a deeper blue this time. 

I do hope the weather stays cool!

Now onto Cria, sadly neglected. It's all the stocking stitch body ...

Hamamelis shawl progress

This has been set aside whilst I knitted on the striped baby cardigan, which is finished, just need buttons.   Yesterday I picked it up, and worked two repeats, just one more repeat and an 18 row border to go.

I've started this pattern a good few times, but never been that happy with the look of the knitting.  I think it might just be that I hadn't knitted enough of the pattern to see the emerging lace.  It's looking really good.

The yarn is knitwiches Seriously Gorgeous Camel and Silk, Sea Steel, a lovely grey green.  I tried to take photos today but the the weather was dire, dark and wet.  In the end I've used my [jpme omdpprs!

Nearly there! 

We tried to take hotos of the blocked red Magrathea shawl too, but these are terrible, so let's hope next weekend we have brighter weather!

Still knitting away on the striped baby cardigan

I'm knitting this twice! 

If I hadn't had to reknit the body, I'd have finished this off on Sunday evening.

If I hadn't decided to knitt he sleeves separately and flat, I'd have finished this on Tuesday evening.

Why would I think that seaming and sewing in striped sleeves would be neat??  I did this on Tuesday, realised I hated the messiness of it all, so I'm now reknitting the sleeves, top down, in the round.

Sleeve one is done.  I'll start sleeve two today.

Pretty annoyed that I haven't finished this, baby B visited us at work today, he could have had his cardigan! Oh well, weekend's work!

 
 

Something small

OK.  I have five wips on the go, plenty for me.  But the baby which we were expecting on 29th June finally arrived - on 6th July!

He's a boy, and he weighed a massive 9lbs 12oz at birth!  I'm amazed that she managed this without any help or pain relief!  I'm knitting him his 'newborn' cardigan, but in size 3-6 months of course.

It's the one I fall back on each time, Debbie Bliss, Striped baby cardigna, from (I think) her Baby Cashmerino 2 book. 
This time, instead of pale blue and cream, it's denim blue and cream.  Knitted the body in one piece up to the armholes but am knitting the sleeves separately and straight (just too tired to work out top down or find good needles for in the round, last night).

Cute!  Must get a move on though, don't want him  to grow too big for this!

What's on my needles

A quick post, knitting progress.

New socks.  Not patterned, as anticipated, but plain ones. I think the colour is Hawaii, though I shall have to look that up on ravelry!

Another shawl - this is Hamamelis, and the yarn is Knitwitches Camel and silk, the colour is called Steel Sea and is more green-grey than grey - mobile night shot!

and finally, Cria. I'm not on the body. Again, the colour is a teal, not nearly as grey as this!

I'm about to cast on another project, a blue and cream striped baby cardigan - my work colleague's daughter has had her baby, a boy, a whopping 9lbs 12oz.  I cannot imagine how she managed to deliver him! 

 

Plain Khaki socks

 

Started: 6th June

Finished: 30th June

Yarn: Regia Stretch, Khaki

Plain, top down socks.

These nearly killed me. No nice colours to look at, don't like the Regia Stretch to knit with. But hey!  My brother will like them, he's a grateful recipient of hand-knitted socks.   And they've been im ny stash for a long time,  which is always a plus. 

The colour is not quite as shown  My camera refuses to capture it!  here's a close up of the patterning of the yarn:

  The next pair of socks will be brighter.  I'm even thinking about knitting a pair with a teeny tiny bit of patterning!

In Dreams Shawl

 

Pattern: In Dreams

Started: April 5th

Finished: June 23rd

Yarn: Wollmeise lace weight, about 1352 metres.  I didn't weigh the skein beforehand, and it's weighed down with beads now.  In Rosenrot.

Needles: 3mm

 

This  was  a knitalong, with clues being released every two weeks.  I really didn't intend to knit this, but having seen one in progress I just had to join in.

 

Dropping stitches was a bit of a nightmare!  Sometimes it took me an hour to pick them up, if they were in a bit of mesh lace.  The beads are all over the place at home! Spilling them, dropping them.  The colour I chose (online no less) match the yarn perfectly, though they don't show up in photographs, such a shame!  Also a bit of a shame that I forgot to darn in the ends before taking photos :)

 

Love it!