What have I been doing with the yarn I already own...?
First, I started making this sock using the Retro Rib pattern from Interweave Knits Winter 2004, which happens to be the first IK I ever laid eyes on. I got pretty far (incidentally, I can't figure out how I got this far...the leg was almost done!) but then realized it was waaaaaaay too small. I'm using Brown Sheep Wildfoote, and it's a lot smaller gauge than what the pattern calls for, so I had to improvise. As usual, because I'm so lazy and don't ever feel like making a proper gauge swatch, the gauge I had minimalistically swatched out before beginning the project was wrong, and I really needed to insert an additional pattern repeat or two in order to make the sock be an appropriate diameter. So I ripped apart my sock, wound up my yarn, and am now back to this (oh, I apologize for the cruddy pictures you'll see below; I forgot to have the flash turned on when I took these pics):
Next, the Wave Skirt is a..l..m..o..s..t done. It has this picot edging, and I have never before experienced how heart-wrenching such edging can be. I got to the end of the piece a few weeks ago (...maybe even a month ago!!) and was excited because I was done, and I only had to plunk a little edging on and make a crochet chain for a waist-tie and I'd be done. Only! Yeah - that edging is really taking me a long time. It's 66 repeats of a 8-row pattern. The pattern isn't awful, but the skirt is so big (and, actually, heavy, too!) that I can't drag it with me anywhere, so I have to work on it at home, and I haven't been there a whole lot lately. At any rate, as of today there are only 17 more repeats to do. Hooray!
With the closing of my preferred yarn shop imminent, I stopped in the other one by my house. I had heard rumor that they hosted charity knitting on Sunday afternoons, and so I came to see. I was the sole charity knitter, but they hooked me up with a comfy chair and some big yarn and I whipped out a fairly long portion of a scarf. I was amazed. I don't really do big yarn, but I might just have to try it - the quick results are really quite encouraging. By the way, I did NOT knit the scarf up on the needle those stitches are hanging out on. That's a supposedly size 4 (more like a size 2), but the 10.5 interchangeable I was using I needed the cable for to do the edging of the Wave Skirt. More motivation for me to finish that edging...I think I particularly enjoyed the big, results-quick yarn because I have been working on this guy for so long:
Honestly, I love it. It's beautiful. ...But it takes so long, and I can't memorize that 16-row pattern... What I need to do is sit down and work solely on it for a couple weeks, and it will be very much closer to being done. ("It", by the way, is a sweater. That picture is the front or back, I don't remember - I'm working on both at the same time.)And finally...much to my happiness...
It's the finished body of the Starry Night sweater!! It needs some blocking and proper end-weaving-in due to my inability to seek guidance about doing intarsia, but the front and back are done now, and I'm in the middle of the ribbing for the sleeves. THIS is the project I should really devote myself to, not the Aran above, because I have wanted this sweater from the moment I laid eyes on it, and the nights are going to start getting balmy and certainly not sweater-wearing-ish pretty soon around here.So...that is what I've been doing. Yay, knitting!
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