198 yds Times Two

So, I finished the shop model, and it looks great:

Then, I knit a modified one out of my first knittable quantity of handspun:

I have my own ball of Alumco now. Trying to decide if I want to knit a third one this week...!

Detention gets me points.

I finally got my lovely Dobby's Sunset shawl off the blocking board. I really like all the colors, especially since autumn is about to start, and the little leaves... it all just makes me happy!


Here's a better shot of the whole thing (it's really just a neck-shawl, but I used every bit of the yarn possible (and probably a bit more than I should have - see below).


I was asked about how I prep things for blocking - I do the total immersion thing. That's my stainless-steel dedicated shawl/knitwear bowl, and the dedicated glass to sit atop whatever's in the bowl to keep it from floating. (Stainless steel & glass: non-reactive. Non-reactive is good, in general, when dealing with knitted pretties.)


Bowl of Shawl
I also used a cute trick - the center-pull bracelet - for the first time on this project. It really does work!


Center pull balls can tangle near the end.
But not if you wear them.
Well, not as much, anyway.
It helps.
Really, it does!
And I really did use almost every drop of yarn:


All the yarn that is left from my PEby's "Dobby's Sunset" handspun.
I'm turning my shawl in for Detention today. Points for Slytherin, Woohoo!

(re)Starting a New Shawl

Remember the gorgeous skein of handspun laceweight by PEby that I won? This stuff?


I had decided to make an embossed leaf entrelac scarf out of it. And I got the third repeat... and it Just Wasn't Working For Me. It would've been fine, but I wasn't feeling it. It wasn't Quite Exactly Right for what I wanted for this yarn.


See? Looked fine, but. So, I hit Ravelry, and found a version of a Birch Leaf Shawl that works "for any quantity of yarn". You start at the pointy tip at the bottom, and knit until you run out of yarn (or, hopefully, until you have enough to do five rows of garter stitch for the top edge of the shawl after the last full pattern repeat). I am liking this much better, and am looking forward to the finished shawl. Which might be sooner than usual; I've been on a bit of a roll, shawl-wise, lately!

Stuff I Started in April

So, I never really posted my March Stuff Finished... and I didn't do a collage, but trust me, seventeen things (12 of them Braided Balls for my failed Arithmancy OWL) came off the list in March. April... April is going to be another story. I finished one thing in April. I had some leftover hunter green acrylic, and knit up what I think will be a totebag handle at some point. But that's it. That's the April finish so far.

There is, however, a bunch of Stuff I Started In April:

Scarf:

It's out of my Dobby's Sunset yarn. I kept waffling back and forth on making the embossed leaf entrelac, but I really like it so far.

Mitts:

On one of the recent trips to Fibre Space, two balls of Mochi Plus came home with me, and they're slowly turning into entrelac mitts. If I find more Mochi Plus in this colorway, I'll add to them... and eventually get a shrug. Or a sweater. It's just that soft and cuddly!

Shawls:

That's StellaLuna out of MadTosh lace in Fathom, and she's about 2/3 of the way finished. The whole "have this shawl finished for Easter" did not, as you can tell, happen. Sigh. But it's going to be really pretty, and I'm getting good a spit-splicing (there was an UNBELIEVABLE tangle somehow in my center-pull ball!)


I got some Patons Lace because I liked the colorway. Turns out it has AMAZINGLY long color runs, so I'm knitting a triangle shawl from the long edge down to the point (an idea I got from StellaLuna). Making up the design as I go, and charting same; will probably put it up (a) when it's finished if (b) it turns out well.

Then, there's the shawl I started the day I got the Color Changing Cotton from Looped Yarn Works. It, too, is about halfway done now, but here it is in an earlier day:





There's also my Slytherin Crest Bag, which will be amazing when it's finally finished. This last week of April was spent cutting up the lining, getting all the pockets Just So, and handstitching everything together. NOT EASY. But worth it... hopefully I'll be able to finish it up tonight and tomorrow, turn it in for April Stitch-Along class, and then use it as my identifyer at MDS&W on the 8th. Anyway, progress pics - Bag:


Knitting done...


...then, the ritual bag wetting...


...then, figuring out how to block this thing. Turns out, a piece of floral foam was the perfect width and depth, and just a wee bit short. But I figured out how to make it work:



Yay! Okay, May can start now.

Yarnmail!!!

So, for a while, I had a sad, because I didn't get my Yule Exchange package. (Something is going on with the mail in my area; probably not helped by the fact that they pulled mail distribution away from our little post office to another across town. I've gotten things with my box number that should've gone elsewhere - same box, but should've gone to a box in a zip code in West Virginia (from California) or DC (from ETHIOPIA).) I was figuring that someone in my neighborhood likes yarn, since my prize from last term hadn't arrived. I chalked it up to Also Lost in the Mail.

Then, last night, I got home, and there was a PACKAGE!!!!!! jammed through our mail slot. And I mean jammed - plus, the little yellow envelope looked like it had been left in the rain, gnawed on by rabid chipmunks and both spindled AND mutilated. I should've taken a picture of it! By some miracle, only a tiny hole in one corner went all the way through the envelope to the inside. The CONTENTS WERE SAFE!!!


Ta-daaaaaaah!!!
Not only was there a very sweet card from PEby, but this amazing yarn is her handspun, 332 yards of it (!!) in a lovely colorway she called "Dobby's Sunset". It's even prettier in real life! I think I already know what I'm going to make with it... but I'm still looking through patterns on Ravelry, just to make sure I find The Perfect Thing. I've done hand-dyed yarns before (lots and lots), but I don't think I've ever worked with handspun!


So, happiness all around, I can, in fact, get some mail safely to my house, even if there's tempting yarn inside! *Whew!!*

And on a yarn-related note, I earned my Weasley Badge from the St. Mungo's Express January Journey. I knit Four Of The Same Thing. Here's my pretty bage. (No, not as pretty as my lovely new yarn, but still, kinda pretty.)



Yay for Yarnmail! Woohooo!!



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