CRESCENT SHAWL AND BUTTERFLIES

Crescent Hearts Shawl

Apologies for the hiatus, but some family matters required my attention.
Knitting projects, however, have not stopped. First up, I was flying to California for a conference and had thought I was more than prepared for knitting air time. I managed to complete the second of a pair of socks about midway and started on a lace shawl. I’d designed and knit one earlier and quickly given it to a departing colleague. I call it Crescent Hearts. The pattern is available on Ravelry.

Close up of lace pattern

To my dismay, I found that I’d not included stitch markers and had only 6 in my Knit Kit. Yikes!

While you can knit lace without stitch markers, I do not recommend it. It is far too easy to make errors and thus lose valuable time and energy, not to mention having to rip out lace. (Oh the horror!)

I remembered that a friend had made her own stitch markers from yarn. Seemed like a good idea to me, especially since I wanted to get this shawl moving. So, using the leftover sock yarn, I made 20 little slip knot stitch markers. (They work very well. You just need to make sure you don't knit them into your stitches.) The shawl was nearly finished by the time we returned home a few days later.

I like crescent shawls mainly because they are so-o-o much easier to design than triangle shawls and more interesting than rectangle shawls. Oh, and the yarn is made from soymilk: Pure Soysilk from South West Trading Company. It works up nicely and has a lovely luster.

By the way, the socks used a butterfly stitch. Since the yarn was already multicolored, I had looked for a stitch that would add just a touch of fun, and the butterfly was just that. The yarn was Berroco Sox. The pattern is available in my Ravelry store for free.

Until next time ... happy knitting!

Reah Janise

Butterfly Socks

SUMMER PULLOVER TIME!

Climbing Mountains Lace Pullover

As I mentioned in an earlier blog, I started on a summer lace pullover. A few years earlier, I'd knit a lace cardigan with white cotton yarn. My mother liked it so much that I gave her mine and then knit another for me. The cotton yarn was a worsted weight, so a little bulky.

Then last summer I knit my first triangle shawl using Wolle's Color Changing Cotton yarn. Her four-stranded cotton yarn was light, like a fingering or sock yarn, and I started thinking that it would make an ideal summer lace sweater, something to toss on over a tank top. I emailed her to see if she had any single-color yarns and ended up purchasing skeins in the color granite.

Summer is here and so despite lots of project ideas as gifts for people, I decided to tackle a project for myself. I found a lace pattern, called mountain peaks from the knittingfool.com website. I also use this website for determining how many skeins are needed for a project. I made a slight variation to the pattern.

It seemed that a drop shoulder pattern with a boat neck would be the easiest (no worry over figuring out lace decreases).

And now both sweater and pattern are done. And this is the first pattern where I've included sizes. Here's the link for the PDF on Scribd and another on Ravelry.

Enjoy!

Reah Janise

PATTERN TIME!

Now that the holiday season is over, I've been able to put more time into completing promised patterns.


Sparkly Shawl pattern

The first is Sparkly Shawl. As I mentioned in my earlier post, this is my first triangle shawl design. It's fairly simple, so as long as you are familiar with lace work, you should have no problem following the pattern.


Cable Socks 2012 pattern

The next pattern is for the socks I began on our trip to Scotland. I've actually upgraded this pattern, filling out the corners and edges, so to speak. This sock is my husband's favorite. He says it hugs his legs and is comfortable all around. Here's the original blog post for this sock. I posted two blogs on this sock. The first is when I'd finished the first sock and the second was when I posted the pattern. And now, here is the upgraded and hopefully improved pattern.

I've just finished two sweaters for my nephews in Ohio. They are 12 and 10. I hope to include pictures of them in the sweaters with the patterns.
Until then, Happy 2013!

Reah Janise