Yarn Along

Joining Ginny again in Yarning Along.

The big knitting news for Yarn Along this week is that I finished my sweater! Ravelry link here.
I am very excited.
It's awfully warm, the yarn is kinda thick, so it's more of a jacket than a sweater, but I have worn it and it does fit and I am really very happy with it.
It's still in need of blocking, but I have been wearing it anyway.

I started a new book this week.
That blurry thing up there is Possession by A. S. Byatt.
There was a movie of this book a couple of years ago with Gwyneth Paltrow and Aaron Eckert.
I watched it the other week, and then decided to read the book.
The book is full of poetry and the letters that the main characters send one another, and fairy stories.
It's really lovely to read.

Yarn Along

Last week I talked about getting a ball of yarn in the mail and it came!
This is the first cuff.
I finished Freedom last week, so I hope to resume Rebecca today.
Have a happy Wednesday!
See Ginny for more yarny fun.

Yarn Along

Playing along with Ginny for Yarn Along Wednesday -
I'm still reading Freedom.
It's about 2/3 done, and I am still really enjoying it.
This sweater that I am knitting is actually taking a hiatus, as I am nearly out of the medium brown.
That tiny ball of medium brown there is all I have left, and it came as a little shock to me when I realized that there was no way that I would be able to finish the sweater with my remaining yarn.
Even after I harvested the ribbing and the pocket liners, all that was left was said tiny ball and I have the entire yoke to knit.
So, off to Ravelry I went.
I made an inquiry and I have a ball of yarn winging its way from BC as we speak.
This sweater began its life about a year ago, and suddenly I was taken with the urge to finish it.
It just goes to show that you should never just by some yarn and then design a sweater as you go.
Have a plan! This is the lesson that I have learned here.

More knitting

I finished the Wyvern pattern in my sweater,
now I just have to decide what kind of pattern the rest of the sweater will have.
I don't know why I procrastinated so long, the pattern actually worked up easily in a day (with lots of tv and sonic the hedgehog..ahem)
I have also made progress on the Helleborus Yoke sweaterthe back is a little over half done.
When this portion is finished, after the back, other sleeve and front are knitted, I'll pick up around the neck and make a collar, and around the sleeves to make a cuff, and I hope I'll add some length on the bottom, I haven't read that far ahead yet...

Knitting Explosion

Hi,
My name is Jess and I have a knitting problem.
I have 3 sweaters in full swing, and I am about to start one more.
There is the Helleborus Yoke sweater from the newest issue of knitscene magazine.
It isn't often that I have to make a sweater RIGHT NOW, but this one called to me.
I happened to have an appropriate yarn just waiting in my stash so I got the pattern last Saturday while I was working and started in knitting.
I had one false start, but I'm back on track and here is the front and now I have one of the sleeves done too. I'm using size 10 needles, which is helping this become a super speedy knitting project.
The pattern is written so that you work in a circle around the yoke, so the way the sweater is emerging is really very interesting and I just want to keep knitting and knitting to see what comes next.
It's a mid-range of difficulty kind of project. I can watch tv, but I still need to look down once in a while for the cables.

The second project on the needles is a yoke sweater from an old (as in about 5 years) Dale of Norway pamphlet. The hem is finished and now I have 15 inches of solid-color stockinette to finish.
This one is going everywhere with me so the unending monotony of it doesn't drive me crazy.
It'll be good for riding in the car, or waiting to pick up the Younger Hug-a-Bug from school.

The third sweater is one that I am designing myself.
I bought the book "Here Be Wyverns" by Nancy Spies in 2003 when it came out.
This book is a treasure trove of stitch patterns that the author gathered from medieval sources like tapestries and mosaics.

I decided to make a sweater using some of the patterns and I am making rather a slow go of it.
I have two of the patterns picked out, and the first pattern is complete.
There are pockets, the facing of which is sticking up there on the right-hand side.
The next pattern that I plan to use has a long repeat (195 stitches) and I have to work myself up to actually begin it.It's a totally awesome, and not totally un-dorky pattern.
As you look at the sweater, it looks like a swirly floral pattern, but then the center back is dragons.
Actually they're Wyverns (as in Here Be Wyverns) which are defined in the book as "a two-legged dragon having wings and a barbed and knotted tail"
I hadn't heard of a Wyvern before I saw this book, and not since then either until I saw a trailer for the newest disastrous creature movie on SyFyWyvern
An ancient evil has come to feed.

This movie looks scary in more ways than one...

Anyway, that's my knitting story currently.

On a more serious note, thanks to all of you out there who visited the Craft Hope for Haiti Etsy site.
The last update I saw was that they have raised over $20,000, and that's since last Thursday.
W.O.W.
That is a spectacular outpouring of love from the crafting community and I am proud to have been a part of it.