Myrtle Leaf Shawl

The snow has all melted and London has reverted to mostly rainy weather. Today however is gorgeous. Cold but oh so sunny with a clear blue sky. I'm not really a hot weather person -- but I love a sunny day.

So immediately after today's update I'm off to walk through the park. Greenwich Park is stunning on a sunny day (on any day really) and being able to stroll around it while the rest of the world is studying or working always feels a bit decadent!

Although the park has many trees, none are Myrtle trees so I won't be able to confirm whether this Myrtle Leaf Shawl from Victorian Lace Today is an accurate representation or not.

I knit this on 3.75mm needles using just over 1.5 skeins of Jaggerspun Zephy WoolSilk in Ebony (between 900 and 1000 yards).

It's a pretty straightforward knit (although do check out the errata if you decide to make it - there are a couple of errors in the chart). The body of the shawl is a 12 row pattern repeat - where each row is a pattern row (so no purling back).

The edging is knitted on. It is an 8 row repeat and works up reasonably quickly.

This wasn't one of my favourite projects knitting-wise. It wasn't challenging and the knitting got a little dull towards the end (40 repeats of the leaf pattern!) The shawl pre-blocking was particularly uninspiring.

Having said that, it's been very popular with the non-knitters who've seen it. In fact, it's been more popular with non-knitters than many of the complicated shawls I've knit.

And I'm sure there's a little lesson in that somewhere.

Unblocked the shawl was 18" x 50" and it blocked to an impressive 21" x 76".

Snow Day in London!

London awoke to lots of snow this morning.

As a Canadian I tend to dismiss most attempts at snow in London -- but even I will concede this is real snow. Apparently it's the most snow London's seen in 18 years.

I'm not sure if it's the fact that it's a Monday in February, or the general economic doom and gloom (possibly both) but Londoners have almost unanimously declared a snow day!!

London Transport has decided not to run any buses today. None. Zippo.

Most trains are running a cut back service and 3 of the Underground lines have shut.

I just returned from a walk to the park (stopping off at the grocery store on the way back) and there's a definite day off from school feeling out there. The park is full of sledging kids and snowmen and of course continual snowball fights. The grocery store was PACKED with people stocking up on snow day essentials like hot chocolate, crisps and candy.

I love it! (I will not love it when because there is no snow removal programme here the snow compacts and becomes ice and a simple walk to the shops becomes treacherous. I HATE walking on ice.)(But I'm trying not to worry about that yet.)

(And it's just started snowing heavily again!)

Of course you didn't come here for a weather report. You came here expecting to see knitted things and I aim not to disappoint so here is Miralda's Triangle. (Photographed yesterday before the snow began. What a difference 24 hours makes!)

It is from Knitted Lace of Estonia (yes, again). (What can I say, when I find something I like....)





The scarf was knit on 3.75mm needles using Posh Yarn Eva 2ply in a purpley lilacy colourway. Finished size is 58 " across the top with a 26 " drop.

Like Ene's Scarf (also by Nancy Bush) this one starts with casting on a billion (or 331) stitches and decreases evenly every second row until you're almost out of stitches!

Being an Estonian pattern it does have the obligatory nupps - but they are a bit more subtle in this scarf. It includes two stitch patterns I hadn't come across before: the gathered stitch and the 3 stitch cross.









The gathered stitch provides a nice accent row - here it's used before and after the large diamond motifs. It's a simple stitch - you knit 3 together but don't slip the stitches from the needle, then YO, and then knit the same 3 stitches together again - this time slipping the stitches off the left hand needle. This leaves you with 3 stitches on the right hand needle.




The 3 stitch cross is an interesting stitch and I'm keen to try it in a variegated yarn where I think it might be quite interesting.

The cross is worked over 2 rows. On the first row you slip the first stitch purlwise, knit the next tow stitches together and then pass the slipped stitch over (so 3 stitches become 2). On the return row you insert a YO between the two stitches (so the 2 stitches become 3 again).

May I Present.....

The Crown Prince of Greenwich - officially my first successfully finished project of 2009!

The pattern is the Crown Prince Square Shawl from Knitted Lace of Estonia (I do like this book). There is an error in one of the charts though so do check the errata on the Interweave site if you are going to knit this one.

When I initially looked at the pattern I thought it might be a dull knit as there is so much repetition -- apart from the edging the pattern is just two motifs repeated over and over again.

How wrong I was. I loved this nupp laden knitting. It held my interest and I was never bored.

Not even when I had to rip back 20 rows in the main body.

It was the usual story. I spotted a mistake about 3 rows after making it but managed to convince myself it wasn't 'too noticeable' and 'could be fixed by blocking'.

10 rows later I wasn't quite as sure but thought - maybe blocking and some needle magic will fix it. 20 rows later I knew I was kidding myself.

I attempted to drop just the affected stitches and repair -- but as you can see from these photos that left some VERY loose stitches. Attempts to take up the slackness in surrounding stitches failed -- nupps are not so easily manipulated!!!

So, I bit the bullet and pulled the needles out and ripped back the full 20 rows.

Sigh.

I don't really mind frogging but I do wish I wouldn't delude myself for QUITE so long.




After that it was smooth sailing.


I knit the shawl with Jaggerspun Zephyr in a cream colour -- mostly because I had enough of that in the stash! I used two full skeins for the body of the shawl, and 30 gms of a third skein for the edging.

The pattern as designed as the edging cast on and knit separately in two pieces and then stitched to the body.

I really couldn't face the idea of that, so I wimped out and picked up stitches all around the body (in the same ratio that the pattern uses for attaching the edging to the body) and knit it in the 'modern' (as Nancy Bush calls it) way. I used a very simple 12 stitch repeat edging, not too dissimilar to the pattern edging but without the nupps -- because you can have too much of a good thing!

The shawl was knit on 3.75mm needles.

Unblocked size 35"x35".
Blocked size 53"x 53".

The Last Project of 2008

On my flight home the air steward (the one who knit) recommended that I visit Loop in Halifax if I had a chance. I didn't have much time in Halifax - I arrived in the evening and was due to be on a train bound for home at noon. However, the disaster of running out of yarn for Kali's mittens coupled with the happy realisation that Loop was a short walk from the hair salon (I had to get my hair cut, my hair was a mess) convinced me to add the shop to my morning itinerary.

Loop is a great shop with very friendly staff and if that isn't enough (it is) it is attached to a cafe where I had one of the best latte's I've ever had. Not to mention some delicious home made toffee that the barista kindly gave me.

Unfortunately I was on a bit of a mitten wool mission so I didn't have much time for browsing but I did allow myself to be distracted long enought to grab Knitted Lace of Estonia. Which of course meant I needed some laceweight yarn so I grabbed a couple of skeins of the ever reliable Jaggerspun Zephyr in a deep green colour.

Knitted Lace of Estonia is a lovely book, but I expect if you are a lace knitter you know that and probably have a copy already. If you don't - what are you waiting for?

After a bit of to-ing and fro-ing I settled on Madli's Shawl (which had been on my 'to knit' list for ages, it was also published in Interwerweave Knits Summer 2004). I wanted a wider, longer stole than the version in the book so I added additional repeats of the pattern (width and lengthwise).

I cast on at home in New Brunswick and worked on it on the train journey to Halifax and the flight back to London. A truly international creation!

The pattern in the body of the stole is pretty easy to remember and is fine for train (or TV) knitting. There are lots of nupps in the pattern - but as I've said before once you learn to do these they aren't bad at all. (If you are struggling there is a tutorial by Nancy Bush on Youtube. The key is to make the nupp stitches CRAZY loose. When you knit the stitch actually pull the right hand needle to the right to make the stitch longer, use your thumb to keep the YO's long. The stitches should look really odd alongside the other stitches because they are that loose.)

The details:
Madli's Shawl from Knitted Lace of Estonia and Interweave Knits, Summer 2004
3.5 mm needles
2 full skeins (1260 yards) of Jaggerspun Zephyr (50% wool 50% silk)

Unblocked size: 52" x 21"
Blocked size: 70" x 22"

The stole is held closed in the picture above with a lovely shawl pin by Romi.

Where is the Love?

As summer never happened I've decided to skip autumn and winter and I'm moving on to Spring. The Spring Shawl specifically.

The Spring Shawl is one of the Shetland lace Heirloom Knitting patterns by Sharon Miller. Sharon is a very talented designer, responsible for many beautiful patterns including the much admired Princess and Wedding Ring shawls.

I bought the pattern well over a year ago and it never seemed to call out to be made. And in all honesty, it still hadn't when I finally did start it. And therein lies the mystery of why some patterns sing to me, and others don't.

The pattern ticks all the boxes for a pattern I should love. It is undoubtedly a beautiful piece of lace. Pictures of finished shawls I've been able to find are all stunning. It is a big project and a challenging piece of lace. Every row is a pattern row -- perfect for keeping my attention. All of these things say that I should have been chomping at the bit to start this project.

But I wasn't.

It's a bit like those weird occasions where you meet someone who is very attractive, funny, clever - but somehow - they don't make your socks roll. Whatever that indescribable something may be -- they are missing it.

Anyway, I started the project because I felt I should and I have to say that nothing in the first phase of the project changed my feelings. I knit on. But without much enthusiasm. I didn't hate it by any stretch -- but neither did it begin to match the knitting obsession of Lyra. I would have been just as happy to knit on any other project.

I finished the centre triangle and began the deep borders. And something has changed.

When I was on the second pattern row of the border I was convinced I had entirely messed it up. In the time honoured tradition of knitters everywhere I threw the needles into the corner and threatened to abandon the project entirely. I huffed and puffed about how it was a lame project anyway and that if I hadn't had to force myself I wouldn't have even started it and .... and.... and...

And maybe it wasn't such a bad little project after all. I mean look at that red. How could I abandon something that red? And really I probably hadn't messed it up that badly? It was looking quite promising. And I'd finished so much of it already.

So I picked it back up and quite quickly realised what my silly mistake was. A little tinking and knitting and I was soon back in flow.

And in love.

Sadly my new love is not very photogenic at this stage. But this blobby red thing currently has my heart.

I'll keep you posted as our relationship develops.