A Shawl that Wasn't

I'd been planning this shawl for a decade. I had the perfect yarn picked out, and the pattern, and gorgeous dreams of how it was going to turn out...

That didn't quite happen. A couple of months ago I realized that I could use my seven skeins of Knitpicks Shine instead and I cast on and formed new gorgeous visions of the shawl I was knitting... and four skeins in something went badly wrong. Best guess is that I knit the same row of lace twice, but despite hours of picking back and re-starting that row I could not make it work.

What do you do at that point, when you're probably thirty hours in and can't move forward another stitch? I know knitters who would unravel the entire thing and immediately cast on again. I'm not one of those. I have ripped back shawls, but I draw the line at knitting the same pattern on my second (or third) attempt. Not when I'm this far in and I've done that much lace.

I could have unravelled the yarn and put it back into my stash, but I think that would have made me feel worse than just binding off everything I'd knit before things took a wrong turn. I love the drape and the way that the lace looks. I just wish I'd been able to keep going until I'd used all seven skeins.

At some point, I'll knit the full shawl as planned. Just not right now.

Stash Dive 2018 -- The Results

One of my goals for 2018 was to dig through my stash and get everything organized. No one actually thought that was going to happen, did they? It's still a confused jumble, but I did pull out some of my oldest yarn from the deepest corners of the sewing room and knit it up into shawls and socks. 

What counts as deep stash diving? I used December 2013 as a cutoff because five years is a long time and because "before hubby's accident" is a definite point that I can keep track of in my memory, along with "before we moved into the farmhouse." I can usually place my stash into one of those two categories if it isn't newer than that. There's a lot of guessing involved and if I wasn't fairly sure that the something meets the five year cutoff, I didn't count it as a stash dive project. 

The yarn for the Campside Shawl definitely definitely falls into the oldest category. I first wound the yarn into a ball and swatched with it back in 2005.  I thought that the  yarn for the black and white socks was as old, but I searched old blog posts and it looks like it would've been from 2006 or 2009.  

The contrasting heels in some of those socks are because I'd bought single skeins of yarn to knit socks for the boys when they were toddlers. That didn't happen and I've seen how they take care of their socks even now that they're old enough to know better. So I made socks for myself. 

It's a lot harder to decide which projects count towards stash diving when it comes to cross-stitch. If I use old fabric and floss to knit a free download I just found and fell in love with, does that count? (I decided that it didn't.)

Stitching up a kit that I bought and packed away before the move definitely counts.

So does finishing a project that I talked about in my very first blog post from 2004.

I'll definitely continue the stash diving into the new year. I wanted to get organized, but pulling out and actually using stash that had been almost (or entirely) forgotten may have been the bigger success. There's a lot more that I pulled out and haven't used yet and I'm really looking forward to casting on, or cutting it up for quilt blocks, or doing some stitching.

Black Cat Alphabet

Except my cat is white because I had this pretty grey fabric buried in my stash that seemed like the perfect option for this project. I don't know what it is and it's got an oddly rubbery texture that I've never run into with aida...but once it's finished I won't be touching it anyway. 

The pattern is Black Cat Alphabet by Judy Whitman of JBW Designs, from the 2012 Just Cross Stitch Halloween issue. There's more than enough fun stuff in here to keep me happily stitching until the end of October.

Halfway Home Shawl

Can we all just agree that taking flattering pictures of large shawls, especially asymmetrical ones, is difficult? This one has fantastic texture and looks much better in real life. 

The pattern is Halfway Home and it's free on the Universal Yarns website. There's a simple lace panel that you can knit from memory once you're past the increases that form the shawl's point and the rest is garter stitch. 

I could happily knit a lot more of these mostly garter stitch shawls. They're perfect for working on in the evening while the family watches television. (Anyone got a Hulu or Netflix recommendation for us once we're done with the original Lost in Space?) 

This is definitely a stash-dived project. I had three skeins of Red Heart Designer Sport that I bought at a Michael's clearance sale back in 2008. There must've been a plan for it at the time, but whatever that might've been was long forgotten....along with the yarn itself. That was tucked into one of the darkest corners of my stash. 

But it made the best shawl! I'd planned on donating this one, but now I'm having second thoughts and feeling guilty about that...even though I know there will be lots more shawls to donate and to keep. 

Frankensocks?

I  thought I'd use the leftover sock yarn from this pair, along with the solid brown that was left over from the last pair and might have originally been left over from my Owlie socks to make a third (or fourth) pair. 

There was definitely enough for anklets... except I don't love wearing anklets so now I'm pulling other leftovers to see what might coordinate into a pair of Frankensocks. 

I think I'm worried too much about making the colors coordinate. But it's a fine line between "That could work" and "That's totally and completely an inappropriate yarn choice!"

Bamboo and Ewe Socks

This is one of those rare occasions that I didn't lose the ball band before I was done knitting and I actually know exactly what yarn I used. It's Sensations Bamboo & Ewe Pattern, one of those skeins I picked up when the boys were toddlers and I thought I was going to knit socks for them.

Now it's a finished pair for....some adult in my life. Maybe one of the boys if they ever start to be more responsible with their footwear. It all depends on who wears them first.

Campside Shawl

As soon as I stumbled across the pattern for Campside, I could picture which stash yarn would be the absolutely perfect color. I bought this subtly variegated orange yarn years ago and at the time it was a huge splurge so I was afraid to actually cast on with it. 

Pattern: Campside (free download)

Yarn: Bon Prix Ornaghifilati 

The yarn itself was a huge disappointment. Expensive acrylic from the yarn shop should not be harder on my hands than a particularly bad skein of Red Heart Super Saver, especially not when it claims to be blended with wool and alpaca.

The pattern, on the other hand, is fantastic. The eyelets get denser as you knit your way towards the border and there's a really neat ribbed edging along the bottom. Aside from the name, that edging is what drew me to the shawl in the first place. I made mine wider than the inch and a half that the pattern calls for because I like the look of it so much.

Can I start making all of my shawls with ribbed edging now?

As Deep as the Stash Diving Gets?

I've been looking at last year's finishes and my current projects and thinking that was was missing was a big full coverage piece. There are at least a dozen that I'd like to start, but that means gridding fabric and pulling floss and a lot of time spent on busy work before I put in the first stitch. 

Then I remembered that there were two full coverage pieces sitting in my UFOs. I actually mentioned Stonehearth Hutch in my very first blog post...and don't think I've picked it up since. If I did, I didn't mention it by name. 

Looking at it now, it's probably my least favorite of the Thomas Kinkade cross stitch patterns that I own. I'd forgotten about it completely until I pulled out that box of UFOs a few months ago. But I'm three quarters of the way done. It makes sense to put in a few hours to finish the thing, right?

I think something might have gone wrong with the door and that's why there's unstitched space there. But those memories from thirteen or fourteen years ago aren't terribly clear. I guess I'll figure it out once I start stitching on that part, right?

Striped Socks that Aren't for Boys

Look, more new socks! This was one of those single skeins I bought when it still seemed like a good idea to knit cute socks for toddler sized feet. When there were toddler sized feet in the house...

I tossed the ballband before copying down the information but the colorway didn't have a neat name, just something about multi stripes. (Edited to add -- it's Sensations Soles & More, TP/GRN/BLU) The heels and toes are Drops Fabel, left over from Convoluted Clues.

I like the way the stripes wrap fall around the short row heels. It's always a gamble to see how that's going to work out, but these are close to perfect.

These could totally be socks for my younger two sons, but I've seen how they take care of their socks.

Reyna Shawl

The pattern for Reyna describes it as the perfect answer to that single skein of variegated sock yarn that's been sitting in your stash for months.  In my case it was two damaged skeins that had been improperly stored for a decade and this pattern really was the solution I'd been waiting for. 

Isn't it pretty? 

 Pattern: Reyna

Yarn: Knitpicks Stroll 

I came so close to throwing away this yarn so many times. It was dusty and had breaks in it and even I thought it was beyond salvaging, but this light little piece of lace makes me glad I didn't give in and do what was reasonable.

More Playing and Experimenting with Floss

Thursday was our monthly stitching group up at Acorns and Threads in Portland. Most of the regulars had other things going on and couldn't make it, but I'd already planned my day so I went ahead and drove up and spent a few hours working on my second Not Very Top Secret X-Stitch Christmas Bauble (one of these times I'll get that name right!) while surrounded by gorgeous floss. 

I like this one better than the first one I stitched from the same pattern.  The colors were more fun and I also like the pattern that it created.  Instead of spiraling my way around the orange peel sections, I alternated back and forth with up and down. 

I have more variegated floss in my stash and more ideas for how to play with it, but I still haven't decided whether I want to spend the time on a  third..or fourth...bauble. They're time consuming, but they're also a lot of fun.

Not Very Secret Christmas Baubles

There was Anchor variegated floss in that box I found last week... and Audrey was talking about how she used variegated floss to stitch a bauble for Mr. XStitch's (Not Very) Top Secret Xmas Xstitch Bauble Project... and bandwagons can be fun to jump onto....

So I stitched a bauble. I'm not fond of the colors, but this will be one of hundreds and I'm telling myself that it'll be like a scrap quilt where sometimes the ugly blocks make the prettier ones look even better.

I stitched the contrasting center portion first, then the outline of the circle. After that, I could pick up the project and work on it whenever I had time to add a few stitches. I worked each orange peel shaped bit from the outside in, which made the colors kind of swirl. There's a different plan for the next one...and the way my schedule looks this week, there definitely should be a next one!

Stash Diving for Floss

This week's episode of "What is this and why do I own it?" features some pricey embroidery flosses.

Guys, I'm soooo confused by this one. I knew I had a few skeins of Weeks Dye Works and Gentle Art Sampler Threads in my stash, along with some stuff from a smaller independent dyer. When last seen, it was all in a little square box.  Of course it wasn't in that box, which seems to have vanished without a trace.

But how is there so much of it? I can explain the WDW and GAST because I used those in a few projects and some are obviously partial skeins. The variegated Anchor is a complete and total mystery, along with the Caron Wildflowers.

I'd remember if I found this stuff at a thrift shop or an estate sale...and I'd remember if I'd bought it because this stuff definitely wasn't cheap. But it's here and I can't imagine that all of these colors were intended for the same project.

This is the kind of confusing thing I don't mind stumbling across in the sewing room.

Close to You

Just look at the colors transitioning through that garter stitch! And look at the edging! For what started as a skein of "what was I thinking?" yarn, this stuff made a gorgeous little shawl. The pattern is called Close to You and it's a free download over on Ravelry.  It's almost entirely garter stitch and there are only two lines out of every twelve where you have to count just a little bit. Days and days of knitting time without looking at a pattern, which is what I needed for this project.  

Pattern: Close to You (free Ravelry Download) 

Yarn: Knitpicks Chroma Fingering (Sandstone)  

I've almost never ordered a Knitpicks yarn I didn't like. Chroma Fingering is one of those rare exceptions (but to be fair my skeins have been sitting in my stash for years and the current version may be completely different.)  I ordered it during one of the big yarn sales a few years back and originally thought I'd use it for socks, but when I cast on for a pair the yarn unspun with every stitch. It's a loosely spun single ply and my skein ranged from thick and fluffy to thin and tight. (Some of  the reviews over on Ravelry say it's not appropriate for socks, but there are also lots of pairs in the finished project photos.)

It's much better for knitting shawls with, although I still felt I was babying  the yarn quite a bit to keep it from untwisting or splitting....but as soon as I finished this shawl I cast on a different one with a purple skein of Chroma, so I can't hate it too much. 

I went into this project knowing that I was playing yarn chicken and wound up spacing out the picots on the binding to make sure that I wouldn't run out. It was a middle of the row decision, but one that I'm happy with.

This one was a great stash diving project. I used up yarn that I'd given up on and made a project I'm thrilled with.

Bobbinating

bob·bin·ate
verb

wind hundred of skeins of DMC floss onto little cardboard bobbins

"Michelle has spent days bobbinating her floss collection."

I've been going through all of my floss with a DMC checklist, working to put together a master set of floss. When I took the picture, I still had the 3800s left to wind and had run out of bobbins.

I've gone through all of my floss stash and UFOs and partially kitted up projects and seem to be twenty-two colors short of a full set, not counting the last two releases of new colors. I think there are about fifty-one of those, but since all of the charts in my stash pre-date those sets, I'm not in any hurry to rush out and buy them.

There was another floss sale a couple of days ago, with even better prices than the last one, but I found out about it a couple of hours too late. That's okay. The next time there's a sale, I'll have a list of exactly which colors I need to fill in my collection.

Another Pair of Halloween Socks

These are pretty much identical to the pair that I knit in October of 2014. 

When I finished those, I was kind of bummed to discover that I'd bought the same yarn twice. Because, as gorgeous as it is, who needs two pairs of matching Halloween socks? And what is there to do with this yarn but plain stockinette and ribbing?

A friend's injured foot and love of Halloween, which gave me the perfect motivation to knit these up on a tight deadline... although if I could make the choice, I'd definitely wish she was pain free and the yarn was still in my stash waiting for a purpose.

Self Striping Blue Socks

Another single skein of sock yarn used up after adding a coordinating solid for the heels and toes. 

I was just throwing together what I had, so it was a pleasant surprise that the heels and toes go so well with the darkest stripes in the body of the socks. The ball band is gone, so I don't know what the yarn is, just that I probably bought it at the craft store ten years or so ago....when I thought knitting socks for little boys was a good plan.

Telluride Shawlette

I stayed up very late last night because there was snow predicted for this morning and I thought that, if it actually happened, it would make a pretty backdrop for the third shawl of 2018. 

Pattern: Telluride Shawlette (free on Ravelry) 

Yarn: Knitpicks Shine, Melon, 5 skeins  

The rows in triangular shawls get steadily longer. Someone please remind me of that the next time I tell myself I "only" have another eighteen rows to finish the project. I didn't plan on staying up nearly so late, but it was well worth it. 

This project started with some Knitpicks Shine Sport that I'd picked up when they still had a tiny store in Vancouver that carried Connecting Threads fabric and occasionally some yarn. I counted four skeins in the bag and searched my Ravelry queue for every shawl that matched that weight and yardage, then changed my mind a couple of times after looking at the printed patterns and settled on the Telluride Shawlette. 

It's much easier than my first glance at the chart made it look. Every yarn over has to be in the right place to maintain the pattern, but its an easy repeat and I could find and fix mistakes on the fly. 

I didn't realize until the bitter end that I was playing yarn chicken. The pattern calls for 364 yards. I thought I had 440, which seemed like a safe margin until I started the fifth skein I hadn't realized was there. My shawl wound up taking just under 550 yards, which makes me think I either added an extra pattern repeat or was spectacularly of from the designer's gauge. Or, because of the way I bought this yarn in a bag without labels, maybe it was a return and all of the yardage wasn't there to begin with?

Whatever happened, I used it all up and made a pretty shawl and I'm happy.

The shawl, on the other hand, is extremely soggy. 

Blue Basketweave Shawl

Maybe by the end of the year I'll have improved my shawl photography. The shawl itself is thick and warm and amazingly perfect, especially considering that the yarn was originally purchased to knit a sweater for one of my little boys. 

Yarn: Bernat Softee Chunky, Faded Denim, 4 skeins  

I knew I wanted basketweave, so I didn't even look at patterns for this one. I cast on seventy stitches, did seven rows of seed stitch, then placed stitch markers to keep the seed stitch border separate from the body of the shawl. (Okay, I did swatch first just to make sure that my finished shawl would  meet the width requirement for Twelve Shawls Forever. But it was just a little swatch and I didn't do it in the stitch pattern so it barely counts.)

If you've never knit basketweave before, it's ridiculously easy. This is five rows of k5, p5 ribbing, then p5, k5 ribbing for another five rows. I alternated that until I had just enough yarn left for another seven rows of seed stitch and cast off.

I didn't realize that I was playing yarn chicken, but I wound up with a little over ten yards of yarn left in my skein. If it'd been much tighter than that, I would've played it safe and left off a row or two of the seed stitch on one end.

The goal with these shawls, aside from keeping myself warm, is to use up stash yarn. Preferably with as few leftovers as possible.

Black and White Socks

This is my first stash-dived project of 2018 and if I'd known what fun patterns the yarn would make, it wouldn't have sat in my stash for nearly this long.

Yarn: Regia Ringel Color

I know from experience that Regia yarns can do some really fun things, but this stuff is ugly in the skein and I hadn't seen any pictures of finished projects to motivate myself with. My one previous pair with this yarn made boring and uniform stripes.