FO: Print O'The Wave Stole

She is blocked and unpinned.

Stats: Print O' The Wave Stole, by Eunny Jang
Yarn: Knit Picks Shimmer in Turquoise Splendor, 2 skeins
Needles: Addie Turbos, size 3
Cast On 1/14 Cast Off 2/17
Mods: I knit in one piece instead of two in order to avoid having to graft the center.

Thoughts: I loved knitting this. The pattern was easy to memorise, and lots of fun. This is the first rectangular shawl that I have completed (two prior attempts went to the frog pond). I have decided that I HATE using variegated yarn for shawls. I got this yarn for Mother's day last year, thinking that I would knit Icarus in it, but I never got past the first chart with it. I do wish that Knit Picks would come out with this blend in a solid color yarn, since it feels so YUMMY to work with.

I do need to get better at at taking photos of my work.

Monday is for Weightloss

but this week I am stalled, again. Still at 226. Grrr. I was doing so great the first half of last week, I was down 2 lbs early on, looking like I was going to make a full recovery in the gain, than V-day and AF hit on the same day, and I have been a chocolate-eating-pizza-gorging-whats-a-veggie? girl ever since.

This week I will do better.
This week there will be no massive chocolate eating.
This week there will be no binging on doughnuts while working OT after already having MacDonald's
This week I will make the time to work out even if I have to drag my fat ass out of bed at 5 am to do it.
This week I will not trip and bang up my knee to where I can't work out like I've done the last two weeks


On the knitting front:
I finished the POTW stole, and have a photograph of it pre-blocked in the camera, at home, unable to post it right now.
I finished the first sleeve of the PBSJ, and cast on for the right front. I think I should get this finished this week, or early next week. Then I can use the needles for the Alpine Lace Shawl from VLT. I'm thinking I'll use the Midnight Alpaca KP lace weight yarn for it, and see how much yarn I use.

Monday is for Weightloss

Or weight gain as this week has been.

After the week from heck last week, not being able to work out and making bad food choices, I am up 4lbs, back at 226 *grrr* So much for fitting into a smaller size bridesmaid gown for N and D's wedding.
At the rate that I am going, I am never going to lose this weight.
I did work out on Saturday, starting over with the Firm beginner rotation, but tripped again on Sunday, ripping up my knee in two spots this time. I will take some Ibuprofen and try to work out tonight after C has gone to bed, but I don't think I will do that great with squats and lunges, and I know I am not going to be able to do the full tall box climb.

Knitting content ahead.
In order to make sleeve island a shorter stay, I cast on for the first sleeve of the PBSJ on Saturday, and have done the third set of decreases. I think I am almost 1/2 way to the point of doing the serious decreases for the shoulder shaping *yeah* and should finish the sleeve this week. Then next week will be the right front and maybe the second sleeve. However, I do have plenty of yarn to lengthen the sleeves, and make them more wrist length than bracelet length. I will have to debate this.
On the POTW stole, I rounded the second corner on Saturday night and am almost done with the second short side, should be turning that corner tonight. I have 34 out of 84 repeats of the border left to go. I have been doing 5-6 repeats a day, and should be finished with this next weekend.

A good week for knitting...

A Bad week for everything else.

The week started of with C and I both being sick at the same time. Normally I don't mind taking a sick day from work to stay home with him, but when he is sick (running a fever, controlled with Tylenol) the boy is one little hyper ball of non-stop energy. I needed to rest and recover myself, instead C had me playing, dancing, cleaning doggy doo (don't ask), baking, and doing a lot of holding and snuggling. Tuesday I traded off with DH so I could go into work and recover from my sick day, but had to watch C while DH had a meeting. When I finally got to work, the first thing I did was to spill my coffee all over myself and my desk. Wednesday was the 2 year anniversary of my SIL's death from Cancer. Carrying C into daycare, I tripped, spilling both of us to the ground, hurting my knee and banging his head really hard. Being a 2 year old, he has made a full recover much faster than I have.
The border of the POTW stole is coming along well. I have been averaging 5 repeats a day (more on Monday when I was home with C) and I am almost halfway done with the edging. I am not liking the stripes of the edging, but I think I will have to learn to live with it unilt it is blocked. Who knows, maybe the miracle of blocking will change my mind on that.
I have made good progress on the PBSJ. I finsihed the left front tonight, while surfing YouTube for Bollywood videos. All that I have left is the right front, which I will cast on for tomorrow, and sleeve island. So fare I have only used 6 of the 20 balls of Merino Style that I have for this, so I think I will have plenty left to make the Deep V Argyle Vest from Eunny's website as well. While the color's aren't the best combo together (MS Honey and Storm, both left over from other projects), it will give me a chance to practice stranded knitting on a larger scale than the Endpaper Mitts did, and maybe I will build enough confidence in my knitting to order the yarn to make either Wendy's Ingrid or Eunny's color work sweater from the winter IK.

Monday Weightloss, Tuesday eddition.

I'm up a pound. I'm not happy about it, but we have all been sick at the Cynder household, and I haven't had the time to workout since Wednesday, and I have been eating junk since Saturday. I am counting points today, and will have to dip into Flexies for tonight, and I know I was way over for yesterday.

C and I stayed home sick yesterday, and had pizza and made cookies, so I blue a bunch of points there. I'm trying to eat healthier today.

On the knitting front, I'm about 70 rows in the left front of PBSJ, and should finish the front by Saturday (which is my goal), and I have 14 repeats of the border done on POTW stole. However, I am paranoid that I am going to run out of yarn, so I will be keeping my fingers crossed. Since I bought these skeins last May, I doubt that the same dye lot is available.

Knitting Math.
If there are 2 rows each with 17 and 21 stitches, and 4 rows with 18, 19, and 21, that averages to 19 stitches per row and 304 stitches per repeat.
The body had 80 stitches per row and 960 stitches per repeat.
That means I can do 3.15 repeats of the border with the same yarn that it took to do the body.
84 repeats of the border divided by 3.15 equals 26.6, the equivalent number of body repeats that I could do with the same yarn. Since I ran out of yarn on the first ball in the 33rd repeat, and still have a small ball left over from the Swallowtail (in the same dye lot), I think I will be ok.
*SIGH*

Weekly Photo Progress report.

PBSJ has been mostly neglected this week. I finished the yoke piece Tuesday morning, and ignored it until Thursday morning when I cast on for the Left front. I had a few rows done by Saturday morning, but the POTW grew to a point where it no longer makes good car knitting (more on that later). While we were out running errands the last few days I got up to row 40 on the PBSJ in the car, (pardon the blurry photo), and should start on ball 6 of the Merino Style here shortly.
I have finished the body of the POTW stole! Picking up the stitches for the edging caused much stress and hair pulling, but I put markers on every quarter of the long sides and knew to pick up 60 stitches between the markers. This morning I finished the inner border, and I have done the first few repeats of the edging. I think I should be able to do 4 a day (84 repeats, divided by 4 a day should be 21 days), and have this done and blocked before D's wedding. N and D came over for dinner Friday night, and we gave D the PFS shawl. Her face lit up when she saw it, and that made the 6 weeks of working on it well worth it.


DH got me an early Valentines Day present. We decided to buy stuff for each others hobbies, so he got the new WOW expansion pack, and I got yarn...
4 Skeins of Misti Alpaca Lace in a pale pink to make one of the larger shawls in VLT, and a skein of Cascade 220 Merino in a heathered blue (already wound in a ball with plans to make Shedir from the Knitty Breast Cancer special. I chose the blue color in memory of my SIL Cindy who died of Ovarian cancer (turquoise) two years ago this week.

Flip Her Over Man, She is Done

The Peacock Feathers Shawl is Blocked, and ready to give to D next time I see her, or when N says its a good time to do it. I love how she turned out, and hate that I have to give her up, but I do have yarn in the stash to make another one for me, in a blue green.
Detail of the point of the shawl pinned out. I opted to keep the side feathers shallow, but to do a full pinning on the center feather. I think she turned out lovely, and not too big. She is 82 inches across (I know, because I pinned every inch on the top to keep a straight line), but I didn't take the measurement of the height. It hits me just below my bottom, so it won't drown D too bad.
I've made good progress on the POTW stole. I am almost done with the 20th repeat, and should finish the last 14 this week. The color of the bridesmaid dresses match the midshade blue perfectly, so I have a feeling that this will be worn that night as well. I actually like how the yarn is pooling, and hope the first skein makes it for the whole body, so I don't have to match the striping.
I've also made good progress on the PBSJ. I finished the back Friday night at movie night, and cast on for the yoke this morning. The yoke is going fast and should be finished tonight or tomorrow. I couldn't capture the details of the armhole or neck shaping thanks to the insane curling of the stockingnet, so more detailed photos will have to wait until blocking.

Good Progress for the week.

I think I have made good progress this week with knitting. Here is the back of the PBSJ, where I have closed the lower triangle, and just started the second. I have placed markers on both sides of the fold line stitches so I won't miss one on the back side (again).








Here is a detailed shot of the triangle. Notice the stitch markers are just cut up bits of straw. Very economical when your toddler keeps dumping out and losing your stitch markers.










I'm about 7 1/2 repeats in on the POTW stole. So far the pattern is very easy, and I think the variegation of the yarn is working with the pattern. I know others who have knit this thought variegated yarns would take away from it, but I am liking it.

Its a rainy weekend here, and my parents bailed on watching C today, so DH's and I will be staying in (again) and I will probably get a lot of knitting done.

A Very Productive week.

I finished the PFS on Saturday, but haven't blocked it yet, maybe tomorrow when my parents have C for the day, that way I can vacuum and pin out on C's floor.
I finished the first Endpaper Mitt on Sunday, before going over to Danny's for a haircut (my first in a year...Yikes), bud didn't cast on for the second one right away. Instead I decided to work on Lucie for a bit...
Then I noticed that I had dropped an edge stitch on Lucie 20 rows back. *sigh* To the frog pond she went for now, until I can either tighten my gauge enough to work on one of my circular needles (from a 2 to a 3, which is in use, but more on that later) or I break down and buy a size 2 circ (with my next knit picks order, after the yarn diet has shed some more weight).
So I did an actual gauge swatch for the PBSJ, and hit gauge on my size 4 knit pick options, and cast on for the back panel. So far this is an easy knit with just enough of a cable to keep me from getting completely bored. I am on row 30, almost done with the large bottom triangle. I have to say, I am impressed with how the pleats come together, but not as happy with working with the KP Merino style as I was last time. I am knitting on bigger needles, but it feels like the yarn is bigger than the last batch I got for Christmas of 2005. But, as I get further into my second ball of yarn (already) I see it getting softer, and thinner, so maybe there was just one ball of yarn that was too bulky. We will have to see. Hopefully this doesn't end up eating all 20 balls of yarn, because I really want to have leftover to knit the Deep V Argyle Vest.
I also cast on for the POTW stole on Sunday, using an invisible cast on from Victorian Lace Today, and after a few false starts with the cast on, it has been smooth sailing so far... The only thing I don't like is how I have to move stitch markers with almost every row, but if I keep track of my YO's I think I have come up with a way to do it without having to move markers. More on that later. As of last night, I am six repeats in (of 34 if I knit it in one piece)
Monday was a holiday, so more knitting on the two new projects.
Tuesday it was back to work, and it was frigid, not cold, but frigid, in our building. I cursed myself out for not completing the second Endpaper Mitt all day, and cast on for it at lunch. I made an executive decision to put all other knitting on hold and to get the second mitt done ASAP, and stayed up late Tuesday night working on the first repeat of the color chart.
Tuesday night/Wednesday morning that light chance of snow that wasn't going to do anything turned into a major storm for the area, bad enough for the University to close (during the first week of classes for the Semester!) so I had more time to work on the second Mitt, when C wasn't demanding my full attention (his daycare was closed that day as well). That night when S was putting him to bed, I finished the second mitt, wove in the ends for both of them and blocked them. Thursday morning, my hands were glad to have their warmth.
Thursday night was back to knitting on PBSJ and POTW. This weekend I hope to block the PFS, get some more done on the PBSJ, and do another couple repeats on the POTW.

SO much for knitting just from my stash...

After Seeing the swatches FlyinMySoup did for the Veniza pullover, I think that I must add that to my To do List. But I am seeing a sweater done in shades of pink and green, or green and purple, with blue swirles. If my math is right (and since I don't actually own a copy of the Fall IWN, so it probally isn't) my size would only take 18 balls of Palette, and therefor I could make the sweater for $40 ish. But since I won't have any money for things like that until after the tax fairy commeth, I should be able to know out a project or two before then.

I am on row 236 of the PFS. I know I can finish it this weekend. I might not block it this weekend, but it will be done. I will try to take some photos of it this weekend, since I don't have time to take photos and upload them durring the week (thats precious knitting time, and its dark by the time I get home, plus I need to spend time with C)

Lucie will not make a good travel project, since she is being knit on straght needles, so I will probally cast on for the POTWS or the PBSJ once the Endpaper Mitts are done.