Highland Triangle Shawl

I've started a new project! I'm working on the Highland Triangle Shawl from Folk Shawls.





I'm using Wool of the Andes from KnitPicks in Wheat and I'm up to row 43 in the second set of repeats. It's a bit darker than shown on their website (use the catalog when chosing colors, it's more accurate), but I like it. I think that this one, unlike the Wool Peddler, may need blocking when it's finished - something that I'm not looking forward to as I don't have a regular bed that I can do it on. I can just see pinning it out on the floor and finding three cats on top of it.

I finished the black garter stitch shawl for the K4 project & I'm over half way through knitting another one in medium blue. I also brought home two more 8 ounce skeins from Thursday's meeting to make two more - one in cranberry and the other in a variegated blue with touches of cranberry.

Now on the subject of Fuzzy Feet. They're easy to make and despite the early problems I had with the first two pair, I like knitting them. But shouldn't they last longer than 6 weeks????? The pair I finished at the beginning of January has already been mended twice because they're wearing through. Ok, I admit that DH loves them and wears them around the house all the time, but still - 6 weeks??? Last night, I took the first pair that wore out and cut out patches that I sewed onto the bottoms of pair #2. Hopefully this will keep them going until I can get another pair knit and felted, but I'm beginning to see this as an unending project.

Cloths For Crisis

Back in September of 2005, I joined with Sallee of Knitnana fame to host Cloths for Katrina, a Yahoo group dedicated to knitting cotton washcloths for those displaced by Hurricane Katrina which struck with such horrible ferocity along the Gulf Coast at the beginning of that month. Since then members of that group have knit and sent off probably close to 2000 washcloths to survivors. But now, five months later, it is becoming more difficult to find ways of distributing those cloths. The evacuees have left the large shelters, those housed in hotels around the country have been told to find individual lodgings and many have started new lives far from the Coast. Rather than abandon the effort, the poll which closed yesterday showed that almost 85% of the members want to continue in some form.

Accordingly, Sallee & I have opened a new group Cloths For Crisis which will encompass those we can find still in need from Katrina & Rita, national disasters still to come (unfortunately) with the next hurricane season, and local needs. There's a new button over there in the sidebar or you can click on the link above or on the button over there to join us.

We know that a hand-knit washcloth isn't a magic wand that will solve all the problems of anyone caught in an event like Katrina or lodged in a local homeless or battered women's shelter, but that simple cloth, hand crafted with love, is a way of saying that someone cares, that the person receiving it is not completely alone. Please join us. Knit a few cloths to set aside so they can be sent out within days of identifying a need. (Our biggest problem with Cloths For Katrina was that we were playing catch-up, trying to knit cloths for distribution while the evacuees were scattering.) Knit a few more to send to those still homeless. And then, before putting your needles and yarn away, knit even more to send to a local shelter or charity. There's nothing more satisfying than giving from our hands & hearts. Try it, I think you'll find that you'll like it.

No Photos Tonight

..... but I have been busy. The back yoke on Mom's vest is almost done, I just need to work short row shaping on the shoulders. I finished the green garter stitch shawl for the K4 project and I'm almost half way through making a black one. The meeting was today so I turned in the green one & picked up a skein of medium blue to make the next one after the black shawl. On Monday, I started a pair of fingerless gloves in Rainbow Dreams Trade Winds colorway. I finished the first one that evening and the second Tuesday evening while watching tv. I know that I have another pair - the ones in Rosy Forecast - around here somewhere, but I haven't been able to find them, so it was quicker to make another pair. Speaking of missing items, remember the missing size 9 circular I was searching for some months ago? I found it - it's in a partly completed sweater that I'd forgotten about that was tucked in with fabric in the quilting corner. Now I have two needles in that size. Ah, well.. It's a handy size to have and it's comforting to know that I wasn't crazy and I really did have the needle and didn't just dream it. Plan for this evening is to work on Mom's vest and maybe more on the black shawl. I need to start swatching for the Highland Triangle Shawl for the Folk Shawl KAL and I'd like to swatch the Frost Flowers lace from A Gathering of Lace to see if it will work for the black vest I want to make Mom. I think I need more hours in the day (or less time on the computer) and a couple extra sets of hands. {g}

Here We Go, Round Again

A couple days ago, I swatched the lace for the Kimono Lace Shawl in Folk Shawls with an eye toward using it as the front panel when I remake the lime green vest for Mom. I'm using the same DK weight wool from a recycled sweater that I used for my Aibhlinn and it seems to work nicely for lace - enough so that I'm wondering if I have enough in the large hanks I had left over to make a shawl. Anyway, the flash from the camera washed it out a bit, but the pattern can still be seen.



And here it is being worked into the vest. This yarn is acrylic rather than wool so it doesn't stretch out as much until the vest in on, but I think it's going to work. Because I didn't like this yarn on the size 13 needles the pattern calls for, I did some calculations and discovered that the largest size knit on 10½s will come out about 33" or just about right size for Mom who is tiny.



Our K4 group met yesterday and I turned in the cream colored garter stitch shawl that I finished earlier in the week and worked on the green shawl. Other than those two projects (the shawl & Mom's vest) I don't have anything on the needles other than really old PIPs that have been in progress far too long. The next "Just For Me" project will probably be the Highland Triangle Shawl but that needs to wait until I get the vest off the 10½ circulars. Guess I'd better get busy.