Pretty as an Albino Peacock

I have cast on for the Pretty as A Peacock Shawl. I have four skeins of the Knitpicks Merino/silk Bare yarn (yeah, OMG 1760 yds! It REQUIRES 1500 yds of fingering/sport wt!) After a few bumps in the start it is going along smoothly. I did not check for errata on this pattern and it turns out there is one very significant error right out of the blocks. The cast on instruction number is wrong! Ha ha, I cast on 3 times, counted the stitches on the chart and realized that the bottom line of the chart and the c.o. instruction were wrong! So I went and looked online and lo and behold it was wrong! I am reading the chart and not the written so there are less errors that I would have encountered, but I think I have learned by lesson, when buying a newer pattern that hasn't been knitted 10,000 times by other knitters always check for errors. Um, duh. Pretty basic isn't it? It also suggested a knitted on cast on and I did that and didn't like it so I did a long tail cast on instead. As of last night I have achieved row 49.

To answer the question of several boggled people: I, who am obsessed with lovely peacock colored yarns, am not making a natural colored shawl. I have a couple of jars of lovely peacock blue and green dyes (picked up at University Art Supply) for wool and silk, which I plan to paint onto the shawl when I am finished, ala this woman's beautiful Peacock Feather's Shawl. I am not sure if I will just graduate it down ward like she did or if I will try to paint in a more detailed feather coloring. The PaaP pattern I am using has longer single feather details than the PFS and might lend more nicely to that, with the colors radiating outward from the eye of the feather. I'll probably have to knit up a sample to test paint and see how the dye takes/bleeds or perhaps turn it over to the hands of my very artistic and paint oriented sister.

So I cast on for the Snow Queen. As soon as I started knitting my asthma started to bother me. So I went and used my medicine. Then I come back later and the same thing happens. I'm beginning to think that maybe my lungs and Kid Silk don't agree with each other. So I'll put it aside for now and try again in a couple of days.

Instead I am going to cast on for my Pretty As a Peacock Shawl. I am using Knitpicks Bare, silk/merino blend. It has a very nice shine to it and is soft and smooth as well. I am looking forward to working with it.

I made it, with room to spare!

I finished the Madeira Stole this morning. With 20 grams of yarn left over! Woo hoo. I could've modified it and put on a longer edging or something. I am just relieved to have not run out of yarn though! I really think the motifs look like little school houses or row houses. The ends are woven in and that sucker if blocked and drying. It is posing on a BRIGHT pink sheet on the living room floor. I really stretched it in length and sacrificed a bit in width for that. I pinned it out lengthwise first, that is the first time I have done that, it was interesting. Usually I pin the 1 side first, then the other side and finish with the ends. Finished size is 22 x 80 (instead of the recommended 26 x 64). I added in all 3 extra motif repeats on both sides below the diamond and over the double row of houses.I was blocking it with string then had a string-tastrophe (known to you as my DD's foot!) and changed over quickly to pins mid block! I am having a hard time taking pictures of the whole thing without the wierd fading off into space/ Star Wars opening look, so once it is all dried out I will take some more pictures when I can move it and post them on my Ravelry page. On to the next project!

Madeira Fun.

Yeah, super fun. So as I said before, I was knitting away on the Madeira Stole and I get to this diamond in the pattern and realize that it was half way. So I look at it and notice that it is, um, kinda short, like 30 inches. So I weighed and I worried. I have added 3 extra repeats of the single motif section of the pattern, adding about 12 inches.

I am/was so paranoid about running out of yarn I weighed that thing like 20 times! I weighed the knitted section and the 2 balls after finishing each repeat. By the time I reached the second repeat I was feeling awfully worried and I took the second ball of yarn and knitted the knitted on edging to the one completed edge.

Well. I weighed it after the third motif and I still had more yarn on the unfinished side than on the finished side, so I am crossing my fingers that I will come out with enough yarn. If the whole weight theory works, I should come out with about 10 grams of yarn left over... It will be a good experiment in the whole weight of yarn theory and consistency in knitting. Until then I will be knitting and sweating bullets in fear of running out of yarn and ripping back to the second extra motif repeat on the first half and re-knitting the other 50 inches again. Keep your needles crossed for me!

I finished the never ending pair of Embossed Leaves socks: The upper photo is the true color of the yarn, the lower pictures are a little bluer than what it really looks like. . The last end was woven in on Monday night. They fit nicely, the elastic gives it a nice snugness. I am curious to see how this corn blend fiber will wash up.

Now I can get back to work on the Madeira Shawl. I have apparently finished half of the shawl. It was not long enough so I went back and reread the instructions several times to see if I had missed a repeat but it didn't seem that I had. So I added another repeat of the "house" pattern on each half. It adds about 4 1/2 inches. It still seems like it might be short, but I am worried about running out of yarn. What I need to do is to knit on the edging to the side I have finished and then weigh the yarn and weigh what I have finished and see where the half is.

Ah, should I start a countdown to Stitches on the side of my blog? I can't wait to buy more yarn to stick in my stash and not use! Woo hoo!