Too Much Wool

whew

So, I did say I was taking a break, but I didn't promise I'd have nothing to say. .

The last few days were incredibly busy. And stressful. There's no denying that taking your only child to college 200 miles away for the first time is a challenge. We ran around like mad getting last minute things (of course we forgot a few - thankfully there's always the post office), having family and friends over for a goodbye pizza party on Sunday, and then packing up and hitting the road on Monday evening.

We spent a nice night at my aunt's house, about halfway to my daughter's school, Monday night. Although we didn't get a particularly early start on the road on Tuesday, we arrived with plenty of time to spare (in spite of New England deciding that it was going to spit rain on us the entire trip).

My daughter is now ensconced in her dorm room, excited about this new part of her life, and itching to start classes (they start next week). I'm mostly trying to unpack from the road trip and worrying a bit about her catching the cold that I've been fighting for weeks now. I'm a mom, I've got to worry about something - that's what I've chosen to focus on right now.

I've been informed by all and sundry that I'm supposed to be freaking out, the whole empty nest syndrome etc. As of this moment, I'm not. I reserve the right to go that route at a later date, but for now I'm okay.

A big help on the road, and over the past few days, was a sock. I tried valiantly to do a picot edge, but some combination of variegation, very slippery new Knitpicks circular needles, and lack of attention span combined to thwart that. So I went with a simple lace cuff segueing into stockinette for the duration.

And no, I'm not moving all the wool, wheels, and looms into her room. I don't think that's right. However, one wheel may find its way in there for the time being - its kind of hard to resist. In the meantime, I think I'll be taking a day to regroup, run a few stupid and unavoidable errands, and perhaps indulge myself in a little woolplay.

therapy

for now

I'm going to have to take a blog-break, possibly until after Labor Day weekend. I came down with a bad cold on Sunday night, and I'm still sick today. We leave to take my daughter to school Monday, and there's a lot to be done between now and then. (I truly wish that half of 'what needs to be done' wasn't laundry - just about anything is preferable.) Then Labor Day weekend is a big party for my dad's birthday (a big one this year) and I've been deputized to help my mom organize and cook.

Thanks for everyone's comments about the shawl - I realized belatedly that with a family wedding coming up in October, I should have made a blue or green one for my MIL to wear to the wedding. Hey, there's still some time, right?

I'm going to go back to my tea-drinking and þel-spinning now (that's therapeutic, you know).

shawl

I finished the shawl. Despite severe misgivings about the choice of yarn (mostly because nupps and mohair are a bad combination), it all worked out. Quite well.

Here she is, unblocked:

Looking rather shrively, if I do say so.

Here it is, blocking:

I blocked it fairly tightly stretched, because I was worried about the mohair shrinking back up after being released from tension (so far, it hasn't).

And the modeled shot.  My daughter is away until Tuesday so I had to rely on Jon (who, you may remember, makes me look ogre-ish in almost every photo he takes of me).

So I opted to have him take photos of only my back, which works out pretty well, shawl-wise.

Specifics:

Pattern: Swallowtail Shawl by Evelyn Clark, Fall 2006 Interweave Knits

Yarn: Kaalund Yarns 100% Kid Mohair in Pointsettia

Needles: Size 4mm/US6 Lantern Moon circs (I used larger needles than the pattern specified)

Size: 31" from back neck to point, 56" across top edge

Start-Finish: 8am - more or less - Sunday August 13th - noon Saturday August 19th.

The yarn was lovely, although almost wirey. It blocked beautifully, has a slight halo but nothing like the furriness of Kidsilk Haze. It drapes amazingly. It was a real challenge to make nupps with, having no elasticity, but I knit the whole shawl loosely to compensate. The slight variations in the color give it a lovely depth - I might be newly addicted to single color, hand-dyed shawl yarns now.

The pattern was great, no problems at all (other than the fact that I didn't read it at all before starting), but Evelyn Clark does write a really good pattern. I love the combination of the center section and the borders, the way it flows into the Lily-of-the-Vally (aka nuppfull) section and then the peaked edging. I'd definitely make another one. I have plans to, actually.

of half-wits and endless amusements

I figured a late-in-the-day post was better than nothing - not that anyone was holding their breath waiting - so here goes.

The shawl isn't finished. I had a class last night that got me home near 11pm, obliterating any chance I had of finishing this morning. However, I have rented a movie, and plans are to finish it tonight - I've got 6 (long!) rows left to go.

I have no idea if this movie is good, but The Twilight Samurai was excellent, so I have hopes. Doesn't matter too much, I just need something to knit to tonight. I can always be entertained by a good samurai movie, much to the dismay of my entire family.

Rather than knitting, I've been endlessly amused by .... fleece. I just keep thinking about the half-wit quote I posted the other day (and the fact that Sonja mentioned to me that there's a half-wit who sorts wool in the Gísli saga as well.) Sonja also mentioned that the image of the half-wit from the film version of the saga combined with the thought of me and my wool in NYC was just hysterical. So be it.

So, we've got sorted and unsorted Icelandic wool, the first endlessly amusing task.

On the right you have an unsorted bag of fleece. On the left, a plastic basket with locks sorted and neatly arranged prior to washing. I can spend hours doing this, if no one watches me (you know, the 'laughing fervently' thing, it could be embarassing.)

Then we have the true gem of the whole process, the progression from nothing to .... well, from something to .... something better. Something amazing.

This is unsorted Icelandic lamb fleece. (Not the same as what you see above, this is another one - ahem.)

This is the same stuff - - nicely sorted, washed and dried. Stephanie and Juno, please take note, I've gotten responsible about my lock formation/arrangement prior to washing. I'm reformed now.

And then, because I really couldn't help myself, you've got þel-p*rn:

This fleece doesn't need tog and þel separated [Icelandic lamb's fleeces generally have less coarse tog than the mature sheep], but I did a few locks because, um... I'm obsessive/compulsive like that and I wanted to see what I came up with. It's delicious, really. See the chocolate (moorit) tips on the gray? I can't tell you how happy that makes me.

When next we (royal we) blog, I should have a finished shawl. If I can keep my hands out of the fleece long enough.

nupps no more

There you have it. Twenty-two rows of nupps (the 24 I mentioned yesterday was a mistake). I'm two rows into the (final) Peaked Edging chart, which means I've got 14 more rows to go. Each row getting longer, of course.

The slight variegation of this yarn looks gorgeous. It's the perfect alternative to a straight solid color for lace. Oddly enough, I'm seriously thinking of doing this shawl again - and I'm not even done yet. I have some alpaca/silk that I had thought of using, but I thought I wouldn't have enough. As it turns out, the 400m of the mohair that I'm using won't all get used up, so I may have enough of the alpaca silk to do a slightly upsized version. (The alpaca silk is a heavier weight, which would require bigger needles, make a bigger shawl, and probably take more yardage - I've got 580 yards of it.)

I also swatched with my hemp/silk laceweight.

Its interesting. This swatch is washed - the hand is crisp but it still has a lot of drape to it. I've got 2300 yards, its a 2/24 weight yarn, and .... well, there are lots of possibilities. I'd be happy to hear some suggestions.

nupp-nupp-nupp

I've said this before. I know this about myself, I know its technically "wrong" but I hate rules and so I often ignore them. Often this causes major regret, but I don't learn well from prior mistakes.

The rule? The mistake? I rarely read a pattern through before starting.

Now, I took a look at the Swallowtail Shawl pattern, saw it was small, had a central portion and borders (I like the borders, Birch almost bored me to tears), and ..... it was small. I needed a quick fix, something that wasn't going to go wrong, felt if I looked at it funny, or otherwise challenge me.

Sunday morning I blithely cast on. Knit like a demon for two days, and then sometime yesterday afternoon .... I turned the page. (Stop laughing.) Looked at the second set of charts (which I was then 8 rows away from starting). And saw [cue ominous music].....

the nupps.

I had seen the picture of the shawl. Seen the pretty border. Saw the name and assumed that we had some sort of "swallowtail lace" and just jumped right in. Lily of the Valley? I know all about that. Full of nupps. Did I read the pattern description right above the first two charts? You know, the paragraph that said - Lily of the Valley? 'Course not.

Yet there I was, 8 rows from starting the nupp-full chart and I figured, what the hell. I did nupps on Madli, and it didn't kill me there. (Still haven't finished that shawl, but it'll happen eventually - rectangles bore me.)

So this morning, I did the first two rows of nuppiness. The first being a right side row with the wonder that is a nupp [k1, yo, k1, yo, k1 - all into one stitch], and the second being the dreaded purl-5-together row that completes the nupp.

And here you have it - a nupp. Now, only an idiot would set herself up to nupp her way through 24 rows of nuppy charts with 100% mohair yarn. Mohair. Do you have any idea how much stretch and spring mohair has? ZERO. Which makes purling-five-together rather interesting.

It remains to be seen if I'll learn from this mistake or not. Although sometimes I really think its better not to know what you're getting yourself into.

tails and tales

Let's see. I killed an orchid, watched a dragonfly in its death throes (it didn't just keel over by the way, it took an hour to die), and managed to felt a small batch of Icelandic fleece. [Marcy, it wasn't the TN fleece - don't worry.)

Thankfully, I also managed to not felt another whole Icelandic fleece.

I plied, as I've been threatening to. Badly, for the most part, although some went better than others.

the overplied stuff on the left is some wool/silk I bought at MDSW from Stefania. The absolute abomination on the right is the worst spinning I've done since I got a wheel. I have three bobbinsfull of the singles, and the problem isn't in the plying (I don't think so, at least). I'm having trouble dealing with this magnificent failure.

To soothe my ravaged psyche I bought some hemp/silk laceweight from Habu.

Okay, full disclosure - I bought the laceweight on Friday before my psyche was ravaged and needed soothing. But soothe it did - I kept it out on my desk all weekend and fondled it.

Considering how everything else was going I did the only logical thing I could think of.

Cast on for a new shawl. It's the Swallowtail Shawl by Evelyn Clark from the new (Fall '06) IK. I'm using some laceweight mohair that Emma sent me for my birthday last year.

 

almost ..... not

Saw this big guy (he was about 6 or 7 inches long) land on a coleus on my deck, so I rushed to get the camera (thinking of Laurie and her awesome dragonfly picture).

And then he keeled over and died. I'm not having a really good weekend.

.... and sometimes I wonder

if the universe is trying to tell me something because today while I was reading, this one line jumped out at me:

The half-wit sat on the floor and laughed fervently as he pulled apart pieces of wool.
                                    - Iceland's Bell, Halldór Laxness