Tuesday, June 9, 2009

Rollercoaster

It's been an emotional and chaotic week and change, but let's skip the personal drama in favor of a little knitting.

First up: 1 completed moody mansock.

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Next, 1 featherweight cardigan in Knitpicks Shimmer Lilac Dream

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1 Veronique circular shrug, only a couple of inches short from the decrease-and-cast-on section that creates the back ruffle and the sleeve holes.

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And finally, one bane of my existence (you want to know another? spelling. I typed that word three times and I'm still not sure it's right). Sorry about all the hair in the photo, I put my hand up against my shoulder to model the shot (since laying my hand down on the arm of the couch had not produced very good shots) and didn't think to flip my long frizzing flowing locks out of the way (I love parentheses).

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This is a twice-knit spiraluscious mitt. I keep screwing up the pattern. Saturday I knit almost to the point where it is in that picture, only to find that I had made a mistake one or two rows after starting the thumb gusset which was very obvious (see those diagonal lines that go across the back? kind of obvious when you get a yarnover in the middle of one) and I had to rip back and reknit. I made a similar mistake Sunday night, though I caught it sooner, and had to pull it out and fix it. And now? Now, my friends? Now it is TOO SMALL. I am royally irked, but I have pretty much accepted that I'm going to have to reknit on bigger needles. It is possible that my mom's hands are smaller than mine, but it's so tight on me that I wouldn't wear it, and if by some freak occurence her feet are smaller than mine but her hands are larger, I will have sent her some very pretty tourniquets. Sigh.

The yarn is Fly Designs Nymph, their merino/tencel blend, which I chose because I love my merino/tencel socks and because it is a nice soft but strong blend that can put up with a fair amount of abuse. I did, I admit, expect the color to be a little more saturated, but I don't know why because it looks just like the picture on the website. Anyway, it's still pretty.. But, this overdue mother's day gift is going to be even more overdue because I have to start over. SIGH. No, I didn't knit a swatch. Look at that thing. Why would I bother? I did actually try it on sooner and find that it was coming out a little tight, but the bottom of it is actually fine and it is only the part that goes over the hand that cuts off circulation. SIGH.

In other news, I took a class on coloring with Copics from Laura, and had a very educational and interesting time. I went home that night and practiced.


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I think I need more practice. And more markers. And better paper.

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Why didn't I crop that last picture better? I think I uploaded the wrong one. Anyway, I think it actually went pretty well for my first solo adventure. I'm particularly find of the rose, although I need to get a more intermediate color. The shading is rather dramatic as one of these was a 2 and one of them was a 7 (was it R32 and R37? or was it 22 and 27? or was it 29? I can't remember). Anyway, expect to see more Copic experiments in the future. I have a wedding shower to go to on Saturday and I have the perfect plan for a card for it, and one for the wedding.

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