Beginnings

Because, after all, what is yarn but a beginning? (You there, in the back, fussing about raising sheep and spinning and how yarn is not actually the beginning. Shut up. You're ruining my poetic comparison. It's the beginning for me.)

I got some gorgeous Christmas loot. There was apparently some sneakiness involved during our visit to Cloverhill for the Dragonfly Fibers trunk show.

Djinni Sock in Black Pearl



Love it. That makes 5 skeins of Djinni sock total in my stash. 2 skeins are slated to become Taygete, the next shawl in the 7 small shawls series, and one is in the process of becoming a pair of socks. I feel like I'm going to save the Black Pearl and Reluctant Dragon colorways for a shawl. Ooo, maybe I will look at them together. At the trunk show there was a gorgeous Clockwork made from two skeins of Djinni.

And...even better...1200 yards of Dragonfly Fibers Gaia Lace in Black Pearl. I can't tell you how many times I went back to this at the trunk show, and it was only a very limited budget and an iron determination to be good that let me walk away from it. I was absolutely delighted to open this gift!!



It's gorgeous. Absolutely stunning, and so soft. 45% cashmere and 55% silk. Oh, let's have another shot, just for kicks.



I'm officially on the prowl for a pattern worthy of this goodness. Something night-themed would be awesome. Just the thought of being wrapped in all that soft gorgeousness....oh, sorry, where was I?

From my friend in Texas who sends me yarn every year from the Heritage festival, I received these:



Mmm, warm squishy worsted weight naturally dyed merino goodness. I'm just now noticing that the yellow in that photo is wrong...it's more peachy in real life. I have no idea what I'm going to do with these as yet, I will have to wait for a project to strike me. Historically the Heritage yarn has come in very generous skeins but I don't think there was any actual yardage listed - only the 4 oz notation. But I'm sure I can get a couple of cozy hats out of these at the very least!

One of my friends went to Spain on vacation and she brought me yarn from Barcelona, and some other yarn that was also made in Spain but she wasn't sure exactly where. She also bought me an absolutely soft, beautiful woven shawl. And I, of course, forgot to photograph any of it because it was in a separate bag from the other Christmas loot.

I also bought myself some things with Christmas money from grandma - a skein of Sanguine Gryphon Bugga in Arachne for the final installment of the 7 Small Shawls ebook (planning to knit #6 from stash), 3 skeins of Handmaiden Silk Twist in Silver for Galadriel's Mirror, and Unique Sheep Ling in the Mirkwood colorway for the In Dreams mystery knitalong. Those items haven't arrived yet - but that's got to put the cap on my spending for a good long while. That was a pretty major splurge, but between that, the stash, the Christmas loot - I really ought to be set on yarn for quite a while. My project list is already bigger than I can probably manage for the year and I now have yarns for just about everything, so I'll try to be good from here on out. It does not help me, however, that one of the group members on Ravelry just posted that Signature Needle Arts will be offering size 3 and 4 circulars starting January 18. Oh well. They will have time to work any kinks out by my birthday.

Before I close, I leave you with a funny story related to yesterday's post. I got my beads back and was working on Phoenix when I realized how few beads were left in the tube. I groaned, thinking I was in for yet another delay in finishing this shawl while I ordered more beads. Fortunately, I thought, the people over at Bobby Bead are wonderful and if I ordered right away I would probably get my order before I had time to run out.

Something about this thought triggered a memory, though. I ordered a bunch of beads in different colors some time ago when Bobby Bead was having a sale, and I remember looking at one of the tubes when they arrived and thinking, oh, that was the color I used for Phoenix, and how silly of me to order something I already had.

I went upstairs and sure enough, in my bead bin was a tube of size 8 Toho silver-lined smokey topaz. This is great because it means I can keep knitting with no fear of delay - but it also made me mad because if I had just remembered on Sunday that I had that tube, I might already be finished!!! There I was thinking that I couldn't work on it because I forgot the beads, and I had a whole tube of them upstairs. Argh!

Endings

After so much time away, which I spent very productively, I have so much to say that it might be too much for one blog post. I'll give it a shot and then we'll have a bonus post this week if I have more to say.

With no further ado, let us begin. First up is one you haven't seen before.



In an attempt not to get caught at Christmas with a half-finished shawl, I started this one way early. I needn't have worried - it was a surprisingly fast knit. The end result is a little shallow, I suppose, so that might be why it went more quickly than I expected. Right about when the rows start to get really tedius, you're done. As a result this one was done in August and I am horrible at keeping gifts secret, so it was a real effort not to even hint at this one. I couldn't even talk about it on Ravelry or put up a project page, as the recipient might have stumbled upon it.





This is one of those projects where I really had a specific effect in mind. I wanted an aspen-themed shawl, I wanted it to really look like aspen, and I wanted it to be the color of aspens in the fall, and I had very specific ideas about what that meant. I chose the Aspen Grove shawl (as opposed to the many, many other lovely aspen-themed shawls out there) because to me the stitch motif actually looks like a real aspen leaf. Moreso on the model than on my version, to be honest, but I think that has to do with the yarn I used. It's a very tightly spun silk from No Two Snowflakes, in a OOAK colorway called Opportunity Knocks. It's perfect for the shawl but I think because the stitch definition is so incredibly crisp, the shape of the leaf is a little less rounded than I would have preferred (might also have to do with my guage), but it's still very close. I paid close attention when I blocked to make sure I got them as rounded as possible.



I actually spent a lot of time thinking about whether I could possibly get a gradient effect in the shawl so that the trunks would be more white. I thought about using 3 colors and holding two strands together throughout, changing from two yellow strands to one yellow and white strand and then one white strand - but in the end, I just went with this yarn, which is much more variegated than you can see in the pictures. Then I thought about beading the tree trunks with white pearl seed beads, but after examining the chart I decided this would be too difficult and end up making the shawl too heavy.


(I'm not sure but I think this photograph is actually of the wrong side. You can see the pearl bumps in the leaves. Oops.)

The next thing I have to show is this:


That was my Christmas present from the SO - enough KnitPicks blocking mats to cover a 6x6 surface. Why on earth would anyone need so many blocking mats?

So that I could finally do this:





Though as you can see, my finished project fell far short of the 6' diameter the pattern instructed. Not surprising, I used the recommended needle size, and I'm a tight knitter by nature. Photographing white on grey turned out to be a little challenging, but I did my best.







Once my Christmas knitting was done my hands were not idle. I was determined to finish some projects before I got home, projects that I knew would take forever to finish if I just had an hour or two every night to work on them. First up was Bluebird with its 70 million repeats (not really, it was only 38, but it felt like a lot). Normally I avoid patterns with repeating motifs for this reason, I get bored very quickly and the project just drags out as I slog through the middle sections. So, I put my vacation time to good use and cranked on this as hard and fast as I could to get through it. Then I relaxed a bit as I knit through the other end. I was hoping to finish this by midnight on New Years, but I didn't quite make it. I was distracted by guests and board games, which are all integral NYE traditions for us, so though I had it in my lap the whole time, I did lose a lot of knitting time. By 1 a.m., I had made it to the last row. I chose not to do the bind off just then, though, since I didn't want to screw it up due to tiredness. This turned out to be a good decision as I nearly screwed it up in the afternoon.



Yesterday I rearranged my blocking mats and pinned it out.







I should probably be ashamed of how happy it makes me that I can now block without leaving the room with the TV.



The beads were so pretty that I wished I could have used more, but I couldn't figure out a logical placement that didn't use way too many more than I wanted to deal with.

I still have one loose end that's not quite tied up yet.



Once I had the middle section of Bluebird done, this monstor became my vacation knitting. After such a long break, it didn't feel like it was going nearly as slow as it had when I stopped, so that's good - although an eye on the clock shows that it is not, in fact, going any faster. Then, at the airport while working on the last repeat of the Edge chart, I started to worry that I was going to run out of yarn. You can see that ball doesn't have much left, and if you squeeze it it becomes truly frightening how little is left. I stopped, afraid I was going to run out and end up having to frog a whole repeat of Edge. I didn't have a scale with me (I was, in fact, sitting at the airport when I reached this conclusion) so I decided it was better to wait until I could weigh it. I did have a little winding incident when I wound this yarn and I knew I had a little miniskein left over from that, but I was sure it was going to be too tiny to matter.

On New Years Day, after I finished Bluebird, I picked Phoenix back up again and got out the scale. The yarn I had left weighed about 13 grams, and I was fretting myself to pieces. I went and got the little mini skein. When I took it out of the ziplock it was in, it was surprisingly fat. I went straight back to the scale.



Yes, I thought, now we're in business. Now instead of 'definitely not gonna make it' I was back up to 'might possibly, if I'm very lucky, make it.'

As of yesterday I still hadn't totally used up the original ball, and I'm into the ending rows now. There are 10 ending rows and I'm running at roughly a gram a row, or slightly less. I don't think these last rows get any bigger, so I think, maybe, I'm gonna be okay. I'm going to get another 2 rows out of the original ball, I think, which will leave 6 rows of the ending rows for that little 9 gram miniskein. That leaves me 3 grams for the bind off, which...will be really tight, honestly. I mean, if you figure that a normal row would take 1 gram, then I would like to think the bind off will take no more than twice the normal amount of yarn. But I'm not sure. And, to be honest, I'm using more like .8 grams per row, so maybe I will have a little leeway. I could leave out two rows of the ending chart and probably be no worse for it, but...I don't know. We'll see. I normally don't mind frogging when I need to, but I'm not sure I could handle frogging that many stitches if I get to the end and don't have enough. Stay tuned, people, this one will be a nail-biter. I was honestly hoping to finish yesterday, but I left my tube of beads at the SO's place at the NYE party so I had to stop once the ones I had in the bag ran out. At 40 minutes a row this is still going to take a while to complete, but if I don't have it done by this weekend I will cry.

Since I was stuck, I did what any knitter would do - I started a new project. I was hoping to cast on Fiori di Sole, but it turns out that all my size 4 needles are in use. I'm honestly not sure how this is possible, I have 3 or 4 sets and I can only account for two. There is one set of wood tips in my needle binder, but I have such a preference for the metal ones that I thought I might as well just wait until Phoenix is done and I can reclaim those needles.

Instead I started this.



The Limestone One-Skein shawl in delicious fingering cashmere from Zen Yarn Garden, in a color that reminds me of rasberry sherbert. So light, so soft, so gorgeous. My new love. But I'm sticking to my guns on finishing Phoenix. I'm so close. That will be my first priority until it's over.

I plan to cast on for Fiori, and that will leave me with one really intensive, demanding project (Sevillano), one more relaxed lace project (Fiori) and one pretty easy fingering lace project (Limestone). I consider this an acceptable status for WIPs.

I also finished (and gifted) the Esplanade hat I was working on, so that's off the needles, leaving me with just shawls, a couple of pairs of socks, and the one sweater (Simone from French Girl Knits) as active WIPS. We do not speak of the non-active WIPS.

The rest of what I had to say involves Christmas loot and this is already a pretty picture-heavy post, so I think we'll save that for a bonus post.

Merry Christmas from Chiron Beta Prime

The clock is ticking down and I'm knitting like a fiend. I finished these to stick in my mom's stockings:





Leafprints mitts in Great Northern Yarns Cashmere/Mink DK. I have to say I wasn't impressed with this yarn in the ball, but the fabric it creates is soft and silky. I'm not sure I'll buy it again, though - even though the minks are supposedly not harmed in the gathering of the fur for the yarn, it just gives me the heeby jeebies a bit. We'll see. On the up side, I may have enough yarn left to make some for myself.

I'm still working on these for my brother:



I've actually gotten quite a bit farther than shown on the second glove - I'm almost ready to put the thumb stitches on holders. I hope I can finish these tomorrow, but it will depend on how many family activities I have to participate in. I know of at least one shopping trip I have to be part of because I need some things.

I made my brother a pair of very simple ribbed mitts a couple of years ago, no fingers, just a hole for the thumb, the really easy ones that take one skein of yarn and an evening to make from Last Minute Knitted Gifts. He was pretty unimpressed, all I got was a mumbled ‘thanks’ and I kind of put the endeavor down as a failure. But, I found one of the mitts on the washer a month or so ago (he lives in my basement) and I thought, well, if he is washing them, maybe he is wearing them, and maybe it would be worth making him a pair of fingerless gloves. I've made these for a couple other people who really like them, so I'm hopeful. if I get the same ‘you are weird and I don’t get why you do this’ face I got last time, I will know I really am a sucker. I got enough yarn to make him a hat, too, but I don't know if it'll be done by Christmas. It might be tight on the gloves as it is.

I brought a ton of WIPs with me on this trip, but because I've been working on the two projects above I haven't gotten very far. I'm past the halfway point on my Bluebird shawl and I've done a fair amount of work on the Esplanade hat I have on the needles. I really want to finish these two and my Phoenix shawl by the time I get home. That might be a bit of a stretch but I'm going to try. I discovered last year that vacation is a great time to power through projects that would otherwise seem to stretch on forever, since I have more time to sit and work on things. I can power through pieces with a million repeats (Bluebird) or really long rows (Phoenix) because I have more long, dedicated blocks of time. But, we've been moving around so much up till now that it really hasn't been feasible anyway. Thanks to plane delays and all the stuff leading up to the trip, I was really exhausted when we got here, and today is the first day I really felt remotely like myself again. I'm hoping things will be looking up now that there's no more traveling to do until it's time to come home.

Merry Christmas and thank you to all my readers. May your holidays be warm, cozy, and drama-free.

Knitting and Not Knitting

Well, the first Christmas hurdle is jumped. This weekend was pretty thoroughly chaotic. There was knitting, and there was...not knitting. I sing in my church choir, and we had rehearsal and then the performance of our Christmas concert. That was Big Item No. 1 on my Christmas worry list, so at least I can cross that one off now.

Also in the not knitting category:



I do not come from a baking family, but I have been adopted into one, and every year the SO's family has a giant Christmas cookie bake. I don't really participate in the baking but I'm sure my assistance in cookie selection and quality control are still very much appreciated.

While supervising said baking I finished the socks I was working on for my coworker and put a little more length on the white snowflake scarf (OF DOOM). It probably could still stand to be a little longer, but I'm tired of it, so I went ahead and knit the second snowflake panel to finish it off last night.



I used a stretchy lace bind off and I'm not sure it was the right choice. I just can't seem to reach a happy medium with bind offs. They're either too loose and messy looking or too tight. This one is a bit loose (you can't tell in the picture because I artistically tucked the corners in so it doesn't show) but the scarf does need to be blocked a little wider than it currently is, so I'm hoping that'll take away some of the loose edging. I really just can't win with scarves, the bind off end and the cast on end just don't ever match for me.

I also finished the last of the gifts I have not disclosed here - or so I thought. Then I realized that I was going to have a ton of yarn leftover and (somewhat reluctantly) started another piece. I don't think I'm going to worry too much about getting this one done by Christmas, though. It's a bonus, so the recipient will get it when the recipient gets it.

This will leave me with only 'optional' Christmas knitting left - little extras I had planned for some of my less knit-appreciative family. Oh, and the weaving in of ends. Looooots of ends to weave in. I didn't do it as I went along, and well. Looooots of ends to weave in. Boo.

We got our first snow for the year yesterday morning:



Not very impressive, but enough to make me smile. More is supposedly coming this week, but I'm very concerned about it because I have a plane to catch this weekend. Last year we flew out right after the big blizzard and we were delayed in the airport for hours thanks to all the previous flights that had been cancelled. Hope we won't get stuck again this year! Also, I think my two coworkers that have done most of the work for the Christmas party planning may leap off a building if the party gets cancelled due to snow for the second year in a row.

Already Overbooked

Whenever I don't have time to knit, or if I'm stuck knitting something really plain, I do a lot of looking at knitting and daydreaming about knitting, and I've come to the realization that 2011 is going to be kind of packed on the knitting front. I have SO many things I want to knit! This is not unusual, I always have a ton of things I want to knit. I actually don't use my ravelry queue very much because my queue is so fluid - some projects I knit right away, some are on my list for ages before I get to them. I generally use my 'favorites' button to keep track of patterns I'm interested in so I can revisit them later.

But, this year things are a little different. I've become a little more active in the social aspect of Ravelry, and I've now got a list of projects with corresponding knitalongs that give me a little bit more of a timeline. With that in mind...holy cow my time is filling up fast!!

So here's a list of things I'm looking at knitting so far in 2011

1., 2., and 3. - Romi's Seven Small Shawls
Knitting through these ebook patterns with the Romi group on Ravelry has been a ton of fun, and I plan to knit along right through to the end. All three designs should be finished by the new year, but they won't be through test knitting and ready for release until January at least. I don't know Romi's exact plans but I expect (and hope) she will give us some time between releases. We run knitalongs on the Romi group for each Romi project and I think if she released all three of them at once the rest of the mods and I might go a little crazy.

5. and 6. Romi's Pins and Lace Club

Romi's Pins and Lace patterns ship in January and April (perfect for my birthday!!), and I haven't even finished the pattern from October of this year!! I feel behind already. Sevillano is gorgeous, though, and is number one on my to-knit list when I get back from Christmas. If I'm lucky I'll be able to bust a move and get it mostly finished before the new one ships. Totally doable, right? Right?? (really this should probably be 5, 6, 7, and 8, but I can't remember when the other two installments ship, and thinking about it is overwhelming me a little...so we'll just not worry about those other two for the time being, hmm??)

7. The Light and Dark Lace Club by The Yarnarian and Zen Yarn Garden

Y'all, I love mystery knits. Don't ask me why. On the surface, it's completely crazy. Why would I spend good knitting time working on a product that I may not even like in the end?? Yet the surprise is so much fun. I love it. And the trick, I've found, is to pick mystery knitalongs from designers whose work you like in the past.

Now, having said that, I have never actually knit any patterns from this designer and I'm not that familiar with her work. But I AM familiar with Roxanne of Zen Yarn Garden's fabulous yarns, and I couldn't resist this idea. I stay away from clubs in general because there's too much commitment involved, but this bi-monthly club is pay as you go, if you want to - you don't have to purchase every club package and you don't have to pay for multiple months up front. And $26 strikes me as a very reasonable price for a fun surprise showing up in my mailbox in February, one of the dreariest of months. The yarn will be mailed in February and the pattern will come in installments after that. This was a little Christmas present to myself. I picked the pussywillow colorway.

8. Galadriel's Mirror from Sunflower Designs (from the designer of Evenstar)

Remember what I said about finding a designer whose work speaks to you? Susan's work speaks to me, and I LOVE this pattern. But, I have to find the right yarn for it. It uses a fingering weight, and I have plenty of fingering weight yarn, but none in sufficient quantities for this piece and none in a color that I find sufficient. Based on the book's description of the mirror, , I'm thinking I would like a silver yarn with a hint of blueand I'm thinking a silk blend would be great for a little added shimmer. OH. What about Hand Maiden Silk Twist?? Ooooooooh. I must think on this. Maybe in Silver or Stardust. I'll have to come back to this idea. Knitty-Noddy has it in Salt Spray, that would be pretty awesome too...They only have two, though, I would need three. Anyway, no knitalong for this one, so I don't have to worry about keeping up with anybody - meaning this one will probably get knit later in the year, towards the summer or fall.

9. Two Towers Mystery Knitalong - In Dreams from Sunflower Designs

Evenstar was the mystery knitalong for the Fellowship of the Ring, and Susan has just announced Galadriel's Crown, the mystery knitalong for the Two Towers Collection. I'm not sure I'm going to buy the whole collection this time around, but I definitely plan to participate in the mystery knitalong again. This one will be designed for Unique Sheep Gradiance colorways, which I've wanted to try, so that will be exciting. Unique Sheep has several LOtR themed colorways, too, so I might have to try one of those - but we'll see what speaks to me. I have very specific color associations with various locations and characters in LOtR (also they have neither a Lothlorien or a Galadriel colorway at this time, so I figure I have free reign). I'm kind of thinking maybe Lemon Drop - I associate golds much more strongly with Galadriel and Lothlorien than greens. But, I'm not sure I would wear yellow all that much, either. Maybe Moonlight in the Garden? Decisions decisions. I'll have to do some Ravelry searches and see how these colorways knit up, I think.

10. Limestone One Skein Triangle Shawl

I have a skein of fingering weight cashmere just waiting to become this shawl. Again, no scheduled knitalong for this one, so it'll be a floating project. I do kind of like to have one fingering weight shawl on the needles for when I need a break from the really fine lacework, and I think this one will be perfect. Also, cashmere.

11. Bitterroot by Romi

I've loved this design ever since it was released in Knitty, but I haven't made it yet, and I'd really like to.

12. Fiori di Sole by Romi

I was planning to do this over the holidays, but since I've ended up with so many other projects I don't know if I'll have the chance!! I still want to do it, but I'm not sure when it will happen. This is a big shawl and it's perfect vacation knitting but I think it might drive me a little crazy to only work on in small pieces. Clearly, I just need to plan another vacation so I can knit it.

13. Midsummer Night's Dream

This one has been on my to-knit list forever, but I refuse to knit it until I find the perfect yarn, and I haven't yet.

I could add more to this list but I think this is really quite sufficient, don't you?? Designers, I understand you need to make a living and the only way for you to do that is to design as fast as the mills can churn out graph paper, but do you think you could maybe tone it down just a leeeeetle bit so I can keep up???

Squash and Stretch

Running pretty low on blog fodder this week. All I really have is this:



My snowflake scarf is growing at a snail's pace, or at least that's how it feels lately. When I first started, it seemed like it was growing by leaps and bounds, but no more. I set it down to measure on Saturday before I started working, and I was at 33 inches. I placed a marker on that row so I could see how much progress I'd made. I worked until I had a more then the length of my middle finger (approximately 3 inches) between the marker and the needle and stopped and measured, just to feel good.

33 inches. WHAT.

I fumed, moved my marker, and knit some more, maybe about an inch and a half as measured against my pinky finger (approximately two inches. yes, I have measured my fingers so that I can use them to estimate. don't judge me). Measured again. 38 inches.

It was clear that the scarf was toying with me at that point. I thought about it for a moment, and laid the scarf out on the couch, smoothed lengthwise, and measured it. 38 inches. Then I smoothed it widthwise, and measured it. It shrank considerably in length.

I sighed. The guage on this scarf is very loose (on purpose) and the slightest little puff or tug or even the weight of the scarf as it hangs from the needle changes the length (and, correspondingly, the width). Since I am going to have to block it with some stretch in the width in order to open up the snowflake panels, the scarf simply isn't as long as I think it is. I think I'm going to have to knit it longer than I thought so that it's still an appropriate length when blocked. I could cheat and just let it be short, but the coworker who is to receive this scarf is a 6'2" Amazon, so I can't really skimp too much. I will just have to suck it up and accept that I have to knit more.

I could have made a lot more progress this weekend, but I was pretty lazy overall. From now on it's run run run with family events and preparations for my church concert, so I took it pretty easy this weekend. Plus, frankly...everything I have left to knit is boring. This is appropriate, considering how little time I have left to get everything done, but I find myself putting it down frequently to hop on the internet, or try to find something better on TV, or what have you. What I really need is some self-discipline and a few good movies. Oh, and a Starbucks attached to my house.

Planning is always the fun part

I have become quite the unfaithful knitter, lately. Normally I don't have that many projects of the same type (that distinction is very important) going on at once. I have a variety of different knitting projects - complicated lace, TV knitting, mindless knitting, and I usually have only one project in any given type at a time. But somehow in the last few months I haven't done as well at keeping the startitis at bay.

In a little over two weeks I'll be on my annual pilgrimage to my parents' for Christmas, and I hope to get in quite a lot of knitting. So, I started thinking about what I'm going to take with me, and I went over my projects to decide what goes and what stays.

1. Sevillano
My love for this shawl knows no bounds, but alas, I don't think it can accompany me. No beads to worry about, but 100% silk does not travel well and this shawl really, really needs attention and alertness. Sevillano, my beloved, will have to stay at home.

2. Bluebird
This one's going with me. I'm thinking about taking it for the plane, actually. It's not too big and I'm working the center panel with its billions of repeats. I think I've done 10 repeats out of 30 something. It's not too complicated and I have the chart (sort of) memorized, so I won't get totally lost if I have to stop in the middle of something for boarding or what have you. This plus an audiobook should make my plane flight bearable - assuming TSA doesn't take my needles. I hope they won't, they never have before, but I'm going to make sure I have cable caps with me just in case.

3. Phoenix Rising.
I think I'll definitely take this one along too. At its current stage, it's really too large to work with on the plane, and the center panel is beaded, but it should be fine for working in the car or at my parents house. We're driving to my grandparents' this year so in addition to the plane, there will be quite a bit of car time. I should have enough room in the car for everything I need, and with the help of superfloss I should be able to keep the beads under control, since there are so few of them anyway. The rows are huge on this one and it's a long slog to get through it, so some enforced time with it in the form of a long car trip may be what it takes to get this thing done.

4. Simone
I'm wavering on this one. On the one hand, it's been sitting there a while and I'd love to be able to wear it before summer gets here again. On the other hand, it means taking a lot of yarn with me and I don't want to increase the wear on the sweater before I even get to put it on by carting it around in a suitcase. I think Simone will have to stay.

5. Esplanade Hat
Easy, mindless. Not a lot of work left on this one at all. I think I'll take it with me, I think on the last one it took me about the length of a movie to get from where I am now to the crown decreases, so it might be handy to have around. It's small, too, so it won't be a big deal to take it with me.

6. Follow the Leader Faroese Shawl
Eh...I don't know about this one. I'm not in love with this project. I bought the yarn not long after I first started knitting, and it just doesn't really do anything for me. The yarn itself is fine, but the color is just blah. I don't know what I was thinking. I've actually debated frogging this project and giving the yarn a new home, but it makes good mindless knitting, with only the center panel taking any attention, so I thought I might as well slog through it and get it done. I don't know if it's trip-worthy, though - socks and the Esplanade hat are easier to carry around for mindless stuff. This one will still be here when I get back.

7. Socks
I'll definitely be taking socks with me. I have three pair started (not counting the socks I showed in the last post, which I really hope will be finished BEFORE I leave), which is pretty unusual for me. I have categories of socks as well as with the rest of my knitting, and I often have a patterned sock and a plain sock in progress at the same time, but for me to have more than one set of plain socks going at once is very unusual. Well, two of the pairs are only at the cuff of the first sock, so I suppose I could start a pattern on one and then it won't be so bad. We'll see.

That's a lot of knitting, but here's how crazy - er, I mean, optimistic - I am. I have two projects unstarted that I want to take with me. One is Fiori di Sole, a Romi project that I've been dying to do for ages and was specifically saving for this vacation, and the other is the Limestone One Skein Triangle Shawl. I was given a skein of ZYG fingering weight cashmere as a gift some time ago that I think would be perfect for the Limestone shawl.

So much to knit, and so little time! Maybe I'm being way overly optimistic, but while I may not get to the new projects I wanted to start, I do hope I'll be able to clear out that WIP queue a bit. I'm almost certain I can finish Bluebird, I'm pretty sure I can finish Phoenix Rising, and I think I can do all that and still finish the hat.