shawl down, vest to go

Finished the Shipwreck Shawl in 10 days. Not so sure about the outcome, but it was pleasant to make.

Pattern: Shipwreck Shawl by Knitting Harpy
Yarn: Premiere Yarns Festival Mix Fiber (also known as... whatever the hell the factory had left) 3 skeins of what I suspect was some kind of wool fingering weight yarn with 359 yards per skein
Modifications: Knitted the entire center section with US#3s instead of US#4s, then as the outside grew I used US#6, US#8, US#10.5, and US#13. For the last section of the outside I only did about 5 rows instead of 14 before binding off.

The inside circle pattern doesn't pop out as much as everyone else's does. At first I thought it was because I used variegated yarn, but I've seen a lot of variegated yarn examples on Ravelry that still show up. Maybe once I get it framed against a white wall in the new apartment (I intend to use this as an art piece, now a shawl) it'll look fancier.

I've had a thing for lace shawls lately, but since I never wear them, I'm taking a break to knit up a Four Seasons Vine Lace Vest, a free pattern from a Classic Elite Yarns Webletter. Using an angora/lambswool mix I recycled from a thrift store sweater and dyed over with Kool-Aid.

I like it, so far, and might even get to wear it since winters here only call for so many days of full-on sweaters. A wool vest is the perfect warmth and easy to take off when I get inside for class.



Speaking of life outside knitting... we move in two weeks! My mother and I managed to fit my grandmother's cedar chest she got for her married life into the car on the way home from Michigan this summer, and when we move I'm sticking it in the craft room to store my fabric and such.

My 20th birthday is this Wednesday, and my mom hinted that she and her boyfriend found something special for my craft room when they went antiquing. So that something will also be there once we move in.

And since I have a day and a half left of being a teenager... I guess I need to think of something stereotypically angsty to do tomorrow.

traveling stash enhancement

A few new yarn shop adventures. Two summers ago we visited Yarn Company, which I liked, and Uptown Fibers. Because of construction, Yarn Company is only open Thurs - Saturday, so we didn't get there.

We visited Uptown Fibers and my mother found a yarn she liked for a shawl.



I'm going to make the Malagash Square Shawl with it. This yarn is kind of hard to photograph because of the shine. It's a variegated blue/green plied with a steel silver/grey. There's some fluffier less spun pieces in there that make this a very interesting texture knitted up.

Then we were at Craft 2000 and all their yarn was on closeout. I found this random yarn called Festival Mix Fiber and got it. Apparently this name is applied to any random discontinued yarn manufacturers have on their shelves, because I have found a million different examples of this label and none of them are anything close to what I have.



It's a fingering or maybe even a lace weight yarn in variegated deep pinks. I can't find yardage amounts for it, so I'll probably measure it out on my skein winder when I get home and figure out how much is there. I'm thinking of making a Shipwreck Shawl out of it to hang on the wall for art.