WIP Wednesday: Marching Along

We had an impromptu KAL. Surprise! The last Quidditch event of the Winter 2015 term of the Harry Potter Knitting and Crochet House Cup on Ravelry was a speed event. We were given a list of patterns and could choose to knit or crochet one of the patterns as fast as we could within a given time frame. The faster you completed your item the more points you earned. I decided a couple days into the race to participate so I stalked Cyprienne to see which pattern she picked from the list. She picked the knitted hat pattern, Barley. I love knitting hats so I decided to go for it. Every day, something happened to keep me from working on the hat. You can read about my adventures here if you are so inclined. This hat pattern is simple and would have been a quick knit if I hadn't run into so many personal difficulties. Will I knit another? Maybe but probably not. I would say it's a good pattern for someone knitting a hat in the round for the first time but I have other hat patterns I'd rather knit multiple times.

The Barley Hat was barley'd on my end as well -- for some reason I decided that stopping everything else in the world and making a hat was an excellent idea, so I got finished in a day with much less drama overall!  Slouchy hats make me look like some sorta goiter tried to grow out the back of my head, so I cuffed the brim to turn it into a beanie; the gray is quite pretty and the hat was very quickly stolen by my daughter... she has yet to return it.

I managed to finish (!!) my Rosebud shawl, but I don't have many beauty shots yet, so you'll have to forgive me.  The weighing of the yarn proved to be foolproof and I was able to squeak out an extra Chart B repeat before edging and binding off with seven grams to spare -- phew!  The red is just so gorgeous.

AND the Hooded Cape of DOOM continues a-pace as my sole project for as long as I can stand it.
My finish-before-April desperation ramps up daily...

WIPs Wednesday: February Edition

I have a bit of a theme happening for me this term . . . . I was working on my Rosebud shawl the other day when two things happened. First, I realized I was accidentally slipping all of my stitches purl-wise instead of knit-wise to knit stitches together. Second, I made a mistake and when I went back to fix it, I accidentally dropped a critical stitch that quickly turned my work into an unfix-able mess. Sigh. I decided I might as well frog it and start over so I could do it right. This means my progress photo today is just a few rows, 6 to be exact, past my cast-on photo. Time to knit like the wind!

 
February is more than halfway over and I'm still being thrown for a loop, slightly off-kilter, as they say.  The knitting is going, but I keep getting interrupted by projects for my daughter, who has decided that everything that can be knit should be knit. for. her, so she can show her friends all the one-of-a-kind stuff... very flattering, but very time-consuming.

I love knitting on my beautiful Rosebud shawl, and I'm reaching a decision point: how many repeats of Chart B should I do?

a Valentine of flowers in KnitPicks Gloss Lace, colorway Fiesta

I've been strategically weighing the remaining yarn, and I keep flip-flopping between going for that extra repeat (with the potential for running out of FIESTA!) or knitting the shawl as written (and wishing it larger when finished).  Stay tuned, fair reader, for the exact moment when I lose my nerve!

Let's not forget about the hooded cape WIP -- we're still having a knit-along, but it's asynchronous now!  I'm beading and beading and beading and beading and beading and beading and

it seems like it will never end.

WIPs Wednesday: January Edition

Winter blechs and various sicknesses have hit Chez Cyprienne, so things are all thrown off every which way!  The hooded cape is ready for the crazy beaded knitted-on edging; I'm terrifically scared about it -- much more than I should be, considering I've done similar things before -- and the only way I can hope to feel better about it is watching Downton Abbey and marathoning Gilmore Girls.

 

 

bad lighting makes for pretty colors / winding skein 5 of 7

Lemongrass Fluted Cowl is at 6" and holding -- it could be that I'm allergic...
or maybe the pattern moves me to openly weeping with its simple elegance.
Anything's possible?  I do really like the pattern.

An apple a day will stop me from wheezing?

Life, well life for me has been busier than expected. Busy in a good way. :) This has led to a delay in the whole, frog and start over on the NEWT cape plan. I am, however, almost done with the Fluted Cowl. At this point in time, my plan is to quickly finish the cowl over the next day or two then frog and re-cast on the NEWT. Once I start over on my NEWT, I plan to make some serious headway before casting on any other projects this month. By the way, I'm really enjoying the cowl pattern. It's simple enough that it's easy to memorize but interesting enough that it's not boring. It's been incredibly cold where I live which is why I've been in a big rush to finish the cowl as opposed to working on my NEWT.

The NEWT that's full of errors. 

(Please excuse the scrape on my hand.)

The Fluted Cowl that's almost finished.