Knitting Knews
That's what's been keeping me from blogging, the Evenstar shawl. I am done with Clue 5; there are only 2 more clues to go. At nearly 600 stitches per row, it takes about a half hour to do one row. Especially since I count each repeat and each motif inside each repeat. May be slow and may be a bit boring but it's kept me from major screw ups while knitting this shawl.
I would recommend being this compulsive to anyone embarking on a complex lace pattern. The sanity you save may be your own. The other bit of advice I have is to use a good, grippy rubber band (I'm using one from my hair stash) on the ends of the circular needles, to prevent loss of stitches while the project is away. The fancy doo-dads they sell I've heard have a tendency to jump off tiny lace needles at inopportune moments. From what I've read on the Ravelry boards, stitches on complex lace projects have a finite chance of migrating or wandering while the knitter is off doing non-knitterly things. The more complex the lace, the higher the chance that the stitches will wander off the needles according to the formulae:
where z* = complexity of pattern and tau* = patience of knitter to reknit the thing, D being number of stitches the knitter will have to pick up times the number of rows dropped to get back to where the knitter was. Easier to stick a rubber band on the ends.
Since I was in a picture-taking mood, and my boat-load of pins (for blocking Evenstar) came, I decided to take a better photo of the lovely budding lace pattern that is the main part of Swallowtail:
Such a gorgeous little lace pattern! Makes up for the drawbacks of the yarn. You can really see the intriguing Twilight color of the Jamieson's Shetland in the macro. Wonder if adding a bit of hair conditioner to the Eucalan will help it soften.
The Beaverslide Dry Goods yarn and the Miyuki 6/0 beads, came so I can make a pink Shetland Lace Triangles shawl for my little niece, as requested. Just like Mommy's.
2 comments:
I am pretty sure you mean 3ADH. and you clearly need one of these:
http://www.etsy.com/listing/36807291/lace-needle-stitch-stoppers-package-of-4
I had them made because I hated the rubber bands.
The shawl looks beautiful! Gorgeous!
Alas, I don't think that stuff softens up. I have a shetland sweater pattern that I would love to knit, but it requires almost 20 colors. and the only people who have that range are Jameson and J&S. I just won't invest the time into a scratchy sweater. But it's so pretty, sigh.
My rows on the Queen Susan are 1200 stitches. Erk.
3ADH, absolutely. For a Shetland shawl, maybe 7!ADH.
Oh, those are cute. Speedy doesn't come with them? Even if I offer chocolate?
Thank you, high praise indeed. I don't know if I could handle 1200 sts/row.
You know, I'm going to try the hair conditioner anyway. What have I got to lose?
For your Shetland sweater, would you commit heresy and use Brown Sheep Cotton Fine? Not the same color range as the Shetland wool purveyors but maybe enough range for your pattern.
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