26,880

Do you ever wonder just how many stitches you are knitting in a project?  I'm a math nerd so this concept is usually lurking somewhere in my brain as I am doing yet another knit, purl, or yarn-over.

For the Shetland Shawl, from Victorian Lace Today, the answer is

26,880 stitches  for the center portion.

There are 70 stitches across each row, using a pattern with an 8-row repeat.  Instructions call for 48 repeats of this pattern chart.

Math nerds do things like this -- 70 x 48 x 8 = 26,880.  Yikes!  If we knew the answer we might not ever ask the question -- and this would mean no more knitting.  Not a comfortable or pleasant outcome (though the nerd in me will likely continue to do the computations.)

For the Shetland Shawl I am making progress toward a finished center portion.  Knit-on border to follow.  I've started this border, a 12 row repeat with double yarn overs to make nice large holes.  Pictures show the details.

If you look at the upper left you'll see the sticky note
I am using to mark 1) the row I have worked and
2) the number of repeats of the pattern.
Remember 48 is the target -- I am at 29.

Here's the border with its accompanying chart.
The 'rule' is that I must finish a 12 row repeat completely
before I put down the needles.  Border goes up one side,
around the corner, across the top, and so on.

Close-up of the border, unblocked.  Size 4 US dpn, same size
as circular used for the center portion of the shawl.

The light is courtesy of the last of the sunny days we can expect here in the Pacific NW.  Days are opening with heavy fog and chilly temps.  Favorite, and oft-asked question:  Has the sun come out yet?

Hoping your sun is shining.

Recycle

Good stuff with this latest project --

1. Another wonderful Jane Sowerby design from Victorian Lace Today, one of my favorite books;
2. Using up stash
3. Recycling the apple bag.

Gotcha on that last one, didn't I!!

Here's the shawl.  Yarn is from KnitPicks, their Gloss Lace weight.

It's a Shetland Shawl.  Historic notes say that
it later morphed into Shale shawl, which today
is a Feather/Fan pattern.

Waste yarn lace cast-on (red variegated
yarn across the bottom.)  After 48 repeats of
8 row pattern, I will add a knitted on
border.
(My gray slacks in the background; I'm sitting
on the deck during our NW 'summer.')

Recycle?  This project must be portable as it seems that right now husband and I are on the "Visit the Doctor Once a Day" event.  No Groupon coupons for this tour, though.

Anyway, portability means I can't really comfortably carry along my beautiful knitting bowl.  The lace yarn is in a nice spool/ball created by the yarn winder.  But these chunks of yarn can get messy and fly-away, like hair.  I was searching for a containment device, like a crocodile clip or a nice barette.

I have a couple of those webby yarn bras in the tool kit, but once my eyes lighted on the apple bag, I knew the solution was presenting itself.  This bag held 5 wonderful pounds of fresh Gala apples.  Only a few left for the fruit basket and time to recycle the bag.

Here's the green apple of yarn in the bag.  I never removed the
white gathering thing, but instead cut off the chunky staple
from the other end of the bag.

Insert green ball.  Invert,  Rescue a twist tie and
now I have yarn contained in a bra that lives up to the
description:  One Size Fits All.  I just have to move
the twist-tie for a smaller or larger ball of yarn

Turn down the leftover portion of the bag.  You can see the
yarn coming forth from its container.

Just make sure you choose a soft bag, not one of those stiff kind that can be recyled into a sink scrubby.  That would never do.

I have 12 repeats, on my way to 48.  My math tells me I'm 25% on my way to the inner portion of the shawl.

Glass half full!

That Afghan #Completed

Finally, I can state affirmatively that the light at the end of this tunnel is not a train -- whoo hoo!  It's actually an afghan.

This afghan project was a good idea at the time but like a lot of projects took a right (or left) turn into a dead end street.  For me, a dead end knitting street includes addresses at

• 10 Boring Lane, 
• 26 Not Interesting Street, and 
• 43 Can't Bear to Pick it Up Blvd.
• With other addresses in between that mark the mindless and dull knitting.  (My fault entirely.  I joined a KAL for beginner knitters and didn't realize this until yarn was bot and paid for and Clue 1 arrived in the email.  Lesson:  read more carefully, Becky.)

During the now passed #AugustCompletionMarathon, I put my head down, got the birch needles clicking and turned up the creative juices while knitting YABS (Yet Another Boring Square).  Darliss wins for the comment of the century:  It looks like the dish cloths we knit to give as gifts.

Here's a collection of pix to show you what I finished and how I modified things to keep the target more interesting.

Library book:  Nicky Epstein's Crocheted Flowers, plus
a skein of Caron Soft in a variegated spring color scheme.
Fun to try each one and so I crocheted a flower garden.

Blossoms and buds

More blossoms

A border, crocheted so it would work up quickly.  One row of SC and then a row of shells.

Almost done.  There's no train, tho the light is shining brightly off of the new afghan for the end of my bed.  And just in time for the cooler temps when an extra bit of soft and cuddly is what the doctor ordered.

We are Knitters

We are just two regular gals who like to knit.  We each have over-committed to knitting our Christmas gifts, and which of you out there has not also done the same.

Still we shop sales and add to #Stash and review patterns and wind skeins into tidy balls. mWe start and stop projects and we finish things that we give to babies, friends, children, spouses, and grandchildren.

So it won't surprise you that Darliss and I have decided to do our own KAL.  We recently shopped a wonderful sales at Fibers, Etc, in Tacoma.  There we found some lovely lace weight yarn -- Darliss bot emerald green and I bot a silvery gray.

My job was to research patterns.  Today we found it.

It's a Eunny Jang design and we both just love it.  It's called Print of the Wave.  I'm on my iPad so am posting the entire URL you can paste into your browser.

http://web.archive.org/web/20071013040157/http://www.eunnyjang.com/knit/2005/12/patternia.html

If you wanna join us, leave me a comment and I'll send you my email so we can post your pics.

Happy Knitting.  Now go buy some yarn and cast on a new pattern.  It's what Knitters do!