That time I quit knitting (for a couple of days)

I've decided to try using Ravelry's projects pages as a way of keeping track of my knitting. I don't really use Ravelry for much, I don't list my stash (though maybe I should) I'm not super active on the boards, though I read them somewhat regularly. I mainly use Ravelry to find projects and read reviews of yarns. So I thought it might be interesting to try out the project feature. I'm Cambriaf on Rav, if anyone's interested in taking a peek.


In knitting:
I have some finished objects! I finished the first Blood Orange sock.

I  finished the Milkweed shawl.

                                      (I have no idea why i'm making that face, but it made me laugh)

It's very lovely. I could have gone up a needle size, I think, but overall, I'm very, very pleased with it. I really enjoyed knitting with Mirasol Nuna, the sheen is lovely. There are great colours available, it washed and blocked really well. I'd love to knit some kind of drapey cardigan with it.

I also finished the Harvest cardigan. And I almost quit knitting. Yeah. Here's the story; On the 26th (of May) I received my skein of Sevilla in the mail. We just happened to be going through a week of high heat and high humidity so I did not feel like pulling out the sweater right away and knitting on it, but I powered through, I caked up the yarn, russian joined it to the little bit from the previous skein, and knit the last 2 inches of sweater. The bind off took foreverrrr but I finished it and on the 27th I gently soaked it in some eucalan, toweled it off, and lay it flat to dry. It was looking kind of big y'all. But I'm optimistic and thought maybe as it dries it would go back to the correct size. Then I basically ignored it for a few days, while it lay on the my drying mats. And when I could no longer ignore that the sweater was huuuuuge and the stitches were majorly stretched out, I tried on the sweater and cried. Originally the sweater ended at mid butt, now it was almost down to my knees. Rolling up the sleeves twice meant my finger tips were barely visible. It was horrible, horrible, horrible.  After a tantrum of frightening proportions (oh yeah, lets talk about how relaxing knitting is shall we) swatched and measured and washed and while there was growth, it wasn't nearly as significant as the sweater. I dumped the sweater back in the wash bucket, and let it soak for half an hour. I was very careful not to stretch it more, and patted it dry with towels.  I was so depressed that I threw the sweater in the dryer, on low, for 40 minutes and left the house. I promised myself that if this did not work out I was going to throw out all my yarn and burn all of my needles.
I'm very, very happy (SO HAPPY) to report that the dryer did the trick. It's back to the original size.
I'm sure there is a lesson to be learned here...

I really, really want to make another Harvest. My dream yarn for this is Malabrigo Rios in Pocion or Indicita (or even Sandbank).

Somewhere in all of that drama, using some stashed Valley Yarns Goshen in Winter Lake (Why the hell would I buy a worsted weight cotton/modal/silk blend?? Why would I think that's a good idea?) I cast on Jackie O by Purl Heroine. It's a cute little cropped cardy. It's a pretty straight forward knit, the slip stitch pattern makes it visually interesting.
I finished it, and I think I'll probably get some wear out of it?  I'm not crazy about the colour, it's kind of silvery grey, lighter than I thought. I've basically decided that if I like wearing the cardy, but I still have beef with the colour, I'll just over dye it.

I'm glad I've knit the yarn from stash, I'm pretty sure I bought it so I could expand my fibre horizons. I didn't want to be that person that finds one type of yarn and only knits with that yarn, there's so much wonderful stuff out there to knit with. That being said, I really do prefer knitting with wool. Plus, I live where it's cold for, like, 9 months out of the year, so wool just makes more sense.
 I don't have enough of the yarn left to really knit anything else, so I'm going to try to destash it on Ravelry.


In WIPs
I cast on the second Blood Orange sock. Super exciting!


In Hibernation:
The second felici sock. Still not feeling it.

Smash, Completely forgot about. Not feeling it.

Also in hibernation, Be Simple. Not feeling it either. I may have to frog it and find something else to do with the gorgeousness that is Fleece Artist Trail Sock.



June 12th- I've had this blog written for over a week, though I did edit the FOs as the Jackie O cardy was only finished yesterday (the 11th). I hadn't gotten around to posting because I hadn't taken any pictures of the FOs and WIPs for the blog.  Life, reading, video games, and way-to-hot-for-sweater weather all got in the way (though luckily, the last couple of days have been grey and cool).  As well as a lack of knitting mojo.  Anytime I finish a big project (especially with the drama surrounding my Harvest) I tend to have a mojo drain. I seem to need a few days to recuperate from the "omg i'm the worst knitter everrrrr, never knitting again" feelings. I need to re-charge my batteries.  I'm having super strong "buy new yarn" urges (coincidentally occurring as my income tax refund materialized? hahaha)  I keep filling up virtual shopping carts with all the yarn! but then not actually going through with buying any of it.

I did find another project to start knitting on, while doing all this imaginary shopping. The All Year Cardigan by Taiga Hilliard Designs. I am knitting it with Malabrigo Arroyos that I had in stash, in the colourway Chircas, which is an olive-y green. The cardy is knit on size 8 needles (my karbonz interchangeables) with a sport weight yarn, so I think it will be a relatively quick knit. It comes with three options for sleeve length and I think I may do the elbow length sleeve.

In reading:
Went to the library a couple of days ago, combined two loves and borrowed Friday Night Knitting Club by Kate Jacobs. Took out the next one in the series as well...will possibly review the book in the next blog...