Now you see it…
Now you don’t. First, here’s a progress picture of the Faux Russian Stole from Gathering of Lace.
As you can tell, I’ve altered the pattern quite a bit, nearly doubling it in width. It looks quite nice, actually, when pinned out. I decided to pin it out for a blog photo, and was relieved to find no major mistakes.
Now here’s another progress picture:
All those YOs, all those K2togs, wrapped around the cone. That fat little bulge you see around the middle is my poor stole, frogged! Why?????
Well, for a number of reasons, with my impulsive decision-making being merely one of them. It’s been annoying me for a while now. The size 5 needles were making the garter stitch too loose, and I’d been ignoring it. My alterations were making it nearly 30 inches wide when blocked and I realised it was going to be a loose, drapey blanket rather than a nice shawl. It needs to be on size 4s and not that wide, which is what it will be in its next avatar. Also, I went and observed a history class in an inner-city middle school yesterday and it left me more depressed than I have been in a while. While frogging this leaves none of those questions about school education in the US unanswered, it did make me feel a little better.
But, I decided that I’m going to do lace now. Reading Eunny’s Lace Series is also just confirming my notion that lace is incomparable. I love the rhythm, the weightlessnes and the delicacy of knitting lace. My next shawl will be the black shawl my MIL has been asking for for ages. If I can get my ass going, it should be ready by the time I leave for home in July. We have a long road trip planned in June, hmmmmm.
I’m knitting this one on size 3s, in Jaggerspun Superfine Merino, which is a 100% wool version of Jaggerspun Zephyr. So far, the pattern is going well. I also like the yarn, which doesn’t slip so much. I started on bamboo straights, but am now using one bamboo, one metal, because one of the bamboos splintered and was snagging the yarn. I hope I can hone it back to usable condition.