I'm trying to decide if it's worth the extra steps to make thumbnails for photos. I know there are a few people left on the planet who still use dial-up internet service. Does it take too long to wait for a picture 300 pixels wide to load?
So, anyway, about the works in progress: the first picture is of the never-ending grey socks and 39 inches of Branching Out. The grey socks are down to the last bit of shaping on the toe of the second one. I think I'll dig into my Cherry Tree Hill yarn for my next pair, and maybe do something besides the basic sock. It's not that I can't, it's just that I really love basic socks. The scarf is coming along slowly, in part because I haven't given it enough attention to make rapid progress. Also, I'm using thinner yarn and thinner needles than recommended. I'm going to make it 5 feet long, pre-blocking. Going on the assumption that my sister in-law does not know about this blog, I'm planning to give it to her for Christmas.
The second photo shows the progress on a top-down raglan in this yarn. I got it from Lakeside Fibers a couple months ago, on the dainty-size 1 kilo cone. Later, I saw the tag inside that said Valley Yarns, which is the other name of WEBS. This yarn is lanolin-rich and a little tough to knit with. But, my washed swatch came out deliciously soft, so it's worth the effort. The finished sweater will have long sleeves and a turtleneck. I have about 7 more inches on the body. It looks like I'll have a generous amount left on that kilo cone!
Yesterday, I finally checked out the ongoing clearance at Coyote Yarns in Middleton. I was hoping to find a few specific types of yarns, to solve some stash-deficiencies. What! you say. How can the woman who blogs as SABLE have any stash deficiencies? Well, It comes from seeing the potential in every yarn. When my yarn hoarding first manifested itself, around 1990, my old favorite yarn shop in Ithaca NY, Knitting Machines, Etc, had bought a close-out lot of a Shetland-style fingering weight yarn. I bought the whole big box of it and Alice Starmore's then-newly-released Fair Isle Knitting. I have made many projects with yarn from that batch, but there have been a few colors that resisted use. I keep trying new ways to pair up these yarns with other yarns, so that they might finally leave my stash. I had an Aha! moment recently and started playing with a three-color slip stitch from Barbara Walker's First Treasury. I used the difficult beigy-tan-tweedy yarn with a loden green and a navy-blue with tan and loden tweedy flecks. And it really sings! And my husband likes it and would wear it in a sweater. Problem solved, right? Wrong. Because I don't have enough of the dark tweedy blue. So, an example of yarn-shopping to solve a problem would be to buy the type of fingering weight blue yarn I would need for this project. An example of the type of shopping that creates problems was buying 6 skeins of Noro Transitions from the sale bin. And I solved that problem at Coyote Yarns. With 4 skeins of a nice soft bulky black yarn which will tame that Noro into a very warm cardigan.
Now, if only I could solve the problem of my time deficiency!
1 comment:
LOL Elizabeth, we are in the same Zone! I swear I did not read your recent entry before writing mine - about seeing potential in yarn and having enormous yarn stash. I so understand. Buying more to enhance what is there - its what I did all last week, until I strayed into new territory with yarn that didn't go with anything I already had, making it not stash enhancement but New stash. Good thing we don't live close enough to shop and really do damage together. When you figure out the time issue - then you'll have hit the gold pot at the rainbows end - let us all know, k?
Post a Comment