it’s official!! i’ve completed my knitting olympics project with time to spare. this was probably the most gratifying knitting experience i have ever had believe it or not. i was always afraid of lace because mistakes are so hard to fix in them but i’m now feeling confident enough to tackle another project at some point in the near future.

without further ado, i give you… the flower basket shawl.

from the front

the back

yarn: munsell merino queen color 1127 (this yarn is found in japan only)

yarn amount: 4 skeins (with some leftover). i used two skeins double-stranded throughout and felted together the ends when changing skeins.

needles: US7 denise interchangables knit flat

pattern: flower basket shawl from IK fall 2004 by evelyn a. clark

the only modifications i did to this pattern were to change the double decrease to slip 2 stitches knitwise together, k1, psso and i did 9 repeats instead of 7. boy am i glad that i stopped at 9 repeats too because this baby took up my entire new blocking board and then some! i had to clip the very top ends to string because they fell off the board!

more pictures in the extended entry…

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i can say with 90% confidence that i’m going to finish my olympic knitting in time and it’s due largely in part to the lovely blood orange gin and tonics that KP has been cooking up around here.

bloody good drink

this is the only good part about winter.. it’s when blood oranges are in season and they are a particular favorite of mine. blood orange gin and tonics remind me of italy which is the first place i had ever had one. drunk and insane partying with our italian friends all over veneto. good times.

i’ve also been working like a dog at work. this is a three-day week for me yet it felt like three months. so much to do and so little time.. and i won’t be there tomorrow for any of the craziness! huzzah! i’m going to sleep in late, knit, and get my hair done. i couldn’t ask for a better friday.

for those of you who have been stopping by from craftster, i’ve finally taken a picture of my underarm decreases on the somewhat cowl. this was the second iteration of this pattern and i believe that it’s the best fitting one for my body.

underarm decreases

the dilemma: my chest size is large in proportion to my arm size so the sleeves were coming out absolutely huge!

the first solution was to decrease a bit after knitting a few rounds. this didn’t work at all. when i put it on there was all of this bunchy fabric right under the armpit. i realized that i had to decrease away those picked up stitches (and then some) if it was going to fit. so i whipped up this little pattern…

pick up and knit the amount of stitches specifiied in the pattern under the arm. placing marker in center.

knit 2 rounds.

*knit to 6 stitches before marker, ssk, k1, ssk, k1, pm, k1, k2tog, k1, k2tog, knit to end of round. knit 1 round* repeat from * 3 times more (4 total).

*knit to 2 stitches before marker, ssk, k1, pm, k1, k2tog, knit to end of round. knit 1 round * repeat from * 5 more rounds (6 total).

knit to ribbing… decrease to a multiple of 4 for 2×2 ribbing.. etc.

looks like it’s working for now. anyway, i’m at 8.8 repeats of my flower basket shawl which i should really get to right now.. and there’s ice skating on! huzzah! (i’m so glad to be home.)

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this weekend, i played catch up. mainly i caught up on my sleep, laundry, cleaning, organizing, tv watching, and knitting but i’m sure there are a few other things that i caught up on as well. like socializing. i certainly haven’t done as much socializing this winter as i hoped i would. last winter was particularly bad. KP and i spent loads of time hanging out at home and enjoying the fireplace but then all the rest of our social life suffered so we’re making a concerted effort this year to get out more.

a couple of weeks ago, we attended a birthday party at my friend danielle’s. i took a few pictures but mainly spent the party talking to people i hadn’t seen in a very long time. i owe danielle though. she made this beautiful, absolutely stunning appetizer tray and i promised to put a picture up here and hadn’t gotten around to it.

mmmmm, doesn’t that look yummy?

isn’t it gorgeous, ladies and gentlemen? danielle went out of her way to make sure there were plenty of vegetarian and vegan goods on hand to keep people satiated. she did a bang up job. party at danielle’s next time!

the spread

it was great hanging out at her place and seeing all of our friends despite the total of 5 hours of sleep i was running on. this weekend, KP and i got to see everyone again at a baby shower (a baby shower with a keg even!) where i was admonished for not posting the above pictures. i’m a bad blogger.

ok, now it’s time for an olympic update!!! the events are progressing quite smoothly around gleek’s olympic village.

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so here i am cruising along at a snail’s pace because most days this week i’ve been too tired to knit when i get home.. except for a small amount of ribbing on my somewhat cowl. i was going to take this friday off from work to relax but i was just told that i have to be present for some tech training all day so that scaps my dreams of sitting in a hot bath and knitting all day.

anyway, i’m just checking in to give you a progress report. i’ve finished four repeats and am moving on to number five. i also realized that this is the first project that i have ever needed to use a life line on. my first tip to all who decide to use one: do not thread it through your stitch markers. yep, big mistake. anyway, i feel more secure about plowing through the pattern knowing that i can always fall back to a non-mistake ridden row..

here it is! growing growing growing…

after four repeats

sorry about the image coloring. i could correct it if i actually had the time. which i don’t. i’ll take better pictures when the project is all done.

so i have a question for all you knitters out there. i’m going to have to join in new balls of yarn sooner or later and i’m wondering if i should do the spit-felt thing or change balls on the ends and weave them in. this is 100% merino yarn so felting would work, i think, but the yarn is very thin. i tried felting with the somewhat cowl (which uses a thicker weight of this very yarn) and it didn’t work. thoughts?

by the way, eunny has a nice tutorial on splicing in non-wool yarns today.

oops! almost forgot.. happy belated valentine’s day everyone! i had a lovely dinner out with KP, sassy stitchess and mr. sassy. it was expensive but highly worth it.

veggie valentine

mmmmmmmmmmmm

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ok, let’s get the obligatory snow pictures out of the way. yes, we have had the blizzard of ‘06 and it looks a little something like this…

snow on my temp gauge

i’m just excited that i didn’t have to go out in it. i’m not a snow person despite growing up in michigan (or maybe because.. hmmm..)

snow on the cars

anyway, before the big blizzard hit, friday evening was my usual spiders night at the point where i got a chance to cast on for my new knitting olympics project.

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is the sound of my leisure time grinding to a halt. i’m swamped, people, SWAMPED!!! and my commute this morning didn’t help at all. who else road the F train this morning and was met with a platform full of people? raise your hands. right. it sucked. i waited 20 minutes for a train and then it was slow and packed full of people who refuse to take off their backpacks or put their shoulder bags on the floor. you can’t even pull out your book and read so the ipod takes over. i listened to 18 magnetic fields songs (out of the 125 that i have in my major magnetic mix) before making it to 42nd street. late i was and i wasn’t happy about it. this week, i’ve been coming into work, coding non-stop till 5PM, i then hit the gym, am home by 8PM in time to have some food, knit for an hour and then pass out. and sometimes i don’t even knit! oh the horror! why? because i’m also working on rebuilding a website, building buttons for my spiders, and redesigning a blog for a friend. it’s hard work being this busy. right now, i’m typing with one hand and shoveling in udon with the other. ladies and gentlemen, you are witness to the ultimate in multitasking: blogging and working chopsticks AT THE SAME TIME!

so, this is all my excuse for being a bad blogger this week (much like lisa.) the knitting is going so slow that i don’t have any progress shots for you and i haven’t started any new projects so please witness the depths of content that i am about to dive into to bring you something… ANYTHING.

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