Two FO's and a work in progress

The Shalom Cardigan is finished and blocking at the moment. It turned out well, with only a slight degree of panicking over growing superwash yarn during the blocking process. Modeled photographs are forthcoming.

In the meantime, here is a picture of a long-finished knitting project: the cashmere OX cable scarf I knit my boyfriend for Christmas. Begrudgingly modeled (but not begrudgingly worn) by the man himself.


I'm partial, but I think he bears a slight resemblance to the sexy Severus Snape. This photo was snapped during a walk this Saturday, a truly glorious day that led me to do a little sightseeing in my neighborhood:


Ah, scraggly weeds and the Henry Hudson Bridge. Gotta love NYC.

It's a Halloween Miracle!

I only had enough yarn for the neck ribbing and part of one armhole, but somehow... the yarn lasted for eight vests and eight socks!

... no, seriously, I ran out of yarn halfway through an armhole ribbing, and I had to unravel the vest (which was already on the short side) from the bottom and reknit it shorter to conserve yarn. But -- through the miracle of blocking, I was able to stretch this baby to be more than long enough!

I guess my pumpkin patch was the most sincere one this year...


How's that for a sweater girl pose? The Hermione costume was a hit. Here's a photo of the whole thing, with the cape and wand (recognize it? It's a bamboo knitting needle -- size 8 clover, to be exact).


By the way: knee socks? So comfortable. Why can't adults wear them? I got a lot of weird looks for them walking down the street yesterday (and a few leers, which, eew).

Mr. Pottah!

Imagine that title being spoken in a sinister (yet sexy) British accent.

Iteration 2 of my Gryffindor vest is on the needles and has taken priority over other knitting in the weeks before Halloween. Knitting worsted weight wool with circular needles is so fast, man! I worked for a few hours on this , and I'm already a few inches from the armholes.

After this vest is done, I must force myself to return to the fair isle yoke sweater. All of that fingering-weight stockinette... but I want to wear it! I have to keep reminding myself of that fact!

Works in Progress

Now that the top-down Arwen has been shipped off to its recipient, here's what's been cooking Chez Looking Glass in the last few weeks.

First things first, I have been doing a LOT of reading, of medieval lit, criticism of medieval lit, and more medieval lit. Three classes in medieval English literature, plus picking up a colleague's Canterbury Tales class while he's out sick, has led to a veritable onslaught of Middle English. I suppose it won't be long until I am blogging like this guy.

The fair isle yoke sweater continues to progress, having been divided for the sleeves. At a gauge of about ten rows an inch, however, it is moving along mighty slowly. To stave off boredom I have cast on for a number of other projects as well:

My Halloween costume: yes, this is the beginning of a Gryffindor vest. I'm knitting it in Ella Rae Classic Wool, which is certainly on the scratchy side but still very pleasant to work with and a steal at something like $4.50 a 200+ meter skein.

A pseudo-secret project. In Knitpicks Swish DK, which has been good in an economizing way. It has stood up to some ripping-out, which bodes well for its wearability, I think.

Another sweater for baby Andrew, also in Swish, in one of their lovely new heather colors. Question about this one for you loyal readers, though, if you can eyeball from the arm buds and neck size what the finished sweater's size will be: is the car just too small? It is proportional to the buttons I used for the wheels, but in proportion to the rest of the sweater it seems absurdly tiny. That could be hip, I guess, but it would depend on proper motif placement. Should I rip it out and make the car bigger, and give it intarsia instead of button wheels? Should I rip it way back and place the small car higher? Should I say, "this is a sweater for a one-year-old who will spill mashed peas on it the minute he puts it on, so stop your neurotic questioning and finish it"?

Sigh...

Harry Potter, sunshine, and new Swish DK in the perfect shade of red. What could possibly be better?

Except, of course, Harry Potter, sunshine, knitting and swedish fish:

So far, I am really enjoying Book 7 and am about halfway through. I am finding it a little weird that Hogwarts has not factored in the story much at all, but I guess I kind of expected as much. But there's been good and surprising character development and certainly a compelling story line. It's bittersweet, of course -- I think that's why I'm knitting and reading, to draw it out and make it last longer.

As for the Swish DK, I love love love the color, and am pretty pleased with the feel -- it certainly is not as smooth and tightly wound as some more expensive superwashes I have tried, like Karabella Aurora 8 or Filatura di Crosa Zara. But for the price, this seems like a great yarn. I am particularly excited about this red, because a lot of the other colors I ordered came out much brighter and louder than they appeared on the computer, which is a fact I often forget about Knitpicks yarn. But this one is true -- a deep, lovely adult cranberry, I'd say about two shades darker and perhaps further into the browns than the Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino I used for the Peach Blossom jacket.

And the design, you ask? I am REALLY excited about this one. I thought long and hard about how to get all of the aspects of this sweater just right and came up with an ingenious scheme, if I do say so myself [laughs sinisterly and rubs hands together]. I'm excited enough that I think I'm going to keep this one under wraps, because it might be good enough to submit for publication.

I had a conversation with my mom last weekend about my knitting and my knitting blog (which she agrees is lovely but sees as somewhat of a waste of time and a possible reason I am not married and reproducing at this very moment). My take on it is that it gives me a goal and a place to show off my work and feel like there is a community I belong to that values what I do as much as I do. As for the designs, I have been really excited to get so much more traffic lately on the blog, and I chalk that up to some of my patterns' popping up on free pattern link sites. I'm proud of the things I design and it excites me that some other people like them too. My mom also suggested I try selling patterns like some other people do on their blogs, and she might be right that I could be making some money to support my yarn habit. But so far I've been pleased to be posting free patterns -- I turn to knitting blogs and free sites for inspiration a lot, and I like being part of this free community. So I've been working on some stuff to submit to Knitty, which is also gloriously free, but I don't think I'll be making up pdf's to sell, at least at the moment.

And as for the marriage and reproducing thing? Who knows. She might be right that the time I spent knitting (and blogging) I could have spent speed-dating or something. But after a month of speed dating I might rack up 3 or 4 awkward first dates, whereas after a month of knitting, I'm left with a sweater...