Final Aeolian Shawl

Blocking is completed and I’m thrilled with the outcome. All along the knitting, I have been concerned about the color being too bright. The blocking has “paled the color” since it stretched all the stitches. I Love This. I haven’t been able to get a decent photo of the beading and the subtle “frosting” effect it has on the knitted garmet, but is really pretty.

Thrilled the yarn had enough yardage in one hank to finish. I had leftovers, even though I added a second point to the center of the shawl by mistake.

The construction of the shawl was a mystery to me at first, even after studying and sweating over the 8 pages of instructions, but it was very clever. The stitches begin at the top of the long (hypoteneuse) side of the triangle, and the increases in the center make the point happen at the other two sides.

Now, on to more mindless knitting for a day or two. Then, who knows? I might need to start a sweater or something!

It ain't knitting, but it's workin'!

Although I've been able to get some knitting done this summer, my pride and joy has been in organizing my yarn stash! I've even posted photos on Ravelry of all the different yarns I've got hanging out in the basement just waiting for me to use in the next creative endeavor. Check them out!

Re-organizing the stash was worthwhile. I sorted the yarn into two piles - snob yarn and lesser yarns - and then further sorted each group into piles according to their guage (i.e. worsted, fingering, dk, or bulky and chunky). Any yarn that was purchased with a project in mind was grouped together so as not to use up a portion of it accidentally in something else.

As a reminder of my scarf making days, I have a lovely pile of novelty yarn that includes the fuzzy and other not-so-easy-to categorize yarn.

So far, I’ve stashed 110 different yarns, and I haven’t even begun to tackle the icky Acrylics. There is enough of that to fill a large rubbermaid tub, a 1 cu.ft. rolling bin, and another smaller office file storage box. I even found a couple of "wips" (works-in-progress, that is )that need some attention!

The icky yarns are mostly acrylic worsted, but some are blends. These were a bulk purchase in ‘06 from a thrift store for $20 and they filled the back of my husband’s trunk. However, in the group, there were 6 or 7 skeins of Brown Sheep Kaleidoscope and several other skeins and partials I’m considering to make a Crayon Box Jacket.

My frustration has been this - the good snob yarn is not enough to really make the patterns I want and the large pile of acrylic worsted is not something I would ever use to make a the patterns I want. I am learning to be more selective in my pattern search, keeping in mind that having leftovers is undesireable.

The best part? Well I can see the top of my craft area again. It just sits there mocking me as I ponder my next messy project! It knows, it knows!