Yet Another Scarf

As I told older daughter the other day, I seem destined to own too many scarves. I keep falling in love with yarns and buying them to make something with.

However, this yarn from River's Edge Weaving Studio is so yummy that I can hardly bear to knit with it. What else to do with it? Well, as I originally wrote, maybe I could keep it as a pet.

But that would be a waste (and weird), so I bought a skein of mohair (Rowan kidsilk aura, color 752) to knit with the mohair/wool blend. A knitting friend suggested size 11 needles, with 15 or so stitches, alternating 20 rows of each yarn.

I'll give that a try and see what happens. If all else fails, I'll give it a name and let it live in my house.

Oooooh....

Everyone at my LYS has been working on circular scarves. They are knitted on a 16" length, size 6 circular needle. Most of the knitters have been picking out about 10 colors and knitting the scarves in stripes. But last night, one of the knitters was working on hers---all in one brilliant yellow color. So I thought, hmm.. why not just two colors and not in stripes. I found these gorgeous colors (Rowan kidsilk haze: 70% super kid mohair, 30% silk) and fell in love. PLUS, I had a coupon for ten percent off any one purchase during September. So I HAD to buy it, right?

I started this afternoon knitting with the green, and will continue with that until I run out (3 skeins) and then switch to the magenta. I think it will be gorgeous! However, my joy in the project was briefly derailed when I started casting on; the yarn is the thinnest stuff I have ever used. Really, it's just fuzzy thread, and I am not exaggerating. After a few rounds, the stitches became a little easier to work with. I have learned that Addi turbo needles do not have very pointy points. I imagine it would be impossible to knit lace with them, but I don't intend to try lace any time soon.

To add to the thrill of this new project, my husband left a window open (no screen) in his basement office. Two chipmunks have come by to visit me. Indoors. I screamed, then dh caught the first one. The second is somewhere still, but I've let the cat in and maybe he can hunt it down. I think chipmunks are cute, but good grief! They belong outdoors!

Finished Objects

Yay! Two projects finished---finally! After spending two months knitting a pair of socks, I was able to get busy on two other projects-one, the dreaded beaded scarf, and the other, a scarf I had bought the yarn for about four months ago. It was nice to knit on something other than size two needles for a change.

I like the beaded scarf, and knitting it was much easier than the beading process was. Sixteen-hundred beads on yarn a bit too thick for the holes in the beads---not fun at all! I used the kitchener stitch to graft the two ends together, and it didn't turn out as well as I had hoped. The seam is quite visible and since the scarf could conceivably be worn with either side out, the seam detracts from one side a bit. I know (now) that the kitchener wasn't designed to work with a combination of knitted and purled stitches.

The second project is a scarf (Horndal Scarf from Noro Revisited by Cornelia Tuttle Hamilton) and it's an easy project. The garter stitch sections are knitted in Noro Kureyon and the ribbed sections are knitted in Noro Blossom yarn. As always, Noro colors are gorgeous, but I don't like the sudden surprise of knots, especially knots that cause a sudden shift in color. When I use Noro in the future, I will re-wind it into balls so that I can look for knots and color shifts before I knit.

Next project? I am starting on a sweater for grandson, who will be two this months. I bought that yarn last fall to make him a sweater for Christmas. Ooops......

The Dumbest Idea I Have EVER Had

I don't know what possessed me. Last week at Knit-Nite at the LYS, I saw a beautiful scarf. It had beads knitted into it, and I loved it. "What a great gift idea," I thought. And it is. I'm sure people I would knit them for would love them.

However, each scarf requires 1500 beads. FIFTEEN-HUNDRED!!!!! And how do these beads get in the scarf? Each of these FIFTEEN-HUNDRED beads is threaded onto the yarn, bead by bead, by hand. I've been at it for twenty minutes, I have about thirty beads on the yarn, and I've broken one needle already.

I am visiting older daughter in Austin this weekend, and I offered to watch her three children, to let her have absolute, complete peace and quiet so that she could string all these beads. She said "No," very emphatically.

So now I have NO idea how I am going to accomplish making this scarf. The only thing I can think of is to leave the beads, yarn, needles, and foam pad out on the dining room table, and then to work on it little by little, bead by bead.....for a very long time.