Nettle Grove Shawl

I attended a genealogy conference in Frankfort one Saturday late spring or early summer.  On the way home I stopped at ReBelle in Lexington.  Of course, if one makes the stop.....almost certainly one buys some yarn.  I bought Juniper Farm Zooey to make a Nettle Grove Shawl.  The Shawl/scarf was on display in the store.  And it turned out that I had saved the pattern for this item already in my library.  I have been knitting on it all summer.  When Sarah asked what yarn it was, I realized that I had forgotten to blog the information when I started it....so here it is.



and here is the Nettle Grove Shawl



and here is my finished product which I really like a lot!

Newsprint Cowl

I started a new project to insure that I will have knitting for tonight's plane trip.  I am doing the Newsprint Cowl.  The yarn is alpaca and silk that I bought at the market.



I had size 4 needles on hand which is the size that the pattern calls for.  I think that I actually cast on 183 stitches which was the wrong amount....but I did not correct the amount.  And miracles of miracles I managed to keep the stitches straight when I joined the stitches to knit in the round.  The colors are a light natural color and a dark brown natural color.

The method suggested for the cast on was the long tail method.  I finally found a way to estimate the amount of yarn needed that I actually like.  I cast on 20 stitches.  Then I took those stitches out and measured how long the amount of yarn for 20 stitches was.  Then I found something about the right size:



And wrapped enough times to get right amount in proportion.  The only problem is that I did it wrong this time....and ended up with twice what I needed.  But I think that this will be an excellent way to figure out amount of yarn for cast on in the future.

The pouf

I finished knitting the pouf in January, but we did not get it stuffed and sewn up as I left in a hurry because of Granny's funeral.

https://marshamosesknitting.blogspot.com/2018/01/i-am-still-in-peru-and-have-started.html

But this past Saturday Mary and I decided that it was the day.....So we finished the pouf Saturday night. Here is what I wrote on my Peru blog:

We finished the pouf tonight!  It was a huge project.  Where do you find the filling?  So, Alberto thought that he knew the best place to look and he was willing to drive us there which was huge!  Maybe 30 minutes through CRAZY traffic both ways.  He is a nice man. When we finally arrived.  Mary and I spent silly amounts of time deciding which filling to use.  Alberto had been right.  This was the right place to find the filling.  PHOOEY!  We made final decisions only to find out that they were out of the filling we wanted.  But luckily the woman helping us went to someone above her.  And the person above her was good.  She explained that the filling that made sense was in the already made poufs on the floor.  And indeed the poufs on the floor had the right amount of firmness to suit what we were thinking.  So for half the price we bought an already made pouf and took it home.  So we stuffed THE pouf with the new poof and then put the stuffing that we had on hand all around it until you couldn't see the store-bought pouf.  Mary had the patience of Job...she kept stuffing it just a little more...and then I sewed it up.  It was just as imagined.  EXCEPT it was too big for the baby's room. 

So it turns out that I could have followed the pattern exactly and the pouf would have been plenty big.

For more photos with the twins and Mary:

https://ringinthenewyear2018.blogspot.com/2018/08/saturday-aug-4th.html

Peru

How does it happen?  I pack at the last minute.  I have a knitting project that I love that comes with me!  But when I get here, I have failed to pack the other two skeins to finish the project.  So when I run out of yarn, I am out of a project.  Can I really spend 6-8 hours on a plane with NO knitting?

So, I spent time in January looking for yarn in Peru.  Perhaps there is somewhere in Lima that I failed to look.  But what I found was that there are not wonderful knitting stores that showcase Peruvian yarn.  Nor are there lots of knitting stores that have needles and etc....The stores that call themselves yarn stores have acrylic yarn from China on shelves.

But I need something to take on the plane with me if I run out of yarn on this project.  So, of course, I have to buy yarn for another project.  Huge Phooey! huh?

So I take a stroll around the Inka market which is where I found the best yarn last time.  And I found probably the same yarn that I bought last time:



And I spent several hours with the help of some of my knitting buddies at home sorting through possible projects in order to return to the market to buy some yarn.  I had also scouted out a place that had knitting needles as well as a yarn needle that I need to finish Mary's pouf.

So here are the projects in case the same thing happens to me again next year:

Embrace the detours.


I was thinking of this as a possible use for two natural colors of alpaca.  Fingering on size 7 needles.  Two colors approx 225 yards of each color.

Melanie Berg's La Crau


Fingering weight yarn.  US 6 needles.  # colors with 393 yards each.

Newsprint Cowl



Again, I was thinking of two shades of Natural Alpaca.  Light Fingering.  Size 4 needles.  620-670 yards of yarn.

Agatha Shawl




The pattern for this is in the Fall 2018 Knitscene magazine which I bought digitally.  I have had trouble downloading the magazine, but it says it is available on the Interweave site.  I got information on yarn and etc from Ravelry.

Fingering yarn.  US 3 needles.  770 yards of yarn.

In the Loop pattern.


Did not buy the pattern yet.  It is knit on size 8 needles using worsted weight yarn

Aviendha Shawl





Lace weight yarn.  US size 4 needles.  567 yards of yarn.



385 yards of fingering weight for main color.  195 yards of contrasting color.  Size 5 needles.  I am thinking that this might be the pattern I do.  Because it is knit in the round, I believe that I can switch more than one color in rounds.


Ok, so then I went to buy the needles.  Funny little store.  The owner must not really be a knitter .....or perhaps her knitting experience is just different from that in the US.  She had only needles in mm and only in the whole sizes or the half sizes....that is she had 3 and 3.5 but nothing in between.  So I purchased size 3 and size 3.5 which are equivalent to size 2 and 4.  Lucky that scarves and such are not so specific for gauge!  The needles that I am using for the project right now are size 7,

















So I began to look for patterns.  And since my knitting group at home was meeting the same day, I asked for suggestions.  So here are the patterns that I pulled together for the day.  The below pattern was from the website:  In the Loop.




Sally sent me patterns. I think that one of them was a pattern from Melanie Berg.  So I started looking at her site.  She is one of my favorite designers.  Her patterns are also associated with the name Mairilynd.  The above pattern is La Crau

Sally suggested Aviendha Shawl:





And I had a pattern I liked from Purl Solo that might fit the bill.  It is called Newsprint.