Auspicious Beginning

I finally finished my Ene's Scarf on New Year's Day night. I seem to have been the victim of reverse, reverse psychology on this one. I was SO sure beginning with many stitches and working my way down to few would go faster than working few to many. I expected it to practically knit itself, but au contraire - it seemed to go on forever. However, done it is! Soon it will be on its way to a most special woman, a second mom to me, and one of my first knitting mentors.

Shawl for Pam

Pattern: Ene's Scarf by Nancy Bush.
Yarn:Drops Alpaca ~3 1/2 balls (50 grams each)
Needles: KnitPicks Options, us size 4
Finished size: 65" across the top (56" before blocking)
33" from point to top (30" before blocking)
46" along diagonal edge (40" before blocking)
Started/Finished: 10/28/2006-1/1/2007

Knitting The Blues

Blue socks. Blue Shawl. Blue hat. It seems that the only knitting happening around here lately is knitting in shades of blue.

SO here's a blue-knitting-in-progress post. You can see that progress, albeit slow progress, is being made on everything blue.



Ene's Scarf is, according to the wondrous shawl progress calculator found here, just past the half-way point. I'm expecting it to start growing quickly now that I know I'm on the downhill side - and with ever diminishing row lengths, no less!



The mystery hat is moving along, doesn't look like much yet, but you just wait.

And the sock, poor sock. It's the only blue thing that's for me, and as such it's been neglected. The hat bumped it from it's soccer-knitting status .. I've stuffed it like a sausage here, so you can see the pretty pattern. Don't worry, sock, I'll be back.

Addicted To Lace

My needles were still warm from the Shetland Triangle yet I had to have more. On to Nancy Bush's Ene's Scarf: my newest lace obsession. It was a bit slower to get going, as you begin with the wide end rather than the tip, and it was an effort to get 375 stitches cast on and established. But after one false start (Can anyone fix mistakes in the first row without messing up the cast on edge?), I got it going. Even though it appears to grow more slowly when knitting from the wide end, I'm appreciating the psychological lift I get knowing the stitch count is decreasing with every other row.

I'm not working on it quite as manically as I did the Shetland Triangle, but I am loving it. Now that the pattern is established it's easier to read the stitches and stay on track. I'm using Garnstudio Drops Alpaca in a blue that is close to, but not quite the blue you see here. Mine is a little duskier.

Thanks to everyone who left such kind and flattering comments after my last post. It was good for my knitting soul.