What was I thinking?

So, Saturday night, Swallowtail was blocking and I decided that I’d do another shawl, since I seem to be in the mood at the moment. I fished out the Laminaria I started last summer as a project to do in the garden with an audiobook, then gave up when we didn’t actually have a summer, but it’s still too fiddly with all those Estonian stitches to do in front of the tv, so I spent at least two hours trawling Ravelry to find the perfect pattern. I was looking for something similar to Swallowtail or Forest Canopy, quite straightforward but with plenty of detail. Could I find anything? Of course I couldn’t. The only one that really caught my eye was the Shetland Triangle, but I didn’t want to pay about £6 to download it, I’d rather buy the book it’s in (Wrap Style). Or just see if I can borrow it from someone. In the end I pulled out my file of printed patterns and found this one I’d bought a couple of years ago after seeing my friend Kath making it.

During the course of my wanderings round Ravelry and my stash page, I’d remembered that I had a beautiful skein of cobweb cashmere from Artist’s Palette, bought at Wonderwool last year, and decided that that would be a lovely thing to use (remember the bit where I was looking for an easy project? I’d long forgotten by then).

I cast on at about half past ten (it seemed like a good idea at the time), did the first couple of rows, then read the pattern several more times to try and make sense of it (I think it’s been translated into English, or at least written by someone who’s first language isn’t English, and the style of writing takes a little getting used to). I did a few more rows, then realised my stitch count was out and gave up.

I was out most of yesterday, at car boot sales, then at the Spinning and Weaving Guild Open Day, but I had another go when I got home, in peace and quiet with lots of counting, and finally managed to make sense of the chart. It’s easier once the set up rows are done, but you have to be on your toes, you can’t put a stitch marker at the centre as on most knit rows it’s a triple decrease, and the edges are still fiddly. I’m not far off done this section though, and the next one looks easier. Although this one looked simple enough, so those could be famous last words.

The very thin yarn is taking some getting used to too, I’m terrified that I’ll pull it too hard from the centre pull ball and it will just snap. But it’s nice to have a bit of a challenge, even if I did already have one in the form of Laminaria. They’ll both get done one day. And it might be sooner rather than later if the weather is more like Saturday’s sun than today’s rain and general coldness.

But last night I gave up and hunted round for a very easy project as an antidote to all this lace, and found the Frontier Blues cardigan from Knitscene Winter 07/Spring 08 in my queue. I had the exact number of balls of Rowan Cotton Rope lurking under the bed, the fruits of one of last year’s Kemps accidents, so I cast on. It’s done in one piece, from the bottom up, I’ve done about three inches so far.

My camera hates lilac with a passion, this really isn’t the right colour, but whatever I do it won’t have it today.