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So, I bought some Rowan Kidsilk Haze yesterday and some beads (when did John Lewis stop stocking beads?! and thank you to Hobbycraft for being on our walk home) and am waiting for an earlier order of crystals in order to make something new.
It's a shawl (from the booklet from Issue 91 of The Knitter (can't find a big photo of it... yet!)), knit from a tab in centre back, which I've never successfully done before.
It's also beaded, with two different weights of bead. And these are knit-in having previously been threaded onto the yarn. This is also something I've not tried before. (The odd bead attached using a crochet hook during knitting, yes. Not this way.)
And... It's in Kidsilk Haze, which I've avoided for years. Everyone uses it and I'm too much of a yarn snob to follow the crowd. Also....
Wind back many, many years and picture me watching the RSC production of A Doll's House at The Other Place in Stratford on Avon. We're sitting on the far side of the auditorium having walked across the set and climbed up stairs at the far side to get to our balcony seats. It's summer. My neighbour on one side is wearing perfume (probably L'air du Temps) and a new mohair sweater. I get an violent attack of hay fever. I cannot leave, as far as I can see, without crossing the set. I suffer through the performance by hiding behind handkerchiefs and trying tot to sneeze too loud or too often. I've avoided hairy yarns ever since. (Happily, I saw the same production of A Doll's House when it later toured to Newcastle, and so I got to enjoy Cheryl Campbell's wonderful performance properly.)
So, back to the knitting, new yarn, new techniques.
The knit a tab, pick stitches along its side and base, technique, especially with a provisional cast on to unpick, is as much of a fiddle as I feared. I nearly had it twisted. It was hard to tell if it was successful until I'd knit a dozen or so rows. But, I did it. It looks fine. I'll do it again. (At the time I thought the hairy yarn was a hindrance, but I think that it's probably very generously hiding any imperfections.)
The yarn is sticky. My heart sank when I had to pull the end away from the ball and it resisted. This is not a ball of yarn that is going to unroll and escape away from you across the floor exiting pursued by a cat. As a solution, I stuffed it in a yarn bowl with a rim that is smaller than the ball and it unrolls easier with the bowl holding it under a little tension.
It doesn't grip the needles, though, sliding on (and off: oops!!) my Symphonies and over the join from needle to cable very smoothly. It just likes to hold onto itself!
The yarn is also, as I mentioned, hairy. I'm fine with that. No sneezes at all. I've had to exaggerate my knitting style, throwing the yarn much wider so as to trap less of the halo of fibres round the needles. I'm terrified of ever having to pull any back, so the extra care is worthwhile. The fabric I'm producing is light as a feather, but feels plump due to the depth of that halo. It knits up fast, too, and I've already got 108 stitches of the 204 I need before border pattern and beading begin.
A good experience, with the beading to look forward to.
[I may also have acquired some neon shades of sock yarn yesterday to spice up the beekeeper a little. It was both gorgeous, and in the sale.]
It's a shawl (from the booklet from Issue 91 of The Knitter (can't find a big photo of it... yet!)), knit from a tab in centre back, which I've never successfully done before.
It's also beaded, with two different weights of bead. And these are knit-in having previously been threaded onto the yarn. This is also something I've not tried before. (The odd bead attached using a crochet hook during knitting, yes. Not this way.)
And... It's in Kidsilk Haze, which I've avoided for years. Everyone uses it and I'm too much of a yarn snob to follow the crowd. Also....
Wind back many, many years and picture me watching the RSC production of A Doll's House at The Other Place in Stratford on Avon. We're sitting on the far side of the auditorium having walked across the set and climbed up stairs at the far side to get to our balcony seats. It's summer. My neighbour on one side is wearing perfume (probably L'air du Temps) and a new mohair sweater. I get an violent attack of hay fever. I cannot leave, as far as I can see, without crossing the set. I suffer through the performance by hiding behind handkerchiefs and trying tot to sneeze too loud or too often. I've avoided hairy yarns ever since. (Happily, I saw the same production of A Doll's House when it later toured to Newcastle, and so I got to enjoy Cheryl Campbell's wonderful performance properly.)
So, back to the knitting, new yarn, new techniques.
The knit a tab, pick stitches along its side and base, technique, especially with a provisional cast on to unpick, is as much of a fiddle as I feared. I nearly had it twisted. It was hard to tell if it was successful until I'd knit a dozen or so rows. But, I did it. It looks fine. I'll do it again. (At the time I thought the hairy yarn was a hindrance, but I think that it's probably very generously hiding any imperfections.)
The yarn is sticky. My heart sank when I had to pull the end away from the ball and it resisted. This is not a ball of yarn that is going to unroll and escape away from you across the floor exiting pursued by a cat. As a solution, I stuffed it in a yarn bowl with a rim that is smaller than the ball and it unrolls easier with the bowl holding it under a little tension.
It doesn't grip the needles, though, sliding on (and off: oops!!) my Symphonies and over the join from needle to cable very smoothly. It just likes to hold onto itself!
The yarn is also, as I mentioned, hairy. I'm fine with that. No sneezes at all. I've had to exaggerate my knitting style, throwing the yarn much wider so as to trap less of the halo of fibres round the needles. I'm terrified of ever having to pull any back, so the extra care is worthwhile. The fabric I'm producing is light as a feather, but feels plump due to the depth of that halo. It knits up fast, too, and I've already got 108 stitches of the 204 I need before border pattern and beading begin.
A good experience, with the beading to look forward to.
[I may also have acquired some neon shades of sock yarn yesterday to spice up the beekeeper a little. It was both gorgeous, and in the sale.]
