Don't worry, I'm not dead

Sorry I haven't been posting for a while but there hasn't really been anything post-worthy happening lately. Actually that's not true, I've just been too lazy to post. I did finish a rather large project, though .

It's a half-circle shawl by Jennifer Jones. For something called a half circle shawl it's not very half circle-y. It's like a pentagon with a bite taken out of it. I'm not sure if I missed a step or something to get that shape but I am baffled, but aside from that I'm quite happy with it. It's huge which is nice. I'm always mad at shawls for being so small, I like things that keep more that the back of your neck warm. Like for example, this thing. But I won't go doing a big rant about the size of shawls, I'll just continue talking about my shawl. So, anyways I used Needful Yarns Woodstock and it only took 400 grams. That's a lot of shawl for 400 grams.

In other knitting news I have been trying to find a pattern for one skein of hand-dyed Misti Alpaca lace.

Actually, I found a pattern. It's very pretty, looks like it would sufficiently hold my attention and is for hand-dyed yarn and I have enough. What's stopping me? The fact that my perfect pattern is in Finnish. They do provide a sheet with translations of the abbreviations and it is all charted. I prefer to knit from English patterns, so I think I'm going to do this one instead.

I am happy

I am happy right now for 2 reasons. The first reason is look at what I have re-blocking. It's the swallowtail shawl. I love this pattern, although the nupps where a little bit tough.

I say re-blocking because I actually finished it yesterday morning and it was blocking all of yesterday but when I un-pinned it parts of it looked un-blocked. So I re-blocked it last night and it's been drying all day today and all last night. I'm only showing you the tip because my room is a mess (Hey! I'm 13. When you were 13 the default state of your room probably wasn't that tidy either.) Anyways, you might have noticed the green yarn there. I'm probably not the first one to think of this, but I felt pretty clever when I stretched some yarn between the corner pins so that I have a straight reference line to block the edges evenly.

Anyways,
the second thing that is making me happy today is this message that I found in my ravelry e-mail box.

Madeleine, I own a little yarn shop in Swansboro, NC called The Salty Sheep Yarn Shop. I have been trying to come up with some one skein ideas for Christmas knitting and came across your scarf pattern. I love it! I think it would be a great teaching pattern. I don’t know how you feel about shops teaching from your patterns. I would love your permission to use it. Have a great day and Happy Knitting! Peggy

Now, of course I said yes because that is the most exciting thing that has happened in a week.

Madeleine:1 Scarf:0

I have defeated an enemy whose main weapon is boredom. But I persevered through a project that was just repetitive enough to be boring, but required too much attention to be mindless knitting. It's Halcyon from Knitty winter 2007 that I knit on commission. The yarn is Zephyr wool silk from Fiddlesticks Knitting that I hand-dyed using this technique.

Here's a close-up. the picture is a little blurry, so it looks like there is halo to the yarn, but it is pretty smooth.

Poll!

You may have noticed the new poll on the side bar. The idea for it came about last night when I was thinking to my that it would be really nice if stockinet stitch didn't curl up. Think about it. we could have stockinet scarves and blankets that don't curl up in to a small tube. Or we wouldn't have to do button bands or worry about the sides of the arm holes rolling up on vests. We wouldn't have those roll brim hats, but we can live with out those. And than I thought "wouldn't it be cool to see what knitters would change about knitting if they could". And thats exactly what I did. Unfortunately, due to the laws of physics this is not a poll asking you what I should change about knitting, because I do not have the power to change the laws of physics. It would be nice, though.