Monday, September 17, 2007

New beginnings

The best news about my new Joy... it gains kitten approval.



These two have been very good. They are quite mezmerized by the movement but, so far, content to watch from a close distance.

After all the spinning excitement around here this weekend, I did decide to spend a bit of time knitting as well. FiFi is continuing to get some attention. I've finally re-knit everything that I frogged. Right now it's taking me about 15 minutes to do a row on the lower bodice (I've never claimed to be fast!) and I think I probably have 24 rows left, subject to a final try-on. At this rate I might be able to finish during my trip to Oklahoma this week.

Speaking of traveling and knowing I might be close to finishing FiFi, I felt the need to do some travel preparation yesterday. I've decided that my next project needs to be with the alpaca that I purchased in Maine this summer.



Pretty hmm? I've been scouting out patterns for awhile. I have 550 yards of the alpaca and its a light worsted weight (now all wound into balls in prep for travel). My idea was to knit a stole of some sort. After quite a bit of "research" on ravelry and elsewhere I thought I had found a winner ... Cozy from knitty.com.



Yesterday I swatched a bit and decided that this just doesn't suit the fiber very well. I tried 3 different needle sizes and none quite do it for me.

Try 2 ...



yep, Clapotis. I almost don't want to do this just because everyone else is doing it, but it does seem like a reasonable choice. I'll have to make a clapotis-ette as I don't have the quantity for a full size version. Rather than swatch I just cast on... after all what you see above is practically a swatch ... and so far so good.

Now I just have to overcome my own second guessing about exactly how big I can make it. If I assume that worsted and light worsted are the same, then I need to start the straight section now. If I think I could get a little more mileage out of the light worsted, I could do another repeat of increases before going on. I think I'm going to just go on and if nothing else I could make it longer with any extra yarn. After all, better to end up with a little too much rather than not enough right? Of course maybe I could order more... but it was expensive... see, that second guessing... it's a bear!

1 comment:

Octopus Knits said...

I was wondering how kitties would respond to a wheel (I'm sure it depends on the individual, but I'm glad to see they're not tacking it or trying to bite your fiber.

The alpaca will make a gorgeous Clapotis!