Another lace update

I have started my friends birthday cape at least four times so far and each time I've made a mistake. Normally this wouldnt be too much of an issue because I can usually spot it and pick back down to it on a few stitches and fix the error. Unfortunately this pattern is a bit more complex than it looks at first glance so its difficult to figure out where mistakes are and even harder to imagine fixing them in my usual manner. Sooooo, its still sitting in the bag where I threw it in disgust the last time I messed it up and I really HAVE to get back to it soon because my friends birthday is in November and I really want to have it finished for her.

Since I threw the cape aside Ive been working rather diligently on my Victoria Shawl project and am pleased to be able to say that I'm exactly half way through the body of the shawl.

I have been a bit worried the last couple of weeks that it might not come out as big as the pattern says because I'm knitting it on 3mm needles and the pattern calls for 4.5mm. But now that I'm halfway I decided to dry block it and have a look-see and I'm no longer overly concerned. The border on this sucker is HUGE and to be honest looks like a wee bit of a challenge but I'm still majorly keen to get the shawl finished and I'm pretty sure it'll be fairly close to the measurements stated in the book.

Half a Victoria Shawl dry blocked

Extreme close up

Tomorrow I head up to the local TAFE to talk to some teachers about my suitability for a course I'm interested in doing next year so I wont have heaps of time to knit but I hope to spend a good part of Sunday knitting either the Victoria Shawl or re-starting my friends birthday cape. Wish me luck ;o)

Disasters in transit - moving right along

I am sad to report that my cap shawl has had an unfortunate frogging incident.

A few days ago I was taking it with me to my partners store where I intended to work on it while I kept him company for the day. I was moderately devastated upon arrival to discover that about 20 stitches had slipped off the needle and at least 9 rows of knitting had unravelled while in transit. With the pattern being so lacy it was impossible to pick up the unravelled rows (and believe me, I tried my hardest) so I decided to frog it and start it again on smaller needles at some later date. I did dry block it and take a photo of it to show how much I had done (you can see the damage in the lower mid to right corner of the pic). Here 'tis...

I have started knitting a new project (just cast on last night) its the lady's circular cape (Ravelry link) from VLT which I'm knitting from a divine baby alpaca 2ply (laceweight) in black for my closest friend as a birthday gift. The pattern calls for a 4.5mm needle but I'm using a 3.25mm instead to compensate for my super loose knitting tension and the fact that the yarn has very little halo. Fingers are crossed that it will turn out as pretty as the pic in the book...

Here is the pic from the book
Victorian Lace Today by Jane Sowerby

I have also been asked to knit a baby blanket for a friends sister who is due to deliver in about 10 weeks. I know the lovely lady in question from Derby. The reason I mention this is because she had asked me to design a motif that included cats and quad skates. So I designed a cutesy little kitten curled up sleeping next to a roller skate and am going to knit the image using the intarsia knitting technique. Stay posted as I intend to put the charted image up here for download once its finished. Maybe.

Cap shawl addiction

Im totally in love with the circular shawl I'm knitting. The pattern (Ravelry link) is so simple and so pretty. I can see myself knitting half a dozen of the darn things. I have actually been knitting this with exception to everything else since I started it. Im already nearly finished the uncharted section and am so keen to get started on the next chart. Heres a quick photo update, although, its not a great photo but you can see the difference since the first photo I posted.