Silly, but ambitious, Icarus

Well, as promised, here is another FO post. This one has been a long time in the making! I have completed my Icarus Shawl, just in time for the New Year!




Now for the specs:

Started: April 13th, 2008

Completed: December 28th, 2009 (Over a year in the making! Damn, that feels good!)

Yarn: Baruffa Cashwool in Dark Green (I have a ton of this yarn left. I have no idea what I will do with it!)

Modifications: I did fewer repeats of the first chart. At least I think I did. In all honesty, I was just too lazy to count my repeats as I went along and also too lazy to count the stitches.

Verdict: I love it. The yarn is really light and airy. I like that it isn't a fuzzy yarn, so you can really see the details of the lace. I might have wanted it a bit bigger, but let's be honest here. I have no patience. Once I start to feel like I'm forcing myself to work on something, it's time to finish it! Fortunately, lace shawls sort of lend themselves to size modifications. The final word is that I love it!

To shift gears, since it is New Year's Eve after all, I think it is necessary to make the ubiquitous resolutions blog post. I don't think these are going to be too terribly difficult, but we shall see.

2010 RESOLUTIONS

Before the baby arrives:

• Finish Max's Argyle vest (This is the only resolution that should be ridiculously challenging. I don't know why I hate working on it. I think there is some kind of mental block there. It's easy knitting...and I'm excited to learn to steek, which is something I worked into this project)

• Go through stuff in basement. This is really urgent. We need the storage space cleared out before the baby comes and I know that half of the stuff in there is only there because we have been too lazy to throw it out/take it to Salvation Army. Some of the stuff is just junky crap from when I was in grade school that I kept for no good reason. Garbage. Out with it.

Throughout the year:

• Get WIPS down to only 4-5 at a time

• Spin a sweater's worth of yarn (and possibly dye it, see item 4)
  

• Knit a sweater from my handspun
  

• After the baby is born, get back to dyeing yarn (with natural dyes!!)

• Gym once a week (I'll have to lose the baby weight, after all)

• Take a prenatal yoga course

• Write something (Too vague? Here's an explanation from my "other" blog)

• If I don't like it, frog it. (This isn't just about the knitting, folks!)

In other news, I might be considering a destash in the new year. I have way more yarn right now that I will ever knit and I'm going to have to say "bye bye" to the craft room once the baby takes it over. We are planning to keep the baby in our room with us for a while to make feeding (and bonding time!) easier, but "it" will still need a place for clothes, a changing table, stuffed animals, and other silly things we and others will be spoiling the tiny womb monster with. So, just be prepared for that. ::wink, wink, nudge, nudge::

And come back in a few days for ANOTHER FO!!!! I know!!! Crazy, right? It's nothing too exciting or impressive, just another quick knit baby item! Squee!

Promises, Promises

Like I said I would, I will share a few of my "New Year's Resolutions" with the masses here, which may be a recipe for disaster, but I don't find myself caring too much about that. I won't share them all because, let's face it, the list is up to 16 items give or take and I don't want to take up too much of your time with non-knitting related promises. So, here are my Knitting Resolutions of 2008!

1. Knit a sweater from a Japanese Pattern (I already have one picked out and have figured out possible yarn substitutes...and it won't cost me more that $40 to pull off...God, I love knitpicks!)

2. Knit two sweaters for myself (the Japanese Pattern Sweater can count as one of the two. The other will likely be the Bridesmaid Wrap from Wedding Knits by Suss Cousins. I bought the yarn for it, but unfortunately left it in the STL when we returned from the winter holidays. I won't be able to start it until my mom gets around to mailing it to me, which could be on Monday and could be in 2009...)

3. Knit two sweaters for Max (Cobblestone and something else. I'm all torn up inside between Jared and Beau, both from Vintage Knits)

4. Knit one sweater for my Mother (she likes one out of the most recent Knit Simple and it suggests Patons Classic Merino yarn, which means it will be inexpensive)

5. Spin on a regular basis

6. Abandon the Park and Draft method of spinning

7. Knit a sweater OF MY OWN DESIGN (this was a resolution of last year that I did not accomplish...on to round two!)

8. Focus more on lace projects

Well, I think that's enough for now. I would like to add that I have already checked number 6 off of the list! It just clicked a few days ago and I've been spinning like mad ever since!! I would also like to mention that I have resolved to knit 6 sweaters this year (if you count the one I'm supposed to design myself). It seems like a lot, but there are 12 months in a year. So, I have two months to finish one sweater. Considering that the average time I think it takes to knit a sweater is one month (if I don't loose my focus/interest and throw it aside for months), I see no problem with this. No problem...right?

Speaking of sweaters getting tossed aside and forgotten about, I am trying very hard not to do that with my Purple Lace Blouse (again). I am working on the borders now and have finished the fronts and back. I'm finding it difficult to work on because of having to purl two together through the back loops. I have done it many times before, but not with cotton. Let me tell you, it is a chore. My hands start to hurt after a while, which does not make me want to knit on it in a semi-psychotic fashion. Who knows, this little thing might take two more months to finish after all.


In true crazy fashion, I started a new WIP (I'm up to 5 now):


It's the Butterfly Mobius from The Knitters Book of Yarn. I LOVE it so far. I think it is going to be very nice and comfy. I'm even using old stash yarn!! It's Regia Bamboo Color sock yarn that I've had for nearly two years! I was going to try to make socks with it again (my first attempt was a miserable failure), but I've decided that I'm not going to be bothering with socks too much in the New Year. I do want to knit some thigh highs, but other than that, I just don't feel the urge anymore.

While in Saint Louis I worked the Swallowtail Shawl up to the nupps section and it has been sitting in its little baggie ever since. I learned nupps and got quite comfortable with them in my half of an Estonian Garden Stole, but for some reason I can't bring myself to start the nupps section on the Swallowtail yet. It's probably a wise decision considering the woes with the Purple Lace Blouse. Take the difficult and tedious projects one at a time....one at a time...

Let's see, what else? I baked a cake...didn't take pictures, though. I'm starting yoga (after one lesson, my muscles ached and I had a headache the next day from the muscle pain...it should go away once I practice more). I think I'm going for a lesson tomorrow morning...

That's all for now. I want to get back to my spinning and make some progress there before Max awakes from the dead (practically).