I waited I finished the Slipstravaganza to use the Deep End colour (the brown one) and I am left with 7g of the Mystical Path Mohair lace. I did not include the Ice Sky bright blue merino because I thought the colour would be clashing with the others. I’ll find a way to use it !
A light, warm and very soft cowl to keep for colder days (that do not really seem to be coming here in France..).
I’ve been thinking about Christmas and gathering my thoughts and ideas for fuss free presents.
Last year I made beautiful scarves and beanie for my sons, with beautiful yarn that requires to be carefully taken care of. A bit of a poisonous present for young adults as my sons. So I decided that I would be knitting care-free gifts this year.
I’ll be talking about that later, everyone is head over heels for little scarves or ascots this year. I tested two patterns with this giant ball of mostly acrylic yarn my mother gave me : the Heatwave Scarf by Pia Trans and the Sweet Li’l Scarfette by Ambah O’Brien
The Heatwave Scarf on the left is not well served by this sports weight yarn. The samples were knitted with lace mohair and I think I’ll test another one with this orange lace mohair from my stash. I’m sure the overall FO will be much much better looking !
The Sweet Li’l Scarfette on the right is fine with the yearn. I still need to knit the last pointy end and I already like it.
So I may knit several others for my sons girlfriends, my SIL and my nephews girlfriends. I’ll also be testing other patterns, stay tuned !
This project exists because I am on a yarn no-buy year (with specific rules). I wanted to knit with cotton as we are in a very warm and dry summer here in France, I wanted to knit from my stash, I liked the blue colour fades from these two cotton skeins from HobbI I really do not like knitting with. It is very splitty even with bamboo needles.
That said, the Painting Triangles Shawl by Stephen West caught my eyes as soon as I saw it in his Painting Shawls book. Ever since, I thought about a blue fade. Sooooo, there it is, knitted from my stash, a piece I love from a cotton I highly dislike.
A perfect finished object that matches my likings, the season, my goals, and that brings me happiness 😺
I have leftovers, in different quantities depending on the colour. I need to repurpose them, either in washcloths or may be in a test run for a stitch pattern for a scarf ?
I had about 2.5 100g balls left sp playing yarn chicken, even with short sleeves or even only a few border rows. I planned to use something else for the collar or the sleeves or both.
Thing is, this pattern was difficult for me to knit. I like knitting flat, no problem here. But I could not memorise the pattern. I had to read the chart, the tiny chart, for every row. I did take a picture, I did print it on a larger scale, but the picture definition does not allow to print the image at a much larger scale.
Reading every row on a chart that is too small was a pain to me. So I decided that I was going to knit 2 rows every day and see from there.
I spotted a mistake about 10 rows back, and tried to do some surgery. I got very frustrated with the twisted stitch pattern I could not work back up. I tried and worked on it for several hours. Frustration got so high that I frogged the project. I will be back at it at some point I know, because I love the finished cardigan.
During the summer travelling months, I knew I was going to spend some money and buy yarn. I was completely OK with that and still am. I had planned and prepared for it even though unexpected choices had to be made. These places I went to (one in July, two in August), I won’t have opportunities to visit again in quite a long time. So be prepared for some spending, in particular if we sum up July and August.
So in August I went to the Pyrénées, a much awaited trip for a short vacation. I first stopped to spend a few days with my mother and go with her to the first attorney appointment for my fathers assets (he passed away in June). After all that was done, I went to pick up my second son on the way down to the Pyrénées and we spent a week there, making the most out of this shorter stay. I then went to spend a week at my mother’s home, and that will be for the August check-in !
I am quite a bit behind everything, blog and Instagram posts, YouTube videos, I hope you will understand I needed a little break from social media 🙂
Aulon – Beautiful in the summer fog ❤
The week of vacation program included hikes and buying my beloved mohair yarn from this small farm up in the mountains. I have already posted about it in a previous post from last year. It looks the same, although the mountain is a bit browner and much less green, due to the lack of rain and unusually high temperatures. The goats are kept near the farm to have food and water. They used to spend the summer higher up in the mountains, but it would not be safe for them with this very hot weather.
Unfortunately they were out of the colours I had in mind, so I went for the Mohair Cardé, a rougher yarn where the threads have not been combed to bring the fluff out. I has a beautiful stitch definition, is very well suited for colour work, and produces a very warm finished object. You can see it in action in my Pull Zenzi.
I have a sweater quantity of the beige and blue colours, 4 skeins of the grey, 3 of the pink and 2 of the yellow. I think the pink and the yellow are not coming back..
I bought the yarn with intentions, for one plain sweater and for one colour work. And all got changed after I bought a newly released pattern in August – Teaser teaser, stay tuned !!
While I was in vacation, Sari Nordlund released the Kuutar top and had an offer for the Kuutar family. I won’t wear a top, so I bought the Kuutar Tee pattern I had my eyes on. I already have the Kuutar sweater pattern in my queue, they all have very beautiful designs and yokes. I may get to it before the end of the summer, or I may not – so it will be for next summer 😺
Regarding my money expenses, the total for July goes up to €360 for a grand total of €717.59 since the begging of the year. A bit more than usual, a bit more than expected, without guilt !
I now need to organise my thoughts and plans, and assign these skeins to projects. I think I will have another blog post and video about this in the next week.
On the yarn no-buy subject, I have finished the Painting Triangles Shawl by Stephen West, with this cotton I do not like. Using bamboo needles helped as they made it a bit less splitty, but I still had to be very careful while knitting. I am so pleased to have made something I love out of this cotton I really do not like. The finished fabric is fine, the finished shawl is big, very big, and looks quite beautiful to me.
Would have I knitted that shawl if I was not on a no-buy ? I do not think so. I would have either knit another pattern or bought some other yarn or cotton. I am very happy and feel very satisfied I used my stashed cotton to make something that brings me joy.
So I bought yarn according to my rules, I used my stash to knit a shawl I love from a cotton I did not, I call that a success even though my yarn expenses have made a huge jump !
This is the project I have been mostly working on recently. I guess I am a monogamous knitter at heart !
I am using cotton from my stash, a cotton I do not like because it is very splitty, even when using bamboo needles.
I already used most of a long changing colours ball when I knitted the Papillon / Butterfly Shawl for my beloved SIL 2020 Christmas present :
The colour effects are nice, she loves it as she cannot wear wool. The perfect project for the recipient, one of the projects that gave me the most headaches ! Being that careful to catch all the microscopic cotton strands was a bit .. difficult.
Given all of these drawbacks, I love the pattern and the project, Stephen West is a real winner for me and I am very happy I could get my hands on the Painting Shawl Book the pattern is from.
The blue fades are perfect. I balled up the remaining of each colour, labelling them with a number, and worked my way through the two skeins colour changes, from dark to light to dark again, and so on. If I run of a colour, I’ll use the closest one, or mix-match what I have ! I love the effect, I love the fabric.
I used to knit one colour section in one sitting, it is now difficult as the number of stitches increases every other row. I cannot do it under an hour any longer. Well, I need to switch my mind from speedy knitting to marathon knitting 💙
Knitting a project I like from this cotton from my stash I did not like is one of the nice side effects of my no-buy project !
I am trying to catch up on my blog posts after my father passed away in June. I did not have much time, having to take care of all the admin stuff for my mother with my sister, and processing the shock. Even if he had been sick for several years, and his health slowly degrading, it happened all of a sudden, without warnings.
During the first grieving times, I did not fell like working on my more complicated projects, so I cast on a very simple cowl with this scratchy cotton my mother gave me. It will be perfect for my hikes, a careless piece that goes into the washer, light and a bit warm for the late summer and fall days.
The pattern is free on Ravelry, I made no modifications to the pattern itself, other than the colour changes and a bit more length to use most of the cotton I had in stash. My Ravelry project : https://www.ravelry.com/projects/IsabelleGD/my-friend-zoe
I kept a bit of the last solid blue cotton ball as it is much softer than the other ones and I can use it in some washcloths !
Knit Now 