The Wedding Shawl

I had a long weekend up in NH for a friend’s wedding. I killed two birds and stayed at my dad’s in VT – 30 minutes from the orchard where the wedding was being held. Saturday night was the rehearsal dinner and I was weaving in the ends moments before handing over the finished shawl. And of course no pictures. I meant to take a picture before I blocked. I meant to take a picture of the shawl actually blocked. I meant to take a picture when it was done. I meant to take a picture at the wedding. But no pictures. And no one has posted any pictures yet either from the big day (I didn’t post this Monday as intended and since then I’ve found pics for your enjoyment). I just combed facebook and turns out both the bride and groom are socially non-networked. All in all the shawl worked out wonderfully – I got tons of compliments Sunday and everyone was impressed (including myself). I had meant to re-pin the shawl but was just so exhausted lately it didn’t happen. I had kept a grueling pace at the beginning and then found I had an extra week plus so slowed down to a stop but not quite finishing it. I missed pinning one of the points but don’t think you can tell. The strange thing is that I used a lot less yarn than what was called for (I returned a ball Friday) and I was a little timid on the blocking so it’s about 1” less all the way around. But it was nice and cozy and kind of warm for the 70s weather we had this weekend.  And a gorgeous setting up in an apple orchard in NH.

I was driving back yesterday on route 2 that I drive all the time and I was so exhausted. I got about half way and then had to pull over. Found a little parking lot, parked in the shade, reclined the seat and took a 30 minute cat nap. I’ve hardly ever had that happen before – so tired I knew I was going to lose the fight with the eyelids.

Now that I’ve handed over the shawl, I feel at liberty to start a new knitting project. I have three baskets full of projects that need fixing, darning and other not-fun stuff. And nothing that travels yet. Ever since the weather got fall-like I’ve been hankering to cast on. I think I’ll have a go at the Treeline Striped cardigan from purlsoho.com. It eases the guilt as I’m using up yarn stash that is not enough for a full sweater. Still need to do the math tonight. Fingers crossed there is enough yarn.

Since it is now later in the week, I can report that I did indeed print the Treeline pattern, and then proceeded to weed through my yarn. I have an Ikea bookcase that is composed of cubes – 4x4 (idea stolen from Cece). I had the yarn arranged in the cubby holes by color. I stayed up until after midnight Monday night, going through each section of yarn and pulling out the balls of yarn that weren’t enough for one sweater. Trying to find what yarns would go together (by weight and fiber type). It looks so nice, but I’m no where closer to starting the Treeline sweater. Turns out the yarn I had in mind is a different yarn weight than the pattern. But I do have a nice collection of tweeds I may have to make into a Shetland sweater. So no new project on the needles yet. Instead I worked on one of my repair projects and finished it (it has felt so good getting that sweater done and it only took 20 minutes of work), and I’ve picked up a sweater I had started earlier this year – finishing up one of the fronts. It’s a brown cardigan. I’ll provide more info later (maybe). It sure is knitting season again and I’m gearing up to finally finish the repair jobs I’ve got in the basket. There’s got to be at least a half dozen sweaters that out of commission currently. Fine for summer time, but now I’m itching to wear them again. Pressure’s on!