2 posts tagged “shawl”
I have finally finished the shawl I started in March. I wanted to learn how to knit lace, so I took a class at Lettuce Knit in Kensington Market, and this is the end product. The instructor designed the shawl, and I used Blue Sky Alpaca in colour 511, which is a rich ruby red. What I learned about lace knitting was that you can't really get an idea of what it will look like, or how big it will be, until it is finished and blocked. I was quite concerned that it was going to be no more than a wooly handkerchief, since it looked so small on the needles. Once I finished binding it off, I was even more concerned, since it was only 120cm across the top, and 75cm on each shorter side. Here is a pic of the shawl before I blocked it:
And a pic of the shawl ater blocking:
The Blocking Goddess must have been smiling down on me, cuz She increased the size of the shawl by 15% to 140cm across the top, and 90cm on each shorter side. I think she appreciated my show of commitment to blocking through my purchase of proper blocking wires and these very cool double-pronged pins made by Clover, which I think are really for quilting, but they did a great job of holding the wires in place. Blocking also really brought out the design:
Now for a glory shot:
Looking for blocking wires and pins took me to two knitting stores in the west end, in two little neighbourhoods that I didn't know about before. The first was Village Yarns in Islington Village. The second was Ruti's Needlebed in Streetsville, where I actually got the wires and pins. Ruti's is also a quilting store, which would explain the choice of pins. Both have classes and knitting meet-ups and retreats and all that fun stuff that knitters do together. I'm looking forward to visiting both of them, and checking out these little corners of my new hood.
Well, after that freak storm that knocked out power and postponed the Beginner's Lace Class I was going to take at Lettuce Knit, we were rescheduled and got down to the business of learning how to knit lace. Those of you who know how to do this already, skip to the next paragraph. For everyone else, knitting lace is really just a matter of dropping stitches, so that there are holes in your work, and picking up stitches, so that you end up with the same number of stitches on your row. The thing about dropping and adding stitches, however, is that there are a number of different ways to do this that cause your stitches to lean to the left or right, or to leave big holes or no real hole at all. Done well, these stitches in combination can create some very intricate and beautiful designs. So it takes a lot more concentration than just knitting and purling, and you have to follow pattern charts with little symbols on them that tell you what sort of stitch to make.
In this class, our project was a lace shawl, which I have yet to complete, but I wanted to share some pics of my progress so far, and the progress made by a couple of my classmates as of the end of the second class. We were all using different types of yarn, and the other two women were using variegated colours, so we are all going to end up with very different shawls. For example, Lisa was knitting with Araucania Nature Wool, a kettle-dyed wool from Chile, on 5.5 needles:
Lisa started the shawl with leftover yarn from a sweater, but found she wouldn't have enough, so she worked in another colour. I just saw her at the Knit Collective meeting, and she said she now has to find another colour, since the second one is done now too. If I get an updated pic with the third colour, I'll post it.
Amanda was knitting herself a shawl to keep in her chilly office. I've suggested she might want to put some sort of theft alarm on it, because it is being knit from Manos del Uruguay wool in Bramble, also on 5.5, and will most definitely attract shawl envy:
I am knitting mine in Blue Sky Alpaca in sport weight in colour #511:
I knit very tightly, so the pattern cannot be seen well. I'll block it and take another picture once that's done. This is actually a birthday present for my mom, but it won't be finished in time (her birthday is tomorrow). I told her she couldn't read my blog until after she got her present. I'm not afraid that she'll lurk around and find out; she really does like surprises.
