handmade by stefanie

After a productive weekend, I am down to just two knitting projects on the needles: the shawl that I started last week, and a new hat project using some yarn I'll be reviewing soon. For the shawl, cashmere is the yarn of choice yet again - I'm knitting the  Inauguration Consolation pattern using 3 colors of yarn from Lux Adorna . I started a new hat project using a free pattern from Ravelry, Lake Reed by Asita Krebs. The yarn is a new option from Dalegarn called Lerke Pluss , and I'm excited to give it a try. I think it'll be great for this cabled stitch pattern! I also resurrected my Dillinger hat from time out (if you recall, I'd made a glaring error in the colorwork several inches back). On Sunday I frogged to where I got off track, and now I've resumed knitting - so far, so good...and Robing REALLY wanted to be in this shot, incidentally: I warped a new project on my loom this week, another scarf using some handspun yarn: And, of ...

My first Curl was finished at the beginning of the month! I started Caesious way back in January for the informal KAL in Hunter Hammersen's Ravelry group . Things kept popping up to distract me from working on it, but at last I got back on task and finished it up. The stitch pattern was easy to memorize and perfect for my variegated handspun yarn, spun from Malabrigo Nube . It's squishy and soft and fun to wear; I'm thinking of adding a button so that I can take advantage of the openwork stitch pattern which can serve as de facto buttonholes. I love that I was able to use up pretty much all of my yarn (I had a small amount left over which I used to wrap a birthday present); that's the beauty of the patterns from Curls - you just knit until you run out of yarn! I definitely plan to knit more patterns from this book! If you missed my review, click here to check it out . Have a crafty weekend!

This morning I was suposed to be headed to Columbus, OH for the TNNA Summer Trade Show  - but there was a slight snafu and I will now be taking an overnight bus there tonight. Argh! Such is life, I guess. Before I go, I wanted to share this week's finished projects, however - first, I was able to finish my Zilver shawl with plenty of time to block and dry before leaving town...that is, if something in my luggage hadn't leaked all over it. I am currently re-blocking it, which is a shame because I had really been looking forward to wearing it at the show. Zilver is a free pattern from Lisa Mutch of Northbound Knitting , an etsy dyer/designer selling excellent yarns, fibers and patterns. For my shawl, I used one skein of Sincere Sheep Cushy in Winter's Night, however (though knitting with some of Lisa's yarns is on my to-do list - the fiber I bought earlier this year was fantastic to spin with!). The yardage is a little less than the yarn that's called for in th...

My Panoramic Stole is done, and ahead of schedule, too; I wanted to finish by the end of this month at the latest, though my real goal was to bind off at the close of this coming weekend. I did end up omitting a panel, as I was running out of yarn: I have 14g left over, which is definitely not enough to make it through another mesh panel, let alone the short-row garter section. I was a little worried about cutting things short, so to speak, but everything ended up just fine - my shawl is very close to the 80" length listed in the pattern, in fact. I'm sure that if I wanted to block to the specific dimensions given, I could easily hit those marks! Here's a shot of it blocking in my yarn room. Once it's dry, I'll be sure to take an "action" shot of me lounging around the house in my pretty new shawl! The pattern is from Coastal Knits , which my husband got me for Christmas, and I used two skeins of Malabrigo Sock in Chocolate Amargo. In other exci...