mary makes merry

Drape takes shape

My infant Linen Drape project is coming along pretty well, as is Gigi. Here's a rather poor pic of the former. It's 17 rows of moss stitch and about 4 row of stockinette thus far, though you'd never know it from the photo:

I wonder if any of the Drapers will come up with a use for the cardboard tubes the yarn comes wrapped around. I've wracked my brain lo these many months and always end up recycling them, but doesn't it seem like they could be turned into something handy?

Clark is getting ready to go to the Cubs game today with friends (thanks, Mark!). Sounds like they've got really good seats -- please cross your fingers that the rain stays in Spain today...or at least well away from Chicago!

Stop, thief!

One of our neighbors has a lilac bush right up against their front fence. Each year, it dangles a few nice big bunches of blooms over the fence, right about head-level. This year, one bundle of blossoms was perfectly placed for me to bury my nose in it for a couple of breaths as I walked by. When I went past it this morning, though, some darn fool had stolen the bloom! What a jerk. It happens every year. I hope the home's residents don't mind too much. I don't know how much they use their front entrance -- maybe they don't even notice. But come on, people.

KIP was great last night. There were some nice new faces as well as a couple of people I hadn't seen in a while. It's a growing phenomenon! I worked on Gigi the whole time. I don't know if that pink is going to make it as the trim...we'll see. I met up with Carolyn and Amy at Knitter's Workshop first. They each got that crazy new Noro yarn, Daria Multi (I think that's its name) with which to make cool little purses. As Amy said, the yarn almost feels like aluminum, odd as that sounds -- it's got a stiffness but a drapiness as well. Hard to explain. Happy weekend!

Word on the street...

...is that Amy will be at the KIP at Letizia's tonight! And Bonne Marie's post today suggests that she'll have some great stuff to show off, so with those two + everyone else + everyone's else's projects, it should be just another great night in KIPLand! Wonder of wonders, I get to go for the whole thing for the first time since about February.

Cast away

I cast on for my Linen Drape-along top on Sunday night. The specs thus far: For the body, I'm using numbers from Essence in the Rowan 29 but am putting a fairly wide border of moss stitch (15 or 18 rows) at the bottom. I'm going to add short sleeves, too. The neckline/collar situation remains to be determined. I really love the way moss stitch looks in this particular yarn, so I'm poaching the look of the borders at the waistline and the sleeves from Flourish in that same book. We'll see! I've only done four or five rows on the body, but I like it so far. Whew, this yarn is WHITE. I keep meaning to check if it glows in the dark! Gigi is getting some attention, too, though it's not going as fast as version 1. I like the fabric a lot better, though; go figure that knitting to gauge might have that effect.

Seems like everyone had fun at the Sheep and Wool Festival! It was too cool to see all those bloggers together.

A rippin' good time

I own just one Phildar book, and it's in French, but every time I look at it I am struck by the presence of one little question at the bottom of every page: Have you made your swatch? (It's so much more elegant in French, of course, starting with the beautiful word échantillon instead of our nasally swatch!) I bring this up because non, I did not make my échantillon for Gigi and have come to grief over it. Having gotten almost to the armholes, I had to rip it back to the ribbing. I then went up two (!) needle sizes. C'est la vie, of course, but dang. From now on, I'm going to think of it not as a swatch but as an échantillon in hopes that it will charm me into being more careful. The darnedest thing is that I knit something with Cotton Fleece yarn last summer and was sure I remembered which needles I used. I guess my tension is probably more anxious than healthy these days, which, come to think of it, is not surprising. At any rate, I did finish the Donegal Tweed socks; there's a frost advisory in Chicago tonight, so they went right on my feet. One skein was enough for the pair, with just a few yards to spare!*

Say, I'm in the Linen Drape-Along! I spent the weekend deciding that I can start the thing without knowing exactly how it will turn out -- it'll be a hybrid of a few Kim Hargreaves designs, some of which even call for Linen Drape. I just hope it's not a mutant! I'll cast on in the next couple of days for it. A knitalong! Whoo-ooo!
*The cuffs are 5 1/2 inches long, and my shoe size is 8 1/2 or 9.