…but maybe a piece of cake.

I had one of those ideas last sunday which I knew from the start was never going to actually happen.

I thought “I have a number of projects on the go, and some of them need to be finished soon, and some of them should have been finished AGES ago, and therefore need to be finished as soon as possible so that they are late, but not OMG!LATE!.

I know! I will promise to only knit a certain project on a certain day, so that each project gets some knitting time each week, and thus will get finished quicker (than having no knitting time spend on them at all.)”

I even made a table with the days of the week in it, and next to that, the project I should knit each day, and then added the information into my diary.

Then I totally ignored my careful plan, cast on Tatami, and have knit only that so far this week.

Ooops.

 

Mind you, despite being on 3mm needles Tatami is coming along. The 21st Century 4ply that I originally (bought for a large but ultimately dull shawl that I abandoned) is as lovely as I remembered it being, and apart from my worry that I’m not compensating enough for my slight lack of row gauge, it’s all going pretty well. Even when I add in both sleeves the stitch count only goes up to just over 200st which is totally manageable.

That said, the barbara shawl and the dreaded looks-like-fairisle-kinda-but-is-really-evil-intasia waistcoat still need finishing well before Christmas.

(It’s a nice shawl, but it grows alot, and maybe I’m just not in a shawl mood? – though I hope that’s not the case since I like knitting shawls generally. Anyways I’m having a break…)

(PLEASE NOTE: This is the original – not the one I’m knitting. The one I’m knitting looks like this:

Or even worse – like this! [Turn you face away if you’re fainthearted!].

(Luckily other Bluestockings have offered to maybe help darn some ends in. It has been suggested that it gets passed around the table, one darned in end at a time. As thanks, they all get invited over to my house to watch my hands shake as I cut the steeks for the armholes and neck.)

 

Yes, I’m slightly in denial about both of those projects at the moment. So tatami it is. Well tatami, and some Saartje’s Bootees (pdf), for our wedding photographer Sarah, who I’ve just found out is about to give birth. *raids sock yarn half balls*

I keep thinking it’s going to be more summer-y that it is. Half the time I’m right, and I’m boiling it jeans and a tee-shirt. However the other half of the time – like today – I get blasted with cold wind and I can’t shake it off. Thus I think I’m going to have to shut down the computer for the day, and have a hot bath while W is out digging up more of the allotment.

Then I plan to get in pajamas, and hand knit socks, and do some more work on the Tea and Biscuit socks,

 …and Tatami.

Ok so firstly *whistles innocently* the shop isn’t going to be open till later this week (I hope) since there are a few last bugs I need to sort out. However it is still moving forwards.

However on a related note, I finished my first item of clothing out of Oxford Kitchen Yarn! I am very excited. 🙂

Minimalist Cardigan by Ruthie Nussbaum (Interweave Knits Fall07)

My Ravelry Post: here
Yarn: Oxford Kitchen Yarns DK in Pumpkin, about 10x50g skeins.
Needles: 4.5mm
Notes: I probably could have make the next smaller size since the shoulders ended up a little wider than I am, which meant that the sleeves originally ended up in that no-mans-land of too long to be 3/4 length but too short to be full length. So I ripped them back a couple of inches, and now they are fine. Also I tweaked the cap shaping because the last part was too long. (I’m not sure if that’s a problem with the pattern of certain sizes or not?)

I was a bit worried about the stocking stitch edge rolling too much, but – while obviously it does roll – the collar construction actually works really well, and i’m really happy with the finished effect. Obviously if you wanted it to sit flat you could always knit it as garter instead or something but then your cardigan would be wider.

Conclusion: I really love this cardigan. I’m really happy with the tweadiness of the semi solid colour way, and it was a fun and relatively quick knit (about 3 weeks from start to finish). Despite my usual loathing of actually knitting moss-stitch I enjoyed this pattern a great deal. I didn’t even mind knitting it in pieces and sewing it up (I’m pretty proud of my finishing too. 😉

I’m wearing it right now as I type.

(In my defence I was in flipflops and the path was very lumpy…)