As promised...

Once again, the might of the Internet coerces me into actually doing the stuff I've been meaning to.

Exhibit A:

Finished the Luna Moth shawl (used total of 5.5 balls of Naturally Merino et Soie yarn). I was pretty chuffed with how this one came out, and it was pleasantly straightforward as well - not a single bit of weirdness in the pattern. Nice and easy to knit too, and the only markers I ended up using were to mark the centre stitch. I think that I'm now definitely quite firmly ensconced in the lace-with-thicker-yarn camp - I love the look of it. I've gushed about this a little on the Ravelry page for this project, but the thicker yarn gives this project a more substantial, more organic look that I think works really well. So in summary, still love the yarn, and highly recommend the pattern, especially if you're like me and haven't had very much experience with larger lace projects.

Exhibit B:

Please excuse the armpit weirdness - for all that it did end up fitting, and I'm happy enough with the way I look in it, it was disproportionately difficult to get a flattering photo of myself in this top. I think it might just be one of those garments that looks better in motion..

Anyway, this is the finished Askew tank (used about 2.7 balls of Noro Silk Garden - yes, you heard that quantity correctly). And yeah, it fits, but it was a bloody close run thing. I'm just glad I didn't end up making my usual size for this one - there's no way it would have fitted me. As it was, I eyed the ease recommended for the pattern, eyed the number of cast on stitches, and promptly made it bigger than I would have normally. I'm not sure why the fit issues were there - and Ravelry informs me that I'm not the only one to have them. If my gauge was off, it definitely wasn't that off... Might just come down to body shape, as well as size... Oh well, I'll take it on board for next time.

I ended up making it a halter style top instead of a tank - mainly for practicality reasons, and yes, for a few superficial ones as well. For a start, I think it might have been a struggle to sew the straps to the back and actually have them stay on. For some reason this batch of Silk Garden was breaking more than I'd experienced with any other batch (I really was at my wits end with this - and I don't even want to remember how many ends I had to weave in because of this), and I didn't want to put as much strain on the yarn as it would have taken for those straps to work as a tank. So, I'm didn't sew them at all (Anna = lazy bum). Instead I'm just tying them behind my neck.

Normally this wouldn't work of course, or at least not if you like your clothing to actually stay on, but the tightness of the top actually works in my favour for this. It's so tight that there is no danger whatsoever of this falling down by itself - I need to peel the thing off like a banana skin. So I think halter was definitely the way to go. And on superficial grounds, well... frankly the tightness of this top does my comparatively limited, erm, endowments no favours at all. It's simply not flattering. So the halter's emphasis on the shoulders takes the attention away from the fact that it squashes my chest into Silk Gardened oblivion...

All in all, I was happy enough with the way this one turned out - not ecstatic, but happy enough. I think next time (and there definitely will be a next time because my fit issues aside, this pattern has heaps going for it - insanely quick, easy, and a really interesting shape/design) I'll make a size with a lot more ease.

And, while this isn't part of the WIP purge, I love it anyway, so here's a picture...

That's my new hat! I made it to kill time while I waited for nice men to deliver my new bed. They didn't end up coming, which makes it all the better that I had a hat to console me! The pattern is Foliage (chunky version), which every man and his dog seems to have made, and I used a little over half of a skein of Noro Iro (yes, I'm very much feeling the Noro love lately now that I can afford to do so). This is a great pattern - though I had a bastard of a time knitting it, due mainly to needle woes. I had to start over three times because I just couldn't wrangle eight stitches over five needles. In the end I resorted to numbering the needles (embarrassing...). This was a bit dopey really - as was pointed out to me at SnB last night, I could have just started with fewer needles and then added them in. But you see, I have no common sense, and sensible things like that just don't occur to me (Anna = all kinds of dill).

I deliberately knitted the brim very loose. As you can see in the above picture, I have a lot of somewhat exuberant hair, and when I wear tight hats it, well... becomes very clear why I had the nickname of "lampshade" in the first few years of high school (kids can be so hilariously cruel). I was concerned that this would come out too tight, but thankfully there were no issues on that front. I love how this turned out. The pattern is a little lost in the thick yarn and colour changes, but who cares - look at those colours! I've been wearing it every chance I get.

I also frogged a bunch of stuff as part of aforementioned WIP purge. Among the casualties were a bamboo tank I'd abandoned a while ago, and the Honeymoon cardigan - both self designed things. I was a little bummed about the cardigan - it was actually finished bar sewing the zip in, but gauge issues and weight loss conspired against me, and the thing just ended up too big, and not in a good way. Also, I had to tackle the ridiculous irony of the fact that even though the Honeymoon cardigan didn't last, it lasted longer than the marriage that the honeymoon in question was following did...

Yep. The reason for the sudden total change in FO photo locations becomes clear. In a nutshell - stuff kind of went to hell in a handbasket: I wasn't being treated well at all, and as a result of this I stopped being able to handle even basic things like work and uni, and generally crashed and burned a lot. Attempts to rectify these things were not met constructively. So, I left. The last few months have NOT been fun to say the least - there were some very, very bad patches. But I believe I made the right choice (as do my friends, family, and the counsellor I've been seeing to try and get my head on straight again), and even though it's still incredibly difficult and ugly at times, I don't regret leaving.

Oh - this possibly helps to explain why I've suddenly turned into a one-woman knitwear factory (escapism anyone?). Anyway, that's all there'll be on that particular topic on this blog - I have other places to rant. But yeah, I'm just trying to get it all clear in all areas of my life, and since I had made reference to my marriage/husband here, I thought it was worth a mention. And here's the part where I am inappropriately flippant to dispel the melancholy of the last paragraph or so: Now I can knit more - he never liked the knitting, got annoyed when I tried to talk to him about it, and usually complained whenever I knitted when he was around. So, there shall be no more of that...

Anyway, I've blathered on for long enough. In conclusion, my Yarn and Fibre Company package came, so now I have more Noro than you can poke a stick at. This pleases me greatly. But I have to finish my bag before I can start knitting with it. Those are the rules...