Textured Shawl & Braided Bread

My third shawl for 10 shawls in 2010.

The Pattern: Textured Shawl by Orlane
Size: 44in/112cm neckline; 28in/72cm sides; 20in/51cm neck to tip
The Yarn: Three balls of Valley Yarns Sheffield in Light Grey (360yd/329.2m)
Needle size: US9/5.5mm and US10.5/6.5mm

Started: 4/4
Finished: 4/13

This was a really quick knit. Its simple and beautiful. I wanted to use a light solid color to show off the textured pattern. Dark colored yarns work well with lace because you get light shining through to highlight the pattern. But with a solid peice like this I felt that a dark color would just eat up the textured pattern. I also decided against varigated yarn because I thought it would make the texture disappear. I love how the textured portions look against the simple stockinette stitch. I think this would be lovely adapted into a blanket.

The Sheffield yarn was ok. It feels nice and was priced well. I think I just don't really like yarns with angora. I find that they shed alot. So the entire time I knit this I was a total mess. The yarn was shedding all over my lap and the little hairs would float up and stick to my face. Yuck. But it does look really pretty and feels soft.

I cast on using a crochet method where you make a crochet chain and then knit into it. I don't think this was the best choice. If I were to do this again I'd use a cable cast on. But if your interested in the crochet chain cast on Eunny Jang has a good tutorial here: Invisible Crochet Cast On II.

After casting on here's what I did:
26 rows of stockinette
9 repeats of textured pattern
18 rows of stockinette
9 repeats of textured pattern
18 rows of stockinette
7 repeats of textured pattern
BO with US10.5/6.5mm

Leaving me with only had 94in/23cm of yarn.

When I look at Orlane's shawl I think mine turned out kind small. Ooops. We have approximately the same yardage (Orlane used 328yd/300m), but different weights (I used worsted and Orlane used DK). So maybe that's why? I didn't swatch or anything before hand. I typically don't unless I'm doing a sweater or something where the fit matters. I might try blocking it again to get it just a little bigger. But I kind of like the kercheif size.


Here is my latest baking attempt.

It looks so pretty. It's cranberry walnut celebration bread from Bread Baker's Apprentice. Along with the cranberries and walnuts there is also orange zest in the dough. And surprisingly it is really easy to make the braided shape.

Clothilde & Pretzels

Another shawl completed for 10 shawls in 2010. I have actually been meaning to post this for a few weeks now, but I'm lazy. I finally got my butt in gear and retouched my photos. Of course retouching wouldn't be necessary if I just took better pics in the first place.

The Pattern: Clothilde by Kristen Hanley Cardozo
Size: neckline 64”/162cm; sides 33”/84cm; neck to tip 45”/114cm
The Yarn: One skein of Sundara Yarn Fingering Silky Merino in Pine over Gold
Needle size: US6/4mm and US10.5

Started: 1/23
Finished: 4/4

I'm really happy with how this turned out. The yarn is delicious. If I could afford to I'd use Sundara yarn all the time. Its soft and shiny and the colors are great.

Following Cattywampus's project notes I completed 4 repeats of the Gull Wing Lace and two repeats of the Spearhead Lace. I was a little bit afraid that I would run out of yarn. Cattywampus said she only had 12 grams left. I don't have a scale and have no idea what that really means in terms of yardage. But she had used the same yarn, so I put in a lifeline after finishing the Gull Wing Lace section in case I had to take out a repeat of something. The lifeline turned out to be a total lifesaver. I didn't run out of yarn, but I really messed up somewhere.

I'm still not sure what I did, the pattern was really easy to follow. But partway through my first Spearhead Lace repeat I noticed the sl-k2tog-psso's weren't matching up. I kept trying to fix the part that was screwed up but then it would mess up the next part. This led to much frustration and and angry muttering and I was forced to put clothilde away for a few days in order to preserve my sanity.

Luckily I'd put the lifeline in. This was my first time using a lifeline and it made it so much easier to fix my error. For those of you unfamiliar with lifelines check out the fixing mistakes section on knittinghlep.com.

I also made some soft pretzels.

I got this recipe from The Best of Cooking Light Everyday Favorites. I topped half with salt and sesame seeds and put asiago cheese on the other half. I prefered the asiago cheese topping. They were really good the first day, but weren't that great the next day. They got kinda tough. Anyone know how to solve that?