Loving Loft

Look what I made last night!

It's the Taos Chullo (see original in sidebar) in Loft by Zitron .

I wanted to make it again to:

1. check the pattern

2. see how it worked in a different yarn. The original is in Ecological Wool that comes in a huge skein - I've made a large turtleneck collar, a pair of French cuffs and the hat out of one and I still have 96 yards. It occurred to me that knitters probably want a yarn choice that is more in line with the yardage requirements of the pattern.

3. Ecological Wool seems kind of scratchy to me. Not so much in the hat - the mohair in the color work forms a nice, soft lining, but I noticed it in the collar. I'm not sensitive to such but I know that many people are, so I wanted to find an alternative.

4. Most importantly, I have it in mind for a Christmas gift for a certain blonde I know.

Detail of colorwork

I love this yarn! It's 100% merino, so I expected it to be soft, but this is incredible. The flow of the yarn through my hands while knitting was almost sensual. I've tried it on, of course, and it feels like a soft hug. I'm more than pleased, so I hope the lady for whom it's destined enjoys it, too.

The knitting good news: it only took 1 evening and 1 skein of Loft.

Just needs the ties and blocking and it's finished!

Next up - second version of the Holiday Shawl. First one is in Fiesta's LaBoheme. It's quite expensive; in fact, much more than I usually spend on yarn. I was unbelievably lucky and found this on sale. Once again, I wanted to try it in a second, more affordable yarn. This is from Joann's. I rarely shop at Joann's here in ABQ because the local store is a disaster, but in Houston it was my go-to place for anything sewing. I'm not particularly enamored of novelty yarns, either, or, for that matter, yellow. Given all that, I'm not sure just why this yarn called my name, but it did and so here it is.



It's called Camelia and I think it's the store brand - the label says Sensations Bellezza Collection. I had it in my stash and it should have been enough for the shawl without the ruffle. I have 4 balls and this little bit used 1. So I'm now back in my familiar predicament of not having enough yarn for my project. I'm going to have to figure this one out - why should the yardage be so different for the same pattern in the same gauge on the same size needles?

I guess I'll go rummage through the clearance bins tomorrow - one thing about a messy store is that they just might have a random ball misplace somewhere - I know that this summer yarn in not going to be part of the regular inventory now.

I'm supposed to be working my way through 27 pages of acronyms and further information links to try to get my patterns up for sale. It occurred to me in the shower this morning (why are showers so conducive to creativity - or am I just weird?) that I want to do some Christmas socks. My head is just buzzing with ideas - not one of which is an acronym or contains one bit of HTML. Maybe I can do just one step and then reward myself with some charting?