Even better Koigu!
You all know I love me some Koigu, right? It's pretty much perfect in every way. I have 4 WIPs in Koigu at the moment, and about 100 random skeins waiting in the stash for just the right project. I am a Koigu addict.
And then last week, I met the best Koigu EVER. Koigu Cashmere. It's exclusive to String and we've only gotten the first 6 colors in so far, there are a few more on their way, but let me tell you: WOW. Wow wow wow! It looks exactly like Koigu, with those amazing color variations that shade into eachother to create new colors. It's the same gauge as KPPPM. But it's the softest cashmere ever! It's absolutely decadent. I bought 2 skeins the second Troy the UPS guy dropped the giant box, and I'm almost done with a pair of armwarmers:
These are loosely based on the Koigu armwarmers in The Knit Stich book, but I had to change some things b/c I have ridiculously tiny wrists. This picture shows how long they are, they reach all the way into my elbow crease. Here's a closeup:
These pictures are pretty accurate for color, in real life they're a little more fuschia/pink and less red but they have such an amazing range of color, I can't stop staring at them! I'm almost done with the second one and I promise to take a daylight FO photo to really show you what it looks like.
I'm in love.
Knitting at the Yankees Game
Have you ever wondered how much knitting I could get done during a Yankees game? No? Well this picture shows you how much! I cast on during the first inning and knit pretty much the whole time, except for when I was clapping/eating hot dogs/shading my eyes. When I got home I counted the rows and multiplied to see how many stitches I'd knit: about 5,500!
The guy sitting in front of me kept turning around to ask if I was done yet, and the woman sitting near him complimented my color choice, but other than that my knitting went unnoticed by all in the bleachers.
So now I can add Baseball Game to my list of places I've knit in public. And this marks my 3rd professional sporting event knit at, too! The previous two were a Rangers hockey game and a Giants football game. The key to knitting at a sporting event is picking something that you don't have to look at, that packs up small and provides a lot of knitting (not chunky knitting because you have to bring lots of balls with you!).
Oh, and before you ask, it's Koigu color P604, knit on size 5 needles. I bought this 2 years ago and still love the color, it's even prettier in person.
Hey, there's knitting in this post!
It's about time, no?
First, here's what will probably be the next Chiagu pattern: an ocean-like stole knit in (what else?) Koigu. I'm using fewer colors than Tramonto used, so this one won't be such a big financial commitment to complete but you still get to enjoy the colors flowing into eachother. I'm about half-way done with this and I'm really happy with how it's working out, it's fun and quick to knit and the colors a soothing and water-like (duh, waves + blue, you're supposed to be picturing water, I hope!)
And this one I just started on Friday, it'll be an empire-waist tank with crochet detail, knit in GGH Bali which I bought in Vegas last summer. My tension tends to be less even on cotton than wool (yet another reason I don't enjoy knitting in cotton), which is why you see those little dots all over. This will also be a Chiagu pattern eventually, but it's slow going knitting in the round at 5.5 sts/inch, so this one won't be ready too soon.
To relieve my boredom at a stockinette tube, last night I stopped and crocheted the edging onto the top part just to break it up a little. I really love the way the edge looks! It took me several tries to end up with this, it's totally not what I had planned on using, but that's just part of the design process, things need to evolve on the needle sometimes.
Thankfully I've reached the empire waist, so now I get to start the stitch pattern. Even though intellectually I understand that stockinette in the round is probably NOT slow, and that logically, having to manipulate the yarn and needles to make a stitch pattern HAS TO take longer to produce the same amount of fabric, that's just not what it feels like when you're doing it. So I'm happy to have reached the patterned part! =)
Better.
So my toe seems to have healed, it is no longer bruised or slightly crooked. I guess I just sprained it. The fire in Brooklyn is over and they've labeled it suspicious and are investigating. The Giotto sweater lies in a heap, waiting it's turn to be ripped out and reknit. I haven't had much knitting time this week due to work knitting, but I did manage to get past the halfway point on Halfobi2. Here's a sneak peek:
This is the first front, which is as much as I can show you at one time without loosing any semblance of stitch detail. When layed out flat this thing is rather huge and the resulting photo has to be gigantic to show anything worth seeing. But you get the idea, you've seen it before. Want a closeup of the stitches? Ok!
I think I succeeded in picking a spring-like color combo, huh? I love it. The colors go together so perfectly that it doesn't even look like there are two strands held together. The best way to combine Koigu with a solid is to pick a color that only complements and doesn't compete with the Koigu. You want a color that fades into the background, letting Koigu do its thing. The only way to find out if it's going to work is to swatch it, I tried out 3 colors before settling on this pairing. It's worth trying a few combos before you pick one, because it really is hard to tell if it's going to work unless you knit it up.
I should have this finished this weekend. . . although with MDSW on Sunday, my knitting time will be cut in half this week. It's worth it though! I hope to meet some of you fellow bloggers there!
Going slightly buck wild.
Slightly buck wild is an oxymoron, isn't it? Well, maybe I'm just deluding myself by saying "slightly."
Witness recent additions to the stash:
On the left we have two skeins each of two gorgeous colors from Sweetgeorgia yarns. They're both superwash sock yarn, in colors River (left) and Kissed (right). Don't look for them on the site as she's sold out again. This yarn is yummy, supersoft, plied similarly to Koigu but less tightly. The colors are glorious and clear, and perfect for some cheery socks. I can't wait to try this stuff out and see how it knits up! It seems slightly thicker than Koigu, probably because it's not spun tightly, and has a more superwash feel than Koigu does, but otherwise the uninitiated might confuse the two!
Next in the Parade of New Yarn is Koigu KPPPM in color P432 with matching Karabella Lace Cashmere to make, what else, another Halfobi. I decided the first one is a bit dark for spring, so I'm making a lighter one to wear with my summer wardrobe. And no, I haven't lost my mind, this makes perfect sense. Plus it's a really quick knit!
And last but not least, rightmost in this picture is a new-to-me yarn from Lorna's Laces called Swirl DK, which is a merino/silk blend. This isn't an intimate blend, meaning that the silk and wool weren't carded together before it was spun; one ply of silk wraps itself around the wool, giving the yarn a marled appearance (that's the technical word for yarns that are made of different-colored plies, as opposed to tweeds, where the plies have flecks of color). The silk and wool take dye differently so that gives it the look of different colors, when it actually isn't. This is my favorite Lorna's colorway, Black Purl, I've also used Lion & Lamb in that color for a shawl and the sock yarn is somewhere in the stash for an eventual sock. This is earmarked for yet more socks.
Seems like a lot of new yarn, no? What's really bad is that this doesn't even include the Manos I bought this week, nor the stuff that's coming from WEBS (Cascade 220 and Malabrigo). I must have been feeling withdrawal symptoms, because even for me, this is a BIG HAUL in a short amount of time. (In my (pathetic and rather feeble) defence, I bought the Sweetgeorgia stuff before I left on my trip, I just hadn't gotten it yet)
Now to just knit it all. I wish I had more hours in a day.
The Giotto cuff-to-cuff cardigan is almost done, it's just missing front bands. I'm at the stage in every project where I think it sucks and isn't gonna work, but I'm going to charge on, because I think it could potentially be great. We'll see. I'll show it to you as soon as I can, which will hopefully be tomorrow.
My Chinese food is here, gotta run! (cold General Tso's is nasty!)
