I was really keen to have a crack at lace knitting so I joined up to Ysolda Teague's "Follow Your Arrow" Mystery Knit-Along where I knew there would be plenty of support available to get through the project.
It was my first Knit-Along and it was a really fun thing to do and I especially enjoyed the interaction with other knitters from all over the world. Every week for 5 weeks we were given a choice of 2 clues. Because I wanted to see how each clue turned out I decided to do 2 scarves. I was able to keep up each week with both scarves until the 5th week where I finished the final clue on my first scarf and then released we had reached a situation of Dire Straits on the home front. I'm not saying the Dire Straits was in any way related to the fact I had spent the previous 5 weeks knitting like a madwoman at every opportunity and may have neglected the household as a result but in hindsight the timing is rather interesting. I shelved the final clue on my second scarf and will pick it up again as soon as order has been restored, which I'm hoping will be in another few weeks.
It's not that I wanted to have a lace shawl to wear per se, I just really wanted to try knitting lace and if I could wear it at the end that would be a bonus. The fun was going to be purely in the making of it. The truth is, the making of it nearly did me in. It required every inch of patience and then some. It was not the relaxed knitting I'm used to where you can still carry on conversations or watch some TV while you're at it. I lost count of the number of times I had to recount stitches or rip back a row and I had to start over from scratch not once but twice. One little mistake in lace knitting can make the whole thing look terrible. Despite this, or maybe because of it, I really started to bond with my scarf over the course of the Knit-Along and as I finished the clue each week I was looking forward to getting the next clue in my inbox. I am quite pleased with how it came out and will definitely enjoy wearing it. I love the way you can see the arrows within the design of the scarf.
After my last scarf, I decided to have a change from my usual neutral colour palette and opted for this gorgeous blue/green. I love the colour and any worries I had about it being a bit 'out there' for a scarf have disappeared now that Hemlock Green is one of the 2014 Pantone colours of the year and I am literally seeing the colour everywhere.
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| I have no idea why I look pregnant in this shot. |
My ravelry notes can be found here and I'm joining up with Ginny this week, something I'm trying to do about once a month, which is a more realistic time frame for me to be able to have a book read and a bit of progress on a knitting project.
Hope you are all having a great week!
Mel xxx