Knitting on the Road

No, this isn't a post about the wonderful book of socks. Rather, it is about some of my knitting while traveling this summer. I didn't finish, or start, anything extraordinary. Rather, I just knit things I didn't have to concentrate on. We were on the road for three weeks exploring northern Idaho and Washington State, on our way to Seattle for the wedding celebration of my step-daughter.

In an earlier post, I showed you the not-lacey wedding shawl on the floor, being blocked. Here are two photos of the finished product.

This is daughter #2 (now 16 years old!!) modeling the shawl at the family gathering that celebrated the marriage of step-daughter #1 (now 40 years old!). You can see how sheer the shawl is. I used laceweight cotton. Never again.
And, here is the front. Pattern is the Landscape Shawl by Evelyn Clark, available through Fiber Trends.

And finally, the bride and groom, cutting the wedding cake, with the shawl draped around the bride's shoulders. I was very happy to participate in the wedding by making the shawl. And, I think that the bride truly loved the shawl. I hope she wears it frequently.

I knit a lot while in the car and on airplanes. For airplane knitting, I decided to take bamboo circular needles and not my 2.5mm circular needles on which socks-in-progress were dangling. On the way out of the door when we were leaving on vacation I grabbed three balls of variegated cotton yarn--I purchased the yarn last summer while in Barcelona, Spain, from a yarn shop owned by a knitting friend in Barcelona. She is American, her spouse is Catalan/Spanish. I didn't know what to do with the yarn at the time. But, I like bright colors. After I get home with bright yarn I question my sanity. However, I thought an airplane ride would be perfect for forcing me to make a decision.

After swatching (I tried the seafoam stitch--doesn't work well with cotton, I discovered) I decided to use the yarn for a fishnet lace scarf, from the Montego Bay Scharf pattern in Summer 2007 Interweave knits. Amy Singer wrote the pattern. It's not difficult at all. A simple four row pattern that is really a two row pattern. But, somehow I managed to get off track at the beginning. Maybe the airplane hit some turbulence. Or the man next needed to climb across me to get into the aisle. Do you see the problem??
I didn't see the problem right away. I just kept merrily knitting along. When I finally realized that my fishnet rows didn't line up in row 6 or so, I had three options:
1) rip out 12 inches of knitting to fix it
2) pretend there was not problem and that no one would ever notice
3) cut off the beginning and knit on a border.

I chose option #2. Denial. Belief that the knitting fairy could come one night and fix it. Pretend that the end of the scarf is supposed to be wonky.

So, I knitted and knitted. About 5 or six feet of knitting. Because I made a garter stitch border on the sides, at the end of the scarf I did 8 rows of garter stitch and bound off. Then, I looked at the beginning again. Option #2 was not the right option. I needed to implement Option #3. Cut it off!!!

By this time, I was in a long distance car ride and hubby was driving. Bless him.

I figured that I could use waste yarn (that I luckily had in my purse) to make a safety line. But, I couldn't seem to follow a straight line. The scarf is really on the bias. And I could not, for the life of me, seem to follow the pattern. So, after multiple false starts, I painstakingly used a needle to pick up the stitches, tugging on each stitch to find out where it led to the next stitch. Painstaking. Real painstaking. Did I mention that I was doing this in the car?




Well, it worked. I used the picked up stitches to do 8 rows of garter stitch, and then cast off! I didn't add the fringe that Amy Singer used. I decided to give this scarf to my Boulder, Co sister and she is only 5 feet 1 inch tall.

Why did I ever think that #2--denial of the problem--was ever an option? I would have been embarrassed to give the scarf to my sister, who would never have noticed the problem. But, I would have known. Why do I do this--pretend that a mistake will never be noticed, when I would notice--even if I never saw the item again in my lifetime??

Ah well, here are some photos from the road trip.
The first one is sunset over either Priest Lake or Pend d'Oreille lake in northern Idaho.



Next photo is not photoshopped! For some strange reason, there is a miniature statue of liberty at the beach in Sandpoint, Id. The sign did not explain.

We stayed one night in Leavenworth, WA. This was a dead or dying former lumber town back in the 1960's. Then, some civic minded citizens decided to save their town by turning it into a Bavarian village. They succeeded and it is now a tourist destination, complete with Bavarian style buildings all over, Bavarian dressed store clerks, and a production of Sound of Music every summer in an outdoor ampitheater near the ski hill.

Last week I attended the 40th high school graduation weekend of my small (33 graduates) girl's convent school. Here are some of us looking grey but happy!!
More of my on the road knitting later.

Mystery Laundry Basket Winner; Landscape Shawl; Travel Mystery

The Prize Winner!!
Do you see this sweet, sweet kitty? His name is Cosmic and he is well loved by daughter #2, who calls him her little brother. Cosmic is also a knitting kitty; he loves to help pull the yarn out of the ball and he removes pins from items while they are blocking. He also loves to go outside in the nice weather. Can you imagine how sad we would all be if he ran away, was attacked by a dog or eaten by a coyote. (our last kitty was attached by something and died in the backyard. That psychotic cat was no great loss, but Cosmic would be mourned for decades.
Well, we solved the problem! In my last post I showed this photo and asked whether anyone could guess what it was used for. There were many great, imaginative guesses. Some were close, but no one got the correct answer.
Vicki Knitorious guessed it was a trap.
HPNY Knits loves riddles and mystery.
Diana thought it was a little boy's trap.
sherriknits Sherri guessed a trap, such as a cat trap.
Karen thought of something for gardening.
Kate anticipated the Yarn Harlot's battle with the local yarn stealing squirrel and thought it was a means of protecting yarn that I was drying.
Melissa also thought of a trap.
greno Bea from France suggested that my neighbor (male) is a secret knitter and he didn't want his wife to know so he hid the yarn under the basket!! I love that idea!
Pilar from the Canary Islands thought that I asked my husband to put up a clothes line from which to hang freshly laundered hand knit socks, and he did it upside down!! How does she know my husband so well??
Acuarela from Spain thought that it was a play area for cats or rabbits. Actually, her guess is the closest. and she gets the prize!

We put a blue harness on our precious Cosmic and attach the end of the long rope to the harness. He can then roam around the backyard, pulling his laundry basket as he goes. However, he can't really leave the yard because the laundry basket gets caught on bushes. Sometimes his leash gets caught on rocks, flowers and so forth. Then, he sits quietly until we come to rescue him. We only put him out when we are home and can keep an eye on him. He loves his harness and leash, and will sit next to the box in which they are kept on the screened porch. He cries mournfully and hopefully until we open the lid. He recognizes the sound and stands still so we can put his harness on him. Then, we carry him outside and attach him to the long leash.

Aquarela wins two skeins of Manos of Uruguay Cotton Striata.


Landscape Wedding Shawl

In my last post, I explained that I was making a Landscape Shawl for my step-daughter's wedding on July 2. I finished it on Sunday, mailed it on Monday and it arrived on Tuesday!! And she loves it!! Here it is, blocking. I will post a photo of her wearing it in August. The wedding is a small private affair. The family party will take place in Seattle at the end of July.
Although the shawl is perfect for her (not lacy, lightweight cotton, dusty blue) I would not make another shawl out of fine lace weight cotton. Maintaining tension was impossible and I tried to master 3 different ways of holding the thread/yarn. Nothing worked completely well. Although I love the feel of the lightweight cotton shawl, and the drape, I can't see fighting with the thread/yarn for thousands upon thousands of fine, fine stitches again. I can see why such fine cotton is used in crocheting, but not in knitting.
This is the second Landscape Shawl that I have made. You can see the different shades of blue in the photo; this was caused by different knit and purl stitch patterns. The pattern is for a perfect triangle of a shawl. However, I wanted the shawl to fit better on the shoulders, like faroese shawls. the shawl is knit from the tip, beginning with one stitch. When I got to the tip of the last triangle, that is, the last V that you see in the middle of the shawl, I began doing short rows on either side of the yarn over increases that define the final V. I knit two rows between each short row. The shaping worked out well, giving a bit of extra shawl on each side of the neck.
I am not a big fan of triangle shawls, I've decided, because I like more shawl to keep my chest warm. (Being flat chested, I don't have much insulation there to keep me warm!!) I was glad that the short row shaping worked. I will have to figure out how to do this in lacy patterned shawls.
Summer Pleasure
Travel Mystery
I love it when knitting bloggers post photos of places to which they have traveled. Here are some photos of a place to which we traveled recently. All photos are from the same city, as is the photo of the flowers and sun-umbrellas above. I have enough yarn in my stash for two lifetimes. Therefore, I thought that rather than tell you where I went and what I saw, I would let you tell me!! Name the city and answer one of the questions. Take a wild guess. The names of all commenters will be put into a hat (handknit, of course) and I will draw the winner!

Where is this and why did it give me the shivers??


Who or what can cross this bridge and what river does it cross??

What is this building?


I will tell you what this is. I took this photo in the ladies bathroom of the building in the photo above. This is a sink without a faucet. You simply run your hands under the little etched drops of water and water comes out. Unfortunately, the little drops of water are hard to see. My husband came out of the men's room (which must have the same type of sink) complaining that the bathroom had soap dispensers but no water!!