Watch One, Knit Two

I've been listening to the KnitPicks Podcast for a while now. In general I really like it and pay attention to Kelley's tips however one of her recommendations I've pretty much avoided.  Her claim that one needs to have a bunch of different projects on the needles has never sat well with me. For one, unlike Kelley I'm not a process knitter I get little joy from just making stitches one after another, I'm a project or result knitter - my joy comes from looking at the growing sweater or sock or shawl that's on my needles. On top of being a project knitter I like to stay focused on the one thing I'm working on since when I get sidetracked I tend to forget about the thing that had been consuming my attention.  But recently I've discovered the beauty of having multiple projects on the needles.


As I've mentioned in my last post I've been working fevereshly on my Raglan Sweater and it's been growing quickly.  I was hoping to have it finished this weekend but no matter how I tried it was not going to happen.  One of the things that interfered was my daughter's piano recital.  I knew that there was no way for me to bring that giant bit of knitting into those close quarters.  However as I thought about it, I realized that I had Grandma's Shawl tucked away in my knitting basket. It was in progress but I had put it aside since I was so focused on the sweater.  Since it didn't take much room at all I took it along and worked on it the whole hour.

So now I must admit that there's quite a bit of value to having various projects on the needles especially a small one that is easy to take along no matter where!

Back to the pointy sticks ...

So here's the Raglan that I've been working on and I think it's looking pretty good :)  I love the self- striping yarn but right now I'm a little concerned about the sleeves.  How am I going to be able to match the striping on the sleeves?  I think it'll look really weird if the the color changes don't match on the right and left . *bites nails* 

On a side note - I've not done any knitting on Grandma's Shawl or the Blue sweater. Also I've somehow managed to loose my cloth tape measure and have been using the metallic one that I use for hanging pictures *rolleyes* 

Back to the pointy sticks.....

I'm thinking that I'll use this blog for my knitting stuff since I don't want to bore my f/list at LJ too much with this.

So what's on my needles ...

       1)Blue Sweater .... boy oh boy is that thing giving me the blues :( I was hoping to have it finished by X-mas but that obviously didn't happen.  I've not picked it up for months .... I really don't like making sweaters in pieces, I much prefer knitting them in one piece, in the round ... so much more satisfying to watch it grow and be able to try it on!

        2)Raglan Sweater .... loving this one, it's being knit up in a bulky yarn so it's moving along fast and it's an in the round raglan .... I love everything about this one.  I'm close to making waist decreases  so I've got about 1/3 of it done and that's just in 3 days of knitting! YAY.

        3)Lace Shawl ... this one was for Grandma. I had actually finished it and hated the way it looked so after hemming and hawing I finally decided to frog the monstrosity and started a different pattern.  I'm still not in love with it but I thing it's much, much better than before so I'm not complaining.  I've got about 1/4th of it done and if it wasn't for the Raglan Sweater I'd be moving along faster!


What's in the wings ....

      1)Lace .... I just bought a beautiful mohair/wool blend lace yarn that I'm hoping to knit up into a lace shawl for a friend who's getting married in June in ITALY.  I'm debating between the Swallowtail Shawl or the Seascape Stole .... I think the multicolored yarn would work well for both so I've still got some thinking to do.

       2)Socks ....  Over the holidays I bought a couple of skeins of sock yarn that I'd like to work up into socks. However, I'm off of sock knitting since I did so much of it over the past few months so I think this is going to wait.

        3)Felted Bag ...  Michael's had a great sale on LionBrand Felting Wool recently that I couldn't NOT buy some. I found a beautiful blue/black/purple multicolored yarn that I think will make a lovely felted bag.

         4)Tops .... I've been scanning Ravelry lately and have found some really pretty patterns for tank tops/sweaters/shirts that I'm anxious to dive into a multitude of projects!  Thankfully I don't have the yarn ... otherwise I'd drive myself nuts trying to decide what to knit next! It's tough enough as it is.

Well that's it for now.  I'm sure I'll be posting an update with the Raglan soon since I think it'll be ready for pictures any day now :)