Taste of Aran Afghan

I love knitting in groups, especially in groups of people who are all knitting the same thing. So, when Faye, at Village Yarn and Tea, started talking up her aran afghan class, I was intrigued and signed up. I didn't want to spent hundreds on the yarn, so I ordered 24 balls of Wool of the Andes from Knit Picks in white. My living room is mostly black and white, with a floral black and white couch, so this will go great. It is also a great, neutral color so if I decide to use it in a different room it will still go great.

Class began on September 8th. We started the simplest block, Candle Flame, during class. Faye taught cabling without a cable needle, a technique that I already love to use. The class was fun and I look forward to October's class.
I finished the block the next day. The top picture, is of the unblocked "square." Faye recommended not blocking any of the squares until the end as they will probably come out different sizes, due to the nature of the patterns. They will need to be blocked to match one another closely.

Stash Enhancement

Back on August 31st, I told you about a sale at my favorite LYS, Village Yarn and Tea. That day, I also purchased a skein of Araucania Lonco Multy in a beautiful variegated orchid color. It is 440 yards. I started searching Ravelry, almost immediately for the best pattern and easily narrowed it down to a pattern from "Victorian Lace Today" and Zetor. Both were shawl patterns. When I finished my Fan Shawl, I had those needles, the ball of yarn and both patterns with me. (I usually take the bus from work to my father-in-law's house on Fridays and this Friday was typical.) I began to work with the pattern from VLT. The needles I had were too large and so I was unhappy with the way that the pattern was working. I frogged what little I had knit, and cast on for Zetor. BEAUTIFUL! The Saturday after I began the shawl, I was at VY&T with my friend K (like usual) and she found some black beads on clearance that were just perfect for the shawl. So, I purchased them and added beads to an already wonderful knitting pattern. I loved knitting the pattern so much, that in a few days I had the entire shawl finished. I did wait almost a week until I blocked it. Blocking, as always, really made the knitted piece shine.

Silky Fan Shawl

Last Friday, I finished knitting the main body of the Malabrigo Shawl. I took all but around 2 yards of the 5 skeins of Silky that I had from Eat.Sleep.Knit's Malabrigo Projects Club. To knit the border, I dug into my stash and pulled out the remaining 1/2 ball of Silky from a club shipment earlier in the year. I love the raspberry color with the gray. Blocking this one was difficult and I am still not completely happy with the results. As you can see, there are points where it should be round. I may need to re-block it and not use blocking wires. However, I was trying to get some good stretch to it and felt like I needed the wires for that. The shawl is soft, lovely and warm. It will be a great addition to my fall wardrobe.

Latest Shawl

When I get really tired of my current stealth project, I have been working with the yarn from last month's Malabrigo shipment. I am knitting the Fan Shawl from Crystal Palace with Malabrigo Silky. It is a free pattern that I found on Ravelry and is very fun to knit, while still being simpler than the said stealth project.