NaKniSweMo Ends

I managed about 20% of Morrigan during this month's KAL. The point was to get it done, but I feel really great about the progress that I've made! I've knit 4 of the 18 balls into the project.

Soon, I need to get back to the 2 sweaters that I'm knitting as Christmas presents. I have Yosemite and the Cambridge Jacket to finish before then.

I have, however, been working on Cambridge some this month. There are some times where I like to knit during another event. If the other event is something that needs my attention, then I've been knitting the simpler pattern of it, otherwise, I've been working on Morrigan. With all the great progress that I've made, I wish I could just keep working on it instead of changing back to presents! :) However, it's all so much fun that it doesn't really matter and I love to make things for others.

ETA: NaKniSweMo may be over, but I've signed up for NaKniSweMoDo for 2009 on Ravelry. This will be my first project to work on once the Christmas knitting is finished.

Here are the latest photos of my Morrigan. I have 2 balls of yarn knitted into it at this point! Since taking these photos, I have completed about 12 more rows and have about 13% of the sweater completed.

More Morrigan Progress

Morrigan is coming along nicely. It doesn’t look much different than the last picture, but once I finished the second ball of yarn, I will take another picture to share. I finished 7 rows, yesterday! If I could do this many every day, I would be able to finish in just over 2 months. However, I rarely have that much time to knit on it in one day. I really am enjoying all the cables and look forward to any time that I can spend with it!

A Lovely, Long Weekend

This weekend I went to Lake Retreat, in Kanaskat, WA, with a group of friends form church. Saturday was lovely. Oft and on, there was SUN! The camp is on the west side of the lake and most of the benches face the lake. So, when I was trying to find a sunny place to sit outside and knit, most of the benches put the sun at my back. However, I did finally manage to find one that let me sit with my face to the sun. It was a great half hour, or so before the wind picked up and I went inside to warm up.

I have been working away on my NaKniSweMo project, Morrigan. It is starting to grow and the pattern is getting easier and a little faster to work! The cabling truly is lovely and the fabric so soft. I took it with me on the women’s retreat this past weekend. Everyone who saw it was awed by the complexity. I have almost 2 inches of the body done and figure that it is probably around 6.5% of the total project. I finished the first ball of yarn on Friday night and began the second after my friend untangled it for me.

I also took the Cambridge Jacket with me. We had 4 lecture style meetings while there and I like to be able to keep my hands busy. Morrigan is too complicated to fully focus on the talk, so I needed a simpler project. This one really worked well. I managed to finish the back a few minutes after the 4 and final session! It looks great and I had many compliments on that one, too.

On Monday, I knew that I would be tired from staying up too late at the retreat, so I took the day off ahead of time. I planned to knit on Morrigan some more, but ended up having a great time outside. I raked the leaves off our porch and flower beds, pruned some of my plants back, divided another plant and put away some little fences that I use to keep the neighbor kids out of the flower beds in the spring and summer. I have procrastinated for many months and finally did it! It looks great and I am happy to have it done.

More Stitches Than Expected

While reading posts on the Ravelry group, NaKniSweMo, I wondered at how many stitches my finished project would have in it. To qualify for the group the sweater is supposed to contain at least 50,000 stitches. After some lengthy calculations, I think mine has around 200,000. I’d say that qualifies! However, I am currently on task to finish in about 4 months, not 1. I don’t feel bad about that as the project is 4 times larger than the minimum requirement, so taking 4 times longer to complete would still be pretty good! Tonight, I am going to try to finish enough rows to get myself set up to finish in 3 months instead of 4. This is a cotton sweater, so if it is finished during the Spring, I will still get to wear it right away.

NOT Impossible

Well, I've been working on Morrigan some more. It is possible to knit once the set up row is finished. It is sssllllooowww going though! I have about an inch after around 6 hours of working on it. I love how soft it is and I the cabling is starting to look pretty! :)

Impossible?

I spent this morning casting on for Morrigan, my NaKniSweMo project. I knew it would be difficult, but, WOW! The directions seemed to read: ajdklfaiowefeefecxkm...when I first started to look at them. Yes, you read correctly, nary a K or P in the list. However, each of about 8 letters used stand for the next line in a chart and then those 8 or so (to begin with) charts are repeated in various orders, creating the patterning. It is pretty complicated to figure out. I misread them and left out 46 stitches. Of course, I had to come to nearly the end of the first row to realize that I had missed 2 sections. At 456 stitches, that really took a while to rip! After 3 hours I have almost 1 row to show for my time.

Later on, I went to Ravelry to add the project to my list of current projects. When it came time to rate the difficulty, I thought, "This has to be the most complicated pattern that I've ever seen," so I clicked to rate the pattern as the most difficult that Ravelry allows. They call this "impossible." If I don't get the hang of it pretty soon (yes, I know less than 1 row is too soon to tell) I may rip and knit something simpler with this gorgeous cotton blend yarn. The yarn is Rowan's Calmer. It is soft and stretchy and I love it! This yarn definitely will not be sitting and collecting dust regardless of my ability to knit the project that I desire out of it! :)

Little Progress

This week has been a difficult one. As such there has been little knitting progress. I get migraines and they are worse when it is getting darker outside. They are also worsened by strong chemical smells. At work, lately, there has been a tar smell in the building. (A neighboring building has been re-roofing using a tar based product. Our building's ventilation system is set to bring in "fresh" air but can be reset to recirculate the air, instead. However, they have not reset the system until there is already a very strong smell in the building.) During the time off that I've taken due to said migraine, I did get a little further on my Alpaca Sox, getting the heel turn and gusset decreases finished on the first sock.
In addition to not feeling well, I hit a wall with the sweaters that I've been knitting. The colors for the fair isle work are not working together as I planned, so I'm waiting on it until I can go look for a different color to use. The mostly cotton yarn for Yosemite bothers my hands after a while and I'm getting tired of the same thing! :) However, I did pick it up again for a while today and have just another 2 1/2 rows until I start working decreases and binding off a few stitches. That will make it new and interesting and I'm sure to get much done on it in the next week or so.
I needed a cast on fix, today, so I started another present. I'm knitting the Cambridge Jacket by Ann Budd (Interweave Summer 2006) in Elann's Peruvian Wool. On the large, size 9 needles, this was a great quick satisfaction project. I have knitted through 2 of the 18 balls of yarn, in just the first day, and am almost to the bottom of the arm holes on the back! I'm not sure how much more progress I'll make as I do want to cast on for the NaKniSweMo KAL. I want to make Morrigan, from "No Sheep for You." I have the exact yarn, yes even the color, as the one in the pattern and have been excited to start ever since I decided on a project. I just finished looking at my Ravelry Projects page and I already have 10 projects started, but I am going to start something new. Ooo, I can hardly wait!