My Latest Plans for NaKniSweMoDo

I am planning so that I can fulfill by hope to finish my NaKniSweMo project during the year. My plan is to work on a new project, finish it, and then work on WIPs for the remainder of the month. This is the plan for every month. Of course, I do have 2 on the needles already, so I obviously will not need to start a new one every month, but I love to cast on for a new project!
There are several people in the group with finished projects already and I am just ichin’ to get mine finished. I have the sleeves and the back finished on the Siena Cardigan from Interweave Knits, Fall 2006. Because of the large (US size 9) needles it is going quite quickly. I am finally getting to the more interesting part as the patterning is only on the fronts near the button bands and that part is knit as the front is knitted. The yarn is the very soft and fluffy Misti International Pima Cotton/Silk in soft lavender. The only complaint I have is that I am constantly covered in purple fuzz! Since I wear black as a basic, it really shows. I expect that it will be at least a little better when I am no longer knitting with it, and wearing it instead.

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.

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! :)