lace on the brain

It must have been the anticipation of THIS arriving in the mail for me that my mind has been on the subject of lace knitting lately.


I made this Foliage hat for my sister. (True confession: I started it before the Citron shawl. First I would alternate: do one repeat on the hat, do one section on the shawl. Then it was just one more section on the shawl. The shawl won.) I finally finished the hat a couple of days ago. This is very soft Queensland Super Aussie Merino worsted.

Then I have the terrible, terrible task of test knitting a new yarn I dyed before my surgery. It's an as yet unnamed blend of 50% merino, 50% silk fingering weight that is simply divine to knit with.

I started on a Prairie Rose shawl from the Knitter's Book of Wool.

I liked the pattern well enough. In fact, it's gorgeous. It was kicking my butt a little, since it's been a while that I've made anything more complicated. Maybe it was my poor post-surgery brain that just couldn't handle it. (Ask me another time what really stupid things I've done in the last two weeks.)

But I decided that the yarn and the pattern were fighting each other....the yarn was too busy for the pattern, the pattern too intricate for the yarn. I frogged it,

and started a Twilight scarf from the book A Fine Fleece.

Better, no?

Tomorrow, we talk about what's inside the book. ;)