Finished!

 

I've finished my Scéal Grá pullover!  I am planning on wearing this Christmas day, so it feels good to have it off the needles and blocked.  I knit this for the Eat.Sleep.Knit fourth quarter KAL and I knit it in Shibui Knits Lunar and Silk Cloud, both in the Deep Water colorway, held together.  (The color is not quite as dark as navy blue, but it has a little bit of green in it too.  It's hard to get just right in photos, but this top photo is probably the most accurate, colorwise.)

Double stranding my yarns slowed my knitting down quite a bit and working the 3 into 7 cluster stitches with two strands was borderline psychotic, but I'm thrilled with the finished sweater.  I didn't do the body increases or the flounce as the pattern was written, but just knit straight from the yoke.  I did do the short rows to shape the back of the pullover, making it longer than the front.

The pattern called for i-cord bind offs at all of the edges, but I only worked them at the lower hem and the sleeve hems.

I did a round of single crochet on the neckline just to keep things simple and focused on the lace.  I steam blocked the finished sweater to smooth everything out and open up the lace.

I loved this pattern and I'm very happy with the finished sweater.  I also plan to use this pairing of yarns again at some point because it's just crazy soft and fluffy, but I think I'm going to knit something single stranded in a heavier weight yarn next.

One Down

 

I finished the first sleeve yesterday!  As soon as I bound off, I popped the sweater onto Fifi for this picture before it got dark, but I started the second sleeve after dinner last night, so I'm actually a little bit farther along than this now.  I haven't done the neck finishing and I still have a couple of ends to weave in but I think that's it, once I've finished the knitting.  I'm definitely on track to have this finished to wear for Christmas!

On To The Sleeves

 

I finished knitting the body of Scéal Grá last night.  The i-cord bind off seemed to take forever, and using two strands of laceweight held together isn't exactly working to speed things up.  I feel like I have to pay attention to each individual stitch as I knit it, which really slows things down.  On the other hand, the feel of the knitting is just amazing and the finished sweater will be completely worth it.  I'll definitely use this combination of yarns together again, but I'll give myself a little break first.  Maybe a nice single stranded worsted weight sweater next.

I didn't do the body increases or the flounce at the lower edge, but I did do the shortrows to lengthen the back.  The bind off is rolling up at the lower edge because it hasn't been blocked yet, but you can see a bit of the shape the shortrows gave me.

I believe I'm supposed to do an i-cord on the neck edge to finish it, but I'm not sure if that's what I want there.  I might do a single crochet edge like I've used on a couple of Ravello pullovers.  It will stabilize that edge without really adding anything visually - I think the lace is probably enough.

I'm planning on starting the first sleeve later today.  I'll make decisions about the neckline later!

Have a great weekend!

Finished Socks

 

I finished Mickael's socks.  I did have to add another yarn at the toe, but honestly, if I don't mention it to him, I doubt he'll ever notice. There's only about half an inch of the other yarn and the gray I used is really close to the grays in the original yarn.  This is the biggest pair of gift socks I'm making for Christmas this year since Caleb has asked for shorter legs on his socks.

This leaves me with one more pair of socks for Caleb (which I cast on yesterday) and my Christmas sweater to knit before Christmas.  I'm hoping to finish the body of the sweater this week and the sleeves shouldn't take too long to knit.  I think I'm on track to get things done!