Before we get to the knitting I have to say, THANK YOU. To all of my readers, old and new, I thank you for all the love you’ve shown me over the last 2 weeks. I have been overwhelmed by all of the Ravelry messages, blog comments, Instagram comments and emails I’ve gotten about EVERYTHING. It has all been nothing short of amazing, kind and at times things that have brought me to tears with your heart warming words. A girlfriend of mine who doesn’t knit but loves to see what I make read the MDK interview and the comments and said to me, ‘Those people really get YOU, D.’ That made me smile. Yarn people are my people 🙂 Okay, enough with the sentimental stuff and on to my latest finished object!
I have found that two color brioche is kind of mindless knitting for me. When you need a reset or something in between projects, brioche is perfect for me. I can memorize the pattern, I’m a little engaged but not so engrossed and I’m always a little challenged. I’m sure that’s odd to some but we all have different knitting quirks. So after my latest sweaters and in between working on my Togue Pond Tank (since summer refuses to come) I decided to make the West Knits Askews Me Shawl.
First, can I say it’s hard as hell to photograph a full shawl. I tried to pin it to a wall to get a good pic and didn’t have enough pins! This baby is huge (taller than me at 5 feet 4 inches) and it has an unusual shape, almost like a stingray. I used almost a full skein (560 yards) of Miss Babs Yowza in Sunday Funday(the lighter variegated color) and 550 yards of Neighborhood Fiber Company Studio Worsted in Georgetown, a gorgeous deep cobalt blue (I found a skein of it I thought I lost in my yarn room…clearly I’ve got to clean up more). I mix Yowza and Studio Worsted up a lot in projects (examples seen here and here to name a few), they’re both a light worsted that I feel leans more on the dk side and they pair nicely together. Added bonus their skeins are 560 yards and 400 yards so I have fewer ends to weave in when I’m finished.
I also realize I always seems to like the lighter side of whatever brioche project I create, which is usually considered the wrong side but since it’s reversible does it really matter? I photographed both sides but clearly I only liked the lighter side but hopefully you can see both sides when I modeled it worn. I really enjoyed this knit but this I’m not keeping this one, it’s going to a friend. It’s a bit of a thank you gift, but now I want to make one for myself with all kinds of stripes of color from my leftover skeins of dk weight yarn I’ve got hanging around. That might just be my next little in between project I work on. And speaking of gifts…
One of my closest friends was recently in Ireland for work and bought me what he called a cheesy souvenir but I just call it adorable. A green (my favorite color) traditional aran sweater mug!! I don’t even want to drink coffee out of it so I think it will go in my craft room and hold knitting supplies. I think that’s where it really belongs.
So have I finally convinced the rest of you to jump on the brioche bandwagon with me? I actually want to do the Askews Me Dress too!
