Greta!

Okay, folks, you know you're having a bad photography week when you have to resort to the "least crappy" photo. This shawl is beautiful, but apparently she's not very photogenic. At least not in the lighting that has been available to me the last few days. I'll keep trying to get better photos, but I really want to show her off. (I love the way NB names her shawls. "Greta" sounds so graceful.)


The close-ups are a bit better:

Those nupps (rhymes with "soups") really pop out when blocked, don't they. And the edging is my favorite:


The specs:
Pattern: Greta Garbo Shawl Kit from the Wooly West
Yarn: Nordic Lites in Linganberry
Needles: size 5
Size: around 60" across the top and 30" down the middle
She's a bit smaller than she was supposed to be. I should have gotten a third skein of yarn and moved up a needle size, but she's okay, I guess. I'm 5'7", so I like my shawls to be a little on the big side.

I've been working on the Kimono Top. It's coming along. It adds to speed when half the stitches on each RS row are slipped instead of knitted. I've been working on some other stuff, so I'm not further along. I'll tell you what my kitchen smells like and maybe you'll excuse the slack knitting - freshly baked bread and geranium oil. The bread smell is sort of obvious, but as for the geranium oil, I made up some wonderfully fragranced face cream yesterday with almond, jojoba and rose hip oils, beeswax, and lavender and rose geranium essential oils. It's really nice and my skin feels nice and soft.

Happy Valentine's Day!

I know, a day early. I know it's really Friday the 13th, but I've actually always had pretty good luck on that day. I'm a big believer that if you believe you're going to have bad luck, you certainly will. I'm not saying there aren't days where bad luck just seems to find you no matter what, I'm just saying, there's no point in looking for bad luck to happen.

I'd actually hoped to have the Greta Garbo done and all blocked out by tomorrow, but the best laid plans and all that. I got sidetracked by a family-wide stomach bug. We were pretty much laid low for most of last weekend and the first part of this week. Not too much knitting got done. I had made progress before that though and it really shouldn't take more than a couple of weeks.


It really is a very rich red and I know you can't really tell much about what pretty much looks like solid blocks there, but they're full of nupps in heart designs, and when stretched out, those nupps really pop out. It will look very pretty when finished and I might have some new earrings to go with it.

Warping woes and paper fashion

Saturday I finally found a few minutes to finish warping for my scarf. I had already finished the threading and all I had left was to wind the warp onto the back beam and tie it on the front. As I was almost done winding, I hear "ping". Two of the warp threads had popped. I was told later that I could have just tied them together and once it is woven and washed, you can't tell. But I didn't know that at the time, so I unwound the entire warp and 30 minutes of work, and I'm exactly where I was. *sigh*

Then there's some other stuff distracting me from my weaving. I've made a bit of progress on my Greta Garbo Shawl. I've started the main charts now and it is going to be so very pretty. I'm loving this shawl and I think I may have even come to terms with the dreaded nupps.

The other things that are distracting me are a couple of books that I bought ostensibly for my daughters. But crafty person I am, I've been having a bit of fun on my own. The books are Paper Fashions and Paper Fashions Fancy. They're Klutz books, which I just love; the books are always creative and these are no exception. They come with stencils and ideas for making paper clothes from scrapbook and other designed paper. It's not a great picture (I didn't want to wait until tomorrow when I might actually have decent lighting), but here are a couple of things I've made so far:

A dress with boots and handbag decorated with gold thread and gold glitter and a set of pajamas. They're actually not all that big, the pjs are 5 inches high, so the designs are perfect for cards or scrapbooks (or just being creative). I plan to do more this week and I'll share. (By the way, if you might be interested in a "Paper Fashions" group on Ravelry, let me know. I'm trying to start one up to share creations.)

Hearts and Cookies

I've completed the lace border of Greta. I had to rip about three rows because I wasn't happy with the nupps. (By the way, did you know "nupp" is actually pronounced to rhyme with "soup"? I did not know that until I watched a video on Knitting Daily with Nancy Bush to see how she made hers.) Anyway, I'm much happier with the nupps (rhymes with "soups"; I have to remember that) now. Although they don't seem very prominent now, I think they'll be wonderful when all blocked out. For now, see the heart:


I've also been in the kitchen again. I recommended the book "Super Natural Cooking" a couple of weeks ago and I'm telling you, the book is well worth it, if for nothing more than the desserts. The popcorn from Monday's post was from there as are these delicious thin mint cookies:

Chocolate and mint, two of my very favorite flavors together. They're made with whole wheat flour. Okay, they have a bit of butter, but cookies just aren't cookies in my house without real butter. None of that fake butter-wanna-be stuff here.