Wrapped In Lace.

Hello lovelies! How are you all doing? It so nice that you popped by for a visit, I've got a little something to share with you :-)

I have a little bit of extra time at the moment, which is nice! I've given up my German course for a month or so,  until I'm done learning the material for my new role at work. I was finding a little bit much trying to balance everything so I think stopping the course for a while is wise. It means I was able to finish a project!!
 
As you know last month I bought some new yarn (you can read about it here in my 'Silver Linings' post). Some Zpagetti yarn and some lovely vibrant lace. I had a play around with both. One of the yarns I absolutely adored, the other...errrrr..... not so much!!!

Ok so lets briefly talk about the yarn I didn't like so much. The Zpagetti yarn. I was super excited about working with this extra thick yarn. It is made from strips of cotton material and looked like it would be a lot of fun to work with.
It was interesting to work with, but not fun. I found it quite tricky to use as it stretches a lot and also working with yarn so thick took some getting used to.
I had a go at following the instructions it came with to make a bag, but I wasn't happy with the outcome. I had a go at some other things from the Zpageti website but also wasn't happy with the how they turned out. The biggest problem for me was that the yarn varies tremendously in thickness as you work through it. This resulted in my work looking very wonky. I HATE it when my work looks wonky!!! Enough said!!!!!!!
Sooooo I still have two balls of Zpagetti yarn waiting to be made into something. I haven't given up on it totally, I'm just waiting until I find the some  Zpagetti fuelled inspiration.

The other yarn I bought was a gorgeous lace merino from Lana Grossa. It's a delicious bright turquoise and I've been franticly whipping it up into a delicate shawl for a friend of mine. I do Hope she likes it!

Here it is!!!

I'm very happy with how it turned out. I used a pattern by Kim Miller, it's called 'Wrapped in Lace' (Here's a link to it on Ravelry).

It's the first time I've ever made a lacy shawl. The pattern was very easy to follow and can be made to the size you desire.

Isn't it beautiful how delicately it hangs!? I'm obsessed with this colour at the moment. It sums up happiness and Summer. I think that it appears very classy and fresh.

I used 150g of the lace (3 balls) and just loved how it worked up.
I adapted the pattern a little when it came to edging as I didn't want to add beads to the shawl. Instead I went for a little picot design.

I wasn't sure about how the edging was looking when I first started. However,  once I blocked the shawl I was extremely happy with it.

So there we have it. My 'Wrapped in Lace Shawl' for my friend Mimi!

 

I can't wait to give it to her now that it is finished! Maybe I'll be able to pursued her to have a picture taken whilst wearing it so I can share with you all.

What kind of projects are you all working on? Anything similar to the shawl I've just finished?

Have a SMASHING week!! ;-)

Matt xxx

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Oops! I knitted again...

I think I've got the knitting fever! Let me rephrase that, I know I have the knitting fever! I haven't been crocheting much recently, since there have been so many things I wanted to learn about knitting! Don't worry, I still love to crochet, and I will keep on crocheting!

My latest project is again a Stephen West pattern, it's called Earth & Sky.

The yarn I used for this project is Golden Eagle Alpaca, which is a 100% Alpaca, fingering weight. I love how vibrant the turquoise is next to the black and gray! I've only recently discovered how much I love turquoise! I think it works great in this color combination! 

It was a little bit scary to start such a big project (I started with 3 stitches and ended up with almost 500) especially since the yarn is so very very thin! I worked the shawl with size 4mm knitting needles.
I loved working on this project, but I did put it aside sometimes. I'm not the best 'purler' and it really slows me down! I'm telling you, rows of 500 purl stitches aren't that much fun! I'm chuffed with the results though!

Because of the fingering weight yarn, and a bit bigger needles, there is a lot of drape! It's incredibly soft (I love alpaca) and even though it looks very thin, when wrapped around my neck, it keeps me perfectly warm! 

The colorwork is very clever in this pattern. It's called 'Intarsia knitting' which scared me when I first heard it. However, I love a good challenge! It turned out very easy, you just twist the working yarn over the new color of yarn before you start knitting with that new color, and on your way back you do the same. This way you don't have to carry the colors at the backside of your work (which wouldn't have looked so nice on this scarf). In the picture below you can see the intarsia quite clear, but I think it looks very neat!

I couldn't help taking my scarf out for a little photo shoot at a lovely location around the corner! It is such a beautiful and sunny day today!

Here's a shot of the same place but from a distance. I walk past this everyday on my way to work, and always love how pretty it looks! In winter it was even more beautiful, everything was covered in snow and ice! 

It's a lovely day here in Hamburg! I'm very lucky because I have two days off now. I can enjoy the beautiful weather and spend time doing the things I love! These two days were very welcome because my head is overloaded with information with all the rehearsals I'm doing. I only started less than 2 weeks ago and we've already learned 5 shows. I will elaborate a little bit more about my job in another post and when I'm a little less busy ;-)

Have a beautiful day everybody!

Dennis xxx

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