Finished Object Friday! Multnomah Shawl

Wow, how long has it been since I've finished something? (I checked - December 14th, 2010.)

I've been on a bit of a stash-busting bender lately. I found this ball of Mark's and Katten Fame Trend, a Christmas gift in 2009 from my aunt and uncle, and decided it was next on the list.





I browsed the Ravelry pattern database to see what I could find. I came up with Multnomah. (Available free at http://helloknitty.net.)







My goal was to use as much of the yarn as possible. I left I tiny tail after casting on the 3 starting stitches:





I knit extra repeats until my yarn supply seemed dangerously low and did a k2tog bind off to keep the end stretchy. I had about 8" of yarn left.





Let me tell you, I was seriously sweating that bind off! Here is a shot of the whole thing, pre-blocking.





The cat's odd sitting position is due to the fact that he was slowing inching his way closer to the yarn tail while feigning innocence.

WIP's

I have many works in progress right now - more than the total number of projects I completed in 2010. I think packing and moving my yarn stash shook the dust off of my knitting mojo.

I am actively working on a pair of socks and two cardigans. I actually finished a lace shawl last week - more on that in another post.

Kai-Mei socks:





I should have been finished with these a few weeks ago, but I found a mistake on the foot of the second sock. Not that it was hard to find; there was a large bulbous protrusion on one side of the lace pattern where I had apparently forgotten to decrease for twenty or so rounds. I ripped back to before the problem started... but haven't picked them up again. I probably could finish them in a night if I set my mind to it. Maybe tonight?

Vine Lace Cardigan:


(No Photo. How boring.)


This has been on my needles for months. I realized pretty early in that I had misread (or mismemorized) the lace pattern and was doing something completely different. Didn't feel like ripping it out, so I'm going with it for the rest of the cardigan. I think I put this down to work on holiday projects in December.

(Did I write 'actively working on' above? Well, it felt like it until I thought about those projects.)

Clara Cardigan:





I started this just last week. I've had this yarn (Cascade Sierra) in my stash for years and really wanted to find a pattern so I could finally knit it. The cardigan has an interesting side-to-side construction, with short rows creating the collar. I hope the cotton content doesn't make it too heavy and pull the garter stitch out of shape. Hopefully the vertical rows will help prevent that.

I have also gone a bit crazy and have started matching up all of the yarn in my stash to the project I will make with it. Somehow, this feels like it will help me knit faster and get through the stashed yarn quicker. At least it looks a little more organized!