I may be a little late in joining the party, but now that I’ve decided to do so I’m jumping in with a list of small projects that will hopefully lower my Ravelry stash count. The goal of March Madness is to complete many small projects. Check out the Ravelry group and feel free to join in.

Planned projects:

• Crofter’s Cowl, Lorna’s Laces in Blackberry (top right)
• Mrs Beeton’s, Jojoland Melody in Purple w/ Jaeger Mohair Art (bottom right)
• Mrs Beeton’s, Elann Highland Silk in Purple w/ Jaeger Mohair Art (bottom right)
• Celtic Cable Neckwarmer, Valley Yarns Williamstown in Teal (top left)
• Celtic Cable Neckwarmer, Knit Picks Swish in Bordeaux (middle left)

If I finished these projects I’m mulling over what I can do with the following:

• 1 skein of Rowan Felted Tweed in Purple – I already made a lovely Relm “slouchy hat” it says on Ravelry and not beret or tam. Considering Porom.
• 1 skein of Sirdar Snuggly Baby Bamboo DK – I’m not sure about this one. Maybe it’s best to hold onto it and make a little sweater later on instead of trying to use it as a single skein. There are a few baby hat patterns that would work too.
• .5 skein of Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Worsted in beige. This one was not listed in my Ravelry so unfortunately it won’t lower the stash count.

For now I’m jumping in with the 5 projects above. As those progress I’m sure other ideas will shape up! I’m already mulling over a few other patterns too.

Not a lot to say about these – we need to order the metal roofing and start putting up trim. The siding will be fake board and batt. At some point will get back to finishing the fencing. In the meantime, Miss Blondie is perfectly happy at her boarding stable.

I have recovered from the Ene disaster I showed you in the last post…

1. Ene’s Scarf – On Monday night I finished the first skein of yarn. It supposedly uses just over 2 skeins so I am about halfway done.

What’s up next? Looks like I may do a few small, diversion projects for March Madness, but I may cast on for Rosalind at the same time. As Anne pointed out, Rosalind is probably too big to make a good lunch time project (likely too complex too). I know on Ene, when I was working on the outer border I’d sometimes only get a single row done at lunch. Two rows at the most.

I read on Ravelry something about the curse of Ene being that you could never cast on just once. I’m a believer now.

This is what happens when you so very carefully count to be sure you have all 375 stitches, but you neglect to carefully mark the center stitch. I was at row 26 before I realized my center repeat was off – I had 12 diamonds on one side and 10 on the other.

Normally I have success dropping stitches down and re-knitting them. I tried TWICE, re-knitting half a dozen rows each time, but things simply did not line up. The yarn was getting stretched out so out it came. It was even frustrating to rip it out, it did NOT want to let go.

I wasn’t sure I could re-start right away. The good news is I did and things are looking good again even if I’m only at row 9.

This is my third shawl for the 10 Shawls in 2010 Challenge. I have to admit, this one is rather boring to knit in a solid color. I’d recommend using a gradient dyed yarn or handspun, anything that would make it more interesting to knit – especially if you’re going to make it larger than the original pattern. That said, it is very well suited to knitting when you want something that doesn’t need focus because only 2 rows out of 20 require any counting.

DH was insisting that the photos look better with a flash while I usually try to avoid the flash. I can kind of see his point that the color with flash is closer to reality, but the light is so harsh. So there you go – that’s me looking a bit annoyed while I think, “this is why I usually take the photos myself on the dress making form.”

Pattern: Citron by Hilary Smith Callis
Yarn: KnitPicks Shadow Lace in colorway Snorkel Heather
Needles: US 6 Circulars
Notes: I followed the pattern until I finished the Fifth Section, then I added a 6th and 7th section. After that I completed the Ruffled Edging as stated in the pattern.

Original 2 skeins: 98.6 grams
Remainder: 14.1 grams
So that means I used 755 yards.
Finished measurements are 44 inches wide by 22 inches deep.

This week I moved on to my 4th shawl of 2010. Ene’s Scarf just barely won out over Rosalind for now. My desire to have all 4 of the Shakespeare in Lace 2009 shawls finished is pretty strong so I think Rosalind will be on the needles next.

1. Ene’s Scarf – (which is really a shawl) The 375 stitch cast on was a bear. I was rather careful about triple checking the number of stitches and using a larger needle because I didn’t want to find out I’d screwed it up after knitting several long rows. All the effort seems to have paid off because I’m a dozen rows in and it’s looking good.

This is one of those patterns I’ve wanted to knit for a long time so it’s really cool to look at my progress so far and realize I finally am knitting it.

I’m still not sure when my sock mojo will return. I have seen plenty of nice patterns, but nothing has grabbed me enough to tear me away from shawls yet.

Warning: picture heavy post ahead! As an extra bonus, something you don’t see on my blog very often: dogs.

We are having a very mild Winter here in Washington. It’s still been very rainy so we take advantage of every sunny day we get. This weekend (and days on each side of the weekend) we’ve had gloriously sunny weather with a high in the 50’s and lows around freezing.

Saturday started with evening up the truss ends and building the lookouts (all of these things create the eves on the outer walls of your building), attaching fascia board, and finally sheeting half of the roof. At the end of the day the crew moved around to the opposite side of the building and got the fascia on, as well as the lookouts. With the prep done, it only took half a day Sunday to sheet the back side. After that it was quick work to roll out the tar paper.

All this work was done with an all volunteer crew of family, friends, and neighbors. I don’t help much with the building aspect, but later on R will help with projects at all of their houses (as he has also done in the past). My main job for the weekend was fetching food/drink, and keeping an eye on the dogs. Shown above is Logan who is 3 years old and Ziva who is 5 months. Logan is *really* gentle, but he’s big so it took an hour before Ziva was comfortable playing with him.

Over the weekend I was wondering whether this week’s Wednesday Work In Progress would be a repeat performance where last week’s project would be blocking and I would have just started the next project. Alas, no. I didn’t quite make it.

1. Citron – Moving right along, I have finished all the called for repeats and one extra. I’m not sure if the repeat I’m on now will be the last one or if I’ll do one more for a total of 3 extra.

I still think Ene’s Scarf is up next, though anything could change until it’s actually on the needles!

I’ve been wanting to knit this pattern for a long time. The only thing that held me back was trying to decide what yarn to use.

Pattern: Flutter Scarf by Miriam Felton
Yarn: Wooly Wonka Tencel Blend Laceweight (Alpaca, Merino, Tencel) in colorway British Queen
Needles: US 2.5 Circular (3.0 mm)
Notes: I was afraid I may be borderline on having enough yarn so I eliminated 6 stitches from the width of the scarf. As it turned out, I had plenty of yarn. I don’t think the smaller width hurts the scarf though, I doubt anyone who’s knit this would be able to tell the difference.

For anyone considering using their remaining yarn from Desdemona for this pattern: the finished scarf weighs 55.6 grams. I still have 49.8 grams! Guess I didn’t need to worry about running out. Note that my weights are for the Alpaca/Merino/Tencel blend.

Finished measurements: 72 inches long by 7.5 inches wide. 112 repeats of the scarf body pattern.

It blocked out a bit longer than I really expected. I was targeting the same length Mim shows in her photos, but I’m tall so I fully expected to do extra repeats. At any rate, I’m still very happy with it at this length. It is so soft and feels wonderful to wear.

Finally, this is how I blocked it. I’m not unhappy with the result, but I think my fluttery ends will look even better when they relax a bit.

I feel like I’m repeating last week, only here are my next 2 projects. Last week Haruni was blocked and Flutter Scarf was in the beginning stages. This week Flutter Scarf is being blocked and Citron is in the beginning stages.

1. Citron – I couldn’t for the life of me decide what to cast on last night. My top 3 choices were Ene’s Scarf, Rosalind, and this. Ultimately, I was tired and so the easiest of the 3 is what won out. So far I’ve finished the first section and you can just barely see the pattern take shape.

This should be a relatively quick knit and then I’m pretty sure I’ll get started on Ene’s Scarf. The thing about Ene is that the cast on is something like 400 stitches and tackling that isn’t something that should be done when a person is tired.