WIPs and a promise . . .

So my challenge to myself this year (and part of a New Year's pact I made with a friend) is to become competent at knitting lace.

Hah! Little did I know . . .

The lace madness bug has bitten. And it involves things I wasn't sure I'd ever do . . . like knitting with nickle plated needles, reading charts, and knitting with smaller needles than I ever thought I'd enjoy.

Of course, it has involved much buying of yarn, which I always enjoy. I did a major destash last October when one of my favorite LYSs offered a deal . . . bring in your old yarn (any kind, any amount) and get 20% NEW Yarn . . . enough for 2 complete projects. Well! There was, of course, yarn I'd been lusting after, and it seemed like a good time to blast my yarn budget to tiny bits. After all, a good cause . . . acrylic yarn lurking in my stash going to a better (charity based) home freeing up space for wonderful wool, and wool/mulberry silk, and wool/alpaca/silk yarn . . . how could I lose! And better still, it left enough space in my stash for the new, yummy, lace weight yarns!

What I didn't reckon on was that this lace knitting business and my Harmony wood needles would not fare so well together. I have loved those needles despite their many failings (coming loose from their screw housings, cables breaking, cables unscrewing) and I discovered that they are just not what I need for knitting lace. So I hauled my nickle plates out of the bag, and boy howdy did I pick up speed! Same problems, tho, at least with the cables despite cranking on that silly little cable key like no tomorrow.

So away I go to the internet to do my research. Much spare time devoted to reading reviews of needles. Much input. Much head-whirling. Turbos? Addi lace? Hiya-Hiya steel? KA bamboo? All of them having pros and cons. Maybe just stay with the Options nickle plate and bit the bullet on the cable issues? Oh, heck with it, another glass of wine and it just will not matter.

But I persevere (or perseverate). I finally got fed up, even with myself, and called the wonderful folks at Little Knits (www.littleknits.com) and ordered the Addi Lace Clicks. And some more lace yarn with the gift certificate that came along with the purchase. I'm waiting for the needles . . . I hope I will be thrilled with cables that don't unscrew themselves.

So . . . I currently have four WIPs on needles that involve some form of lace pattern. My stash is tolerably organized. My large Lion tote bag that is home to tools not immediately in use is organized. I found a wonderful app for my Android phone that keeps immediate track of needles, hooks, projects, and even contains a built in row counter. I can't figure out how to be able to save photos of WIPs to the stash program, but if I do, I'll post it.

And I was reading a blog in Knitting Daily about stash organization which is really what got me started writing this. One or two of the folks that responded were talking about keeping a knitting journal, and it occurred to me that rather than put ONE MORE THING in my darned Laurel Burch tote bag . . . I could keep an electronic journal here. And now, I'm thinking, hmmmm . . . maybe I do want a hard copy after all.

Any way -- 2 of the scarves on needles now call for the same stitch:

Cast on odd number of stitches
Seed stitch 1st two rows (k1,P1) repeat to end of row
Row 3 and all subsequent rows: Sl1 *K2tog* repeat to end of row
Repeat row three until you're out of yarn and don't want to buy more, sick of the scarf or reach the desired length.

Easy peasy!
Pics will follow