Crafts - Lovely Morticia & next projects

I've been a busy bee! I cast on the next Boo Knits project, a beautiful lace shawl named "Morticia". With me loving all things goth and the "M is for March" challenge going on over at Ravelry this was the perfect pick to extend my bead-working as well as lace knitting skills. I had some dark purple yarn planned for it some time ago but decided to go all black - same yarn though, Lana Grossa Lace Lux - with silver and purple beads (see my last post). Fast-forward 25 days and the shawl was done!

Blocking my last project went well enough but I knew the Morticia shawl would turn out bigger. Since I'm also a little bit of a perfectionist (at least in some areas ;-) ) I finally caved in and ordered some blocking mats and wires for my future works. I barely managed with the amount of mats and found using the wires somewhat challenging as I had to connect the three wires in some way to make the full bend but in the end it turned out quite alright, if I do say so myself:

Sooo, what's up next? I found a pattern for a mid-calf length hooded coat and also found that coincidentally I had the magazine the pattern was from at home already. Gnashing teeth at the estimated yarn costs and my birthday coming up resulted in a very generous gift from my parents (thank you!!!), a voucher for one of my favorite yarn stores. Yarn ordered, Morticia finished, coat cast on :-) I dubbed it "Something Death Would Wear?" in honor of my avatar and favorite comic character, Sandman's Death.

While I'm sure the coat will keep me busy for a while I do have some more Boo Knits' shawls queued up. Other than that I recently acquired various skeins/balls of yarn which ask to be made into something for my daughter, like this Wollmeise "Hoochie Mama" and "Xaverl":

 

Crafts - Mustardseed done, Morticia next - beading awesomeness

My knitting/beading hack from last post? Worked like a charm! But first things first...
After working the first beading rows I was hooked ;-) It's fun, it's a challenge (sometimes), it's variety and it's fun! Here's a picture of a lace border repeat, the shawl almost done.

 

Today I managed to actually wash and block the thing. Did I mention that I -hate- blocking? I still hope I did a reasonable job (minor adjustments happened after this picture was taken)...  I love(d) the pattern and I think, apart from the Dragonfly Shawl, this has been the second fastest piece I've worked. Did I mention I'm on vacation next week and have a lot of knitting time on my hands?

 

So, now that I knew how to work beads and stumbling over a pattern I've been wanting to do for quite some time, AND Bev calling out March to be M-KAL month (knit-a-long with one of her patterns that start with M) I finally decided to give the Morticia pattern a go. Seriously, how can a (half-)goth like me resist a piece named after a favorite goth/knitting TV character? *grin*

I actually wanted to use the exceptionally beautiful yarn my friend Betsy sent (see this post) but I had used the Lana Grossa Lace Lux in various other projects before and remembered there was a black variety of the yarn as well. So I decided this will probably be a better fit and went to acquire some at one of my favorite stores, Wedermann. Because... my friend & co-worker Anja, who does lots of beading work, recommended Perlenmix as a source of beads to me so naturally I had to go and check. As they're 5 minutes walk from Wedermann one thing lead to the other... and here's what I came home with - I've been good, I swear! ;-)

 

So, I've cast on my Morticia today and what should I say - it looks way more complicated than it actually is. Bev's directions are meticulous and perfect, everything fits together perfectly (yarn, needle size, beads - thank you, instinct!) and I can't wait to have this beauty finished.The beads are a little bit smaller than I the ones I worked with the Mustardseed shawl above, but as the yarn is a little bit thinner as well they're a perfect match.

Crafts - Utilities and DIY jewellery

I've been writing about the lace shawl I'd started to take with me and work on during my vacation. The yarn I chose and I took some time becoming friends. I'd cast on a few different things but always ended up frogging after a few rows. But as you've seen in my last blog post the Aurinko is coming along nicely. I was eager to properly try out my new Karbonz needles but found out quite soon that for exactly this yarn they are the wrong choice. I reverted to the KnitPro Symfonie wooden needles - which I had to use for getting through airport security anyway - due to the way the transition between carbon and metal is worked. The Lace Ball yarn is just a fraction too thin and keeps getting caught which is a nuisance working on a piece at approximately 300 stitches after the first third. To illustrate what I'm talking about - this is what the transition between wood and metal looks like with the Symfonie needles:

Just right, pretty much no stitch getting caught. Yay!

On to the project I did together with my daughter - custom made stitch markers! When I started the Aurinko shawl I didn't have any within reach so I used a paperclip. The rather bulky plastic stitch markers (e.g. these) are way too thick to properly work around with a lace yarn. Since I remembered seeing small loop-thingie likes being used by a friend/coworker I checked with the lovely ladies at Hobbykunst Vösendorf/SCS who recommended the perfect solution. DIY stitch markers! You need the following things/tools:

• thin nylon filament
• some beautiful beads
• crimp beads
• pincer (flat nose, but I'm actually working with my Swiss Tool)
• scissors
• some creativity ;-)

That's it! Takes little time and you get to make markers that work just for you - if you need some for thin needles or thick needles - it's up to you how you make them! :-) Of course my daughter helped me as she loves to use proper tools (guess where THAT's coming from...):

The purple bead ones are what I made together with her, the "G" bead ones I made today:

Since we found some amazing and beautiful shells on the beach during the vacation I promised to make them into pendants for necklaces for my kids. While at the craft store mentioned earlier I got a little carried away (ahem) and bought accessories to make simple earrings. So here we go - DIY jewellery! The kids are super-happy and so am I :-D

 

 

 

 

 

My daughter's custom necklace with shell

 

Bling... I'm usually not one for sparkly things but I couldn't leave those guys at the store...

Crafts - Some lace work, some vacation work

Lace work...
As I promised some time ago there is a finished piece I have yet to write about. It is a lace scarf I made for my mother in law as a birthday present. The first time that I worked with a somewhat fuzzy yarn - Schulana Kid-Seta Lux, which is 71% Super Kid Mohair, 20% Silk, 9% Lurex and interesting to work with. On our last stay at my MIL's house she told me about a (lace) scarf her mother had made for her which sadly was too short for her to wear properly. As it goes the idea instantly came to my mind to make a larger/longer one for her and by browsing through various patterns on ravelry.com I ended up picking the Harlekin Lace Tuch. Simple enough pattern and worked beautifully with the yarn!

The blocking is not 100% perfect but Ursula was super-happy with it and I'm looking forward to seeing her wear it!

Vacation work...
We recently went to vacation to Mallorca and of course I had to take some needle work with me. The snuggly jacket isn't done yet but felt too bulky to take with me. Since I wanted to use the Schoppel Wolle Lace Ball I wrote about anyway I ended up starting a shawl named Aurinko, thanks to the recommendation of the lovely ladies at Wollmeile! I was kind of tempting the fates and put the work on the wooden KnitPro set, packing the Karbonz tips with the regular luggage so I had some fall-back needles in case of airport security deciding that knitting needles were a Real Threat(tm). Everything went like a charm, no inspection of the knitting bag or needles so I could happily knit along during the flight :-)

The vacation week was of course spent partly knitting while lounging at the pool side (and using my new stitch markers which I made together with my lovely daughter - story of which will get its own post)...