uphill slog

Since the last post, my thesis has grown to a grand total of 20 pages. 20% or 1/5th done, not bad! I'm counting and celebrating every new page as a victory, keeps me from despairing. It isn't easy being completely insecure *and* a perfectionist. Right now, the weather is back to what it was a month ago, no light, no pictures possible, so in lieu of showing you pictures of my Herzblut shawl, which is on its second chart and growing slowly, I thought I'd show you some pictures of past shawls.

I actually love shawls, but don't get to wear them often. It's because in continental Europe you can't buy shawl pins for love or money and I'm not good enough at working with metal to make my own. I'm going to skip the shawls that I made for other people and just show you my personal favorites here. The one that I use most often - as the more fashionable substitute for my Lifesaver, which should have been a genius invention, but the execution was too flawed and I haven't wanted it since - is my Winged Black Sheep, which I can wrap around my hips, or around my back and front or around anything I want, really. Since it's dark grey, it hides dirt well (not that I get dirty a lot, I'm a nerd after all) and is most important for keeping my kidneys warm.

Right now it's waiting to be washed, reblocked and put away for the summer. The yarn for it is a handspun  then dyed black yarn that I got on a trip to Hamburg ... in 2008! Time is starting to pass too quickly for my peace of mind.

As I said, the Black Winged Sheep is the shawl that probably gets the most use. Another shawl that sometimes gets taken out of its little plastic bag is my beautiful, beautiful, beautiful Anna's Scarf (officially Ene's Scarf). Knit with vintage Swiss yarn that my father gave me, it's the perfect accessory for a visit to the Vienna Film Museum and the walk back home when it's a coolish night. Also perfect for over a nice coat or a nice dress.

Anna's Scarf is knit from the bottom up, so you start with those pointy bits. And what an endless slog it was until I finally reached the top. Maybe a better pattern for my thesis shawl, but I suspect Herzblut will be something of a slog as well.

Next up is my first foray into entrelac. I had had this yarn in my stash for the longest time, it's Lana Grossa Dasolo Stripes, and I just didn't know what to do with it. Then at some point the idea presented itself - entrelac! It's extremely easy and just a teeny bit tedious as well (is there any shawl that doesn't get tedious at some point?) and is actually a very good technique for striped yarn, whether the color changes are long or short. I think I might have worn this one ... twice? so far. I really need a shawl pin.

In my stash there is some beautiful, beautiful Lana Grossa Qui just waiting to be made into a similar shawl. It's been waiting there since 2008 as well.

Back to lace. One beautiful triangle scarflet - completely in fashion in 2009 - is the following Orkney Triangle. The pattern is called Shetland Triangle, but since I bought the yarn on Orkney in 2007 and it is exactly the color of the sea around Orkney, I think that name is more appropriate. I haven't worn it at all. It is a little scratchy, but the main thing is that I just haven't had the peace of mind to pick the outfit to go with it.

So ethereal. Just like the Ethereal Lace Lattice Wrap, which hasn't even been blocked yet. Blocking takes a lot of space! And you need lots of pins and sometimes even blocking wires or if you don't have such things (and I don't), constructions with pins and bits of string and all that. Tsk. The yarn is a mohair mix, fluffy and delicate and really hard to unravel if you have to. But soooo pretty!

I'll close here. There are plenty of other shawls that I made and haven't worn or blocked yet, some are in construction right now and some are sitting in the stash waiting patiently for me to finish the thesis and get on with life and knitting. I shall now print out over a hundred pages of citations that need to be sorted into my big binder of citations so that I can write five more pages tomorrow to make it 25.

To brighten your day, here's a video I found on Jezebel today: