Tangelo stitching finished

I always love when I finish something, and I finished my Tangelo on Friday night:

(please ignore the shadow of my hand)
I think I want to get this framed so I can hang it on the wall.  I have no idea how I go about getting it framed, but I will deal with that later.

The supplies for the online class (Sudoku Delight) I'm taking arrived on Wednesday.  Callie was rather helpful as I set everything out and attempted to go through the instruction booklet.

I picked up stretcher bars from Exclamation Point on Saturday, and I think I'm all set for the class to start on the 8th of July.

Tangelo needlepoint

With my shawl done, I've been focusing on my needlepoint.  Back in October, I took a class at Needle In A Haystack from Kathy Rees.  Tangelo (her sample):

Part of the class was to pick colors that we liked, so I went for blues and purples.  This is how far I got in the class:

I've been working on it on and off over the last few months, but now I have a new needlework project coming up, so I want to finish this one sooner rather than later.
My progress a few weeks ago:

My progress as of Friday night:

I worked on it Saturday night after work and Sunday on and off all day, and I'm almost done.  I've really been enjoying this.  The stitching process is very relaxing and nothing like the focus I needed for my lace shawl.  I'm looking forward to working on it again tonight, and hopefully finishing it.

Socks and More Socks

I'm at that wonderful place where one large, super-involved project with a deadline has been completed, and now I get to freely mess around with my other WIPs.  The first one I grabbed was my emergency sock (which lives in my backpack in case I ever need it).  It is sock #2 of the pair, and I have finished the gusset and have some number of inches to go on the foot now.  It felt good to have something much less intense than lace.  It looks like I should take a more recent photo, since this one is from October.

I also started a second pair of socks a few weeks ago, because one can never have too many socks in progress, right?  The biggest difference is that the most recent pair will be done on 2 circulars instead of DPNs.  I went with 2 circs so I don't have to worry about dropping one of my favorite DPNs.  I had planned to try knitting in the dark, but I ended up just pulling out the sock and holding it instead, so it has been named my security sock (like a security blanket).  I will take this one with me to Erie, PA in July.  The thought of a DPN rolling down the length of an airplane is heart wrenching.  I used the German Twisted Cast-On for the first time.  Again, I am lacking a current photo.

off the needles and blocking

I'm feeling rather proud of myself.  I finished my shawl on Sunday.  Out of curiosity, I measured it before blocking.  It was about 12" wide and 64" long.

I left it soaking in the sink and prepared to block it.

It took me somewhere around an hour to pin it out completely.  It ended up being about 17" wide, which is what I had planned.  It is longer than 60".

It is currently in the guest room.  I'm pretty sure it's already dry, but I'm going to wait until tomorrow after work to unpin it.  Callie was surprisingly helpful.

Shawl Planning

The shawl I am currently working on has a fun little bit of a story.  I have 2 weddings to attend coming up this summer.  Due to my significant weight change in the last 18 months, nothing in my closet that resembles appropriate wedding wear fits anymore.  Out of desperation, I ordered a dress from Lands' End that actually ended up fitting me.  Unfortunately, it has big pink flowers.  I don't do pink, and I don't do big prints.

The blue is also exactly the wrong shade to work with my current favorite shawl, so I set out to find something in my yarn stash that would go with the dress and failed.  The answer was quick to find me in the form of the weekly update from my favorite local yarn shop, Purlescence Yarns, where I spotted the perfect green yarn.

After some searching, I settled on a decently simple lace leaf pattern that was free on Ravelry.  (I think Callie shows the pattern off very well.)  I swatched, blocked, measured, and calculated.  I did some quick research on general rectangular shawl sizes and settled on 18" x 72" as my goal.  After further inquiries and measurements, I realized 72" is probably too long for me, so that has been revised to 17" x 60".  5 repeats across gave me about 17", and 42 repeats of the 12-row pattern should give me 60".

I set mid-July as my deadline and calculated that I needed to do 5 pattern repeats a week (that was for 72", though).  As of last night, I am at 38 out of 42 pattern repeats.  I'm so close.

Everything is a work in progress

Welcome to my new crafting blog, where sometimes there are tummy rubs instead of crafting.