Does this animal look neglected to you?

Yeah, I didn’t think so either.

My puppy-bear is at the vet today having work done. I’m not sure I’ll be happy till she home again tonight.

To keep my mind occupied, I’m in the planning stages of a new sweater. Ever since the Kauni madness hit last year (do a search for Kauni on Flicker and see what I mean), I knew I’d have to make one. I just had a few issues to overcome:

• A complete lack of experience in stranded knitting
• Fear that this beautiful wool that cost me so much to ship from the Netherlands would be horrifically scratchy
• Fear of ruining said expensive beautiful wool by cutting for steeks
• Complete boredom with the pattern

So far, all obsticles have been over come with this swatch.

Well…semi-annual really. So how did I observe the ritual this year?

1. I washed loads upon loads of laundry (Yet, how is it I still have nothing clean?)

2. I knit a pair of socks,

3. then promptly started another, much larger pair.

4. I finished spinning the never ending mound of hand-dyed, acid green, wool/silk rolags.

5. I began plying said acid green singles…then, decided I didn’t really have enough for this.

This is a worsted 6 ply yarn- yes I am insane.

6. So I promptly died more of the evil acid green stuff, plus a bit of contrasting color.

Neely decided she was needed for scale.

7. I then carded up half of the green stuff and spun about a third of a bobbin.

8. I added 12 inches to the hideous grey monstrosity (also know as the sweater from hell).

Please note that this is an extra large tall sweater knit in 100% cashmere on US 2 needles and that in the last year I have knit and ripped back the neck no less than 6 times- we’re finally making progress now people!

9. I decided that the cuffs on said grey monstrosity needed a special somethin’ somethin’. Thus, I plied up some recycled blue cashmere as a contrasting color for the hem. (Neely says it coordinates well with her eyes.)

Aren’t they pretty together?

10. I washed half of a 5.5lb wensleydale X fleece- gosh golly, was it ever dirty.

Oh and incidentally, I lied. The paper wasn’t 60+ pages long. I kinda gave up after 51.

Although I’ve only been knitting for about 3 years, I tend to be fairly adventurous with project selection. No garter stitch scarves for me, my first project was a mohair sweater (albeit still unfinished- I love knitting but not the sewing up). I then proceeded to top down everything (top-down is too a verb.) I then had a love affair with lace, and socks, and hats. It even got to the point where I taught myself to spin with nothing more than a few online tutorials. I also crochet (hate me now because I think it’s easy-peasy).

At this point, I feel that I can safely say that I fear no stitch or technique. I love them all.

That said, I was fascinated by steeking but had yet to venture into the realm of stranded knitting- kind of a prerequisite to steeking. Last week, I decided to remedy the situation. Thus, I proudly present the raven’s very first stranded knitting. Binx kindly offered to model it for me.

A close up of the stitch pattern.

Pattern: Andean-Style Headband

Designer: Kay D. Collins

Materials: Some of my first handspun (the multicolored bit), and Elann Peruvian Quechua (held doubled)

Fiber Source: Dancing Leaf Farm , Elann

Needles: US4 / 3.5 mm

Personal Critique: My gauge wasn’t bad; there wasn’t much of any pulling despite my chronically tight knitting. I do need to remember to learn how to do the fancy-pants jog-less stripes so as to prevent alignment problems in the pattern. In the future, I should also probably make the floats so as to allow the fabric a bit more elasticity (i.e., not everyone has a pin-head like me).

That said, this nifty headband and a bottle of mullein oil are mercifully preventing my current earache from escalating to the point of falling flat on my face (my earaches are always accompanied by extreme vertigo). I also think I’ve found a new obsession outlet for my dye experiments (more on those soon, promise!)