We were away for 10 days at the beginning of the month which means vacation projects that fit in a suitcase as we were flying (in an aeroplane). Firstly I found yarn for a hat and then found a free crochet pattern. I would have finished it if I hadn't fallen asleep on the plane ride home. Oh well, I am taking a break from these anyway, aren't I?
I took the sock project mentioned at the end of this post and a different pattern but I also wanted something really easy but I didn't have anything like that on the needles. OK let's be honest I had started a hat in the middle of February as my easy project but I decided that as it is a baby hat the chances were that I'd finish it quickly and then I'd need another easy project so it would be better to take just one project. I already had yarn and pattern in mind for the next easy project so that was packed. The pattern is Arlequin Shawl, a free pattern on Ravelry and the yarn is Strawberry Shortcake by Candy Skein.
I cast it on the same day we arrived as hubby was working. And I'm glad I did as there was a problem with the needle. There was a slight rough spot on one of the needles and the yarn would sometimes catch on it. With the wonders of the internet I was able to locate a store nearby and visited it the next day. It was a small store with needle work in the front half and yarn in the back. I bought some locally dyed yarn for a friend and a needle for me. They only had two brands of needles and one was bamboo which was a definite no so I bought the other brand, new to me, Lykke. It worked really well and is very smooth to knit with. This was the only project I worked on. I had wound the yarn into a centre pull ball and weighed it when I got home and was surprised that I had used three-quarters of it. It will be a while before I finish it as it is now my easy handbag project.
At the end of February I posted a picture of my Pi shawl and said it was ready to cast off. That was true on that date but about half-way through the cast off I was coming to the conclusion that I was not going to have enough yarn to finish. (The stitches are doubled on the row before bind off so there are over 1000 stitches.) So the bind off and the preceding row were pulled out. Such fun when beads are involved. I started the bind off before we went away and by then I was sick of the project. Having a break from it was good as I finished the bind off on the 14th. It needs to be blocked but I can say that the shawl was started and finished on Pi day.
Then I had it in my head that I had to cast on a Pi shawl on the 14th to finish on 22 July. So I sort of did (such good written English). I have a small amount of lace and light-fingering weight yarn and chose to use one to start a shawl but not Pi shaped. It is QD - Quadratische Decke Shawl a paid-for pattern on Ravelry but so totally worth it. It is going to require concentration but that is fine. The yarn I am using is the yarn shown on the right in this post.
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