My handpainted yarn arrived yesterday
 

 
It took me over an hour to wind this up by hand. I think there is over 1800 yards of lace weight yarn here. Maybe it's time to start thinking about a ball winder! The colors look much prettier after it is wound. I started a swatch but I didn't do something right so I have to start over.
 
Here's another photo of Madli's shawl.   
  
 

 
I stretched it out and pinned so as to get a better look at the pattern. If I knit three pattern repeats everyday it will be done in a little over a week. In reality, I know it's going to be more like 2-3 weeks before I finish it.
 
 

I haven't been posting, but I have been knitting.


This is the back of the entrelace sweater. I really like the way it's turning out. It's about 20 inches wide so I hope it isn't too large. The way the pattern is written it is difficult to change the pattern to reduce the size. I'm using size 2 needles which are smaller than those called for in the pattern.
This project was rudely interrupted when my Jaegger Zephyr came in the mail last Friday. I had to start Madli's shawl from Interweave Knits Summer 04

When stretched, it'll be about 19 inches across. The color is called Admiral,I'd call it royal blue.

Then for some reason I had the bright idea to try to handpaint some brown sheep nature spun that had been sitting around collecting dust.
It wasn't a success.

I think this will probably be socks--or felted into something.

After looking at some of the yarn on ebay, I decided to make a shawl from some handpainted yarn. I ordered this from Danette Taylor Designs.

She sells on ebay and I think her colorways are gorgeous. She'll do custom colors at your request. She says she doesn't keep her website up very well, but you can see some of her colors there, as well as her ebay store.

Add a few gray highlights and it'd be me!

I'm happy to report that my Violets by the River shawl has been completed.

It turned out as nice as I thought it would. From start to finish it took me about a week to knit. This was the only project I worked on, knitting 2-3 hours each day. As shawls go, I would say that it is small, but if someone is looking for immediate gratification this shawl is a good pattern to start with as it gives you the confidence to try something a little more challenging.

While I'm waiting for my yarn order to arrive, I've started a entrelac/lace sweater.

This is one of the sleeves, done in a mesh lace pattern. I have never done entrelac so only time will tell if I actually finish this one.