A Series of Unfortunate Knits
The series of unfortunate knits happened over these past few months. I'll give a run down in a chronological order.
Way before Chinese New Year, I have some hope of knitting a red hoodie pullover for CY to wear for CNY. If I didn't remember wrongly, it was started after the Cosy Tank Top was finished. The fact that I would run out of yarn was as plain as anything. This red, squishy extrafine merino yarn was bought in Beijing while on holiday last Easter so there's rather limited possibility of replenishing it. Nevertheless, I chose to ignore all the little voices and knit ahead. With the back and one sleeve later, and after a very kind Maryann tried unsuccessfully to track sufficient yarn while she was on business in Beijing (knit pals are the best, aren't they?), I finally put this to the frog pond.
One evening during CNY holidays when there were no visitors, I took out the pile of magazines Olga sent me, one of them is the IK Holidays issue. There are a few projects that I really like in there, one of them is the Quivik Scarf and I thought it would be the perfect project for the Habu Cashmere Nep in stash. So I quickly cast on. The above is the 2nd or 3rd attempt and I still don't like the fabric it was producing, so it was ripped again.
After 2 failures, I turned to a tres bulky knit, hoping for instant gratification in this Big Wool pattern: Cinnamon from New Shapes. Unfortunately, husband hasn't got very encouraging comments on the style and it has been put on the back burner. What do you think? Should I continue or make a Shopping Tunic a la Twinkle instead, or Nob Hill from the new Knitty? I've only 4 balls of Big Wool.
We've planned for a holiday in Paris this Easter! Bearing in mind that it might still be cool and rainy, I've made notes to knit hats for the family. JY requested for an earflap hat and it was successfully done (more on that later). Then it's CY's hat , and this IK pattern has been on my to knit list since it was published and there just is enough leftover yarn from the Cosy Tank Top for this. 4 attempts later, I'm still not getting the pattern. I've googled for any errata, comments from other knitters but it seems to be just me having the problem. So ripped.
And Paris brings to mind berets. How about the Beret Gaufre by Veronik Avery pour moi? Since there're just 2 balls of RYC Cashsoft Aran in the perfect colour for this. Love the details like the turned in hem, the reversibility of the beret. But, it turned out just not puffy and slouchy enough for a beret. It was finished eventually but just not it.
Yes, Paris, here we come. We depart this Wednesday. Not included in the above list are a tunic from a Japanese book for myself, a sweater for CY and a vest for JY, all cast on like 2 weeks ago hoping to finish all in time for the holiday but hope is just hope, we leave in 2 days and all is still undone. Nope, I'm not going to burn the midnight oil. The flu outbreak is bad here and I'd better stay in good shape for the holidays.
Knitting mishaps aside, would you have any suggestions where to go for yarn, fabrics, notions, crafty stuff in general in Paris?
