Little Purl of the Orient

Web Epilogue

Come to think of it, my Charlotte's Web is the size of a shoulder wrap rather than a shawl. But I like it like that as this is a good size to use on the bus to keep myself warm from the sometime very cold air-con. Thanks to all your compliments on Charlotte! Please feel free to use the same colours. It is the Painted Lady colourway from the Threadbear guys. And Laurie, the colours are, in the order of knitting: P822, P521, P441, P130 and P611.

Mary Beth asked what my mother thought of my Charlotte's Web. She has that traditional Chinese tendency to reply in a vague way when she's not so sure, sometimes even asking a question back as in this case. Her reply was "Do you need this for your work wadrobe?". However, she was very happy with the pink dress for Chung Yi when she saw it on the video we played back for our parents. My father, on the other hand, had a more 'positive' note. We were all airing it in the common corridor when a neighbour wandered by to see the commotion. He proudly told her that I made it, you know it's something for the neck when it gets cold in Hong Kong, he said to her. And knowing my parents, and reading between the lines, that's already an approval and it made me so contented. When we returned from our outing, all the pins were taken out and the shawl is neatly folded by my dad. That's what I call family support.

Actually, I bought some yarn from Singapore. I went to Spotlight hoping to find some Patons Grace cotton yarn. They carry mostly Australian (correct me if I'm wrong) brands like Patons, Cleckheaton and Panda. One would imagine that in tropical Singapore, there should be a greater selection of cotton yarns. Instead there are no cotton yarns for knitting only some very fine one for crocheting. Most of the knitting yarns are acrylics and some cold weather yarns and even eyelash. The Cleckheaton Angora Supreme (70% Lambswool and 30% Angora) caught my eyes and I don't recall seeing yarns with angora content in Hong Kong so I bought 5 balls in cream colour. Each ball is 139m long and the recommendation on tha ball band says 7 balls are enough for a lady's long-sleeve sweater. Not bad. An initial idea is to knit the Perfect Pie Shawl from Weekend Knitting. Any suggestions?

As my mother has her own crafty pursuit (she loves to sew), she approves of my stashing. She was here in Hong Kong last July when I gave birth to Chung Yi. On the way back from my check-up, we stopped by a yarn store and chanced upon a pack of 10 Rowan Denim! Now, Rowan is rare in Hong Kong and to find a pack of Rowan Denim on clearance at less than US$25 is even rarer. As I'm the indecisive kind of person, my mum told me to grab it as she said she herself has a sizable stash of sewing material. I'm glad I did. Now I can embark on knitting Delta from the Denim People next. I'll swatch soon.

Charlotte's Web

We went to the Singapore Zoo as schedule on Thursday. It drizzled the whole day though and we didn't get many good pictures. Ji Yuan wanted to ride on the pony but the pony didn't come out because of the rain. The elephant was out taking passengers but Ji Yuan didn't like it so instead mummy rode on it.

I managed to block the Charlotte shawl with the help of my mother. I woke up bright and early one morning and we took out the old mat and pinmed down the shawl and let it dry in the corridoor outside the flat. I did the edgings before the blocking and it did hinder the stretch. The final width is only 30 inches compared to the 76 inches as stated in the pattern but is big enough for me though.

Here's the Charlotte's Web that grew from the frangipani tree in Singapore.

This is a clearer view of the colours. Click to make larger. Although the colours are not from the same family scheme, I find that they blend rather well with their next door neighbour. I can't recall the exact numbers but I'll write them down on the gallery page when I return to Hong Kong.

That's all for now. We're returning to Hong Kong tomorrow and I'll return to the office right away on Monday.

Home sweet home

Nothing is better than going back to one's home. Not that I don't love Hong Kong, it's just that I feel so at home here in Singapore. The skies are just bluer here and the trees are so much greener and taller. These few days have been action-packed and enjoyable. I can say ours is a Hong Kong-paced itinerary.

The Singapore Botanic Gardens is a must-go for us every time we visit Singapore. The gardens are simply lovely and we love to let our kids run about or feed the fish and turtles in the ponds. Some times there are even outdoor concerts to enjoy. Here is a snapshot of the gardens and our two girls in pink dresses sewed by my mother.

Our visit coincides with the month-long food and gourmet extravaganza, the Singapore Food Festival and everywhere we go, there are interesting events promoting local fare and other delicacies. Then there is also the Great Singapore Sale and we just couldn't resist buying some books and children stuff. We also bought a dainty white dress for Chung Yi to wear next February for my younger brother's wedding.

This morning, we went to Little India to have a stroll as Wai Lung loves the ambience there. It's like being in India. We had Southern Indian food for lunch too. Yummy. At the word that we wanted to go to the nearby Chinatown next, Ji Yuan started to say no and wanted to go home. After investigation, we found out that she's afraid of the 'Chinatown
dragon'! She'd learnt that from a song in school so we had to persuade her that there's no dragon in a real Chinatown. Oh well, we'll bring her to see some animals tomorrow at the zoo.

And what's up knitting wise? I couldn't leave Charlotte's Web in Hong Kong knowing that it's just twelve rows short. So the other day when the children napped, I finished it up, even the crochet border as well. See, here it is, in its unblocked stage, looking more like a stingray than a shawl, accompanied by the origami seal and penguin folded by Wai Lung. Now I got to find a way to block it properly.

On with the Web

A big thank you to you all for the kind comments on the babies and the dress, I'm truly touched! I can't seem to wipe that silly smile off my face these few days despite an intensive work schedule, horribly hot and smoggy weather (it reached 37 deg. celsius yesterday!) and an eye infection.

After the euphoria from finishing the baby dress, I got back to knitting Charlotte's Web. I'm now about to start stripping in the 5th colour. I wish I could show a more interesting photo but the stitches are all cramped on my 60cm circulars which is holding its fort. The shawl still looks predominantly green. I'm hoping the 5th colour will make some difference to it. The colour sequence has been nagging at me but I'm going to carry on and see how it will turn out. Now I've to think about the blocking. Where and how am I going to do it? Our flat is so small, we don't have a spare inch.

Check out these recently launched crochet books: Family Circle Easy Crochet and Vogue Knitting - Crocheted Scarves. The designs look really interesting especially those made up of motifs. Talking about pattern books, my dear pal, Connie, who lent me her pattern book for Chung Yi's dress, gave me 2 Japanese magazines today with lots of fabulous designs. We had wanted to meet up tonight for some crocheting but my parents-in-law left this morning for their holidays in Hokkaido so I had to go home right after work to look after my two monkeys. Tomorrow is a holiday to commemorate the handing over of Hong Kong to Chinese rule which took place back in 1997 and I'll be starting my leave but knowing my children, I won't have much time for the computer and knitting. I'll try to take some photos from those two Japanese mags in daylight and share with you all before we leave for Singapore.

Charlotte Decisions

Christmas arrived early for me this year! A great surprise welcomed me when I returned home from the office last night when I found a package from Houston. Look at these lovely Brown Sheep Handpaint Originals from the generous Kaori! Thanks a million, Kaori, you really made my day and cheered me up from the sick house situation. I'll treasure these lovely yarn.

Finished alternating the second and third colour for Charlotte's Web last night and wasn't quite satisfied with how it is looking. I'd found the first two greens a little too close but had wanted to make the shawl look like a blossoming flower, starting with the greens and progressing to the lilacs and pink. Now there do not seem to be enough differetiation between the first two colours. I nearly wanted to rip it all off and start all over again but then again, it involved many a late night knitting and thought I better put it aside and rethink.

Here are some ideas:
1) Rip it and change the colour sequence, starting with the second green, then the current colourway which is on the needles, followed by the first yellowish green and the last two colours remaining in the same order.

2) Continue as it is, repeating the first yellowish green as the fourth colour and omitting the last pinkish colour, thereby making a green tone shawl. However, Mary Beth's post about how little 4th colour was left alerted me that I may run out of yarn. In that case, if I choose to work only with four colours, I may have to work more rows in the third colour.

3) Continue as it is and let Koigu work its own magic.

Pictures speak louder than words. The left column shows the 5 colours and the right side shows the four colours. Click on them for a clearer view. Meanwhile, I'll leave it and go back to Chung Yi's pink dress before I do something stupid.

Beginning of the Web

Reading back, I find my post of Sunday kind of abrupt. It is quite impossible to blog or in fact, to do anything personal on Sundays. Wai Lung and I have to take care of the two kids on our own without help on Sundays, and I'm really not the competent type of mom who can multitask. When the kids finally took their afternoon naps yesterday afternoon at the same time, which rarely happens, I immediately switched on the computer and Wai Lung hurriedly put on a movie on the VCD. Half an hour later, one telephone ring made the small one, who is an extremely light sleeper, yelled in her crib and there goes my blogging and husband's movie.

Luckily we got to watch a complete movie on Friday night. Fate Come Noi is an entertaining story of two boys' adventures in Rome. It’s on the whole enjoyable but I find the ending a bit too sweet.

Now back to what I had wanted to say yesterday. I started the Charlotte's Web on Saturday when I had a moment of peace at home. Here it is, at 42 rows, just finished the 16-row alternating sequence for the first 2 colours. The two greens are quite close and the colour change is not too obvious. I'll knit on with Colour B for the next 16 rows and see if this sequence is okay. With the hindsight of others who have knitted this shawl and shared their experience, I've now made sense of the pattern. The trickiest part for me is to work the left side in mirror image. I find it needs getting used to to think the lace pattern backwards. To make life easier for myself, I wrote out on a piece of paper which lace pattern row and what colour corresponds to each odd numbered row. And last but not least, the Koigu is wonderful to look at and to knit. Now I understand what the rave is all about and I foresee I may need to order more for myself.

Oh, lovely Painted Lady

Now that Kate is completed, I announce my official status as a Charlotte Woman. I'm itching to start my Charlotte's Web, the dernier cri in knitted accessory but I really got to finish the second part of the Secret Project though, as I'm afraid that the spell of the web will make me stop all my other knitting. So I've started to build the Enchanted Cottage from Barbara Walker's second treasury.

This would probably be the colour sequence. My initial idea is to put the two greens together but they are rather close in real life so I separated them as in this picture. This Koigu KPPPM has a magic of its own too and I can't help taking the hanks out of the package and running my fingers through them. I started winding one hank by hand last night and it took me a good one hour. I'm a hank novice, so far having only worked with yarn that comes in ready-to-knit balls or skeins. I put the untied hank on the floor and started to wind and nearly had a big tangle mid way. Thanks to the advice of Eva, next time, I'll use the back of a chair to hold the hank.