Halfway through row 168. The next landmark, 4/5ths or 80%, will be row 176 – not too far away.
Kathy, I love the account of Princess-knitting in your blog, and will watch breathlessly for your account and photograph of the insertion and the beginning of the centre. You are weeks – months – ahead of me, but/and your progress is enormously encouraging. I do so agree that the Princess, at this stage, takes over one’s life.
Our friends from Boston will arrive tomorrow, so this is the last day in which I can cram the Princess into every otherwise-unoccupied 10 minutes. One can’t sit down and do just-one-row, but one can easily do just-one-pattern-repeat, and then why not just-one-more?
On ssk’s – I was astonished when Sharon’s book first appeared to discover that she doesn’t think it matters, in garter stitch with fine yarn, which way you do a decrease. I’ve been doing them all the way through the Princess in the way they are written: k2tog for / and ssk for \. Except that sometimes, due to yo’s in the preceding row, ssk can be tricky, and then I revert to k2tog without compunction.
Other…
I’m still worrying about the non-appearance of the books I ordered from Schoolhouse Press, probably three weeks ago today. There were two other books, ordered the same day from two different American booksellers found through Abebooks: both arrived promptly.
One is Annichen Sibbern Bohn, “Norwegian Knitting Designs”. I said here not long ago, I think, that I had never heard of it, but now that it is in my hands, I’m sure I have. A Norwegian knitting friend lent it to me once, decades ago, when we lived in Birmingham. It is a slim vol consisting pretty well entirely of photographs and charts, and it’s terrific.
My other new book is Solveig Hisdal’s “Poetry in Stitches”. This one is a coffee table knitting book in the modern style – patterns based on traditional Norwegian, carried dramatically forward, dramatically photographed. I have heard that Hisdal doesn’t actually knit, and that some of the patterns suffer thereby when one comes to get to grips with their execution. I have no idea whether this is true, and anyway the patterns are sufficiently elaborate (and glorious) that no one except a fairly experienced knitter would be bold enough to tackle them.
Kathy, I love the account of Princess-knitting in your blog, and will watch breathlessly for your account and photograph of the insertion and the beginning of the centre. You are weeks – months – ahead of me, but/and your progress is enormously encouraging. I do so agree that the Princess, at this stage, takes over one’s life.
Our friends from Boston will arrive tomorrow, so this is the last day in which I can cram the Princess into every otherwise-unoccupied 10 minutes. One can’t sit down and do just-one-row, but one can easily do just-one-pattern-repeat, and then why not just-one-more?
On ssk’s – I was astonished when Sharon’s book first appeared to discover that she doesn’t think it matters, in garter stitch with fine yarn, which way you do a decrease. I’ve been doing them all the way through the Princess in the way they are written: k2tog for / and ssk for \. Except that sometimes, due to yo’s in the preceding row, ssk can be tricky, and then I revert to k2tog without compunction.
Other…
I’m still worrying about the non-appearance of the books I ordered from Schoolhouse Press, probably three weeks ago today. There were two other books, ordered the same day from two different American booksellers found through Abebooks: both arrived promptly.
One is Annichen Sibbern Bohn, “Norwegian Knitting Designs”. I said here not long ago, I think, that I had never heard of it, but now that it is in my hands, I’m sure I have. A Norwegian knitting friend lent it to me once, decades ago, when we lived in Birmingham. It is a slim vol consisting pretty well entirely of photographs and charts, and it’s terrific.
My other new book is Solveig Hisdal’s “Poetry in Stitches”. This one is a coffee table knitting book in the modern style – patterns based on traditional Norwegian, carried dramatically forward, dramatically photographed. I have heard that Hisdal doesn’t actually knit, and that some of the patterns suffer thereby when one comes to get to grips with their execution. I have no idea whether this is true, and anyway the patterns are sufficiently elaborate (and glorious) that no one except a fairly experienced knitter would be bold enough to tackle them.
Hi Jean,
ReplyDeleteThis is my first time to post a comment on your blog, but I have been reading and enjoying it for some time. I just wanted to let you know that my orders from Schoolhouse Press seem to take a few weeks as well, and they only have to make it to Canada. Don't give up hope yet! It will probably arrive this week.
Kristie
Oh my! for the shawl! You are getting there.
ReplyDeleteHello Jean,
ReplyDeleteThe Princess looks marvelous. What a great job you are doing!
Take care,
Rosane.
So beautiful!
ReplyDeleteI confess to using k2tog exclusively with the wedding ring shawl--saves a little bit of my sanity. :)
Hi Jean, I too was shocked to see Sharon say this, I have always knit as written. The K2tog though in the insertion did save my sanity too. Also makes it a bit quicker, not much though, as I seem to knit 2 tog quicker than an ssk.
ReplyDeleteYour progress is beautiful, I am always stunned by pictures of it, even though I am knitting it myself.
I have found that when knitting it I am taken over by it, but as soon as I stop it disappears from mind pretty easily.
This said, now I see people working on theirs, I want to get back to mine. I haven't much of the centre done, not even one repeat.
I had ISP issues since yesterday, until about an hour ago, so will post the new photo's soon, before the internet goes down again.
K
Your Princess Shawl is just beautiful! I can belive it takes over every spare moment of time. I'm another person who just uses k2tog rather than trying to do left and right slanting decreases. I initially started the Wedding Ring Shawl using directional decreases but switched and you really can't tell with such fine yarn. I look forward to watching your progress through your lovely project.
ReplyDelete