Prizes

Today was the day. We did the draw for the winners of our Joji KAL. Everyone's name was put into a bag and Alex drew them out.

The shawl pictured is called Washed Out and Kathy knit it. I'm showing it for two reasons - I love the colours Kathy chose and Kathy was one of our winners.

The winners have been emailed or messaged on Ravelry. What were the prizes?

1. Two skeins of Mrs. Crosby Train Case in the new colour Waltz
   
2. Two skeins of Wool Local from Erika Knight
   
3. A Fino mini skein kit
   
4. A Gleener travel kit
   
5. A $25 gift certificate to the store

We are as ready as we are going to be for the Knitters' Fair. We'll pack the van in the morning and head to Kitchener to set up in the afternoon. Guthrie is finished - almost. There are a few more ends to sew in. Lynn and Alex did a good job today of getting most of them done.

I was ready to sign off and saw this sweater.

Photos ©Caitlin Hunter

Caitlin Hunter's Ghost Horses. The pattern is free on Ravelry until September 14 at 11:59pm EST.

Ghost Horses is a top-down circular yoke sweater featuring all-over stranded colorwork. This sweater was a dream I have had in my mind for a few years; I love the ring of horses galloping across the yoke, and the fading colors of Spincycle’s Dirty Little Secret against their solid light grey Wilder was the perfect match for my western dream sweater! The pattern is written to be easily customizable in sleeve and body length. Options are given for short or long sleeves (or elbow length, like mine!) 

As always, the yarn listed is just a suggestion! I love Spincycle and highly recommend it, but you can substitute any yarn that you can get gauge with and like the fabric created! Please feel free to join my Ravelry group to chat more about my patterns, mods and yarn substitutions!

The sweater is knit in a sport weight yarn with Dyed in the Wool. It's in my library and I'm considering it for my next project. Now it's time for bed!

Sheep

New stitch markers arrived this morning. They are so cute. Lynn has already claimed a box of the sheep.

I've purchased my pattern for the latest Westknits KAL.

The first clue will be coming on October 4 so I have a bit of time to choose my colours. Here are a few notes from Stephen.

I picked out some colours in LITLG Fine Sock - Shield and Baroque

Gorse and Oxidized

Hedgehog Sock Purr with Hue Loco Phyllis Sock Beach Glass

Donegal Cottage Tweed Sock Bell Heather with Montbretia

We are going to draw for the prizes in our Joji KAL on Thursday afternoon. I want to make sure that everyone has had time to email me their pictures or has posted them on Ravelry.

I'm very early today. Tonight is our fantasy football draft. I hope it goes quick so that I can get a few rows of knitting in. I have ten pattern rows left on my sleeve and then I can start the ribbing.

We are obsessed

We have a few more finished projects for our Joji KAL.

Susan finished Slow Curves in a mixture of Singles. The colours turned out beautiful.

Trina knit Spector in tosh dandelion. I really like how Trina's colours fade. The yoke of this sweater is interesting. I hope Trina will wear it into the store so that we can get a picture of the sweater on her.

Lynn and I have been on a mission. More yarn was hung today. It's become a bit of an obsession for us.

Now I have another job for us on Tuesday - we need to rearrange the Dyed in the Wool by colour.

I showed this wall but it has been rearranged to add a finished shawl. The pattern is Butterfly and we used Uneek Fingering with Hedgehog Sock.

We've been making kits for the Knitters' Fair as well. We aren't wearing our Throwbacks but they will be hanging and we've made up some interesting colour combinations.

Sign ups start September 1.

Welcome to the 10th anniversary edition of the Westknits Mystery Shawl Knit Along (MKAL)! This year is going to be a beautifully bold and graphic shawl to celebrate ten years of Westknits mystery shawls. 

Join the Starflake MKAL Ravelry group here to participate in the fun. 

SCHEDULE  

Clue 1 - Friday, October 4  

Clue 2 - Friday, October 11  

Clue 3 - Friday, October 18  

Clue 4 - Friday, October 25

This year the shawl will be knit with two colours. That makes choosing a lot easier.

Yarn: Fingering weight

Yardage: MC (main color) - 2 skeins of wool (399yds / 365m) 
CC (contrast color) - 2 skeins of wool (399yds / 365m)

Needles: US 5 / 3.75mm circular in 40” / 100cm length or size needed to obtain gauge.

Gauge: 22 sts & 48 rows = 4” / 10cm in garter stitch (un-blocked). Try to get close to the recommended stitch gauge to ensure you don’t run out of yarn. 

I haven't knit in a few days so I need to say goodnight and move to the knitting chair.

New Homes

Karen sent me pictures last night of her finished shawl that she knit for the Joji KAL.

I am very pleased to let you know that I finished my Odyssey Shawl. It is quite lovely! 

I used Life in the Longgrass DK Twist Harbour, Soulskin and Amethyst.

Karen chose amazing colours!! I keep looking at the yarn on the shelf and now I want to knit with it.

I knit Time Trades (pattern purchased on Ravelry) designed by Caitlin Hunter (boylandknitworks). Lynn and I are knitting her Guthrie right now.

Hurry to her Instagram page - she is having a pattern sale until midnight August 28.

Mr. UPS showed up this morning with four huge boxes. One was from Spincycle Yarns. Meet the new colours of Dyed in the Wool.

Ghost Ranch

Castaway

Cold Comfort

The hooks arrived and Rockshelter from Meadowcroft Dyeworks has been relocated.

This wall was going to be the home for tosh merino (it is in the worsted weight room) but I switched it up and we hung sock yarn from LITLG, Long Dog and Urth.

I borrowed this picture from the Spincycle Instagram feed.

I sent an email the minute I saw this picture and asked if there was any way we could have this colour - Castaway. I might need to put a few skeins away for myself.

From Rachel who knit this beautiful sweater..

I used Castaway to knit one of my all time favorite sweaters, and that’s saying a lot if you’ve seen my sweater stack. It’s the Carlina Pullover by Whitney Hayward! Clearly I’m crazy about this shape

I'm tired (and I am sure Lynn is too) from all our moving around today. The problem is that we started a chain reaction. Now we are moving yarns that were never on our radar to relocate. By the end of the week we should have everything back in order.

Blocking

Lynn is very close to being finished. A lot closer than I am.

Blocking makes all the difference in a finished garment. The Yarn Harlot wrote an amazing blog post about blocking and I highly recommend you read it.

First-time blockers are always amazed by the difference blocking makes to the final appearance of their knitting. After blocking, sweater parts lay flat, stitches even out, and what looked like a wild mess now behaves nicely. It’s like magic! After 20 years of teaching knitting, I’ve never grown tired of instructing my students on finishing techniques. In fact, the technique of blocking is one of my favorite things to demonstrate. I used to demonstrate blocking with pieces of carpet, but carpet scorched easily and was too thin for blocking pins to sink into. Rugs, towels and bulky blocking boards weren’t much better. Many of my students didn’t bother to block because it was such a cumbersome task. With this in mind, I set out to improve on the carpet pieces. I eventually had special tiles custom made for blocking, and the end result is my Knitter’s Block Kit.

The Knitter's Block from Cocoknits is available in the store and online.

Sandy sent a picture of her finished Broken Wings by Joji (pattern purchased on Ravelry) knit with one skein of Hedgehog Skinny Singles Concrete.

Linda stopped by with her Suburban Wrap by Joji (pattern purchased on Ravelry) knit with Singles.

Thanks for the pictures ladies. Your shawls are beautiful!

Sammy is very comfortable here. I think we're going to keep him.

Joji KAL

Kelley finished her Hipster (pattern purchased on Ravelry) knit in Hedgehog Merino DK in the colour Raku. More Raku is coming this week. The shawl looks awesome on Kelley and her Shawl Cuff finishes it perfectly. Don't forget about our Joji KAL. You still have time to finish your project. Take a look at the flowers pictured behind Kelley. More on these later.

I forgot to mention that Rima's and Krystyna's Ziggy Shawls that I posted yesterday were also part of the Joji KAL.

I think I am at the correct length on Guthrie so tonight I will start on the sleeves. The sweater will hang a bit different when the sleeves are knit so this is another safeguard to make sure the length is good. Lynn is at the same spot. The sweater is knit from the top down so the sleeves are knit from the top down. The pattern does not have any sleeve shaping. They are straight down to the cuffs. Lynn and I had a discussion about how to add decreases. I don't want the sleeves to be 'puffy' at the bottom.

A 4 projects collection by Quail Studio to elevate your wardrobe with relaxed shapes in super soft Alpaca Classic. 

This pattern book is free with the purchase of Alpaca Classic to make one of these designs.

With its fine weight and intense colour palette, Alpaca Classic is ideal for Fair Isle patterns and light but warm garments and accessories. Its feathery feel and romantic halo are created by filling delicate cotton mesh with luxurious alpaca fibres, resulting in a light weight yarn with incredible meterage and spectacular texture. Knitted on larger needles, it makes an exciting choice for lace patterns too.

We have all colours in stock.

Dad called me to stop by his house this morning and look at his flowers. (They are the same flowers from in front of Kelley's house). We've been waiting for the red flowers to pop open and they finally did. I have no clue what kind of flower they are but they are beautiful. The bad thing is that the flower only lasts a few days. The good thing is lots more are coming.

This doesn't look comfortable but Lucy loves to lie like this. All of a sudden the radio station will change or the heat will come on because some one's big head will hit a button.