Lavori 07/15

 Lavori 07/15 is finished!

This is an 80 round doily (plus crochet cast-off), 8 pattern repeats per round (and 16 PR/rnd in the outer rounds).  The chart is NOT error free.

Chart Errors:

Round 51:  Towards the end of the repeat, there is a | symbol that should be a double-decrease instead.  It's fairly obvious.

Rounds 57-59 end up having an issue, but it's easily fixed.  Instead of what's charted, do the following:

Round 57: (yo, k1b, yo, k3) all the way across.  (This is how it's charted, but the chart omits one repeat, which ends up affecting how to chart round 59)

Round 59: (sk2p, yo) all the way across  (you could do yo, sk2p instead of sk2p, yo, though that'll affect the next error fix)

And somewhere before round 65:  K 6 more stitches at the end of the round before beginning the next round, so that the first stitch of round 65 is directly over the sk2p of round 59.

This was a reasonably fun doily to knit, though it had way more stitches than seemed necessary by the end.  Perhaps it would have been better doing this with either 6 or 7 pattern repeats per round instead of 8.  Dunno if that would have worked well enough, though, since the number of stitches in the early rounds is just about right.  It's the later rounds where things go wild.

I think it is probably a Herbert Niebling pattern, and if not, then it's a design by someone who used motifs that are characteristically Niebling-esque.  Whatever.  It's a cute doily no matter who the designer was.

The thread was from the thrift store vintage stash.  It was 300 yards of something that seemed like it was roughly #30 in weight.  I ran out in the middle of round 79.  Luckily, the leftovers stash yielded some DMC Cebelia that was sufficiently similar, whew.

Hmm, what doily shall I tackle next?  There are a few more small doilies in Lavori 7 that could be quick to knock out.  There's the old French language non-charted text-only doily I've mentioned before, clearly a Niebling design, that could be interesting to puzzle out.  I could pick another big pattern, or do some designs by Erich Engeln or Christine Duchrow or Marianne Kinzel or one of the other greats.  I guess I'll see what appeals, and also what thread I feel like using.

Other than finishing Lavori 07/15, I've been slowly working on my Miami Vice shawl and my Appledore gansey.  There's not enough progress to be worth sharing.  I've mostly been busy with other things.

Lavori 07/30 progress report (converging back to the chart)

I've gotten through all of the re-charted hex mesh area and have re-converged with the Lavori 07/30 chart as written, yay!!!

It's also the point where the chart numbering jumps from 191 to 201 for no obvious reason.  Indeed, there is absolutely no obvious reason at all, so I guess this counts as another chart typo!

I have roughly 10 rounds of knitting left to go, almost certainly less than 20,000 stitches.  The rounds are steadily getting longer, of course.  They're currently hovering at around 1200 stitches per round.  Also, I'm done with the hex mesh area completely.  The only double yarnovers left are the ones between the outer fan segments.  The leaf garlands are on their final leaf.  And the outer fans are growing.

It's kind of fun to watch what happens to the leaf motifs as there are increases on one side and decreases on the other.  Yup, they start leaning rather quickly.  I hope it all blocks out the way it's supposed to.

There is a chart error/typo in round 201!  Well, two, actually, if you count the mislabeling of the chart (round 193 is instead labeled as 201, and that discrepancy will continue for the rest of the doily).  In Round 201:  There is a missing yarnover at the end of the pattern repeat.

Here's my handwritten chart of what I ended up doing in the problematic hex mesh area of the outer rounds.  You can see eraser marks from some of my previous charts.  It's not like there's only one way of handling the issue, after all!  Probably any of my charts would have worked, and even with this one, there are a couple of variations I could have done on particular rows.

Lavori 07/30 partial rechart variation

I started this chart at round 171, when the Lavori chart transitions to 12 pattern repeats per round.  Everything up through round 181 is the same as the published chart except that there is one extra hex mesh motif per round.  Everything after round 191 is the same as the published chart.  So my rechart mostly applies to rounds 183 through 191.

This only shows the hex mesh area, not the rest of the doily.  Also, for some rounds, the hex mesh area is partly at the beginning of the pattern repeat and partly at the end, and I didn't bother to indicate that since I could use my own judgment pretty easily.  There will be 1Mv moves (move the stuff at the end of the pattern repeat to the beginning) every now and then, which again, I didn't indicate, and ditto for the places where the pattern repeat begins and ends with a yarnover.

The rounds I've marked with stars are where leaf tips (which are double decreases) get incorporated into the hex mesh.

The little vertical lines below the center motif, below round 171, are to delineate the central motif so I could keep things relatively symmetric and lined up all the way up the chart.

I tended to do directional double decreases where it made sense, but didn't chart them out specifically.

Dunno if this'll help anyone, but I thought I'd share it anyway.  It might go into my final post on this doily where I also list all the chart errors and typos.

I've already started thinking about future doilies.

-----------------------------

I finished the charity hat I started a few weeks ago.  It's already been donated.  On to the next one!

The above pic shows it with the brim down.  The brim can be turned up to cover the ears, or the hat can be worn as a slouch hat.  Since it's all k1p1 ribbing, the brim can be turned up as much or as little as the recipient wants.

I'm still working on the Miami Vice shawl.  Tomorrow should offer some good travel-knitting opportunities.  I'll have the shawl with me and also supplies to start the next charity hat.  Plus other non-knitting things to do, though I'm pretty sure I won't bring a spinning project.

The sweater is still sitting as I dither over how I want to handle the neck opening (so that the back is higher than the front).

And that's it for me today!

Sweaters, doilies, and shawls (progress reports, mostly)

This is mostly a progress report kind of post, which is very much what the current purpose of the blog is.

Lavori 07/30:  I decided to follow the chart as closely as possible, with one extra hex mesh motif in the middle of the hex mesh section.  This will take me through round 181 with no further adjustments.

There's a chart error/typo on round 173.  I think I wrote about it earlier.  But yes, given that I'm following the chart, more or less, there is a missing yarnover on the left side of the hex mesh motif.  There is a yarnover that will separate the leaf tips from the rest of the leaf motif.

There are also chart errors/typos on rounds 175, 177, and 179.  The second decreasing leaf motif, before the outer fans motif, have a yarnover inside the leaves.  They look like (skp, kX, yo, k2t) instead of (skp, kX, k2t), which is what they are supposed to be and what all the other decreasing leaf tips are.  X in this case is 7, then 5, then 3.  It's pretty obvious when you get there after you're over the first slight bit of confusion.  Round 179 has an additional chart error/typo, in the last of the increasing leaf motifs.  There's a missing yarnover -- it should be k2, yo, k-tbl, yo, k2, like all of the other increasing leaf motifs in the round.

I started another ball of thread near the beginning of round 175 (near the end of the second pattern repeat).  This one looks like it's close to a full ball, and the full ball was labeled as containing 500 yards.  Will it be enough to get me all the way to the end of the doily?  I suspect not, but I'm hopeful anyway.  The rounds already have roughly 1000 stitches per round and the number of stitches per round is going to keep increasing rapidly all the way to the end of the doily as the outer fan motifs develop.

I am confident that I will have enough thread to finish the doily, since after this final partial ball is finished, I still have 3 full balls (350 yards each) that I can use.  The remainder should be enough for another fairly large doily, or if not, then a few smaller doilies.

Travel project shawl:  I'm toodling along on the Miami Vice shawl.  It's not a half pi -- it's pretty much a full pi, though knit flat rather than in the round.  I've only done a few inches and already have over 200 stitches per row on the needle.  Oh, well.  I have 980 yards of yarn that will be knit one stitch at a time, whether the project increases stitches slowly or rapidly.  Hopefully I don't get any annoying stacking of the variegation in the stretches where the stitch count remains relatively constant.  I guess I'll find out!

Appledore Gansey -- still coming along nicely.

Hmm, I really could use another project.  Mittens or fingerless mitts?  A hat?  Socks?

And, because we're having lovely sweater weather, let me share a pic of a sweater I finished and then narble on about it for a few paragraphs.

Elizabeth Zimmermann Seamless Hybrid sweater (from handspun)

This is a sweater made from Elizabeth Zimmermann's Seamless Hybrid pattern.  It's one of the percentage-based recipes in her book Knitting Without Tears, though I used the version that is in the revised edition of Knitting Workshop.

It's called a hybrid because the upper area (above the armholes) starts out like a raglan and then transitions to a wide saddle shoulder.  There's also a back saddle, sort of like a yoke but not quite.

Hmm, I should probably take some better photos to show the details more clearly.

I knit mine from some handspun.  When I bought the roving bump, I was told it was "mostly merino".  I have no idea if that is true, but the sweater is definitely soft enough to wear next to the skin.  The yarn is a 2-ply in a dark maroon color with flecks of blue and purple.  The edges are garter stitch and the rest is stockinette.

There were a few things I had to rip and re-do since my initial calculations were a bit off.  No big deal.  There were a few spots that looked a bit odd until after blocking.  Again, no big deal, and I have enough knitting experience to not immediately assume the worst when things look weird before blocking.

On the whole, though, I'm very fond of this sweater and very pleased at how it turned out.  It's warm and comfortable and attractive.  I've already been wearing it this autumn.

I have several ounces of the yarn left, not that I have any good ideas what to do with it yet.  It might or might not be enough for a vest.  At one point, I was turning all my oddballs into socks, but I'm not sure I want to do that with a soft merino yarn.  So for now, I smile at it when I go stash-diving into the handspun stash.

On arrogance (aka pride goeth before a fall)

I put my fix in place for the Lavori 07/30 doily -- dropping the double-yarnover from round 163, and turning the edge stitches in round 165 also into the double decrease with one yarnover.

The number of stitches matches up for what I need for round 167.  (I'll have to move the last stitch of 166 to the beginning of 167, but that's something that the chart didn't note, either, when it disappears from the end of the chart before beginning 169.)

However, even though I have the right number of stitches, I don't think it's set up properly for the hex mesh pattern.

Ugh.  I really should have done a little knitted sample to make sure it would work.  Why didn't I even notice this earlier while I was charting things out on graph paper?

I guess I'll probably continue kludging my way upward in the pattern until I can get it to align properly.  Round 173 is the point where it would be nice to have it match if I can't get it there by round 171.

Part of the problem is how the hex mesh is aligned on each row and how many reps there are (kind of an even/odd/symmetry thing).

I had felt very smug, and now I feel like an idiot.  Not the first time, and no doubt not the last.  But it's still kind of humbling each time it happens.

Now to figure out what to do for round 167, and its effects on round 169 and then 171.  Harumph.  I'll take out rounds of knitting if I have to, as far back as necessary, but only if it helps.  I'd rather kludge my way forward if possible.

Maybe this is part of why some Niebling patterns are really strange in their hex mesh edge effects.

Ah, well.  I'll try to remain humble.  No doubt this doily will provide more lessons to remind me.

Thinking out loud and counting stitches (Lavori 07/30)

Lavori 07/30 doily progress/discussion

I'm finally playing around with the chart for Lavori 07/30, to figure out what needs to happen in the area with hex mesh, to get from the stitch count of round 163 to the stitch count of round 171.

As discussed in the last post, the chart as written does not work.  The first rep of round 165 is consistent with the stitches needed by round 171, but is not consistent with the existing number of stitches from round 163.  The second rep of round 165 is the opposite -- it is consistent with the stitches of round 163 but not consistent with what I'll need in round 171.  The second charted section has one extra repeat of hex mesh compared to the first charted section.

Both of them need to be the same at this point since the chart already unofficially has 12 pattern repeats per round (2 repeats charted, in the current 6PR/rnd chart) and will officially transition to a chart that is explicitly a 12 PR/rnd chart on round 171.

So I'm counting beginning and ending stitches for that section of rounds 163, 165, 167, 169, and 171.  I've knit through round 164, but can do some small stitch adjustments and/or will take out as many rounds as I need to in order to make it work.  Yes, all 800+ stitches per round, bleh.

One thing I've noticed from the magazine photos (the cover and page 17) is that the stitches there are very distorted at this point.  The outer fans will soon start, the leaf motifs will separate into two (surrounding the fans), and the hex mesh will continue to decrease at both edges.  The stacked increases and decreases distort the fabric in ways that mostly enhance the overall aesthetics of the design.  They exist whether or not they're aesthetic, of course.

Anyway, this distortion is happening right where the hex mesh is.  Which means that any fix I do doesn't need to be perfect.  It won't be all that obvious given all the other stuff going on at the moment.

The above photo from page 17 shows the approximate area (circled in red).

And the above shows the photo from the front cover.  It's kind of hard for me to see exactly how many repeats of hex mesh there are and whether all of the holes are single or double yarnovers and whether edge decreases are single or double decreases.  It's also not at all clear to me what the test knitters did to make the pattern work.  Whatever they decided didn't end up in the published charts, apparently!

I'm sure there are people who could look at the photos and see what was going on, but I'm not one of them.  Not yet.  I do know that doily charts can have a lot of weirdness that is not very noticeable, especially after the doily is finished and blocked, and that's even in areas where the fabric is not distorted.

By round 171 -- the section of hex mesh starts with 14 stitches.  (I don't care how it ends because that's not my current problem)

Round 169 (using the first chart, since it's where I need to be for round 171 to work) -- it ends with 14 stiches, check.  It starts with 18.

Round 167 -- It ends with 18 stitches.  It starts with 22.

Round 165, which is where I am now.  The first section ends with 22 stitches.  It starts with 24.

Round 163 ends with 28.  So I have to do something to get to 14 stitches by round 171, and preferably 22 stitches by the time I start round 167.  I essentially need to make one more repeat of hex mesh (4 stitches) go away in a visually unobtrusive way over the next few rounds.

So.  Round 163 starts and ends with a double decrease and 2 yarnovers.  If I drop one yarnover at each end (which I can do easily, since the slightly loose stitch in round 164 will disappear when being blocked), then I'm down to 26 stitches.  (This changes the edge stitches to a single yarnover and a double decrease.)

For round 165, we now have 26 stitches to start the round.  The edge stitches for the hex mesh in round 165 are charted as / \ o o / ... \ o o / \.  After dumping one of the yarnovers from round 163, it's easy to change the / \ to a double decrease.

However, if I merely change the last couple of stitches to a double decrease, I only get to 24 stitches by the end of the round.  I'd like to get all the way to 22 if possible since there isn't a lot of wiggle room in the next few rounds.

If I change the last few stitches of round 165 to a double decrease and 1 yarnover (as I'm doing for round 163), that should get me down to 22 for round 167.  And then we're good.

I will probably check this out with a mini-swatch to make sure the numbers work and nothing looks too obviously stupid.  I don't know if there was a better way to have done it starting in some earlier round, but I'm obviously working under the constraint of not wanting to take out and re-chart and re-do thousands of stitches.

F&F Shawl -- making progress!  I'm on the second of four skeins of yarn, starting at around row 66 or 67 or so.  This means the shawl will be roughly 130-ish rounds before binding off.  I still like how the variegation is interacting with the pattern.  Unless things change, I'm committed to the project, yay!

Sweater -- still in the planning stages, but I'm inching closer.  Current plan is Appledore-ish gansey with fuzzy gray handspun.  Simple seed or moss or betty martin stitch should show up OK even without really sharp stitch definition.  I last knit it at 4.5 st/in, but might do a swatch on smaller needles to see if I can easily get it tighter and if I can, if I like the fabric of the tighter gauge.  If I have less of this yarn thank I think I have, I can do 3/4 or shorter sleeves.

Rigid Heddle Loom Weaving

I've decided that I'll use this blog for weaving posts since weaving uses yarn in similar ways and similar quantities to how knitting uses it.  And also because weaving might be a good way to use bits and bobs of handspun that are too small or ugly or rough to use for the kinds of projects I usually knit.  If I end up doing a lot of weaving or acquire and start using a bigger loom, then I'll probably just start up a new blog devoted to weaving.

I have stopped circling the newly-acquired vintage rigid heddle loom and started working with it.  This will be my first-ever real-loom project.  I don't count tablet or inkle weaving since those, in my brain, are narrow wares rather than real weaving.  I also don't count the small amount of backstrap weaving I've done with either small rigid heddles or string heddles since those projects are closer to narrow wares than a piece of cloth.

When I picked up the latest rescue wheel, the person asked if I also wanted a similar-vintage rigid heddle loom, too.  I said "sure!" since, well, fiber-equipment rescue means that I say yes to just about any working piece of equipment that fits in my very strict budget (and my car).

The pic below is the loom as I received it.  It's a Northfield Tia Rigid Heddle Loom from the mid-1970s.  It has a 20-inch weaving width (about 22 inches overall) and an 8-dent heddle.  The sides are plastic.

There's also a rod that came with the loom, notched every 1/2".  I have no idea what this is since it didn't come with the original loom (as I can tell from looking at internet photos of etsy and ebay sales of the loom in its box).  So it's either from some other loom or weaving equipment entirely, or it was used for some random purpose that isn't obvious.  I'm tentatively planning on using it as a stick to hold a string heddle if I want to do any fancy weaving.

None of the original shuttles were still with the loom, but the person from whom I got it threw in a couple of extra stick shuttles that were lying around.  Good enough for now!

Dang, weaving has lots of jargon.  And dang, I know and understand a lot more of it than I did a few years ago.  I'm probably still moderately incorrect at times.

As you can see, there's a project already on the loom, a very weft-faced fabric that uses every slot and hole in the heddle.  Many of the warp threads are snapped.

I need to get a new photo of what things look like now.

The old project is off the loom.  Cut cut cut unroll untie discard etc.  The loom has been dusted and wiped down with a damp paper towel to get off old spiderwebs and bugs.

And I've warped for my first project.

Most of the stuff I've read says that an 8-dent reed/heddle is suitable for worsted weight yarn.  I found a skein of Sugar n Cream in my oddballs stash so that's what I'm using.  (I found another worsted-weight cotton to use for weft.)

I decided to start with half the width (slots 20-60-ish, or 80 ends) and about 2 yards-ish for warp length.  Good thing I didn't try for anything wider -- that's as far as the warp skein went!  There's only a few yards left, not even enough to have gone for 82 ends.

I did a direct warp, mostly because I've not done one before.

The warp is wound onto the back beam, with leftover one-sided scrap used between layers of warp.  (One-sided scrap is what we call 8.5" x 11" copy paper that is in the recycle bin.)  I had some help with this -- someone held the warp at a gentle tension while I wound it on.

Next up will be cutting the front of the warp and moving half the threads from the slots to the holes.  Sley away!

I'm sure the first project will suck in all the usual beginner ways.  Eh, I don't care.  We all start at white belt.  In other words, you can't get better without starting where you are.  As with my first sprang project, my first tablet-weaving, my first doily -- they might not be terribly complex nor expertly executed, but I'll still be thrilled.  And hopefully I'll keep practicing until I become competent.

If the first piece doesn't suck too badly, I might try to turn it into a bag or some other semi-useful item.  Otherwise, I'll throw it into the sampler/prototype box.

Hopefully I'll remember to take more pics as I finish the warping process and start weaving.  At some point, I'll write more about the rescue wheel, too.

Lavori 07/30 progress and the next set of chart errors

I'm still slowly making progress on Lavori 07/30.  I'm definitely in the section where there are already 12 repeats per round, meaning that the chart (at 6 pattern repeats per round) repeats the same sequence of stitches.  This makes it easier to keep track of things and also to spot errors.  There are over 800 stitches per round now.  The flower is long gone; it's just the hex mesh and leaf motifs now.

Here are the next two chart errors.  I could have put them in my previous post but was hoping to wait until the post where I finally did jump to the next chart (at round 171).

Round 159:  After the first set of leaves (and the skp, k3, k2t that finishes it off), the stitches at the beginning of the stretch of hex mesh are charted as yo, skp, k2t.  This should be symmetric with all the others, and the skp should be a double-decrease (sk2p, left-leaning to preserve symmetry).

Round 163:  In the first set of leaves, the last leaf is missing a yarnover.  It should be (k4, yo, k-tbl, yo, k4) like all the other leaves.

Now I am on round 165 and have discovered a true chart error.  All of the previous ones have been fairly obvious typos, but this one is a little more complex.

The first set of hex mesh motifs shows 5 repeats of the motif, while the second shows 6 repeats.  The first set does not match the stitch counts for round 163.  The second set does.  However, the first set, going upwards through round 169, does match the stitch count needed for round 171.  The second set, therefore, does not.

Sigh.

There are decreases at each end of the hex mesh motifs.  I believe that if I change them from single to double decreases, that the stitch counts will work out.  The first set on the chart will work as charted from then on.  The second set will match the first set.

I need to do some charting and very careful stitch counting before I continue.  If necessary, I can also involve the edge double-yarnovers that are next to the double decreases in round 163 and change them to single yarnovers by dropping the second yarnover.  I'll see what seems to work best to make sure I reach round 171 with the correct number and arrangement of hex-mesh motifs.

I can also see that there is something weird at the end of round 167/169.  There's a double decrease at the end of round 167 that just sort of disappears in round 169.  There are no move-the-marker symbols on the chart at that point but I suspect that the last stitch of round 167/168 does move to the beginning of round 169.  Then, of course, the problem will be moving to round 167 instead of round 169 depending on what I do at the end of round 165 (since I'm probably changing the skp at the end of round 165 to a double decrease).

On the bright side, the leaf motif sections for the next few rounds appear to be charted correctly, no missing yarnovers or anything.

--------------------------

I did start a new travel project!  It is indeed the F&F half-square triangle shawl I mentioned in the last post.  Instead of handspun, I'm using a batch of commercial yarn from the stash.  It's a smooth variegated light-worsted-weight yarn.  I have 4 balls of it, between 450 and 500 yards.  I like it so far.  I had thought to use this yarn in a Wingspan shawl, but that was a few years ago.  I'll be happy to have it out of my stash as long as the yarn and pattern are a good combo, which so far they seem to be.

I'm dithering a bit about sweaters again.  This time it's the simple gansey projects I had done some research on a few years ago -- the Appledore gansey and/or Harry Freeman's "seeds and bars" gansey.  The Appledore gansey/jersey is a classic gansey in its construction, but the only decoration is on the shoulder straps.  Harry Freeman's gansey has several horizontal bands of simple moss or seed stitch patterning, separated by bands of garter or reverse stockinette.  The Harry Freeman gansey is a very popular and widespread style with a lot of simple variations, and even Mr. Freeman himself had several slightly different versions in his sweater wardrobe.

There is a pattern given for an Appledore gansey in Rae Compton's book on traditional gansey/jersey knitting.  I had adapted it for my size and for a big batch of handspun I wanted to use, and had gotten as far as the armholes when I decided I didn't like how it was turning out.  So maybe I'll try again, not following any specific pattern but just kind of winging it.  I have several books that discuss ganseys in addition to general sweater construction plus the resources of the internet.  I also have several sweater-sized yarn batches, both handspun and commercial, in various yarn weights.

Although I like the seeds and bars patterns, I'm not sure what yarn I'd want to use.  Plus I'm not sure it would be flattering on me.

-----------------------------

I still haven't plied the yarn spun on the new rescue wheel.  Maybe this afternoon.  Then it might be time to clean and warp the rescued rigid heddle loom.  I think I've already written about that a bit.  I'm still trying to decide if general weaving posts will go on this blog or on another fiber blog.

No photos for this post!  Maybe I'll add something later, but chances are that it'll wait to the next post.

Another July progress post on Lavori 07/30 (with the latest errata, of course)

The pic I have looks like a proper wad of thread.

But you can see bits of leaves and the crossed stitches of the flower.

Two more chart errors:

Round 141:  There is a missing yarnover at the very beginning of the pattern repeat.

Round 153:  Ditto -- a missing yarnover at the very beginning of the pattern repeat.

Both of these are in a section of the pattern where every 4th round begins and ends with a yarnover.  It's pretty obvious that the yarnovers are missing in the above rounds.  I'm not at round 153 yet but listed the chart error already because it's so obvious.

I've finished another partial ball of thread (early in round 146) and am on to the next!  It was attached to a project already when I bought the thread, a pretty little piece of filet crochet.  I cut it off since it would have been a pain to unravel and re-block the thread while it was still attached to the unused thread wound on the cardboard tube.  Maybe I'll eventually unravel and re-block and use the thread, and maybe I'll leave the filet crochet project alone in honor of the person who crocheted it, wherever he/she may be these days.  I'm sorry their project never got finished and never got used.  I certainly won't be the one to do it.  Not only do I have no idea what the finished project was intended to be (and how many more motifs it might have contained), but I don't particularly enjoy doing filet crochet.

I am at around the midpoint of this doily, maybe a little bit beyond, with close to 3/4 of the rounds being done.  Soon I will move to the 60" long needle, which is the longest I currently own.

The rest of the doily doesn't have anything too wild and crazy, not like the earlier parts.  It'll be the leaf motifs, lots of hex mesh, and then the outer triple-fans with 12 pattern repeats per round.  Hopefully I'll be able to stay focused, especially when the stitch counts really start climbing.

My travel knitting project is close to done.  I'm starting the final block of yarnovers.  I don't know if I'll get through the remainder of the pattern as written or if I will run out of yarn and end the shawl a little bit earlier.  Either way, it'll be OK.  And either way, I really do need to figure out the next travel knitting project!

The first July progress report on Lavori 07/30

Another few weeks, another few rounds, another few chart errors.

Really, though, it's coming along; maybe not the fastest progress but still relatively steady.

I'm done with the flowers.  No more crossed stitches.  That feels kind of weird after so many hundreds of them in this pattern so far.  But nope, they're done.  Now it's time for the final set of leaves, which will soon match the other leaves that started a while back, as the pattern transitions from 6 to 12 pattern repeats per round.  After that, the outer fans will start and the number of stitches will climb quickly, but that's not for a while yet.

I'm probably close to half-done with the pattern, give or take a bit.  Wow.  I'm also just about done with the current partial ball of thread.  I have a few more partial balls left before I'd need to start one of the full balls of this stuff.  (I have three full balls or 350 yards each in addition to all the partial balls.)

A few more chart errors:

Round 127:  A missing yarnover between the left side of the flower and the hex mesh section.  It should be (yo, sk2p) after all of the crossed stitches.

Round 135:  2 errors in this row!  There's an extra yarnover to the left of the crossed-stitch section (the right side of the crossed-stitch section has the correct single yarnover), and also an extra yarnover in the center section of the leaves (there should be no double yarnovers in the leaf motif area, just single yarnovers).

So far, all of the chart errors have been more like typos than errors.  They're all fairly minor and all fairly obvious.  I hope that continues, should there be more errors up ahead.  I assume there will be more of these chart typos, because why wouldn't there be?

As part of my final posts on this doily, after it's completed, I'll have a list of all the chart errors in this pattern.  That might be in 2025, or maybe not until 2026 or beyond.  We'll see!  So far, I'm pleased with my knitting stamina.  But I often get the doldrums between half and two-thirds to three-quarters done.  I'm trying not to push myself too hard and also mixing this in with a lot of other fun things.

No photos for this post!

Yet another June 2025 Lavori 07/30 progress report

Another week, another few rounds, another chart error.

Round 105:  there's a missing yarnover at the beginning of the pattern repeat.  I noticed this as an anomaly a while ago, and yup, it is indeed missing.

I'm done with the columns of twisted stitches, yay!  I had been twisting them on intermediate rounds, so it's kind of nice to go back to not needing to think or count on the non-pattern rounds.  Soon I will start the next set of leaf motifs, which will be part of this pattern all the way to the end.  Plus I'll soon increase a bunch more stitches and then start on a new set of crossed-stitch motifs as the flower fully poofs out.

The large number of stitches is somewhat tedious.  But there's enough variety that I'm still enjoying myself quite a lot.

My travel shawl is coming along nicely.  I've finished the section with four sets of eyelet rounds.  Now I do another section of garter, then a section with five sets of eyelets, then a few more rounds of garter stitch and then cast off.  It's more than it sounds like since the rows have an ever-increasing number of stitches.  But it feels like I'm getting a lot closer to the end than the beginning.  The ball of yarn is quite noticeably smaller.  All of this is subject to how much yarn I have, of course!  If I run out sooner than expected, I'll cast off sooner, too.

It also means I need to give more thought to the next travel project(s).  And, as I keep writing, I don't have enough projects on my needles and I really should cast on a few more -- a hat, a sweater, mitts or socks, etc., plus start planning the next semi-mindless shawl.

No pics today!

First Lavori 07/30 progress report of June 2025

Just what it says...

The last leaves are starting to close and I've started on the flower, yay!

There's a chart error in round 93 -- a missing "1" in the middle of the pattern repeat, in the flower stem.  There's a small segment that should be O-1-O-1-O, and that second 1 is missing.  It's obvious when you get there.

It looks like a proper crumpled wad of thread.  I've done almost half the rounds which means I might be around 20-25% finished.  Except that it doesn't, since the stitch counts do all kinds of weird things rather than being a predictable and steady increase rate.  Whatever the true percentage of total knitting I've already done, it is clear that there is much (much, much) more to go.

I'm in no rush, luckily.

Onwards!

Back to the Main Quest Doily

Yay, I've resumed work on Lavori 07/30.  I'm back in the land of yarnovers as hex mesh starts separating the various leaves.  Pattern rounds that begin and end with yarnovers have also begun, which are so very characteristically Niebling-esque.  The number of stitches per round is increasing steadily.

After knitting with #40 thread for the Side Quest doily, the #30 seems like rope.  I'm close to the end of this partial ball of #30 and will soon switch to the next.  Fingers crossed, as always, that any differences in the shade of white are unnoticeable.

Another chart error -- the chart numbering jumps from 191 to 201 for no obvious reason.  So, instead of this doily being 210 rounds, it's actually 202 rounds.  Maybe there's something else going on, but if so, I'll figure it out when I get there.  There's nothing obvious going on in the photo of the doily or the instructions, and everything in the chart seems to line up properly.  Given that there are well over a thousand stitches per round by the outer parts of the doily, this means roughly 10,000 stitches I won't have to knit, which is fine by me.

Also, watch out when I get to round 105 -- I suspect there's a missing yarnover at the beginning of the pattern repeat.

That's it for today!

End of April 2025 progress report (Lavori 07/30 and the travel shawl)

Here's a recent progress pic of Lavori 07/30.  The early section of hex mesh is completely done and I'm in the stretch with no yarnovers.  I'm also in a short stretch within that where the stitch number will stay constant for a few pattern rounds.  The leaf ribs that are indicated by the V1V stitch sequence are turning into simple crossed stitches.  This section of doily is nothing but leaves!

I ran into the first chart error, in round 55.  There's a missing V symbol early in the pattern repeat.  It's very obvious when you get there.

The first partial ball of this white Clark's Big Ball #30 ran out in the 20s, not too long after I transitioned from dpns to a circular needle.  It was only a tiny amount and I'm glad it went as far as it did.  The next ball is close to done.  Will it make it to round 70?  I guess I'll find out.  I have at least two more partial balls before breaking into the first full ball (or presumably full, since these are all thrift store finds and there's no guarantee).  My guess is that I'll have knit about 200 to 250 ish yards of thread by the time this ball runs out.

So far it's been fun.  I'm on the 32" needle, so I suppose I can justify sneaking in a small doily every now and then while this is in progress, and even more so after I move to the 47" needle.

Here's a quick view of my travel project.  It's the Touchstone shawl from Ravelry, designed by Laura Aylor, worked in one of the Zauberball sock yarn gradients.  I've done the third set of eyelet blocks thanks to a bit of good travel knitting time this past weekend.  I have no idea if I'll have enough yarn to get all the way to the 5-block set as the pattern calls for, if I'll have lots of yarn left after that, or what.  I guess I'll find out!  The gauge is a little loose but it's still pretty reasonable.

I keep looking at my yarn stash and thinking about thicker yarns and non-lace.  So maybe I'll get inspired and cast on a few more projects.  I really do need more.