Celestarium Shawl

Posted on March 25, 2016 by Deborah Cooke

This year, I’m trying to finish up all the knitting I have in progress, before casting on anything new. I have a LOT on the go, so this is going to take a while. (I also have very little discipline when it comes to knitting and keep casting on more projects, but that’s another challenge. The rationale is that I’m stash-busting.)

My current focus is a circular shawl in gradient-dyed yarn. Let’s talk about that today.

Once upon a time (way back in 2012), a designer created a circular knitted shawl that was essentially a map of the heavens. For every star visible above in the northern hemisphere, there’s a hole and a bead in the shawl. The pattern is called Celestarium. (Subsequently, she did one for the southern hemisphere called Southern Skies.) This is a pretty cool pattern, IMO, and qualifies as geek knitting. There are over 1000 Celestarium shawl projects on Ravelry, if you have some time to browse. Almost 600 of them are completed.

Some time after that, Earthfaire created a kit for the shawl, featuring gradient-dyed yarn from the Unique Sheep and crystal beads. Here’s the product page for the kit, although they don’t have any more.

I did get a kit when they were available, although it’s been waiting on me for a while. (Stash must age before use, you know.) The colourway is called Twilight. Mine shades from purple through to deep blue black. (You could choose to have it shade the other way – the last shade is the biggest skein and is for the border.) This is the same yarn base as my BitterBlue shawl – it’s a merino and tussah silk blend called Luxe. I really like this yarn, probably because I really like raw silk. It also doesn’t have the seracin smell that some silk yarn has, which I really really really dislike.

I’ve been knitting on my Celestarium for quite a while now. It has a lot of plain knitting, with the occasional star – which stands to reason. Even on a starry night, there’s more sky than stars! The charts are huge because there are no repeats: the final chart prints on eight sheets of paper, which then are taped together lengthwise to show the rows.

This is not TV knitting.

Here’s a star: Celestarium by Audry Nicklin knit in the Unique Sheep Luxe (Earthfaire kit) by Deborah Cooke See the little hole to the left of that middle bead? This is from the part closer to the middle of the shawl, where it’s more purple.

(Mr. Math has found a pun for this one, btw. When I drop a bead, he calls it a falling star. When I find it, he asks if I’ve caught a fallen star. Of course, he then advises me to put it in my pocket and save it for a rainy day.)

Round shawls that increase in diameter at a regular rate are called pi-shawls, and are based upon a design by Elizabeth Zimmerman. (My Urdr shawl was another of these.) What happens is that the number of stitches doubles at set intervals, which creates circular bands of the same stitch count. Clever designers make magic happen in these bands. When knitting a pi-shawl, I find that the first few charts are done really quickly, then the stitch count gets high enough to slow me down. The Celestarium shawl is knitted with fingering weight yarn, so the final chart has 576 stitches in each round. (The Urdr shawl was knit in lace weight, so the stitch count doubled one more time on that one.)

I’ve finished the body of the shawl, knit some extra rounds around the outside and am now knitting the border. I chose a traditional Shetland border called Wave Lace. It’ll look much better blocked, but here it is, still bunched up on the needles, but stretched out a little bit on the rug. Celestarium by Audry Nicklin knit in the Unique Sheep Luxe (Earthfaire kit) by Deborah Cooke I actually pulled two stitches off the needle accidentally when taking this shot. =8-o

800 rows of border to go, then it’ll get a good block. I’m looking forward to seeing it then – blocking lace is magical.

What do you think?

Finished Snow Angel Shawl

Posted on January 28, 2016 by Deborah Cooke

You might remember that I was knitting a lace shawl. The pattern is called Snow Angel and it’s by BooKnits – here’s the Ravelry link for the pattern. I knit it in a gradient dyed yarn called Freia Ombré Lace in the colourway Autumn Rose. I actually ran out of yarn, so used some Elann Silken Kydd from my stash. I think the colourway is Baked Apple, and I worried it might be a bit dark, but I like it. I also used green glass beads with copper linings, in the positions specified in the pattern.

Here’s the finished and blocked shawl on the back of the couch. I’m not sure why I’m so surprised by the size of it but I am. I had in mind that it was going to be a scarfy little thing, but it’s a shawl. The colour is the most true to life in this first picture. Snow Angel by Boo Knits knit by Deborah Cooke in Freia Ombre Wool/Nylon Lace

Here’s the whole thing spread on a rug so you can see the crescent shape of it, and the gradation in the colour. And yes, it’s too big for this rug! Snow Angel by Boo Knits knit by Deborah Cooke in Freia Ombre Wool/Nylon Lace And here’s a detail of the middle of the shawl, though it’s a bit blurry. It’s always amazing to see how the lace opens up when it’s blocked. It was hard to discern the pattern in those photographs taken while the shawl was on the needles, but not it’s obvious. Snow Angel by Boo Knits knit by Deborah Cooke in Freia Ombre Wool/Nylon Lace I’m very happy with this one. What do you think?

Snow Angel Shawl

Posted on December 30, 2015 by Deborah Cooke

I started to work on a lace shawl in a yarn that’s gradation-dyed to change from one colour to another over its length. I bought this yarn originally to make a cowl, but didn’t like the lace stitch so switched out for this pattern. It’s called Snow Angel by BooKnits, a new designer for me, but I’ve admired her designs for a while. The shawl blocks out to a crescent with lace dripping from the outside edge. This pattern is very well-written, both written out and charted so there’s a choice of which kind of directions to follow.

Here’s a peek at the lace so far. It looks like a lump because it isn’t blocked yet, but I think it will be very pretty. It starts with the green and will end with pink. Of course, it has beads.

Those Wyrd Sisters

Posted on May 29, 2015 by Deborah Cooke

I was going to tell you about a new shawl project today, but instead, I’m going to show you another one that I finally finished. (Yay!) That post about the new project has been bumped to next Friday.

When I was writing the Dragon Diaries, I did a lot of research on the Wyrd sisters in Norse mythology, also called the Norns (or sometimes the Nairns). These three immortals decide the fate of all living beings – in the myths, they’re spinners, but in Zoë’s books, they’re knitters too. Around about the same time, I was intrigued to discover that a knitting designer had created a trio of shawls to celebrate these three sisters. I had this idea that I’d knit them all to commemorate the publication of Zoë’s story.

I finally cast on in 2013.

I did finish the first one, Verdandi, pretty quickly. Verdandi is the sister who governs the present, so I called my project “Is”. This is a triangular shawl, and I knit mine in Fleece Artist Nyoni. This mohair, wool, silk and nylon blend is discontinued (so that’s a Ravelry link), which is too bad because it’s a scrumptious yarn. I still have a bit in the stash in another green colour. 🙂

The post about my completed Verdandi is right here.

Then I cast on the second shawl, Urdr. Urdr is the sister who governs the past, so my project is called “Was”. That was in September 2013. This is a huge round shawl knit in very fine laceweight yarn. The idea behind the design is that this shawl is supposed to represent the well at the root of the world tree, Yggdrasil, which the sisters tend. I used a gradient colourway from the Unique Sheep called Brigid, which made me think of copper cauldrons and ancient goddesses. (You can see Brigid on this page of the Gradiance colourways. It’s in the middle of the fourth row. Mine didn’t look quite like this sample, but each base yarn takes colour differently. Mine was very teal at the one end and quite a warm grey gold at the other with no mauve or blue bits—actually it has colours like the two middle skeins in the sample.) The base yarn is Ling, which is a silk and merino blend.

Knitting this shawl became a bit of a slog, as the rows at the end had more than 1200 stitches, and I added rows to use more of the yarn. Also, knitted lace looks like nothing until it’s blocked. I was losing heart because I had what looked like a lump in my lap each time I picked up the needles. I told Mr. Math about two weeks ago that I had to finish it, and he said “What’s the rush? You’ll just cast on another one.” Such was my mood that I wasn’t so sure of that. Maybe this would be The Last Shawl.

I should have anticipated that blocking would change everything. it’s such a magical process. Imagine my surprise when my lump stretched out to look like this:It’s at least six feet in diameter and so lovely that I can’t stop looking at it. The yarn is dyed in gradients, which means that there are six skeins in the set, and you change from one to the next as you knit.

Here’s a detail shot, after blocking, on the couch. You can see the colours better in this shot, although IRL, the gradation is more subtle and the middle is less blue than it looks here:It’s supposed to have nupps (which are little knitted knots) but I don’t like knitting nupps so I put beads in those places instead. Because I didn’t make nupps, I used less yarn. I wanted to have the entire gradation of colour, though, so I added repeats to the border. I also added more beads to the outside edge. Details are on my Ravelry project page.

It was totally worth it, and I’m ready to cast on another shawl, if not two! I’ll tell you next week about my nerd knit in that raw silk and merino blend (in another gradient colourway from the Unique Sheep, also with beads). There’s also the third Wyrd sister’s shawl to knit. It’s called Skuld, for the third sister who controls the future. My project will be named “Might Be” and I have some lovely Fleece Artist yarn set aside for it. I’m going to try to be good, though, and finish the lace stole that’s on my needles and only one third knitted before casting on another. (Ha.)

What do you think of my Urdr?

Bitterblue Shawl

Posted on May 22, 2015 by Deborah Cooke

I told you a while back about a shawl I was knitting in gradient colours, following a pattern called BitterBlue. Well, now it’s done and I’m very happy with it. Because I chose not to block it, it’s between a large scarf and a small shawl in size. Blocking would make the points stand out more on the border and would make it larger, but I like how scrunchy the garter stitch is. Plus I just love the colours.

Here it is:I did make some changes to the pattern – some planned and some inadvertent user errors – and you can read about those on my Ravelry project page, right here. The base yarn is really nice, and I realized that I have another kit from Earthfaire in the stash that came with the same yarn. I caked up the yarn for that project up, and will tell you about it next week.

What do you think of this one?

Bitterblue in Progress

Posted on April 24, 2015 by Deborah Cooke

Time to show you some knitting again!

I had lots of plans to finish more of my projects on the go, but so much for good intentions. I had ordered a kit for the Bitterblue Shawl from Earthfaire in the Magic Carpet colourway, and when it turned up in the mailbox, I just had to cast on right away.

I inverted the order of the colours and am approaching the halfway point. This shawl uses yarn that has been dyed in gradients, each skein slightly different from the previous one so that the end project shades from one colour to the another. In this case, it shades from plum to green. Unique Sheep Gradiance is the name of the company and the line of these meticulously dyed yarns: you can see some of the other colourways on their site, right here.If you looked at the pattern on Earthfaire’s site, you will have noticed that my shawl looks different – and not just because I inverted the colours. The pattern has a larger cast-off after every third repeat of the border pattern. When I tried that, though, I didn’t like the look of it. I thought I’d prefer the shawl if the line between the border and the body of the shawl was smooth, instead of stepped off, so that’s what I’ve done.

The result of that choice will likely be that the shawl will come out a bit shorter – because mine will be wider and there’s a finite amount of yarn. When you use gradient yarns, you’re supposed to ease the transitiion into each colour change, alternating between the old and new colour, before changing completely to the new colour. (Here’s the Unique Sheep tutorial.) This always gives me stress when the rows are of different length, because I fear I’ll leave the wrong amount of yarn and run out in the middle of a row. OTOH, I don’t want to have yarn left over when I’m concerned about the overall size of the shawl. So, I’m just changing from one skein to the next, without easing into the change, and using a Russian join between them. I think it looks good.

You can’t see another change I’ve made: on every row knitting back toward the border, the first stitch is to be knit according to the pattern. I thought the edge was too tight that way, so began to slip that first stitch instead. (And actually you can see it if you know what you’re looking for. The shawl begins at that lower point, where the purple end of yarn is showing. You can see that the right edge curls more in those first few rows – I changed to slipping the stitch before that row of 5 beads.)

And YES, this shawl had beads. A lot of beads. The beads change colours too. I started with yellowy ones on the purple, then shaded into greenish ones. I’ve just changed to the ones called Root Beer and will finish out with purple beads. You can see the beads better in the image below:The wool in this kit is really lovely. I’m not often a fan of silk blends, but this is wool and tussah silk, which is sometimes called wild silk. I love the feel of tussah silk in fabric, and also love it in this yarn. I’ll be wearing this one a lot when it’s done! I might not even block it because I like the look of the garter stitch. We’ll see.

Irtfa’a Shawl

Posted on August 2, 2013 by Deborah Cooke

This shawl has been on my needles for what seems like half of forever. It can’t really have been that long, because I bought the yarn in 2009 at Little Knits in Seattle – I was attending the Emerald City conference and Pam and I did a yarn trawl. The pattern is Irtfa’a by Anne Hanson.This is a Faroese shawl, which means it has a distinctive shape. A Faroese shawl has a vertical band down the centre back – you can see it still scrunched on the needles here – then each side extends like a wing. The border along the hem is knitted on last, which is what I’m in the middle of doing right now. Even though the shawl isn’t blocked, you can already see the shape of it, at least on this left side. The shape is even more clear in the shot on Anne’s website, because that shawl is finished and blocked. (Here’s the link again.)

Here’s a closer look:I knit this following the pattern instructions until I got to the hem. First of all, I added some rows to the hem of the shawl to make the last set of points finish out in diamonds. That’s hard to see here, but will be more clear once it’s blocked. (I like it a lot.) I added some beads (of course!) too. I also changed out the border pattern. Of course, I ended up with a wider one so it’s taking me a while to finish, but it’s a pattern I memorized quickly. (It’s a modified version of a border included in the end matter of Victorian Lace Today.) Here’s my Ravelry project page with a more in depth description of my mods.

I’m hoping to have this one finished soon, so I can cast on my Fire Dance Circle Shawl.

Inspired by the Kleks Shawl

Posted on January 25, 2013 by Deborah Cooke

Last fall, I came across a wonderful lace yarn in my LYS. It was dyed to change colours once over the length of the yarn. The yarn is Knitwhits Freia Handpaints Freia Ombré Lace, and the colourway I chose – Grapevine – changes from purple through brown and green to chartreuse. I thought it would look great in a semi-circular shawl – crescents of colour – and was inspired by the Kleks Shawl. This is the Ravelry link for the Kleks.

I really like the look of this shawl, with its alternating bands of stockinette stitch and bramble stitch, but wanted a shawl that was a wedge out of a circle with a rounded neck – like the letter C. It’s clear from the projects shown on Ravelry that the Kleks doesn’t have that shape. I also was confused by the increase instructions in the shawl pattern (it’s easy to confuse me about such things) and noticed that many Ravellers had issues with the stitch counts.

So, I made a plan for some variations. This is how my shawl came out:

The colour is richer than that, but the flash did what it does. The crescent is about 18″ deep, so the full width is roughly 45″. It falls to my elbows and comes together nicely at the front. I love it!

Here’s how I knit this variation. You need a multiple of 4 for the bramble pattern, plus there are 3 stitches on each border. It made sense to me to cast on a multiple of 4 plus 6 stitches, then to always increase stitches in multiples of 4. If I can avoid counting stitches, I will!

(Actually, in order to make the lace pattern come out symmetrically, you need a multiple of 8 stitches plus 4, plus the borders, but I missed that bit. You might want to modify the counts if asymmetry troubles you.)

Here we go!

Collar:
Cast on 86 stitches.
Knit 1 row. Knit 5 more rows, slipping the first stitch on each row. (This gives a neater edge.)

First Stockinette Stitch Band – You’ll add 8 stitch markers in this band.
19 rows in total
Row 1 – Slip 1, K2, K8, M1, place marker, * K9, M1, place marker. Repeat from * six times. K to end. (94 stitches.)
Row 2 – Slip 1, K2, purl to last three stitches, K to end.
Row 3 – Slip 1, knit to end.
Row 4 – as Row 2.

Repeat this four row sequence four times, as follows:
Row 5, 9, 13 and 17 – Slip 1, K2, *K to marker, M1 before marker. Repeat from * seven times. K to end.

After each increase row, your counts will be as follows:
Row 5 (102 stitches)
Row 9 (110 stitches)
Row 13 (118 stitches)
Row 17 (126 stitches)

Remove the stitch markers anytime after Row 17. You’ll need them in different places for the next stockinette stitch band. End after Row 19, with the wrong side facing. (Yes, you knit the pattern stitch on the wrong side.)

First Lace Panel – 15 rows in total. This is one repeat more than the pattern specifies, which is why I have 15 rows instead of 11. Work in trinity stitch (or bramble stitch. Call it whichever) as specified in pattern, keeping three border stitches in garter stitch. There are no increases in this panel.

Second Stockinette Stitch Panel – This time, we’ll put 16 markers in the work.
19 rows in total.
Row 1 – Slip 1, K2, K7, M1, place marker, * Repeat from * fifteen times. K to end. (142 stitches.)
Row 2 – Slip 1, K2, purl to last three stitches, K to end.
Row 3 – Slip 1, knit to end.
Row 4 – as Row 2.

Repeat this four row sequence four times, as follows:
Row 5, 9, 13 and 17 – Slip 1, K2, *K to marker, M1 before marker. Repeat from * fifteen times. K to end.

After each increase row, your counts will be as follows:
Row 5 (158 stitches)
Row 9 (174 stitches)
Row 13 (190 stitches)
Row 17 (206 stitches)

Remove the stitch markers anytime after Row 17. You’ll need them in different places for the next stockinette stitch band. End after Row 19, with the wrong side facing.

Second Lace Band – as first lace band.
15 rows total.

Third Stockinette Band
Following the same increase strategy, add 24 stitches to every increase row. You’ll end with 326 stitches.

Third Lace Band – as first lace band.
15 rows total.

Fourth Stockinette Band
Following the same increase strategy, add 36 stitches per increase row. I forgot to count the stitches after this one.

Fourth Lace Band – as first lace band.
15 rows total.

Border
In an ideal universe, I would have had enough yarn to mirror the 19 rows of stockinette stitch followed by 6 rows of garter stitch at the collar. I was running out of yarn, though, so had to adapt. I worked 3 rows of garter stitch after the last last panel, putting beads on the second row, on every second stitch. I didn’t have enough yarn left to cast off (there’s about a meter of it) so I knit a row with some Kidsilk Haze in BlackCurrant that was in my bits and ends, then cast off with that. For the cast off edge, I used a crochet hook – this is the cast-off from the Fiddlesticks Knitting Peacock Shawl, which I liked on it. *Work 3 stitches together, place bead, chain 5, repeat from * to end, work last chain into last stitch and bind off. (I was short one stitch at the end, but just worked 2 together before the last loop instead of 3.)

And that’s it! What do you think?

Lace Jacket by Brooke Nico 2

Posted on November 25, 2011 by Deborah Cooke

I seem to be knitting a lot of projects lately that have knitted borders. Or maybe the borders just take so long to knit that they feel like endless projects. Not sure. At any rate, here’s another one.This is the lace jacket by Brooke Nico from Vogue Knitting fall 2010. I cast it on last fall in Kidsilk Haze, then put it aside for a while. I’ve been charging away on it lately – mostly because it’s so astonishingly pretty – and am now knitting the border. The jacket is constructed as a circle – well, actually, a pentagon – with a border all around the outside of the circle. You leave stitches on holders in two wedges of the pentagon, then go back and make sleeves there. I still have to do that bit. The red stitches toward the centre are those saved stitches.

But look at this border. On one hand, I think it’s really too wide for the circle and that maybe I should have substituted a narrower lace border. On the other, well, it’s just so pretty that I can’t stop knitting it. I’m incredulous that I’m knitting something so lovely.

What do you think?

Aeolian Shawl

Posted on September 2, 2011 by Deborah Cooke

I just FINISHED a lace shawl that’s been on my needles for most of the year, and yesterday I blocked it out.

The pattern is Aeolian, which is a free pattern from Knitty – you can download it right here. I made the largest size on the smallest needles, because I like how this yarn works up on smaller needles. It’s blocked out to be 33″ down the centre back, which is plenty big enough for me.

The yarn is 2ply lace from Wellington Fibres – yup, gotta get some goat in! – and the handpainted colourway (done by WF) is called Mardi Gras. The colours reminded me of pictures of the Grand Canyon, with all the layers of colour in the rocks. So, did the pattern. It’s quite exciting that the colours didn’t pool – it really does look stripey like those pictures.

The pattern calls for beads and nupps, but I just added beads. I also used fewer beads than instructed – most of the first chart I left without beads. I was worried that it might be too heavy otherwise.

And here it is. Just a detail shot because it’s too big to all fit in the viewfinder!What do you think?

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Knitting and other tangled webs we weave

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