Where, O where has she been???

If you were worried that something bad happened to me, not really. I got super busy with work and time just seemed to evaporate. I am hoping you can relate and can forgive my absence. It wasn’t quiet around here due to lack of knitting, that’s for sure!

I finished my cotton summer sweater – Edinburgh Tee – and I have to say I am pleased with how it turned out.

I made a size large and used less than five skeins of Cascade Ultra Pima. Had some trouble with the sleeves – miscounted the rows when I was working each side of the neck a couple different times resulting in some creative vocabulary and frogging, but finally got it right. I am very happy to have finished a summer project while it is still summer and I can get some wear out of it!

Found this really fun Berroco yarn on the Shop Hop earlier this summer and made up a pattern for it. The yarn is Brio and its a wool/acrylic blend with a touch of sparkle. The simple pattern uses k2tog/YO or YO/ssk to create directional lines. It ended up the perfect length to wear long and drapey or to wrap twice around my neck. Of course, I will not be wearing it anytime soon since its hot, hot, hot here right now!

I also finished knitting on my HPKY Fringed Vest – although it still needs to be blocked and have its fringes finished off. It was last seen in its original skeins in this blog post. Here it is today where it will likely be for a bit since, as previously mentioned, its a bit too hot for a long, fringed vest right now:

I am currently knitting on a super secret sample that I cannot share just yet as the yarn has yet to be released, but there will be more on that soon.

Also, stay tuned for an update on Fall classes. I will be teaching through Washington County Community Education (both Woodbury and Cottage Grove) as well as at What in Yarnation in Cannon Falls again. Watch for sign up information shortly!

New project – Edinburgh Tee

Browsing the new patterns posted on Ravelry recently, I came across a pattern that really grabbed me and said “MAKE ME!” – Edinburgh Tee by Jill Wright.

© Fiesta Yarns

I just love the cabling detail on the front. Plus, it is summer and I really need some lighter weight knits to wear. This seemed like a perfect solution that would also be fun to make.

I chose some pretty blue Cascade Ultra Pima and actually swatched! It is a good thing, too, as despite generally being an on-gauge knitter, my initial swatch did not get gauge. I went up a needle size which did the trick, but I did not like the fabric it produce. So, the US6 would not work and neither would the US7. Fortunately, one of my needle gauges shows an option between six and seven and I had a needle that measured as that. Hence, I’m using a US6.5 – a size that doesn’t really exist, but works for me.

I also learned a new cast on that is specifically designed to be stretchy and set up for ribbing: Tillybuddy’s Very Stretchy Cast On from the great reference book Cast On, Bind Off (previously blogged about).

Here is the progress so far: