Progress, Folks!

Hi All!

I'm alive, I promise. Still studying for the Bar. Have had it up to my eyeballs and just want the sorry experience to be over.

HOWEVER. I have been making progress on the leaf lace shawl (with a few boo-boos, one which cannot be fixed and the other I'm hoping blocking will help some) as a stress-buster. I was thinking of leaving things at eighteen repeats to make the small shawl as per the pattern, but when I stretched it out along a longer cord and tried it on - as much as you can try it on with a cord - it was too small. So I guess I've just signed myself up for an extra forty rows, and lemme tell you, at this point, those are long rows. But I'm sticking with it. Here you have it.

Yes, for you perfectionists out there, I coulda frogged it. But hey, guess what - this was my fourth attempt; I'd already frogged it three times. And man, as you can tell from this and this, frogging and fixing lace knitting is a b****. Yeah, it can be done, sure. Any takers? Not me!

On another note, I was toying with the idea of making Norah Gaughan's snapping turtle skirt. Oh, the wonder of the snapping turtle skirt!



But Berroco Suede at $10 a ball? Fuhgedaboudit! No frickin' way! At 12 required balls for my size, that would have been a - cough, cough, wheeze - $120 skirt ($90 from yarn.com with discount, but still), with no guarantee that it would come out as nicely as in the pic. Norah, my friend, think about us! Please! Not all of us are rolling around in money, nor are we designers for Berroco who likely benefit from all kinds of free yarn! (Free yarn... Free Berroco yarn... Drool).

That said, being a stubborn Frenchwoman, I would not be defeated, nosirree. And no jokes about the World Cup, please; I'm still sore about that. If that idiot Italian hadn't told Zidane something that caused him to lose his cool - quite out of character for him, I might add - we just might have won. And I won't take any crap from Italian soccer fans; you know who you are: your players are the worse drama queens I've ever seen (they're watching, oh boy! Let me fall to the ground and hold my shins, and if nobody pays attention, get up and run like a rabbit again), and they play really dirty.

But I digress.

Not one to be defeated, I decided to go and hunt for an adequate substitute. Berroco suede, 120 yards for 50 grams. Hmmm. Google "yarn 50 grams 120 yards" - no dice. Go to Elann, Knitpicks, no luck. Go to yarn.com and search, and find... This:

Marco Polo, 120 yards for 50 grams, very likely much slinkier than Berroco Suede, but the colors - and the price, $4.29 per ball - were right. Still not a rock-bottom cheap skirt, but much better ($51.48 + shipping). I haven't swatched it yet because first I gotta finish the leaf lace shawl and start a sweater in this yarn in Blueberry for my Dad, but I will let you know if I have any luck.

Until then, back to the Uniform Commercial Code (when will it end?) and take care and drive safely and stay out of trouble. On that last one, "or not."

Knitro