Christmas in progress

I've moved to blogger beta, so apologies if things look a little odd or if anyone has trouble commenting.

It's a week until Christmas and I've still got a pair of socks (one started) and a tea cozy (about 1/3 done) to knit. This is the parcel of yarn which arrived from Get Knitted on Friday. The Noro Kureyon is for the tea cozy, the brown Trekking Pro Natura is for socks for my (non-blog reading) Grandad and the purple stuff will probably be socks for me (perhaps Pomatomi) one day and will sit in the stash until then.

Two socks in a week. Or perhaps less, depending on when we go to see my Grandparents. Doable? Bearing in mind I'm working all week? We'll see.

Diamond Fantasy Shawl

It proved impossible to take a picture of me and the shawl which flattered us both, so here it is, hanging on my pinboards. Click for bigger.

Started: 22 July 2006

Finished: 1 December 2006 (knitting) 7 December 2006 (blocking)

Pattern: Diamond Fantasy Shawl by Sivia Harding

Yarn: Most of one 100g skein of Cashmere sock yarn from HipKnits.

Needles: 3.25mm (I think) straights.

Modifications: None. I did 7 repeats of the main pattern.

Notes: Love it! This is my first proper largescale lace project, if you don't count Arisaig. This size is just about right for a small shawl, but I'd love to make a bigger one, using proper laceweight yarn. 7 repeats was as much as I could cram onto straight needles and it got a bit tricky at the end. It's also hard to tell how big it is before you cast off. The lace repeat was too long to memorise completely (40 rows, I think, half of them plain purl) but there were really only about 3 or 4 different sorts of patterns, so once I'd worked out what sort of row I was on, I could just get on with it without having to consult the pattern all the time. Lace charts are very useful and make it easy to see your mistakes. As far as I know, there are no mistakes in the finished object.
I'd happily wear this myself, but it's going to my Grandma. I hope she likes it.

Updated to edit photo.

Because I'm impatient and like showing off

Here's the back of DFS. In the dark, in a mirror.

I know we all know blocking is magic, but I'll say it anyway. Blocking is magic!

it's been a while

Has it really been that long? Well, I've been knitting knitting knitting, but all of it is secret until after Christmas. But I have finished a couple of things I can show you. This was our living room last week. It's a good thing I have lovely housemates who don't mind if I take up the whole of the floor with towels for blocking.

Updated: Sorry, pushed publish too soon. Here, from the top right, you can see Diamond Fantasy Shawl (present for my Grandma), a swatch for Sunrise Circle Jacket (got gauge first try, woo hoo! I'm using an oiled yarn, Troon from Texere in Cranberry, and when washed, it puffs up nicely, giving me just the right dense fabric), Jaywalker socks, which aren't new, but happened to need washing and Cobweb (for me, using up the remains of a skein of cashmere sock yarn). Modelled shots when I've convinced said lovely housemates to take some.