My current muddle of WIPs. The ever present socks in progress and my current love, the Stripe Study Shawl.
I could have sworn I bought a red with a hint of orange for the contrast stripes, but the more I look at it the more it seems to be just straight up orange. No matter, it all works with my beloved grey.
Although I cast on for Stripe Study a couple of weeks ago I shied away from working on it much as I knew it would consume me and shunt my twisted socks to the background if I let it. However, since we’re all agreed that the foot is the fly-by home stretch, I felt that since I’d turned the heel it was “safe” to finally plough on with some lovely garter stitch. Oh, how I love garter stitch. It has such a rustic, squishy cosiness to it. Delicious. The pattern is a whole lot easier than I thought it was going to be, although it’s been a while since I worked on anything other than socks so the 4mm needles felt awkward and clumsy in my hands at first.
I had a brief dalliance with some other short row methods (shadow wraps and Priscilla Wild) since I’m not usually a fan of a standard wrap & turn, but ended up ripping them out and going back to basics. The wrap & turn method included in the pattern really is the best match for this project. I should have listened to Veera!
Still on the topic of the Stripe Study, Nat over on Misadventures in Craft recently blogged about a Stripe Study KAL that she and Crafts from the Cwtch have organised so I’m going to be joining in with that. There’s an FAQ about the KAL here (far too many acronyms going on in this sentence!), so if you fancy joining in then head on over to find out more! There’s even a discount code for Nimu Yarns for all you bargain hunters out there.
And on a completely non knitting related note, but you all know how I love to flash my nails, here’s what I’m currently sporting. I’m ashamed to say that my last mani only came off the nails at the Easter weekend (yikes, a whole month with the same mani! Gross. I am most definitely ashamed of my slobbish approach to nail grooming). I don’t think it’s a colour I would have normally picked up but it was given to me by my bestie when she was having a clear out during a house move. She said she never wore it because it was too bright for her, and although it doesn’t look too day-glo in the bottle, my goodness was she right. This pink looks a little muted in the photo but in reality it’s almost bordering on neon. I do love it though. It’s a perfect warm weather colour, although there’s very little of that happening in the UK at the moment. Incidentally, my bestie’s 2-year old daughter calls nail polish “nail badges” (although I at first I though she was saying “nail badgers”. Yeah, I can be kind of slow like that.). How adorable?!
