Lovely Laceweight. . .

Some people think knitting with lace weight is a bit nuts because it's so, so fine. But I never fail to be amazed at how such a thin, delicate thread can turn into something so substantial and fabulous. Of course there's the little matter of knitting thousands of stitches first!

I've finished two projects in lace weight recently. Due to the fading hours of daylight it's taken me a while to photograph them. The first is Mahy, designed by Karie Westermann.

It is a lovely shawl to knit, constructed as a hap with a garter stitch center and then stitches are picked up for the lace edgings. The yarn is Scrumptious Lace from Fyberspates. I fell in love with a toffee coloured skein at Yarndale and knew it would be perfect for this project.

This photo show better how intense the colour is.  I just love it.

My second finished project is Vijante, designed by Martina Behm.  Yes, it's a poncho/shawl/thingy but it is wonderfully cozy  to wear over your shoulders and the lace weight gives it plenty of drape.

I made it much shorter than the pattern called for because one edge is significantly longer. You can drape it around an arm, or wear it as a triangular or asymmetric garment.

It's a very versatile garment and I love the cowl neck which is loose enough not to feel suffocating, but warm enough to dispense with a scarf if I'm going out.  The brown -hued yarn is Madeline Tosh Lace and the deep blue is a skein of silk lace weight from Natural Born Dyers that I picked up in Sedburgh. I tried to minimize the impact of the colour changes by adding stripes and increasing their width when I was ready to knit with the blue.

It's a fairly easy knit - just rounds and rounds of stockinette although the hypnotic nature of this and the use of lace weight is a perfect recipe for accidentally dropping stitches.  And it is a LOT of knitting; I started it back in June and seem to have been working on it forever.  Really glad I finished it though - it may just be my favourite knitted item of this year.