Travel Yarns and What We've Knitted Along the Way. . .

We've been travelling a lot in the last month.  At the beginning of May, we flew back to Canada for a couple of weeks. First stop was visiting friends in Ottawa.

And discovering a new (to me) yarn shop. Wabi Sabi is a colourful treasure trove and they carry Brooklyn Tweed so I was able to pick up two skeins of Vale, their laceweight yarn which I've been wanting to try.

Then we flew north to visit family in Sault Ste. Marie where not all the ice had quite melted on the St. Mary river.

Beaver spotting!

And we drove to get some lovely, peaceful views of Northern Ontario.

I was excited to find this Sugar Bush yarn in Shabby Motley, the indie yarn shop in Sault Ste. Marie.  It's called Cabot and is a sportweight cotton/linen blend.  I fell in love with these colours.  Perfect for a summer top.

Incidentally, Shabby Motley also runs the cafe/gift shop at the airport, which makes Sault Ste Marie only the second airport I know of (Keflavik being the other) that sells wool.  In this case, some Icelandic wool from local sheep just down the road.

We also spent a few days in Toronto (I may have bought more yarn) and had a lovely day out on Toronto Islands.

As you can see, the weather was gorgeous and even hot, so I was itching to cast on something with the Cabot. I also had a long flight coming up.  And then Kate Davies released her Pabaigh pattern -  a perfect layering piece with lots of stockinette in the round.  Perfect!

I cast on and this is how far I got by the time we got home.

We'd barely unpacked before we were off for a relaxing weekend in the Yorkshire Dales.

With a climb up to Malham Cove.

By the time the weekend was over, I'd nearly finished the top - just a few rows left to go of the funnel neck.

And then came the realization that this yarn, which I thought would have the drape necessary for the neck, just didn't have the crunchiness that is also needed. Try as I might, I just couldn't make it lie in a way that looked good.  And suddenly a cowl neck also didn't seem appropriate for a summer top.  I ripped back. . .

And ended up with this stockinette curled neckline instead which I am very pleased with.  It's a far cry from the original, but I now have a summer top that feels very comfortable and will get a lot of wear over the next few months.

In which we'll be staying more or less at home.