Woven Star Shawl

I love small loom weaving. Weaving on a small frame loom is portable, allows me to use up small amounts of leftover yarn and it gives my wrists and fingers a much needed break from crocheting and knitting. As such, here's my latest small loom FO...the Star Shawl!

I love my Hazel Rose Diamond Looms. You've seen my diamond loom shawls before and I've got a diamond shawl schematic that seems to work for me, but this time I decided to vary it up a bit. I am a big fan of this shawl on the "Knitting in Tuscany" book cover by one of my fave designers, Nicki Epstein. So, I figured why not try a star shape with woven components! Using my 3.5" loom, I wove 8 diamonds and arranged them into an 8 pointed star. Beautiful. Now repeat (and repeat again)! I used lots of my own homespun as well as some commercial yarn scraps on the individual diamonds.

I also wove a few squares and triangles to fill in the open spaces between the stars. All in all, I am pretty happy with the results.

Oh, and even more exciting that this FO is the fact that my loving boyfriend and very talented photographer, Steve, has been elected the Head of Photography at Monster Crochet. And thank god for this! His photos are heads and tails above my own. In addition, the lovely lady in the photos above? Yes, that is Heather. Hi, Heather! She will be modeling a lot of my wearables now. Another thanks be to god for this development. Yay! Thank you both for helping me!!

That 70s Shawl: The Second Movement

So, my original design went from this...

...to this...

This is what I was aiming for to begin with. I just didn't know it at the time!

 Big, bee-you-ti-ful 70's flowers encased in handy hexagon frames!

Thank you to my gorgeous offspring for modeling my newest creation. She's a doll!

Anyhow, I like this version of the shawl MUCH better than the first pass. I am especially fond of the overall shape of the wrap. It's difficult to tell in the pics above, but shaping looks like this:

This wrap looks just the way I had envisioned. So excited! Oh, I will be making this pattern available for sale both in my Etsy store and on Ravelry.

Happy Monday everyone!

Another Autumnal Diamond Shawl

You may remember the very first diamond shawl that I created. It was actually more of a rectangular stole, but it was the beginning of what has become a suite of shawls/wraps that sport diamonds as their primary motif. Oh and lest we forget, I use only scrap yarn to weave the diamonds for these over the shoulder pieces. It's my woven version of a granny square.

So, following on the heels of diamond shawl numero uno is yet another earthy delight...



This shawl is much larger than it's predecessor and almost resembles the tail feathers of a turkey when viewing it from the back...



Not unlike my past diamond shawls, I edged each motif with a crochet (sc) border and then assembled the pieces using crochet (sl st) as well. I am not a fan of sewing knitwear of any kind together. I always crochet my seams, be they sweater or shawl. I have found that my crocheted seams are not only stronger than the ones I have sewn, but they are also more uniform than their sewn counterparts. And I like uniform seams, kids. They make me very happy!



Lots of varied yarn weights exhibited in the newest version of this shawl as well.

More of these to come as I have a lot of odd ball stash to power through. Oh, different woven motif shapes are in the works as well. Loving my lap looms to be sure!

One Half of Granny

I have a stack of FOs that has travelled with me from residence to another, waiting to be immortalized in living digital color. It just so happens that I pulled one of these purty wooly wonders from the stack this morning, as we seem to be in a state of perpetual cold in West Los Angeles. So, not missing a long overdue opportunity to photograph said item, I present to you my newest Half Granny Shawl...

Crocheted from some of my Koigu sock yarn stash (and let me tell you, I've got a store's worth of this stuff), this light wool number is great for throwing over one's shoulders on cool summer evenings or for donning in offices that double as meat lockers, as is the case with my lovely cube farm abode.

In shaping this triangular shawl, I began using double crochet (dc) until I reached the bottom of my shoulder blades, then moved onto trebles (tr) for the length of the shawl. I stole this idea from my personal crochet idol, Ellen Bloom, who has both granny square technology and drape down to a science. Thanks Ellen!

I edged the entire shawl with a basic picot stitch as I'm not a one who fringes (well, not with regard to crochet anyway).

Yay! I feel so accomplished having decreased my pile o' FOs by one! Plenty more knitting, crocheting and weaving to come...

Stella Circular Shawl

OMG, October has been a blur! So much so that I have been unable to post during what has to be my most favorite time of the year. I haven't even had a chance to unearth my harvest decor for goodness sake!

*Sigh*

Despite the current madness, I have still managed to maintain my daily fiber regimen. Oh yes, still designing as well as randomly crocheting, knitting, spinning, weaving and sewing, albeit in a lower gear. As such, I have a FO from an OPP (other person's pattern) to present to you...



This is my version of Kristen Omdahl's Stella Shawl. The pattern can be found in her book, Wrapped in Crochet, one of my current favorite crochet tomes. Upon first inspection of this book, I knew that Stella would be my first project. I mean, check out the pic below direct from the book's pages...



The shawl is simply gorgeous. Further, the project gave me a perfect excuse to purchase an entire bag of Blue Sky Alpacas Suri Merino! What a lovely yarn to work with, so soft and luscious.

I had a blast crocheting my Stella. The directions were clear and without mistakes. As such, I motored through this WIP, completing the shawl in less than two weeks. I am very happy with the results and intend to make another after the craziness of the holidays subsides.

Happy Monday everyone!

Drama Queen

Nothing like beginning a year with massive life changes. I cannot bring myself to go into detail right now, but let's just say that my path to the future has gone off road. Needless to say, I have no words for the experience right now, but I'm sure I will again have the ability to string plenty of apt phrases together after gaining a bit of distance from the whole debacle.

Personal drama aside, I have finished another Danish Tie Shawl. Like it's predecessor, this delightful example of shawl-dom was knit from my own hand-dyed fingering weight yarns.





I am also quite close to finishing the pattern testing for the Pie-rets. Let me tell you all that I must have been drinking when writing up the lattice crust version of said hat. Uh, yeah. Pattern testing has been nothing short of an adventure. Wow. Anyway, I'm almost there. Should be finished with the final version of the Pie-ret patterns this week. Stay tuned!!