Meditations on Lion Suede

I work out of my home office, but I take a break to watch Knitty Gritty. It's on at 1 p.m. where I live so it's the perfect little lunch break. I also have 2 skeins each of 2 different colors (Orchard and Vineyard) of Lion Suede. I've had them for about 1 1/2 years leftover from the Scarf Binge of Xmas 2005 (which was accompanied by the Knifty Knitter Hat Gorge as well - 15 scarves and 11 hats (plus 6 reject scarves that ended up in the donate bin...I may have been a little crazy!).

So last week, I'm watching Knitty Gritty and lo and behold they're making a Lace Sampler Shrug out of 2 skeins of Lion Suede!!!!!

Yippee! I gotta get myself on that show somehow. Did I tell you that Vickie and I could be the exact same age, down to the day? But I digress.... Here's the shrug after one day of knitting while my computer network was having PMS:

As Myra said on the show, the edges are a little wonky, but they'll all even out with single crochet. Aren't the YO's awesome? The pattern is fun and speedy. It moves so quickly from one pattern to the next, that I have't once gotten bored. I have a slight problem with getting bored. So I have a lot of yarn. And a lot of projects. I may just finish this one!

Now if the Scarf Binge of '05 taught me anything, it was that while Lion Suede is beautiful (LOVE this "Orchard"), it is a little tricky to work with. I had just bought Scarf Style and was enamored with the cabled scarf shown in Touch Me. Not willing to spend the money on that, I decided Lion Suede would give me the desired result without the fuss. Can you tell I'd never used it before?

I also used plastic needles. And, I tend to knit tight. Kids, don't try this at home.

I wrestled with that scarf through completion - and made another in mistake stitch rib - but learned that Lion Suede is sticky. If you've ever wondered what that means, try knitting it with plastic needles and you'll find out! Plus, my when my mom washed it, suddenly there were little loops of yarn sticking out all over the place that she needed to tug on to get back into shape. After all the tugging, the scarf didn't lay as nice as it did in the beginning. Thus, the excitement over this lace shrug. With lace patterns, you can and should tug to get it just so and there's enough room to the pattern that it will still lay right.

This pattern really is a fun one to follow and it's moving along like Speed Racer. Apparently I didn't learn my lesson and started it on plastic circular needles, but quickly realized that this was the perfect project for my 14" Boye's. The yarn slides nicely but won't fall off, and the stitches stay the right size. I prefer working with circulars for everything, but with lace, my YO's get stuck when I'm trying to slide them into position.

So that's the project for today! If I'm lucky, I'll have an FO to post tomorrow!