My Next Project...

Ok, technically, I'm not done Via Diagonale yet, but it's at the "non-knitting stage" and I need something more repetitive on the needles for my limited down time.

The body of Via Diagonale is complete and I JUST need to make the I-cord. I find I-cord to be the most tedious type of knitting I have encountered. Wait, I stand corrected, attached I-cord narrowly edges out loose I-cord. I'm planning to cheat (Zibibbo, if you are reading this, avert your eyes) and use this:



the Bond America Magicord Machine, to make the I-cord. I know, then I'll have to sew it on by hand, but for some reason this seems to produce a neater result for me than making the attached I-cord in the first place.

The real show stopper is that I will have to wind another ball of Butterfly Super 10 in the main colour to make the I-cord. I picked up my stash of Butterfly Super 10 when a local yarn store went out of business and some of the skeins were pretty bedraggled when I liberated them. I won't be able to use my new swift to wind them because the skeins are just too frazzled, so I figure I'm in for about a half hour of drudgery unsnarling the skein prior to winding it.

You get the idea...



So, in the meantime, I'm distracting myself by knitting something for me, a summer top!

It's from Melissa Leapman's Hot Knits...Marissa

It's a basic, short-sleeved summer top. Fairly frumpy, but hey, who am I kidding, so am I. Or rather, the currently fashionable tank tops and sleeveless creations write cheques that my doughy, 40ish upper arms can no longer cash!



I'm planning to knit it in a celery green cotton blend from my stash. I'll admit, I was a bit more enthusiastic about this project BEFORE I whipped out my pattern at SNB last night. It was pointed out that an adult-sized project knit on 3.75 mm needles might not be the best choice for someone who complained about the time commitment required to finish Via Diagonale. (Actually, I think someone sucked air through their teeth and said...whoa, that's brave to start so late in the season...so I'm paraphrasing again.)

I'm going to try to knit it on circular needles up to the armhole, partly because it will be quicker than stockingette on straight needles and partly to eliminate any "waviness" noticable on the fine gauge stockingette because of differences in "knit" and "purl" tension. I'm sort of between sizes for this pattern, so I think that I might knit the smaller of my likely sizes and retain the two seaming stitches when I convert the pattern to circular, just to buy me a tich more room.

Anyway, that's what I'm up to...