The Bog of Lost Scholars

I’ve started the Heere Be Dragone shawl and am up to row 72. When I look at it as “row 72 out of about 320″ it looks like great progress; when I actually look at the chart and realize I’m not even through the first chart of ten, not so great. And I suspect my gauge is a little smaller than the pattern’s, though it’ll still be a good-sized shawl when it’s blocked. But the pattern is very interesting to work, and I love how the yarn I chose is working — Chewy Spaghetti’s “Capellini”, a hand-dyed wool/silk laceweight, in a gray with very subtle color variations.

I’m back up to four pairs of socks on the needles:

• The Ivy lace socks that’ve been in progress for a year and a half are still in progress; I do have a clear idea now what I’m doing for the heel, though.
• I’ve finished the heels on the Hula socks and am working down the gusset; after that it’ll be just straight stockinette for a few inches and an inch of ribbing. I might even finish them before the end of the month.
• The Trekking socks have toes and a smidge of foot. In spite of my attempts to make them match, they turn out to be fraternal, but I’ve decided I’d rather have fraternal socks than rip them out.
• The Apple Laine Party Time socks also have toes and a bit of foot. These are my first socks on two circular needles, 16″ Knit Picks Options. In future, I may keep doing the toes on DPNs, as I found doing them with circs a challenge, but once I have the full complement of stitches on the needles, the two circs are working well. And the yarn is bright and cheerful and happy.

Update on four sweaters:

• The Aran has a couple more sleeve rows.
• Flutter has been one of my frequently-worked-on projects lately; it’s a reasonably mindless knit good for bus rides. I’m a little concerned that the sleeves will be narrower than I find comfortable, and I need to look at the pattern to see whether they’re going to be long for me. But if what I have doesn’t need ripping, I’m well over halfway through the sleeves.
• I knit a couple plain rows on the Turkish sweater, but I really need to run in more ends on the lower section before I start having to run ends in the next section.
• The Baby Surprise Jacket is through the decreases and into the increases.

As for the miscellaneous projects:

• Haven’t touched the microsock ornament.
• The Piano Felted Bag is coming along, though delayed because I had to steal needle parts to work on Flutter for a bit. I’ve got about eight rows of one color to do, and then I’ll probably go ahead and start the keyboard chart.
• All cross-stitch has been ignored.
• The loom is still waiting for me to get some leather conditioner and to adjust the harness height.
• The latch-hook rug hasn’t been touched in a while. I’m not too worried about that one languishing; if I get a reasonably neurotypical child this time, in a few years I might see whether he shares my childhood fascination with making latch-hook stitches.

The Flower Basket Shawl is done and in the mail. Yay! I almost started Heere Be Dragone afterwards, but I don’t have a one-piece #2 needle, and I don’t want to try this with my Boye interchangables, so I’m waiting for the needle to arrive.

Other progress:

• The Dancing Socks are growing, I’m pretty close to the heel.
• I’m on the last skein for the Fat-Bottomed Bag and hoping I have enough yarn. (If not, I’ll see what I can find that’s similar for the strap holders.)
• The Baby Surprise Jacket is nearing the end of the decreases.
• The Piano Felted Bag is in the top striping section; pretty soon I’ll start the keyboard stranded section.
• I did a few more repeats on the Flutter Cardigan sleeves.
• Also a few rows on the Aran sweater.
• I actually pulled out the Turkish sweater (and had to shuffle needles, as there’s only two pairs of adapters for the Boye interchangeables — another reason to build up my stash of KnitPicks Options?) and completed the bottom section. Still have to run in a gazillion ends, though, and I’d better do that before I get too much further.