Faith by Kim Hargreaves

I have been making some progress with Faith. As I mentioned before, I had to re-knit the back shoulder shaping and the sleeves since the sleeves were much smaller than the shoulder shaping. For some reason, this always, always happens to me. If it's the other way around (the shoulder shaping smaller than the sleeves), it would not be too bad; just the sleeves look a bit puffy, like french sleeves, which I actually like very much....

Anyway, now it looks like the the sleeves and the body match. YAY! I can never get the picture that shows the right color, but at least you can see the sleeves and the body are in the right size (sorry about the un-blocked parts. I hate blocking).

I have started to knit the left front. I had a hard time with the bottom lace part for some reason. The first attempt turned out to be ginoumous. I might be reading the chart wrong, but it seems that I get 12 picots (I'm knitting the medium size to get xs-s since my yarn is a lot thinner than the suggested one ao that the gauge is very off) before the curve starts, which is waaay too big. I looked various pictures on Raverly, and it seems that there are only 10 picots before the curve starts for the medium size. Why??? In any case, I tried like 5 times before getting an adequate result. Now the front piece might be a tad narrow (could use 1/8 inch extra width, but I can steam iron cr@p out of it, I guess), comparing with the back, I think I can live with it. I am now starting the shoulder shaping for the left front.

When not working

I've been in knitting frenzy when I ever have any spare time. I've been working on faith cardigan as well as Louisa Harding's Marie (from Dauphine).

I am soooo in love with the yarn Thalia. It's such a shame that the yarn is discontinued. I was very lucky to score 8 skeins in color 1 at ebay. The yarn is actually tape which looks almost transparant with varigated gray and tan wool as well as gold metalic thread running through. There are many other patterns (like Augustine, Rose and Terese) I want to knit with Thalia from the book. In fact, her books from 2009 use Thalia. Why then is this yarn discontinued???? It makes no sense. In any case, I love this book. I love almost all of the patterns!!! I'll definitely buy more of her books.

The suggested needle is US 10 1/2 and 11, but I have never used such big needles!!! I bought some clover bamboo needles at JoAnn. It feels sooo weired to knit with large needles, since I'm so used to knitting with US3 or 4. I don't think I usually use anything bigger than US6. Now I remember that I had hard time knitting Calmer with US8, even though I love the yarn.

I originally casted on size S, but it seemed too wide so that I recasted 8 stitches less. Now it seems a bit too narrow on top, though the bottom looks just about right. I hope it won't be too small. I'm done with the back, and just started to work on the front.

My faith cardigan is not working.....The sleeve of the back seems to be waaaaay too big comparing with the sleeve I finished. I flogged the back down to where the sleeve decrease starts, and added several rows to the bottom before starting the decrease. Hope this will shrink the sleeve opening without making the body too short. I also reknitted the sleeve so that the shoulder part is larger by adding a few increase around the middle of the sleeve but repeating the decrease until getting the same number of the stitch as suggested (does it make sense?). I hope this works out.....

By the way, I am a major tea snobb, and must have my cuppa in the morning. But why is it so hard to find high quality loose tea in US??? I just bought some Harney & Sons tea and Kusmi tea from here. I didn't really think about where the phyisical location of this etailer was until I saw the USPS website for the tracking number....it's Orlean, NY of all places. I used to live in Ithaca, NY and have driven through the area so many times. I felt quite a bit nostalgic about my time in Ithaca. Even though I used to complain about the long, cold, snowy winter, I actually miss that place quite a bit.

Now that it is finally cooling down in SoCal, I can make my hot cup of tea with plenty of milk, and sit with my yarn (just for now before going back to my work....), thinking of good old times in snowy Ithaca......