shawlette + movies for the queue

A friend of mine has a beautiful, peaceful urban garden, and yesterday seemed like a perfect opportunity for a photo shoot.

pattern: Berger shawlette, by Lisa Fliss

yarn: Orange Flower MCN fingering weight, "boysenberry"

~ 300 yds (2/3 skein)

needles: Clover US 7 bamboo circs

my ravelry project page

notes:

Easy, free pattern. Seriously, this knit up in an instant, as the stockinette body goes lightning fast. I absolutely love the yarn -- I used a different colorway for my Wandering the Moor shawlette, and it holds up beautifully and has a good balance of drape and body. Plus it's super soft.  Overall, a win-win project. The pattern requires a small amount of yarn, so it's a great way to use a short-ish skein of fancy merino sock yarn.

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film recommendations

I'm always on the lookout for movies that are different and interesting (no Transformers for me, thank you very much), and these two fit the bill lately:

Trollhunter -- a Norwegian mock documentary about film students following a man they suspect of poaching. Surprise, he turns out to be a grizzled, slightly disgruntled government employee -- on the Troll Security Service.

Junebug -- a film that explores class and cultural conflicts, as a newly-married couple heads from Chicago to the husband's hometown not just to meet the family, but for the wife to convince an "outsider artist" into signing up with her gallery. It's a film that does a good job of showing rather than telling, and it's uncomfortable at times as it explores how people negotiate relationships, their day-to-day lives, and their anxieties. Paul wasn't too keen on this at first, but really came to appreciate it in hindsight. Junebug does a good job of building characters, which I (like Ebert) value.

Does anyone have film recommendations to share?  I also saw Bridesmaids, which was a hoot (plus it was great to see Milwaukee on the silver screen), but everyone knows about that one already.

framboise

Done and dusted! I enjoyed knitting Hilary's beautiful Citron pattern. Miles of stockinette, perfect for knitting night or catching up on a boatload of Masterpiece Mystery episodes.

 pattern: Citron, by Hilary Smith Calais

yarn: Sweet Georgia Yarns Superfudge, 1 skein (~550 yds)

needles: Clover US 7 bamboo circular

 my ravelry project page

notes:
Easy, classic pattern that will be very wearable. I intended all along to give this shawlette to a friend, but parting with it will still be difficult. I didn't get to knit the whole ruffle -- 100% my own fault, as I substituted a fingering-weight yarn (for laceweight), upped the needle size, and blissfully ignored gauge issues. I'll definitely revisit this pattern for myself.

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So, back to Masterpiece Mystery...  this is an addiction I've cultivated since childhood (credit the Edward Gorey intro for that one), and luckily I married someone who enjoys it, too.

The most recent Poirot episodes have been beautifully shot, and the wardrobes and sets are magnificent, but the actual stories... oy vey. I know that David Suchet would like to finish the entire Poirot catalog, but I get the impression that they're now scraping the bottom of the barrel (not the best Agatha Christie has to offer).



I'm also getting caught up on Wallander -- Kenneth Branagh is fantastic, and the whole milieu is evocative (plus that amazing theme song by Emily Barker and the Red Clay Halo). That said, Scandinavian crime fiction and TV series seem particularly awful to read and watch given the terrible events in Norway this past week. My heart goes out to my family's homeland.

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On a more uplifting note, my friends are in the midst of a baby boom! So many opportunities to knit wee sweaters and the like.

I'm branching out and trying a new pattern, the little garter cardigan by Ragga Eiriksdottir (from Knitting Iceland). Don't worry -- the shocking pink yarn is all waste yarn -- there will be no gaudy contrast in the finished product. I absolutely love how Ragga incorporates an i-cord edge as you knit the body. It's very clever, and Elizabeth Zimmermann would highly approve! The pattern is pithy and expects you to use your noodle as you knit -- it would be very easy to miss the instructions for buttonholes. Susan B. Anderson just posted a very handy tutorial on how to do a crochet provisional cast-on that works well for this cardi.

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in other news...

- Spotify is now available in the U.S.! Are you using it? I am! It's pretty handy and user-friendly.

- Brooklyn Tweed's new Wool People pattern collaboration is just beautiful! It makes me long for autumn. Gudrun Johnston's Levenwick assymetrical cardigan pattern has captured my fancy. I'm not sure I'm ready to cough up the cash for Shelter, though. I wonder if some stashed Cascade 220 or Rowan tweed might do the trick?

- The fall 2011 issue of Knitscene is out, and some of the projects are just lovely! I've let my Interweave Knits subscription lapse (there's never anything in there that I want to knit anymore) -- perhaps it's time to switch to Knitscene.