Saturday, October 6, 2007

Fall Fiber Festival

I think I'm losing it. We took a little trip out to the Fall Fiber Festival at James Madison's Montpelier and I came back with -- absolutely nothing! Not even any photos. It was dusty, hot and humid, and I couldn't even bear to touch the camera with my lemonade sticky hands. Oh well, it's not like I don't have any yarn, fiber, or other goodies at home already. Still, I did notice lots of lovely alpaca -- in the "fluff" and as spun yarn.

Since there are no festival photos, I suppose I should distract you with an update of the Falkenberg Plissé. Here you go:

What you are seeing is one half of the upper bodice heading out to the sleeve. That's lots (and lots) of knitting folks! For some reason I keep hearing Pete Seeger's voice singing "Inch by inch, row by row..." OK, it's a song about gardening, but it still resonates. Bonus points to everyone who knows who Pete Seeger is (without googling). What scares me, more than a little, is the rate of yarn usage. Kits be very nervous making indeed. (I know, bad grammar, but imagine it said in a pirate accent, arghhh.)

5 comments:

Laurinda said...

Ooh, I know who Pete Seeger is...though with that song, I tend to get Raffi's voice stuck in my head instead. Somehow, when I was assembling boxes at work, Little Boxes always got stuck in my head. You definitely are slipping, not coming home with anything...unfortunately, I don't have that problem. Love your blog.

Laurinda

Anonymous said...

I'm also knitting this design, and I'm a few rows behind you. I'm also worried about the rate at which I'm using up yarn. Mind you, I did make two large swatches that I plan to unravel and reuse, but I'm at the beginning of the first sleeve and already about to start ball three of eight. By the way, did you manage to get row gauge on this pattern? My gauge is more like 26 st and 48 rows (instead of the 44 called for).

Your Plisse looks grand so far...but it's a whole lotta knitting, I agree.

Karen said...

Laurinda -- I blame the heat for lack of shopping -- however I did come thisclose to bringing some very nice alpaca home. Lisa -- yes indeed, my row gauge is slightly off too -- but the other way -- closer to 42? I don't want to sound too alarmist, but with a denser row gauge I would be 'very' worried about running out. (That was my problem with Tokyo, and also why I gave up with Falkenberg's yarn and knit it in a yarn that I 'could' get row gauge with.) Fingers crossed for you -- will you be able to get extra (easily)?

FairyGodKnitter said...

It looks great. I love the color. The sleeves on this thing do eat up a lot of yarn. I thought I'd use 5 skeins for the bodice and sleeves and then have 3 for the skirt but it was more like 5 1/2 with only 2 1/2 for the skirt. But that was just enough to finish it, I have about 6inches of yarn left over. And I did get a little more length in blocking. Still, I wish the kit was a bit more generous, I'd have paid a few more bucks for one more skein of yarn.

Karen said...

Only six inches left over? Oh my, that's too close for comfort!