Works in Progress: Olympic Knitting Update

So far, I've really enjoyed the Ravellenic games, which celebrate knitting during the winter Olympics in Soochi.  Two of my three knitting projects are complete.  I've also frogged two projects that weren't working out, and have shared that yarn with other knitters in the Torch Passing project.

My first finished project is a Bray hat, which I knit with the Brooklyn Tweed Shelter yarn I raved about last week.  Other knitters have complained that it breaks easily, but I found it to be very pleasant to knit with and the color is gorgeous.

The second project is the Little Shells Shawlette, which I knit in Fleece Artist Woolie Silk 3-ply that I dyed into a lovely, variagated pale, pale pink colorway.  If you haven't knit with this yarn, you should.  It was a joy.  And the finished product is really awesome.

I ran into a problem with the shawlette.  I took the directions very literally when they said to cast off loosely.  And I did.  If you look closely at the picture above you can see that although the points are long and lovely, the cast off in between them is a sort of nasty, too-loose affair that wasn't very attractive.

With the help of Jaime at In the Making, Birmingham's best yarn shop, I managed to frog the cast off and get the stitches back on the needles.  There was a bad moment last night around 1 am where I realized two stitches weren't where they needed to be, but the pattern is so well written I was able to figure out where they belonged and do some careful laddering to get everything in place.  Another cast off — this time not particularly loose — and everything looks much better as it blocks.

I'm wildly ecstatic to have finished both of these projects in just over a week!  It feels like some pretty good Olympic knitting.

I haven't finished, actually haven't made much progress, on my third project, Adrian Bizilla's Flocked Mittens.  I finally had to admit to myself that I don't know how to knit continental, I can't fake it, and I need to spend some time learning how to do it, so I can properly knit with both hands and do justice to the color work in this pattern.  I don't expect to finish these anytime soon and certainly not during the Olympics, but I'm in love with the picot edge and braided trim, so in and of itself, this has been a great learning experience so far.