the once a year cousins

On the third day of Christmas we had brunch with Roo's Aunt Elizabeth & Uncle John, and Roo's parents, and a whole bunch of cousins. Our kids played with the cousins' kids while I figured out once again what second cousins are. It was fun.

And, Branching Out made its first public appearance.

Here it is being blocked.

I have to say that I was a little worried about being able to wear it. It feels so soft and light as air in your hands, but occasionally I'd bring it up to my neck and think 'oh-oh, I'll go mad with itchiness if I wear this next to my skin'. I figured I'd have to wear it OVER a black silky turtleneck. But it really is quite soft & I only fidgeted a bit, and that was to keep my damned shirt from riding down so low because I'm sure there's a limit to how much cleavage is allowed at a family brunch but this Zara shirt refuses to cooperate.

Here it is, being modelled in the artsy photo shoot No, really, that's a picture of the scarf, not of my chest. Reminds me of those artsy Rowan knitting photos where all you see is some chick with lots of messy hair, standing in a field outside an English country house & if you squint, you can kind of see that she's wearing a sweater. That's the thing that you can make if you buy 20 balls of Rowan most expensive and follow the obscure instructions, which say things like, decrease while maintaining pattern on the left and reverse pattern on the right. And after they don't give you instructions for lots of the tricky stuff, they waste several lines of printing space reminding you to join all the pieces of and weave in all the ends. I mean is there any knitter out there, who faced with a sweater in 5 pieces, doesn't know what needs to be done next? And who wouldn't know to weave in the ends? But how to keep the cables from going gimpy while decreasing for the armholes - that, they won't tell you.

Details
Pattern: Branching Out from Knitty.
Yarn: Rowan Kidsilk Haze 70% Super Kid Mohair 30% Silk in Blushes.

Knitting notes: Can't rip Kidsilk Haze. Can carefully tink back a row or two. Best to just avoid making errors. Don't knit the lace rows while doing anything else. On good days, can knit the alternating rows while listening with one ear to dull TV program. Don't use metal needles as your work will just fall off. I finally stole Amelia's Crytalites acrylic needles which felt nice for this project but the size I needed just happened to be translucent fuschia & I really couldn't see my yarn on the needle very well. I have heard many people say bamboo is the ticket for Kidsilk Haze but my only pair of bamboos were too small.

Would I do it again? Hmmm. Definitely not right now. Very satisfying but required just too much attention. I might eventually make it again in a thicker yarn though. For now, I'm going back to socks.