The Burgos shawl

I read this article and liked the woven stripes on the scarves the article is about and decided to reproduce them in knitting. I had a hard time making the horizontal lines look the way I wanted - regular stranded knitting would show the zigzag edges between colours so I added a plastic element.


The stripes are made in two colours (A, B) and then in two shades (1, 2) of striping yarn thusly, starting from purlside:


Row 1: purl in colour B
Row 2: hold two strands of colour B together, the shades should differ. Purl one in shade 1; twist yarns by 180°, purl one in shade 2, repeat until the end of row. Twisting the two yarns helps a bit but this is a pain in the arse anyway.
Row 3: purl 3 in colour A, purl 3 in colour B. If stitch count is not divisible by 6, improvise.
Row 4: knit 3 in colour A, purl 3 in colour B to make columns.
Row 5: as row 3
Row 6: Break colour B, turn the fabric, purl.
Row 7: Use two shades of colour B similarly to row 2, twist the yarn in other direction. While breaking the yarn is not high in my books as I generally prefer to respect the yarn, knitting this from the reverse side, which means having the twists on the back, is just awful.


Stripes are used to one's liking.


Should anyone notice that the blue yarn on the left is apparently handdyed and the breaks between balls are visible - you're right. The darker yarn is indeed darker. Oddly enough, both were the same colour as per ball bands. I thought 9 balls would be enough but they're only 70-ish metres and 25 grams and I wanted a larger wrap. The yarn, OnLine Linie 150, is discontinued so when the dark blue stuff arrived, I was somewhat angry but I decided to make do. I have five balls in grey which will be dyed someday soon.


Today I made a pic of my progress and only then I noticed that since the 2nd stripe, I forgot about the edging (simple stuff, p2 k1 p2 edge, purl on the reverse) and being as anal as I am, I'm correcting it. The edge is rolling towards the back which is why I didn't see the problem immediately but only after 150 or 200 rows.

Little white magicians

It was Nanny Ogg or one of the Ephebean philosophers who said that a jar of marmalade now is no biggie while a promise of a jar of marmalade somewhere beyond the horizon keeps people going on and on and on.

In my case, it's the botanical expedition in May. Long time to go yet and meantime I need to watch the goddamn cold white stuff falling and to deal with people.

My shrink kept prescribing anxiolytics, just in case, and sleeping pills, just in case. I guess that my internal system is set to a day which lasts 24 hours and five minutes because after some time, I have problem falling asleep and a bit of zolpidem not only knocks me off but causes silly dreams (which I probably don't dare to publish. On the other hand, half of my traffic goes from a discussion server where they've already been mentioned. Maybe one day).

The job is stressful, the bunch of idiots filthy underlings employees try how far my nerves will stretch, or maybe they're just dumber than a box of rock, who knows, who cares.

I bought another plant book, I knit and I keep nomming chemicals. I suspect that it's rather the placebo effect than anything else as I hear that good old benzodiazepins work the best but they're somewhat addictive. Well, I think that an addiction is just a mild discomfort compared to the feeling that blood and brain matter is gushing out of my ears after having to listen to some idiotic whine over and over.