The Ballad of Elenor Amell

The time has come for me to tell the story of the Traveling Woman. This event has been prompted by the fact that I'm still working on the Simple Chevron Scarf and it is not interesting to blog about.

This is the tale of both the shawl  and the tale of the woman that inspired it. Her name is Elenor Amell. She is my player character in Dragon Age: Origins.

Yes, I know this is Inquisition. It's prettier.

As a person who loves characters of all kinds, I tend to overthink my protagonists if video games give me the ability to choose who they are. Elenor Amell is quiet, stoic, and rational. She shows little-to-no emotion on her face and even less through body language. This ice-cold demeanor is the product of fourteen years of practice. Growing up in an inhospitable tower, surrounded by people waiting for her to lose control, she developed a vice-grip on herself and her actions. Everything she does is calculated.

Get underneath that, however, and you find a deeply emotional person. She cares far more than she will ever let show. She believes in the ability of people to do good and tries her best to be that herself. The people she lets in will never know a person that will give more of herself to a cause or a relationship.

She also loves really bad puns and uses her deadpan expression to her complete advantage.

She's my favorite. Because I am a dork, I wanted to make her a shawl. I decided on the colors long before the pattern. Elenor is the Warden-Commander of the Fereldan Grey Wardens and their colors are royal blue and white (I think it should probably be grey, but that's the devs' responsibility). I decided on just royal blue, because I thought those colors contrasted too much in a lace shawl.

She's so pretty. I love her. I'm a dork.

Then, I had to fit a shawl that fit her personality. Elenor is a bit of a plain Jane. She is elegant, but that elegance comes from simplicity. While I love lace shawls with lots of bits and bobs and fancy, those wouldn't suit her. Practicality first, style second. That's her jam.

Traveling Woman was Maker-sent. It fits Elenor perfectly. It's simple stockinette and eyelets for the set-up rows, plus enough lacy goodness in the edging to be elegant but not overly fanciful. The x-large laceweight size is light enough for decoration, but large enough to provide actual warmth. It's beautiful and practical, just like my Fereldan babe.

My decision to make the x-large size was aided by the fact that I was considering which would better impress her boyfriend/lover/hubby/snugglemuffin, Alistair. My friend suggested that I consider this and then I thought about how if she wore the x-large size, she could wear only the x-large size. It would be sexy and adorable.

I am aware these people are fictional. I am aware that I am a complete dork. I am aware that it is incurable. I have made my peace with this.

Anyway, my real point is that I love my characters to a fault sometimes, but I don't consider it a fault when I get a gorgeous shawl out of it.

Holy earrings, batman!

Being shy sucks when you want to take pictures of other people's knitting for your blog, but you're too nervous to actually ask.

I went to the LYS today and worked on the Simple Chevron Scarf. I'm almost through with the ball left-over from the first half, which makes me a little over half-way through the second half. Just a few more days of this and I'll be able to start work on something more interesting.

In the meantime, check out how cool this is. My mum's friend, Kate (no relation), does metal-working semi-professionally and makes her own jewelry. The talent is palpable, as evidenced by that gorgeous earring she's made.

Kate's invited to take me to SAFF this year. She is a beautiful person. This does mean, however, that I'm now on a yarn diet. No buying yarn until SAFF. With my own money, at least -- mum's buying yarn for her sweater.

In the background, there is the Chevron Scarf, being itself. It's going to be gorgeous when it's done, but the going is tough, blog-wise. I'm still working on Blight as well, but it's fairly repetitive right now as well and I can't seem to get good pictures of it.

I'm slightly worried it won't block well, seeing as it's partially acrylic. I might have to steam-block it and I don't know that my steam-iron will actually do the steaming part. Plus, I was hoping to block it here instead of at home. Mum isn't supposed to see it until Christmas.

A pretty awesome project

I started the second half of the Simple Chevron Scarf and I realized something.

I don't actually have a problem with the repetition of the scarf. I've complained about it a lot, but the truth is, I rather like the repetition. I went to a spoken word reading at the library today and it was the perfect project to work on without distracting myself. I watched almost a full season of Parks & Rec this week and it was the perfect project to keep my hands occupied while I watched Leslie Knope and Ben Wyatt being adorable. I've been grinding through side quests in Dragon Age: Inquisition like crazy and it's the perfect project to knit during cutscenes and loading screens.

(I also have classes and my livelihood and whatever, but how is that important?)

It is a pretty awesome project to work on. The problem is that it isn't a pretty awesome project to write about. There's no excitement in it. No changes in color, no fancy lace, nothing. It's the same row over and over for 40 inches (it was supposed to be 36 but I lost track of time -- I have enough yarn for it, so I don't care). Twice. It's about as interesting to write about as watching paint dry and I want to write about knitting.

That said, I think this blogging thing is going to work out better than I thought it would.

Stitchin' 'n' Bitchin'

I went to my first ever stitch 'n' bitch today. I know it's a crime that it's my first ever. I've been knitting for four years now, you'd think I would have gotten together with some other knitters in that time. Alas, I don't know any other knitters and my hometown has no LYS so there wasn't really opportunity to meet them. Now I live just outside of a city and there are plenty of yarn stores around.

Real-life yarn, how I have missed thee.

I have yet to figure out the public transportation system here, though, so I was picked up on campus by a friend of my mother's, who has recently taken up knitting and lives in the area. Her stitch 'n' bitch largely consisted of women in their sixties with personalities. Everyone has personalities, of course, but these ladies had big personalities.

I will tell you one thing: if you have the chance to sit around and knit with a group of older women with strong opinions and even stronger Brooklyn accents, take that chance. They called YouTube videos "the youtubes." It was a beautiful experience. I'm going again next week.

I kind of wish I'd had something more interesting to work on, though. They were working on beautiful scarves and sweaters and afghans while I stitched away at the Simple Chevron Scarf. It's getting fairly long. I'm thinking that I will cast off the first half within the week. I switched over to straights so I could start my mum's shawl and I've realized at this point that I will never have enough size 6 needles. Not possible.

I want to live in Canada

It is 62° degrees Fahrenheit in Toronto, Ontario right now. It is 68°F in Quebec City, Quebec and Halifax, Nova Scotia. It is 75°F in Winnipeg, Manitoba. It is 76°F in Fredericton, New Brunswick. It is 62°F in Victoria, British Columbia. It is 61°F in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island. It is 77°F in Edmonton, Alberta. It is 61°F in St. John's, Newfoundland. It is 40°F in Yellowknife, in the Northwest Territories and Iqaluit in Nunavut and 42°F in Whitehorse, in the Yukon. The only place that I don't really want to go to is Saskatchewan -- it's 84°F in Regina.

My point isn't that I now know the names and capitals of Canada's provinces and territories. It's that Canada knows that it is autumn and most of the US hasn't caught on yet. It's almost the middle of September and I haven't seen a single yellow or red leaf, never mind orange. The only state that currently has its crap together, weather-wise, is Alaska at 53°F in Juneau, and their politics frighten me.

See anything other than green? Yeah, me neither.

This wouldn't be as big a deal if I didn't now live in the mountains. I was promised a respite from the horror that is fall in the southern states. Yes, it is 71°F today, but it's also been raining statewide for almost a week now. It might be a bit cooler but it's also as humid as Satan's shower out there. No fun.

I am a knitter. I was made for soft yarn and blazing fires and pumpkin spice and snow. My parents should know my pain -- my dad's from upstate New York (currently at 60°F) and my mom's from Moscow (52°F). Why they thought it would be a good idea to move to the gates of hell, I have no idea. It was 100°F here this year -- that's about 37°C for metric readers. That is not good weather to be working with wool. That isn't good weather for anything.

Still, I've been steadily working through the death-rays of sunshine. Most of this work has been conducted indoors, as I am not a masochist when it comes to heat -- only cabling. I've almost reached the end of the first ball of Palette and am on my way to the halfway point. I'm thinking another half-ball and then I'll bind off and start the next half. Then I'll throw myself off a bridge from a combination of repetitiveness and heat.

I have a schedule, you see.

Nightmares and progress

I had a dream last night that I knit five repeats of an Estonian lace shawl and then noticed a glaring mistake in the second repeat. Let's just say I didn't sleep well last night.

Progress is going faster than expected on the Chevron scarf. I have abandoned it at times for a different project (I'll get to that in a moment), but all things considered, the first half is almost 14" long. Usually, I would expect to have knit more stitches in a week, but considering how repetitive this pattern is, I count myself fortunate that I haven't abandoned it entirely.

Abandoned it entirely is the key word. While I haven't done that, I have begun work on the mother's shawl. She still doesn't know about it -- in fact, I get the impression that she is unhappy about my aunt presumably getting one before her. Which is actually pretty great for me. Who says I can't keep a secret?

I decided on Deborah Frank's Blight for the shawl pattern, instead of Nightsongs, like I had originally been planning. Blight has a more organic shape for its leaves than Nightsongs and I am picky. The yarn is self-striping, which has me worried a little about whether or not it will continue to self-stripe once I get to the high stitch count rows. Future Me can deal with that.

Speaking of my mother, I still have no yarn for the swirl jacket. Mum wants Preciosa Tonal in Stormy and that colorway is out of stock until the end of the month. Actually, she could probably go with any yarn somewhat soft, but I'm dead set on working with that 100% merino goodness. She just picked the color.

As I'm fairly sure I'm going to finish both the shawl and the scarf by the end of this month, my eye has started to wander. The "playing video games while knitting" thing has somewhat backfired, as I very much want to make these for myself.

It's important that I have them. The only thing currently stopping me from snapping up yarn to make them is that I can't find any in the right colors. Either the blue is too light or dark, or the red is too purple. Grey tends to be okay no matter what yarn I look at.

I know the best idea is to go to an LYS and ask them, but I'm not familiar with any in my area yet and I haven't figured out the public transportation system anyway. These are the perils of moving.

Laborious Pursuits

Labor Day, according to Wikipedia, is to celebrate the American labor movement. I didn't know that until I Googled it for the purposes of writing this blog entry. Learn something every day.

This year, Labor Day for me, is less about celebrating the American labor movement, though I am most grateful to all those who gave their lives and livelihoods to fight for the ability for all of us to have safer working conditions and earn living wages.

Labor Day is about getting to go home for the weekend. This is my first year away from home at college and I have yet to get to the part where I'm at home enough in the environment for it to be fun.

Being home for the weekend has the added bonus of giving me the ability to block shawls. Travelling Woman is finished. Ends are weaved in, it is all bound off, and it has been stretched across a king-sized mattress and soaked with water until it became the beauty you see before you.

I had a long post about this, because I have a whole line of long, complicated reasoning as to why this shawl exists, in this color, in this style. The short version is this: I have a player character in Dragon Age: Origins named Elenor Amell. She is calm, elegant, rational, and classy and I would very much like to embody those qualities. Therefore, I made a shawl for her me, inspired by something that I thought she would wear.

Not too over-the-top fancy, not plain enough to be missed. A beautiful, elegant, understated shawl in a shade of blue representing the Grey Wardens, an organization she counts herself lucky to be a part of. The shawl is a fitting tribute to a character I adore.

I can't work on my mother's shawl at home, so I've begun work on my aunt's Christmas present. After dismissing multiple patterns for being wrong (I tried one knitted lengthwise - that didn't work out well), I've settled on Aimee Alexander's Simple Chevron Scarf. I've also decided to make my aunt a shawl. I didn't think it was something she would like, but my mum laughed at that idea, so I think that means she would like one.

That's going to take a bit, though, because I don't know what colors she likes. Making a neutral-toned scarf is driving me mad and I think if I see another skein of cream-colored yarn again, I will rip my hair out.

Ahem. The Chevron scarf, while attractive, is somewhat repetitive. Just a little bit. I think I'm going to start my mum's shawl soon, just so I can work on a project that changes over time. In the meantime, I'm going to watch Castle and pretend that I don't have to go back to school tonight.

Gifts from the PO

I got mail today. I love getting mail. It makes me feel important, wanted. Like someone in the world feels I am worthy of love and envelopes.

Even if that person is me. KnitPicks had a 15% off sale last week, which was an amazing thing for a multitude of reasons. One, yarn was cheaper. Two, I need about 1200 yards for the sweater I want to make for myself. Three, yarn was cheaper. Four, I needed yarn for Christmas gifts. Five, yarn was cheaper. Six, there's some semi-expensive yarn I wanted for one of my mother's Christmas gifts (or possibly New Year's. Depends on if it's too hot to knit in the Caribbean -- that's a different story). Seven, yarn was cheaper.

You can smell the wool and burning hole in my pocket in the air.

Obviously, I found this the perfect excuse to buy a metric crapload of new yarn. Anyone who thinks this was a bad move can let the door close behind you on the way out. Have a great day, but don't enter this place again. We don't want your kind here, mostly because we don't think you would have a good time among us bad-decision makers.

The prized new stash item is these two skeins of Chroma Fingering Weight, in Lake Front. It will become a shawl in the future, probably Gail (aka Nightsongs) by Jane Araújo. My mum likes green and other colors, and she likes lakes, and she likes leafy things. She's into gardening. So, I think and hope she will like this.

I do love my mom though. She always appreciates knitted things.

 

Second up is three skeins of Palette Fingering Weight in Coriander Heather.  This will become something for my aunt. My aunt is classy, modern, fashionable. I have no earthly idea what to make for her. I'm going home for this weekend and I'm hoping my mother will be able to help me with this

I also have 10 skeins of Palette in Ivy, which will eventually become St. Brigid by Alice Starmore. I've chosen to try and pursue an Alice Starmore pattern because I quite obviously hate myself. Evidence that further supports this is that I was looking at it and thinking: I could totally knit the body partially in the round.

I think I might actually die of knitterly angst.

Thankfully, my adventures in Starmore probably won't be started until after I finish Silken Dreams by Sandra McIvers. My mother bought me a book full of swirl jacket patterns last month, out of the goodness of her heart, and also because I told her I would make her one. I don't have yarn for it, because I also told her she could pick it out. I'm not telling her which jacket I'm making though. That is a surprise.

I'm kind of hoping that I haven't told her I have a blog yet. That would ruin the surprise. I don't think I have, or at least I don't think I've told her the name. We'll see.