jbdigriz

Your friend’s cat is a supermodel! They’re giving some Blue Steel right there!

What a fun project, it looks beautiful. Love it!

You can definitely do this. Before you choose a final pattern and yarn, I’d definitely coordinate with your sister to make sure she likes the choices, and they match her dress/theme. Matching it to her dress choice is actually an opportunity to make the item even more unique and special for her…like adding some bead edging accents that match a sparkle or pearl accent on her dress.

For the knitting itself, a few pieces of advice:

-Do a small test piece with the yarn/needles you’re planning to use. This will teach you how to start a pi shawl (fiddly if your first time), if you want more slippery/sticky/blunt/pointy needles, and let you see how it blocks out. This can be your memory doily for your sister’s big day, or perhaps give it to your mother (if you’re close) or to the bride as an additional memory.

-Lifelines, lifelines, lifelines. I’m pretty cherry about dropping down and fixing complex patterns, but lace is extra challenging because of the fine yarn and the fact that the stitches are often harder to read before blocking.

-I love Elizabeth Zimmerman’s Pi shawls. But be aware that the outer rounds take FOREVER. So when you’ve got half the radius done, you are not halfway through. You still have lots and lots (and lots) to go. Just be aware of that from a time management perspective.

Good luck, and I hope your sister and you both love the pattern and yarn that you choose!

If I’m really at odds and just need something to keep my hands busy (but isn’t a ton of commitment) a tea towel. Two inexpensive skeins of cotton, needles aren’t huge or tiny, no fit issues just a general size-ish, and can get weird with colour and texture. I’ve got a pile of them now, and my friends covet being able to pick one for themselves. There’s one for every kitchen and style!

Uuch, yeah, I just went and looked at the chart. Seems pretty challenging to find the rhythm. That’s part of why I set it aside initially; it looked kinda chaotic? Props to you making it through the whole thing. I guess the upside is that it is nearly impossible to see if you made a mistaken cross somewhere, lol.

Oh wow, this is a neat one. I noticed this pattern when it came out, but didn’t really pay it much attention at the time. Looking at your sock, and rechecking the pattern, it looks like all the twisted stitches do a decent job of breaking up the colour in a short-segment variegated yarn. That’s pretty groovy.

And I love that colour combo; reminds me of the beach. Your recipient was lucky, hope they enjoyed 'em!

One of my absolute favourites of all time is Sprouting. Such a nice fit, cables aren’t very stressful but are enough to not be boring, works with solid to moderately variegated yarns.

Another one I come back to, since I have a proclivity for neon-technocolour-short-dye-repeat yarns, is Crusoe. It seems to have the magical ability to tame even the most stubborn pooling and highlight all the pretty colours in a skein that has all the pretty colours, if you know what I mean.