Poly-lace-amous

[Editor's Note: Kindly excuse the lack of photos. I have tried for three days to upload photos here, and nada is the result. Use your imagination; that's likely to be better than my photography skills anyway. Sorry!]

Apparently, I'm only supposed to have one teammate (aka lace project) for Amazing Lace. And right now, I'm smitten with six projects (well, more than that, lots more, actually, but I'm only counting lace projects here) - how can I choose among these beauties?

Mohair, for those cool nights of late spring and early summer. Four ounces of hand-dyed mohair plucked, a decade or more ago, from Elaine Eskesen's shop in Damariscotta, Maine. It's destined to be Eugen Beugler's Ostrich Plumes stole from the Spring '96 Interweave Knits. However, first I have to get by the slight problem that half-way through the first repeat, I have 5 more stitches than I should have. Just a little jog in the road to paradise...

Sea Silk, for the sticky days of August. Here we have a lovely ball of pink and green Hand Maiden Sea Silk, just waiting to be knit up into, into, ... well, hell, I know I had that pattern around here somewhere. I think it's Evelyn Clark's Flower Basket Shawl from the Fall '04 Interweave Knits, but I'd know for sure if I could just find the damn pattern. I know I tried knitting a swatch on circs and the tips kept sliding right out of the yarn, so I bought myself a pair of bamboo straights, which are, by some miracle, with the yarn, but the pattern .... well, maybe by my next post.

Cashmere, for always, in subtle grayed blue. Which is about how long it's going to take me to knit the Peacock Feathers Shawl from Fiddlesticks Knitting. Especially since when I tried to swatch, the yarn broke on row #3. That would be the first row of real laciness, after two rows of garter stitch. Prediction: This one's just for show, at least for this summer.

Jaeger's Trinity - silk/cotton/polyamide fibre, pale icy blue, for a lovely summer knit. This will, whether it likes it or not, become Katherine Hunt's really lovely Aguave lace pullover, from Knitter's magazine, Summer '05. However, I'm already up (down?) to a third swatch, as swatch #1, with the suggested needle size, was way too big. Swatch #2, with needles two sizes smaller, is still too big, even after washing, so it's on to swatch #3, on, coincidentally, size 3 needles. Here's a pic of Marguerite's finished Aguave - lovely, isn't it? This is the only photo of Aguave Google would find for me, but it's a good one!

Cascade Pima Tencel, deep purple, for those mindless days of summer, when all you want is lots of smooth, sleek stockinette, with just an arabesque here and there to liven things up. Now that I'm finished casting on three times, and have finally figured out that ssk is not k2togtbl, and even conquered that odd double decrease, more or less, I think this Arrowhead Shell by Barbara Venishnick, from Knitter's, will fit the bill. If I don't run out of yarn. I bought the right amount, but somehow it's going by awfully quickly.

Rowan Felted Tweed, wool/alpaca/viscose, tweedy light green, because you'd think I'd know better for summer knitting, but I don't. This is for the gorgeous Jean Moss Eriskay Cardigan, from the Fall 2000 Knitter's magazine. This knit up beautifully, I almost hit gauge on the first try, but then I realized a dreadful fact: This is not lace. This is twisted stitches, not a yarnover in sight. Hell....

Enter Plan B: Conveniently, I went to the Massachusetts Sheep and Wool Fest this past weekend and there I found, in addition to the spinning wheel of my dreams, this beautiful Icelandic laceweight yarn, in the colorway Gemstones, a green/blue mix, from Jager Farm Icelandics, of Haydenville, Massachusetts. I'm saved. And then, browsing through old knitting magazines as I was drifting off to sleep, I came upon Gayle Roehm's Lacy Cables Shawl, from Knitter's of Fall, 2001. I have the right yardage and the pattern even calls for Icelandic laceweight! Clearly, this is destiny calling.

There's not a chance that the Amazing Lace-Mistresses can coerce me into choosing just one of these.

Of course, we can predict that about a third of the way through any of these, I'll get frustrated/bored/seduced by a new pattern or yarn, or maybe even by spinning, and these luscious summer shawls will get stuffed in a bag or a box or a basket, somewhere.

I never was good at yarn monogamy. But a heady summer fling with all of these, all at once, well, sure!