Golden Apples

3 More Rounds--but no Photo.

I am back to a normal pattern of ending with a one plain round —something  I hope to keep with for these last few rounds. Since yesterday, I have knit round 218 (plain) 219 (pattern) and 220(plain).

Next up is round 221-- of 235! --8 more patterned rounds, (and 8 more plain ones) + 2 round as a edge; that's 18 more rounds to the shawl. Then I can bind off--or plead insanity, and add 6 more bonus rounds! I am actually considering the 6 extra rounds and a lacier finish to the final set of feathers.

At this point, it seems I will have enough yarn to do so--(the one gigantic 8 ounce ball is now an flattened one of only 1.75 oz.(about 50gs)--so while a lot of yarn (over a mile) has been knit—there is no worry about running out of yarn. (Since I have another skein of this yarn anyway, well running out of yarn was never really a worry.)

My goal now it to have it done by the end of the month—to keep up with the 2 round routine—even if I take a day or two off as I go along.

Round 219 was my correction round.

Somehow, small errors do creep in—some of the feathers were a stitch short--(somewhere I missed or dropped a YO) some feathers had extra stitches.. (how?!) some feather were not centered (the raised center decrease wasn't exactly in the center of the leaf. In all, about 5 feathers (of 60) had some small defect—but now each of them is perfect.

The defects were small but now all of them are correct-- I am not a super stickler for corrections—I do my best to keep the pattern correct—and try to check each pattern round as I go--(I do have pattern markers every other pattern repeat.) But I have no intention of frogging rounds and rounds of work for a single stitch that is out of place. A small correction or two (or 5) spread out over 60 motifs isn't really going to be noticeable—especially when done mid feather. These corrections would be much more noticeable at the tips--(when a single feather with a bent tip from a K5 together –instead of a knit 3 together stand out.)

Now that it's almost done—I need to find an art supply store and find me some silk paints.

Art supply store are having a rough time—Big box stores like Micheal's and ACMoore carry a lot of the basics (and cheaper,  I suspect, but I haven't been pricing canvases or brushes)--but they don't carry specialty items like silk dye or silk paint. They have some cheap dyes for cotton (tie dyeing T-shirts)--and some stock some dye supplies (synthroll (sp?) for one) but few have mordants (many are toxic) and fewer still have acid dyes or silk paints. Silk paint, unlike dye, doesn't need heat to set. Paint it on, let it dry, and its a permanent color.

But art stores have a hard go at it, competing. Pearl (my favorite art supply store) went under a few years ago, and a local (well not really local anymore, but local for years when I lived in Little Neck) store—Ben's Artarama is gone now some 8 years. Ideally—I find someplace on the island—or will schlep into Manhattan—I am sure some of the great art supply stores on east end of 14^th Street are still there.  I'll bring a feather with me, to color compare.  Until I stopped and really looked at the colors--I never realized how much bronze could be found in an actual feather.  I hope I can find some paints that have  iridescent qualities.. the feathers really light up and change colors.... I'd love to be able to capture that quality.