Knitting fiend

I’ve been a knitting fiend lately. Every spare minute after work has been taken up by yarn. I need to keep knitting, as fast as possible, because I have 5 days left to finish this current project. Why 5? Because I need to finish before the end of the closing ceremony of the Olympics.

When I started following the Yarn Harlot and read a bit about the Knitting Olympics, I was inspired (as I frequently am after reading her posts). After joining Ravelry, that event continued to be in the back of my mind. I wasn’t sure if the Knitting Olympics would be a go again for Vancouver, but I knew that the Ravelympics were in the planning stages. Here was the perfect opportunity to take a break and knit something for myself while also challenging me a bit. Don’t get me wrong, I love making things for other people, but being a bit selfish once in awhile is okay too!

First I found the yarn – Malabrigo sock yarn in the Solis colorway, a great mix of blues, greens, and teal. Then came the project, or at the least an idea for one. I wanted to do some kind of wrap – maybe lace, maybe not – in the form of something shawl-like. Triangular shawls don’t really appeal to me, for whatever reason, so that took a lot of patterns out of the running. Originally I was going to try for the Candle Flame Shawl. The idea of doing a flame pattern in a blue-green yarn just really appealed to me. But a free copy of the pattern was elusive and in the end I would have to alter too much (the edging, style of ends, etc) to suit me, especially considering this would be my first lace-style pattern. I knew I had to do something that didn’t specifically need lace-weight yarn, both because I had already picked up the Malabrigo, and because I wanted something with a bit more heft than normal lace.

Finally I found the Leaf Lace Scarf pattern and I was hooked. I made a minor alteration, repeating the pattern five times so I would get a wider, wrap-sized piece. Needle size I kept the same – 4 – because after a quick swatch (training for my event!) that seemed to be giving me the size I was looking for. Gauge really isn’t an issue; I just wanted to be sure I was getting the right width with five repeats.

So now, here I am, a member of Team Tardis and entered in the Short Track Shawl event for the Ravelympics. Right now I’m just over 60% done and hoping that I’ll finish just in time – it’s going to be a close one. The catch? I want to watch as much Olympic coverage as possible. The winter games are my favorite, and I’ll watch pretty much anything from curling to skiing to, of course, hockey. Although I can’t technically do both at once – I have never mastered the ability to knit without watching what I’m doing – I’m very used to listening really well and looking up at the important parts of TV shows, movies, and now Olympic events. I love watching athletes come out of nowhere and win medals, sometimes the first for their countries; or athletes who have no real chance of winning – but compete with such hope and joy that you’d never know it. I’ve been cheering for Georgians, Latvians, Slovenians, and Jamaicans right along with the Americans. My heart breaks for the Dutch speedskater who listened to his coach and was DQed from a gold medal, and for the Canadian figure skater who just lost her mother. I’m a sucker for the stories and for the competition.

But for now, before coverage starts again tonight? Must keep knitting . . .