Thanks to Betsy, and her generous gift package of Aeros last winter, I will finish the Cowl Neck Shell.  I worked on it in the car, when I wasn’t acting as co-pilot and navigator ( both being important jobs during rush hour (s) and we did manage to hit morning and evening).  I’m nearly finished with the front dart decreases and increases.  The stitches slide much more easily, if only the Aeros had a more flexible band  I’d really love  them.  So, I figured that I’d keep going on it, that is, until I got a message from Margene.  You can read   her morning’s post if you want to get the jist of it.  Here it is… the shell is going to grow… hmmm, not good at all.  This is a rather fitted pattern, not suitable for growing.

see, it has darts.. it’s a fitted pattern 

I, like Margene, have lost weight, quite a bit in fact, more than 25lbs.  If it grows, it will look awful.  Margene just frogged her Summer Tweed Camomile for that reason.  Doesn’t make me want to pick up the needles this morning.
Margene also has links to some great stretches and excercises for back, shoulder, neck, you name it… every place we are / I am hurting these days.  I do blame a lot of it on my knitting and computing positions.  Repetitive stress, a term we all hear, all the time.  It goes for the fun stuff too.   Today is treatment day four, I still can’t knit more than a few rows without a break.  The tension starts building in my neck and shoulders and I know I have to stop.

Cindy asked what pattern I’m swatching.  Trying to pin me down are you??  I really loved the sweater Kim wore last weekend, her Paprika.  I may start the sleeve in the silk/ linen as a real swatch.. ahem.. after I finish the C.N. Shell.  I’m nearly out of project bags. It’s time. They’ve circled my chair like a wagon train and I’m beginning to feel the pressure.  Just beginning..  I am also carrying a sock around with me, progress at hand?

A couple years ago I picked up some wonderful Adrienne Vittadini blue silk / linen yarn at the JCA sale.  Tonight I swatched it , it matches Gauge perfectly.  Last year I bought a cone of beautiful heathered blue wool/ silk ( very similar to the Lavold yarn).  It also swatched perfectly for the same pattern.   Decisions.  I’ve switched needles on the Summer Tweed.  First up my black ebony, then the addis, and finally… the winner, tho’ I still do not like working with this yarn… the Aeros.  Who’d have thought?
It’ll be a very early morning, a trip to CT for a funeral.  I’ll get some knitting done in the car, time to pack up and get some sleep.

As the shawl neared completion, I started poking around my stash, checking the myriad of knitting bags surrounding my chair and running through my memory for projects to begin.  It’s spring, summer is closing in fast so I figured the best plan of attack would be to finish the cowl neck shell that I left half finished last fall.  It’s knit with Rowan’s Summer Tweed.  It’s the last project, and the only project, I’ll ever knit with this yarn.  I love the color, hate the yarn.  The fabric is fine, but maybe a tad heavy for a shell.  There isn’t any give to the yarn at all.  It makes my hands tired, every stitch feels like a struggle.  Tonight I took it to Tuesday night knitting.  It took a few minutes to figure out what / where I hat left it.  It took a LOT longer than that to find where I had stashed the pattern and my notes.  Tomorrow, I’ll switch to different needles.  It’s on a circular black ebony #7.. maybe an addi, it’ll need something slippery but with a good point. 
I washed up a few yards each of several yarns that were sitting on cones in my office in order to swatch them for projects.  I saw a ‘barn jacket’ type sweater at NH last weekend that I really liked.  It’s from the Green Mountain Spinery book and a possibility.  Kim wore a beautiful sweater ( Paprika) that I’m also thinking about, maybe in a silky wool, one of the washed samples.  How about another shawl, I can never have enough.  They are terrific projects to carry with and I have some ‘Autumn Rose’ in the merino/silk singles that I’ve kept out for myself and would love to find the right pattern for..
I’m hiking three miles in the afternoons to help relieve my back pain.  The doctor said last week that he was surprised I was still walking.  Even after all the treatments this week, it’s still sore, sitting and standing are painful, walking no problem.  My hikes are through the woods.

The days of early spring are nearly over.  The lace of the early foliage, chartruese weft against the warp of the tree trunks will be gone for this year in a day or two.  This afternoon I noticed  that the leaves were plumping out, the fat days of summer almost here.  Time to shift gears..