Purple Dotted Rays

One more Purple Dotted Rays! I love this pattern and I love Stephen West's designs, so addictive!

I started this shawl at the beginning of February this year and happily knitted it in less than ten days. 

The yarn is Italian bobbin merino, white, which I dyed in various shades of red, purple, brown and grey. I am truly in love with the combination I was able to achieve.

When I cast on the shawl back then, I was in a frame of mind towards turning my hobby into a small business and registering a shop on Etsy. So the shawl was to be one of a dozen of items to be listed in the shop. However, after attending several seminars and reading further on Etsy businesses, I became convinced that it was not for me, I simply lack the entrepreneurship enthusiasm, required for such a shop to succeed. So, for now, the idea has been abandoned and the shawl remains the sole item I made for purchase. I intend to keep it for myself, or possibly gift it to Gaby.

But why am I showing it today? Because, back then in the middle of February, I finished the shawl at 99.9% Yes, I ran out of yarn some 20-30 stitches before I finished the I-cord cast off.

I still have over 300 g of the original white yarn and I tried at least 5 times in the course of the year to dye a small amount of it to match the colors of the shawl. But it is so difficult to recreate such a random and colorful combination. The attempts came out too purple, too red, too violet, always strikingly different.

Then, after dyeing my Berry Punch Yarn earlier this month I tried again. My first attempt was sort of orange-purple, but a good base for further retouching. On the following day I added some blotches of grey, bordeaux and brown and I declared it finally good enough to have the shawl finished.

And here it is, in all of its glory on another very cold, bleak and windy December day, in combination with my new purple corduroy skirt and my beloved black Grasser sweater.

Pattern: Dotted Rays by Stephen West
Yarn: Merino Extrafine 150 g, hand dyed
Needle: 3.5 mm circular Addi
Time to knit: 10 days + months of hyatus

Burda Black Dress and Purple Dotted Rays

This is my second Burda #114 06/2021, this time in black ITY fabric. I used the corrections I had made to the pattern when I worked one my leopard tunic earlier this month, introducing a further sway back adjustment. The fit is quite loose, but I find it very comfortable and as the fabric is drapy and fluid, the dress actually looks elegant, not too baggy, despite the amount of positive ease. However, when I make this dress again, I will try to go down a size by self-grading to the next smaller size (the smallest provided for this pattern is 36).

I've always been a staunch advocate of natural fabrics, but this ITY polyester is actually so nice and soft next to the skin and so breathable, that I've been reevaluating my fabric preferences for the summer and now I want a long dress in floral ITY, if I can find such fabric here in Sofia.

Pattern: Burda #113 06 / 2021

Size: 36

Fabric: ITY, 100% polyester

Time to make: 2 days

 And a few pictures of my old new Dotted Rays shawl. Three years ago I knitted my first Dotted Rays, using various yarn remnants. I loved the bright and a bit brave color combination, but the past three year showed that it was not well suited for my wardrobe and I was not using this shawl as often was I wanted. So this spring I decided to unravel the stripes up to the purple part of the old shawl and to overdye the yarn in purple and bordeaux colors. 

The light and darker blue and greenish stripes took the overdyeing quite well and looked in harmony with each other, however the bright yellow yarn kept clashing with the rest of the colors, no matter how much dye I added to it, until it turned dark brown. In the end I decided to leave it aside and dyed a new ball of the same yarn (white merino extrafine) in light purple (the fourth color stripe).

I am extremely pleased with the final result and now I intend to use this new Dotted Rays as much as it deserves - it is the perfect shawl for slightly cold weather

or as a summer evening cover. And although the temperatures these last days have risen drastically here in Sofia, it did come in handy yesterday evening after this photo session, while we were shopping in the cold storage area of our local supermarket :)

Pattern: Dotted Rays by Stephen West
Yarn: Merino Extrafine 150 g, self dyed
Needle: 3.75 mm circular Addi Lace
Time to knit: 10 days

Dotted Rays

My latest project made out of scrap yarn - Dotted Rays by Stephen West. How much I loved this project you might discern from the fact that the minute I finished it I wanted to cast it on in another colorway or at least make the Exploration Station shawl. Pure knitting pleasure!

I had two 30+ gram balls of blue and green turquoise from my Vine Yoke cardigan and two other 30+ balls from my overdyeing experiments with the Haruni Shawl of the same yarn. To liven the colors I dyed some 30+ grams of similar yarn (it was supposed to be the same yarn but it turned very slightly thicker) in golden yellow using left over dye from my Easter egg dyes (this year I felt bad throwing away Easter egg dyes so I kept them after I dyed our eggs :)))

The shawl is very soft and big enough to cover my back or to wrap it around my neck. I didn't want it to grow too much so I blocked it loosely, just washing it and then spreading it to dry without pinning it to form.

Pattern: Dotted Rays by Stephen West
Yarn: Merino Extrafine 150 g, self dyed
Needle: 3.75 mm circular Addi Lace
Time to knit: one week