A knitting blog should have knitting...

Right?

And so I do.  Along with gathering up projects long-planned but delayed in execution (off with their heads!), I have also been gathering up WIPs.  By which I mean, if I am going to be entirely honest, I have been sidling up to my WIPs, trying not to make direct eye contact, lest they charge.

However, I have finished two of them.  They are two of the most recently cast-on, admittedly, but they are, nevertheless, off the needles.

The first is the Leif Slipover, which I knitted for Older Daughter.

I have my doubts about the wearability of this vest, to be absolutely frank.  It's bulky.  I admit that I have serious prejudices about bulky yarn - most of those have to do with the fact that it's...well...bulky.  It doesn't drape in any sense of the word.  I guess it's cozy (right?).  And cozy is nice.  I think what it boils down to for me, though, is that I never feel like it's moving with me when I wear bulky stuff.  I feel like my clothes are wearing me instead of the other way around.  I'm really hoping that Older Daughter doesn't share my prejudices.  (It may help that she has easily four inches on me, too; I think height helps when wearing big clothes.)(OK, I guess it's almost five inches by now.  I'm still in denial.)

Here's what made me knit it, though.

That, right there, is a very cool design feature.  Very cool.  And I do love how sculptural the cables are at this gauge.  I knitted it on size 15 needles, instead of 17s, but other than that, I knitted the pattern as written.

I also knitted it because it seemed like a cool, teenager-y sort of knit.  I so hope I'm right.  It hasn't been blocked - in no small part because I think it'd take forever to dry, and we're finally having some coolth around here, so I thought she might want to wear it.  I'll ascertain whether I'm right and then find a time to block it - maybe that'll improve the drape?

The cables are cool, though.

I should be more enthusiastic about this one, I know.  It's the color she wanted, and I'm pretty sure she likes it.  I think that this particular knit just combined too many elements of which I am not fond, and, frankly, I was totally underwhelmed by the pattern-writing.  I kept wondering where IK's tech editor was on the day they finalized it for print (and I know enough to know that this may have nothing to do with the designer's original pattern-writing skills).  There were a lot of bits in there that just made no sense whatsoever, and I admit to being pretty glad that I was able to "read" the cables to see where things were supposed to be going.  That said, I think that the design itself is very nice; I particularly like the waist join (as I mentioned), and the designer does a nifty thing under the arms, in which one picks up the purl bumps just below the stitches used for the two fronts as part of the back - it's a nice way to create an overlap under the arms that tightens things up and looks clean. 

I think you can see it there.  But you can also see how bulky this is!!

OK, I'm over it.  I also finished a project which is the exact opposite of this one in every way.

(In spite of how happy Older Daughter looks wearing this, it's mine.)  Actually, to be fair, I'm only halfway done.  This is the Churchmouse Bias Before and After scarf, and it's intended to be a pair, which can be worn together or separately, in two different colors (my second color is a gorgeous teal green).  The ends are beaded, which adds a lovely weight to what is otherwise a weightless (but warm and soft) scarf.  And, as promised with this pattern, it is ugly (really ugly) during the knitting, but the blocking changes everything.

It's knitted out of Cascade Alpaca Lace, on size 6 needles, and it's one of those knits that's boring boring boring in execution, but which I know I will wear endlessly.

If I can get it away from my daughter.