Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Entrelac is addictive

I finished the Mini-Lady E/Danica hybrid scarf last night. I'm amazed how quickly that went. I'm really happy with the results. Haven't sewn in the two ends yet (hooray for spit-splicing) and will have to block it as soon as I can find a place. The colors are wonderful. No photos yet.

Also started my full size Lady E. Finished the beginning triangles before bed (insomnia... again). Sat it on the table before falling asleep. I've had surprisingly good luck being able to leave my knitting lying around even though we have so many cats but I finally learned my lesson today. Someone, probably the female, who happens to hate me, made a giant mess out of my poor ball of Karaoke. Didn't hurt the WIP itself, thank goodness. But I spent all day trying to untangle that freakin' ball! Of course this would happen to the yarn that's way more expensive than my usual stuff *and* special ordered. Lesson learned.
After a maddening but mostly successful untangling session, I managed to get a little knitting in. I'm now partway into the second ball, almost through the 5th tier. :) It's really pretty. The colors are subtle but so pretty and multi-faceted . And it's so surprisingly light!

Going from a Kureyon project, to a couple SWS projects, to working with the Karaoke is interesting.

The Kureyon was nicer than I expected. The colors are really nice, especially in the skein. Some of the subtleties are lost once it's knit up, and more so after a wash, but the overall look is still really nice and interesting. The color combinations are interesting and kinda random-ish. Of course the biggest draw is the butt-load of colors available. The texture leaves something to be desired. It's not as bad as I expected. Not itchy but definitely rough. Decent to work with and soft enough for my mom to wear as gloves. When splicing ends together, I was surprised how much work it took to felt well. The yarn itself is a little more irregular in thickness than the other two but seems to knit up fairly uniformly.
Biggest complaint? The dye stained my fingers as I worked with it.

SWS is really nice. I love working with it. The fluffy texture is nifty. It is easy to split so sharp needles and knitting by touch alone can be a bit tricky. There aren't a ton of colorways but the colors are pretty. The striping is more uniform than with the other two. I found Natural Earth to be a bit more random and the pink/green to be a pretty set sequence. The yarn has a very alluring sheen. I wish it retained that a little more when knit up. It does to some extent, but the fuzzing does distort it a good bit. It's soft and great to knit but can be a little scratchy/prickly right against my skin and sheds a bit. Frogging is pain because it loves to stick to itself and looks pretty worn once you've ripped it out. That's not a really big deal since it looks pretty uniform once it's all knit up.

The Karaoke is really interesting. The colors are so complex. I'm using Mermaid Mix and it's very subtle overall but there are amazing variations within the yarn itself. The texture is totally different. Not as "soft" as the SWS but that makes it less fuzzy. It's more gentle than SWS though. And sooo much lighter. What I've knit up so far has almost a cottony feel. Better stitch definition than the other two. I don't think it will shed much, which is nice. My only real complaint with the Karaoke so far is that it's a bit weak. It broke on me a couple times while I was trying to untangle it. Still seems to produce a reasonably sturdy fabric though.

All three are definitely good yarn and have their places and uses.

1 comment:

Karin said...

Good yarn review. Thanks!