Blackbird Wrap

Last night I sat on my couch in a quiet house and picked up my copy of Elizabeth Zimmerman's Knitter's Almanac. I read the chapter on the invention (or "unvention" as EZ calls it) of the Moccasin Sock.  It got me in the mindset to do some Unventing of my own, and this morning, sitting on my quiet couch in a beam of Sunday morning sunlight, I started the Blackbird Wrap.

This little stash of Columbia-Minerva fingering weight wool has been waiting for the right project.  I found it for 50 cents a skein at Lucky's Attic.  I love it because it is old, and the history of the one who bought it new maybe twenty years ago is a mystery.

Who knows why one of these skeins went with me on the drive to Clarksburg Friday night? I needed some security knitting, because I was going to a funeral home which always makes me insanely nervous. I grabbed this yarn and the first needles I could find, which happened to be size 6 dpns, and hopped into the family wagon for the 45 minute car ride.  By the time we reached Bridgeport my fidgety fingers had cast on and knit the first few inches of a sideways triangle shawl.  It is a pattern that I have been playing with all winter, very simple (one increase every right side row, you can't get much simpler than that).

The knitting calmed my mind and once I found my family I stuffed it into my purse and didn't need to pick it up again all night.

This morning I picked up my copy of Nicky Epstein's Knitting Over The Edge for inspiration and finally settled on a bit of lace edging worked sideways called Partridge.   After I ripped out all the work I'd done in the car, and cast onto a size 7 circular needle the same sort of thing with extra stitches for this edging, I just started going!  After two pattern repeats it looks something like this.

Clearly this piece is going to need some severe blocking.  The leaf motif reminds me of feathers, a bit.  I hope the rest of this lazy Sunday affords me the leisure to do a few more.