Symphony Shawl – my 2020 year long project

Symphony Shawl kit yarns

Sweet Georgia Yarns made this lovely set of yarns as a holiday kit, and I loved it so much I bought two: one for me and one for my friend M as a Christmas present. It has 15 yarns, so I figured I’d do it as if it were a monthly yarn subscription, and maybe double up a few months. But as it turns out, the pattern has 12 sections if you count the setup one, so I haven’t even had to divide it up myself!

January set up

January’s up was teensy tiny but since I had advent projects still on the needles and the Rose City Yarn Crawl MKAL to start, that wasn’t a problem.

The yarn feels like a standard sock yarn to me. Did you know that there’s only a handful of yarn wholesalers in the US so most of our indie-dyed stuff uses the same bases even if they give them different names? Sweet Georgia is based in Canada so they may have some other options, but I bet not *that* many. It’s a solid base, and after my overdose on single ply I’m very glad to have a more durable sock yarn. And those colours! Saturated jewel tone tonals. Beautiful.

February lace section

I debated doing the colours backwards just to be different but decided I liked it too much to mess with the order. I’m barely started — that’s only one extra-mini down, 14 to go — but it’s already interesting and fitting nicely in as a shorter break between projects.

I had been planning to go subscription-less this year, but at the very end of the year I decided to try one that seemed particularly interesting. I’ll write about it soon!

Mudra Necklace and Loquita Necklace

My mom hates shopping and gives me birthday money, and I’ve tried to make a habit of actually buying myself things in December and January as presents. And lately, most of what I covet is yarn, so…

These two kits are from Laura Nelkin, whose kits I’ve enjoyed in the past.

Mudra

Mudra necklace in colour stone

This was very similar to the Fetish cuff I did this summer, and in a good way! I wasn’t sure if the neutral colour was the right choice, but it’s lovely and very wearable. It’s a very easy kit with a simple beading pattern, yet very satisfying.

Loquita

Loquita Necklace in blue

The Loquita Necklace was harder than the Mudra one, but it’s so carefully explained that it was complicated but not really confusing. The clasp isn’t great at staying closed on me so I have been tucking the hook into the knitting instead of the eye so that there’s a bit more friction there. I love the yarn, but if you look up close it’s a surprising choice: it’s got long alpaca hairs that stick out and make the stitch definition a bit less clear.

Loquita Necklace blocking

It feels so soft and blocks perfectly, though, so I guess that’s worth a few stray hairs.

Both kits come with floss loops for stringing beads, and Loquita also came with floss for placing beads during knitting but I’ll admit that I used my Bead Aid for the Loquita stitches because it was nicer than the floss. I do love the tin that Loquita came in: it’s a bit bigger than the one I use now and I think a bit harder for my toddler to open as a result, so it’s probably going to see a bunch of use in the future!

It was really nice to have some quick projects to fit in now that the Rose City Yarn Crawl MKAL has started so I’ve often got a little gap at the end of a clue where I need a bit more to do before the next one is released.

Overall, fun kits that are nicely put together, and beautiful finished pieces. Plus I’ve got a new beading tin now! Happy birthday to me!