Look, sometimes I get an idea in my head and, even if it seems impossible to achieve… I have to give it a go.

So it is with this shawl. It’s beautiful, all celtic knots made of delicate cables in 3 ply yarn.

The pattern is Morvarch (Ravelry link) by Lucy Hague (Lucy’s website link), and here’s how I was getting on at row 13:

A bit of a guddle but just starting to see the celtic knots appear, seemingly out of thin air but actually out of several hours of counting, cabling, tinking and two or three false starts.

I don’t mind a couple of false starts. It’s very common for me to rip out and knit again a few times until I’m happy that I’m on track. Starting with eight stitches, using a magic loop, was not without its challenges, I can tell you, but the reward is getting it right.

Hey, did you know you could buy yarn 3000m at a time?! Yarn on cones is a recent revelation for me. I was extraordinarily excited when I found out I could get sweater amounts of yarn for under £20.

This is from Yeoman Yarns, who I highly recommend for quick posting – when you want the yarn, you Want the Yarn. I’m sure it’s not just me. Alas, the exact one I wanted was out of stock there, but enter my new hero LYS, Fankle Yarns in Prestwick, near Glasgow. Not only did they have it in stock, but it was with me within two days. They made a humble knitter very happy.

It’s Tibet Tweed, in Lagoon, which is 25% nylon, 25% silk, and 50% merino wool. £16.99 for 3600 metres. You can’t do capital numbers the way you can with letters so please use your imagination.

And so, despite having one project on the go already, and three in the sin bin to think about what they’ve done, I went ahead and cast on. A few hours gave me the pics above – another few brought me to row 26, and what a difference!

The cables! The knots! The over/under/over-ness! Are they a bit shoogly? They might be. It’ll come out in the wash, I’m quite positive.

I’m keeping track of rows with this low-tech wearable. I generally just have it sitting to the side, rather than wearing it, but it’s nice to have the option if you’re on the move.

Now, let me be honest: I did start another (aNOTHERnother) project over the weekend too. I’ll spare you the justification cos if you’re reading a knitting blog you probably understand. I had some extra spending money, I bought yarn (obvs), and I got over excited and cast on.

But that’s for a future blog post.

Yarn on cones!

OK I’m done.