I’ve always wanted to knit another find your fade shawl. I really enjoyed the first one I knit years ago and I wear it often to work in the winter. In June of this year I began another out of handspun I had in stash. I used 5 of my own handspun yarns and two of Miss Marja’s handspun yarns. The thing is, I finished the shawl ages ago but the final color I used was not tonally correct for the shawl and I hated it. After blocking the shawl, I couldn’t take a picture of it and blog about it or consider it finished because I couldn’t appreciate the way it looked.
Well, I’ve had this week off, and one of the tasks I put on my personal to do list was to sort out the find your fade shawl. I ripped out the final color that I hated and then picked up all the live stitches. Then I found a new yarn in my stash that I figured would look more tonally appropriate and knit it back in. I was thankful to really appreciate the final product.
This shawl is massive and interesting, a real highlight of all those handspun yarns! I love it. I am so glad that I get to add this to the list of finished objects I created this year.
I decided to go back to my first A to Z project pan post to see how long I have been working on the project. I knew that I had not started at the beginning of the year. Turns out, it was February 15 of this year. I am proud to say that this update brings me to completion of a few other items, and now I only have 9 items left in this project pan. In fact, I am down to being able to take just one photo of the items for an update. Here’s where I was last month, two photos.
It had actually been a really big update, a ton of goals hit particularly in the eyeshadow department. This update isn’t quite as dramatic but I did hit 3 goals, two of those were new eyeshadow pans. I did also repress my highlighter so that’ll look different this time. I have not hit pan on the repressed highlighter. Here’s this update photo with the list of uses below.
A: Mario Badescu facial spray with Aloe, Herbs, and Rosewater. This is finished, but I forgot to save the empty container. (21 uses this update, total uses 40.) B: ABH Sultry palette Bloom-goal is to hit pan. (1 uses this update, with 11 uses total) C: ABH Sultry Palette Cinder-goal is to hit pan. (3 uses this update and 12 total) D: ABH Sultry Palette Dystopian-goal is to hit pan. (5 uses this update with 40 uses total) E: ABH Sultry Palette Ember-goal is to hit pan. (3 uses this month, 6 total) F: ABH Sultry Palette Fresh-goal is to hit pan. (4 uses this update with 40 uses total and goal met!) G: Grace & Stella Spray all Day Rose Spray-goal is to finish. (17uses, with 67 uses total and now used up) H: Pur Highlighter-goal is to use up. (22 uses this update with 124 uses total) I:IT Cosmetics CC cream-Goal is to finish. (9 uses to finish, so a total 24 uses in the project.) J: Elf Jellypop primer-goal is to finish. (15 uses this update with 89 uses total) L: Estee Lauder Doublewear-goal is to finish. (6 uses this update, 40 uses to finish my goal) M:Tarte palette Mermosa-goal is to hit pan. (5 uses this update with 33 uses total and goal met!) N: Tarte palette Nude Beach-goal is to hit pan. (5 uses with 34 uses total and pan hit!) O: C.Y.O Lifeproof foundation-goal is to finish. (13 uses with 29 total to finish) P: ABH Sultry Palette Pearl-goal is to hit pan. (5 uses with 93 uses to hit goal.) Q: Tarte blush color Quirky-goal is to hit pan. (9 uses with 88 uses total and I have hit pan!) R: Rom&nd bronzer: goal is to hit pan-goal achieved!. (34 uses with 105 uses total) S: ABH Sultry Palette Steamunk-goal is to hit pan. (2 uses with 31 total uses to meet goal with massive pan!) T: ABH Sultry Palette Twig-goal is to hit pan. (6 uses with 41 total uses and a goal met) U: Urban Decay Eye Primer-goal is to finish. (24 uses with 61 total uses before finish) V: Urban Decay eyeliner in Voodoo-goal is to use past the 24/7. (14 uses with 64 total uses) W: Lancome Teint Idole Ultra Wear foundation-goal is to finish. (12 uses with 28 uses total and I am finished.) X: Too Faced Boudoir Eyes (soft and sexy) eyeshadow palette use up In The Buff eyeshadow. (1 uses with a total of 35 uses) Y: NYX eyeshadow pan (forgot to get a photo this update) goal is to use up. (24 uses for a total of 80 uses) Z: BH Cosmetics Zodiac Palette-goal is to hit pan on the matte Virgo shade. (9 uses for a total of 26 uses)
So, two more eyeshadow pans hit and another foundation sample used up. But, I am about to take a bit of a break from this project. I am not saying I don’t want to continue, I am just saying that this time of year I really enjoy a full stash shake up and rotation. I want to concentrate on the rest of my stash and figure out what I might concentrate on panning next year. I can tell you for certain I won’t be deliberately panning eyeshadows again next year. I might do some usage goals or something to that extent. I will, of course, consider doing some other type of panning project.
While I am working on my full stash shakeup and rotation, I will continue to work on some of the items in this project. I am pretty close to hitting my goal on the voodoo eyeliner and I think I can finish up the jellypop primer pretty quickly at this point. And the cream eyeshadow from NYX is something that will continue to be useful during a stash rotation. But the work on the eyeshadows is going to slow significantly. Once I’ve completed a stash rotation, I’ll try to finish up the final goals. But for now, I don’t intend to force myself to work on this project. See you on the flipside of stash rotation! Or in an upcoming project pan, once I’ve determined which items I really want to finish up.
I’ve been rearranging my craft room and decided that I needed a quick and fun knit that would use up yarn that I’d already wound into a ball but never knit with. Mostly because I wanted to reclaim the space. So, I decided on a very simple brioche knit scarf. 2 balls of yarn eliminated from my stash and a pretty nice scarf in the donate bin.
I often knit simple items and donate them to our dog rescue to use in raffles. This is the perfect item for that, it’s simple, lovely, squishy, and will likely be appreciated by someone. Both yarns are handspun. I’d do another right quick, but just can’t manage to bring myself to cast on another quite yet.
A little over a month ago I threw a whole bunch of samples and products into a bin and claimed I wanted to get them used up. I’d been organizing my bathroom drawer and gotten frustrated with the amount of tiny items and almost finished items. I just wanted to concentrate on a few things and get them out of my drawer.
Here’s the original bin:
It’s not an organized project pan, it’s simply an attempt to clear the bin as much as possible. Quite frankly, over the month, more sample sizes have been thrown in there as they’ve come into my life. But I did try to tackle my first update in a fairly organized manner. I decided to concentrate on the sachets as well as the bigger items that had very little product left in them.
Here are the items I finished over this past little over a month. I am not going to go into great detail about them. There’s a couple of different moisturizers, all of them were almost finished when I put them in the project. I have decided I would not repurchase the murad one, it pills under makeup and that’s not great for me. I just use it as a night cream now. But, sadly, I have another full one! So I am now concentrating on getting that used up as well. Both Peter Thomas Roth items are very nice moisturizers. Through the winter I prefer something a bit heavier than the cloud cream moisturizer, but it’s a lovely one for the summer. These days, for makeup removal I prefer a cleansing balm or oil, but I am determined to finish off the three clinique makeup removers just on principle. I actually used one to assist in removing some stubborn tape residue on my craft room walls. 🙂
I am glad to let these empty packaging pieces go and start on a new batch in the upcoming months.
Over the past weeks I’ve been working toward finishing up my westknits mystery shawl. All that I had left was a colorblock border which was definitely something I looked forward to. Unsurprisingly though, it took me a rather long time to finish. That was a lot of stitches to bind off with a big border!
The full shawl.Details.Colorblock border and more details.
One of the reasons I am always happy to participate in the westknits mystery shawls has to do with the fact that I am likely to learn a new technique or create something very interesting. Plus, no matter the technique, there will be a very good tutorial accompanying it. I also enjoy very large shawls and the westknits mystery shawls are indeed very large. This one is, however, a bit smaller than some in years past. I am not disappointed necessarily, it’s just an observation.
I am not good at following along with knitting trends these days so I do hope that I am able to catch the next one! Because I do get a lot of enjoyment out of the process.
Suzy Sells Sea Shells 