The Wendigo Knits

Happy Birthday Beautiful Boy

2012-01-06T13:22:00.000-08:00

My oldest son turned four on New Years Day. I can't believe he's already four years old.

He has many redeeming qualities. One of his best character traits is that he knows how to receive a hand knit gift properly; he puts it on, caresses it and immediately starts dancing. I love that kid.

Happy Birthday sweetheart.

A New Year a New Found Love

2012-01-04T06:06:00.000-08:00

My love for all things wooly hit a bit of speed bump earlier this year. I had a serious case of fiber festival fatigue. The sight of yarn made me queasy. Thankfully, sometime around September the stash began to call out to me again. The lovely naturally dyed indigo/woad mittens that I posted about last spring are finished and warming my hands.

I wasn't planning to knit any Christmas gifts, but somewhere around the 20th of December my inner knitter took over and the mittens, scarves and hats started to pour off of my needles. The damn has burst and there is no looking back. Mittens, scarves, blankets, a skirt, hats and several cowls have just flown off of the needles. My UFOs are going before the death panel. Finish or be frogged is the mantra. There was a small fiber arts stash sale and I sent two laundry tubs full of yarn off to find new homes. There's no room in my stash for slackers.

In an effort to use up some of the smaller amounts of stash yarn I've decided to knit up a couple of pairs of bulky boot socks. I don't love sock knitting, but I do love think warm wooly socks. These are a pair called "Aran Socks" from the book "Country Weekend Socks" by Madeline Weston.

They aren't charted and so it was slow going for the first repeat of the cable, but now I'm cranking along at a respectable pace. The yarn is "Not Your Average Washable Worsted" by "J Knits". I'm a little on the fence about superwash wool, but this stuff is pretty nice. I'm knitting them at a slightly tighter gauge to try and make up for the extra elasticity that superwash usually has. The colorway is called "wheeling" and it reminds me of a snow sky. There's some very subtle variegation in the dyeing. It's a good match for this pattern.

Looking back on this past year I'd have to say that the knitting highlights were spending a weekend hanging out with Ysolda Teague, dyeing my own yarn with plants from the woods around our home, getting a handmade needle case from a dear friend and teaching my brother's wonderful girlfriend how to knit. She's a natural.

All in all, it was a very good year.

Smmmittens

2011-02-20T08:26:00.000-08:00

On Wednesday I bought a bouquet of tulips from the market. They looked like this.

Today they look like this, which is good, because this week has been rough.

I've been buried under a truck load of e-mails and meetings for a National Fiber Festival that I'm helping to organize. You can check out the blog for the festival, here. I haven't done any knitting since before Christmas. I haven't really felt like knitting. I don't know why, but I completely lost interest. Well, all of a sudden I'm feeling like picking up the sticks again, and I've picked out two new patterns to keep me motivated. Both of them are stranded. The first is a mitten kit from this company.

I took one look at her mittens and decided then and there that I must knit a pair. She dyes with mushrooms among other things. Her blog is fantastic. It inspired me to run out on an impromptu fungi hunt. That's the best kind of fungi hunt. You can check out my natural dyeing adventures, here. This is another reason I haven't had any time for knitting. Too many dorky hobbies, not enough dork time.
The mittens are coming along quickly. The Finn sheep wool is soft and rustic all at the same time. I'm a little at a loss to describe it. It has a nice shine, a sweet smell, a gentle drape, and it's hairy.....in a good way. The colors are indigo, Japanese knotweed, and woad. It's really fun to have all three plant dyed blues next to one another. The mitten knitting is keeping me sane for the moment. Try saying mitten knitting 5 times fast. Yup, that's the other way I'm staying sane.
The second project has hit a wall. The wool is from Blacker Yarns, and was a Christmas gift. The pattern is from Kate Davies and is called "Tortoise and Hare". I love the pattern, and I like the yarn, but as soon as I opened the bag of wool I realized I might have a problem. These two balls of yarn are supposed to be different colors.

They are different, but they aren't different enough. Just my luck, one "mid brown" sheep happened to have a fleece just like his "dark brown" cousin. I don't want my tortoises and my hares to be the same color, so I went stash diving for a substitute. I have a whole tub of Jamesons Shetland, but none of the colors were right. This is the best I could find and I'm still not thrilled with the combination.

I think a silver gray might be right.....I guess that means it's time for some yarn shopping!

One, Two, Three, Doh!

2011-01-22T06:03:00.000-08:00

This whole learning a new craft thing must be good for the brain because it's making my head hurt.

Kumihimo, the ancient craft of Japanese braiding, is both "fun and relaxing" until the moment where you realize that the conversation in your head has gone from "one, two, three, four" to mentally yelling at the conservative guy Jon Stewart is interviewing. Then there's a pause. Then there's some pretend counting that doesn't really correspond to where you're actually at in the sequence. You're just doing it in the hopes that it will remind you of where you were and then you realize with horror that you're completely lost. This has happened twice. I blame Jon Stewart and my toddler.
After the shock and cursing had worn off I went back to the decidedly unhelpful little booklet to see if there was a "troubleshooting" section. There was no such section. I would like to take the time to issue a warning to all the new crafters out there. If a booklet has less than 20 pages it is like a good looking, rich, popular, high school sports champion. It will get you into trouble very quickly and it will feel no remorse. Maybe it should have been obvious that the secrets of the ancient Japanese art of Kumihimo could not be explained in a 10 page booklet, but I'm an eternal optimist when it comes to these things. Well, I'm somewhat of an optimist and I'm most certainly impatient.
Thankfully, the second time I made this mistake I had taken photos of each "point of braid". That's this...

and of the braid itself, as it was being worked. That's this...

So no all I have to do is find some quiet time when I can figure out exactly where I am in the braid...."Childrens do learn."

In other news, my husband celebrated another birthday recently. I made him some stellar chocolate, cherry, and black current cupcakes and a seriously tasty Greek spaghetti squash Spanakopita type thing.

The recipe for the cupcakes is in Nigella Lawson's book "How to be a Domestic Goddess". Boy do I miss watching her slink around the kitchen, plunging her finger into whatever unsuspecting bowl was silly enough to leave itself uncovered. She really is an Olympic champion of the Sunday morning lounge.
I substituted black current jelly for the cherry jam she calls for. The recipe was ridiculously simple for such a rich and sophisticated tasting cupcake. I'm sure there's a good argument against using the word "sophisticated" to describe cupcakes but I think that's a snobbish approach to food. These were gone in less than two days. Next time, it's marmalade.

Away

2011-01-18T10:55:00.000-08:00

I've been away for a long time. There hasn't been a lot of time for knitting. I mean, how can you knit when you're chasing your children here?...

Or here...

Hawai'i was amazing even without the knitting. The colors and the smell of flowers are overwhelming.

Then there was the mad dash for Christmas presents and a last second toilet installation before we met my parents in Paris. Never underestimate the power of multiple toilets to soothe even the most savage of holiday family events.

Paris was lovely, as usual. We trudged through the cold wet snow with the expectant smiles of an Arctic expedition on it's first day. At the end of each day we were tearing through piles of food and pyramids of shopping bags. I managed a quick yarn stop, but no knitting.

Christmas morning was spent in the shadow of the 15 ft. Sequoia my husband slayed. We celebrated a very memorable Christmas in the shade of it's magical shadow. Santa was very understanding of my fiber needs. He'd been checking to see if I was naughty or nice and discovered that all I've really done this year is chase a two year old around the house with a pair of pants in one hand and a baby tucked under my arm. Santa really came up with the goods. There were mountains of yarn, a knitters loom, and a surprise gift.

I am learning the art of Kumihimo, that and chasing babies.

2010-09-13T07:54:00.000-07:00

We're all finally over the summer of "big ouches", as my toddler would put it, and are doing some much needed catching up.

In these last couple of weeks there's been a whole lot of family time. When we're sick all we ever seem to be able to keep up with is the bare minimum of house work, so the last thing I want to do right now is stay inside. The boys agree.
We've been picking things in the garden, watching movies, eating lunch at kid friendly cafes, visiting with friends, swimming and generally trying not to sweat the small stuff. It's been a good month for all of us including the dust buffaloes roaming around the living room.
Yesterday at about 8:30 AM we saw a hot air balloon being inflated in the distance and threw the kids into the car with only about half the usual amount of back up clothing, caffeine, snacks and diapers. A bit of bad weather arrived and we lost sight of the balloon so we headed out to a plant sale ( I found a caper berry bush. I know, amazing. I'll talk about that later.) in a neighboring village. Because we'd left in a rush, we arrived a half an hour before the plant show was scheduled to open. We ducked into a second hand shop to pass the time and I found this.

She's a little beat up, but that just means that I won't mind sharing her with little children. There are 11 dolls in this set. The smallest is about the size of my thumb nail and she opens. The patterns on their aprons and kerchiefs are made out of straw.
I've been thinking a lot about patterns lately. I think it must be the changing colors in my garden. With fall coming on I'm tempted to start some stranded mittens or maybe a stranded vest for one of the boys. I haven't the heart to start another sweater right now. I also lack the time and the focus to work on anything of consequence. I've channeled my color work desires into a men's scarf. It's posing with my sexy radicchio.

The color work is an easy to memorize slipped stitch pattern from Barbara Walker's first book, knit from odds and ends of Noro "Cash Iroha" and "Silk Garden". The other day I was pawing through my stash when I realized that I hadn't done any knitting since we recovered. I think these long days in the sun are leaving my brain a little scorched. My other projects are looking too fussy and complicated. I'm glad I started this. The Noro "Silk Garden" in this scarf is providing a little interest without demanding any actual work. I'll just keep on knitting until I run out of remnants. That's about all the planning I feel like doing after a long Indian summer day.

KAL

2010-08-07T03:59:00.000-07:00

The Fall issue of "Twist Collective" is up. It's probably one of my favorite issues to date. I like this, this and this. Not to mention this. But a knitter has to be reasonable. There are only so many hours in each day, and my children make a good case for needing to be fed. Their case involves a lot of yelling, but there's some precedence to support their argument.
This is my swatch for Hallett's Ledge. I'm using "Imperial Stock Ranch 2ply".

This particular yarn has tried to be knit into sweaters three times. I was a little worried that it might be cursed, but now I believe it was just being picky about a partner.

In an effort to get this project finished quickly I'm bringing in a friend. My friend's name is competitive nature. I've joined a Knit - a - Long. I don't advertise the fact that I like winning. It always seems a little crass to be competitive, but I'd be a liar if I didn't admit that I like to win, and being a liar is way worse than being competitive. I guess I could just not admit to either, but that would make me sneaky. I'll end this train of thought before it goes too far. Oh no, it's gone too far.
I thought I might be able to come in second or maybe third, but was shot down on day two. Let me repeat that. Someone knit an aran weight, long sleeve, cabled sweater with a button band in two days. She must have cut her hands off and replaced them with super mechanized mini knitting machines. That's my theory.
I don't think I could knit this sweater in two days unless I didn't sleep and was cool with wearing a diaper. I'm not cool with that, so I'll have to wait.
I'm really enjoying the community of the KAL. It's wonderful to be able to chat about whether or not to use a P2tog instead of a K2tog. It's thrilling to see other peoples' swatches. It makes me feel less alone in my dorky-ness. Thank you internet. You complete me.

Jazzysocks

2010-07-22T11:39:00.000-07:00

These are a pair of custom fit, no nonsense, top down, heel flap socks. I started them back in January, maybe you remember, and then there was a lot of baby having and leg twisting, etc., etc. In the wake of my shawl knitting frenzy I finished them off. Oh, and by the way, I was wretchedly ill when I finished them. This is no exaggeration. I tend to exaggerate. I thought you ought to know.

I was so wretchedly ill that I only managed a couple of hours sleep over a two day period. It was that kind of illness where you're sore deep down in your bones, and your skin feels sticky even when dry. My internal thermostat was going crazy and after some harsh bargaining with the Tylenol it opted not to go above 101F but not to go lower than 99F. My throat, however, was a real shark in the medicinal negotiations. It refused to compromise on anything. It made the homeopathic medicine cry.
I finished the foot of the second sock during the worst of this illness. There was a lot of one row, put the knitting down, stare at the mobile above my baby's bed for an hour, pick the knitting up, knit a row, repeat. My baby is also sick, and there was a lot of staring at mobiles going on. There were some points where we just stared at each other and telecommunicated about how much this bug sucked. He's my buddy.
Four days into this festival of germs, I'm starting to feel like the party's winding down. My throat is allowing for some solid foods and my body has cooled off. I have a throaty wispy voice which by husband describes as sexy, but which I would call contagious sounding. There's a lot of hacking and gasping for air, which I suppose just makes me sexier. The baby is still running a fever, but the doc says it's O.K. so I'll try not to freak out all over him and tell him that 4 days of fever is not O.K. for a mom, let alone a baby.
I'm going to sandwich this blog post about illness with a tiny bit of knitting and hope you'll still consider this a knitting blog. I don't want to have to change the title to "The Wendigo Gets Sick and or Hurt a Whole Lot, Plus There's a Little Knitting Going On". So, on to the socks.

I think that they are hideous. They remind me of modern dance, or free form jazz, or eating too much candy and then going on a violent amusement park ride run by a very young person who seems frighteningly uninvested in their job. They are totally gross. They are jazzysocks. I'm calling them that, because bad jazz is my least favorite thing in the world. Really bad jazz being either the Kenny G. or the crazed squealing horn variety and about 70 percent of the jazz in between. Billy Holiday, you know I love you. I'm not talking about you. You're more blues, and I love blues. Back to the socks, I think they went from Missoni to Methuselah when I knit the second foot. The small stripes circling the first foot are cute. The large sludge colored stripe on the second foot is throwing everything off. It's jazzy.
I'm not going to blame this jazzy quality on the dyer, Farmhouse Yarns. They made a beautiful yarn with colors I love. The creamy white with touches of yellow, pale blue and pink with a dark vegetable green does in fact remind me of "wild flowers" (that's the colorway). I think that in my delirious sickbed knitting I made one foot two stitches smaller than the other one. It's totally my fault.

These will be the socks I wear when I just don't care what other people think, which is most of the time.

Fini, All Done, No More

2010-07-18T12:29:00.000-07:00

That's what my two year old son says when he's finished with something.

This is "Haruni" in Blue Sky Alpacas "alpaca silk", colorway "ivory". It took me about a half an hour just to pin it out for blocking. I'm so very proud of this. I know my friend will love it.

It's such a relief to be done with it. My hands were so busy knitting this thing that they couldn't stop, and I've almost finished a pair of socks in the last two days. It's like knitting in the wake of a big shawl boat. Now, if the promises of our mail services are to be believed, it should get there just in time for her wedding reception.

Soldiering On

2010-07-13T08:44:00.001-07:00

One week after I gave birth I fell into a small stone watering hole while trying to count the salamanders. I am aware of how impossible that sounds. Yes, it is true. One leg stayed on shore, while the other one went in. I pulled a bunch of calf muscles and was pretty handicapped for about a month. During our June knit night there was a small fire. This was due to too much talking and not enough paying attention to the candles. I burned myself while trying to put the fire out and lost a good bit of skin on the back of my hand. Thanks to some good witch doctoring by a fellow knitter (mother of 8, lives in a yurt) my hand healed in about two weeks. I had one week with a good right hand and then I sliced the back of that same hand open on an exploded champagne bottle. I know, all of my accidents are fun related. Try not to be jealous of how much fun I'm having.
It took four stitches to close up the cut. I thought that would be the end of things, but since then I've had an allergic reaction to the tetanus vaccine, then an allergic reaction to the stitches which in turn caused the cut not to heal properly. Then my husband had a run in with a wood chisel and had to have three stitches. That's seven stitches in one week. Today my cut is starting to look like it's healing up but.......it seems like I might be coming down with some sort of sore throat thing.
This is the point at which I am admitting defeat. I am not going to pretend that any of this is O.K. It's insane. I know it's not life threatening, or terminal and things could be a heck of a lot worse, but right now I'm feeling pretty put upon.
That's why this......(please ignore the mess on my desk)

should be making me strap on the ole' straight jacket. This is "Haruni". Well it's almost "Haruni". It's "Haruni" minus one row of knitting. I ran out of yarn one row short.

Do you see the pretty scalloped edging? That's the row I'm missing. It's not a row I can skip. This is a gift for my best friend's wedding, so it's got to be finished within the week.
The extra skein has been ordered. In my professional opinion, the other yarn that I ordered along with that one skein was a medical necessity. It's a small soft cushion between my psyche and the proverbial wall.

Rough Draft

2010-06-18T15:02:00.000-07:00

This needs blocking. It also needs hooks and eyes sewn on, but I just couldn't resist wearing it around for a day. It's the "Ambrosia Cardigan" by Katya Frankel, from the most recent issue of "Interweave Knits". The yarn is "Classic Silk" from Classic Elite Yarns. I like it. It's very soft and has a nice hand. It's a blend of cotton, silk and nylon and has a slightly slubby texture. It's a very good around the house cardigan. I think it brings out the beer wench in me.

Now....... I've got to finish the shawl. This time it's for real. There's a cast on ban in place. I've got no where else to go. The shawl is all I've got. No more Mrs. nice pink cardigan. It's on, baby.

The Worst Word I Know is

2010-06-01T11:00:00.000-07:00

Procrastination.

This sweater is a soft pink pile of procrastination.

I was planning to finish the Haruni shawl for my best friends wedding, but the baby came a week early, and another work deadline was moved up by two weeks, and somewhere around the Monday before a Sunday wedding I realized that the shawl would not make it. I spoke to my friend about the shawl's state of borderless-ness and she gave me the go ahead to not go ahead. She wasn't planning on wearing at the ceremony, so I didn't feel too bad.... yeah, I still felt like a jerk. Thankfully she's having a reception toward the end of July, and so I have a chance between now and then to finish what I started. This whole finishing what you start thing is very important. My mother told me so.

The problem is my Dad and Mom sent me some yarn. I wasn't expecting it, it just arrived looking all soft and smelling of a real American yarn shop. I put it up in the stash with every intention of waiting until after I'd finished the shawl, but with the new baby around I needed something easy to knit on. Evening after evening passed with no knitting. That was unacceptable, but I knew that I couldn't pick up that complicated lace knitting without a good solid block of time. If this sounds like a real B.S. excuse then you've got a good sniffer. I, however, was not savvy enough to see through my own thin excuses. I ran upstairs and grabbed a ball for swatching. "Yeah, I'll just swatch a little. A little swatching never hurt anybody. Besides, I'm not actually going to cast on for anything." This is a slippery slope, my friends. You see, that same day I had received the summer issue of "Interweave Knits". I was clearly lying to myself at this point. If there were a court of law that had an interest in whether or not unfinished handknits were being held hostage in my closet I would be in cuffs right now. The rest of that evening is sort of a blur. I know at some point I was tearing my desk apart looking for a ruler to check gauge. I think I started cruising Ravelry for pattern suggestions. I don't think the word "cruising" has been used to describe a good behavior since the 1950's. Everything spun out of control when I realized that my favorite sweater from the new IK was knit in one piece from the top down. That tidbit of info was what sunk my battleship of good intentions. I mean, top down sweaters pretty much knit themselves. Am I right?
Flash forward a week and I've got a nearly complete sweater in my lap. The shawl is languishing in a basket. I need to start bailing out the battleship right now. My friend's reception is coming up fast. Time to suck it up and start doubling the number of stitches on my needles in preparation for the border. Oh sweet baby Hitler that sounds like a lot of stitches. Sigh.

The Best Excuse

2010-06-01T10:04:00.000-07:00

I have the best excuse possible for not keeping up with my blogging. It starts with a "B" and ends with a lot of diapers. Meet Miles.

When I had my first child we were unprepared. Oh, we had about four stylish baby carrying devices, endless booties and piles of freshly laundered diapers, but we were very, very, very unprepared. My first baby was what a nicer person would call challenging. I used many bad words to describe the situation. I'm going to have to preface this next part with a disclaimer. I love both of my sons and I don't think being a "hard" baby says anything about what kind of person the baby will mature into. My first son is a sweet, charming, thoughtful little boy.That said, my first boy was a disaster of a baby. He would probably have been diagnosed with colic if we'd ever been brave enough to get in a car with him for more than 10 minutes at a time. If he wasn't nursing, or asleep, or being carried by someone who was walking, he was crying. It made me feel like I didn't know what the heck I was doing.
I considered trying to convince a doctor to make me deaf. I fantasized about those sci-fi pods that put people into stasis for crazy long periods of time while they zip around the universe. Why don't we have those yet? Our first baby hated all of the baby carriers save for the Baby Bjorn. He wouldn't lay on his back. He never slept. He always wanted to be in motion so, that year, my husband bought me a rocking chair for Mother's Day. The instant my butt hit the seat the baby started crying. I was woken up 5 to 7 times a night until he was 8 months old, and he didn't actually start sleeping through the night until he was two. I thought all babies were that hard.
That's why I prepared for this baby as if we were all about to go on a four month trip to one of Dante's layers of hell. I stocked the freezer with about a month's worth of pre-made meals. I cleaned the whole house as if it were not going to be cleaned for a month. I taught the dogs not to scratch at the door. I organized all of our paper work. I was prepared to do nothing but nurse and pace the house. This is, I'm sure, why I now have one of the least demanding babies possible. It's like I gave birth to a house plant. He needs food, a clean diaper, an occasional burp and some cuddling. That's all. He makes me feel like a super mom. All I have to do is pat him on the tummy lightly and he starts cooing at me. I think this is nature's way of trying to trick me into having more. I just have to find the part of the form where I can check the box for the "easy baby".

The Right Tool for the Shawl

2010-04-16T03:37:00.000-07:00

Having the right tool in the garden is essential. I've learned this the hard way on many occasions. Struggling with a badly sharpened pair of clippers does more harm than good. Trying to dig a hole with the wrong shovel will take you twice the time. Knowing this did not stop me from struggling with the wrong pair of needles for the last couple of weeks.

I've been knitting a "Haruni" shawl for a friend's wedding. When I started knitting, the only 3mm needles that I could find were some short poplar straights. These were fine for the first couple of inches, but about midway through the body of the shawl it began to weigh on the ends of my needles. I struggled forward until the day I realized that I was knitting with my head cocked at an alarming angle and one needle balanced on my leg. The other needle was perpendicular to the ceiling. My back was bent and my wrists were burning. I stopped, searched for my credit card and went online to order a 3mm circular needle. I don't want to have to tell my grandchildren the story of the shawl that gave grandma a hump.

The needle I ordered is a Knit Pro Symfonie circular. After slipping all of my stitches over to the new needle I took it for a test drive. It's the difference between eating a tin of spam with chop sticks in a cold February rain and being fed homemade waffles on a sunny Sunday morning in bed with your beloved. These needles are fantastic. They are light with just the right amount of grip. The points are expertly pointy. The purple cord and dyed wood are stylin' and the joins are smooth. I'm at a point where it's taking me about an hour to complete 8 rows of knitting, but the needles are making it a pleasure. I can't really think about the fact that I'm about to double the number of stitches when I start the border. That's going to be one of those character building exercises. Hopefully the 6 audio books I've just uploaded will numb me sufficiently that I'll knit my way to the end in a trance. It will be a close your eyes and think of England thing....I hope.
I've also started a baby cardigan in a recycled cotton yarn I bought in a moment of weakness.

I'm not wild about knitting with cotton, and this cotton (Plassard Nature, Coton Recycle) is very splitty. To be fair, it has a nice drape and the simplicity of the pattern makes the knitting tolerable. The pattern is a pretty standard baby kimono called "Bella Baby Ensemble" from "The Knitter's Book of Wool", which is a great book with a good number of classic looking patterns. The color is a soft gender neutral mint green. I can knit it without charts or counting or cursing. It's the yin to my shawl yang.

Minerva

2010-03-12T01:34:00.000-08:00

Today is my birthday. As a treat to myself I'm going through my vintage Minerva knitting magazines and trying to add them to the Ravelry database. I know that doesn't sound like a real treat. It sounds like work, but I swear I'm enjoying myself. The combination of organization, 30's style, and knitting is pure pleasure. Plus, I don't have to feel guilty about not being productive. My parents drilled that one in so far it's never going to claw it's way out of my psyche. Must. Be. Productive. So, as I was saying, I'm flipping through my old magazines photographing these designs and although I've looked at them dozens of times I'm still blown away by their beauty.

Can you see the splits at each shoulder, and the delicate glass beads on the end of each tie? She looks so calm next to her flowering bush.
This next dress is spectacular. That's about as close as a modern woman should ever get to a bustle. She looks 12, but the dress looks mature enough to order drinks. Those sleeves could probably order the martinis for her.

How does a woman dress like that? It must take her hours just to squeeze into her foundation garments. Can you really wear a hat that small and not look like you're about to hop out of a clown car? They pull it off. I don't know how they do it.

I really love the intarsia collar and cuffs on this one. It looks like it would be deeply annoying to knit, but with a little bit of length added to the ribbing at the waist this would be a very wearable sweater. I think it would make me look like a lady detective.

This next lady is sporting a bow that ought to be on top of a car at a dealership, and a hat that has ears. I'm not completely sold on this one, but the tunic does have some nice details.

I don't have any desire to wake up and worry about whether or not I've got a clean pair of gloves. I know that dressing like this isn't possible for someone with children, or a garden, or a kitchen, or a waist, or dogs. Oh god, can you imagine what a dog would do to a knitted dress? Still....I could probably get away with wearing that first lace blouse with a sturdy linen skirt. I really don't have time for new projects. Thank goodness I still have time for fantasizing. I'll leave you with the tam o'shantered sailing Scottswoman. Imagine the kind of life you would have to lead in order to justify this ensemble.

Planting, Spinning and Waiting

2010-03-04T06:11:00.000-08:00

I have spring fever and have abandoned my knitting to spend more time outside. It's not quite warm yet but we've had a week of warmish days. I've been pruning, planting and hauling compost. My master lists are tucked into my moon planner and I open it carefully every day, as if it were a sacred text, checking to see when to plant what, and what to plant where. I can't stop smiling even though my back feels like it's one kink short of a Z . As if things weren't good enough, Jeanette called yesterday to tell me that she's back in her own home. We went to visit her today, and she has flowers popping up all over the place.

On the wool front, I've got two new hanks of freshly washed handspun. The first (pictured below) is posing with my lettuces.

It's a blend of dyed merino, yak down and some black Jacob. I think it's an aran weight. The next yarn is a worsted weight blend of dyed merino and cashmere.

I think it's destined to become a baby hat. Both of these skeins look like spring to me. Maybe that's just the spring fever talking.

Snow Drops and Sandwiches

2010-02-23T10:32:00.000-08:00

The other day we went for a walk down by the Vers river.

This time of year there are carpets of snow drops along the banks.

The water is a delicate blue green.

It's a peaceful place. It feels like no one comes here. Everything is so still.

The Romans built an aqueduct along the cliffs because they liked the taste of this water. You can still find little well houses where later inhabitants tapped into the aqueduct's tunnels.

We finished off the walk with peanutbutter and jelly sandwiches. It was a very good way to enjoy the final days of winter.

Little Signs

2010-02-10T12:36:00.000-08:00

My witch hazel is witchy. There's one branch that decided to bloom yellow instead of red. The flowers are just starting to open so you'll have to look closely to see it. The whole bush is red except for this one little branch. It's remarkable. I think I've said this before, but I'll say it again, I love this plant. It's going to get a spot right next to our bedroom window, so that we can wake up to it every morning. It's always doing something interesting.
There are also some crocuses popping up under the plum trees. You can see one peeking over the shoulder of the baby cardigan.

This is my Jade Baby Cardigan. It's exactly what I wanted it to be. I ended up knitting the sleeves from either end of the same ball in order to get as much length as possible out of the paltry 270 yards I had (J-Knits Superwash Me, DK in pueblo). It's a light weight cardigan, so I don't mind the short sleeves. I think it will be just right for a spring baby.
I did make one small mistake right at the very beginning, and didn't notice it until I was well past the sleeves. See if you can spot it. I really don't think it was worth ripping back for. Hint, it's in the lace on the right hand side.

The buttons were bought at La Droguerie in Paris. They're like a cross between lace and snowflakes. I was saving them for a special project. They tend to catch a little when you button and unbutton the sweater. They're not very practical, but since babies only wear these kinds of sweaters for a month or two, I'm not going to worry about it. Life is too short, and these buttons are too pretty.

Unexpected Happiness

2010-02-06T10:57:00.000-08:00

Sometimes when life gets really hard the best thing to do is to stop and look at all of the little things.

My marmalade and quince paste came out perfectly.

A knitter friend gave me a brown ball of dried plant, and after about three hours in a little water, it opened into this.

It's a rose of Jehrico.

I'm knitting a baby cardigan with no pattern, and it's working out beautifully.

Even the button holes are perfect. That almost never happens.

Couch-scapades

2010-01-31T03:34:00.000-08:00

My husband and I have been couch warming for the past couple of days.

We thought that we had dodged our son's cold. Actually, we did dodge it for a day. We took our usual combination of homeopathic remedies and felt great. The following day I was feeling so good that I celebrated with a coffee eclair followed by a half a bar of chocolate. This is a stupid thing to do if you're trying to avoid a cold. My husband did roughly the same thing, and we both started feeling bad about an hour after the last piece of chocolate had finished melting in our mouths.
The positive side of this is that the cold has given me a chance/excuse to do some knitting. In an effort to avoid another failed sweater I have changed my strategy. I spent my first day on the couch making these.

These are swatches with nice blue note cards attached. I had entirely too much fun filling out the cards. Organization is such a turn on. Don't you think?

I know people usually swatch for a specific project, but I think this may be where I've been going wrong. One days worth of swatching has taught me a lot about myself. The first thing that it has taught me is that I am a way looser knitter than your average bear. I knew this, but I didn't know exactly how much looser I was. For a project that calls for bulky yarn and size 9 needles, I may need to pick a worsted weight yarn and size 6 needles. Shocking, I know. Before I discovered this fact, I would automatically drop a needle and a pattern size. I (wrongly) figured that this was enough to ensure a good fit. Now that I see that in writing, it seems delusional. So the key here is that I've discovered that not only do I have to change needle sizes, but I may have to change the weight of the yarn as well. Instead of picking out a pattern and then picking out a yarn, I'm going to swatch every yarn I own until I get a fabric I like, take notes, and pick a pattern accordingly.
The other thing I learned is that yarn labels lie. Worsted is not always worsted. I can not rely on the label, or Ravelry or even a well intentioned fellow knitter. I'm going to use classifications like worsted, dk, aran, sport, fingering, and bulky as guides, not absolutes. You can't look at a yarn and tell how it's going to knit up. I've got pretty good eyes, and I can pick out two yarns that look for all the world like they're exactly the same weight, but when I knit them up on the same size needles and I get two completely different fabrics. Fiber content is a factor, but even with two "aran" wool yarns you can get massive differences in gauge depending on the spin, the crimp of the wool, your mood, whether your watching an action adventure or a romance (this has actually happened to me), the weather, the sheep's diet...you get my point.
The hours on the couch spent wiping my nose, popping Tylenol, knitting little squares and watching the first season of "Mad Men" were bliss. I've decided that "Mad Men" is the "Dallas" of this decade. There are a lot of rich white folks, some sexism, cheating, fist fights, shocking amounts of booze, and a good measure of corporate hooha, but I digress. At some point, I paused the drama and crawled up to the yarn hole to raid a bin for more swatching material.
Up until this point I had thought of these stash yarns as specific sweaters. Each yarn had been purchased with a pattern in mind. Now, things are different. Every yarn is looking for it's soulmate. There are no more arranged marriages between a yarn and a pattern.
While looking at my finished stack of swatches I had another thought. I'm going to try to knit my way from one bin to another, starting with these yarns. Why not? I like all of them. I've got enough of each yarn for a sweater, or at least a vest. It's a stash busting/sweater knitting two fer. It also means I won't have to pull my whole closet apart looking for a specific yarn. In an attempt to avoid another sweater knitastrophy, I've made myself a few rules.

1. The sweater I choose must have been knit by at least 5 people on Ravelry, so that I'm not the (sucker, Guinea pig, lab rat) person who has to spend hours sorting out pattern errata.

2. The sweater must look good on most of the people who've knit it. I've noticed that some sweaters are much more figure friendly than others. I need to knit something that looks good on everyone, that way if I flub up the size I can pass it on.

3. I'm going to error on the small side. I thought that it was, when in doubt, better to knit a larger size. Maybe that's true for some people, but most of my friends are medium to small. If I have to give a sweater away it will give me a lot more options if it isn't an XXL. Add to that, knitwear stretches out over time. It almost never gets smaller, unless your husband felts it in the washing machine. The final argument is that finishing a huge hunk of knitting only to find that it's way too big is more demoralizing than knitting a smaller bit of knitting, only to find that it's too small.

4. I must achieve gauge before beginning. This is not optional.

5. I must check for errata every time. This is also not optional

6. I must read (most) peoples' Ravelry notes before I begin. There's plenty of good info in other people's notes, especially when it comes to sizing.

7. I must read and re-read the pattern all the way through before beginning.

Following these criteria, and using my new swatch system, I've chosen to knit this. This is "Rosamund's Cardigan" by Andrea Pomerantz. It can be found in the Fall 2009 issue of "Interweave Knits".

I chose this sweater for a couple of reasons. It's a cardigan. People liked knitting it. Most people who started it finished it. It's knit from the top down, which means I can try it on as I go. It can be made to be reversible. Yeah, I know, reversible stuff is cool. The other people who have knit it had relatively few problems with the pattern, and it looks good on almost everybody. Looking at the photo in the magazine I would not have guessed that it would look good on most body types, but I swear it does. It's been in my queue for awhile, but not at the top of my list of things to knit.

The yarn was really the deciding factor. It's called "Ecolana", and it's made by Aslan Trends. It's a blend of alpaca and merino, which gives it a slight drape and soft shine. There are some white guard hairs which give it a fuzzy look. It's not unlike the yarn that this pattern calls for. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that this will be "the one", but even if it's not, at least I'll be able to give it to someone who will love it.

Something Old, Something New

2010-01-28T04:25:00.000-08:00

I've frogged the Turbulence U-Neck. It's much less painful to frog something if you wait a day or two. I've moved on. Before I tell you about the new knits in my life let me show you something I finished a while ago. This is the "Sunflower Tam" by Norah Gaughan, from her book "Knitting Nature". I've mentioned "Knitting Nature" before, and I'm sure I will mention it again. It is one of the finest and most interesting knitting pattern books on the market. Just be sure and check the errata before you begin a project from that book. I believe complicated patterns and a wide range of sizes are to blame for the amount of errata.

I had to knit this hat twice, because one inch short of the finish line I ran out of yarn. It's knit in The Fiber Company's "Road to China". This yarn isn't cheap, but yarn and cheap booze are alike in that, you get what you pay for. I love knitting with this yarn. It has a glow about it that makes me look like I've got a halo. That could come in handy in a crisis.

My first version of this tam was knit for Jeanette (my 91 year old neighbor). It was knit in exactly the same yarn, but in a soft blue. I rarely knit things twice. This pattern is an exceptionally good one.
Next up, the Missoni-like socks, fronts.....

and backs.

Now I've got to poach some size 1 needles from a different pair of unfinished socks. Don't laugh. That's the gritty reality of sock knitting. Some socks make it, some socks don't.
Last on my list of show and tell is the lace knitting.

I love it despite the fact that it will look like a big pile of nothing until it's blocked.

I'm beginning to see the appeal of lace knitting. It's like Christmas. It seems like a silly hassle, and then you start to get into the spirit of things, and when you can't stand the wait any longer you get a big beautiful surprise.

I Can't Make Change

2010-01-26T02:25:00.000-08:00

This is two days worth of knitting.

My little boy had a cold and that gave me more time to knit than usual. He goes into a trance when he's sick. We spent a whole day on the couch in a puffy eyed, snot nosed Pixar daze. When I began this sweater I swatched for gauge and got 18 sts over 4 inches. Because I couldn't go down a needle size without being in danger of the finished project being closer to knitted armor than a sweater, I chose to knit the petite size. What you are looking at here is an XL sweater. I got about halfway through the back before I measured the width. It measures 25 inches. I was aiming for something in the range of 20 to 22 inches. 25 inches is way too big. There is something very confusing about knitting a petite size and ending up with an XL size. I couldn't for the life of me figure out how this had happened. Then I remembered something. I'm dyslexic with numbers.
You can see how this might be a problem. 8,9,3,6 and sometimes 0 are often exchanged, rearranged or transposed in my head. I went back to my swatch and measured. I had been getting 16 sts over 4 inches, not 18. This sucks. This sucks big time. There is pretty much no way I can knit this sweater with this wool. In fact, I'm wondering if I can ever make it through a sweater without some critical error. The first sweater that I ever knit was a very simple drop sleeve cardigan. I actually knit the same sleeve 4 times because I kept reading the numbers incorrectly.
Having dyscalculia and knitting is like having dyslexia and wanting to be a copy editor. It's a nasty combination of inability and desire. I've tried all sorts of things to help me avoid making number mistakes while knitting, but the sad truth of it is that knitting is all about numbers. One extra stitch in the wrong place has the potential to cause hours of angst. I've got no clue how to reconcile my love of knitting with my learning disability.
Fortunately, the blow of finding out that I had wasted two days of my life was softened by a package arriving.

This is Blue Sky Alpacas, alpaca silk. It's for a new lace project. It has a beautiful sheen and halo.

After suffering several brutal sweater failures I don't have it in me to take on 40 pages of lace charts. I've chosen instead a lace project with only 2 charts. So far, I've spent a good 2 hours ripping back and fixing mistakes, so it's already proven to be a wise decision. The gauge is also a lot more friendly. This is the beginnings of a swatch for the 40 page "Swan Lake" project.

I really disliked working with yarn that fine. It makes me queasy just thinking about the hump I'd develop on my back from trying to see each stitch as I slowly undid 400 or so stitches after missing a yarn over.
I'm really hoping that I have the patience to make myself a sweater. It's hard going into something knowing that you'll probably fail, but I guess that's something I'm going to have to learn to live with.

Sweater Dating

2010-01-23T07:02:00.000-08:00

After some consideration, I've decided not to try and knit another "Owls" sweater right away. Instead, I'm going to try and knit myself a different sweater with a different yarn. Note I said "try". I'm also going to "try" not to get my hopes up about this one. If learned anything from dating it was that the right guy will show up just about the time you've stopped looking. I'm hoping this also applies to sweaters. I'm going to play it cool and keep my options open.
I've chosen the "Turbulence U-Neck Sweater" by Norah Gaughan.

It's a good versatile piece, with a lot of stockinette and enough people have knit it that the errata for the pattern has been worked out. Translation, it's the nice guy of sweaters. To make things a little more exciting I'm using a yarn I bought while on vacation. There's something so seductive about new yarn. Don't get me wrong, stash yarn is great, but it's familiar. Recently purchased yarn still has that yarn store smell.
The yarn is a good sturdy wool called "Imperial Stock Ranch 2 ply" in a heathered shade of raspberry (my color name, not theirs).

This combination of reliable wool with a steady eddie pattern should help to avoid any unpleasant surprises.

I swatched last night, and my gauge was way off, but the fabric was already on the verge of being stiff, so I'm knitting myself an extra small. This has the advantages of making me feel extra small and of being fewer stitches to knit, excellent. I even took the time to make sure that my math for the finished bust size was real math, not my usual "Alice in Wonderland" math.
In the spirit of not getting too committed I'm going to find another sweater to work on at the same time. Maybe this other sweater will be the dangerous type. I'm sure I'll settle down and commit to a sweater in the future, but I'm on the rebound after a rough break up, and I need a little time to sort things out.

Death Row Owls

2010-01-21T07:38:00.000-08:00

I've been knitting for 10 years. I do not own a wearable hand knit sweater. This is a big sore point with me. My first two sweaters ended up not fitting me the way I had hoped they would, and so they were gifted to a good friend. There was one sweater that fit well, and looked good, but it was washed on the delicate cycle, and it felted. There are four other sweaters that I started and haven't finished yet.
I need a sweater. I mean, I don't actually need one to stay warm, but I need one to feel like I'm not some sort of failure as a knitter. I've successfully knit things for other people, so I should be able to knit something for myself. Clearly, this is a working theory. I thought that "Owls" would be a walk in the park.

This was going to be the sweater that I finished without problems, and wore regularly. It is not that sweater. That doesn't sound nearly as dramatic as it sounded last night, after I threw my knitting to the floor and started crying. Before you decide that I'm an overly dramatic individual, let me give you the back story.
My father gave me 6 balls of Rowan "Cocoon" for my birthday last year. He said that the yarn store owner had knit a sweater with owls on it, and that it was a lovely pattern. I, being familiar with all lovely owl patterns, recognized his description of the sweater immediately as "Owls" by Kate Davies. I had a few other things I was working on at the time, and thought I'd wait to cast on until fall. Fall arrived, and I was eager to get started. I was so eager that I didn't bother to check the yardage. I assumed that the yarn store owner had sold my father the correct number of balls. Wrong. So, after swatching, casting on, and knitting a significant portion of the body, my knitters sense kicked in, and I went to check the yardage. I was 200 yards short. For you non knitters out there, that's not even close. I was frustrated, but I soldiered on. This was my first mistake. I should have ripped back, and picked a different yarn for the sweater. That would have been the mature thing to do. I had reservations about using Cocoon for this project, and now I had reservations about the sleeve length.

Instead of listening to my inner knitter, I decided to knit elbow length sleeves. I convinced myself that I could live with that, that I would be happy with elbow length sleeves. This was a lie, but I am not above lying to myself to avoid frogging a days worth of knitting. I made some changes to the pattern, knit the body, knit the sleeves and took a break.
When I got back from our Christmas trip to the states, I picked it back up, ready to start on the owl cabling. I've knit several seamless sweaters and so I just kind of glanced in the direction of the pattern. From this point on, every single stitch count was off. Every time I corrected for one problem, I ended up with another problem. Logic packed her bags and kissed me goodbye somewhere near the second row of yoke decreases. Nothing made sense anymore. In a desperate attempt to steer things back on course I asked my husband to tell me how I should decrease 9 sts. "evenly" over 85 sts. He told me what he thought was the right answer. I misinterpreted what he had said and the following count was off. I withered like the wicked witches of Oz. I was an inch short of finishing, and from the armpits up it had been a fudge festival. I had a heaping pile of poop in my lap staring at me, daring me to put it on. So, I tried it on.
It didn't fit right. To be fair, it wasn't a total disaster. It was too tight in the armpits and there was a little too much negative ease (stretch) across the owls. The thing that put me over the edge, the thing that made me hate every single stinking stitch of that sweater was the fact that I had an entire ball of Rowan Cocoon sitting next to me on the couch (for you non knitters, that's a pair of long sleeves). It was insulting. I have put this sweater on the knitter's equivalent of death row and unless there's a call from the Governor this thing is going to be terminated.
In an effort to get back on that horse, um owl, I'm trying to decided whether to use the yarn to start a project I know I like, because I've knit it before, or to try another "Owls" sweater with a different yarn.
In happier news, we have some fish.

They don't have names yet, but they are keeping the tank warm, while we wait for the others. The black fish was being a little shy during our photo shoot. They like to spend a lot of time together, and we're having a hard time telling whether it's because they really like each other, or because the are fighting. Fish psychology is complex.

Stripe-ed

2010-01-13T01:16:00.000-08:00

I'm not big on new years resolutions. In fact, I'm not a big fan of new years. It just seems like a big fuss over a date that most of the world can't agree on. However, I'm not immune to social norms, and I always think about the new year, in terms of what I'd like to accomplish. This year, I'd like to blog more, knit more sweaters and less hats, put a huge amount of compost into my garden, take more long weekends instead of a long vacation, go for walks somewhere other than my driveway, count orchids in the woods and learn how to roll out pasta with a rolling pin. We'll see how many of these things I get done and next year I'll make, or not make, resolutions accordingly.
In the interest of ego boosting, I'm going to count this striped sweater as the first sweater of the new year. It was finished on new years eve, so it's a close call. Maybe it's not a close call for the tax man, but I'm going to call it for 2010.

This was knit in Mission Falls 1824 merino superwash. I haven't had the chance to buy some elastic tread for the collar, but the recipient doesn't seem to mind too much.

He's got a mouth full of milk in this photo. It's like having a human water balloon running around the house.
I didn't use a pattern for this. I was getting 4 sts to the inch on size 7s. After measuring another sweater of his I decided to cast on 96 sts, and just went from there. I didn't bother to worry about the jog in the stripes. It runs up to the armpit and then hides in one of the decrease points of the raglan shaping. I made the body of the sweater a little longer, because I wanted it to be extra warm. I can always lengthen the sleeves as he grows.
While we were in D.C. I had a chance to visit Stitch DC. I found a couple of really great yarns there, and while I was perusing the needles selection I found a special Addi Turbo circular sock needle. I couldn't resist trying it. I don't like it. Let me be more specific. I really don't like it. It makes my hands hurt, and I feel like I'm some sort of giant handed freak. Plus, the stitches keep slipping off of it. Yikes. Here's a picture of the sock and the mean needle.

The needle may have left me cold, but the yarn is great (Farmhouse Yarns Fannie's Fingering Weight in Wildflowers). The pooling is a little crazy, but I kind of like it. I'm going to place those wide lightening bolt like stripes on opposing sides of the socks. Here's a closer shot.

The stripes remind me of Missoni. Mmmmmm Missoni.

Deep Knit

2010-01-11T09:00:00.000-08:00

I don't know what happened to me. I'm knitting all the time. I'm knitting like I need to knit in order to keep my house from falling down. Actually, it would probably help my house if I stopped knitting and paid a little bit more attention to that water damage next to the dormer. I have officially overcome my knitters block and am completely in love with wool again. I'm so crazy for the sheepy stuff that I managed to churn out a sweater for my son only days after receiving the yarn for Christmas. I finished a sunflower tam with only minimal complaining due to a bad reading of the instructions. I finished a hat for my brother in two days, and promptly cast on for a sock. I knit so much, and so hard, that I ran out of materials for my vacation knitting.
Now that I've settled in at home, I'm attempting the knitters equivalent of walking the high wire. I'm knitting this. This, for those of you who are not on Ravelry, is what looks like a very, very complicated lace stole named "Swan Lake". There are 45 pages of charts and instructions.....Fourty five. Spelling it out seems more impressive. I'm swatching with a lace weight superwash merino that I bought while in Italy, but I might just take an hour to dig out a paleozoic era ball of cream colored lace weight alpaca. I know it's in the stash somewhere, but it's pre-Ravelry, so I've got no idea what it is, or how many yards there are. All I can remember about it is that the lady at the yarn store said I'd never run out. She better be right about that.
I've knit lace before, but never something on this scale. I'm more than a little intimidated by the charts, but I'm ignorant enough to have enough confidence to go ahead with it.
I'm also more than half way through knitting "Owls". I've gotten all the way to the yoke, and am in need of 10 minutes of relative calm for connecting the sleeves to the body. I haven't got enough yarn for a full length version, so I chopped the sleeves off. I moved the shaping to the sides, as there have been some complaints about the original shaping. The yarn I'm using is Cocoon from Rowan. It's wonderfully soft, and I think it has enough mohair in it to keep it from pilling like mad.
Thankfully, the weather has been cooperating with my knitting obsession. We've had lots of fluffy snow. I don't have any photos of all of this frantic knitting. Maybe that's because I'm spending all of my time knitting. I'll leave you with a few parting shots of our snowy wonderland.

Backing Towards the Horse Slowly

2009-12-20T14:08:00.000-08:00

I've written several posts in the past month, but decided not to post them to the blog, as they all had a rather grumpy feel. I've even been considering changing the name of the blog to "The Bitter Knitter", on account of my numerous knitting disasters. To be fair, I'm not a bitter or grumpy person. Under normal circumstances I'm a pretty cheerful person. However, the knitters block was turning me into a serious snarp. I thought I'd tried everything to overcome it, but the one thing I hadn't tried was just being patient and letting it run it's course. Something about Christmas makes me feel as if I should be knitting frantically, and that (combined with a paw through deep stash) made me feel all warm and fuzzy towards my knitting. I have, in just three days, finished up four projects. That's like taking the monkey on your back and making it dance for coins. I feel liberated.
Here is the first of my triumphs. This is the "Mathless"cardigan that I was supposed to be writing up a pattern for. Well, I gave up trying to make it simple, and just finished the darn thing off.

That white stuff is snow. We've had about 5 inches over the past three days. I couldn't resist the snowy photo op. The buttons were found only a couple of days ago at a local antique shop. She had a really adorable lithograph of a young girl knitting, but it was in rough shape, and the buttons were a better deal. Besides which, I think my obsession with knitting needs to have some boundaries. I don't need to subject the rest of my family to bad artwork, just because the subject is knitting. Now, If I ever see a print of dogs knitting, I might not be able to pass it up.

The second success is a finished "Ishbel Beret" from "Whimsical Little Knits" by Ysolda Teague. This was a truly pleasurable knit. The Cardiff cashmere is super light and squishy,and the pattern is easy to memorize. It took a long time to finish because I misplaced the second ball of cashmere. I found it during the deep stash dive I mentioned earlier.

My last photos are of a baby hat I made out of my first attempts at Navajo plying. The hat was cast aside as a shameful error in judgment. It has resurfaced many times, and I finally took pity on it. I found a couple of leaves that I'd knit out of Jo Sharp's "Rare Comfort" mohair, and I sewed them on. I'm pretty happy with the end result. Maybe I'll be able to get a photo of it on the boy.

If you're better at counting than me, you'll notice that I said I had four successes, but there are only three projects in this post. The fourth project was the "Tomten Jacket" by Elizabeth Zimmerman. I couldn't bring myself to put in the zipper on my sewing machine. The risks were too great, and I knew that there was no way that jacket was going to make it out in one piece. So after months of waiting for "a sign from Jesus", as my Dad would say, I hand sewed in the zipper. It's completely adorable, but by the time I'd sewn in the zipper, the light was waning, and my little boy is too fast for low light photographs.

Mad "Max"

2009-11-09T12:42:00.000-08:00

Several weeks before Halloween I decided to make a "Max" costume, from "Where The Wild Things Are", for my son. This was in the proud tradition of watching my own mother sweat and swear over the costumes she made for me. I knew it wouldn't be easy, but I'm the only mom in the house, and if I don't suck it up and make the holiday magic, no one will. I'm exaggerating a little. I love costumes, and I hardly need and excuse to take on a project well above my skill level. Besides, I was dreaming of reading "Where the Wild Things Are" to my rosy cheeked boy, while he pointed excitedly to the page, and then to himself, and his perfectly made costume. I knew he would love it. I knew he would demand to wear it to bed, and that I might even have trouble getting it off of him. I choose polar fleece, thinking that it would be both easy to wash, and not a terrible all day, all night, all day again, fabric.

It took two days of sewing, and the body had to be made twice because I didn't measure carefully. At one point my machine decided to start sewing in reverse. I've got no idea why it did this, but I'm never going to trust it again. The fake fur I used for the tail was treacherous, but it came out looking just like the real deal.

Several days before Halloween we decided to try it on to see if it fit properly. He's never been fussy about clothing, and is usually pretty reasonable about the very unreasonable things I like to make him wear. Before I even reached the changing table he had started to cry. My husband and I managed to wrestle the costume onto him, but it was a little like putting a sausage casing on an angry snake. His sobbing was so loud that both of the dogs hid under the table. After about five minutes, it was clear that this costume fell somewhere between enhanced interrogation and actual torture. We peeled it off of our screaming baby, and I sulked a bit.
Halloween came and went, and I was still a little afraid to put him in the costume. Just picking it up caused him to shout "NO!", and run in the opposite direction. The problem was, that I felt that after two days of sewing, I really did deserve some cute pictures. I'm not the world's most selfless mother, but I'm also not keen on making my son miserable. Candy seemed like the only solution.
One sunny morning, when he was in an especially sweet mood, we launched our attack. I readied the camera, and my husband started doling out the gummy bears. We assumed that a few gummy bears would do the trick, but children aren't dumb they're just inexperienced. Our son quickly realized that he had the upper hand. His cheeks were so stuffed with gummy bears that he had to keep his shouting to a minimum, but he steadfastly refused the humiliation of the hood. We had to do a 1, 2, 3, countdown in order to get a photo.

The whole ordeal was over in about 10 miniutes. The baby seemed a little resentful, but candy heals most emotional wounds. I'm not sure I got the photos I was looking for, but I certainly got the photos I deserved.

Here's what I learned about making a costume for a two year old.
1. No hoods, hats, headbands or anything else that is supposed to stay on their heads.
2. Nothing that hangs over, or covers hands or feet. They find this both confusing and irritating.
3. Tails are O.K., but only because they can't see them.
4. Make sure that the costume is easy to get on and off.
5. Don't choose white.
6. If your child absolutely refuses to wear the costume, set it aside and eat some candy.

Jeanette

2009-10-28T12:04:00.000-07:00

This is my neighbor, Jeanette. She's 91, and has lived in the same house for 72 years. Last year she fell ill and spent the whole year living with her family. She missed her home, and managed to convince her children to let her move back. They won't let her stay over the winter, and so as soon as it gets cold, she'll be leaving again. That year she was gone, I realized how much I love her, and how much it means to me to have such a good friend living so close.

I can talk about anything with her. She has a wicked sense of humor, and is nothing like what I expected a lady in her 90's to be. She isn't stuck in the past. She isn't old fashioned. She doesn't complain about anything. I keep wishing that there was some way I could make her my age, so that we could raise our kids together, and she could show me the millions of things she knows about this place. She and her husband subsisted off of their land for most of their lives. She is a fantastic gardener, and did everything from making her own cheese to knitting her own underwear. I knew you were wondering if there was going to be something about knitting. During our last visit we talked about how women were treated when she was young. She said that there were three things a women was supposed to know, before she could be considered for marriage; how to make soup, how to spin wool and flax, and how to make babies. Well, women didn't really have to know how to make babies, they just needed to be able to do it, repeatedly. I was confused about the "making soup" until another friend later explained that "making soup" just means cooking in general. I do know how to spin, "make soup" and make babies, but I'd rather not have to wash the babies diapers in a stone trough, a half mile from my house, in February. Jeanette had to do this for all three of her kids. She also had to take over the farm during the war. When I gave birth to my son, she warned me against leaving him in a basket at the edge of the field. Apparently, vipers are attracted to the smell of milk on the baby's breath. Just after warning me about this, she gave a little laugh and said she guessed I wouldn't have to worry about this, as I wouldn't be plowing the field with a newborn at my side. This is true, but I did like to work in the garden with him, and it's always good to know what snakes do and don't like. FYI, they don't mind dogs, but hate cats.

This is a photo of her picking the bugs off of a cabbage. She didn't plant much this year, but she's hoping to come back sometime in March, so that she can begin planting. I'm glad that she'll be in a nice warm house during the coldest months. She still heats her own house with firewood, and that last year she was here, I was a little worried about her. Still, I'll miss her at Christmas. I'll miss the little trail of woodsmoke on the horizon and her socks drying on the line. There's always a good bit of repair knitting, a new toe, or a band of ribbing to make them longer. Each one is a little sculpture. Actually, she knit the cardigan in these pictures. She doesn't knit anymore, but she'll tell you that she's knit over twenty sweaters for adults, and many more for children. Sometimes I day dream about what it would look like if you took every thing that a person created in their whole life, and lined them up. Everything from their children, to the macaroni necklaces from kindergarten, to each muffin and pancake. I'll bet the line of things she's made in her life would stretch a very long way into the distance.

The Great Distraction

2009-10-23T11:52:00.000-07:00

I'm still living in fear that I will never want to knit again. Every time I look at my projects basket, I shudder. Intellectually, I know that this is simply a bad case of knitters block, but years of yarn hoarding and knitting book acquisition have made me more than a little committed to this hobby. I'm starting to panic. Walking away now would leave me with unspeakable amounts of free time, and a gaping void in my closet. I know that sounds like a positive thing. I assure you, it is not. I would only replace the knitting with an inferior hobby, which I would suck at. This would make me even more temper-a la- mental and hermit like. I'm going to limp along with yarn related activities in the hopes that I can lure the desire to knit back into my life.
Spinning is acting like a pressure release valve right now. I just don't have the brain for knitting, and spinning requires a minimal amount of concentration. In fact, it's better for me not to concentrate while spinning. I've found two spinning clubs in my area, and I finally managed to make it to the serious club. They are members of a real live guild. I know, you thought those went out with the 18th century. Well, spinning went out of vogue then too, but that doesn't stop some of us from being extremely out of date. During my first session with the serious guild ladies, I learned how to spin all sorts of kinds of silk. I really sucked up to the instructor, and was more than a little satisfied at being the first to finish. This is an ugly part of my personality, but genetically speaking, I come by it honest. I'm so rarely the first in any class, that I really relish those few instances when I can be impressive. Here's my bobbin from that class.

We tried silk noil, throwster's waste, silk tops, silk hankies, and some silk roving. The best part of it, was making punies. Just having an excuse to use the word puni, which sounds both child like and dirty, was a lot of fun. Our instructor, Jane, taught us how to card the silk noil out, and then roll it off the cards onto a knitting needle. After sliding it off the needle, you have what looks like a very skinny, very long cocoon. Some puni making tips are; don't try to card too much at a time, keep the silk at the ends of the cards, and when you're rolling it off onto a needle, make the roll as tight as possible. Now, you are a puni making expert.
Since the spinning meeting, I've been inspired to finish up some old spinning projects. They don't make for the best photographs, so I jazzed them up with a little fall color.

This is Blue Faced Leicester, spun and then plyed into a worsted weight yarn. I've got another hank of this, and a whole sack of roving. I'm going to try and spin enough for a sweater. This is assuming I recover the will to knit a sweater.
The next photo is of a merino batt that a friend gave me. It's much more peachy in real life. After I took the photo, I took out a good bit of the twist by running it back onto my wheel. It's much fluffier now, and I think I've got enough for a pair of mitts. I think the original plan was to ply this with something else, but I'm glad I'm keeping it simple.

Those beautiful leaves in the background are from a witch hazel that's sitting in a pot on my porch. The leaves look like they're burning. This witch hazel is going to get a special spot next to our bedroom window. It's been beautiful in every season. I highly recommend witch hazels. You get a pretty plant, homeopathic home remedies, and it has the word witch in the name, which makes it sound dangerous. A dangerous name is not something that most plants can pull off.
Now that I'm talking about something completely unrelated to the topic of this blog, I'm going to show off my new terrariums. We have a very large arched window above an old stone sink. It looks beautiful with plants in it, but they tend to block out a lot of light. As it's a dark room, I wanted something that would show off the window, without blocking the light: enter terrariums.
I think we can probably make at least 30 of these things without filling up the window.

They only need to be misted every week or so, and so it won't be a huge chore to keep them all watered. I'm far from being an expert, and there are many good books on the subject, but here's how we made ours. We poured about 1/2 inch of activated charcoal into the bottom of a glass container. Then I added about 1/3 inch of soil. We arranged our moss/lichen/ferns/succulents, and added a few objects. The activated charcoal keeps things from getting funky. It's very important not to over water these things. I can only imagine the fetid mess that an over watered sealed terrarium could make. They really are magical little worlds, and I'm so excited to have an excuse to scrounge for old glass jars.

I think my next terrarium will feature something architectural.

Like a.....

2009-09-22T00:26:00.000-07:00

I have not forgotten that I have a knitting blog, I just haven't knit anything in....a month. That's really shocking to me, but even more shocking is the realization that I haven't done anything crafty. There's been no spinning, no sewing and no knitting. I haven't even had the get up and go to sit down and blog about it. I'd like to be able to offer you an in-depth discussion of knitter's block, but my brain is waltzing around inside my head, and I can't seem to make it sit down and take things seriously. The only thing I can offer you are photos of our beautiful rain.

After a terrible summer drought, we've finally made it to fall, and the rain has returned. It's the only thing I can seem to focus on.

The mornings are misty, and the yellow leaves are laying in slowly spreading circles beneath the trees. You'd think this kind of weather would get me knitting again, but my poor brain is still wandering around like a.....like a ......like a nun in a ......monastery? No, that doesn't work. My brain is wandering around like a bee in the rain. Well, that's just weird. I can't think of anything clever. I'm going to have to go for a walk, and come back with something better.

Snappy

2009-08-26T05:59:00.000-07:00

I've just inherited a camera from my photographer husband.

My technological expertise goes about as far as a donkey in a wheelbarrow. Despite this, I am contentedly snapping away at anything and everything. I got a little over exited about some buttons, and ended up having to edit through some 30 or 40 button photos.

They are great buttons, but posterity can live without 40 photos of the same three buttons. Yesterday I managed to set aside a little time for quilting. In two hours I (almost) finished this.

I even hand sewed the little cabin, and the nesting doll in the doorway. These are some of my favorite fabrics. Notice the rabbits in the blue fabric pattern.

I'm considering a third panel at the bottom. It's a good size for a baby quilt, but if I add a panel, it could be a crib quilt. I'm going to do a lot of embroidery on this. There will be a corn crop, birds, pumpkins, and maybe a squirrel or two. I still haven't decided what to do about the border, but that's the nice thing about quilting. I don't have to decide in advance.

Woman vs. Shawlette

2009-08-23T00:48:00.000-07:00

I mentioned earlier in another post that I was in a sort of Mexican standoff with "Ishbel". I thought that this fight would be won when I called in the cavalry on knit night. To be fair, this wasn't their fight, and they were as mystified as I was. A day or two later I rallied the troops for a frontal assault. I didn't think I would win. In fact I thought that there would be heavy casualties, mostly involving me swearing a lot, and then weeping in a corner. Within two minutes I had found the stray yarn over and was advancing towards victory with no doubts as to my superiority. After years and years of knitting, I am a battle hardened commander of yarn. I should have known that the shawlette was just feigning a retreat so that it could sneak around for a good swift kick at my rear.
Mid way through the lace, I realized with horror, that I did not have enough yarn left to finish her off. The shawlette had me surrounded and was cutting off supplies. The only way to win was to throw the original battle plan in the bin, and go all in. First, I dug out some a small ball of cashmere in a similar colorway. By some miracle of Jupiter, it was actually the same weight, and looked pretty next to the body of the shawlette, but it was far too small a ball. I knit forward, and ripped back. I tried to skip lace charts. I tried to rewrite lace charts. I was losing. I started to swear. I started to yell. In a completely unladylike display, I ripped out the needles, frogged back several inches and tossed the shawlette on the table. I was preparing to wave the white flag, when I noticed that the shawlette looked good, remarkably good for something that was missing it's border.
I made a snap decision. I would let my enemy lie there thinking she had won. The following morning I would retrieve my needles, and finish her off. After a sound nights sleep, I went in for the kill. By 10am the following day, I was casting off. Victory was mine. I tossed her in a hot soapy bath, and pinned her down.

I am not above humiliating a shawlette on a towel.

I was so pleased with this victory, that I cast on for a matching beret.

I'm not prepared to wear these two items at the same time. There's something a little creepy about a matching beret and shawlette. However, it's nice to work on another knit with the same lace pattern, while it's still fresh in my head.

The beret is also cashmere, and so far, it's been a real pleasure. I'm not going to let this one get even a step out of line. Remember the Alamo, or whatever.

Un-responsibility-ness

2009-08-10T23:54:00.000-07:00

There's been a bit of a lull in the knitting. I don't know if it's because of the weed pulling opportunities that the recent rains have provided, or if it's because I'm baking like baking might add years to my life. Our village fete is this weekend, and I'm on the hook to make Irish soda bread for 240 people. Incidentally, I only signed up to make bread for 120 people, but somehow that number got changed. Thank goodness I don't trust authority figures. I started making bread weeks ago, on the hunch that the powers that be might have their numbers wrong. I've also drafted another sucker to help out. When I do get a moment or two, I've been plugging away on "Striven".

It's a very good end of the day, so tired I can't tell my dog from my baby, sort of project. I think I'm probably going to have to cast on for another sweater in a thicker yarn. Knitting a sweater on size 4 needles is pretty demoralizing, even for those of us who lack morals. I have some Eco-wool in the stash that's been begging for parole. I'm considering the "Placed Cable Aran" by Cathy Payson. It can be found in the Fall 07 issue of Interweave Knits. The only thing holding me back from a quick and dirty cast on, are all of the UFOs hanging out in my living room. I might have to get one of those "No Loitering" signs. Maybe I should just suck it up, and finish them. In my defense, I'm living in a house where this is considered breakfast.

We may have some self control issues going on here. Just in case you don't recognize the container in the back ground, that's chocolate macadamia nut ice cream on a French country loaf. I know, it's genius. I wish I could claim this creation as my own, but my husband deserves all of the credit for this masterpiece of irresponsible cuisine.
On a completely unrelated note, I've got a quilting itch, and it needs scratching. Here's a rough draft of a baby quilt I'm about to start cutting pieces for.

I'm only going to use a couple of fabrics for this. The little cabin in the woods theme should be pretty gender neutral. Gender neutral is key, when you don't can't remember who's pregnant with what.

I think I'll probably end up doing some embroidery on this before I start quilting. I want this quilt to be a little bit dark, like the music from "Peter and the Wolf". Children have lovely dark sides, which should be cultivated with traditional fairy tales and scary quilts.

Striven

2009-08-02T14:50:00.000-07:00

This butterfly landed on my swimsuit while I was laying out by the pool.

I love summer, I really do. I look forward to it, as if I'm still in the second grade. Tomatoes, peaches, strawberries, sun tea, swimming, BBQ, what's not to like? Before knitting, I was not a fan of fall. Fall was like one big endless Monday. The thrill of going back to school wore off right around the time I received my first homework assignment. I went to Catholic school, so they gave homework out on the first day. Now, I love fall. I love it so much, that even on a perfect summer day, I think about fall knitting. This is what I'm knitting for fall.

The pattern is "Striven", and is published in Rowan Magazine 42. I believe this to be one of the all time greatest Rowan Magazines ever. It has tundra, and heather, and a purse shaped like a pineapple. There are at least 15 things I'd love to knit from this magazine. When it came in the mail I did something I almost never do. I went online, and I ordered the exact yarn that this pattern called for; wool cotton and felted tweed. When the yarn arrived I pulled a ball out of the bag, grabbed the magazine, and started to read through the pattern. It seemed really daunting. There was some weird Swedish stitch I didn't know. I put the yarn down and picked up another project. Since that day, this sweater has been haunting my stash. Two years later, I'm not afraid of the weird Swedish stitch. I'm ready to knit the sweater, and sit on a rock wearing a kilt with a "come hither if you dare" look, on my face. That model really sold me on this sweater. Such confidence for someone with a cave bat complexion.

I've finished the ribbing on the back, and am about two inches into the slipped stitch stripy pattern. It looks like weaving. I suppose that's the idea. There's something odd about the weight of the fabric. It feels too light. I tried swatching with a smaller set of needles, but came up with an equally airy fabric. I guess it's the stitch pattern that's causing that.

I think I like the felted tweed. It's the kind of yarn I could grow to love. I'm going to take extra care with this project. I want this to be a sweater that I wear with pride. I still don't have a hand knit sweater that I'll wear in public. I'm more than a little ashamed of that. Everything seems to get given away, or shrunk, or never finished. This time, I'm going to stick it out. It helps that the color work is fun, but not challenging. It also helps that the sweater is named "Striven". Striven sounds like driven + strive. One can't very well chuck a sweater named "Striven" into a bag. It just seems wrong.
This next photo is of my new friend Amy.

Amy as in, an A+ version of me. She's got the same size bust, but with an impossibly small waist. She was found at a small shop that was going out of business. Actually, truth be told, I saw a young woman walking toward the parking garage with a dress form under her arm. I cornered her and demanded that she tell me where she bought her dress form. She breathlessly informed me that there were only a couple left, and that they were being sold for 15 euros a piece, and before she could finish her sentence, I was off like a shot, dragging my husband and son behind me. Because it's a store form, and not a sewing form, I'm going to have to make a couple of adjustments. For one, Amy is going to need to put on some weight. No one in this house is allowed to have a 38 inch bust with a 26 inch waist. Them's the rules.

The Drought

2009-07-29T13:07:00.000-07:00

We've been suffering from a serious drought this summer. It's rained twice in as many months. Our lawn is ecru. The leaves on our trees are curling with the heat. I've been watering, and watering, and pleading with the weather reports. It looks like we're going to keep on watering, because there's no rain in sight. Even the forest is going brown. I might just take the mower out for a spin to see if I can do a large scale scrimshaw illustration on our front lawn.
The knitting photos I have, are a little uninspiring, so I'll mix it up with some pictures of my dahlias. They're the only things keeping me sane while I water the day away.

Don't be fooled by the green in the photos. That's the only part of the garden that's getting enough water. If you look carefully, you can see the white lawn in the background.

To help with the dry mood, I'm knitting something green. This is "Ali", by Kim Hargreaves. I'm really enjoying the knitting, but my enthusiasm is tempered by the the fact that I'm going to have to call a yarn store in Florence. I did not buy enough yarn, and I did not check the yardage before I cast on. Now I will pay for my lazy/cheap nature by having to make an arse of myself in Italian. That seems fair.
Next up, "Ishbel".

I don't believe that time is linear. I don't believe in fate. I don't believe that 2 + 2 always equals 4. These three things are helping me to cope with the knitting equivalent of a parallel universe.

I made a few mistakes in the body of the shawl, which didn't show up until I counted all of the stitches, in preparation for the lace portion of the shawl. I ripped back, almost to the beginning, and re-knit the body. I counted twice, just to be sure, and then started the lace charts. I am five rows in, and something is horribly wrong. The lace pattern looks right. It matches the chart. There is no errata. Rows 1-4 went smoothly. There were no extra stitches, and everything was lining up. I am missing two stitches on either side of the center line. I have looked, and counted and stared at the chart with an opened mouthed fish expression. Nothing is making sense. Logic does not apply. Logic tells me that I must have omitted two increases on the previous row. I did not. Logic tells me I must have two extra decreases somewhere. I do not. I am in a Mexican standoff with a shawlette. Neither of us has budged. I'm going to bring out the big guns on knit night. This shawlette is not going to best me.

Feckity

2009-07-17T01:59:00.000-07:00

This week's knitting has been feckity. Feckity knitting is knitting that causes me to swear a lot. I'm trying not to use "real" swear words around my babbling sponge boy. So, "feckity feck" is the swear du jour. This is the swear producing knitting du jour.

The yarn is pure cashmere in a creamy shade of burnt orange, from Handmaiden Fine Yarns. No problem there. The pattern is "Ishbel" from Ysolda Teague's "Whimsical Little Knits" e-book. No problem there. The knitting is by me, and that seems to be my problem. I was enjoying this too much. It was causing me to snuggle into my favorite chair and sigh. This is always a bad sign. Knitting is like the sea. You should never turn your back on it. You should never allow you mind to wander too far, or it will swallow you up. There are many, many versions of "Ishbel" on Ravelry. Everyone was Oooing and Ahhhing about this pattern. It's easy, and quick, and wearable and well written. I threw myself into the water without my bathing suit on. The water felt great, so great in fact, that I was knitting with my eyes half shut, and a Mona Lisa smile. Now I'm drowning, and all I can think to say is "feck". Somewhere along the right hand side of the triangle, I missed a couple of yarn overs. It's almost invisible. It took me a good ten minutes to find them. I'm underwater, staring at 176 sts, wondering what to do. I'm going to have to force this cashmere to do unspeakable things. I'm going to have to compromise my knitting ethics, in order to save myself.
Earlier this week, I was also forced to fudge my way out of a corner. These may look like an innocent pair of baby booties, but they hide a dark secret. It's hidden in their soles (pun intended). I found an extra stitch at the end of a row of kitchnering, and I just tucked it into the seam. Upon knitting the second booty, I realized that I'd have to make the same mistake in order for the soles to match. Despite this slack handed approach, they're darn cute. The pattern is "Tiny Shoes", and is also from Ysolda Teague's new book "Whimsical Little Knits".

I really love the little buttons I found for them. I'll certainly be making more of them, with leftover sock yarn.

Now they need to make their way to the post office, and then to the mommy to be. They probably won't travel very far after they make it onto the feet of the baby, but these will be very well traveled booties. The yarn is from Canada, it came to me via Virginia, it was knit in France, and will be mailed off to Minnesota. All of that flying makes my green side cringe, but at least I was able to get two projects out of the yarn, and the labor was my own.....justification.....complete.
This last photo, is of a swatch for a new sweater. This is knit with yarn form our vacation. It's "Monet", 30% cashmere/70% Merino, by Ixia. I think the ratio of cashmere to wool is perfect. It still has that lovely halo, and feather light feel, but the wool will make it harder wearing. Also, I won't bust into tears if my little boy decides to smear some yogurt on the shoulder. There is no doubt in my mind that he will decide to do this.

The pattern I'm swatching for is "Ali" from Kim Hargreaves new book "Breeze". Truth be told, this is not the first Hargreaves pattern I've attempted. I've got two projects that never really made it past the first four inches. This one shows more promise. It's less complicated, and has a lot of basketweave, which I find addictive. The swatch is beautiful. The fabric is light. It's a perfect weight for a cardigan, and there's enough room between the stitches for the cashmere to bloom a little, after washing. FYI, you should always knit cashmere a little bit looser to allow for the bloom. It gets softer with each hand wash. I'm going to keep the swatch near to me, like a carrot on a stick. I'm determined to finish a sweater for myself before the cold weather sets in. Before I go, I wanted to add that I'm not just being artsy with my photography. Greens tend to get really weird when I post them to the blog. I thought I might try and trick my camera into giving me a more accurate green, by including a contrasting green in the photo. I'm pleased to report that my sneaky tricks have worked. Note to self, be more sneaky with the electronics.

The Pasta and Sock Machine

2009-07-08T13:53:00.000-07:00

I have been a pasta and sock machine these last couple of days. Yesterday I made orecchiette, and a day later I made some tagliatelle.

These were ridiculously fun to make. This would be an excellent project for kids. The dough is just water, semolina and salt. I found the recipe in one of my old "Gourmet" magazines. It's very easy to make the little "ears". It's not quick, but it's easy. The end result was well worth the effort, just like, (enter the segue) these socks.

These are "Sam" from "Sock Innovation" by Cookie A. This pattern is not for a novice knitter, but it's not enhanced interrogation. I had the pattern memorized by the third repeat. They are very slow going. I feel like I'm knitting under water. I'm not the kind of knitter who can devote herself to one project. The pace of this was making me feel like I should look into retirement communities, and so I cast on a baby booty. Nothing knits up faster than a booty, and it has the added benefit of being something that goes on a foot. So, it's not making me feel like I'm cheating on the sock. The pattern is from "Whimsical Little Knits", by Ysolda Teague.

I'm already looking forward to the second booty. Booty, booty, booty.

Newsprint Madonnas

2009-07-03T03:59:00.001-07:00

While I did manage one post on our trip, I couldn't seem to justify spending our precious vacation time searching out an Internet connection. I was too busy searching out yarn, and paintings of breastfeeding women in Catholic churches. The last one is a little odd. I'll cop to that. I was a wee bit obsessed with all of these breastfeeding virgin mothers, and their chubby-fisted counterparts. You almost never see women in France breastfeeding in public. I don't remember seeing many women in America doing it, and I only saw one mother in Italy doing it. Inside the churches is a different story. There are portraits of suckling Jeesi everywhere. Almost every other church we went into had at least one.

I'm still breastfeeding our son, and he's taken to letting me know he wants a feed, by cramming his hand down my shirt, giving me the worlds meanest titty twister, and then trying to yank the tit up and over my collar. There's nothing like walking around the Vatican with a baby's hand making one of your breasts look like it's hatching out of your clothes. I was a little embarrassed by the situation until I found this painting.

I love the look on her face, one part amused, one part annoyed and a lot of love. It's good to know that I'm not the only one who's been felt up by a toddler in a church.

The yarn search was equally comforting, comforting and soft. I found five different shops. Some of them I knew about before hand, and some of them were discoveries. There was Mirko Filati in Florence, Sheep Shop in Pisa, Lovilane and Filo et Filo in Lucca, and a shop I can't remember the name of in Massa Maritima. I bought a lot of cashmere, some cotton, some wool and a little bit of linen. There was even some mystery yarn. I'll post pictures of the newest additions to the stash soon, but for now, I'll finish up with a little bit of swatching.

This is a pure cotton yarn that I found at Filo et Filo. The lovely lady who owns the store is having a fire sale, and going into retirement. Or at least, that's what my limited grasp of Italian led me to believe. She was selling yarn at shockingly good prices, and I scooped up every ball of this stuff. I don't normally go in for worsted weight variegated yarns. I don't like heavy weight cottons, or tape yarns, but this yarn is a glorious exception. It's very Issey Miyake. It's stiff and soft at the same time. The yarn is knitted out of many very fine strands, and then pressed into a tape. The dye is painted on, and reminds me of newsprint.

It's nice to knit with and despite the fact that it looks like it would be a splitty nightmare, it's relatively hard to catch a needle on it. Because of the construction it doesn't have that chalky dead weight sort of feel that most other thick cottons have. I'm stalled on what pattern to choose. Right now it's between two patterns in Norah Gaughan vol. 2. There are several other contenders, but these both seem appropriate for the yarn. I'm leaning towards "Mobius", that's the one on the left.

Variegated yarns are tricky, and the last thing I want is something that looks like wet newsprint wrapped around my shoulders. I'm looking for something that will bring out the Issey Miyake in me. There's a fine line between origami and a fish and chips wrapper.

Yarnstores, Italian Style

2009-06-23T10:56:00.000-07:00

Going on vacations requires a lot of planning. Even when you try not to plan, you end up planning. The eating, the where to sleep, the what to see, the what the heck is that building over there?, demands some planning. Adding a baby, and a car to the mix, requires a wedding planner like demeanor, frost in the face of flames. One might think that with all of this planning, I might have forgotten about yarn. I did. That is, I did until I missed an opportunity to visit a cashmere goat farm. It would have been beautiful, goats for the baby and husband, cashmere for me. I not quite over it. That small planning failure ensured yarn vigilance for the rest of the trip. I managed to hit up five yarn stores. Here's the line up.

I put an example of each yarn in this bowl just to take photos, but I'm thinking of leaving it out on the dinner table. We'll see how long it takes the man of the house to notice that the fruit has been replaced. He has a very high tolerance for fiber. I'm guessing it will take a week or so. Looking at this lovely bowl of yarn has given me many ideas. I've already dreamed up new lives for all of my lovelies. Here, I'll show you.

This is a softy cabled cashmere tam, possible "Rose Red" or "Gretel".

This is a sturdy hemp and cotton shopping bag with a garter stitch bottom.

This is a breezy summer lace scarf, something vaguely nautical in a very simple lace pattern. This yarn is without a tag, but I'm sure it's navy and white cotton with two different strands in green viscose.

This is a soft wool and cashmere sweater with 3/4 length sleeves and a leaf motif, possibly "Eastlake", possibly "Climbing Vines Pullover".

This is an alpaca and wool blend. It's a little shy at the moment. I think it wants to be something with aran cables.

This yarn knows exactly what it wants to be. It is a moorit sort of brown. There's a hint of red in it. The halo is saintly. It will be "Mary Jane" from the "Twist Collective" winter 2008. The yarn and the pattern are soul mates, destined to meet on my needles.

Sockus Maximus

2009-06-14T06:51:00.000-07:00

We're rampaging around Italy like our barbarian ancestors, eating, checking out the nekid' statuary and eating deadly amounts of gelato. There has been a fair amount of car time, and that has allowed for some sock knitting. In between gaping at this.

and this.....

I have been knitting these. The Yarn is made by "A Swell Yarn Shop" and is called Duet, because there's one mini skein of a matching color for heels, toes or whatever strikes your fancy.

I am trying to finish this pair before Father's day. I should be able to do this. They aren't a perfect match. They're more like fraternal twins, which is nice. It's the first plain pair of socks I've ever knit. The knitting is pretty boring, but it's fast, and it allows for the ogling of more nekid' statues.

One of the real highlights of our trip has been a stay at an agritourismo called Il Cortile, in Cicciano. You can Google them to find the website. The courtyard was vast,

and the rooms were furnished with family antiques. There were several acres of gardens, which we had all to ourselves. Every night we ate a four or five course meal prepared by the family. There was even some homemade booze. This is a glass of a limoncello like liquor made from what looks like a giant lemon.

It was excellent. It think you could have guessed that by the fact that I took the trouble to photograph it like it was a holy relic. I would have photographed the burnt orange ice cream with candied orange zest......but I ate it too fast.

When my parents met up with us in Rome, they came bearing gifts. This was probably because they'd heard we're barbarians. There was a sea colored skein of Malabrigo Sock.

There was another skein of Madeline Tosh sock yarn in a variegated shade of grey called "Tern".

There was even a copy of Cookie A.'s new book "Sock Innovation".

The gifts were very very good, and so we let them join the rampage.

Shame Has a Name

2009-05-28T12:41:00.000-07:00

We are leaving for a month in Italy, this coming Monday. There is a code orange level of stress humming a cicada like hole in my head right now. To give you an idea of just how desperate things are around the house, I caught myself doing something really unforgivable this morning. I was tidying up the living room, and I saw three pieces of sweetened puffed rice stuck to the seat of the couch. They were from yesterday's breakfast, and had hitched a ride to the couch on my toddler. I looked at them. I weighed my options, and then I ate them. The distance to the bin was too great. It would have required too much effort. I am officially a human compost bin. I am officially pathetic. You can thank me later, for not including pictures in this post.

Tipple Cat Hat

2009-05-26T11:50:00.000-07:00

I'll begin with the tipple. Today we bottled 17 bottles of elderflower champagne.

This is a real science experiment. It's my first brewing project, and the first time I've ever tasted elderflower anything. It took four days to get a good ferment going, recipe here. We're a little scared of exploding bottles. We've secured the champagne in a plastic trashcan with blankets. Our other security measure is to leave for Italy, and let our house sitters deal with it. I have no business making elderflower champagne one week before we leave on vacation. I certainly have no business leaving a possibly explosive sugary alcohol bomb for our unsuspecting house sitters. I know this, but I don't care.
Here are the cats.

I found these while going through some unopened boxes from our move. Our move was three years ago, don't laugh. I had completely forgotten about these beauties.

I think they were a gift from my mother. They are hilarious. The open mouthed cat is my favorite.

They remind me of Charles Dickens characters. They should have names like Cornelius Bruggs, Constance Fellander and Mellie Whithers. I'll have to keep my eyes out for worthy project.
Last, and probably least, is the summer sky hat.

I finally found some buttons for it. I had been looking for bird buttons, but the only birds I could find were perching or very very plastic. The ladybugs were languishing on the bottom of my sewing basket.

I got them out on a whim, and was really pleased with how they looked. They are made out of glass, and are completely inappropriate for a baby hat, but then the whole hat is totally impractical. It's not machine washable, it's got little wisps of mohair trailing off of it, and now it's got baby chokers sewn all over it. I don't care. I like it.

I think my brain left for Italy without me.

T & A & a Pattern

2009-05-14T07:17:00.000-07:00

After a shocking dry spell, my mailbox finally decided to deliver. In one day, I received the summer 09 copy of Interweave Knits and "A Stitch in Time vol. 1". This is a book I ordered from Amazon a while ago. It was ordered in some sort of "The Three Faces of Eve" moment, because for the life of me, I can't actually remember ordering it.

This book is fantastic. It's a new version of a book published in the 1972. The original was a compilation of over 100 patterns printed in the UK between 1920 and 1949. The new version includes 60 of the original patterns with rewritten versions in larger sizes and new yarns. It's wonderful to see the two patterns side by side. I love the old sales pitches. "The young girl looks her sweetest in a butterfly collar." This collar is the size of a large hawk.
While vintage patterns are fun to peruse, I often find it a little hard to see myself knitting them. I can't imagine knitting a floor length gown on size 4 needles. I don't think I'd make it through the 600 stitch cast on. Despite a few costume pieces, This book has a surprising number of really wearable garments. There are at least 5 things I'd love to knit, and probably another 10 that I'd knit if knitting was all I did, and I had an unlimited supply of yarn. There's another reason I love this book. In my grandma's heyday, before very tall teenagers dominated the runways, clothing was all about T&A. I've spent a number of years hating my Ts and ignoring my A. Clothing that's meant for flat chested runway models does not do my figure justice. Patterns from the 30's, 40's, 50's and some of the 60's are much more flattering for me.
Interweave Knits also has some good summer knits. I like this issue. There's a pretty little cardigan form Connie Chang Chinchio (winner of the most alliteration in a knitwear designer's name award), and an incredible entrelac lace skirt by Annie Modesitt. The other thing that caught my eye was a baby cardigan from the staff projects section. I was very excited about knitting this for my little man until Nicole, from "Stash and Burn", referred to this sweater as the "Loppem for babies." On second glance, she's right. Maybe there's a small part of me that wants to be matchy matchy with my son, but there's a bigger part that doesn't want to leave emotional scars. The more I thought about it, the more I wanted to change the pattern. I wanted a different cable pattern, long sleeves, a bigger size, different yarn, more buttons, a different yoke....... and so I present to you the ( in progress) "Mathless Cardigan". I gave up on knitting from a pattern, and hit the drawing board.

I don't want to spoil the surprise, so I'll save the description and pattern for another post. I will tell you that it's the easiest pattern ever. All of the major numbers in the pattern are divisible by 5. I have a rather antagonistic relationship numbers. I'll leave it at that.

Ye Olde Photoshoot

2009-05-12T01:10:00.000-07:00

I roped my husband into taking some pictures of me in my "Loppem". I still haven't found the right buttons, but I'm sure that won't take long. It's a little on the big side, but it's still wearable.

I went with the bed jacket feel of the sweater, but it looks just as good with jeans.

The photoshoot may have gotten a little out of control. They always do.

I blame this on the old French nether garment. Just look at these seams.

Who sews like this? This woman must have started her first sampler in utero. I'm awe struck. I'm sure I could sew a seam like this, but could I do it for yard after yard, by candlelight, after making three hot meals, looking after five kids, slaughtering a chicken, and taking forty pounds of laundry to the local lavoir? This kind of craftwomanship is truly commendable. Here's one of her buttonholes.

To give you an idea of scale, that button is about the size of one of those tiny little buttons used to secure the corner of a man's collar. You know, those buttons that are impossible for anyone over the age of 14 to button. The most shocking thing about this masterpiece of everyday life, is the price. I paid ten euros for it. Every seam is hand sewn, all of edges are finished with a hand sewn scalloped lace, every tiny button hole is perfection, and it cost me ten euros.

It hurts a little to see something so beautiful, so undervalued. There are racks of these things at every antique show, and most of them are just like this. Now that I knit, when I look at these, I see hours of a woman's life.

Thanks H.C., I promise I'll wear it with you in mind.

On the Monkey

2009-04-28T11:01:00.000-07:00

I have been on a serious finishing jaunt. Due to some April downpours, I've been stuck inside.

Yesterday I finally got around to finishing the Spindle Socks.

In one afternoon, I knit a whole foot, grafted the toes, blocked Loppem, blocked the Tomten jacket, cleaned the house, and set the twist on some handspun. It was as if I was in some sort of fold in the space time continuum. This is probably the same fold that's been collecting all of that time I lose during the rest of my week.

These socks were knit, from start to finish, without a hitch. There was no swearing, no throwing of needles, no threatening to abuse the knitting with scissors. It was the bizarro world of sock knitting. I was so inspired by this triumph, that I cast on for a second pair of socks. Yes, I'm ignoring the fact that I have three or four other pairs waiting to be finished. Please don't bring that up right now. I'm basking in the glow of a completed pair of sunshine colored socks. As I was saying, I cast on for another sock. It's the Monkey sock pattern from the talented Cookie A. She has a new book out. It's amazing. Her Monkey socks have been knit by 8916 people, on Ravelry. I thought I might as well hop on the bandwagon.
The sock I am knitting is too big. I sort of knew this as I cast on. I sort of knew it as I knit for three inches. Thankfully, I sort of had the brains to try it on, before denial led to a finished pair of yeti sized socks. My ego is a little bruised by this early failure, but the Monkey pattern is so addictive, that I think I'll drop down a needle size, and get back on that Monkey.
The other Hallmark knitting moment came when the Loppem sweater went from bad seed, troublemaker, redheaded stepchild status to beloved, angelic, can do no wrong, only child status. I don't know how this happened. I had resigned myself to the fact that I was probably going to have to rip out the whole thing, and then reknit it. I knew with certainty that it would be entirely too big. I would have bet lots of money on it. I gave it lots of nasty looks, and sighed many times while finishing up the yoke. About an inch from the finish line, things began to look more promising. The neckline wasn't going to be elephantesque. I bound off, and raced to the nearest reflective surface. It looked O.K. in the dark reflection of a glass door. I ran down the hall to the bathroom mirror, and was shocked to see a completely wearable sweater. I really can't tell you how this happened. I think it's a combination of the style of the sweater, and a diabolical case of body snatching. Someone snatched my imaginary willowy frame and replaced it with a buxom-y Germanic matron's figure. I'll post pictures, as soon the sweater finishes drying, and as soon as I come to terms with the fact that I'm not a size 6.

A Little Tomten

2009-04-19T12:28:00.000-07:00

March was a funny month, what with all of that monogamous silliness, but I think it's made April sweeter. I've cast on for all sorts of projects without the usual guilt, and I've even been inspired to stay the course with some of the UFOs from March. I guess that's reason enough to try a month of monogamous knitting. Here's my latest UFO turned FO.

This is my version of Elizabeth Zimmerman's "Modular Tomten Jacket". I knit it with some leftover balls of Manos from the stash. There are three colorways that feature brown, and one ice blue colorway. There are some sweet little pockets on the front, that I edged with an i-cord trim. It was my first time knitting an applied i-cord, but it won't be my last. It's magic. It's such a fast and easy way of putting a perfect border on an imperfect edge. The best part of an applied i-cord is that it looks good on both sides. That doesn't happen very often with knitting, or for that matter with anything else in life.

The stranded patterning is of my own design, but it could easily be replaced with simple garter stitch, or with a different pattern. I really love the way that the thick and thin Manos yarn worked up in the stranded work sections.

I'm one hundred percent happy with this little jacket. It's soft, it's practical, it's an easy knit, and best of all, it makes my little man look like a garden gnome. It's way too big for this spring, but it should last him all of next winter. Hooray for spring. Hooray for knitting.

No Fussin'

2009-04-13T12:33:00.000-07:00

The socks are knitting themselves.

Well, they're almost knitting themselves. It's strange how one pair of socks can languish in the sack of despair for months, and another pair can be knit in a matter of days, with no fussin' or feudin' at all. Shocking as it may be, in my 9 years of knitting, I have never knit myself a pair of socks. I have knit them for plenty of other (mostly grateful) people. But this pair, this pair is the pair that I have been dreaming of.
Turning 30 is too often billed as a traumatic birthday. 30 was very good birthday for me. It helped me realize that, while it's good to give away knits, it's also good to take care of yourself once in a while, maybe more than once in a while....maybe all of the time.

I've also just found out, that I may be a sock person. I think I want a whole drawer of these things. In the past I've always opted for more complicated sock patterns. This was a mistake. I do much better when I can put them down, and pick them up hours later, without having to look at a chart. I also need them to be done quickly. Making two identical knitted objects is tax on my sanity. I need the whole operation to be as quick as possible. These have just enough interest to keep me from feeling like I've eaten three bowls of plain oatmeal, but not so much that I start going cross eyed. They are, in a word, perfect.

Sock of Solace

2009-04-10T06:04:00.000-07:00

Happy Spring! Before I start with the knitting, I thought you might like some plum blossoms.

Now, let's get on with the knitting talk. This is the part of knitting a sweater where the little girls are separated from the women. This is my "Loppem". "Loppem" is a lovely knit. It would have been a simple, pleasurable, quick little thing, but for the way that the pattern was written, and then corrected....and then corrected some more.

When I first began knitting I was baffled by the lack of a standardized language. Every country has a different code, different sizing for needles, and a different way of laying out the pattern. Within each country, each designer or design group has a special way of writing out the pattern. Some patterns come with charts, some are written out in code, or a mixture of text and code, and some are a combination of the two. Then there are the recipe style patterns. These give a rough guide, or a "how to", for building a knitted piece. All of this was overwhelming, and a bit frustrating to me, as a new knitter. The amount of information given never seemed like enough. Nowadays, I can get by on a sketchy outline. I have, through years of tantrums and tears, learned enough about knitting to be able to read between the lines. The thing that I have not learned, is when to trust my instincts. Do you see the tiny bit of knit st. where there should be pearl st.? It's just after the second cable crossing. It irks me. It irked me when I first ran across it in the chart, but I thought, "She must have written it that way for a reason."

I want to trust the designer. After all, she has already knit the garment once, or at least spoken with someone who's knit it. Time and time again, I learn that I should trust myself. A well fitted sweater is an elusive beast. It relies on many different parts that must all come together well, or at the very least, close enough. This sweater is making me crazy. The decreases don't line up perfectly, the cable pattern is slightly wonky, and worst of all, it might be way too big for me. I don't know whether to rip it all out, and start again, fortified with the bitter knowledge of hindsight, or soldier on, knowing that it will always be my redheaded stepchild.....the sweater that could have been perfect.
In an effort to gain something positive from the situation, I will list for you the things that should be considered before beginning this project.

1. Check the errata. There is a lot of it. ( The link wasn't working for me, so I just cast on in ignorance. This is a terrible idea.)

2. Choose a size at least one to two sizes smaller than you think you will need. No one, who has knit this, has had a problem with it being too small.

3. When you get to the armholes, make sure that you're happy with the length.

4. Know algebra. (I do not)

5. Marry someone who knows algebra, if you do not.

6. The decreases for the sleeves MAY NOT LINE UP, unless you make them line up. This is where the algebra comes in handy.

7. The button holes look like they were placed by a blind monkey. They should be placed 2, 3, or 4 stitches in. Otherwise, they will lie outside of the button band. Damn you, blind monkey.

8. The decreases for the yoke MAY NOT LINE UP, unless you make them line up.

While I sat and stared in disbelief at what should have been an FO days ago, I cast on for a sympathy knit. This combination of yarn and pattern are soothing my shattered ego. The pattern is called "Spindle Socks" by Anna Bell and the yarn is "Alyeska" from Pagewood Farms. The colorway is "Mississippi Mud". It reminds me of pollen, or gilt, or sunshine. The yarn has a beautiful springy feel.

It's like knitting a sweet honeycomb. I can't put it down. It (and an episode of "Lost") might just give me the strength to frog aaaallllllll of my "Loppem".

Oh, if I had only checked the errata. Back to the sock of solace.

Lay Lady Lay

2009-04-09T02:15:00.000-07:00

I've got all sorts of knitting news, but before I post about "Loppem", I'd like to introduce the newest members of our gang. Yes, it's a gang. Here are two of the three ladies.

This is the Loch Ness monster of chickens. She's practically impossible to photograph. She goes hightailing it into the coup at the first sign of trouble, or of anything really.

For the moment, I am calling them "the ladies", because I haven't come up with names for them yet. I think that the biggest chicken will be named Oprah. The other chickens just sort of do whatever she's doing. That seems very Oprah like to me. The other chicken's don't have names yet, but I'm accepting submissions, so name away. There's the shy/alarmist chicken and the mellow chicken.
I've still got to figure out what variety they are. They were bought at a market from a rough looking gentleman, who handles his chickens like I handle weeds. I was going to buy some Bantam hens from a breeder, but these girls looked like they could use a good home, and while I'm not running a shelter for wayward chickens, I am a bit of a softy for women in tough situations.
They're a medium grey color with darker grey heads and some reddish feathers around their necks. I didn't expect them to lay for a week or so. Apparently, chickens get really stressed out by moving. I can relate. So, I was shocked to find an egg only hours after they settled in.

Voila, the first egg. I am unreasonably proud of the ladies. They are already laying up a storm, and just in time for Easter. Before I go, I've got one last trick up my blogging sleeve. The day after they arrived, I found this in my yard.

Even the mushrooms have caught chicken fever.

Obvious-ness

2009-04-01T14:20:00.000-07:00

This post will be short, and it will taste of artificial sweetener. Here is a photo of me knitting on the couch.

This is my actual view of my knitting. I knit like this for a full hour before realizing that this

is a much better way to knit. Genius. All I had to do was move my butt.

Two Short

2009-03-29T13:28:00.000-07:00

This wee little swatch,

has turned into this.

I don't quite know how this happened. The baby took two very long naps. I blame him. I know I'm supposed to wait until April, but...... I'm the decider. I'm already about 4 inches into "Loppem" by Norah Gaughan. I made an executive decision to put the "Owls" sweater on hold. There's been enough brown knitting. I need some color. The yarn is Pear Tree merino 12ply bulky. It's divine, and I don't just go around using words like divine. I can't seem to put this project down. There's already been one mishap. I completely ignored the fact that the cables are mirrored. I'm not going to let this get me down. I'm enjoying every stitch. My project is so happy it decided to roll around in the cowslips.

The Vest of Shame

2009-03-28T13:56:00.000-07:00

I have not been completely honest, and today that little lie has caught up with me. The Vest of Shame A.K.A. Skye Tweed Vest, was not knit for my father. It began as a vest for my ailing grandfather. I've been telling myself all of these years that I could just finish this vest, give it to someone else, and forget all about the real reason I didn't want to look at it.
I first began knitting this vest after my grandfather was diagnosed with cancer. My grandfather began to get smaller, and smaller. It suddenly seemed like the size I had chosen was going to be way too big. I was terrified that I wouldn't finish it in time, and so I started a hat. Every time I knit on the hat I cried. I couldn't do it. Somehow, it was an admission that he was really sick. It was a chemo cap. I didn't want to believe that he was going to be sick enough to lose his hair. So today, staring at that vest of shame lying in it's bath, I realized that this couldn't be pawned off on my unsuspecting father.

This vest is a vest of shame, because I'm ashamed that I didn't have the courage to finish it while my grandfather was still alive. I guess if I think about what my grandfather would say if he were here, he'd probably tell me that he knows that I love him, and that no amount of cabling, no matter how complicated, would ever be needed to convince him of that fact. He was a wonderful grandpa, and today I am missing him very much. This might explain the swatching. I needed something to cheer me up. Please don't judge me. It's only swatching, after all.

The Learning Cliff

2009-03-27T08:16:00.001-07:00

I'm going to begin this post with a positive development, and finish with a cautionary tale. The positive development is this.

There is something a little creepy about finishing a project that's taken this long, and had so many problems. It's like waking up one day to find that the school bully is suddenly handing out cupcakes, and putting his/her arm around you. There's something off putting about the whole business. I keep waiting for the sweater to jump up from the table, and throw itself in the fire. I think I might only be mildly surprised if it did. Before it has a chance to do something evil, I'm going to weave in the ends, wash it, block it, and insure it for 1 million euros before sending it off to daddy dearest.
The cautionary tale is about a young woman who taught herself to spin. She thought, after a ludicrously short amount of time, that she knew enough about spinning to spin some yarn for a sweater. After all, it's making yarn, how hard could it be? She spun, and spun and spun. Then, after what felt like enough spinning, she started knitting. She knit a back, the left front, and she started knitting a belt. This is where she discovered that some of her yarn was of a different weight. She shrugged, and knitted on. There was a nagging feeling, but she ignored it. Then, she began the right front.

This is a sad tale. It doesn't end well for the girl, or for the sweater. Do you see how the left front is dwarfed by its looming, and still incomplete twin? This is why you should always listen to that inner voice. Always.
I've ripped out the musclebound right front, and am knitting a lighter weight version. I hope this story has a happy ending, one that doesn't involve me learning too many lessons, or gaining any more character. I really don't need any more character.

Off the Horse

2009-03-24T13:41:00.000-07:00

This whole Monogamous March thing is sucking the knit out of me. I envisioned piles of FOs, and smug blog posts about success. My father's vest has struck a wicked blow. When I began knitting, I never swatched. This is not uncommon, but it is comparable to a new cook, not bothering to read the first two ingredients of every recipe. I won't always result in a disaster, but it will certainly result in a finished product that only vaguely resembles the picture in the book. I've just re knit the last third of the front of my father's vest, three times. Yup, three. That's a lot. It's a heartbreaking amount, but I had to make some alterations due to issues with gauge. If you are new to knitting, swatch. Don't ask, just do it.
All of this talk about swatching is just a lame attempt to justify what I am about to do. I have just swatched for a new sweater. Ahhhhh, that feels so good.

This is the "Owls" sweater that I was raving about earlier. My father bought me the yarn when he saw the yarn store owner's version. She had knit it while sick with a cold. It took her two days. I know, that's shocking. Now, I figure it's not really cheating, if it only takes me a couple of evenings. I'm still going to try and finish up a few of the UFOs before the official end of March, but I've learned a few things about myself.

1. I am not a project monogamous person.

2. I do not enjoy fixing mistakes made by a younger dumber me.

3. I love casting on.

4. I need to make more notes while I'm knitting.

5. My life and my knitting schedule are incompatible.

6. Spring is for gardening, not swearing at vests.

Full Cycle

2009-03-18T12:43:00.001-07:00

The boxing kitty has been getting a lot of use.

It has been playing in the dirt.

It has been climbing.

And, at the end of a long day, it has taken a nap on the couch. Yes, I dress my son like a circus performer. No, I did not intend for his pacifier to match his long johns. A sweater that gets this much action needs a wash.

For those of you who aren't already in the know, wool sweaters can be washed very easily. Here's how to avoid a nasty felting incident. Fill up sink with hot, but not scalding, water. Add a small amount (dime sized) of no-rinse wool wash. Obviously, the amount of soap will vary according to the size and filthiness of the garment. Babies are extremely filthy. I use Eucalan wool wash, but there are other brands. Swish the soap around gently, and then VERY gently push the sweater into the soapy water. Agitation is the enemy. Any real agitation at this point, will cause felting. Let sit for ten min, or however long it takes you to remember that there's a sweater in the sink. Drain the sink, and VERY gently squeeze the water out. Do not wring the sweater. Wringing it will cause it to go all wonky. You can lay it on a towel and roll it up like a jelly roll to really get the water out.

When you've gotten a good bit of the water out, lay the sweater out to dry. I dry mine on a towel if the weather is bad. If the weather is good, the sweater ends up on a picnic table outside. You'll probably have to flip it a couple of times. While the sweater is wet, you can mould it like wet clay. Straighten out all of the ribbing, and press the cables into shape. If the sweater is big, you might want to try washing it in something other than a dinky little bathroom sink. For my husband's sweater, I used the shower basin. It ended up looking like Hans Solo frozen in carbon.

You know you're taking sweater washing too seriously, when you start making a high pitched sweater voice, that's begging you to let it out of the wash.

The Cold Truth

2009-03-11T11:02:00.001-07:00

I've been meaning to blog, but a few things have gotten in the way. First, is a raging cold. Second, is a sick baby. He has the same cold. Third, is a sick husband, same cold. Fourth, is a sick brother, who's visiting, and managed to catch the cursed cold. Fifth, is the lack of will to live (which translates to a lack of desire to blog), on account of the cold.
Normally, I get pretty excited about having a cold. This is because, in my head, having a cold usually means hours of couch time with the knitting needles. Notice, I said "in my head". It never happens this way. When I start to get a cold, I panic, because there's, roughly, 5 bazillion things to do. So I spend the first hours of my cold running around, trying to batten down the house's hatches. Then, when the full fury of the cold hits, I am too tired to knit. All I can do is stare at my knitting, and moan about wanting to knit. I know, I'm painting a really pathetic picture. It's day 8, and tomorrow's my birthday, and darn it if I'm still sick with the cold. It's my party, and I'll cry if I want to. You know the rest.
At least I was able to get some knitting done. This time I fooled the cold. The first two days, I didn't get any knitting done. It was business as usual. I ran around, I tried to pretend that I wasn't sick, and then whammo, I was suddenly wondering if I shouldn't hang upside down to prevent myself from drowning in snot. By the fourth day, I had just enough strength to hold the needles. By day seven, I was making real progress on "The Vest of Shame". The secret to cold knitting is to contract the worlds longest, worst cold, and then wait until the forth or fifth day before picking up the knitting.
"The Vest of Shame" is rapidly taking shape. At first it took a rather stumpy shape, then after much ripping and cursing, it took a Frankenstein like shape. I was worried that my father might not be that long in the torso, so after much more ripping and cursing, we are looking at a father like shape. I have a deadline for this project, and that means it probably won't get blocked. I'm not wussing out, I'm just being realistic. I am not the kind of person who finishes her knitting several days before a deadline, so as to allow for blocking. My brother is leaving..on a jet plane...couldn't help myself there. I'll need to get this done, sewn, and wrapped before next Tuesday. That should happen. Jinx.
There was one really bright spot today. When I check the mail, I found this.

It's a teensy weensy sweater, stuffed with something that smells really good. This is the kind of thing that makes a weepy eyed, runny nosed knitter, get all weepy eyed and runny nosed. Thanks Debbie.

Monoga-Monster

2009-03-06T11:56:00.000-08:00

I have hit a snag with my "March to the Finish" or "Monogamous March" commitment. I haven't fallen off the yarn bus, but I'm finding it difficult not to hit the driver over the head, and run off with all of the yarn. Here's my problem. March is a great month for a stash spring cleaning. March is a perfect month for finishing up those old UFOs before the summer knitting begins. March is also my birthday month. This is a good thing for me, but it's a bad thing for my UFOs. I just received a birthday gift. These beautiful yarns are like woolly sirens.

How am I supposed to stay faithful to "The Vest of Shame"? How can I possibly slog through two different second socks, with this around?

I am feeling like a beer lover who just decided to kick the habit the day before Octoberfest. I'm trying hard to focus on the task at hand, but I can't stop peeking at the new arrivals.

There's a comedy album by Chris Rock, in which he says that "Men are only as faithful as their options". While I don't believe that, I do believe that I might have a serious problem with project monogamy. I'm starting to dislike the "M" word. It's reminiscent of my days in Catholic school, and not in a good way. It makes me feel like I'm wearing an itchy kilt, listening to sister Virginia Marie go on and on about the virtues of being a "follower". Maybe, I'm a polygamous project knitter. Maybe, I'm not cut out for all of this pious knitting. I can't give up on my commitment, but I'm unable to focus on the task at hand while all of those beautiful yarns are parading around my dining room table. I can't stop thinking about the possibilities. I'm beginning to think that the most seductive things in life, are the things that could happen.
When all of this Catholic school style knitting is over, I'm going to put on my Roman toga and cast on for a ludicrous number of projects. It's going to be Ape S*&t April this year.

Pumkin Killer Sweater Man

2009-03-04T11:32:00.000-08:00

I don't think I really need to post today.

I think these pictures are worth thousands and thousands of words.

This is what happens when you let the model get creative with the shoot.

I think he's brilliant.
After four tries, I got the collar right. Apparently, a collar that is too high causes certain people to want to barf. Who knew? A little bit of brown elastic thread really did the trick. He loves this sweater. I am still a little embarrassed, but he really loves it.

When Good Knits Go Bad

2009-03-02T11:30:00.000-08:00

Today the urge to make oatmeal cookies seized me with a vengeance. Four dozen cookies later, I slunk over to the couch, oh wait you think I ate four dozen cookies. No, no, I baked four dozen cookies. I only ate about a dozen. So, I was lying on the couch staring at the wall, suffering from sugar induced zombie-ism, when I saw a UFO. I had placed this UFO on the middle of the coffee table, so that the first time my butt hit couch, I'd see it. My trap worked. Guilt is a strong antidote to sugar induced zombie-ism. This UFO is the dark heart of my UFOs. It has been haunting me for years, nagging me every time I cast on. It is "The Vest of Shame" a.k.a. "My Dad's Vest" a.k.a "Skye Tweed Vest" by Kathy Zimmerman.

The most annoying part of a UFO is the first hour of knitting. This is because I didn't keep notes pre-Ravelry, and I'm forced to "read" my knitting to figure out where I am in the pattern. That shouldn't be enough to deter an intrepid knitter such as myself. That's not the only reason I hate the first hour of knitting. The other reason is that, 9 times out of 10, there's a problem. 9 times out of 10, I made a booboo, and was so annoyed that I chucked the offending project into a sack. Here is where it gets stupid. I (almost) never check for a problem. I pick up the UFO, find the pattern, look through the instructions to find where to restart, knit for a half an hour, and then I find a problem. This happens every time. So what's the problem with "The Vest of Shame"?

Stitch count, check. Length, check. Shaping, check. Cables, crap. I think there's a problem. I was going to write a lovely post about tweed and oatmeal (see the warm fuzzy June Cleaver's kitchen photos), but two inches into knitting I started to feel really happy with the knitting. It was going along so smoothly. It felt like I might just finish this succubus. Whenever I get a feeling like that, I spread my knitting out to admire it. This was the point at which I realized that there is something not quite right with the cables. I squinted at it. I pulled a little. I almost called my husband over for a second opinion, but I didn't want a second opinion. I didn't want to face the music. I wanted to shove that mean, two faced, jerk of a project into the bottom of a sack, and forget about it. The problem is I can't forget it. My Dad's birthday is just around the corner. That mean hearted vest must be finished. It's "March to the Finish", and I've made a commitment. I may not be able to stop myself from shoving a dozen hot oatmeal cookies into my mouth, but I am woman enough to stay the course, and keep my commitment. I will finish this vest. I will celebrate my victory by shoving another dozen cookies in my mouth.

Oh, before I forget, the Spring issue of "The Twist Collective" is up. It's great. I like these socks, and this sweater, and this blanket, and this vest, and....maybe I'd better wait until April.

Verge

2009-03-01T12:32:00.000-08:00

Today was a perfect day for knitting, and of course I did not have time for knitting. I did think about it quite a lot, but there was no actual knitting. I wasn't going to post, except that I had to share these little bright bits of spring. These are what's fueling my desire to finish those UFOs.

Now, I know there are a lot of knitters who yearn for a long cold winter full of fireside knitting and hot cocoa. I too love winter knitting, but I also love a lap full of smooth linen lace on a hot day. Beach knitting sounds like a dream right about now. Spring has sprung, and I'm ready for the soft cottons in pale green to peep out of my knitting basket.

There are a couple of patterns that are first on my list. I've got enough CEY classic silk, in an apple green, for the "Flutter Sleeve Cardigan".

Or I could cast on for the "Nadine Tunic" with a butter yellow linen yarn. There's also the promise of a new Twist Collective on the first of March. I know I'm getting ahead of myself here. I've got a lot of spring cleaning to do before I can cast on for anything, but it's always nice to have something to look forward to.

I'm really looking forward to the freedom of a clean slate.

Cat Boxing

2009-02-28T11:12:00.000-08:00

I didn't touch the needles or the wheel today. The entire kitchen has been reorganized, and my back has gone out for the evening. I hope it doesn't drag itself in around ten tomorrow morning. I've got too much work to do. While I was abusing my back, I discovered this sweet sweater.

This sweater was mine when I was a little girl. My mother passed it on to me when I was pregnant with our son. I think it was knit by my grandmother. She was a wonderful knitter, until her hands became too arthritic. I have many baby sweaters that she made for me, but this is the only one that will work for my little boy. It must have been an early effort on her part. Normally, her sweaters are almost machine like in their perfection. This sweater has a lovely way about it. There's a funny bit of crochet between the sleeves and the body. The sleeves are extra long. The little cat is wearing a sleeveless jumper with mittens. I like to think of it as a boxing cat, but I'm pretty sure those are mittens. Who would wear mittens with a sleeveless jumper? A cat on a sweater, that's who. The kitty is all done in duplicate stitch. It's an impressive amount of embroidery, and she managed to convey a real sense of movement. I think that cat looks ready to take on a dog.

All of these silly little knitterly things combine to create an utterly charming piece of knitting. It makes me think about my own knitting foibles. I love for my finished pieces to have a polished look. They rarely do, but it's what I'm striving for.
The first sweater that I ever made was a gift for my grandmother. It was a very boxy jacket/cardigan thing, with a monstrous looking shawl collar, all in garter stitch. I knit it out of a bulky weight Noro yarn, in a lagoon like palette. The yarn was all wrong for the sweater, it might have been wrong for any sweater. The sweater was huge, with no way of closing the front. I think there must have been miles of fabric in the arm pits. It was the usual first sweater disaster. About a week ago my aunt wrote me to tell me that my grandmother wears that sweater every time she goes out for lunch. What love she must have for me. She's knit dozens of sweaters. She knows a bad sweater when she sees one. She's always been a very stylish woman...and yet she wears my sweater. And now, my son will wear her sweater. It's round two for the boxing kitty.

The Tricky Sweater Has a Trick

2009-02-27T11:56:00.000-08:00

I'm sorry I missed posting yesterday. I was going to try to post every day for the first month of my blog, but I had to choose between finishing the tricky sweater, or blogging. I told you that that sweater is tricky. It always wins. 6 rows short of finishing, it dealt me a crushing blow. This is my first crew neck. I followed the pattern carefully. Well, at least as carefully as I am capable of following a pattern. Truth be told, the first go I had at the collar, was a wing job. But lets ignore that, and focus on my second, more earnest attempt. As I was saying, I followed the pattern carefully, but the collar is, how do I put this? The collar is limp. It looks like my husband got into a fourth grade style scrap and the other kid did a lot of collar pulling. Here's a picture of the gaping collar.

Sad, isn't it. I'm still considering my options. I could switch to smaller needles half way through the collar ribbing. I could......well really, that's my only idea. Lets hope that the third time's the charm.

On the UFO front, I'm rallying the troops for a run on "The Vest of Shame". I've knit the front, and the back, to the armpits. I did so much fussing and ripping out during the first couple of inches into the decreases for the arm pits, that I decided to knit the back all the way up to the arm pits, as a way of tricking myself into finishing. It was a very crafty move on my part, but somehow this vest has remained a UFO for (cough, cough) several years. I'm not going to let that get me down. Dad's birthday is just around the corner, and this bad boy is going to feel the sting of my needles.
The other project which may get a little attention is this wrappy vest type thingy, named "Petersburg".

I love this photo. She looks like a sexy Swedish Hippo.

It's only a short day of knitting away from making the UFO to FO transition. I'm going to ignore the differences in yarn/gauge, and press on. I'll wear this around the house, when nobody is home, and it's dark, and I've hidden the mirrors, and the dogs are asleep. It'll be grand. If it weren't for my crazy spinning, I would have breezed through this one. It's a pleasure to knit, because the cables are very intuitive, and the shaping is minimal. The wool is an oatmeal colored Blue Faced Leicester. It's amazingly soft stuff, just the sort of thing I'll want to wear in the dark, alone, with no mirrors, when the dogs are sleeping. I'm only willing to overlook this projects glaring flaws, because it's the first sweater I've knit with my own handspun. It's a little like a first car. I may not want other people to see me wearing it, but I'm darned proud of the thing.

UFO No Mercy

2009-02-25T12:15:00.000-08:00

My favorite knitting podcast is "Stash and Burn". There's a "Stash and Burn Groupies" board on Ravelry. It's a great place to go for a little knitting momentum. Yesterday I noticed a thread titled "March to the Finish 2009". The idea behind this thread is that we all pull out a couple of UFOs to complete during the month of March. I quickly checked to see how many UFO's I have. It's somewhere in the neighborhood of 13. That sounds bad, but actually it's only sort of bad.

Three of my UFOs have come to a halt due to some sort of yarn problem.

I spun the yarn for this, and as I spun the yarn got thicker and thicker. Consequently, the gauge is different for each piece of the sweater. Not exactly a good look, but I think I can salvage this one.

I need two more balls to finish this, and when I ordered them, I was sent the wrong color. That sort of killed the poor bear's chances of making it out of the UFO pile. I've got a couple of ideas about how to get this guy finished. I think it might involve some knitted bloomers. Knitted bloomers are always a good idea.

This is waiting for me to find a missing ball of Manos. I need to do this before my boy grows too big for the jacket. I may just throw caution to the wind and finish the sleeve with the brown yarn I have on hand. Babies don't really care about dye lots, do they?

Three of them are more than 70% finished.

Oh, Vest of Shame, why do you taunt me every March when my Father's birthday rolls around? This March I am going to finish you, stuff you in a box and weep.

These Socks are waiting for a quiet afternoon. This will probably never happen. I'm just going to have to finish them to the sounds of my baby destroying my kitchen.

This is so close it's actually been worn twice. I need to undo the cast off, and do a sewn cast off instead, to give the finished edge more elasticity. Then I can wash it, and give it away to someone who doesn't look like a gorilla when she wears it. I think the fact that I'm going ot give this away is actually what's been keeping me from finishing it.

Two are laying about due to pattern mishaps.

Dumb mistake.
Dumber mistake.

Then there are the hangers on.
These projects are the ones I can't seem to shake. These are the UFOs that haunt my stash. They are unfroggable, unforgiving meanies.

There's one more. This one's a hard one.

I started this when my grandfather was first diagnosed with cancer. Everytime I tried to knit it, I cried. Then my grandfather passed away. Then a really dear friend was going through chemo, so I picked it back up. Every time I tried to knit it, I cried. Then, our dear friend died. I think this hat might never be finished. Some things aren't meant to make it out of the UFO bin.

I'm going to pull up my pants, pull out the needles, and attack this pile without mercy. I'm turning 30 this March, and I'm not going to enter my third decade on earth with UFOs in my basket.

The White Linen Lie

2009-02-24T11:53:00.000-08:00

I follow several knitting and sewing blogs religiously. Every morning, after I'm done with the baby grooming, I pour myself a cup of tea and sit down with the blogs. I love perusing photos of socks in the snow, and quilts draped over tree branches, with little girls in handmade sundresses prancing in the foreground. I know it's all make believe, but I don't care. If they can make a hand knit that glamorous, then more power to them. I like to think that someone, somewhere is living in a gingham and dahlia dream house, with pavlovas on milk glass cake stands and cold glasses of homemade ginger lemonade always at the ready. Sometimes, I like to make people think that I live in the gingham and dahlia dream house. Most of the time this is not an option, because they either know me too well, or they're dropping off a package, and my child has just smeared peas all over my shoulder.
During the photo shoot of my completed Primrose Cozy, I was sweeping the reality under the rug. I was trying to take a photo that would trick the viewer into believing that my house was a perfect balance of stylish and cozy, a place where the loaves of bread practically bake themselves, and the tablecloths don't need ironing. I don't think I was able to achieve this. I was only able to push the pile of mail so far to the left, and I couldn't seem to avoid the wrinkles/crumbs on the tablecloth. Here are my pictures of the finished Primrose Cozy.

This is what my dining table actually looks like.

Because this is a knitting blog, and I'm on an honestly kick, here's a shot of the inside of the cozy. Don't expect this level of transparency from me in the future. I'm not sure I can bare the inside of my knitting, on the internet, more than once.

Intermission with an Incomplete Boar

2009-02-23T11:06:00.000-08:00

Right now, I'm deep in translation. I've been pouring over the sock section in my new/old book of needle work. It's pretty thick stuff. I'm not sure how long it's going to take me, but I'm pretty determined to translate the whole section. This is going to mean a bit of a break from the usual posting. In the interim, I'll post a picture of Yo-yo the three legged boar, and her cute little babies. Why am I posting this? Because, I'm pretty sure you haven't seen a picture of a three legged boar and her babies. And.... I'm hoping to distract you from the fact that I haven't finished the translations or done any knitting.

Distraction complete.

The Owling

2009-02-22T09:00:00.000-08:00

Ravelry has been hit hard with a case of owl fever. Awhile back, I knit a pair of "Give a Hoot" mittens. It's a free pattern, and I loved the mirrored decreases on the palm of each mitten.

These were the first owl cables I'd ever knit. Not long after I'd finished the mittens, I came across an owl sweater. This sweater stopped me in my tracks. It's wearable. It's a quick knit. It's feminine. It's knit in the round with no seaming, and best of all it's reminiscent of childhood, without being childish. Apparently, I wasn't the only one who had a knit at first sight moment. "Owls" is currently topping the "most popular pattern" chart with 344 projects. I'm not usually one to grab a torch and jump in with the mob, but this sweater is calling to me. I'm fantasizing about all of the yarns I could use. I've got two hanks of Eco wool in my stash that would work perfectly. Although, I'm not totally convinced about the color.

There's another reason that this owl cable mania has such a hold on me. When I was pregnant with our baby, we had a family of owls nesting near by. Every night for several weeks, we would turn off our lights so that we could watch two adult owls teaching their baby owl how to hunt. It was beautiful and comforting. Every time I see an owl, I think of those evenings we spent holding hands, peering into the night sky, thinking of our baby. I think I must knit this sweater. I really don't have a choice.

Treasure

2009-02-21T03:39:00.000-08:00

Today my husband wanted to go to an antiques show in a neighboring town, so we packed up the wee one and headed out early. I wasn't really in the mood to buy anything, until I saw a box of mother of pearl buttons. There was already one lady pawing through it, and I had to do that polite, pretending to be interested in ye olde baby bonnet, antiques show dance while I waited. There were no prices, and I was a little wary. Nice buttons aren't cheap. I've spent enough hours scrubbing barn dirt off of old buttons to know this. Once in a while, you get lucky. Today was my day. She was practically giving them away.

I really had a hard time being practical in the face of so many beautiful buttons. There are these beauties.

I have a whole card of these little guys. They look like miniature planets, and are much more colorful in person ( I've got to get this color thing straightened out ).

The button lady also had a copy of this book, "Encyclopedie des Ouvrages de Dames".

This book is a treasure. If the world suddenly became a crochetless, fancy napkinless wasteland, I would be more than prepared. There is, of course, a section on knitting. Brace yourself, this book is about to blow your mind.

This woman is casting on with FOUR strands, say what? I need to know why she's doing this. But wait, there's more.

This is another crazy cast on, and this next one...... well I've got no idea what this is for, but you can bet your socks I'm going to try it.

Speaking of socks, there's even a section just for the sock knitters, but that will have to wait for another post. I'll leave you with a photo of the almost vanquished posie cozy. The fight isn't over yet, but I'm feeling confident.

I win you, posie cozy.

When the Knit Hits the Fan

2009-02-20T09:10:00.000-08:00

Today was one of those days. I should not have been knitting. Once in a while it happens, and when it does it's like knitting backwards into negative space. I think my mistakes today were due to a nasty combination of hubris and multitasking. This is always disastrous. It started out innocently enough. I went to the potting shed to find a plastic pot that could serve as a frame for my posie cozy. Check. Then I started some chicken stock. No problem. Then I went stash diving for a bit of Cash Iroha I knew I had kicking around. Check again. Then I did a bit of tidying. Then I heard my husband shouting. Oh no, the stock....Oops. Thanks to his quick reflexes, the veggies I was browning didn't go black, but that was a close one. After that, the day sort of collapsed like a building demolition in slow motion. I ended up ripping back as much, or more, than I knit. It's a silly little side project that's supposed to be for fun, but that of course, is the problem. I have a hard time taking it seriously. I was translating a stitch pattern written flat to a pattern in the round, and I just sort of breezed through the directions. Yep, yep, yep, O.K. I got it. Well, the posie cozy is not to be trifled with. It got its sweet revenge. I think I ripped out the same four rows, four times. Sometimes, when I have a day like this, that plain brown stockinette seems like a big mug of knitting hot chocolate. What I should have done, was put the knitting down, and take care of the million other things around the house. That's what I should have done. That would have been the mature thing to do. Unfortunately for me, and for my house, that's not what happened. It became an epic battle between the posie cozy and the knitter.

Just to give you an idea of what it looks like to knit into negative territory. This is a swatch in a "Flecked Tweed" slipped stitch pattern,

that I abandoned in favor of this "Simulated Basketweave" pattern.

This four inches of knitting took four hours, yep, four. It also took a good number of four letter words. Tonight I'm going to snuggle up with the brown stockinette, and savor the mindless knitting.

P.S. The last photo is the most accurate, in terms of color.

Late Snow

2009-02-19T05:41:00.000-08:00

I'm plugging away on the tricksy sweater today, and haven't yet cast on for the posie cozy. To avoid more photos of endless brown stockinette, I'm going to turn to my spinning for help. I made several batts a couple of days ago, after reading Yarn Harlot's post about feeding fiber into a drum carder sideways. I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one, who put down her tea and made a mad dash for the drum carder. After a few experiments, I've discovered that this works for carding, but not so well for blending. While I was up in the spinning hole, I discovered some other experimental batts I'd made out of tussah silk. I thought, in a mad scientist sort of way, "What would happen if I threw all of these experiments together?"....

I'm naming them April Snow. I loathe a late frost, but a little bit of late snow is rarely as damaging. I think these look just like a new lawn with a layer of popcorn snow. The photo is not doing them justice. That green is a two tone electric kelly green. I would show you a photo of what they look like spun up, but frankly it's in an ugly duckling sort of phase. I'm planning on a two ply, one ply solid dark green, the other April Snow. So instead of the prepubescent yarn, I'll show you another photo of a series of batts that I blended for long subtle color transitions.

I used four shades of green merino top, and a little angora. Again, the photo is way off. They're much less yellow in person. I was thinking of this hat. I'm not sure if I'll actually use it for a hat. More than likely, I'll make some mitts out of it. It's almost spring, but I'm not giving up on my winter knits just yet.
I'm noticing a huge difference between the color of my pictures, and the color of them after they've been compressed for the blog. I'm going to see if I can fix this, or if maybe my tech support husband can fix it for me.

Primrose Cozy

2009-02-18T03:17:00.001-08:00

Last night that tricksy sweater made me knit a third of a sleeve while watching "A Fish Called Wanda". About half way through the movie I realized that both "The Vest of Shame" and the tricksy birthday sweater, are about the same color of paper bag brown. All of this brown knitting, coupled with the weather, is putting a crimp in my happiness. I found the perfect remedy at the market this morning. I'm going to cheat a bit on the gift knitting. I'm going to knit these peachy primroses a flower pot cozy,

with the leftovers from this sweater.

I know, I know, that sounds like a totally asinine sort of thing to do. It is. I'm not going to try and convince anybody that knitting a cozy for a flower pot is anything other than a completely frivolous use of their of time. Although there's no real defense for knitting a flower pot cozy, I want you to note that I'm knitting the cozy to fit over a plastic pot which will hold the original terracotta pot. This will keep the water away from the knitting. So, while I may be wasting my precious knitting time on a useless piece of bric-a-brac, at least the bric-a-brac will last for years. Lest you think I'm the only person silly enough to do something like this, check out Rowan 42 and you will find "malt pots". Just thinking about knitting a posie cosy makes me unreasonably happy. I think February is beginning to get to me.

Waiting in the Wings

2009-02-17T06:40:00.000-08:00

Just a couple of days before President Obama was sworn in, my husband and I received invitations to a big fancy party at the Hotel de Ville in Paris. Not being ones to ignore an embossed invitation, we packed our fanciest pants, and bought some train tickets. I was down with a terrible cold, my husband was showing signs, but denied any knowledge of said cold. Despite the bad weather, and the worse colds, we had a wonderful time. I couldn't pass up the opportunity to do a bit of yarn shopping, so the cold and I made a trip out to La Droguerie. I'd heard a lot of good things, and wasn't disappointed. They carry their own yarns and patterns, but they also have a fantastic collection of beads, buttons, fabric flowers, feathers, bag handles etc. After fondling half of the shop ( the yarn, not the people ), I chose some fingering weight alpaca. One of the nicest things about La Droguerie, is that you can buy yarn by weight. I ended up with this collection of colors.

The small balls are for the yoke, and possibly the cuffs.

The cone is for the body. I think the color is most accurate in this photo.

It's my favorite kind of secret tweedy color. If you look closely it's a sort of soft off white/grey made out of all sorts of brilliant blues, reds, greens and yellows.
I haven't chosen a pattern. Most likely, I'll end up charting a pattern for the yoke, and using Elizabeth Zimmerman's magical formula, Ravelry link here. I'd like the yoke to have a bold design motif....maybe something a little modern. There are a couple of stranded yoke sweaters in my queue, but this yarn deserves it's own design. I don't have the time to start it now. The husband's birthday sweater beckons, and my father's "vest of shame" needs to be done and in the mail by...let's just skip the lie I'm about to tell, and move on. So, I don't have time for this sweater yet, but a little charting never hurt anyone, and a swatch is never a bad idea.

A Very Little Bit of Sky

2009-02-16T03:11:00.000-08:00

About a month ago I received a small package of scoured kid mohair. After a bit of sorting and carding, I ended up with two piles, a very small pile of locks, and a very big pile of fiber for blending. I'd been interested in trying to learn how to spin the locks (with some other carded fiber) into a bit of novelty yarn. I've never been a big fan of the novelty yarns. They're just not my bag, but I love learning new things, and I really wanted to do something with those perfect little white curls.
I started out by blending about 70% baby blue merino wool, with about 30% white angora. As I spun the single I added in the locks here and there. The end result was much better than I could have expected. I'm new to spinning, and I'm still so astonished by the fact that I can make yarn, that I tend to baby my little handspun treasures. I know that in a couple of years the magic will probably have worn off, and I'll scoff at my early efforts. But life is short, and I'm going to revel in this part of my relationship with spinning........ now, let's get back to the hat. After staring at the little ball for a month, I finally screwed up the courage to make something with it. Here's my "Summer Sky Baby Hat".

It's not quiet done. I'm still searching for a couple of bird buttons to complete it. There seem to be no shortage of babies in my life, so I'm sure it will find a good home as soon as I get my hands on some buttons. I think Etsy may be the answer. I need to do some button snooping.
There's actually another baby hat that I made out of my first attempt at Navajo plying.

There's something a little sad about this hat. It's been living in the bottom of my knitting basket for a couple of months now. I'm not sure what it's missing, maybe some knitted/crocheted leaves, or possibly a little felt mushroom. I just don't know.

First Steps and First Flowers

2009-02-15T13:20:00.000-08:00

So, I don't have a lot of knitting to talk about today. We had a slow sunny day, spent eating fig cake with friends. The baby began walking on his own, and as if that wasn't enough, I saw both violets and crocus poking up from the ground. The closest I can get to dragging this blog back to knitting, is to give you a picture of some new handspun in a very spring like color. It's three colors of merino blended together with some white angora. I think it likes my chair.

Pink Toed Husband

2009-02-14T11:50:00.000-08:00

I managed to sort out the patterns for the socks I posted yesterday. The tatty folder proved to be more reliable than it's name suggests. Ravelry also chipped in, but don't tell that to the folder. The first pair of socks, which were only a couple of inches from being finished, became Valentine's day socks. My husband went out for a couple of hours, and I planted myself in the rocking chair, with an ipod full of "Planet Money" (I like to yell at the free market people), and taught those socks a lesson. I did run out of yarn, no surprise there, but I had another bit of sock yarn in a pinkish purple. He arrived about 10 min. after I cut the last loose end, so I shoved them into the silverware drawer. Yeah that doesn't make a lot of sense, but it saved me wrapping them, and it was a surprise. Mission Accomplished. The one pink toe is a sweet reminder of Valentine's Day. He was very into posing for the sock photos. I think he may have fallen over just after I took this shot.

Today we took a family trip to an animal park. There was fiber everywhere. Here are my findings.

Mini black sheep: The wool feels O.K., not great, but usable. They look a lot easier to shear, and are darn cute little critters. The biggest one was only about 3ft. long and 2ft. high. The babies were puppy sized.

Curly haired pig: Also cute, looks to be a bit cleaner than the other pigs. That curly coat feels like it would be good for scrubbing pots, not spinning. This is too bad. I would have loved to spin up a pig hair hat for my brother, maybe with a little possum thrown in. Pig n' Possum yarn sounds like a big winner to me.

Guanaco: Beautiful creatures, that looked like they were just starting to shed. My husband took one look at my face, and immediately told me not to climb the fence. I considered it.
There were others; mohair goats, buffalo, yak etc. , but their exotic chicken collection was inspired. I was caught off guard by some peacocks. I'd forgotten how beautiful they are. The blue on their necks is shocking. The combination of colors would make me look like a Vegas dancer, but they look so elegant on a bird, go figure.

Foundlings

2009-02-13T11:16:00.000-08:00

Today I found, stuffed rather meanly into a plastic bag, a collection of forgotten socks. I sort of knew about these socks, but I was also sort of pretending that they didn't exist, so that I could cast on for new socks without any guilt. Hobbies should be guilt free activities, but knitting seems to come with a lot of guilt. Another topic, another time, back to the orphaned socks.

These are almost finished, but I must have put them aside after some ripping out. It is also pretty clear that I don't have enough yarn to finish them......... and upon further inspection, one leg is shorter than the other. They are a wee bit funky, but they don't deserve to be shoved into a corner, only four inches short of the finish line.

I couldn't figure out which pattern, or yarn for that matter, these were (Edited to add, the pattern is here on Ravelry), and so with a little sleuthing I sussed out the patterning. I tend to think of my knitting as pre and post Ravelry. These were victims of my pre Ravelry ignorance. Before Ravelry, I believed I could live happily shoving every ball band in one sack, every pattern in a tatty folder, and never taking notes. This might account for the bag of unfinished socks.

Second up, is this beauty of a man sock:

This is also a pre Ravelry tragedy. I think I might have the pattern in that tatty folder I mentioned earlier. The yarn is from Phildar, but I must consult my giant bag of ball bands for the specifics. This system really lacks um, a system. I know exactly why this darling is missing a mate. I just didn't feel like making another one. Moving on.

This sock is, wait for it, also pre Ravelry. I'm pretty sure the yarn is from Mountain Colors, and the pattern is um, it's ummmm. I'll consult my tatty folder and get back to you (Edited to add, these are "Rib and Cable Socks from IK. They can be found on Ravelry here). Apparently, I managed to make it all the way to the heel turn, but then a simple miscount between cables got this sock sentenced to some hard time in the bag, poor sock.

Here's a mug shot of the perp.

Still, it's done its time, and now I think I'm going to give it a second chance. Besides, it's better to celebrate Valentine's day with a good mate.

Medieval Extra

2009-02-12T03:53:00.000-08:00

My husband's birthday is always too close to Christmas for comfort. This year I was caught with my proverbial pants around my ankles. Being a knitter I tried to salvage the situation with a woolly offering. This year, my husband is going to get a custom spun, custom knit, sweater pattern of his choosing...a masterpiece. We've been debating the sweater in question for years. He hates cables, yokes, sleeves without cuffs, and embellishment of any sort. The color must be something that will blind me with it's dreary manly monotonous blah. Miles of stockinette stitch awaited my already heavy needles. To try and salvage what I thought was going to be a very, very boring part of my knitting life, I turned to Elizabeth Zimmerman. I'd been wanting to try her devilishly clever sweater formula ( found here ) for years, and so, with pattern approved, we went stash diving. I have bags of beautiful wool, in all sorts of colors, but my sweet husband went for a pile of old brown Corridale from my early spinning days. No doubt, he thought he was saving me some time. It's a bulky yarn, a bit over spun, and not all the skeins are the same weight of yarn. "Are you sure?", I asked him. He was sure. This was the perfect combination of pattern and wool.

I'm not so sure. I had pictures of a softer, finer, tweedy creation, something that was understated, yet elegant. He has promised to wear this sweater at every opportunity. It's going to be a sort of billboard, advertising my knitterly love. I'm deeply conflicted. There is a part of me that likes to show off. It's not a small part. The part of me that likes to show off is in a fight with the part of me that tries not to care. It's his sweater. He loves it, and yet, yet....it's reminiscent of something from the set of a period piece about the ravages of the plague. This over spun brown bag with a slight halo is one for the ages. It's never going to wear out. I know in my bones that he'll wear that thing every day, and it will only grow stronger from my secret desire to destroy it. This might explain why it's taking me so long to finish it. Every time I pick up the needles it practically knits itself. EZ's pattern is making for a perfect fit, and that sneaky medieval evil sweater has already grown a body and a very long arm.
I finally plucked up the courage to show it to my knitting group. There was a brave silence, before people began with the gentle encouragement. They are truly a lovely bunch of ladies, but they are liars, every one.

The Making of a Knitting Wendigo

2009-02-11T13:14:00.000-08:00

I'm sitting here typing and re-typing the first lines of my first entry, as if it's some sort of great reveal to a seventh grade crush. I've got to get this right for posterity. After all, aren't all of our great great grandchildren going to be digging through piles of ones and zeros to find out what their grandmother was blogging about the year of the economic-fill in the blank with a car accident noise? Maybe I'm getting ahead of myself. This is, after all, a knitting blog. If I'm lucky enough to have great great grandchildren, even they will probably stop reading at the first sign of the word "knitting". Or... maybe they'll be inspired to take up the needles. They might even have the knitting baskets of my grandmothers and great grandmothers, that I'm saving for the next generation.
When my grandmother taught me to knit, it was because she was doing to ultimate destash. She was moving from the home where she had raised four children to a retirement community. She ended up giving me everything, knitting related, that she had. She showed me once and only once, how to cast on, knit, purl and cast off. Then, in her very Midwestern way, she watched and said nothing as I stabbed and yanked my way through the first row. The lesson was done in less than an hour, but she had passed the torch. Nine years later, I could fill a silly red telephone booth with all of the fiber, yarn, needles, knitting books and other knitting related items I own. I think this blog is going to be about fighting the Wendigo. We'll see how that goes.