The Daily Knitting Blat

Puppies are fun

2012-01-05T19:31:00.003-06:00

You may recall my encounter with a visiting puppy last year; she seized a pristine hank of Schaefer Nancy and gave it a thrashing, Wren:1, Nancy: 0.

Wren is back. She's older now, but still in the if-it's-somewhere-my-pointy-nose-can-reach-I-am-required-to-poke-said-nose-in phase.

As a longtime dog owner, I'm pretty savvy about puppy-proofing. Calculate how tall the dog would be standing on its hind legs, multiply by 3 to allow for jumping, and put everything at a height two feet above that. Behind a locked door.

A lot of our stuff ends up on top of the fridge, which, although it's technically accessible, is the highest surface we have.

Last night, I wasn't feeling well and I went to bed at 9:00. I forgot to put my knitting bag on top of the fridge, and I forgot to close it.

Now, for a digression. For the past week or so, I've been working on The Little Neckwarmer that Couldn't. Or Wouldn't. It's a diabolically simple pattern: K2, P2 in the round over a multiple of 4 plus 1. Work until you're out of yarn or until you're sick of it. Bind off. Could it be easier? Apparently, yes.

Because of the extra stitch, the K2, P2 doesn't line up like a rib, but rather as a traveling stitch on the diagonal. It's harder to see when you've messed up, until suddenly a 4-round rib develops. Add to this the fact that a) I was working on two circular needles so one needle had an extra stitch on it, and b) I was sick, and c) I can be dumb as a bowl of marbles at times, and you have a stunning combination of brain fog and ineptitude. I had knit, frogged, reknit, tinked, reknit, taken numerous time outs, etc. during a span of time in which I should have been able to knit 3 or 4 neckwarmers, but I was finally on the right track again.

Imagine my dismay when I got up to find it in the middle of the living-room carpet this morning, covered in dog hair, half off the needles, with suspicious munched-up areas on either side.

I took the needles out and started pulling. I unraveled one piece that abruptly ended after about 18 inches. And another, and another. I collected a nice pile of yarn suitable for needle felting or flossing. When I reached untouched yarn, I'd frogged about an inch and a half. Bah!

I took a deep breath and started working again. I was steaming along, making good progress, when I saw I'd managed to stack up 3 knits. And 3 purls. And then The Little Neckwarmer that Couldn't went back into the time-out bag. I decide to work on a dishcloth instead, since that seems to be the only thing I can manage at the moment.

A garter-stitch dish cloth.

The Fascinator of Awesomeness

2012-01-04T10:42:00.000-06:00

This Christmas, feeling even more bogged down than usual, I knit for only one person. My young friend E., age 9, wanted Christmas clothes for four of her stuffed animals. She was looking forward to her holiday trip to England to visit relatives, and of course, the gang needed some things to dress up in.

And, to answer your next question: Yes, I will have pictures, as soon as she arrives home. In my usual manner, I finished the last outfit five minutes before I had to drive them to the airport, so I'll get photos later.

Really! You can come after me with a set of Lace Addi Clics and poke me about the head and face if I fail!

So, for now, words will have to suffice.

I made all the outfits out of Plymouth Holiday Lights. I knit a skirt and a fascinator (look it up) for Kitty the pillow pet. The red skirt had a picot-edged hem at the top, through which I threaded a crochet chain for a drawstring, as Kitty doesn't have much of a waist. The bottom was slightly flared, and was finished with an interminable-to-knit white ruffle.

Kitty's red fascinator was constructed like a tam, very flat, again with a picot edged-hem. I decorated the top with two jingle bells and two fancy spotted chicken feathers. It's tied on at a jaunty angle (E. didn't want to stick a hatpin in Kitty's poor head) with a green satin ribbon. Very fancy!

Pumpkin, E.'s loved-up favorite stuffed cat, got a green Christmas cardigan vest with white trim and a single button at the top, and a tall pointy red Santa hat with white trim and ear-holes to help keep it on.

Bunny, who is built like a small person, not like a real bunny, got a dressy gown with a red bell-shaped ruffled skirt and a knitted-on green sleeveless bodice. Red satin ribbons are threaded into the eyelets at one side and tied into bows. Bunny would have looked nice in a fascinator too, but there was an ear-to-available-head-area ratio that would have required a 1/8" fascinator. I didn't want to insult her dignity that way.

Finally, Snowflake, a white horse, got a capelike affair that was essentially a rectangle with a hole to allow his head to go through. It should protect him from the worst of the weather. It's not decorated, since this is the piece I finished with only 5 minutes to spare. (I'm not a procastinator, I specialize in Just in Time delivery!)

Whew. Holiday knitting done for another year.

Now to turn my attention to the bottomless UFO tub which should carry me through 2020 and beyond.

Oh, and keep away from me with those Addi Clics!

Of goddesses and gauges

2011-10-05T18:34:00.002-05:00

My friend C.S. earned the title of Knitting Goddess this week. This is not a title you can study for, practice for, or take a test for. It is a title that is bestowed on you, much like knighthood is bestowed in the British Empire.

C.S. has many excellent qualities as a person and a knitter. She's kind, loyal, funny, and a good dog mom. But this is a knitting blog, so I'll focus on her Goddesshood. She revealed to me the other day that she does a gauge swatch for every pair of socks she knits, then makes note of who the socks are for, what size she's making, the yarn and needles, and the gauge. She also has a needle inventory on her smart phone that even indicates whether the needles are bamboo or metal. I'm scared to think about what else she might be keeping track of. She probably knows which outfit I've worn each day for the past 2 years, and whether I had peanut-butter-breath after lunch.

I bow down to you, O goddess. I will never emulate you, being terminally disorganized (it's called "creative" in my household) and in procrastination purgatory. But I sing your many praises.

I don't usually do a gauge swatch for socks, because after knitting several dozen pairs over the years, my gauge is fairly consistent when I use fingering-weight yarn and size 0 needles. If I go up to size 1.5 needles, I just bump off about 4 stitches.

But I was trying a new (to me) yarn today, Cherry Tree Hill's Sockittome. J. and I had a friendly debate the other day about whether it was a light DK or a heavy fingering. I claimed fingering, and J. claimed DK. So I figured it was worth a swatch.

I did my first swatch on size 1.5 needles, figuring that with a thicker yarn than normal, I needed bigger needles. My gauge came in at 7 stitches to the inch. Many people might think that is a perfectly acceptable gauge for a sock. I, however, usually knit socks at about 10 stitches to the inch, so the fabric felt like yurt felt to me. Trying again with size 0s, I achieved a marginally acceptable 8.5 stitches to the inch, which still felt like light yurt felt, but the subtle color of the yarn enchanted me, so I decided to go ahead with it.

It occurred to me that a swatch need not go to waste, so here is a little trifle for you to try next time you do a gauge swatch for something small in the round, like socks or mittens, and you have plenty of yarn:

Do your gauge swatch in the round, using your choice of method: double points, two circulars, or magic loop. If you are using fingering weight yarn, loosely cast on 40 - 44 stitches. If you are using heavier yarn, make your best guess as to how many stitches you need for a swatch about as big around as your wrist.

Work the first 6 rounds in garter stitch. Remember, garter stitch in the round consists of alternate rounds of knitting and purling.

Switch to stockinette stitch, i.e. knit all rounds, until the swatch is about 2.5" - 3" deep. Work the last 6 rounds in garter, as above. Bind off loosely.

Measure 2" worth of stitches. This is the gauge to use for your main project.

You now also have a jaunty wrist warmer, aka swatch. Or, if you don't want to wear it as a wrist warmer, use it as a cup cozy, napkin ring, decorative vase collar, sew shut and stuff with catnip to use as a cat toy, sew shut and stuff with polyfil to use as a doll pillow ... the uses are endless. Endless, I say!

Inside the Design Process, or Abandon Hope, All Ye Who Enter Here

2011-09-25T17:00:00.000-05:00

I'm not a designer, but I play one on TV.

Recently, the yarn shop owner suggested I design a reversible cable cowl and teach a class on it. Piece of cake, I thought. I know how to make a cowl. Easy peasy. I know how to cable. Easy peasy. And I even know how to make cables reversible. What could go wrong?

I expected the process to include some trial and error. I started with two identical skeins of yarn, thinking I'd play around with design ideas using the first skein, then I'd knit the final product with the other. Piece of cake.

My first idea involved a reversible, i.e. ribbed, cable on a field of garter stitch. Garter is reversible, so it seemed like a good choice. Except that the cable didn't really stand out against the highly textured garter. No worries. It was only my first attempt.

Next I tried ribbing the whole thing, except for a column of garter alongside the cable. Now, the rib was obscuring the (ribbed) cable, and the whole thing merged together. And oh, did I mention that I was doing this in a fluffy, bulky alpaca yarn?

Next attempt: 2-stitch wide column of garter next to the cable. It was better than any of the other attempts, but I still wasn't very happy with it. Piece of cake had now turned into piece of pie.

Next attempt (and I was feeling a little hot and sweaty at this point): Stockinette stitch on one side of the cable, reverse stockinette on the other. At least it was reversible, if not symmetrical. But the edges rolled. Blueberry pie. (I don't like blueberry goo).

I took a few days off from "designing" at this point. It had begun to feel less like designing, and more like trying to hit a small nail on the head in the dark with a very tiny hammer.

I had started with my first idea, then continued with the same piece of knitting, trying another and another idea, until I had a long sampler that looked like I had been experimenting with synthetic marijuana while knitting.

After a few more days off, I thought of another possibility: setting the cable off with yarnovers. I tried it. It looked OK. The longer a piece I knit, the more OK it looked, until I decided I really liked it. Piece of French Silk pie !

I eagerly wound the "real" skein of yarn and quickly knit a fresh sample, using my highly refined pattern. It only took about two days to complete the knitting, and then I had only the seaming to do. It was then that the project turned into pie-in-the face.

I had envisioned a cowl that was truly and fully reversible, that is, with an invisible graft between the cast-on edge and the bound-off edge which looked the same on both sides. Better minds than mine have contemplated this issue, and there are two unavoidable truths: First, if you use a provisional cast-on, you will wind up half a stitch off when you try to graft the beginning of the piece to the end. And, while it may be somewhat easily hidden on stockinette stitch, it is blatant on 1x1 rib. Second, if you use a standard cast-on and bind-off, you can seam the piece, but then there will always be a Wrong Side with an unsightly seam. And mattress stitch is very difficult on 1x1 rib. (Any geniuses out there who know how to do it, let me know.)

And no, I will not tell you how many complete cowls (except for joining) I have knit to date. Just let me say that until I solve the joining problem, I will be knitting only swatches to try out my further ideas.

Stay tuned for the ultimate resolution. I'm going to compromise and set the bar a little lower this time. We'll see how well I can do the Limbo.

Verbing a Noun, or Sock of Doom, part 3

2011-09-13T19:18:00.002-05:00

My dad was a writer, news editor, proofreader, grammar guru, and a good guy. He taught me most of what I know about reading, writing, spelling, grammar, and editing, along with the regular Dad-daughter stuff.

One of his peeves was the verbing of nouns. In other words, taking a perfectly good noun, and using it as a verb. For example, a 'gift' is a thing you give to someone. You don't 'gift' something. "I gifted her a set of china" is as silly as "I pied her in the face". Now, throwing a pie in someone's face, that's funny. Pie-ing them just sounds funny.

I'm not a purist like my Dad. While I eschew the verbing of nouns as a general rule, I allow for a little wiggle room. I don't say 'gifting', but I do say 'regifting'. I think it's a funny word, and a funny concept. And if something is funny, it's all good.

So, with that exposition, I can say that today I gusseted the Sock of Doom. Yes, folks, the S.O.D. now has a heel and gussets. It's beginning to look a lot like its big sister. I'm tempted to say "I'm past the danger zone", but I won't. You didn't read it here. No. Nyet. Non. Because then the knitting goddesses, who tend to be fickle, might just have a laugh at my expense. And that kind of laugh, that kind of funny, is not all good.

That kind of joke doesn't laugh me. It sorrows me.

Sock of Doom update (sort of) and Shoes of Doom

2011-09-12T18:38:00.000-05:00

The update on the Sock of Doom is that there is no update. Not that I haven't been making progress on it, just that I don't dare make any comment lest I inadvertently put a curse on it. Sometimes I think a dybbuk* has interfered.

On my way home from work today, I noticed quite a few roadside shoes. No doubt you have seen them, lone shoes on the shoulder amidst the empty Tide bottles, hub caps, broken taillights, random bumpers, mattresses, sofa cushions, broken-down 1970 Mercury Marquises, and the like. What are your ideas about how they get there? Have you ever lost a shoe to Roadside Purgatory?

I always imagine that many of them get lost by motorcyclists, or by people with their feet out the window. When you look for it, you see more people with their feet out the window than you'd think.

What other options could there be? Knocked off when a roadside motorist fixing a tire gets hit by a car? Flung out the window by snotty older brothers? Thrown at George W. Bush? Hurled in a rousing game of Whose Shoe Can Hit the Cop Car?

Put your entries in the comments.

*You can look it up. Or watch the Coen Brothers film A Serious Man.

Sock of Doom

2011-09-08T19:56:00.000-05:00

Since I have been blabbing about my sock knitting disaster the past few days, I thought I'd give an update.

Yesterday, as you may recall, I realized I had started my gussets before I turned the sock heel, and I ripped back to the end of the heel flap and got all the stitches back on the needles in a half-assed sort of way. After that, I put the sock in its little red pouch so I could do some serious self-recrimination.

Today was a new day. The air was clear, the sun was shining, birds were singing, and I went off to work with an idiotic smile on my face. Can you tell where this is heading?

Around 10:30 we had a small break in the action at work, so I pulled out the sock, confident that I was of clear mind and yippy-skippy attitude. I fixed all the stitches to they were whole-assed, not half-assed. I picked up a few dropped stitches, fixed some slipped stitches, righted some twisted stitches, and repaired some split stitches. Maybe 'repaired' is a little grand. The yarn was shredded and looked like hell, but I decided that the only way to fix that was to rip back again and start with a new piece of yarn. I'm a perfectionist in theory, but a realist in practice. On I forged.

After all the stitches were happy and smiling and lined up like little schoolgirls, I set to work in earnest. First, I picked up stitches along the sides of the heel flap.* I started knitting across the instep. I got to the point where I was going to redistribute stitches to work on the gussets.*

That's when I said 'D'oh!'

And then I said to myself something a little more salty.

And then I un-knit back to where I had started for the day.

How many ways can you spell D-U-M-B? How many ways can you BE dumb? Well, let me count the ways, for I am inventing new ones daily.

At this point, I got out a copy of the pattern.** Understand, I have knit socks from this pattern for so long that I memorized it years ago, and can usually knit a sock with only my pinkies and both eyeballs tied behind my back. While I stand on my head. In a bucket full of syrup. Naked. On drugs.

(Come to think of it, after years of doing the above, maybe I have some cognitive impairment).

I forced myself to read the pattern, a line at a time, and knit one row at a time, pausing to admire my work after each row. I'm relieved to say the sock now has a heel, and I don't have to go buy coaches' shorts to wear with tube socks.

After turning the heel, I carefully put the sock away in its pouch, so it wouldn't attack again.

It may be several days, and several pints of vodka, before I attempt the next step, FINALLY picking up the gusset stitches. Or maybe I'll just strip and get out the bucket of syrup.

*See yesterday's post.

**Nancy Lindberg's Knit to Fit sock pattern, # NL 7. A fine pattern. I recommend it for anyone of normal intelligence and sound mind.

Rookie Mistakes

2011-09-07T19:04:00.001-05:00

I made sure to bring my knitting to work today. Yesterday I forgot it, and suffered the tortures of the damned. Well, OK, I was slightly inconvenienced. Whatever.

I have been working bit by bit on a pair of socks. On the first sock, I somehow distributed the stitches askew when I was repositioning my needles for starting the gusset. I was almost done with the gussets when I realized the sole of the sock was very narrow, and the instep was ballooning.

I ripped out back to the gusset pick-ups and re-did them. Do you know how hard it is to pick up off-the-needle stitches with size 0 needles? It might have been quicker to start the entire sock over.

I learned my lesson, so on the second sock when I was ready for the gussets* I made sure to count my stitches and distribute them correctly. I had done two rounds when something just felt wrong. I held up my sock. Yes, the gussets looked even. I recounted the stitches and yes, I had the correct number on each needle. No, there were no dropped stitches.

And no, there was no heel. Ah.

If you are a sock knitter, you know that it is helpful to put a heel in your sock, unless you want to relive the Tube Sock glory of the 1970s, when you could buy white, knee-high athletic tube socks in big economy packs of 750 and when people's socks were perpetually uncomfortable, ill-fitting, and prone to creeping down into their shoes. Don't you just love that feeling of a huge lump of sock under your arch? Keeps you awake better than coffee.

So ...

I ripped out back to before the gusset pick-ups and got all the stitches back on the needle. Do you know how hard it is to pick up off-the-needle stitches with size 0 needles? It might have been quicker to start the entire sock over. (Is this sounding familiar?) I'm now ready to turn the heel. As soon as I get done with the self-flagellation and the wearing of the hair shirt, which I knit from the hairs of my Labrador.

*I thought I was ready for the gussets.

Moment of Zen

2011-09-07T09:21:00.000-05:00

My job at the yarn store is a dream job. During the lunch hour, when people come in to knit and chat, and between helping other customers, we get to knit along with the lunch group. I usually have a pair of socks on the needles, and little by little, the socks magically get finished. Both socks, as opposed to my usual one-sock-wonders that end up as part of a zany mismatched pair.

(The definition of a one-sock-wonder is: One wonders where the other sock went). Dryers can create one-sock-wonders too, as we all know. And who hasn't had that experience where you wonder what that lump under the bedsheet is?

I digress
Yesterday, having changed knitting bags, I went off to work. It was a gorgeous early fall day, and I had an idiotic smile on my face.

I got to work and pulled out my things. I had several things in my backpack. My lunch. My wallet. My phone. My keys. No knitting.

Now, knitting is my panacea. It keeps my little hands busy so I don't overeat, don't smoke, don't pick at things, don't, as the t-shirt says, kill people. And though there was plenty of work to be done helping customers, stocking shelves, and the like, the noon group kept asking me why I wasn't knitting.

"I'm having a moment of Zen" I said. They didn't buy it. I had to fess up.

When I got home, the first thing I did was to find my knitting in my other bag, and put it in my backpack. I slept well last night.

Miscellany

2011-09-03T13:33:00.000-05:00

Having said that I hate knitalongs, especially mystery knitalongs, I bought the pattern for Stephen West's recent mystery knitalong. But I had heard from friends that, since it involves 3 yarns in 3 different colors, it was difficult to know which yarn to start with. So I'm going to look at completed ones on Ravelry, see if I like the pattern and try to understand how the colors should best be arranged. And if I don't like it, I won't make it. I'm making use of my underlying talent for procrastination to eliminate the mystery element.

I haven't been knitting much. I've been busy with lots of other things, like going to the Minnesota State Fair. Aside from CHEESE CURDS, Pronto Pups, and the new sweet corn ice cream, my favorite thing is the knitting display in the Creative Activities building. Emily Tremain's fair isle Doublemassa hat in Kauni Effektgarn is stunning, and, gratifyingly, it was prominently displayed instead of hidden under layers of other items. Katie Smith's beautiful sweater made of Opal sock yarn was also prominently displayed. Both won ribbons.

There were also quite a few lace scarves, stoles, and shawls, few of which were displayed so that you could see much of them. I realize there is limited display space, but some of these items looked very nice from what you could see of them.

Susan Rainey's circular tablecloth, done in what looked like fine crochet cotton, was gorgeous. It was impeccably knit, and impeccably blocked.

I am not a fair-enterer. While I'm vain about some of my talents and abilities, and somewhat proud of my knitting, I don't feel a need to be validated by winning a ribbon in the fair. Or maybe I'm just lazy.

It's been quite zippy on the home front, with a visiting sister, her two dogs (one is a 5-month-old puppy) and three cats. And I have a dog. They form a loose sort of Dog Chorus with hissing and growling for percussion.

Soon after the puppy, a blue merle smooth collie, arrived, I saw her thrashing something around on the floor. Since she had at least five toys strewn over the floor, I didn't think much of it at first. Then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a dash of rich red. I wonder where she got that small red blanket, I thought. Hmmm. We don't have a small red blanket. Ummmm ... OH NO! NOT THE SCHAEFER! Let's just say Nancy is now possibly just Nan. I'm calling the puppy Vinegar Breath now.

By choice, I'm lying low for the Labor Day holiday. I'll need a vacation after my sister's vacation.

I'll be teaching Beginning Socks and Reversible Cable Cowl classes at Borealis Yarns in September and October. Check www.borealisyarn.com for more details.

Curmudgeonly Ruminations

2011-06-16T20:01:00.000-05:00

I hate knitalongs.

As revealed in yesterday's post, I hate deadlines, I don't like things I'm told (or think) I "should" do, and when the two get rolled up together, I really get cranky. Maybe that's why I'm about a year behind in filing my medical insurance paperwork.

The last time I committed to a knitalong, my knitting group and I decided it would be a lot of fun to do one of the lace fichus in "Victorian Lace Today". Fun, fun, fun. Yippity-skippity, whoop-de-doo!

What in the HELL was I thinking?

As always, K., she of the engineer's mind and laser-like concentration, came back the first week with the thing practically finished. She explained the problems she'd run into reading the charts, and how she figured out how to work with them, and what to watch out for.

Meanwhile, M. and I had each made it partway through the ties (thin garter strips) and, each for reasons of our own, had ripped them out and started over.

The next week K. had finished hers and blocked it, and was wearing it. M. and I quietly put ours away to age like fine whisky. I'll have to check on mine, say, in 20 years. The best single malts are at least that old. Or maybe even 21 years. If I'm not in the senior home by then, crocheting granny squares and spending Saturday nights at Bingo. That fichu wouldn't be any good for me anyway. I'd just dribble my pablum on it.

I avoid mystery knitalongs. These are the ones where some stranger online -- sometimes from a yarn company, sometimes just a random torturer -- issues instructions for something section by section, which you are supposed to have the faith to knit without knowing whether you're making a lace stole, a Dr. Who scarf, or a cabled red carpet for the Oscars.

You sink many kopecks into buying the yarn, you get the (sometimes error-filled) instructions, and away you go. Of course you finish each section before the next set of instructions comes out, so you can lah-di-dah your way through the thing and get it done on time.

Or ball it up in the middle of section 2 and put it away somewhere dark, hopefully somewhere moths like to breed.

Did I mention I am short on faith? Especially when it comes to decrees issued by unknown online personages.

I prefer to do my knitting alone, in the dark seclusion of my home, so that if I decide I don't want to finish the project, or that I want to put it aside for a week or a lifetime, I am beholden to no one.

Yep, I'm a curmudgeon. Board-certified.

The year of Kauni Effektgarn and some musings on resolutions

2011-06-15T20:35:00.000-05:00

I don't do New Year's resolutions. Why would I do that, when any resolution I'd make would be doomed to fail?

Think about it: What types of things do people make resolutions about? Typically, eating less, exercising more, quitting smoking, quitting drinking, giving up sugar, saving money -- in short, removing all pleasure from life. And knitters often make incomprehensible (to me) resolutions about de-stashing, not buying more yarn, not buying more sock yarn, not buying any more [insert favorite color here] yarn ...

All I can say is I'm going to hell in a handbasket, and enjoying every bit of the ride. I'm gonna go in a blaze of glory, but at least when I do, my stash won't melt, because I don't buy acrylic.

I do, however, occasionally think, in a noncommital way, about the fact that yarn makes up a sizable part of my "budget" -- I call it that, just for fun -- and an even more sizable part of my possessions. And I occasionally think that, if I were a person who believed in "shoulds" and "shouldn'ts", I probably shouldn't be spending as much money on yarn as I do.

Oh well, screw that.

My coworker and friend E. did a "year of the sock" last year, during which she made 12 pairs of socks in 12 months. This year, she's doing the "year of the hat", and has already produced several really smashing hats. [I encourage you to follow her at paleopurls.blogspot.com.] I admire her perseverance and accomplishment, but that whole type of project is way too close to all things I fear: deadlines, shoulds, and lack of variety. (And variety IS the cheese of life, doncha know. More about that another time.)

However, I've decided to do The Year of Kauni Effektgarn. It encompasses everything I like, and nothing I don't. First, I've lost my heart, and most of my money, to the beautiful, delicious Kauni Effektgarn. It's 100% wool, rich with lanolin, and it shades from one beautiful color to the next in at least 20 colorways.

Second, this Year doesn't involve any shoulds or deadlines. I don't really care if I make 12 things in 12 months with Kauni. But I've already made 3 major things out of it this year: A large Spiral Nebula shawl*, and two (count 'em) Maude Vests from the Simply Shetland 2 book, the first according to the pattern and the second enlarged somewhat for a better fit. I figure I've been more-or-less continuously knitting with the stuff all year so far, so I might as well continue. Especially since I have enough stashed to make both a cardigan and a project-to-be-determined.

Watch this space for further adventures with Kauni, and, of course, pictures. When I get around to it, that is. (No resolutions on that.)

*I knit the Spiral Nebula while my mom was in the hospital for two months, and I've decided it soaked up too much bad juju during that time and must be frogged. Not to mention, It's a big shawl, and it's done in the rainbow colorway. I started picturing myself as Rainbow Bright at age 56, looking like hell but really BIG and BRIGHT. I'm going to repurpose the yarn and incorporate it into the collar of the cardigan, and make a few scarves with the rest.

Stay tuned.

Increasing

2011-05-02T20:04:00.000-05:00

What in the Sam Hill are some of these knitwear designers thinking?

It's well known that Americans are getting bigger and bigger. I have to admit that I'm a proud American, and as such, I am following the national trend.

I'm dimly aware that there are some people out there who wear an S or even an XS. It's a curiosity to me. I was 5'8" in 8th grade, and attained 5'10" + before I started shrinking vertically a few years ago. I've had size 10 shoes since junior high. The rest of my body is, ahem, proportional. And getting more "proportional" all the time, thanks to time, settling of contents, and chocolate.

I recently bought a copy of Brave New Knits, in which there is a pattern for a pretty sweater called Silke Jacket, designed by Shannon Okey for knitgrrl.com. I'm sure Ms. Okey is a lovely person with good intentions, but the jacket comes in four sizes: S, M. L, and 1X. So far, so good. I usually wear a 1X when I buy sweaters or tops.

But the 1X has a 38" bust circumference. I'm sorry, Shannon, that is not a 1X. Maybe a 1-boob, but not a 1X.

At work today a few of us were looking at the book Knit Jackets by Cheryl Oberle. To paraphrase my coworker E., everything in the book is very knittable and wearable. Well, maybe wearable by some. But I think the largest women's jacket I spotted was 46". Now, that's a fairly generous size, but it would still be too small for me. And no, I don't weigh 300 pounds. No, I don't weigh 250. (And NO, I don't weigh 400!)

Can I help it that I'm a woman of substance with substantial boobage? Well, OK, I can help it to a certain extent, such as maybe eating less ice cream (a.k.a. Food of the Gods), but I also have large bones. I swear it.

I'm not naive; I realize that designing unique, interesting knitted garments is a challenge. And I realize that, geometrically speaking, not every design is translatable into every size in 2" increments. But how about these suggestions, for starters:

1. Any book of knitwear designs, unless it is specifically for children or petites, should have at least 20% of the designs go up to 50".

2. Ditch the "S. M, L" labels for sizing. "Small" can mean anything from "fits my big toe" to "fits my big sister" (who is smaller than me). I know what 42 inches means, but "M" might as well designate "Mystery Size".

3. Always indicate how the garment should fit. Is it intended to be oversized, or should it have negative ease? A 50" finished circumference might be for a 42" circumference person or a 54" circumference person, or anything in between.

4. Show a photo of a realistic-size model wearing the garment. Include a fashion shot if you must, but also include a plain shot that shows detail of the garment and how it conforms to the body.

5. Include a schematic for every pattern. That way, if I can't quite see the details of the garment in the photo, I can get an idea of how it's structured and what the measurements of each piece are.

6. Design more flattering stuff for us fat ladies. Those &*^%$#@** skinny beatches already have plenty of cute clothes.

No Knit Wit

2011-04-26T19:04:00.000-05:00

This thing is not a sea creature, nor is it hyperbolic knitting. It's a ruffled silk and wool collar, which I made eons ago, and have never worn. Every time I encounter it in the bottom of a bin of yarn, I think, "I should wear that someday". Then it somehow goes back into the bin and never gets worn. Hm.

Since I have run out of knitting-related witticisms, I'm going to talk about one of my peeves, overused words and expressions.

1. "Devastated". I've been hearing this one a lot the past few days, since there have been a lot of tornadoes and other forms of severe weather. It's not that I doubt that the results are devastating, it's just that I expect people to be more lyrical in the midst of their, um ... devastation. How about "It wrecked our house and everything we own", "What will we do now?" or simply "Life sucks"?

2. "Icon", as in "James Brown was an icon for the African-American community". When Persons on the Street were interviewed on TV after James Brown died, about 90 percent of them said they were affected (or "devastated") because he had been such an "icon". But what does that mean, people? Icons are symbols. So what was he a symbol of? Tell me or I will smite you.

3. "Snowmageddon" and "Snowpocalypse". These were funny the first time I heard them, but by the second day of the first snowstorm of 2010, they were about as hilarious as "Workin' hard, or hardly workin'?" I shall smite both your cheeks with a metal snow shovel if I ever hear these again.

4. "Awesome" (pronounced in Minnesota as 'ossum'). Do my new shoes really inspire awe? My haircut? My recipe for baked beans? If so, you have a low awe threshold. And what happens when you encounter, say, the Second Coming (that is, the Apocalypse without the Snow) if you're already awed by baked beans?

5."Incredible". 'Incredible' means, literally, not believeable. "We went to this incredible new restaurant". Really? You didn't believe you were there, or you didn't believe it existed? If you didn't believe it existed, was your meal filling? Shall I smite you with this incredible wombat?

6. "Supposably". People. This is not a word. And still it gets overused.

Thanks. It's been awesome.

Of Great Blue Herons and Fish Skeletons

2011-04-24T12:39:00.001-05:00

How can a fish skeleton be inspirational?

I saw this one on my morning dog walk, and immediately thought of knitted lace patterns I might design. Lewis immediately thought, "Yum!" Cruel mistress that I am, I didn't let him eat it.

Last year at this time, there were a lot of good-sized carp heads strewn about in the grass near the local pond where we walk. I never did figure out whether they were discarded by humans, raccoons, foxes, or something else, but every time we went out for a walk, I ended up with "fish heads, fish heads / jolly jolly fish heads / fish heads, fish heads, floating in my soup" circling in my brain. (Or is is "roly-poly" fish heads?)

While we were walking, a Great Blue Heron swooped down about 20 feet from us, and let me take about 20 pictures before it flew further away. The photos I got were not stellar, but for what it's worth, I share one here.

Two days ago, a Peregrine Falcon swooped down into a yard as I was driving down Cretin Avenue in St. Paul, a busy two-lane urban street. The falcon missed whatever it was going after, but I got the best close-up look I've ever had of a Peregrine. And yesterday, I spotted a red-tailed hawk atop a freeway light pole. Our local pale hawk (identity as yet unknown, but probably a light-colored red-tail) has been frequenting its favorite utility pole at Lamplighter Park across the street, and I have had some spectacular close-up views as I walk under the pole.

I've yet to see any osprey, cormorants, goldfinches, or Eastern Bluebirds, but I trust with the warm weather I will see them soon. We've had a couple of good rains, which have brought the worms out onto the sidewalks, so the robins are feasting.

Welcome Spring, FINALLY, and Happy Easter!

An FO, plus My Precious Sock

2011-04-22T20:10:00.001-05:00

Pictures, finally. Not good ones. The dreary Minnesota weather didn't cooperate for outdoor photos, so I had to put up with crummy lighting and unattractive backgrounds. If the sun comes out tomorrow, I'll do a retake.

The Maude Vest has been finished, blocked, and worn. I came, I knit, I conquered. When I told my coworker J., she replied, “have you cast on for the next one yet?” Dang, she knows me too well.

It’s a good thing I finished the vest yesterday, since today the knitting voodoo is upon me. Picked up the gusset stitches on my sock before I turned the heel; rookie mistake. Went to turn the heel, and ended up with a non-centered heel twice before remembering, (i.e., looking at the pattern) how to do it. While undoing my mistakes, dropped several stitches. After finally getting everything picked up again, put one of the gusset decreases in the wrong place.It’s great that I have a job where I can knit during my downtime.It wasn’t too busy today at work, but I believe I completed only two rounds on my sock.

I feel like there’s some little fiend dogging me, someone who looks like Rumplestiltskin or Dobby, or worse, Gollum.Excuse me. I have to go buy a garlic wreath, some asafoetida (you can look it up) and a few wooden stakes for good measure.

One down, only ??? to go

2011-04-21T12:55:00.000-05:00

I cast off the Maude vest this morning, and put it in the "spa bath" (cool water and Soak wool wash) this morning. If I'm not too lazy this afternoon I should be able to block it. I was hoping to wear it to work tomorrow, since Katie warned me I had to have it done -- under what authority, I'm not sure -- but I'll have to see if it's dry in time. I may be wearing it with un-woven-in ends.

And I WILL post a picture when it is finished. See? I'm turning over a new leaf. Let's hope there aren't maggots under it. (The leaf, that is.)

Next up is a sweater I had hoped to finish by last Christmas. Well, Easter and Christmas are both about Christ, right? So if I get it done by Easter, I'll call it a success. It's a kimono by Plymouth, knit in Encore, and it was dead easy to knit, although I kept knitting the pieces longer than necessary and having to rip because the Idiot Knitting lulled me into a trance. I hope it will be a cold, cold summer so the friend I'm making it for can enjoy it. Maybe I'll have to take her camping in the Arctic.

All I have left on the kimono is picking up about one-hunderd-and-eighty-four-billion stitches up the front, around the neck, and down the other front, and knitting a wide garter stitch shawl collar. Then the dreaded sleeve and side seams. I might have to fortify myself with a few beverages for the seaming. It's not that I can't do it, it's just ... well, you know. Seaming. Feh.

After the kimono, I will finish the socks I promised to another friend years ago in exchange for a favor. I think I might have to make two pair, the second pair being overdue interest.

My resolution -- OK, yes, I'm making a damn resolution -- is to accompany each of these tiny triumphs with photos of the FOs (hey, I like the sound of that, 'photos of the FOs'). And then my blog can be all pretty.

[Off topic]: I wish I'd had my camera yesterday morning, when I went out to walk the dog in the SNOW and there was a lone goose standing out in the white field, looking as if it was having the same bewildered and murderous thought I was about the weather.

Stay tuned.

F-ing Os

2011-04-19T19:55:00.001-05:00

I’m thinking hard about F-ing some Os. No, that’s not code for naughty-speak.

If you’re a knitter, you probably know about UFOs (Un-Finished Objects). And if you’re me, you have several -- well, several dozen ... ish -- UFOs lurking in Rubbermaid bins and boxes and project bags and baskets and in any other sort of container large enough to hold projects-in-progress.

So, I’m thinking of F-ing some of those Os.

I’m dangerously close to finishing my current project, the Maude Vest from the Simply Shetland 2 book. I have an inch or so left to knit, then I may finish the armholes with crochet or I-cord edging, and then I need to block it.

Usually when I reach this stage in a project, it feels done to me, and I can’t help casting on for something new and exciting. I’m sort of like Donald Trump in this way, only I go after newer, fresher projects instead of newer, younger wives.

And I don’t believe in New Year’s Resolutions, so I don’t ever resolve to F more Os for that reason. And I don’t believe in either Hell or the Knitting Police, so I can’t be guilted into finishing anything I don’t F-ing want to. (OK, that WAS naughty-speak).

So why this sudden burst of potential industriousness?

For one thing, I think my coworker E. is a bad (good?) influence on me. She is one of those dismaying people who casts on a project on Tuesday night -- at work, I might add -- and by Friday morning she comes in with a completed acre of fully blocked Orenburg Lace or a Dubbelmossa Fair Isle hat or some such thing. And not only that, she keeps up with her blog and puts plenty of photos on it as well. I admit to feeling a little competitive.

For another, I’ve had occasion to go into my stash recently and in the process I unearthed a few things that would take about 1 hour each to complete. For example, the Sonoma Wrap from Simply Shetland 2, which involved 72 inches of various lovely stripes in Woven Stitch. I completed the knitting in record time, but so far the edging has taken me about three years. Well, applied I-cord can’t be rushed.

And then there are the socks I promised a friend several years ago. All I have left is the foot of the second sock. Two evenings of work, max, and I could get that sock monkey off my back.

And ... and ...

But maybe I could just look at that beautiful new silk and wool handpainted yarn I bought on Saturday? You won’t tell, right? I swear I won’t cast on ...

High Speed Chase

2011-01-10T20:11:00.001-06:00

The Knitting Police are after me again.

The Knitting Police enforce the Knitting Laws, the most important of which apparently is:

Finish What You Start.

I’m an anarchist from way back, maybe because I came of age during the late 1960s and early 1970s, when it was almost illegal to follow rules. If you say anything to me which contains the word “should”, I have an immediate, visceral reaction which makes me do the opposite of what I “should”.

I shouldn’t have “too much” yarn, whatever that means. (How can you have too much yarn? That’s like having too much air, or too much time.) I have a wide-ranging collection of yarns, both vintage and modern, much of which is parked in the overflow parking, a.k.a. my not-so-mini-storage unit.

I shouldn’t start a project when I have other, unfinished projects. Need I say more?

I should complete knitted gifts before the gift-giving-occasion (GGO), or at least within 6 months after said GGO. Or at the very least while it still fits the recipient. Ahem.

Guilty as charged, Your Honor.

I’m trying to do better, though. Last fall, I decided to knit and felt some clogs for a charity sale. I finished the knitting and felting a full week before the deadline.

This Christmas, I decided a week before the holiday to knit and felt three pairs of clogs, and knit two neck gaiters. And I would have finished them all in time, if the last pair of clogs hadn’t gone mysteriously kitty-wampus on me, causing me to re-knit the last clog on Christmas morning. At least I was able to present the gift in a lovely gift bag, even though the needles were still in it.

Next I offered to knit a kimono for a friend, a dead-easy collection of acres of stockinette-and-garter rectangles. Pure idiot-knitting as long as you have, say, 8 hours a day to sit and watch TV with your hands on auto-knit. I’m almost done with it, and I have barely knit a stitch on anything else while I’ve been working on it.

I was thinking the other day that it’s time to knit one of the – um – several projects I’ve bought yarn for recently, and was getting excited at the prospect, when I realized I have yarn to knit 3 sweaters for the baby my close friend is having next month.

So don’t tell the Knitting Police I’m not going to sew together my own kimono from last year, or finish the applied I-cord on the wrap I knit the year before that, or seam the Alice Starmore gansey I knit the year before that, or …

Uh-oh, flashing lights in my rearview mirror. I’m outta here.

Too Cool for Stitch Markers

2010-05-07T20:32:00.002-05:00

When I teach knitting, I tell my students to read the entire pattern before they begin. I tell them to check online for any corrections to their pattern, magazine, or book. I tell them about the importance of keeping track of stitch counts with markers, and keeping track of rows, with a row counter or paper and pencil.

I’m the teacher, and I know best.

I’m so smart, in fact, that I don’t need to do any of those things, especially if the pattern appears to be easy. Why would I need to read an easy pattern all the way through? Why would such an easy pattern have any corrections when it’s obvious how it is worked? Why would I need to count stitches or rows on, say, an easy triangle shawl?

Recently, armed with an attitude of fearlessness and the confidence of a fool, I began a large triangular shawl from a popular book. I could see from the pictures that it was garter stitch in the center triangle, and an easy lace pattern around the lower edges. So I set about knitting every row, increasing on every row as the pattern told me. I counted my stitches every so often, and while the triangle was still small, I was right on the stitch counts.

About halfway through the center garter triangle, I was off by one stitch on one side of the center rib. No problem; who’s going to notice a little k2tog amidst all that garter, especially since I was working in a nice, fuzzy alpaca yarn?

On the next row, I was off one stitch on the other side. Hmmm.

I thought it might be a good idea, at this stage (having knit up, oh, about 6 balls of yarn) to read through the directions.

It was late. I was annoyed. I ripped out two rows and re-knit them, with the same result as before.

I glanced at the instructions. I had done exactly what they said. I must have made a mistake. Rip. Re-knit. Same result.

At this point I should have: a) Put it down and gone to bed; b) Realized I needed to study the directions in greater depth, especially at a time when I was more rested; or c) Checked for corrections.

Instead I got out a pad and pencil and calculator, and went over the numbers again and again. I could not make the numbers in the pattern match the number of stitches I had, no matter how I calculated. After making myself itchy and hot with frustration, I went to bed fuming. I dreamed my recurring dream in which my underwear is four sizes too small.

The next day, I brought the project to work, and told my coworker how much trouble I was having. As soon as I started talking to another human being, I realized that the trouble was that the pattern said to increase stitches in pairs, yet I was supposed to end up with an odd number of stitches. Reaching back, back – way back -- to 2nd grade arithmetic, I remembered that when you start with 2, and add 2 each time, you do not end up with an odd number. Not ever. Hmmmm.

Checking online when I got home, I saw there were several corrections to the pattern. Ah. I made the necessary corrections and returned to happy knitting – ah, how happy we fools can be at times! -- still not using stitch markers or a row counter. This worked well until my rows started to get over 300 stitches long. I counted all the stitches every few rows with great irritation. You would think, since I have been knitting for 40-plus years, it would have occurred to me to use markers. You’d think that, but you’d be wrong.

Then, at some point, I noticed my right-side marker was on the wrong side. That gave me pause for a moment, but I decided that, since it was garter stitch, nobody could really tell the right side from the wrong side. What I didn’t think about was that given the sequence of increases, I would never be able to achieve the right number of stitches on the right row on the right side this way.

It was when I got to the point where I was supposed to have 399 stitches, and I was on right side which was supposed to be the wrong side, and I only had 397 stitches, and I had fudged stitches several times (and the edge of the shawl was getting ever wonkier) that I realized I could never get to the correct number of stitches on the correct side following the current scheme. I’d have to fudge a couple of highly visible additional stitches before beginning my lace pattern.

Garter stitch is, thank goodness, easy to rip out. Even in fuzzy alpaca.

The alpaca is really nice yarn.

And I still really like the shawl design. That is, according to the picture, since mine is now a pile of little yarn cannonballs.

And I will probably re-knit the shawl, this time using markers every ten stitches, and counting every row as I go. I will be Good and Follow the Rules and my shawl will come out to be a precise triangle with no lurking unauthorized k2togs or m1s, no veering edges. It will be military-esque in its precision.

But not today. Today I am working on a much more relaxing project, a lace shawl in fingering weight yarn with 4 different lace motifs.

More relaxing? Sure. Because with a complex lace project, I KNOW I can’t proceed without markers, counters, lifelines, a parachute, Depends, and Dial-a-Prayer.

Go figure.

Tales of Mass Transit

2009-08-27T10:02:00.003-05:00

I am an overprivileged, bigoted elitist. It's just a fact.

I grew up in an all-white suburb in the 1960s and 1970s and went to good schools. I had a stay-at-home mom who took care of the house and cooked meals that we sat down and ate together as a family. I wasn't allowed to stay out late on school nights or run around with unknown people. My parents looked after me pretty well.

I did have a wild period in my teens, but I got in far less trouble than I could have. I managed not to get pregnant or addicted to drugs. I turned out to be an okay adult. I was lucky. Lucky to have parents with a decent income. Lucky to live in a place where I wasn't in daily danger. I was a typical white, middle-class kid.

All of this, though, means that I don't know much about what it's like to be poor, or to be in an ethnic minority group, to be an immigrant, to be severely physically or mentally handicapped, or to have grown up feeling devalued by society. I try to be inclusive in my thinking, and to understand why others may feel and behave differently than I do, but it's a struggle.

Which is why it was uncomfortable for me to ride to work and back on the bus yesterday, something I hadn't done regularly since the early 1990s.

The #16 line on University that runs between Minneapolis and St. Paul is one that is used by a lot of lower-income people, mostly people of color, and quite a few handicapped people, if my rides yesterday were typical. My ride to work in the morning was mostly uneventful. I noted that there was a woman in a wheelchair riding. Back when I was a regular rider, wheelchair lifts hadn't yet been installed on most -- if any -- buses. It made me wonder what wheelchair-bound people had done to get around previously. My guess is that those who didn't have friends or family to transport them, or couldn't afford handicapped transit service, were mostly homebound.

On my way back from work in the afternoon, things got a little more rowdy. Downtown, a woman with a walker boarded, but couldn't unlatch the special fold-up seat that would allow her room to sit down in the adjoining seat. I left my seat to help, and bent over to get at the latch. A man boarding the bus squeezed past me, and commented "Full moon out tonight!"

Well, yes. I do have a large butt, and I was wearing light-colored slacks, and I was bent over. So I don't argue with his assessment. I did wonder, though, when it became acceptable to comment on others' anatomy in a loud voice in public.

The woman with the walker became engaged in conversation with an out-of-towner who asked about how to get to various places, and about motels near the fairgrounds. She was an authority on how to get around the cities by bus, and even knew the nightly rates of several local motels.

After she debarked, another woman, this time on a motorized scooter, used the lift to get on the bus. She had jury-rigged the scooter with several plastic bins in which she was carrying groceries. She had two signs on her vehicle: "Jesus Loves You", and "Find a Way Every Day to say I Love You and Thank You". What a bummer, I thought, to have to go grocery shopping on a scooter and take the bus.

Soon after she got on, a man toward the back of the bus -- maybe the same one who made the "full moon" comment -- started ranting. "Look at all those groceries. You can't use that to carry all your groceries on the bus. That's for wheelchairs only. I just carry my groceries in bags. You can't just use that thing because you aren't carrying your own groceries. Look at all those groceries! [She only had a modest amount.] You wouldn't be so fat if you walked home with your groceries and didn't eat so much! [She was moderately overweight, likely a result of not being able to walk easily, or, possibly, at all.]

At one point, the woman responded, in a tightly contolled voice "You're wrong. The lift isn't only for wheelchairs. It's called the Americans With Disabilities Act". I could tell what it cost her to keep her anger back. The man kept up his harangue.

At one point, the driver got on the microphone and said, "Tolerance, people", which had no affect on the man. Someone sitting near him, perhaps his friend, perhaps not, asked him gently to give it up, but he didn't.

I suppose the rest of us were afraid to tell him off. With occasional assaults and shootings on buses in recent years, few people are willing to step into tense situations. I'm sure the driver had the safety of all the passengers in mind. But it's discouraging that there wasn't a way to put this man off the bus and keep others safe at the same time.

I'm sure that woman, and others in wheelchairs or with other handicaps, run into this type of treatment a lot. How sad it is that the people who already have more challenges than the rest of us have to endure this kind of assault as well.

Do people act in such an uncivil manner because they're angry? Do people get so angry from being marginalized by society themselves? Or was this guy just a jerk for reasons unrelated to any socioeconomic factors?

Would any of this have happened on a suburban route? Am I elitist, a racist, or just afraid for not wanting this kind of commotion to be part of my daily life? Or is avoiding the #16 just another version of "white flight" that doesn't help anything? But would it help anything for me to continue taking this bus, feeling uncomfortable, getting angry myself?

And, having said all this, I'm well aware that the #16 is probably tame compared to a New York or London subway car. So I'm a sheltered whiner in that respect as well.

At any rate, the circumstance that has me riding that bus will end in a few weeks, and I'll be switching to a different, perhaps more sedate route that originates in a suburb. I can't say I'm sad about that.

What do you think?

Swears

2009-07-23T00:00:00.001-05:00

Knitting is, for a writer, a sublime way to multi-task. If one is lucky enough to find an engaging project that isn’t too fiddly and doesn’t take up too much of your brain, and lucky enough to have a cool room to sit in with only the bubbling of an aquarium for company, one can knit away, writing in one’s head, and come out at the end with a sock and something to say.

As I was knitting along on my sock tonight, I finished the ribbed cuff (the easy part) and confidently began a rather complicated herringbone stitch pattern for the leg, a 12-stitch repeat with all manner of YOs and PSSOs and to-ing and fro-ing. Things went well for the first row, then faltered in the second. I decided to un-knit the offending area, and quickly got into a tangle of un-YOs and semi-PSSOs and I was uttering “oy”s and becoming PO’d and things devolved until the sock was completely FUBAR*, then it was not a sock at all anymore and I started meditating on swears.

I grew up in a mostly swear-free household. In the early 1960s people didn’t just toss off mating slang in a cavalier fashion the way they do today, at least not the people I knew. “Crap” was a daring term in my crowd. “Fart” was about as far as anyone would go, as in, “That old fart!”

My dad was a repressed Methodist, and the worst I heard him say, at the times when he was banging around in the basement trying to fix something, was “hell” or “balls”. I was too innocent, in those days, to understand what the latter term meant exactly (I was probably about 7 or 8 when I first heard him use the word this way) but I knew it was not nice.

My mom was a little more creative. She was something of a potty-mouth, which was probably a result of hanging out with 3 little kids all day. “Poop” rolled off her tongue easily, though only figuratively, of course. Another of her favorites was “foop”.

Somehow we’d never picked up that standard Midwesternism, “shoot”. “Heck” wasn’t for us, either, nor “Jeez”, “Jeepers”, “Gosh”, “Golly” or any of the things even wholesome kids said in Disney movies. Mom said “Oh, dear” a lot, and we gave her a lot to say “Oh, dear” about.

It was only after about 1969 or so that Mom started saying “shit”. One of her favorite lines became “She wouldn’t say ‘shit’ if she had a mouthful”.

I didn’t pick up the habit of swearing till after I was married, and even then, I didn’t swear much. It always seemed much more fun to call someone a “blackguard” or a “scoundrel”, to describe specifically what was wrong with something than to toss epithets around. It was only when I lived alone for several years that I began to swear in earnest.

This dark period coincided with a Presidential administration I didn’t much care for. In fact, every time our Supreme Leader’s face appeared on TV, I was tempted to throw footwear, or at least the remote, at the screen. Since I didn’t want to damage my sole companion (and I had TiVo, for goodness’ sake!) I usually settled for shouting a resounding F***! at the screen and turning off the TV. This is what humans devolve to in a short time without the benefit of polite society.

My vocabulary constricted. That one four-letter word, like a smack to the chops, was so satisfying to say in so many situations: The talk-radio caller who goes on and on, the annoying commercial played for the fifteenth time in an hour, the horrible ‘70s song playing in the supermarket, the blown fuse, burnt toast, dust, you name it.

And then I moved in with housemates, including a young child. Now, even when I had a mouthful, I could not say “shit”. I could not say F***. I could not call someone a thing that rhymes with “gas-pipe”. I could not refer to someone as something that shares a shape and a first syllable with “dill pickle”.

For a while, I had to think carefully every time I opened my mouth. I found myself uttering the ever-useful “oh, dear” a lot, feeling more and more like my mother. But after I had been in the household several weeks, something awful popped out of my mouth.

Yes. You guessed it. I said “shoot”.

*If you have been asleep or off the grid for the past 60 or 70 years or so, FUBAR stands for F****d Up Beyond All Recognition.

Of icons and palookas

2009-07-19T19:51:00.003-05:00

My dad spent most of his career editing copy at the StarTribune, and doing a damn good job of it. He is known as something of a crank on the subject of English usage. I am my father's daughter.

I think the words "icon" and "legend" should be given ten years of prison time without parole. Usage would only be allowed if the former referred to a religious image or small picture on a computer screen, and the latter to a mythic story.

"Iconic" would be permitted, as in, "Michael Jackson was an iconic figure in the black community, representing ..." "Legendary" would be permitted, as, in, "Walter Cronkite was a legendary newscaster, doing everything from [blah] to [blah blah]."

But can't we think of better ways to describe famous people? Paris Hilton might be more accurately described as an overprivileged, underweight, peroxided, promiscuous, partygoing heiress than a "society icon". Tom Cruise might be described as a religious nut, a famous actor, debatably a control freak, rather than a "legend" (or do you have to be over a certain age to be a legend?) Maybe he is only a celebrity at this point; maybe he'd have to be dead to be a legend at this stage of his career.

Although the excess of coverage of Michael Jackson's death would have been hard to put up with in any case, hearing him called either an "icon" or a "legend" every other sentence -- or even in the same sentence -- is what made me feel like pulling my hairs out one by one.

When singer James Brown died (I had to resist saying 'legendary singer James Brown'), one network news station was interviewing people standing outside the Apollo Theater. Person after person stated, as the reason they mourned him so, is that he was "such an icon". What did that mean to them? An icon is only an icon if it's an icon of something, if it represents something larger than itself. I'm sure Brown was an important figure in those peoples' lives, otherwise they wouldn't have turned out in such numbers to stand outside the theater all day. But I still don't know, specifically, what he meant to them.

Call a guy a palooka or a king. Call him fop, genius, stooge, gentleman. Call him anything. Just don't call him a legend.

A Big Fat Goose Egg and a Dime

2009-04-03T14:26:00.002-05:00

The pussy willows are out at the Springbrook Nature Center in Fridley, Minnesota, and the Canada geese are nesting. Red-winged blackbirds are staking out their territories in the wetland, trilling their songs from atop reeds and cattails. A few early green plants are poking out from under the oak-leaf litter.

My friend L., her daughter E., and I took a walk around the wetland this morning. It's a short loop that takes us over a float bridge across the wetland, and through the woods and across a couple of small streams.

I was the first to make a find: A dime, half-buried in the mud near the picnic area. As we walked along the muddy trail, we looked for signs of deer, but only saw shoe-prints, and a few marks that could have been from anything.

L. had the next find, a dead tree that showed marks from both beavers and woodpeckers. Then, at the first stream crossing, we noted that there was still ice among the reeds, even though the ice is out in the big Twin-Cities lakes already. There were several sets of animal prints in the mud under the bridge: raccoon pawprints, goose footprints, and some paw prints that could have been from a small dog or perhaps some other small mammal.

I remarked that I didn't see any green shoots yet, but E., aged 6-1/2, pointed out plant after plant that was peeking out from amongst the leaves. My excuse is that she is several feet closer to the ground than I am.

Once we got to the wetland itself, we saw a pair of mallards. The geese, too, were paired up already, and we saw several that were deep in the reeds, presumably sitting on nests. One gander motorboated angrily at us through the water. The footbridge was messy with goose poop. As we were crossing, E. exclaimed, "An egg! Look, an egg!" I thought she was misinterpreting a splotch of white bird poop as an egg, but indeed it was an egg, a big fat goose egg sitting right on the planking. That must have been a very misguided goose. We all felt a bit sad for the abandoned egg, but it is early in the season, and there's plenty of time to start another clutch.

There were gulls out near the water, too. As soon as we re-entered the woods, we could hear a variety of bird-chatter in the trees. Crossing the next creek, we could hear the water trickling over a natural rock-dam. There was a lot of ice still in the creek; the spring sun hasn't yet been strong enough to melt it under all the trees, bare though they are.

Later, going home in the car, we recapped who had seen what, and who had been the first to make a find on our nature walk.

I was thinking of the pussy willows and the beaver tree when E. said, "Well,Carol found a dime!"

Yes. Well.

I'm waiting for turtle season, which is better than 10 dimes in my mind.

A good blog; More lace

2009-04-01T10:14:00.002-05:00

For your daily dose of hilarity, check out the Cakewrecks blog at www.cakewrecks.blogspot.com. 'nuff said.

It's been sort-of snowing yesterday and today. Yesterday it rained, sleeted, snowed, rained, and even hailed for about a minute. Today the snow is coming down in big, lazy, fluffy hunks that look like polyester stuffing. It's nature's April Fool joke.

I am still under the spell of lace knitting. I ordered a beautiful kit from Fiddlesticks Knitting called the Daisy Meadow Scarf, which uses 1 ball of Fiddlesticks' "Exquisite" lace yarn, which is 50% merino and 50% silk.

It's a triangular scarf / shoulder shawl which starts at the back point and increases at either side. I got through row 50 twice (ouch) yesterday. That's what I get from working without a lifeline. The yarn is, indeed, exquisite, but both slippery and sticky at the same time. (It's easy to lose stitches, but when you try to rip out, the yarn sticks to itself similar to how mohair behaves. Grrr.)

I started knitting it on Addi Turbo Lace needles, but it slid around too much. Also, the sharp points on the Lace needles split the yarn. The second time around, I used my size 5 Plymouth bamboo circulars, and they work much better for this yarn and pattern. And I am putting in a lifeline every 8-10 rows. Those "slip 1, knit 2 tog, PSSO"s are just too hard to unwind without disastrous results in this cobweb-weight yarn.

I am so proud of myself, however. For the second time in a row, I managed to put aside my project when I started to get frustrated, instead of barreling ahead and causing further destruction and rage.

Now, for an update on "Children of Lir". I figured out what my problem had been. (Recap: It starts with a provisional cast-on. You knit down one side, then pick up from the CO, then knit down the other side. When I went to pick up from the CO, I thought a plain row to pick up in was missing from the pattern). I was right; a plain row was missing. But not because the directions were flawed, as I thought. It was because I had blithely proceeded without reading the directions for the specific type of provisional CO to be used. If I'd used the one specified, (a long-tail CO with one strand of waste yarn and one strand of project yarn) I would have created the plain row in which to pick up. Given that I made a crochet chain and picked up in that, I had a "raw" lace row to pick up in, and an upside-down lace row at that!

It took me most of a week, but I finagled and fudged and twiddled and dang if you can find where I made the join. Now I'm happily about 8" past the midpoint. This is a good advanced-beginner lace project. It can be knit in a DK weight yarn (I used Elsebeth Lavold's Silky Wool), it doesn't have anything more complicated than YOs, K2togs, and SSKs, and you can easily see the pattern forming as you knit. It's only patterned on one side, so you have WS purl rows to "rest". The pattern is in "Traditional Knitted Lace Shawls" by Martha Waterman. However, you will want to chart the pattern on graph paper for yourself, as the book only includes written-out instructions. Graphing it makes it much easier to work.

I've been stalking the aisles of Borealis for a couple weeks, plotting other lace projects. There's a small half-circle shawl in "Victorian Lace Today" that's shown in Jade Sapphire's Lacey Lamb in red that I've gotten the itch to do. And I want to make something out of one of the Isager yarns we have in the store, but I just haven't put together the right combination of yarn, color, and project yet.

I'm happy to have such woes as these. I could be sandbagging in Fargo, or waiting in an unemployment line; instead, I'm dithering about re-knitting and project selection. See you at the yarn shop!

Ah, the Glory of Spring

2009-03-25T09:11:00.004-05:00

It is officially spring. Last week we had some lovely sunny days in the 50s and even one day near 60. It is Minnesota. This morning there is snow on the ground.

To put a positive spin on it, though: more time to get caught up with woolly projects that are too hot to knit on in the summer.

Last night I pulled out the Parrot House wrap (modeled by Lewis, below) to work on some more. It's still in the same state it was when I took the picture.

I also pulled out my half-finished "Children of Lir" wrap from Traditional Knitted Lace Shawls by Martha Waterman. I'm doing it in red Silky Wool by Elsebeth Lavold. It is half-finished; it starts with a provisional cast-on. You knit half of the wrap, then pull out the provisional cast-on, pick up those stitches, then knit the other half down in the opposite direction. I didn't do a good job of picking up from the provisional CO, or maybe it's just that I had a migraine beginning and didn't know it yet. At any rate, I'm having trouble figuring out how to get it going again, so it's currently resting quietly in preparation for the next onslaught.

My Sonoma Mountain Wrap is also resting quietly. (You'd think I was running a project infirmary here; maybe I am.) I have to pull out and re-do the applied I-cord border and then it will be FINISHED. But I do have to pause to reflect before that final step.

Although I am not a parent, I do play one on TV, so to speak. Favorite Child, who is now 6-1/2, lives in my household, and I spend a lot of time with her when her parents are working. And, as you bona fide parents and grandparents know, 'tis folly to try to work on lace or other intricately patterned projects, or to do high-risk frogging with children around. I might just catch myself uttering one of the "swear words" on her list, e.g. "stupid" or "shut up". (Those, in case you didn't know, are the two 's' words. The other night, when a show was on cable TV, the more usual 's' word was uttered, and it went right by her.)

My mom's proprietary swear word when we were kids was "foop". One of my housemates prefers "sugar bumbles". I usually go with "oh, dear", "oh, no", or the ever-popular "shoot".

I think I'm going to give the Children of Lir mess another go now; the migraine seems to be gone, though if I run into more trouble, it may be back. If I have to say "oh, dear" more than twice, it will go back into the infirmary.

Handmade Thank-You Card

2009-02-26T12:13:00.001-06:00

Lewis

2009-02-26T12:12:00.002-06:00

Shawl-Collared Vest

2009-02-26T12:09:00.001-06:00

In the Middle of it All

2009-02-26T11:12:00.003-06:00

As a non-shoveling person, I am looking forward to the predicted snowstorm with perverse pleasure. "Thunderstorms and heavy snow with heavier bursts near thunderstorms." It sounds gorgeous.

And for those of you cursing, remember: It's March. It will melt. Hopefully not into your basement.

I'm in the middle of a plethora of knitting projects, too, as usual. I semi-finished a fingerless glove in Louisa Harding's Kimono Angora Pure. (Semi-finished means that I have yet to knit the thumb.) If the spirit moves me, I may even knit the other one. I found the angora surprisingly tricky to knit with. You have to maintain quite tight tension to keep it from looking loopy and uneven, but the yarn is delicate, and will pull apart if you crank too hard on it. It's cozy to wear, though ... or will be, when I finsh the thumb.

I am about 10" into a vest designed by Meg Swansen, the Shawl-Collared Vest. For anyone who thinks that knitting goddesses like myself don't make mistakes or have trouble, consider that I had to start the project over three times. I had gauge problems, and I didn't like a few of the design elements. Now it's clicking right along, or I'm clicking right along, with only 4" left till I get to the armholes and various exciting shaping changes come into play.

My Sonoma Mountain Wrap is resting while I energize myself to rip out the applied I-cord border and re-do it. I don't mind too much; I enjoy doing applied I-cord. It has a nice rhythm, and it's relatively mindless so I can Think Great Thoughts while I do it. But one does have to mentally prepare oneself to rip out over 60" of work.

I have been doing less papercrafting / card-making this week because I have been felled by MWNBAGAH Syndrome, or Mine Will Never Be as Good as Hers. My maniacal card-crafting friend L. has been in a frenzy of creativity, and recently won the Hero Arts [rubber stamp company] Fresh Face challenge on their blog. Go to www.heroarts.com and click on Blog to see. (You have to scroll pretty far down to get to her Froggie Friends card). Her creativity blows me away, so it's hard for little ole me to create in her presence.

I always tell my students not to compare themselves to others. There will always be someone better than you, and if you're going to let that stop you, you'll end up hunkered down in a hole in the ground mumbling to yourself. Or working at McDonald's. It's great advice. Now why can't I follow it?

Have a lovely day, don't get stuck in the snow (if you're here in ND, SD, MN, IA or environs) and always remember: Variety is the Cheese of Life.

Back Again

2009-02-17T21:14:00.004-06:00

I have been indulging my habits: knitting, papercrafting, eating. And I do mean indulging. My wallet is slimming in inverse proportion to my waistline.

I went to the Bohus knitting exhibit at the American Swedish Institute in Minneapolis today. The photos in Wendy Keele's book Poems of Color: Knitting in the Bohus Tradition are stunning, so I wasn't prepared for how much more stunning the real items would be. Using gradations of color, and clever positioning of knits and purls to bring some areas forward and push other areas back, the designs positively glow. (One complaint I have about the mounting of the exhibit is that some of the items are not properly lighted, but the sweaters themselves almost give off light.)

Some of the sweaters in the show are knitted to a gauge so fine it boggles the mind. I think the Pink Lace Collar is knit at about 38 stitches over 4 inches. Can you imagine knitting an entire sweater -- mostly stockinette -- at that gauge?

I bought a kit for the Blue Shimmer hat and scarf set. My wallet took a large weight loss on that, so now I am home snacking on Walgreen's Spice Drops. I went looking for Brach's spice-flavored jelly beans today, but no stores have their Easter candy out yet. Come on, folks, Valentine's Day is over! What are you waiting for?

A digression about candy: have you ever encountered a gumdrop, jelly bean, Skittle, or the like that is misshapen or oddly-colored? Do you find these "mutants" too scary to eat, as I do? There was a tiny gumdrop in the bag I'm working on now; I couldn't eat it. It's cruel to eat the baby ones!

Having splurged on the Bohus kit wouldn't have been so bad, but I've been spending a lot on paper-crafting supplies lately. My friend told me about Copic art markers. Not only can you do lots of nice effects with them, but they come in sets. If a thing is good, a set of those things is better to the 10th power. Along with the Rapture of the Tiny (anything miniature is cool), the Rapture of the Set is strong.

I have been playing around making greeting cards. I make cards not so much to send them, but more to play with color, texture, and composition. If I can use the card at some time, great, but as with my knitting, Process is all. My papercrafting friend L. and I are under the thrall of the Scallop right now. Scalloped borders, scalloped ovals, scalloped circles, scalloped rectangles ... I went to Archiver's and bought every scalloped punch, die, and paper shape they had. Oops.

KNITTING UPDATE

I have finished knitting the Sonoma Mountain Wrap (from Simply Shetland Book 2, design by Carol Lapin). I am just finishing the border. The pattern called for a crocheted border, but I couldn't get it to look good, so I'm doing an applied I-cord border, which is working out well. Abby at Borealis advised me to work it from the wrong side, which I hadn't been doing, so I'm going to rip out the part I've completed and re-do it. Apparently if you work it from the right side, eventually it separates a little and the underlying edge shows through. Who knew. (Well, Abby, obviously).

I knit a whole bunch of scarves, hats, and a couple pairs of mittens over the winter. I made a woven/knitted scarf from Exquisite Little Knits and a double-knit-with-tw0-yarns scarf from the same book. And I knit a number of hat/scarf sets for charity, and some mittens for charity, from Carol Anderson's Projects for Community Knitting.

I made myself a sort of serpentine short-row scarf out of Noro's Transitions yarn, and a chunky garter-stitch scarf from Kochoran. I now have enough scarves to insulate my house. My favorite cashmere scarf tried to jump ship (er, car) by leaping out of the car onto the ground in the parking lot at the St. Anthony Culver's, (maybe it wanted a Butterburger?) but it sent out vibes of remorse and I left the restaurant to look by the car based on an uneasy feeling I had. I rescued it before it got run over and ground into the slush.

I suppose I've started and set aside a bunch of other projects which I've forgotten about for the moment: too bad. I do not apologize for starting new projects whenever the whim hits me.

Speaking of which, I am currently working on Elizabeth Zimmermann / Meg Swansen's Shawl Collared Vest from Knitting With Meg Swansen. I fiddled with the pattern a bit and had several false starts. Lesson re-learned: swatch in the round when you are going to knit in the round. Your gauge can change a lot. (Like ending up with a sweater 7" smaller than intended. Oops.) The vest is knit in the round and steeked. I can't wait for the cutting part!

I promise you some photographs. Some day. Of something.

Parrot House

2008-09-08T16:29:00.005-05:00

Those Lazy Days of Summer ... and Fall ... and Winter ... and Spring ...

I remember going to Girl Scout camp in the summer when I was in grade school and junior high. It was like being in another world for two weeks, with different food, different rules, life mostly out-of-doors, sleeping in cabins or under the stars, mosquito bites and dirty hair and cold showers once a week. New tribes of friends formed. We had girl-crushes on counselors.

I was allowed to take the family's Kodak Instamatic camera to camp. It was newfangled; the flash was built right in and you didn't have to carry flashbulbs (those somewhat-scary bulbs you plugged in with a cuplike reflector behind, and when the bulb went off -- which it didn't always, some of them being "duds" -- there was a loud "pop!" and you stood blinking with bright blue spots before your eyes.

Then there was the wait while you sent your film off to Brown Photo in a special envelope. A week or two later, your black-and-white pictures would arrive (color wasn't widely available yet, and was expensive) along with the negatives. You'd open the packet with a mixture of excitement and anxiety. Would they be good? Or would you have 12 or 24 or 36 pictures of your thumb or the inside of your duffel bag?

Now, of course, we have instant access to photos. Digital cameras let us see our shots immediately, and we can print them at home. So there should be no reason why photos are not readily available, right?

Ah, but you would be underestimating my laziness if you agreed with that. I would have been blogging so much more if only I could rouse myself from my stupor and open up the camera, pull out the memory card, put it in the card reader, plug the card reader into my computer, and upload the photos.

The moon must be in a beneficial phase, because I took these pictures (above) and then proceeded straight to the computer and did the do.

The project is called Parrot House, and it's from Lavish Lace by Carol Rasmussen Noble and Cheryl Potter ... sort of. There is what I believe to be an error in the pattern, and there's a bit I didn't like, so I changed it a little. But it's essentially the same big scarf / wrap. I'm doing it in Araucania Nature Wool Chunky, which I love. It's springy and meaty and easy to knit with. I'm enjoying knitting the project immensely, now that I've got past the difficulties in the pattern. The pattern is fairly easy to memorize, too, so it's good TV knitting.

Overall, I'm not pleased with the book Lavish Lace. The first project I knit from the book, Frost Flowers, had multiple pattern errors. I had to write to Martingale Press twice to report all the errors I found. Now, as I said, in Parrot House, there was also an error. Though I've gone back to the Martingale website multiple times, there are no more errata posted. It makes me reluctant to knit any more designs from this book without demanding a proofreader's fee.

Also, because the projects are lace done in variegated yarns, they seem to work best not only in the specific yarn and colorway photographed, but in some cases, in a particular Potluck dye lot which can never be found again. (The authors are the creative team behind Cherry Tree Hill yarns, and the projects are designed in these yarns.) It's very difficult to find the exact yarn that will work for a given project. There is much discussion in the book about how the yarns and colorways were chosen for the designs, but it only serves to convince me that it's best to stick to those exact yarns / colors.

I nearly drove myself to the Nut House (not the Parrot House) finding yarn that would work for this project. The scarf in the book was done in a Potluck (i.e. one-of-a-kind) Worsted Six-Pack. Every Worsted Six-Pack I considered would have been too busy for this cabled lace pattern. (In fact, I'm not sure I even like the one they chose for the book). The Araucania Nature Wool Chunky is working well, but not until I scoured my LYS and the Internet to get enough hanks in the correct color, which, of course, seems now to have been discontinued or at any rate seems to be unavailable.

That is my rant for today. Now I'm going to sink back into my couch like the true Potato that I am and knit. (Ahhhh ...)

Ahhh ...vacation ...

2008-08-26T11:21:00.005-05:00

I spent the past week at Arrowwood Resort in Alexandria, MN sitting by the pool, looking at Lake Darling, swimming, reading, knitting, playing with my favorite 6-year-old, and eating about six meals a day. The onion rings at the cafe at the resort are excellent, and I ate a lot of them. The extra weight will help with flotation, I'm sure.

My mango Crocs enjoyed paddling in the foam at the edge of Lake Darling.

That squished blue ball of yarn you see under my arm in the photo above is going to be a sample baby sweater for my Lola Baby Bolero class (see the Classes tab at www.borealisyarn.com). This blue one will be an adapted, more "boy-looking"version with a straight bottom front instead of the curved fronts for the more girly version. The red one in the store is the original version with the curved fronts. The adaptation will be only available in my class as an addendum to the original pattern; you can't knit the whole sweater from the addendum.

I brought Shadow Shawl #3 with me to the lake, but as it needs some ripping and re-knitting, I didn't work on it. Not the most relaxing thing to bring on vacation, in retrospect.

I went to the State Fair yesterday and looked at all the knitwear in the Creative Activities building. Congrats to Katie and Jean and Paul for their awards. (Jean: you was robbed on the yellow/green/etc. shawl).

I've now eaten my annual quota of cheese curds, footlong hot dogs (OK, my sister and I shared one, so I guess I only had 6 inches), Pronto Pups, and other good-and-good-for-you foods. Some random Fair hints:

1. Go to Dino's Gyros if you want to sit down to eat. Yesterday there were about 75 people waiting to get into the Whatsis Dining Hall, but Dino's was mostly empty. And their gyros are really good.

2. Warning: the big hunk of bacon on a stick thing that's been hyped this year is maple bacon. Ewwwww .... at least to my taste. I'm a traditionalist when it comes to bacon and the sweet stuff should stay on its own stick.

3. Both the DFL booth and the Obama booth were rather disappointing; we were looking for bumper stickers or car magnets but all the Obama booth had were t-shirts, cardboard rally signs, and buttons. The DFL booth had even less Obama stuff. I'd say they really missed an opportunity. If you're tired, hot, grumpy with humanity, and at the end of your Fair visit, don't walk for blocks to visit the Obama booth, as we did. It's out of the way, hard to find, and about the size of a lemonade stand.

4. OK, cows give milk, but why is the Moo Booth situated in the stink zone of the Dairy Barn? Just as I don't like sweet stuff on my bacon, I don't really like to smell manure while I'm eating ice cream.

5. Park and Ride. We do it every year and it's awesome. The lot across the street from the 4th St. Ramp at the U of M (near 4th St. and 17th Ave.) is free and the bus ride takes under 10 min. There's no waiting for a bus, usually.

6. There's a horrible, loud, Hammond Organ machine in the Creative Activities Building this year. However, it only runs for about 5 minutes every hour. (Otherwise, I would have had to run out screaming in front of a Clydesdale.)

Maybe now that it is starting to feel a little more like fall I'll be knitting more ... ?

Fall classes

2008-08-14T17:40:00.003-05:00

My fall classes will be posted on www.borealisyarn.com by August 25.

My planned classes are:

How to read a pattern (1 session)

How to fix mistakes (1 session)

Lola Baby Bolero (2 sessions)

Two toe-up socks at a time on the Magic Loop (3 sessions)

I don't have dates yet; check on the Borealis website or at the store.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My favorite recent quote from my favorite soon-to-be-six-year-old:

We were driving past a gas station at which the workers were changing the price sign. I thought she might enjoy looking at the workers manipulating the magnetic numbers with their long pole, so I pointed this out to her. Her reply: "Don't you worry. Al Franken is going to take care of all of that for us."

Blahhhg

2008-08-07T11:41:00.003-05:00

What can I say? I am, and have been, mostly uninspired all summer. I have finished a few unremarkable projects. Unremarkable, although I will just remark that one was another "One-Skein Nancy Shawl" in the Frida Kahlo colorway, and the other was the KPS "Easy Lace Poncho" (feather-and-fan lace done in the round on big needles) which is hanging up in the store. Both will be very nice to wear, but neither was particularly pulse-pounding to work on.

Well, the poncho may or may not be wearable once it's finished its stint as a store model, only because a lace poncho done in DK weight yarn on size 15 needles was not meant to be displayed on a hanger. Let's just say it will be the first ankle-length, formal poncho I've ever seen.

I'm putting together my class schedule for the fall, which should be available at the store and on the Borealisyarn.com website in a couple weeks. I'm thinking these classes may fill quickly, as we'll be getting a lot of extra attention to our store and website because of the temporary satellite store we'll be sharing in downtown St. Paul with a bunch of other yarn stores. (See Borealisyarn.com for more details.) It's at 4th and Cedar, and will be there for a few weeks, to coincide with the RNC.

If you're of the Democratic persuasion, you can always wear a pinch-on foil hat downtown to block the Republican rays.

If you have some time for reading this summer, read "The Story of Edgar Sawtelle", an amazing novel that I got lost in for days. (You can find reviews online that are better and more complete than what I could write).

I'm just finishing "My Sister, My Love" by Joyce Carol Oates, a darkly satirical (and disturbing, though riveting) novel that's about a family, and a murder case, that is much like the JonBenet Ramsey case. Though I didn't get sucked into too much of the JonBenet crap that was purveyed in the mass media, and therefore didn't read it in the hopes of finding out more about that case, it does raise some very disturbing questions about modern American culture. The only problem is that I may have to take about a week-long bath after I'm finished reading it.

In between these two books, I read Paula Deen's memoir "It Ain't all About the Cookin'" and Sandra Lee's memoir. I don't especially like either of these women's TV persona, nor do I like their cooking shows or recipes, but I often like to read cheesy As-Told-To memoirs. It's sort of like literary slumming. After reading the books, I have a lot of respect for both of these women, and the strength they had to overcome bad situations and succeed on their own terms. I still don't like their shows, but I don't think I'll make fun of them anymore.

The clock is now ticking down to State Fair (Fate Stair) time. (No, I haven't ever submitted anything to the Fair, and have no current intentions to. Why? I just can't be bothered.) And my sister B. and I are beginning to salivate for ... PRONTAGE! Yes, we are devotees of the Pronto Pup and stolid (and solid) opponents of the disgusting corndog. Why, Pronto Pups are Tempura Tube Steaks while corndogs are only coated weenies. And plus (also), corndogs are gross and just wrong and Pronto Pups are perfecta-mundo, especially with lots of mustard.

See you at the Seed Art display!

Logy mode

2008-07-07T10:48:00.002-05:00

Not a lot of knitting is getting done here in tropical Columbia Heights. With the temperature and dewpoint up, my personal setting is set to 'logy' and the speed to 'slow'. I've been trying to find things to do that can be undertaken in my earth-sheltered (aka basement) digs without moving around much.

I did start that Norwegian mitten. I got about 1/2" into the thumb gusset before the heat took over. Somehow, it's not appealing to knit a winter item with a sturdy wool in 90 degree heat. Go figure.

In the meantime, I'm plodding away on the red cotton hoodie. It doesn't look photogenic at the moment, as it's all bunched up on a circular needle. So, hey, what a good excuse to not take a picture.

I survived the Jamboree and carnival rides without puking, although it was close. I braved one of those rides that goes in a big circle, while meanwhile your individual car whirls around. Then, as if that weren't diabolical enough, every once in a while, the arm that your car is on dips disastrously so that your stomach and other major organs are launched up against your uvula (look it up).

The whole fam damily went on a Happy Family Outing at the MN Zoo on the Fourth. Favorite Child was excited about seeing the big cats. Since the zoo exhibits are set up to be as much like the animals' natural habitats as possible, it's often hard to see the animals, or if you do, you see at most a leg protruding from a hiding spot or a hint of stripes amongst the leaves. So, after much walking, we took the monorail ride, from which it was also not possible to see a lot of animals, although from a different angle. Finally, a magnificent tiger came into view. "Look! Look!" we said to the child. "It's the tiger! The tiger!" However, at that moment, F.C. was absorbed in studying a bug on the outside of the glass of the opposite window, and could not be enticed, or even physically forced, to look away from it. I guess her parents should start saving for entomologist school.

Ennui

2008-06-28T10:51:00.002-05:00

OK, I'm trying a new tactic.

I have been blogging only sporadically because I feel I owe it to you, dear reader, to see a picture of something every time I post. And then I get caught up in other priorities and don't do anything.

So, screw that.

Hello to shorter and more regular (I hope) posts, I hope, and (regrettably) fewer pictures.

The warmer weather overwhelms me with ennui. Ever since I can remember I feel "hot and itchy" and uncomfortable all summer -- just ask my mother, who had to put up with my incessant whining when I was a child. In Minnesotan, this is called "feeling logy". I've been extremely logy these past couple weeks, slumping around the house or slouching on a chair like a beached whale. Bleah.

This weekend is Columbia Heights' annual Jamboree. The parade was last night. There were Shriners in little boat-cars, unicyclists, clowns, high school marching bands, politicians, a bagpipe band, and lots of middle-aged guys driving by in cars with ambiguous hand-lettered signs so that one wondered: Yes, but who exactly is Joe Schmo, why is he riding past waving, and why am I supposed to care?

Lots of the organizations represented threw cheap candy, and I got beaned really hard by a Starlite Mint.

This afternoon I'm taking Favorite Child to the carnival where we can get pukey on all sorts of rinky-dink rides before the fireworks tonight, if the rain holds off.

I hope to start an adult-sized Norwegian mitten this morning before all the hilarity begins. I took Arnhild Hillesland's Norwegian mitten class last weekend at Borealis Yarns. The class was thorough, informative, exhausting, and Arnhild is a great teacher and lovely person. My class mitten was a bit of a mess, but I feel confident that the "real" mitten will be fine. I might even get around to posting a picture if I finish it and it looks OK!

Forgotten but not gone

2008-06-19T17:27:00.003-05:00

Ever had one of those days when it was all you could do just to cope with daily life, much less do any of the things you should have been doing or wanted to do? Well, I've been having one of those days every day since my last post.

No, there's been no tornado, cancer, screaming meemies, or crisis of any kind. Just, you know: life.

I have been spending a lot of time with Favorite Child, now that she's graduated kindergarten. Today's activity was making a worm hotel. If you would like to make one of these with your own favortive child, here's the recipe:

YOU WILL NEED:

Clear cylindrical-shaped plastic container with a large mouth. One gallon is a good size.

Fresh soil from your garden, dry or slightly moist but not wet or muddy.

Sand.

A couple handfuls of grass and 3-4 fresh leaves of any type.

Up to 10 earthworms.

MAKING THE HOTEL:

Put a 1" layer of sand in the bottom of the container.

Put a 2" layer of soil over this.

Alternate layers of sand and soil until the container is nearly full, ending with a layer of soil.

Put the leaves and grass on top.

Spray LIGHTLY with water to just moisten the top layer of soil.

Add worms.

Cover with a layer of plastic film and secure this with a rubber band. PUNCTURE HOLES so your guests can breathe.

Find something that will surround the hotel and keep it dark while still leaving the top open to the air. You can open up the top and bottom of a cardboard box and slip it down over the jar like a sleeve. Or you can build a surround with black poster board.

Place the hotel in the basement or other cool, dark place. (Ours is in an unused dog kennel in the basement within its surround).

Within a day or two you should be able to look along the sides of your hotel and see the guests making tunnels and doing other wormy things.

Refresh the salad for the worms each evening and spritz with water at the same time. Try to limit the amount of time you expose the guests to the light. They don't like it! And is that any way to treat a guest?

HINT FOR FINDING WORMS: Early in the day, before it gets hot, run your garden hose on one spot in the lawn next to a sidewalk until the ground is saturated. At a certain point, the worms will come to the surface to get away from the water. Get a good grip on 'em ... they are wily, slippery little guys.

KNITTING? OH, YEAH. THAT.

I suppose I've been knitting a few things, though I haven't acheived finish-age on many since the silent auction extravaganza. I have put the striped Simply Shetland wrap aside for the moment, as we have no A/C and it's been warmish this week.

I started the Harebell Lace Fichu from Victorian Lace Today, and found it extremely challenging. (When they say "Experienced" they mean it). That is on hold until the mood takes me again, or until I turn brilliant overnight. My friend Karen finished hers in a few weeks and was wearing it already, Ms. Smarty-Pants.

I mostly finished a sort-of pair of Mermaid Socks (or at least my take on them) from Cool Socks Warm Feet by Lucy Neatby. See the picture above when it's posted. In so doing, I re-injured my sock-knitting overuse injury, which results in a very sore and bunched-up trapezius muscle. So I have been taking it pretty easy for a few weeks trying to let that calm down.

However, I did start a KPS neck-down cardigan. I'm going to put a hood and pockets on it, and put a zipper in. I'm doing it in cranberry Fantasy Naturale. Sort of a classic Red Hooded Sweatshirt deal.

AND ... I actually have a day off at Borealis that coincides with a class that's being taught by Arnhild Hillesland. I'll be learning about Norwegian Mittens. I've done these before, but because I'm self-taught, I look forward to doing them the "real" way.

Happy Summer Solstice!

Too many stripes

2008-04-28T09:10:00.002-05:00

No pictures ... read on ...

I "misunderestimated" how long it would take me to finish the excessively stripey baby cardigan for the silent auction at my favorite 5-year-old's school, so I was madly working on it till 5:30 the day of the auction. The auction started at 5:00. Oops. I did finish it, though, and people bid on it, and it made money for the school.

Because I had to rush out the door, I didn't take any pictures of it or the other things I made, as I'd planned. So a lame description will have to suffice:

The cardigan was "Lily the Green" from one of the Sublime baby books, a bolero with stripes of lime, pink, white, and sage, and a sweet striped garter border and ruffle around the lower edge. I estimate I had to weave in about 200 ends because of all the stripes. I wish I'd knit it in one piece up to the armholes! And for the ruffle, you start with 80-some stitches, and end up with 240, so that took a bit more knitting than I'd planned time for -- duh.

I knit two coordinating hats, one lime with a pink/sage garter border, and one pink with a white stripe and a hemmed picot edge. All in all, the ensemble was incredibly sweet and it was hard to let go of. I am trying very hard not to start another one. Although I didn't enjoy making it, I know now what I'd do different and better, so it's tempting to start.

I also make a Lola baby bolero (Schaefer Yarns' Lola) in vivid turquoise/lime. And I knocked off a quick hat in Bella Color cotton, which was on sale at Borealis so it cost me next to nothing, and earned the school $15.

I will post some pictures of some random things next time!

The Latest Stripes

2008-03-27T12:02:00.002-05:00

That's a Stripe of a Different Color

2008-03-27T10:59:00.002-05:00

Drug of Choice

Crack cocaine and methamphetamine have nothing on Jamieson's Shetland Double Knitting yarn, my new drug of choice. And my favored method of administration is the Sonoma Mountain Wrap. I can't put the thing down. The Woven Stitch seems to be in harmony with my natural rhythm, a rocking motion that's soothing and mesmerizing. And the yarn flows through my hands like buttah.

Whenever I am tempted to put the project down, I think: No... just one more stripe! The colors are so rich. The designer, Carol Lapin, has put the colors next to each other in ingenious and varied ways. Each time a color appears, it appears next to a different color than it did the last time. My especial favorites so far are Purple Heather/Peat and Olive/Seaweed. Ooooooooh. Ahhhhhh.

Knitting Advice: Fear Not

I sometimes tell my students: Don't be afraid of your knitting. New knitters are understandably nervous about dropped stitches and other mistakes. It only makes sense; if you don't know how something works, and don't know how to fix it, mistakes are alarming. But really, it's only knitting, and no lives are at stake. So get in there and dig around and see if you can figure out why that goofy stitch doesn't look like the others. See if you can get that dropped stitch back on the needle. And if you can't figure it out, ask for help. The only true knitting disasters involve scissors, fire, ink, and family members who help out by putting your heirloom 100% wool sweater in the washing machine on "heavy duty/hot/hot".

The beauty of knitted fabric is that it's flexible and forgiving. When sewing a seam, if you're a stitch or two off, you can easily fudge by stretching one piece slightly to fit it to the other. If you slipped a stitch somewhere instead of knitting it, chances are its hundreds or thousands of close friends and neighbors will draw attention away from it.

If you're seeking perfection, knitting is not the place to find it. You could end up knitting and re-knitting forever, and then your yarn would look like hell anyway. So, if it looks good, it is good, and no one need be the wiser about those little unexpected embellishments.

New Word

And, finally, thanks to Ms. Not-Morris, who brought a wonderful new word into my life: Poopstitch.

Sonoma Mountain Wrap

2008-03-25T18:21:00.003-05:00

It's a sickness; I need help

2008-03-24T08:45:00.004-05:00

Out (of mind) with the old, in with the new

In my last post, I said that my coworkers' hyperproductivity was making me feel like I need to finish some of the projects I've started.

"Feel like" is the key phrase.

Well, I felt like it. Didn't do it.

Instead, I started some new things. I get a pass on one of the things; it's a baby bolero for the silent auction fundraiser at my favorite 5-year-old's school. The other is sheer indulgence. It's the Sonoma Mountain Wrap from Simply Shetland 2. It's in a delirious range of colors of Jamieson's Shetland DK. I knit the first 4 stripes on Easter Sunday. Well, Easter is a time of renewal, is it not?

The wrap is in Linen Stitch, which is:

Row 1: K1, *sl 1 wyif, K1*, end with sl1 wyif
Row 2: P1, *sl1 wyib, P1* end with sl1 wyib.

Now, some people find Linen Stitch putzy in the extreme, but I like the rhythm and am actually quite fast at it. It makes a nice dense "woven" fabric. This piece will be my take-along idiot knitting project until it gets too big to drag around. Maybe I can finish it before the weather gets too warm for me to want to knit on it. Oops, there's that word "finish" again.

(After) Thoughts on the Afterthought Heel

I've been re-thinking my toe-up afterthought heel socks. I've knit many pairs of these, and I've taught lots of people to knit them. I have many pairs that fit well. But I think the pattern needs a little refinement.

I have high insteps, so the fact that these socks don't have a gusset makes them a little tight across the instep for me sometimes. I've been fussing with different ways to add some ease across the instep. Often I'll just add some stitches in the instep for a few rows, which helps. But in some yarns the increases really show, and if I'm doing a stitch pattern down the instep, it's not an option.

Another option has been to rib all the way down the top of the sock to the toe. This creates a nice, stretchy fabric, and it's a good solution. But I don't always want ribbed socks, and a smooth fabric looks better with some of the self-patterning yarns.

Another issue I've sometimes had with the Afterthought Heel is that it hasn't been quite deep enough if I start with the heel decreases right away. So I've been playing with knitting 4 rounds or so plain before I start the decreases. This seems to work out OK.

I rather enjoy tinkering with patterns and solving problems. If anyone has any insights on the Afterthought Heel, please leave a comment.

New and Wonderful

Go to Borealis Yarns and see the gorgeous Silk Garden throw on display. It's done in strips, with each strip being a different colorway of Silk Garden. Unbelievably beautiful. The pattern is newly for sale at the store. (Rah, rah -- can't help proselytizing!)

Competitive Knitting

2008-03-16T10:42:00.002-05:00

Some of my coworkers are knitting maniacs. I think they secretly have knitting machines in their basements -- or sweatshops. 'The Emotion', as I'll call her, will start a sock at work five minutes before closing, and show up with a complete pair the next morning. 'Coryell' cranks out sweaters in her spare time between making all manner of felted pillows and critters, socks, scarves, felted clogs, Fair Isle hats and mittens, and Goddess knows what else.

I've not been a competitive knitter up till now. I knit things I enjoy working on, and if I finish them, that's a bonus. (Process, process, process!) But all of this hyperproductivity is making me a little jealous. I think I may have to step up my production and (gasp) finish some stuff.

I still, however, am not enthusiastic about putting my goods in the State Fair. I'm not quite sure why. I just don't feel the bug. Now, having said that, maybe I'll put in some mint-green crocheted tissue box covers or something this year.

See my UN-finished Shadow Shawl, below.

Whaaa??

2008-03-14T15:34:00.003-05:00

Holy cow, I was just editing my profile on Blogger, and found that my previous profile listed my "industry" as "accounting." Whaaaa?

When I went to change it, there was no selection in the drop-down menu for "lazy hussy", so I had to choose "arts" as the closest thing.

Shadow Shawl #3

2008-03-14T15:21:00.002-05:00

Oy Vey

Here's the latest shadow shawl I've started. (I did actually finish one last year, but this and another one are still in the cooker). I found a juicy skein of Schaefer Yarns' Anne at the store, and snatched it up quicker than you can say "Jeepers creepers, more YARN?". Though I didn't NEED to make another Shadow Shawl, it was crying out to be combined with Euroflax linen.

I had to go to a size 2 (US) needle, as the Euroflax is heavier than the Anne, and was pulling and distorting it, making the stitches uneven and loopy. The fabric is nice and firm (but still fluid) on a 2. However, the shawl may turn out small because of the smaller needles, so if I find I'm going to run out of yarn, I may do the center 'V' in the brilliant blue Rio de la Plata sock yarn (pictured along with the shawl, the Euroflax, and the Anne.)

And ... I'm on Ravelry now as 'carolfiona'. I don't have much listed yet -- it will take time to catalogue the many, many projects I have going -- but I'm enjoying reading about other peoples' stuff and especially seeing their "ughs". Boy, do I have lots of "ughs" I can put out there! But it might damage my image as Knit Coach!

Pictures!

2008-03-14T15:14:00.008-05:00

Sock Success

2008-03-10T15:52:00.001-05:00

I reorganized, sorted, and labeled my stash the other day, and found quite a few pairs of socks that had been abandoned in varying stages of completion. Some needed only heels, some needed only toes, some needed to be ripped back to the site of a boo-boo, and I had just gotten bored with some of them in mid-sock.

I decided to finish as many of them as I could. Here are some of them in glorious color.

I'm still trying to figure out how to add captions to my photos on the blog, so if I don't succeed, the socks pictured are (in no particular order): OnLine sock (hint: still on needles), pink Smooshy sock (Waterfall Rib and Eye of Partridge heel from More Sensational Knitted Socks by Charlene Schurch), Mystery Sock (the sort of yellow one; I have no memory of buying this yarn, no memory of what yarn it is, and I haven't any idea if I have the rest of the yarn so I can knit the second sock), turquoise Fair Isle sock (done in an Opal colorway from years ago; I also have no idea where the rest of the yarn is to make a second sock. In the meantime I've been wearing it with the Mystery Sock), Tofuttsies sock (pink / blue heel and toe), and Corn Sock (cream-colored Maizy corn yarn).

And the strange red object is the Little Ruff from One-Skein Wonders. I made it out of Louisa Harding's Grace (silk and wool, 22 sts /in.) Grace is a little light for the gauge called for in the pattern, so I added some sts to the ruffle portion and did extra short rows to account for the extra sts. I needed more than one ball of Grace to finish it, given the gauge difference. I don't know if this picture does it justice. It's gorgeous. And I found the perfect button for it at Treadle Yard Goods in St. Paul.

Some notes on the various socks and yarns:

OnLine is one of my favorites of the self-patterning sock types. The yarn knits up smoothly without splitting, the space-dyeing is crisp (with some space-dyed yarns you find areas that were missed by the dye; not so with OnLine), and it makes a pleasing fabric on US size 1.5.

I'm still having a major jones for Dream In Color's Smooshy sock yarn. As I have often said, "It knits like buttah". And there are some juicy new colors that just came in.

The Mystery Sock yarn may be Koigu. I'm sure I bought it many years ago (hence the sketchy memory), well before I worked at a yarn store. The yarn itself feels like Louet Gems, but I don't recognize the colorway. Anyway, it knitted up nicely on a US 1.5, and it feels soft on my feet (or foot, as I only have the one sock.) I'm sure there's no nylon in it. If anyone recognizes the colorway, I'd like to know what you think it is.

Opal is another of my all-time favorites. I have Opal socks I knit 7 years ago that haven't worn out yet -- and I wear my handknit socks a lot. The very first pair of Opal socks I knit are still intact, though I can see that the toes are getting a little thin. Opal's a little pricier than some of the self-patterning yarns out there, but for me, it's well worth the little extra money. If I wanted to save money, I'd buy the 12-pack of white tube socks at Wal-Mart. And wouldn't that be a fashion statement?

I bought the Tofuttsies at a yarn store in California while visiting my sister. It sounded interesting, as it's made with soy, wool, and crab shells. It knits up very soft, although I did have some issues with splitting, as the strand is made up of several different-colored plies. I haven't worn the socks enough to report on how they wear long-term, but they feel fine. I wish I hadn't used heel-and-toe reinforcement, though. It made the heels and toes feel thick and clumpy. I don't usually use it, and probably won't in the future unless I have good reason.

I haven't yet worn the Maizy sock, as its mate is still half-finished. Not that I'm afraid to wear odd socks (see above!), but I have plenty of other crazy single socks to wear. I want to keep the Maizys together as a pair, so I can see how the yarn wears. It knits up extrememly soft. One person I talked to said her Maizy socks made her feet sweat. I'm reserving judgement till I can see for myself. The yarn was OK to knit with, though somewhat splitty. It has some stretchy stuff in it, but that didn't pose a problem for me while I was knitting it. I'll report more on Maizy when I've worn and washed the socks 4 or 5 times.

As for the neck ruffle, Grace by Louisa Harding is a luscious yarn, but very delicate. I had been drooling over it for a year, trying to figure out what to make with it. I wouldn't knit something that gets much wear, as it pills quickly and looks dull and ratty. I figured, though, that a ruffled collar would work well, as it isn't subjected to flinging about, as you would do with a scarf, nor to rubbing, as with, say, sweater sleeves that rub against the body as you move around. It was fun to knit, and fairly quick, too.

And as a final note, I've strayed into Crochet Madness once again and am planning to make some Amigurumi. These are small, painfully cute crocheted stuffed animals. I'll be working from Amigurumi World: Seriously Cute Crochet by Ana Paula Rimoli. I'm also going to crochet a little girl's dress from the latest issue of Katia. I found a great crochet manual, A to Z Crochet published by Martingale. It has wonderful, clear step-by-step photographs, and illustrates all kinds of stitches and techniques. And I snagged a copy of The Crocheter's Handy Guide to Yarn Requirements by Ann Budd. I use my Knitter's Handy Guide, etc. all the time, and since I'm a crochet neophyte, this will be invaluable. You need these books!

And ... if you are in the store, look for the outrageous pink "scrunchie" ruffle I crocheted for my coworker's coffee tumbler. She needed something to distinguish hers from all the other J&S Bean Factory coffee tumblers. (Love that place! Best coffee in the Twin Cities!) Let me just say I finally found a use for that 1/2 ball of pink Crystal Palace "Party" ribbon yarn. If you want a Coffee Scrunchie of your own:

Crochet a chain long enough to fit around the coffee vessel of your choice when slightly stretched (the crochet chain, not your coffee mug.) Join into a round with a slip st. Ch 1.

SC in every ch around and when the round is finished, slip st to 1st SC, then Ch 1.

Now, SC 4 times in each SC around. Join with slip st., ch 1.

Next round: SC 4 times in each SC around (this is a lot more sts than you might think!), join with slip st, fasten off. Weave in ends.

Use your imagination

2008-02-08T14:53:00.000-06:00

Still no pictures ...

My camera is still dead, so you will have to use your imagination as you read about my projects.
Maybe by the time I actually finish something, I will have a new camera.

I am knitting a few things for a silent auction at my favorite 5-year-old's Montessori school, so the other day I knit a sweet baby bolero in Schaeffer Yarns' Lola in turquoise/green. Think hard and picture it here _____________. I still have to sew it together, which I will probably characteristically leave till the very last minute.

She shoots she scores!

I was very frustrated when I found I was a few yards short of a sleeve (is that like being two slices of baloney short of a sandwich?), and I was about to adjust the pattern to have 3/4 sleeves, when a deep urge to organize my stash took hold. I went through every tub, bin, bag, and box, sorted and labeled, and trashed yarn with abandon. I had skeins of stuff that had apparently come to me from aliens, because I didn't recognize it no matter how long I puzzled over it. My mantra became, "Hate it, don't want it, won't use it, hate it, hate it" and I shoved ugly and alien yarns into a big bag, which I then lofted into the garbage bin with a resounding, um, well not a "crash" exactly, but at least an "umph". Ahhhhhhh.

Having purged thusly, I organized yarn into projects-in-progress (a shocking number), yarn awaiting projects (even more shocking), sock yarn (ouch), socks in progress (so that's why I keep buying two new sets of Addi Turbo size 1 every other week), leftovers, and Other. And then ... SCORE! I found three balls of yarn in the color I needed to complete my truncated sleeve. Never mind that I'd bought the yarn to do a different project. That project was so far on the back burner that it fell behind the stove anyway. Not only that, but I found the errant ball of Lola I was looking for to make yet another baby sweater for the auction.

So, life is good. And organized. And as long as I never touch my stash again, nor bring any new yarn home, it will stay organized in perpetuity.

Ha.

Good intentions, sock surgery

2008-01-31T11:46:00.000-06:00

Good Intentions vs. The Plague

Despite all my good intentions, I haven't blogged for a while. I have had The Plague for over three weeks -- don't ask. But I think I am finally getting better.

My camera is still dead (as is Generalissimo Francisco Franco), so still no pictures. They would be a sorry sight if I had any.

Sock Surgery

Maybe it was starting the sock when I was coming down with The Plague. Or maybe it was sheer air-headedness. At any rate, I knit a whole toe-up sock with the exception of the Afterthought Heel I was going to put in, and found it was too small. I swear, I tried it on multiple times as I was knitting it, and I thought it was firm, but not tight. (Something I wish I was.) Well, it was tight. I could just barely get the ribbing over my instep.

No problem, I thought. I'll just undo the cast-off and redo it more loosely. I did this, with a bigger needle. Still too tight. So I pulled it out once again, and, with a much bigger needle, knit another inch on the leg of the sock, finishing off with a looooooose bindoff. It still only barely made it over my instep.

Still no problem, I thought. I'll put in the heel, then see how everything fits. I did this, and the sock was very tight over my instep (I have high insteps, but I usually don't have a problem with this style sock).

Still no problem, I thought, smiling hopefully through gritted teeth. I carefully snipped one thread in the instep (a la Elizabeth Zimmerman's Afterthought Pocket method -- check it out, it's cool) and unraveled it almost all the way across the instep in both directions. I'll just put in an instep gusset, I thought with uncharacteristic optimism.

Well, maybe it was the fact that I was into the full-blown Plague by this point, or maybe it was that I'd already been working on the sock all day, or maybe it was simply not thinking it through well enough. But the instep gusset looked more like an instep growth. I tried it both with short rows and with increases, but it still looked like a tree fungus.

Fine, I thought. I'll steek the sock up the front. What have I got to lose at this point? This is where I should have stepped away from the knitting. Surely I was fevered at this point because I really do know better; when you do a steek, you have to secure the edges in some way, e.g., with a facing. (Not, I think, Fray Check). Once I'd made the fatal cut, I realized my error almost immediately.

OK, I thought, I will just cut off the foot of the sock below the heel and re-knit it on a bigger needle. This would have worked, except that after a few rows (having cut off the foot) I realized I was sick of the yarn, sick of the sock, that I hated it and never wanted to see it again, much less wear it. Most certainly, I would never knit the second sock. So, into the trash it went and good riddance too. (See my previous post for discussion of same.)

After the sock incident, I swore off knitting for a few days while I took to the couch with blankets and tissues. Then, yesterday, my confidence back, I thought I would finish a bolero I'd been knitting for my favorite five-year-old. I'd started it in the fall, and figured I'd better finish it while it was still the season to wear it.

I'd left off when I ran out of yarn from the previous ball, so I picked up the new ball and picked up the armhole stitches, then knit about two inches on the sleeve. And realized the new ball of yarn was a different color than the rest of the sweater. Not just a different dye lot -- a different color. The sweater is a heathered brown. The last ball was a solid chocolate.

Being a calm person, I decided instead to work on a spring bolero for the same child. She'd been asking, just that morning, when I was going to finish it. I quickly located the project, but the pattern was nowhere to be found. I flung some yarn tubs about looking for it, and succeeded only in tiring myself out and hurting my back.

No problem, I thought. (Do you detect a pattern here?) I will just start the Schaefer Victorian Baby Jacket that I need to make in preparation for a class I'll be teaching. I cast on 188 stitches in Anne (a fine fingering weight made by Schaefer) on size 3 needles. The first two rows went swimmingly, since they were stockinette. The third row, the beginning of the lace pattern, did not go well. I ended up with two extra stitches, despite handfuls of markers and careful attention to the pattern. I tried to identify my mistake, something I'm normally quite good at (especially with simple lace patterns like this one), and couldn't find it.

No problem, I thought. I will just tink back and surely I'll find the problem. I did not find the problem, but I succeeded in dropping a few stitches while undoing the Slip 1, K2tog, PSSOs. These dropped stitches went all the way down to the cast-on.

I ripped everything off the needles, broke off the used yarn (this same section of yarn had been used for a previous project I'd abandoned because I didn't like how the lace looked in the particular colorway, and it was looking pretty tired.) I was pretty tired myself and took to the couch with blankets and tissues.

Moral of the story: If you knit when you're sick, and it starts going all pear-shaped on you, stop. Do not pass go, do not collect two hundred dollars. Lie down and watch reruns of I Love Lucy.

Catching up / New Year's advice

2008-01-07T10:32:00.000-06:00

The holidays were great, but I'm happy to be on the other side of them. I've had enough cookies, candies, rich meals, and other gastronomic overages to last me for another year. (And I have the enhanced waistline to prove it.) I wish there were such a thing as aerobic knitting.

My camera has died after a long illness. It is survived by me, dozens of special friends, and a bunch of pictures. While I am waiting until I can get a new camera, you will have to use your imagination to envision the projects I describe. Besides, they were mostly boring lately:

I knit a bunch of things over the holidays, but most of them were hats, scarves, and the like that I gave as gifts. I knit several more two-color brioche scarves. (They're good enough, they're smart enough, and doggone it, people like them.) I knit another moebius for my mother. I finally put the fringe on a scarf I'd knitted for my sister last year.

The only thing I completed that was slightly interesting was the "Caplet", as my sister dubbed it. The Caplet is my own take on the Dubbelmossa hat, the two-layer hat that is essentially one hat inside the other, with the hats being joined at the brim edge. When it is opened up, with the top of one hat at one end and the top of the other hat at the opposite end, and the line of demarcation in the middle, it looks like a giant Tylenol capsule.

I made the Caplet by starting with a provisional cast-on (I used the knit-up-stitches-in-a-crochet-chain method), then I knit the first hat normally. Then I took out the provisional cast-on, picked up those stitches, and knit the other hat identically. I experimented with a YO, K1 turning row at the border between the two hats, hoping to get a picot edge, but the yarn I used (Cascade's DiVe Autumno) was too thick to show the picot. Next time, I'll do a purl row for a turning row. I was concerned about finishing off the top of the second hat, as at that point I didn't have access to the wrong side to weave in the ends, but I was able to take the yarn tail around in several circles at the top and it looks just fine.

Knitting advice for 2008: Be Fearless!

I meet a lot of people in classes and help sessions, and I have never met anyone who can't knit. I have met a lot of people who think they can't knit, or think they can't understand a pattern, or think they can't master a certain technique.

We are often afraid to try something because we think we might fail. I've avoided lots of things for this reason. And it's true, you might fail. Or you might find you don't like it. Or you might find you can do it, but prefer not to. Or that it's too much work. But it's rarely the case that you can't do it.

And anyway, it's just yarn, right? It's just knitting. No lives are at stake. If you feel severely displeased with something you've worked on, you can unravel it, hide it in a closet, give it away, or -- gasp -- throw it in the trash. I have trashed several projects, including an Aran sweater that was 3/4 finished. But by the time I was to that point, I realized the yarn I'd chosen wasn't very high quality (I hadn't been knitting very long, and didn't know much about choosing yarn), and the gauge was way off, to the point that the sweater would have been suitable for a man over 6'5" tall with very big shoulders. I kept it a few years while I was mourning, then I popped it in the dumpster. I learned a lot from that project, and I'm not sorry I spent time on it. The next Aran sweater I made was very lovely and I wear it all the time.

What's the worst that can happen? You can spend (I don't like to say "waste") some time and money that don't result in a piece that you can use for the intended purpose. But if you enjoy knitting, time spent knitting can't be considered to be wasted. And money, well ... if we were in this to save money, we wouldn't do it. (And it's better than buying pulltabs). And you almost always learn from every project, even if all you learn was that you chose an inappropriate yarn and didn't check your gauge well enough.

Be creative with your unexpected results (I don't like to say "failures"). If what you've knit is feltable, felt it, cut it into pieces, and make something out of it -- felt flowers, a cell phone holder, a purse, a haggis* caddy, or whatever fun or outrageous thing you can imagine.

Use it as a test swatch to try out new techniques. Make it into a doll blanket. Or call it art and hang it on the wall. Give it to the Goodwill if it's wearable. Give the yarn to the Goodwill if it's not. You get the idea.

Why not make 2008 the year you become a Fearless Knitter?

*Haggis is the traditional Scottish dish composed of such things as lamb parts** and barley, and cooked in a sheep's bladder. These days they use the better parts of the lamb and cook it in something more appealing, and it's delicious. But historically it was a way to use up all the bits and pieces of a sheep so they didn't go to waste, and the family didn't starve.

** Lips, innards*** and other unmentionables.

*** I would bet this is the only knitting blog that has ever mentioned lips and innards.

No new pictures, but more new projects

2007-11-14T13:15:00.001-06:00

I have had a bad case of start-itis lately, which is why I haven't posted any new pictures -- I'm too busy swatching and getting new things on the needles.

I started another Sandra Stole, like the one Lewis is modeling below, in another beautiful Schaefer colorway. I can't help it; I love the yarn, the color, and the pattern. I got about 10" done before ...

I started a cardigan-in-one-piece that is based on an old Knitter's magazine pattern. The original pattern is by Medrith Glover, and it's called Circumnavigate a Cardigan. I had some juicy red stash yarn that seemed like it wanted to be a sweater. I'm thinking of making a couple of modifications to the design, though. The original is pretty boxy, and since I'm pretty boxy myself, I think I may throw in a little shaping at the sides to make it look as if I have a waist. I'm going to try some traveling stitches on the front to make mock-princess seams that go down to the pocket edges. And I don't particularly like ribbing at the bottoms of my sweaters, so I might do a hem at the bottom. The pattern is a v-neck, and I think I might also convert it to a hoodie with a zipper, so I'll have to leave out the v-shaping. All in all, it won't look much like the original (though it'll have most of the fun construction techniques). It may turn out to be ... interesting, as we Minnesotans like to say.

I'm also starting a lace scarf class [Fiber Trends Cocoon Lace Scarf/Wrap] at the store on Sunday, and a Shadow Shawl [by Maureen Mason-Jamieson] class on Tuesday. So I will be knitting along with my students on those projects as well.

And now, my favorite 5-year-old wants a hat that is pink and stripey on the outside, "indigoo" on the inside (OK, I guess I have to brush up on my double knitting), with a rainbow-colored pom pom. The things we do for the kids in our lives! This one will be (ahem) interesting as well. I hope she doesn't get teased on the playground!

I promise, pictures. Sometime...

Tales of the Twisted Float Shrug; Freddie Krueger

2007-11-07T13:01:00.000-06:00

Annie Modesitt's Twisted Float Shrug

Photos are coming ... sometime!

I have been a busy little knitter. (Well, OK, I'm big and middle-aged). Besides finishing a couple of two-color Brioche scarves for charity, half a Brioche (so far) for a friend, and another rainbow-hued one for my favorite 5-year-old, I made progress on a Smooshy sock (the second of a pair I started as a class example) and knit a 12-inch "pizza pie" three times.

So what's a knitted pizza pie, and why did I do it thrice?

I took Annie Modesitt's Twisted Float Shrug class at the shop this past weekend, and had a great time. I like her encouraging approach, and I learned a lot of little tips and techniques along with learning how to measure for and construct the shrug. Alas, however, the contrast color I originally chose wasn't looking as nice as I'd hoped, so after I'd knit a piece about 12" in diameter, (the shrug is a big circle with sleeves) I decided to change the contrast color. (The main color is a gorgeous teal/yellow green/smoky blue variegated in Cherry Tree Hill's worsted; my original contrast was a dark orange tone-on-tone in Araucania Nature Wool worsted. But the orange was too similar in value to the main color, as my boss lady helpfully pointed out, so it looked flat. Well, OK, it IS flat, in dimension that is, but the color is supposed to have more depth! So a coworker helped me audition other contrast colors and we came up with a rich chocolate brown in Cascade 220. It's stunning, if I do say so myself. And thanks, Ms. Coworker; you know who you are.)

I'm going to do the border in Cherry Tree Hill's Baby Loop boucle in the Java colorway. It should pick up the smoky blue and the chocolate tones nicely. I may have to bulk it up with some Kid Seta fingering mohair, or double the Baby Loop, as it's only a sport weight, and worsted is called for.

Having knit the initial teal et. al. /orange pizza, I started over with the teal/chocolate. I love the way the colors are working with each other. But I was not at all happy with the way I'd been carrying the chocolate yarn up through the 4 rounds of main color. So, once again, the pizza was frogged down to a demitasse-sized coaster, and I started again, cutting and weaving in the contrast strands so I don't have to carry the brown up through the blue. Now it looks like I wanted it to. And it really only took a couple hours to knit each pizza. I'm so glad I started over and got it right. (Photos coming sometime!)

P.S.: See if you can find "Superbunny" at the store, wearing my class swatch in teal and orange.

Freddie Krueger

A friend of mine has been knitting -- and knitting, and knitting -- an intarsia baby sweater. The intarsia is disagreeing with her, much like a liverwurst full of e. coli. Intarsia disagrees with me, too, and I with it. I know I can do it, I just don't care to do it, in the same way that I know I could make fancy cookies like Martha Stewart's, but ... who cares? If I don't enjoy it, why do it? I'm going to leave Martha's title as cookie diva unchallenged, and the intarsia divas can have their beautiful, repellent craft to themselves, too.

Anyway, the particular sweater design my friend is knitting is called "Freddie". It's a very cute sweater, a pullover with a star (or is it a snowflake?) on the front. She has picked up the project and put it down several times, and, as mentioned, is not enjoying it now that she is at the intarsia portion. She even lost the sweater for over a year, I think in the instinct of self-preservation. I think we identified the base problem when it came to me that the sweater is called Freddie ... it must be Freddie Krueger!

My friend called yesterday and said that Freddie Krueger is dead. She has decided to do the sweater plain, without the accursed star/snowflake. I admire her for this; I'm sure it was tempting to do as another friend of mine once did, and burn the offending item in a ceremonial fire while doing a sprightly dance.

So, Freddie is gone. I guess we'll have to rename the sweater. How about Clive? I don't know of any evil "Clive"s, do you?

A Few Comments

2007-10-28T10:37:00.001-05:00

Just a few comments on the pictures below: Lewis is modeling the Sandra Stole in Schaefer Yarns' Sandra in the Margaret Mead colorway. And the flower garden is modeling one of the non-edible Brioche scarves I am making for the charity event. I thought the scarf would look good against the last of the zinnias, so I tossed it over the shrubbery ... forgetting that the "shrub" is a rosebush. It took me a while to get that scarf out of the talons of the rosebush. It almost did get "eaten" after all. I'm halfway through the second charity Brioche and am getting bored with the pattern, so I think my remaining items for this function will need to be something different.

2007-10-25T17:52:00.000-05:00

2007-10-25T17:50:00.000-05:00

2007-10-25T17:49:00.000-05:00

From UFO to FO in 60 seconds

2007-10-22T15:26:00.000-05:00

Sometimes it's quick and easy to finish a piece of knitting. For example, when moving my stash around the other day -- so I could get to a couple of extra dining room chairs that usually reside under a portion of the stash -- I found a stole I knitted last year at this time. The only thing that still needed to be done was to weave in the ends. So in about three minutes, it went from aging UFO to brilliant FO. I wore it to work at the store that same day, and received many compliments.

This is my version of the "take and bake" pizza, only it's the "weave and wear" knitted object. It's satisfying to have a few mostly-finished things lying around. Then, when you need a pick-me-up, you can just weave in those ends and have a beautiful new thing to wear or to give as a last-minute gift. (Don't try this with Fair Isle sweaters or intarsia pieces or your last-minute gift will be a next-year gift.)

Now, some cynics might say that I am just rationalizing my can't-bother-to-finish-itis. And they'd be right. Well, the cynics have to be right some of the time, don't they? Just like that other political party, statistically speaking, is bound to come up with some good policies some of the time. Anyway, whether it's a mark of my slothfulness, or a creative solution, weave-and-wear works for me.

For the record, the stole in question is a rectangular one made out of Schaefer Yarns' Sandra in the Margaret Mead colorway. It's from one of the store's proprietary patterns, called the Sandra Stole. Sandra is a beautiful bulky cotton wrapped in a rayon strand. The rayon plays against the rich colors, adding light and shimmer. I think the Margaret Mead colorway looks especially luminous with the rayon.

That's all the wit and wisdom I can muster for the moment. I've just finished writing a 5-page supplement to a two-page pattern, which I'll be using for my Top Down Socks on Two Circulars class tonight at the store. And now I'm off to teach!

The Plague

2007-10-17T10:01:00.000-05:00

Step Away From the Knitting

I haven't done any blogging, or knitting -- or much of anything, for that matter -- for the past week. I contracted the Plague in the middle of last week, so have been mostly sleeping, drinking tea, and meditating on the texture and properties of the living room wall. It's amazing how quickly you can start feeling sorry for yourself when you have nothing to occupy your mind.

In my case, satisfying occupation of my mind goes with satisfying occupation of my hands, i.e., knitting. I can knit serenely away for hours, without TV or music or company. I come up with some of my best ideas at these times. Conversely, when I'm not knitting, and not doing anything else either, my mind finds bad places to go, into the deep, dark, moth-infested, tangle-skeined, Dazzle-Aire-remnanted, drop-stitched knitting basket of the soul. (You might call it the hand-basket of the soul, and you know where you go in one of those!)

So it's best, I find, to have knitting handy at all times. Even if I'm probably not going to be able to knit. I think if I were the type of person who wanted to go skydiving (I'm not), I'd insist on bringing at least a sock-in-progress.

Still, I've learned that there are times when one has to say to oneself: "STEP AWAY FROM THE KNITTING!" When knitting a complicated lace piece, I have a two-tink rule: if I have to un-knit more than one row, I need to force myself to put the knitting away until another day. Studies (in my living room) have shown that after tinking two rows of lace, any further knitting on that piece within that calendar day will result in a very tenacious hex descending over it, which is likely to end with multiple-row ripping and all sorts of juicy swear words.

Yesterday I started an easy project to work my way back into knitting after my illness. Since I've been knitting a two-color Brioche-stitch scarf for a friend, and since I had agreed to contribute some items to a charity project, I thought it would be easiest for me mentally to just start another Brioche. That way I'd only have to keep track of one pattern. Things went well for the first six inches of knitting (don't get impressed by my inchage; it's loosely knit in worsted-weight yarns on bigger needles) but then I started to go a bit stupid in the head. Am I on the dark side of the work? The light side? Wait -- I just knitted with the black, I should be knitting with the Silk Garden. Or should I --? I found myself dropping yarn-overs, tinking back every second or third row, looking back at the pattern, the yarn, my hands, turning the work this way and that ... And all this on a pattern I could do in my sleep with both hands and one eye tied behind my back a few days earlier. When, for about the eighth time, I looked at my work and saw wrong-color strands going across the flow of the pattern stitch, I stuffed the whole thing in my knitting bag for the day and went to bed.

I think I'm just going to Step Away From the Knitting for today, too. I'm going to be working all day at the store, and that will be sufficient to keep my mind out of the handbasket. I'm sure the Brioche won't get stale by tomorrow.

Garden of the Gods

2007-10-10T11:04:00.000-05:00

Garden of the Gods

2007-10-10T11:03:00.000-05:00

Sparkly Shadow Shawl

2007-10-10T10:59:00.000-05:00

Non-Edible Brioche, Other Works in Progress

2007-10-10T10:16:00.001-05:00

Non-edible Brioche and Other Works in Progress

There's been a lot going on at home -- prodigals returning to the fold and the like -- but I have managed to make a little progress on several projects. I have one sleeve left to do on the brown bolero, I knit a few rows on the sparkly Shadow Shawl, I got the heel turned on the second sock of my current pair of Smooshy socks, and I started a Brioche stitch scarf for a friend whose winter scarf got eaten by his cats over the summer. (I guess once you lick your fur enough, you develop a taste for fuzz -- ?)

At any rate, I hope this Brioche does not get eaten. The front is in terra-cotta Malabrigo worsted, and the back is in Kathmandu Aran tweed in a deep loden green with reddish-orangish flecks. At first I wasn't terribly fond of the colors -- I chose them to match the recipient's new winter coat -- but I'm finding that the subtle variegation of the Malabrigo looks rich, deep, and beautiful against the duller green background. It reminds me of the colors of the rocks at Garden of The Gods in Colorado Springs.

Travelogue

Speaking of Colorado Springs, I traveled there several years ago with my sister to pick up a purebred Smooth Collie puppy she had bought from a breeder. (Smooth Collies are the classic Lassie dogs, only with short hair). We stayed in a motel we'd booked on an Internet site, choosing the cheapest option because we were traveling on a tiny budget.

The motel was like something out of Planes, Trains, and Automobiles: the decor was Early Crummy Motel, the carpet was dirty indoor-outdoor blue, and there was mold on the acoustic ceiling tile over the vanity area. We soon found that something was wrong with the TV; although the switch seemed to be in the "off" position, there was still sound coming out of the speakers. Try as we might, we couldn't shut it off, so we did the only thing we could do: we put our pants over the TV to block as much sound as we could while we tried to sleep. (We now refer to this fondly as "the time we had to pants the TV").

Before we pantsed the TV, we were watching the local news, which reported that a child molester had been apprehended the night before, with a child he'd abducted and held at that very motel. It was all too Norman Bates.

Despite the eerie sound emanating from the TV, the creepy motel, and some interesting driving forays -- we're both severely directionally challenged, and the map the rental-car place gave us was reduced to microscopic scale -- we had a great time, in part because we had a perfect, sunny November afternoon at Garden of the Gods. See the pictures above.

KnitBlat's rule of sock knitting #1: If anyone is looking at your feet so closely that they can see the teeny mistake you made in the ribbing, you have a bigger problem!

UFOs, I Can't Dance

2007-10-03T09:57:00.000-05:00

UFOs, Not-Yet-FOs, and Stash

I am the queen of Unfinished Objects (UFOs), and this week has been no exception. I've been working on a Knitting Pure and Simple bolero for a little girl, in chocolate brown Plymouth Encore, to match her fall wardrobe (she's a 5-year old fashionista). I've finished the body and the front/bottom band, and have the collar and sleeves still to do. All I need is a few quiet hours in which to finish it, but since I've been chief child-wrangler this week (the fashionista's parents are out of town) I haven't gotten much done. Having now played the role of single parent for a few days, I will never look askance at a busy mom's wobbly knitting again. Hey, moms and dads, how do you manage to knit at all, much less turn out some of the stunning work that you do? I bow down to your stamina and willpower.

The other thing I've been hacking away at is the Sparkly Shadow Shawl. The main color is Cherry Tree Hill Supersock Java, and the contrast is Kid Seta mohair in a medium orange variegate. I'm stranding Cotton Gold sparkly sequined stuff along with the Kid Seta. I wasn't sure how this would work out, but it's really coming out nicely. The sequins are really making the mohair "shadow" well. Photos to come -- when I have a moment off from dominoes, Candy Land, craft projects, and Spaghetti-Os.

Just a note here: It's been several days since I succumbed to any new yarn. Working at a yarn store, it's hard not to dally with every new temptation that comes in. I've been trying hard to think about what I would make out of a given yarn, whether I NEED it (what an idea!), and whether it duplicates anything I have. Then I try to visualize my stash, which is hard to do, because to get it to fit into a single image, I have to shrink it to microscopic size. Okay, so I have to imagine a camera panning across the acreage of my stash. Hmmmm ... there's all the Rowan Magpie I bought when it went on closeout several years ago ... the several Hanne Falkenberg kits (including a coat knit in fingering-weight yarn) ... the 10 colors (2 bags each) of yarn I bought at a historic mill in Scotland in the '90s (I couldn't decide which color to get, so I got them all, and had my friend, then living in Scotland, bring it over in bits every time he visited) ... well, you get the panoramic picture. Too Much Yarn. (I'm actually starting to believe there is such a thing.)

So, I haven't brought any yarn home. Not even the ooooooh-la-la Sheep Shop #3 in juicy new colors that we got in at the store this week. Not even the Ranco sock yarn by Araucania that's been like a crazed capuchin monkey on my back for weeks (quit lookin' for bugs in my hair, ya monkey!) Not the Araucania Aysen, which is so soft that I want to buy it just to cuddle with it ... oooops, I drooled on the keyboard!

I Can't Dance

I got no rhythm. In aerobics, I was always the one stumbling left while everyone else was Grapevining to the right. I can't boogie down, shake my booty, do the Mashed Potato, or even polka my way out of a Polish party. I don't even have a Groove Thang.

I was 9 years old in 1964 when the Beatles became popular in the US. I'd wait till everyone else was out of the house, put on Meet the Beatles, and try to dance like the kids I'd seen on American Bandstand. Once, my family came home from an outing and discovered me "dancing" in the living room. Let's just say that families can be merciless. I didn't try dancing again until I was married and in my 30s and my then-husband conscripted me into Community Ed ballroom dancing lessons. He may have salvaged his toes by now.

I got to thinking about this last evening when I took my favorite 5-year-old to her Creative Movement class. She's a natural dancer, and can pirouette, boogie, and breakdance. She gets it from her mom (no relation to me!) As I watched her pretend to be a kangaroo and a snake and a frog, then skip and fly and leap, I envied her. She seemed so happy just to be out there, flinging herself about, almost flying.

I was feeling quite envious, and quite sorry for myself as a dance-impaired individual. For a few minutes. And then I thought back over the day. Earlier, I'd helped someone rip out and reconstruct a piece of knitting, picking up dropped stitches, straightening twisted stitches, clearing up the mysteries of decreases and bind-offs. I'd helped someone else interpret a pattern. And the day before, I'd showed someone how to sew up a sweater. Not difficult stuff, surely. But I'm good at it. Just as E. is good at dancing. I got my knitting genes from my maternal grandmother and my mother. She got her dancing genes from her mother. I could as easily have been born to someone in Cameroon, someone from a long line of people with no eye-hand coordination but a great facility with healing the sick. Or I could have been a transplanted Texan with lots of charm but poor language skills. Or... a Yukon Gold potato. But, as Peter and Lou Berryman say, "We could have been dipsticks, or lavender lipsticks, but we happened ... to be Us." I guess I'm just the non-dancing dipstick that I am, knitting-talented, but destined never to do the Two-Step. And that's ... OK, I guess. I'll take it.

2007-09-21T09:21:00.001-05:00

2007-09-21T09:21:00.000-05:00

A Tale of Two Moebiuses, and the 'P' word

2007-09-20T09:07:00.000-05:00

A Tale of Two Moebiuses
I knit my first Moebius scarf a couple days ago, from Cat Bordhi's book A Treasury of Magical Knitting. The cast-on, was, as she says, easy. In fact, it was so easy, and so rhythmic, that I could do it almost right away without thinking -- and that meant that if I was interrupted at any point, I had to stop and think about how to get it going again.

I did the first Moebius in a variegated Baby Alpaca Grande by Plymouth. The only snag was that I skimmed the directions for the applied I-cord bind-off, and did it wrong the first couple of times. I knew something was amiss when I was getting a jagged edge, rather like the spine of a Stegosaurus. As a friend of mine says, READ the pattern! Well, when I actually read the pattern, it went along faultlessly.

I enjoyed the Moebius so much that I started a second one, in royal blue Kid Seta with Cotton Gold carried along. I'll post pics of both Moebiuses (Moebii?) later today, when I finish casting off the blue one. I hope I can convince Lewis to be the model. He does look handsome in a scarf.

The 'P' Word

I find there are two basic kinds of knitters: Product knitters, and Process knitters. Product knitters tend to keep knitting statistics: How many FOs, how many of each type of object, how many pairs of handknit socks they own, what's in their stash (categorized by color, subcategorized by fiber type, sub-sub categorized by date of purchase...) Product knitters finish their projects. They have handknit gifts finished and wrapped before the holidays, whereas I still have unfinished gifts from three Christmases ago. They contribute knitted items to silent auctions. Many of them -- I shudder to even think about it -- finish one project before starting the next. A subset of members this exotic species even waits to buy yarn for the next project before finishing the current project. Product knitters are good, upstanding, responsible members of society. I applaud them -- and I hate them.

I, on the other hand, am a promiscuous Process knitter. I love the process of knitting. Nothing is more exciting than thinking of new projects and casting on. This explains why I own every size, type, and length of needle by every needle company in the Western hemisphere, and some in the Eastern. And it explains why, even though I own hundreds of needles, I usually have to buy another set for each new project. All the existing ones are in other projects. (If you define "project" loosely as anything from an almost-completed sweater to three rows of a gauge swatch).

I'm excited by knitted pieces that are constructed in ingenious ways, and by new knitting techniques. I would knit an igloo cover if the pattern contained interesting techniques. This explains why I don't own too many sweaters: After having knit several drop-shoulder styles, several knit-in-the-round-from-the-top-down sweaters, a couple Arans, a gansey, and a couple Fair Isles, sweaters feel old hat, to mix a metaphor.

Not that there aren't interesting sweater patterns out there. Nora Gaughan's work is intriguing, and Elsebeth Lavold generates so many good patterns that one wonders if she has a crew of elves in a secret workshop somewhere in the forest. But, wanton knitter that I am, I tend to get past the interesting part and, well ... lose interest. Since I don't have any boring meetings to attend now that I'm out of the corporate world, I don't have as many opportunities to do endless rows of idiot knitting, which was the only thing that allowed me to complete the sweaters I did manage to finish.

Okay, yeah yeah, there's plenty I haven't done yet in the realm of sweater knitting. I haven't done a Bohus, or a lace sweater, or a proper Norwegian sweater, to name just three. Maybe I'm just making excuses for my short attention span.

Once I finish a piece -- on those rare occasions when I do -- I'm alarmingly unattached to the finished object. It can hang in the shop as a shop model, or be given away to the nearest victim. Or it can sit in a plastic tub in storage for several years. At that point, the fun is over. I'm done.

But there is some hope for me. Doing this blog has forced me to focus more on finishing things, if only because FOs make for more interesting photographs than do three rows of a gauge swatch. Who knows -- I may become one of those sainted Finishers yet. Then I'll have to work on actually knitting out of my stash.

Sure.

2007-09-20T09:04:00.000-05:00

2007-09-17T12:29:00.001-05:00

2007-09-17T12:29:00.000-05:00

Knitting injury, A Fat Hat, and Elaine finds a home

2007-09-17T11:32:00.000-05:00

I like to knit socks. I like it a lot. And I like my socks knit very, very tightly on teeny-tiny needles. But when I knit too many socks in a row without a break, I get a very, very sore trapezius muscle and stiff neck. Last time this happened, I went to weeks of physical therapy to get un-kinked. This time, I've put down the socks at the first -- well, the fifth -- sign of distress (Warning! Step away from the socks!) in hopes that I can loosen up without more PT. Undoubtedly, chocolate will help too.

I decided that knitting something in a much bigger gauge would be therapeutic, so yesterday I knit a fat hat in Katia's Nepal. It's just a simple rolled-brim number, with the brim knit on 10s to nip it in a bit (otherwise, I find that rolled-brim hats tend to be, in the words of my favorite 5-year-old, "too fally-offy"). The body of the hat is knit on 11s. The Nepal, a self-striper, worked interestingly for this hat. Rather than striping, it spiraled up to the top as I decreased. I think it looks rather swell with its perky little nipple at the top.

The hat will go to charity after it is finished being a sample for my hat class at the shop. It's so cute, though, that I may need to make some mittens to "go with", as we say here in Minn-e-soh-tah.

I have been harboring some skeins of Schaefer Yarns' Elaine since mid-July, and she has been very persnickety about figuring out what she wants to be. She knits up at about 3 sts/in., and is thick-and-thin. I didn't want to do another shawl, having just finished the one-skein Nancy (by Schaefer) shawl. This week I found the perfect vest pattern for Elaine. It's the Oat Couture Oregon vest. It's fairly simple. The style reminds me of a down vest or fleece vest that you'd wear out walking in the fall. It has a zipper up the front, pockets (hurrah!) and a little bit of decorative twisted rib. I think it will show off the lovely dusky green/blue/tan colorway and the texture of the yarn.

I succumbed to a particularly beautiful colorway of Baby Alpaca Grande at the shop the other day. It's the same muted blues and greens as the Elaine, with some dusky pink thrown in. (We must call it dusky pink; dusky mauve would be so Eighties.) I plan to make a big honkin' Moebius scarf with it. I haven't yet tackled a Moebius, that is, not of the sort that Cat Bordhi invented in her Magical Knitting books. She claims the cast-on is so easy she can do it behind her back, standing on one foot. We shall see. I think I'll try doing it in front of my front, sitting down.

And finally ... The Honeycrisp apple crop is finally in! I invented a new taste treat today: Slice up a Honeycrisp, and dip it in Nutella. Yum!

What is Blat?

2007-09-13T14:38:00.000-05:00

You may be wondering what blat -- or a blat -- is.

Blat is the sound a badly-played brass instrument makes. And, as you read this Blat -- er, blog -- you may start noticing a similarity between the two.

B.L.A.T. is a Bacon, Lettuce, Avocado, and Tomato sandwich, as served by the Longfellow Grill in Minneapolis. This has nothing to do with this blog, but if the Longfellow wanted to send me a lifetime supply of B.L.A.T.s, I would do nothing to stop them.

Blat is also, as Wikipedia informs me, a form of corruption in Russia and the Soviet Union. I will leave you to contemplate the subtleties of any connections.

2007-09-13T13:56:00.000-05:00

2007-09-13T12:52:00.000-05:00

I am often a reluctant convert. When my friend learned to knit socks on two circular needles, and enthusiastically recommended the technique, I wasn't eager to try it. I knew how to knit in the round on double-points; it worked. Why waste my energy learning a new way to do the same thing?

She finally wore me down. I tried two circulars and immediately ditched the dpns. I've made innumerable pairs of socks (and some mittens, and lots of sleeves) on two circulars. When I heard about the Magic Loop technique several years ago, I thought that I should try it, but I wasn't enthusiastic about it. I'd already changed once. I loved using two circulars. (Uh-oh. Whenever I get too settled with something, that's my cue that I'm about to have a shakeup).

The past few weeks, several things happened: First, I was knitting a top-down sock with a turned heel, and struggling to redistribute the stitches side-to-side from their front/back orientation on my two circs. I discovered (duh!) that if I pulled out an extra loop of cable, I could easily transfer the stitches. Then, a week or so later, I was reading Annie Modesitt's new book, Romantic Hand Knits. (Yep, I actually read knitting books.) She mentions that she often knits on the longest circular needle available, and if she is knitting a smaller tube, she just pulls out an extra loop of cable to the side so the stitches aren't stretched out. Hmmmm. Magic Loop ... transferring stitches ... pulling out an extra loop of cable ... Bingo! If I'd just read that blasted little Magic Loop book, I'd have known all this a couple years ago. But, to salvage my dignity, I like to think that the insight is much richer for having been discovered through experience.

Last night, I was at work, and had a moment to knit on a sock I was starting. I wanted to do the cuff on zeroes, but I only had two 32-inchers. Since I owe my soul, and those of any descendants and relatives thrice-removed, to the company store, I sighed mournfully at the thought of buying yet another two pairs of 24-inch circulars. Then, in my Neanderthalic way, I realized -- smiting myself on the forehead -- I can just do the cuff on the one 32-inch needle. I tried it, pulling out loops of cable when I needed to to make the work fit. It worked like a dream. In fact, -- dare I say it -- I really liked the technique. Certain of my knitting friends will roll their eyes when I reveal that I've been converted yet again. Maybe I should've named this blog The Reluctant Convert.

I have racked up two Finished Objects (FOs) since my last post: The one-skein Nancy shawl is truly finished, blocked, and the ends woven in. (My goddess-coworker darned in the ends for me when I wasn't at the shop; you know who you are!) And my class-example top-down-sock-on-two-circulars is finished and hanging on the Wall O' Class Projects at the shop. Now, you may say that ONE sock is not a finished project, and you would be right. But I didn't claim two finished projects. I just claimed two finished objects. And one sock is, indeed, an object. Another coworker and I had this clarifying discussion at work yesterday, and she is thrilled, because she can claim many more FOs now.

Since I am over 50, I know that it is important to take the little victories where you can find them.

Thus concludes the knitting portion of our program for today.

On the reading / writing front, I'm still enjoying Winter's Tale. I read a chapter or two before bed every night. It's one of those books you don't want to finish quickly, because it's such a lovely world to live in for a while.

I picked up a copy of The Wet Collection by Joni Tevis today at Milkweed Editions at the Open Book center on Washington Avenue in Minneapolis. I took a class this spring in the personal essay at the Loft Literary Center, which is in the Open Book. I guess my style is mainly lyrical, and my teachers at the Loft recommended I read Tevis. I'm excited to look into the book later today. I will post a review when I have read it.

If you haven't been to the Open Book, you must go if only to check out the MN Center for Book Arts in the main level. They have classes in a variety of book arts / crafts, and they sell some stunning handmade cards and other paper items.

And now the random ... My housemates and I have been trying to reduce our carbon footprint, but man, those suckers are sticky. I'm tracking carbon everywhere. Specifically, I'm really struggling with my addiction to carbonated beverages. I swore off diet soda, because a) it's a waste of money, b) it's bad for my health, c) it's a waste of packaging and transportation energy, and d) it's just generally Evil. I started drinking vast quantities of bottled carbonated water instead, but quickly realized that it was also a waste of money, packaging, etc. etc. Then we got a water filtering system so that we can have filtered water right out of the tap. We all bought Nalgene bottles and started schlepping those around for our swigging pleasure. Except I still harbor a major jones for fizziness. Today I bought three glass bottles of fizzy water at Target. Glass is better than plastic, right? But ... oops, the label says it's a product of Italy. I guess it took some fossil fuels to move that water across the Atlantic. I feel like a crack addict, slinking off to guzzle fizzy water.

And finally: At the Minnesota State Fair a couple weeks ago, my sister and I went in quest of Pronto Pups. Until last year, I had no idea that corn dogs and Pronto Pups were two different things. Then I tasted my sister's Pup at the fair, and I realized that while a corn dog is a mundane, gritty coated wienie on a stick, a Pronto Pup is an ambrosial delight: a batter-dipped hot dog lovingly deep-fried to golden goodness, not to mention a major phallic symbol.

As is often the case at the Fair, the thing you seek is the thing you can't find. We saw several Corn Dog vendors, but alas, no Pup mongers. We searched in vain, until my sister said, "LOOK! PRONTAGE!" Now, this cracked me up so badly that I choked on my iced espresso. It was not until just now, however, that I realized that the opposite of Prontage must be ... Cornage.

Lewis

2007-09-10T15:16:00.000-05:00

September 10, 2007

2007-09-10T14:10:00.000-05:00

This blog is mostly about knitting, with some random stuff about reading and writing and other topics as they occur.

I had a day off my job at the knitting store today, so I decided it was time to block the shawl I finished knitting back in July. It's going to be a shop model for the store. It's made out of one skein of Schaefer Yarns' Nancy, and it took me less than a day to knit the shawl, and another 3/4 day to knit the ruffle (250 stitches that grow alarmingly to 1000 stitches!)

As soon as I figure out how to post photos, I'll put up a picture of said shawl pinned out. This was a case of PGE (Plenty Good Enough), one of the guiding principles I grew up with (thanks, Mom!). In knitting as in life, you need to know when you should strive for Perfect and when Plenty Good Enough is, well ... plenty good enough. This shawl is rather rustic, since it's made out of a thick-and-thin yarn, which gives it a nubbly texture. It's supposed to fall in a ruffly cascade around your shoulders, and there isn't any lace or fancy stitch pattern that needs to be blocked all to heck to show it off to advantage. So I trussed it out on my blocking wires and pinned it in a few places to make sure the wires stay put. I didn't stretch it out overmuch. I'll see how it turns out. If it doesn't seem like it's flattened out enough, I may reblock it, but I think it's going to be PGE!

I'm also working on a pair of plain socks in Dream in Color's Smooshy. This is my current favorite sock yarn, and this is the 5th pair I've knit in it. It knits, as they say (who are They?) "like buttah". For me, it works best on size 1-1/2s. I prefer the two circulars method. I knit a lot of toe-up socks, but this pair is top-down with a standard turned heel and gusset. They are primarily an example for the top-down-socks-on-two-circs class I'll be teaching, but gee, I guess I can force myself to wear them. (Picture coming).

I'm frothing at the mouth in anticipation of knitting some socks from Cat Bordhi's new book New Pathways for Sock Knitters Book One. I read through the book a couple nights ago, and am stunned by the inventive patterns and not least by the clear and useful ways in which she explains knitting concepts. I can't wait to try the Coriolis sock. The question is, should I do it in my pet skein of Cherry Tree Hill Supersock African Grey, ("pet skein", because it is a wonderful dye lot that has a lot of olive green in it, and I have been waiting for just the right project), or should I be Bad and buy a skein of Ranco, the Arucania hand-dyed sock yarn I've been lusting after? Decisions, decisions ...

Moving on to the "reading/writing" part of this post, I'm currently rereading Winter's Tale by Mark Helprin. I initially read it about 20 years ago. It's set in Belle Epoque New York, and is fantastical, wildly funny, and delightful in its use of metaphor, language, and hyperbole. Nothing I can say can adequately describe it. If you haven't read it, go do so now. Do not stop to pass Go.

And, finally, for the "random" portion of our program: This morning one of my dogs -- the big oafy Labrador named Lewis and occasionally known as "Droolis", "Loomis", and "Duncey Boy" -- not only pooped on a toy that had been left in the yard, he barfed on top of the sprinkler. One more bodily product and he would have had a hat trick!