A dropped stitch

Respect the Damson

This post is going to be very brief, and in effort to simplify I am going to write about one thing, and only one thing and that is the DAMSON.  

 

(okay, I know it doesn't look like much but you gotta trust me on this. )

The damson is a fabulous little shawlette created by Ysolda. 

(775 in the works on Raverly, woops, 776-I haven't added mine yet).  If you aren't familiar with Ysolda, then you obviously aren't spending near enough time on Raverly.  She is everywhere.  On knit night, there are usually at least 3 people with a ysolda pattern in front of them.  The liesl that I just finished is one of her patterns.

Woops, digressing again and I promised I wouldn't. I am not even going to bother to turn the photo around because that would also be digressing.

Okay, the Damson. 

When I first saw the pattern I was thrilled because it was stylish, and it was reminiscent of Grandma's dishcloth.  I love Grandma's dishcloth, and when I first started knitting I made about 50 of them.  Garter stitch, yo's- what's not to love.  Whenever, I teach someone to knit, I start them with Grandma.  Well, when I started the Damson, I was dead certain I would burn through the pattern.  In my arrogance, I quickly scanned the pattern and cast on.  I also only worked on the pattern when I was in route to somewhere.  It became my subway, trip to the grocery store, sitting in a meeting pattern.

I would check the row count from time to time, and more often than not, I lost a stitch somewhere.WTF.

It didn't help that every other knitting project I touched last week, was also screwed up.  At the end of the day (at least for me), it's pretty simple, IF I have 4 projects on the needles, 3 projects on the wheel, 2 that I am carding, and one that I am dyeing, I have taken the art of multi tasking to a horrible extreme, and I need to CUT IT OUT.  My brain was overloading all over the place, and it wasn't even overloading about real life crap, it was overloading because of my knitting. 

So last weekend I stopped knitting everything but the Damson, and I still made a couple mistakes, but instead of mindless ripping back, I actually re-read and paid attention to the pattern.  Overall, the pattern is pretty well written, and from reading comments from other Ravelry users I realize I am not the only one who overestimated the simplicity of it.  There are a few other "smarty pants" knitters out there (thank God).

Thankfully, Ysolda does two things that I really like:

1. She give stitch counts for every row, so you always know where you are.

2. She notes, that the number of stitches between the markers in the garter stitch section on the right side row equals the number of the row.  What this means is if I am on row 46, there will be 46 stitches between my 2 markers. 

Okay, here is where the pattern is a little sloppy.  She doesn't tell you where you are on the row.  Are you at the beginning or at the end, and what about the YO's, aren't they stitches?

Here are my notes, and how I cleaned it up a bit:

1. Using row 54  as an example, prior to starting row 54 (pre-yo's) your stitch count will be the same between the two markers as the row you are just starting.   So when I finish row 53, and turn it over to work row 54, prior to working row 54, I will have 53 stitches between the two markers. Or you can complete the row, and then count, but if you do that exclude the YO's you just worked.

2. The other thing to note, is that both the right side and the left side are  symmetrical (at least mine are).  To make my life easy, once I hit row 36 (or thereabouts), I put a stitch marker after the first four stitches, counted out 50, and then placed another one.  This way  I could easily check my row count.  I knew that if I made a mistake it would most likely at the beginning or at the end of the row, and this way I can quickly count both sides to make sure they are still symmetrical.  I also now keep a calculator in my bag for quick adding.

Using row 53 this time as the example.

Row 53 has 215 stitches

first check: Are there  53 between the middle markers: yes

second check:  Pattern says row 53 has 215 stitches.  Okay, I know I have 53 in between so I subtract 53.  215-53= 162 -100 (that are already accounted for by my markers = 62 divided by the two (each side)= 31.  I quickly check that I have 31 on left side and 31 on right side, and it matches up. Yay!

Please note: Although, this math keeps working out for me, I would really like to do this pattern over again from start to finish.  Obviously, using the stitch markers to count works, but I wish I had done this technique from the very start.  If you see anything wrong with my math, please give a shout out. 

Since I have done these two quick checks, I haven't made any mistakes, and I have saved a LOT OF TIME.  Prior to this I was re-counting the row every so often.  STUPID (and it was making my eyes bleed).

One other quick note, is I am using locking stitch markers for the middle section pre YO, and Post YO, I move up as needed but I find these easier to use when dealing with YO's.  I lock the stitch and never have to worry about the stitch marker moving or getting stuck on the wrong side of the YO.

stitch marker near beginning of row

stitch marker near middle section, and locking stitch marker.  Okay, 50 is the number I am using now, but when I get up to row 65 (which incidentally, I was at two days ago!), I will switch the markers so that there are 100 in between.  I might even do it sooner, the idea is that I want to be able to count quickly and count often, and I don't want to count out 150 stitches every time I need to check my row count.

In a perfect world, I should be able to see my stitches, and most of the time I can, but this yarn is a bit of a horror. "black variegated yarn= bleeding eyes, and as you tell from the pictures lighting in my apartment stinks, especially at night.  I think there are intuitive knitters and there are clever knitters.  My knitting intuition tells me that this is an easy pattern, and why not knit black.  Hah, after tinking back 3 times the clever knitter kicked in, like she so often does, and she ripped me a new a--hole. 

"Use your tools, and stop being so lazy."  She also forbade me to cast anything else on for awhile.

Now, what the f--k, how did a picture of Frankie end up in this entry! This post is suppose to only be about the Damson- I give up.

The days of dye and fiber (or where do you put it?)

This past Sunday, I went to a friend’s anniversary party.  She was celebrating 9 years  “Clean & Serene.”  Okay, I am not sure how serene she really is, because we haven’t hung out in a very long time, but she looked good and I was happy to see her.  Nine years is a long damn time to go without a drink.  “Yikes.”

I, myself, have been hitting the dye pot pretty hard lately.

 
(all this was white a week ago, yikes!)

It makes me wonder what I would be like today, if I still drank.  What if I started drinking now?  Would I kick back a few glasses of Chianti, while mixing dyes?

  Maybe, a few more glasses, while the dye is in the steamers.

How many bottles would I put away, while washing up a fleece? Two bottles, maybe three? 

I don’t blog about my sobriety that much.  It’s a shyness on my part. Most people who know me, know I am sober, but since so many of my friends drink these days I don’t want to weird anyone out by talking about it.  I drank for a very, very long time, 20 years to be exact, and I know on my end of it, I thought people who didn’t drink were pretty f—ked up.  Seriously, and the people that scare me the most are the people who never drank.  I don’t trust them at ALL.

In addition to the anniversary part, I also went last week to an Al-anon meeting with a friend who is going through a rough patch. It was the first Al-anon meeting I had been to in months.  I have a real love-hate thing going on with Al-anon.  It has helped me a lot over the years, but if, I feel shy talking about my sobriety, then I feel absolutely mortified talking about my family, or about how other people’s drinking/ drug use has affected my life. 

After the meeting, my friend and I went and had coffee. During coffee, she asked me a question that I have since been pondering.

“Where do you put it?” 

It didn’t take a degree in rocket science to figure out what she meant.  There is a lot of sadness around the disease of alcoholism, especially for family members. Sometimes, my sadness goes into my knitting.  When I am working, it’s a lot easier, because I am busy, and I don’t have time to think or FEEL.

Time off is a lot harder.

Since I have gotten back from Florida, I have been dyeing a LOT.  First there was the black phase, where a lot of my old stash went black.  Then I went thru a dark phase, forest green, dark blue, teal, vermillion.  Then I went thru my fall color phase, orange, red, yellow.   Now, I am in the natural dye phase (osage orange, logwood, querbracho red).

I liked the logwood so much that I spent three days dying with it.

Ugly yarn before logwood:

(see all the weird splotchy colors?)

Today, I started to think about various shades of sky blue and turquoise for Marion  Just a side note, I think these lighter colors are a sign of better mental health.

I am also trying to get to a few more meetings.  Here’s the thing, “I used to put it” down my throat, up my nose, or into my lungs. Lately, I have been putting it into the dye pot.   The feelings don’t ever go away, I have just found a safer place to put them. 

In addition to dying, I have also been combing, carding, and washing. Both carding and combing are great for getting out extra aggression.  And well, washing, like dyeing just makes me feel a lot better.  I think it has to do with all that water.  The other thing that makes me feel better is looking at sheep.  Not sure why, for months it was yarn, and now it’s sheep. I recently ordered two partial fleeces and I can’t wait for them to get here.  One of the fleeces is coming from cross fire hill farms , and the other fleece is coming from Gleason’s. 

I found Crossfire on the internet, it was this picture that made me reach out to them:

I got samples from both places, and I can't wait to see the fleeces!

Anyway, I hope I didn’t freak any of ya’ll out with all this talk of recovery, but every now and then I like to throw it out there because like my knitting, it’s a big part of who I am, and in AA they say if you want to keep it you gotta give it away, and for today I think I will keep it, because I don’t want to start mixing rioja in my dye pot or accidentally end up with a comb in my eye. 

Happy Thanksgiving, Everyone!

2 Dye 4

"Necessity is the Mutha." 

I am on a dying jag, there is no doubt about it.  "Why knit, when you can dye?"

This has been a very strange fall for me.   I spent a good part of October, sick with either allergies, a sinus infection, or both.  November finds me wondering where all the days went, and how to get back on track.  I have been out of work for two months.  Wow. 

Where did the time go? 

Usually, when I have this much time off, I lose 10 pounds.  Not this time, my friends! This time, I am dying anything I can get my hands on. 

If you have been following my blog, you might remember that earlier this fall I dyed a couple pounds of merino and about a pound of the alpalca, so that I could blend the two fibers and make batts.  Well, in theory, all that fiber should of kept me batty, for quite awhile, but alas, I am pretty sure I am alergic to the alpalca, and although  I hope eventually to able to work with it, currently I am playing it safe and avoiding the "Beast" at all cost.  Sorry, beast:(

Thankfully, I am a girl with resources and time on my hands.  Forget looking for work, excercise, or eating low fat food.  BORING.

Instead, I have decided that a much better use of my time honing my dying skills.

Last Friday, I decided I would try my hand at painting some combed top.

The first batch I tried was using some dorsett, I picked up at Rhinebeck.  I used a meat injector to get the dye into the fiber. 

 

The meat injector worked great, but because I DID NOT wait for the dye to cool, I FELTED THE FIBER.

 
 

I spun ½ of it up anyway, and with the other ½ I made batts.

On Monday, I dyed some merino superwash.

Other than adding emerald green, I used the some 4 colors from Jacquard, yellow sun, burnt orange, crimson, and lilac.  Wow.  The difference between the two fibers is crazy.  The dorsett, which had a yellow hue to begin with soaked up the colors evenly and has a real “southwestern” feel, wheras the merino looks it got attacked by a crayola box.  Spun up it reminds me of the “Candy Land” game.  My plan is to Navajo ply it. 

Today, I am playing with some natural dyes. I have about 17 ounces of kid mohair locks that I bought in Rhinebeck.  I took ½ of the locks, and put them in  quebracho bath, and the other 1/2 in the longwood gray. 

God, I love color.  It’s overcast and gray outside, but on my wheel, I have a 70’s motif, in my bedroom, I have two skeins of sunshine drying, and in my kitchen I spring flowers in the dye pot. 

In fact, the ONLY REASON I can see for going back to work is so that I will have money to buy more supplies. 

Why Top Down?

I am knitting my 6th top down cardigan. 

The first top down cardi I made, was too small, and now lives in the closet in Macon. The second was a disaster, and got frogged, the third was the February Lady sweater and it’s too big, but I wear it all the time anyway.  The fourth was the Mr. Greenjeans, which is damn near perfect.  The fifth is the callie, and it’s also damn near perfect. 

When I first started knitting, my goal was sweaters.  I made 5 my first knitting year, hated the way all of them looked on me, and then moved on to socks, shawls, gloves, hats, and scarves.  ANYTHING     that didn’t make me feel bad about myself upon completion.

In 2005, I again attempted sweaters, and fell in love with the idea of the top down cardi.  The first one I made was the boobholder by Stephanie Japel.  It was a great intro into top down cardigans, but if you look at pictures of this project, you can see all the things that can go wrong.  Mine is perfectly proportioned, I wore it twice when I was about 20lbs lighter and then put it in the closet.  I won’t rip it back, and I won’t give it away because it was one of the first sweaters that I made that was actually attractive.

My next few attempts were not so good, and this was pre-ravelry so I couldn’t see what 1200 women of all shapes and sizes looked like in my pattern.  I checked out “Knitting from the Top Down” from the local library and it made my head hurt.  I bought a pattern from “Knitting Pure & Simple” but couldn’t get gage with the yarn I had, which was a thick and thin, and was recently donated to my friend Grace.  I also tried this sure to fit pattern, which gives technical advice on how to make a top down cardigan, but isn’t meant to flatter the female body, and doesn’t give any advice on how to accentuate the positive. 

Sweaters are personal, they show off the best and worst of our bodies, and sometimes they show what used to be our best is now our worst.  When a sock doesn’t fit, I don’t feel the need to lock myself in the bedroom with a glass of diet coke and a bag of potato chips.  I don’t mourn my 20’s.  I don't consider going back on the cocaine and red wine diet. I accept the defeat gracefully. 

Sometimes, if I like the yarn, I will unravel it, but usually, I just toss the evil sock into the back of my sock drawer, and wait for a day when my foot looses a few pounds.  The other thing that makes knitting sweaters a bit horrific for me, is the time factor.  When I am not working, I can knock out a sweater in a month, but when I am working a sweater can take me an entire season.  To spend 4 months knitting something, and THEN find out it doesn’t fit.  THE HORROR. 

Now, if you’re an experienced knitter, which many of you are, you are thinking to yourself. “Why doesn’t she do a gauge swatch? Doesn’t she check her gauge?  Is she washing/ blocking her swatch?  Is she checking measurements throughout the process of knitting?”

“Yes, yes, yes, and yes.”

These are all valid questions, and dear readers, these are all the same 'snotty ass' questions, I also ask myself when one of my friends knits a sweater that doesn’t fit.

GAUGE, GAUGE, GAUGE.  It’s everywhere. 

BUT bodies are funny things, and how we perceive ourselves is even funnier.  When I knit the February Lady Sweater, I just knew I was an extra large. I knit for two weeks, used up two skeins of yarn, and completed about six of perfect knitting.  I rechecked my gauge, and it had changed. I ripped it back, and started over. The second time, I got gauge for the sweater, and checked it against my body.  It was a little big, but at the time, I was certain I was an extra large.  I was terrified that a large would be too snug, and that all that knitting time be for not.  Bigger is better, right?

Two sweaters that fit later, and even after worrying and learning all that EASE crap, I found out that a large fits me well.  “I will take a 42, please.”  I have also found that the best test for me is to try it on a few times, and to make sure when I try it on, I wear a bra, and maybe a similar top to what I will be wearing with the sweater.  I also walk around, and move my arms up and down.  This my friends, is another reason I love knit picks needles. 

There is also knowing what a yarn will do, and really the only way to know this is by having some knitting time under your belt.  I know that superwash and alpaca both stretch.  If I am knitting with a fiber I haven’t worked with before, I will ask a friend or read reviews of the yarn.  If I am in between sizes on a sweater I want to make, I will err on the side of the yarn.

My current sweater (the liesl) is made with handspun.  Handspun is some of the scariest shit out there to knit with.  It’s my yarn.  I made it. With this yarn, I not only spun it, I carded it, and I dyed it.    Ugh. When I first started knitting most of my projects had that wonky uneven look of being handmade and people always knew I made it myself.  My handspun is far from perfect, but I have found that 3 plying the yarn gives it a more finished look, and with some creative pattern choices my handspun looks pretty good.

Once again, my heart is involved; it’s the double whammy of my body, working with my wonky yarn. Yikes!  What a scary combo.   I picked the Liesl as my first handspun sweater, because it was an aran weight, which meant for fast knitting, and spinning.  It’s feather and fan  which is a great choice for uneven yarn, and most importantly it is top down, which meant I could try it on as I go.  I figured five IF five hours into knitting it, it looked like something little kitty puked up, I would cast on something pretty. 

The number one reason, I love top down is that I can check my work as I go.  I don’t have to wait until I am through knitting it to see what a sweater will look like on me.  I try on my sweater a lot when I am working on it.  Every step of the way, I have a pretty good idea of what it’s going on, and if something is not working I can figure out what to do about it.

For example, I worked my first sleeve of the liesl.  I used size 10’s which is the same size needle, I used for the body, and the body fits very well.  Well, the first sleeve was pretty tight.  My guess is it will probably block out looser, and after some wearing time the yarn will stretch.  The yarn was a combo of BFL superwash, Alpalca, and Merino so I know it’s going to stretch, BUT it really bothered me that the sleeve was so snug.  My biceps are big, and the tightness around the biceps is not new to me, it happens a lot when I am shopping.  It’s also an emotional sore spot with me, and even when I go weeks without working out, I still keep free weights near my bed, and I will do a few sets of weights from time to time so that my large biceps don’t turn into my large flabby biceps. 

Here is the thing, “Why the HELL, would I want to continue knitting a sweater that is tight on me?”  I slept on it, which meant I spend the night in a half sleep state, wondering if I could increase the sleeves.  I realized the only way to do that would be to add another 8 stitches. What if I went up a needles size? “Kinda to think of it, don’t always knit a little tighter in the round?”

I cast on the second sleeve in 10.5 and it fit pretty well. 

It’s probably only a ½ inch difference, but proportionally it feels better, and it’s snug without feeling tight and since the sweater is an aran weight and it’s wool, I think less insulation is a good thing.  I have about 3 more inches, and then I will have to rip back the first sleeve, and re-work.  The nice thing about aran weight sweaters is how fast they work up, the downside is that athough I have only been knitting it for a few weeks, it’s gotten heavy, and the weight of the sweater alone makes me want to be done with it.

If you have a fear of sweaters, I recommend trying top down.  You can throw a rock and hit a decent top down sweater pattern.  Or go look in my queue. If you think top down sweaters, are lacking shaping, take a peak at Wendy Bernard work.  Next on my list is “Wicked.”   But first, I am planning to finally make DH a sweater.  Uggh.  To prepare myself for this, I cast on Damson (another Ysolda pattern). 

Carding out Marion

I know, I know.  I left my blog on a cliffhanger.  All of you are wondering how much money I spent, and how I fared, spending a weekend with 6 other women who are as sick about fiber as I am.   Well, it went very well.  The only downside was that I got a horrible cold that lasted throughout the weekend, and into the middle of this week. 

At first, I thought it was allergies, but when I was still sick after I got back home, I figured out that it had to be a cold yet again.  This is my third run in with a cold in the last 6 weeks.  It was scary for a few days there, because EVERYTHING was setting it off.  I couldn’t knit, I couldn’t cuddle my dogs, and I wanted to lock myself in a airtight vacuum where there wasn’t dust, fiber, or anything smelly.  It was so bad that, on Monday after 3 days of not being able to breathe I bagged up all my yarn.  In retrospect, the yarn should probably been bagged up along, but I really like being able to look around my apartment and see all my pretty yarn.

Ooops, I digress. 

We saw lots of animals, I petted a few of them.  Here are my two favorites:

(I am pretty sure this is a Romney from Anchorage farms?)

(This is a little cashmere goat I met.  I love his eyes.)

I bought a bunch of stuff:

(This is my friend Ester's car packed to the hilt.  I claim the red bag, the wheel, and the bucket full or yarn).

(Yes, most of this is new, and most of it is from Little Barn- which is the place thrifty spinners in the know go)

By far my favorite purchase was a fleece named Marion.  She is Leicester Longwool. 

Now for those of you not familiar with Leicester Longwools, they have wonderful long locks, and spin up very shiny.  They also have a very soft undercoat.  Marion is my first fleece, and after doing a little bit of reading, I have found a nice rhythm for working with her. 

(This is just a really cute picture of Frankie Pom-Pom)

I have been flick carding the locks out.  This is working very well, except where the fleece is extremely matted or when the locks appear to be too short.  If the lock is under 4 inches, I drag it over my hand card and for the most part, the lock has opened back up.  Most of the locks are around 6 inches.

(flick carding)

(dragging stubborn lock over hand card)

 

(opened lock)

So far, I have carded out two little baskets of locks, and a big bag of undercoat.

(this is a dog comb, I bought at Pet Smart. It's really been great for separating the locks from the undercoat)

I spun up a sample, and I have found that spinning in the fold is a great way for me to spin up this fleece.  It has given me a fair amount of control, which is good because the fiber has been a little slippery.

 Here is a sample of how she spun up.  Pretty cool, huh. 

Anyway, I also bought:

1.  17 ounces of kid mohair
2. natural dyes, and more jacquard
3.  skein from Creatively Dyed Yarn 
4. some fiber from Briar Rose
5. combed top from Little Barn, along with some angelina and some silk to dye and make batts with
6.  8 skeins of wild apple hill yarn to make a sweater for DH.  It's a nice shetland 2 ply. 
7. some fiber from Gale Art.

Basically, it's official I can am set for life provided, I knit and spin every day for at least 4 hours. 

I also had some knitter celebrity sightings.  This is where I could get a little bitchy, IF I wasn’t high off of carding Marion.  By far, the friendliest celebrity knitters I met where Ann & Kay from Mason Dixon Fame, and if you click this link, you will see a really cute picture they took of me and my new friend Lisa. 

Lisa also bought a longwool fleece, lives in Brooklyn, blogs, and has two dogs.  Small world, right?

Here is a really cute picture of a few of the girls, I hung out with last weekend. 

(Lisa, Laura, Sara, and Esther)

This is a really cute picture of a knitter, that is not a friend of mine, and I know nothing about, except that she was donning a really cute hat!  (My guess is we could be friends)

KNIT GIRL POWER-ACTIVATE.

The Blue Beast and counting down to Rhinebeck.

I am happy to report that the knitting curse that has plagued me for the last few months has lifted.  I have had some pretty good knitting mojo the last few weeks.  As you know, I finished my swallowtail, I also re-worked the button band on the callie cardigan I had been working on since April.  Seriously, 6 months on a cardigan, a year on a shawl, that’s enough stagnation to make the most patient of knitters antsy.  For someone like me, it was down right infuriating.  The good news is that as apathetic as I felt about finishing the swallowtail, I felt euphoric when I finished the callie.  It blocked out beautifully, and the cotton cashmere yarn is scrumptious to wear. 

In addition to finishing the callie this week, I also finished spinning up the Blue Beast.  The Blue Beast is a blend of BFL, Merino, and fleece from an alpaca named “Beasty Boy.”  I dyed and carded the fiber, and I am really happy with how this yarn came out, because when I dyed it I was really striving for the look of denim, and when I spun it I was going for an aran weight, and in the yarn I got was pretty gosh darn close to being perfect.  It’s bouncy and soft, and I think the only surprise was how gosh darn quickly about 2lbs of yarn can turn into only 5 skeins of worsted weight yarn. 

In late August, as I was finishing my show, I started knitting the Liesl. One skein into the project, I lost interest because the yarn I was using was Rowan summer tweed in dusty pink color.  Somehow knitting in pink cotton after Labor Day just felt like a knitting faux pas.   Sadly, ONCE AGAIN, I had missed out on summer knitting.  The pattern however kept calling to me.  It’s a feather and fan, in a aran weight, and can be knit with as little as 500 yards.  (Hello, hello, knit me, spin me). 

It took me about 3 weeks to card and spin the fiber, and although I swatched for it about 5 days ago, I practiced patience, and didn’t start knitting it until yesterday. 

Although, I don’t think of myself as a perfectionist, I really try my damnest to avoid making “rookie” mistakes. The BFL, Alpalca, and Merino had all taken the dye slightly differently.  I had also used two different shades of blue, and with the BFL, I had did a pour dye, where is with the alpaca and merino, I had immersed the fiber.  I was going for a bit of variegation, and I got it.   Both the batts and the singles had variegation.  My concern was that plied up maybe the yarn would be too stripy and uneven.  I knew I could fix this alternating skeins, but the downside was I couldn’t start knitting until I finished spinning. 

As it turns out, my fear was unfounded because although there are the occasional lighter shades through out the skeins, the skeins are consistent.  Yay!

While I was finishing up my plying, I knitted up the Quant.  The Quant was my second attempt at Navajo plying.  The fiber is a corridale/ alpaca blend from Spunky Eclectic and it was gifted to me from my friend Sarah.  The fiber is a combed top, and I was very, very careful when I divided it up to spin it.  I divided it into 10 sections, and I spun it very fine so that I could get a little more yardage out of it.  I ended up with a sports weight, and about 130 yards.  I love how the yarn came out, and a few people have commented that it looks like Noro (!).  How cool is that?  Pretty gosh darn cool, I tell you.  

Also the pattern is a great intro into entrelac.  The designer says you can knock it on in a night, it took me a week, but after 3 restarts, it was pretty easy, and even better by the end of it, I had the pattern memorized.

(My other friend Sarah modeling the Quant)

Anyway, tomorrow my knitting gal pals & I are heading up to Rhinebeck.  We have rented a house for the weekend.  The weather is supposed to be cold and rainy.  Yay!  I would prefer cool and sunny, but what are you gonna do? Me, I am going to knit, and maybe spin a little.  Will this be the year, I come home with a stinky fleece? It might be.

The Swallowtail Saga

Okay, full disclosure here.

For the last few months, I have felt cranky with my knitting.  

My relationship with most of my projects has felt like a bad marriage.  Stagnant, repetitive, boring. More than once, in the last few months I have wanted to throw both my callie cardigan and the swallowtail shawl out the window, and try a new hobby.

Macramé?  Quilting?  Maybe decoupage? 

The callie cardigan was technically finished three weeks ago, BUT I didn’t pick up enough stitches in the button band, and it looked way wonky.  My friend, Eve patiently explained what my damage was and I took in the information and then threw the callie in the corner for a time out.  I decided that the only solution would be to finish the swallowtail shawl.  I started the swallowtail over a year ago, and for some darn reason the project never emotionally took for me.  Usually, ½ way thru a project, I start to fall in love with it, but I was about ¾ of the way thru the swallowtail, and my interest in it was tepid at best.

In fact, about the only reason I felt like finishing it all was my EGO.  The callie is a very easy project had already made a fool out of me.  The BQE socks had finished about a month ago were pretty ugly.  If I was honest with myself, which I tend to be, it had been months since I had finished something that I really liked.  I knew a lot of this was because I had been working my ass of since the middle of March and although I had knitted the entire time I was working very little progress had been made.  I had also started quite a few projects and they didn’t take. 

Maybe, I would never knit anything pretty again, and my worse fear was true I was too stupid for lace.  It was in this negative space, that I decided it was time to tackle the swallowtail.  The great thing about being unemployed is that if you decide to do some marathon lace knitting, you can get a chart done in a day.  The budding lace repeats had taken me 8 months to complete with a few hours here and there.  I finished the last three charts in less than a week.  I had my share of small setbacks.  I had to tink back twice, and I got pretty confused when I switched to the final chart, which is the peaked edging.  I knew that I had to increase by eight stitches, and I did what I THOUGHT was the right amount of increases, and then somehow my math was off and I had was off by two stitches, so had to tink back to where I had made the two increases, and lose them. 

 

Desperate Housewives, Beverly Hills 90210, and the Gray’s Anatomy kept me company through out.  When I got too brain dead to knit, I switched over to reading about vampires. 

Somehow during this marathon, I caught a cold or it could be that the cold I had in Florida decided to reemerge.  In any case, the first time I blocked the swallowtail, I screwed up the blocking, and pulled out the clusters instead of the yarn over’s.  Duh. I have had months to look at other knitters’ swallowtails, and although my shawl blocked out very well, it didn’t look right.  At first, I was afraid that maybe my bind off had been too tight, and then a quick review I caught my faux pas.  Thank God, I didn’t have to re-work the bind off!

Yesterday, I decided it was time to once again pick up my swallowtail, and re-block. 

 

I am happy with the results, and even happier to have the project behind me.  I am not sure why some projects “emotionally” feel better than others for me, but this is often the case.  It seems strange to me that I can spend months working on a shawl, and feel less satisfaction when I finish it than I do when I finish socks that only took me two weeks to knit.  My guess is that some projects are just more like me, so those are the ones I am drawn to. 

(Harris Tweed Socks- Finished)

 

Trash Lit & a very cute hat.

I sometimes think I should change the subtext of my blog to read “A city girl’s guide to surviving PMS by knitting, watching tv, and eating too much chocolate.”  Sigh. 

Last week was one of those ANNOYING weeks.  My brain went down to Tahiti, and all I was left with was my Type A personality, a ravenous appetite, and some pretty bad cramps.  6 Advil, and two Hershey Bars (the big ones) later, and I was doing okay.

I have found that when I get like this the best thing to do is surrender, or exercise, or both. On the No-No list are paying bills, knitting lace, and going to McDonald’s.  All of which I have done, with very bad results.

The knitters have all been reading the “Sookie Stackhouse” series.  My friend Grace lent me the first book of the series, about a month ago, when I was finishing up my job.  I read the first chapter, found it too light and mindless even for me, and picked back up the very long, and tedious historical novel that I was reading.  

About 10 days ago, my friend Esther lent me the rest of the series.  Now, as many of you know I am a lover of jags, I am not sure why it feels more inviting to read six books than one, but this is how I roll.  I am sure a good therapist would say I have abandonment issues.  I love to read, I always have.    At age 10, I was reading, “Gone with the Wind, Rebecca, and My Secret Garden".  BTW, I wasn’t reading the kids version of “My Secret Garden.”  I was reading Nancy Friday’s version of it, it was the late 70’s, so there was a lot of bestiality in it.  Oh my. 

Thus a great love affair with reading began, and I guess this is also when I discovered the secret joy of reading trash and the freedom of owning a library card.  As a pre-teen, I read 'The Betsy', all of Jackie Collins, and all of Kathleen Woodweiss.  

Here is the thing about trash lit, most of the time; I think it’s a lot like casting on with big needles and making a large luscious scarf with Colinette Five Point yarn.  The immediate results are quite wonderful, but the long terms satisfaction is not there in a way that it would be with a more intricate project.  BUT, if you aren’t knitting at all, and have lost your knitting mojo, by all means please find some beautiful yarn and cast on!

(My friend Sarah at the Garden Sheep and Wool Festival demonstrating the joy of knitting with gigantic needles- "Go, go, go Sarah!")

And my dear friends, this is about where I was last week.  I wasn’t knitting and I wasn’t reading, and I was feeling too dumb to do either.  So I decided to do both.  And in addition to having not 1, but 6 “Sookie Stackhouse” novels at my disposal, I had just finished winding up a ball of my first Navajo plied handspun.  It was only 130 yards, so I figured no matter what project, I picked I couldn’t do a whole lot of damage.  I also figured the simpler the project the better.  My project of choice was a hat.

When I first started knitting, I made a ton of hats.  Most of them were with my handspun, and quite a few of them were in colors that should not be worn, unless you are five, and living in Florida. The pattern I used with some slight modifications was from Zen String.  It’s a 2x2 rib, but I have been working a pair of Harris Tweed socks.  The socks are in double broken rib, and currently this is my stitch of choice.  It adds a nice structure to stockinette, which sometimes is too flat and shapeless for me, but it adds a bounce to ribbing, which is sometimes, too dense for my taste.  I have never used this stitch pattern on a hat, and I was a little nervous that it would be too slouchy, but it worked out beautifully. 
Mods:

Straight 2x2 ribbing for about 1.5 inches,
Broken rib for 7 inches,
I followed the patterns instructions for decreasing, but made sure all my decreases happened, except for the last decrease on ribbing rows.

The hat took me two days to make, and during that time period I also finished my first Sookie Stackhouse book, and started my second.  Although, the books are of the “Light and Mindless” category, they are a shitload of fun to read.  “Anne Rice Lite” meets “Nancy Drew doing the Hardy Boys.”  Oh yah!

My brain returned from Tahiti on Thursday afternoon, and along with it came a renewed sense of determination.  If in my brain addled state, I could create this really cute hat, read two books, and watch “Dancing with the Stars” couldn’t I now tackle something bigger?  How bout’ Club Dead and a little bit of lace?  Thus, after months of neglect I picked up my swallowtail.  I have happily completed 2 ½ charts and now I am closing in on the last chart.  I owe this to Sookie Stackhouse, Beverly Hills 90210 and my friend Eve. Not only did Eve do all the mods for the Swallowtail for me, so that I could make it bigger, she also read all the Sookie Stackhouse books, thus showing me that even smart girls read trash from time to time. 

Beauty and the Beast

    "Beauty in things exists merely in the mind which contemplates them."
David Hume's Essays, Moral and Political, 1742. 

I believe that most knitters look at a lovely skein of yarn, and immediately start to imagine what the yarn could become.  A small skein of cashmere, becomes a cowl or some gloves.  Laceweight alpalca becomes a swallowtail shawl, merino a sweater.  Most knitters look at sock yarn, and immediately start to turn the heel in their mind , or if it’s sexy sock yarn, they start working the lace pattern in right then and there.

I never love a yarn more than I do my first four hours of knitting with it.  It’s what “I think it might do” that’s so magical to me.  I have 400 yards of jojoland laceweight in my stash.  I pick it up from time to time, and ponder what it will become.  Most likely, it will become a lace scarf, but if I wait long enough maybe it will become the lace scarf I wear to the Oscars.

If a knitter looks at a skein of yarn, and immediately envisions it’s future, than the advantage to being a spinner is that he or she gets to look directly at fiber, and envision what it will become.  If you are an really sick  imaginative  spinner, you will  look at the animal and envision what the fleece will become.

Last week, three of my knitting pals and I went to the Garden State Sheep and Wool Festival.  It was wonderful little festival, and it was great to walk around and fondle pet all the animals.  As my friend, Sarah patiently walked back and forth looking at various fleeces with me, it dawned on me that she had the affliction gift also.  She could look at an animal, and immediately wash, dye, card, spin, and knit the animal into an FO. 

After looking at various fibers, I finally settled on Beasty Boy.  Now, Beasty Boy was over 2 pounds of glorious alpalca.  He was super soft, and within a few minutes of eying him, he was already integrated into my stash, blended with some merino, and being knitted into lace scarves, hats, fingerless gloves, and sweaters.  This is where, I tell you that, an hour before I bought Beasty Boy, I had purchased my new petite Staunch drum carder, so my confidence level was pretty high that this could not only be accomplished, but be accomplished at record speed.

Here is beastie  boy, pre-washed.

I was a little overwhelmed by all the smells, and textures when I first encountered beastie boy, so my original recollection of him was as a soft caramel pullover?), but as it turns out he is actually a beautiful pewter gray (cardigan?).  It took me somewhere between 4-5 rinses, but I finally got all the dust out.  

Here is beasty boy after he was dyed.  He is hanging out, with some merino.  Unfortunately, I didn't catch their names. 

And here is the BFL that got blended with Beasty Boy,

and here is my defination of Beauty,

Now if you are not a spinner, I will most likely have to show this to you again in a few weeks after I have spun it so that you can see the FO in it, but if you are a spinner you may already see that this is a sweater. 

Frogging Over: “Sock that Rock” Take 2

“It’s never too late to have a happy childhood.”  Hmm, I am not sure about that one, but I do know that it’s never to late to start a knitting project over, at least not if you are me.  I can’t remember the last time, I actually casted on a project and finished the same project where something in the middle wasn’t altered.  I know that a lot of knitters do this, but I wonder how many knitters do this quite as drastically as I do.

My latest project has been a pair of socks with the infamous “socks that rock” yarn that I got a Rhinebeck last year.  I coveted this yarn for a long time before buying it.  For those of you not familiar with the “Socks that Rock” phenomenon, I recommend you get out from under the rock that you have been living under, put down the acrylic, stop shopping at Michael’s, and join the “rocking sock club.”

Seriously though, all yarn snobbery aside, the yarn is great, BUT I didn’t find it suitable for lace.  I was knitting the Broadripple socks and about 4 hours into knitting them, I found that my sock was too small, and as pretty as the sock was it just didn’t fit the yarn. 

Now this is when a sane knitter, frogs, and re-cast on with a bigger needle or switches yarn or switches patterns.  On my end, I kept working the sock and trying it on every few inches knowing that it didn’t fit, but not having the heart to start over.  “Was I enamored? Or was it just the stress of being down in Florida, near my mom that kept me knitting the socks?”

Here is the thing, IF I had been at home or if my husband had been driving, I think I would have been more “knitting aware.”  As it was, most of my knitting was done while I was visiting various family members.  It was mindless knitting, and the color changes and the springiness of the yarn where enough for me.  I knew the socks would never fit, but for several days I just didn’t care.  They were my security blanket, and I needed them as imperfect as they were.

I turned the heel while listening to my step father tell me tales of when he was a “rubber” salesmen in the 50’s.  My stepfather is in his late 70’s, has prostrate cancer and has just gotten out of the hospital.  Him and my mom never actually married, but they started dating when I was 13 and he is the closest thing to a father that I have ever known.  He is a strong Irishman from Connecticut, and to say he drinks too much is like saying, Elizabeth Zimmerman knitted too much.  Some things just are.

I hit a lot of rain down in Florida.

At times, it felt like bad weather was following me, and maybe it was.  My visit with my mom was painful.  I think I liked it better in my teenage years when she was crazy, and I blamed her for everything.  Somewhere in my mid 30’s I learned to forgive her, and now time with her makes me sad.  In fact, the entire state of Florida made me sad.  In some ways the rain was comforting because being sad in the sunshine seems like sacrilege. 

I got a cold when I was down in Florida, so the drive back to GA felt surreal.  I stopped at a Dairy Queen, and the strawberry shake seemed to help.

It's a six hour drive, so when I got back to the house, I was tired and I went to bed.  I slept fitfully for about 10 hours.  When I woke up, I realized that the only chance I had to feel like myself again would be to rip back the socks.  I didn’t need them anymore.

I spent a few hours tinkering and then I landed on the Harris Tweed Socks.  The body of the sock is knit in double broken rib, which I really like a lot.  It’s not quite as tedious as knitting ribbing or stockinette, but the pattern likes the yarn.  It’s making for a cushy sock and I think it will be great with clogs.  As for me, I am happy to be back in Brooklyn.  It was a weird trip.  Everything felt disjointed, and I hate that feeling. 

I tend to be project driven, and I hate when there is no finality to things.  

(Frankie in the front seat of the rental, the I-pod charging at a rest stop)