Woolly Mammoths

Oak leaf family tr..... nevermind.

2009-09-19T21:23:00.004-04:00

This is a bit of a confessional post: I have backed down from a sweater project, for the first time on record.

I want to make a heavily modified Oak Leaf Family Tree pullover, which centers around this amazing acorn-and-leaf cable... I've chosen some coordinating cables, I have the yarn and needles, but I don't want to do it right now. I have too much other stuff on my plate. I am, however, happy to say I've figured out my leaf technique, thanks to this swatch.

That swatch is using a different method every time a small stem branches off of the large stem, and it plays with acorn spacing and acorn decrease methods too. And leaf increases. The winners are:

The acorn should be 3 purls away from the main stem, not just two as the pattern has it (see the top right acorn). The extra stem movement is easily added by a single 1-over-1 cable cross on the wrong side.
Speaking of cable crosses, 1-over-1 cable crosses are (for me) a cleaner way of moving the little stems than increasing on one side and decreasing on the other.
The acorn should be closed off with a k5tog rather than a centered decrease, but it has to be tight (see the lower left acorn).
The best way (that I found) to introduce a new knit stitch into a 2-stitch stem as a small stem branches away is to increase an extra purl stitch a couple of stitches away from the stem, then use a 1-over-1 cable cross to move one original stem stitch away to form the new smaller stem; as the extra purl stitch crosses underneath, it turns into a knit stitch. Everything stays tight, and continuity is maintained between the small stem and the larger one (see the topmost branching).
My favorite double increase for the middle of the leaf is k1, leave stitch on needle, k1 into stitch below, k1 into the first stitch again. This leaves a "vein" in the middle (see the left upper leaf).

I'll want these notes, probably next winter. I've decided that since I'm using the same yarn I used for the Hourglass Aran, I'd be wise to wait and see how that wears during its first season. There may be things I'll want to adjust for as I prepare to make this next fancy cabled sweater.

In the meantime I'm enjoying knitting up someone else's cleverness, as well as designing a simple (but small-gauge) anniversary sweater for my husband.

Swirled Pentagons: mission accomplished

2009-09-05T19:09:00.002-04:00

I finished this sweater weeks ago, but only now has it been cool enough to put it on for five minutes and ask my husband to take a photograph. As you can see, it fits but is in need of blocking:

I have nothing to say about the completion of this sweater except this: oh my god, so much stockinette, never again! never never never!

My modifications:

Like others (including grumperina), I got the right gauge and size on the pentagons by knitting them with size SIX needles instead of size NINES. While there is nothing in the errata about this, I am convinced there is in fact a mistake.
I made the ribbing on the body 2.5” long to match the cuffs.
I also made the whole body about 2” longer than the pattern called for.

The arms are a little tight -- not so tight that I won't wear the sweater, but tight enough that I can't wear a long sleeved layer underneath. I like it, but a bit less than I was hoping I would; I liked the way the pentagons came down over the shoulders of the model in Knitting Nature and was sad when I found out that sweater was way too big for her. Nonetheless, this fits and is shiny and nice. The best part is the back of the yoke, so I'll be sure to wear my hair braided with this so that people can see it.

Seven and a half little coolie hats

2009-06-28T23:20:00.000-04:00

It took a lot of swatching to get going on my latest project. Along the way I made a little coolie hat for the stuffed bookworm given to me by my good friend Bree:

It took me a long time, and I did a fair bit of trigonometry regarding pentagons, before I figured out that the coolie hat would block flat with no problems. Then I went on a business trip, knitted LOTS of little coolie hats and got them wet and smashed them:

Yes, it's the Swirled Pentagon Pullover from Knitting Nature, a sweater I've liked since the day I started knitting. In comparison to the Overdose Aran, it seems deliciously simple and likely to go very, very fast. I also adore my yarn, which is Valley Yarns Colrain in majestic blue. It's shiny, which brings out all the wild swirling these ribbed pentagons have to offer, and was used by both my favorite instantiations of the pattern on Ravelry.

I loved these pentagons, people. LOVED. Perhaps the most delicious part was picking them up from each other; the directions specified using a long-tail cast-on, then picking up stitches using alternately the working yarn and the tail when it came time to pick up stitches. Something about this fiddly process had me utterly charmed, maybe the neat twist made by the two yarns on the back, or the way the pentagons so cleanly line up knits with knits and purls with purls.

One peculiar thing about these is that I eventually got gauge on them using size 6 needles, making me wonder how the directions (which call for size 9s) could possibly be right. I think that number may be upside-down. The great Grumperina had the exact same suspicion a while ago, but the errata are silent on this matter, so this will have to remain a mystery. All that matters is that she fixed hers and I fixed mine. I'm hoping to get away without altering the sleeves and body very much.

The very last Hourglass Aran post

2009-06-13T22:47:00.002-04:00

This is it... at long last, the FO pictures. :D

I'm certainly glad that my in-house knitting critic approves.

All over except the final photo shoot.

2009-06-06T15:15:00.004-04:00

O HAI INTERNETZ. Guess what is finished? My ridiculously complicated Hourglass Aran. These final pictures of the construction were taken this morning, before washing it; I knew how much this yarn changes when the oil from the spinning comes out of it, and wanted crisp pictures. After the photoshoot I washed it in the bathtub, where it fluffed and softened mightily... so once it dries you can expect one more blog post with pictures of it actually ON me.

Nice detail #1 is how the sleeve underarm area has a gusset, which continues a line between st st and reverse st st that starts on the body where the side panels meet the front and back panels. Maybe nobody will ever see this or know about it except me, but it makes me kind of happy.

I twisted the central cable in opposite directions on the two sleeves.

And, lastly, a shot the shoulder from above, which shows the braided mini-saddles and also the beginning of the closed cabling on the sleeves. I'm very happy with this; it turned out as planned. At one point I wanted to do a different and more organic transition between the saddle and the sleeve cables, but that will have to wait for another sweater. :)

It's hard to get luckier...

2009-05-03T13:55:00.003-04:00

I am always confused by knitting sleeves... they just go ON and ON and ON until suddenly they stop. So for most of this sleeve, I was sure the pattern could not end gracefully and I'd have to just run it straight into the ribbing; but in the end, it could. Check out how lucky I got:

So, I win. One more sleeve. :)

Hourglass Aran sleeve design

2009-04-18T11:51:00.004-04:00

After some tribulation, sleeve #1 is long enough to show you.

The central cable is a (slight) adaptation of No. 46 from Annie Maloney's Cable Knitter's Handbook, the next cable out is my own, and the texture stitch is... um, I can't find which book it came from anymore. It's probably called "little honeycomb", and if you like doing 1-over-1 cable crosses this stitch is for you. :)

I made my life unintentionally difficult by wanting to do a shallow set-in sleeve from the top down. The faster I could increase stitches, the shallower the set-in... but it turns out that there's a limit to how quickly a person can do increases, and it's hard to even hit that limit gracefully. In the end, I begged for help on Ravelry, and this is the wisdom I came away with:

To increase 1 stitch on each side on every row, just do a yarnover for the increase -- you need that extra yarn in the fabric so that the edge (diagonal) stitches can be longer than the other stitches. Twist each yo on the next row to close the hole.

You can see in the upper right of this closeup that I got it working pretty well.

You can also see that I did a gusset rather than do the texture stitch all the way across. Decreases actually continue at the same rate after the gusset; it's just a visual feature more than a shaping one. I could have done without the fake seam, with a bit more planning, but joining in the round left me with a one-row jog in the pattern from one side to the other.

Finally, here's what the sleeve will eventually look like from the front when being worn:

Yeah, the cap wound up a bit trapezoidal, but I think it won't show much.

I already know it will be annoying to set these into the sweater body. I'm thinking of trying to do it using backstitch and a dressmaker's technique, explained here on Ravelry by Annie herself. But first things first: I need to finish the forearm, figure out how to gracefully end the central cable (which I'd like to close off) and do the cuff. To say nothing of ~~the dog~~ the second sleeve.

A new technique for starting closed cables

2009-02-15T13:45:00.003-05:00

Ever since I started knitting cables, I've been looking for a flatter way to start closed cables for those cases where a rounded beginning is desired. Now, I'm happy to present a new technique whose beginning is both flat and full. One right-side row, you haven't started your cable; the next right-side row, you have two 2-stitch cables that are already separated by four purl stitches.

Here's what it looks like, along with an initial try at a matching decrease.
Before blocking, a circle:

After blocking, it's actually a bit wider than it is tall:

How is that possible? The core of the new technique: it relies on short rows to create the bulk at the bsse of the cable, rather than relying only on added stitches. It should probably be called the Bobble Method, because that’s what I was thinking of when the idea was born.

Directions

On a wrong-side row (on which you’re working knit stitches):

Purl into the front and back of 2 consecutive stitches.

TURN THE WORK. Knit those four stitches.

TURN THE WORK. Purl those four stitches, then continue knitting to the end of the row.

On the next row, a right-side row, perform two cable crosses when you get to within 2 stitches of the lump of knit stitches:

Cross the first two knits over the two preceding purl stitches

Cross the other two knits over the two following purl stitches

Pros and Cons

What’s good about this method (and by good I only mean it satisfied my goals), is that it doesn’t depend on crazy increases: it adds bulk directly to the very base of the cable via a couple of extra short rows, and adds only 2 new stitches. As a result, it disturbs the underlying fabric less than a technique that depends on making 4 new stitches. In addition, the 4 stitches in the new pattern are well established before they're pulled hard apart, so that no hole is created when that happens.

Caveat: this is probably best for making cables that do quickly separate to place 4 purl stitches between the new knit columns, since there is a gap naturally formed on either side of the initial short rows that is hidden by (and helps to accommodate) the 2-knit-over-2-purl crosses that move the cables apart from one another.

Caveat #2: it's hard to chart. :P

Why I had to invent it now

I needed something new for the Hourglass Aran I'm designing: a sweeping, luxurious entry into a cable of Annie Maloney's, to go on the sleeve cap and lead the eye downward. (If you like the cable, it's an adaptation of No. 46 from her Cable Knitter's Handbook, a book I highly recommend to any cable enthusiast.)

My thanks to TECHknitter over at TECHknitting, who had nothing to do with this technique, but who first got me thinking in terms of "how can I put more yarn in this particular spot?". I hope this is helpful to those of you out there designing this style of cable.

Hourglass Vest

2009-02-08T12:00:00.003-05:00

Have you been wondering whether my crazy sweater-construction idea with the shaped cable panels was going to work at all? Yeah, me too. :)

It works...

Here's a side view (impossible to take this one without distorting the fabric of the front and back rather a lot):

Here I am looking smug, perhaps because instead of a handful of pieces I suddenly have a functional Aran vest. Or perhaps because it was windy out and I was squinting.

If you look at the sides, you can see I got bitten a little by the rows of plain reverse stockinette stitch on the side panels, which have a larger gauge than the cabling and caused the ribbing there to actually pull in. Though that's annoying, I think it'll block right out when I wash this and is not worth fixing in the knitting, at this point.

Now, onto the next huge challenge -- sleeves. I left a generous armscye in this sweater body, which make it very comfortable as a vest (I'm still wearing it as I type this!) but now need to be accommodated.

Justa Scarf

2009-01-11T12:22:00.010-05:00

With my sweater design coming along pretty well, I decided I was up to trying a scarf. :D Here is Ralph, sitting pretty in 100% chunky baby alpaca.

31 stitches across, 50 inches long, 2 skeins of Baby Chunky Alpaca Paints from Mind's Eye Yarns. I think this stuff could make a process knitter out of anyone. I think I was drooling the entire time I knitted it up. Not my usual style at all, but considering that I lost my old scarf, I had no choice but to give in. ;)

The Justa Scarf is just a scarf; I cast on 31 stitches and knitted 1x1 rib until I ran out of yarn. The only chances I got for that knitterly extra touch were the ends. Both are done nicely with special techniques for 1x1 ribbing:

I was having a little too much fun reinventing the Kitchener stitch from first principles, and managed a sort of purl Kitchener first:

Though I picked it out in order to do a normal graft, I do think it's kind of a cool edge, both decorative and with all the stretch of regular grafting. I might keep it in mind for some other time.

OMG applied I-cord

2009-01-02T14:10:00.002-05:00

The sweater's neck is done, and applying I-cord to bound-off edges is my new favorite technique. I wish I had a before-and-after picture of the back of the neck -- it really went from ragged to gorgeous in about 30 minutes. Not only was the technique pretty easy (I did it based on instructions in The Knitter's Book of Finishing Techniques) but it matches the rolled edging on the sides of the V-neck perfectly.

There's slight unevenness on both right and left sides where the I-cord meets the rolled edging, but I'm not going to stress about that. After I wash this and the yarn fulls, I don't think it will matter.

Hourglass Aran construction plan

2008-12-28T17:48:00.005-05:00

In response to some questions on Ravelry (eightoclock, have you lost your mind?), I put together the following badly Photoshopped picture to show how the side panels are meant to fit with the body panels to give me a completed sweater (and a svelte waist).

After doing this I finished knitting the swatch of the side panel motif, and it does look nice like that with the vertical symmetry. I'll probably do that for real.

Then I went to the gym:

The design process requires flexibility, you know.

Hourglass Aran progress

2008-12-26T21:04:00.002-05:00

Oh, I am so slow, but the whole front is done now. I couldn't get the colors right, so finally just made today's pictures black and white. Here's the front, and the start of the back, which shows the completed neckline shape and also the ribbing I chose. They are baby cables, basically k2p2 ribbing with a tiny k-over-k cable cross every fourth row. It doesn't really pull in any more than my cables, which are close to k2p2 anyway, so I don't think it'll contract unflatteringly.

And here's the fun part, a swatch for the side panel, which I've been thinking and thinking about today. This is my second attempt and at least it's shaped correctly so far, but it's still too wide... I need less reverse stockinette on either side of most of the cable design.

As I said on Ravelry if not here, the side panels are why it's an *hourglass* Aran. They provide waist shaping and the chance to do some freeform cable design, all at the same time. :) And they are insurance, too... if I have the size wrong, I should be able to adjust by reknitting just the side panels and not the whole body.

The bad news (and this is bad news for my sleeve caps, too) is that doing closed cables and controlling the shaping of a piece at the same time is kind of hard. When the cables first begin, they don't really affect the width of the piece at all and you can basically ignore the new stitches, as though the cables were floating on top. Sadly, as the cables spread out they do inevitably change the stitch gauge from the initial stockinette gauge to the "gauge over lots of cables". Worse yet, as this piece starts to taper in, some of the decreases come from the edges and some come from cables melding together. I'm starting to have a lot of thoughts about things that affect gauge, and I'm coming to the conclusion that stitch count matters, but so does the number of knit-to-purl transitions across the fabric, and so do cable crosses.

I haven't finished the bottom half of this yet, partly because I haven't decided whether to just do the top half in reverse (with a couple of small adjustments) or whether to make a different pattern. I'll probably just do the top half in reverse, considering that this rather pretty bit will otherwise only be visible when I raise my arms! And I'd probably look weird, wandering around the city with my arms over my head.

Beyond the lace-only stereotype

2008-11-02T17:04:00.002-05:00

People are always taking backlit pictures of their lace shawls, but I was holding my sweater up to a window lately and noticed that cables have their own beauty when seen the same way.

Progress is slow. I took a vacation last week and thought I would knit a lot, but I ended up reading instead: Anathem by Neal Stephenson, The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman and The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger.

Touched by a Harlot!

2008-10-15T23:03:00.004-04:00

The Hourglass Aran had a brush with fame tonight:

Yes, Stephanie Pearl-McPhee actually touched it, offered to hold it up even, but I had already gotten this super-cute picture so I declined the kind offer.

I've never seen the St James Episcopal Church so packed with people as it was for Stephanie's talk. (Must you really point out that I'd never been in the St James Episcopal Church before at all?) I got to meet metak again, which was nice, and it's hardly her fault I have a lousy memory for faces, but failed to find Vicki in the crowd. And... it was fun. I have been somewhat lukewarm about the Yarn Harlot at times, but I REALLY enjoyed seeing/hearing her in person. The downtime and the laughs were valuable, and frankly? It turns out she has an incredibly great voice. I could have listened for hours.

Here is some better detail of the Hourglass Aran in progress -- actually, it's a photoshopped version of the swatch, which has now been entirely unravelled and redone.

As might be obvious, or not, this is a V-neck sweater front, worked from the top down. That means that when I'm knitting it, it's held upside down. (Duh.) At the Yarn Harlot festivities tonight, two, yes two different people asked if I was knitting a baby jumper.

Apparently the two halves of the V-neck look like pudgy little baby legs.

Transitions

2008-09-17T22:10:00.004-04:00

I've been spending my knitting-time on design lately, and design is a slow beast to ride. I love it -- designing and creating is what I do, in general -- but it also involves more ripping out and less visible progress than I sometimes like.

It, or maybe the giant CONE of wool I'm designing bits of Aran goodness with, have also pushed me toward nonmonogamy. Here is what I've done with the two skeins of Noro Transitions I bought:

Sleeves, in a simple lace pattern lifted from part of an Interweave Knits pattern somewhere. (Note the small wad of zombie-flesh-colored yarn I removed from both skeins just before the sleeve caps.) I like these sleeves, but they do seem to lack something. What is it? Oh yes, a body. These sleeves were meant to be a shrug. Damn. So I've bought some gray chunky cashmerino to deal with that, but the sleeves hibernate while I get on with my real obsession lately...

What is it? It's a swatch, but it's a swatch of the one thing I started knitting for... a custom-designed Aran. You're looking at [a swatch of] the right side of the front, where I've tested the way my cables grow out of the neckline.

Things I know about the design so far:

It will be done top-down, FLAK style, starting with narrow plaits acting as mini-saddles.
It will have set-in sleeves, also top-down but probably just sewn in rather than done with short rows.
From outside to center, the cables are
- of my own design,
- mirrored Windblown Cables from Barbara Walker's Third Treasury of Knitting Patterns, and
- Annie Maloney's Cable 59 from her Cable Knitter's Handbook.
The V-neck really will have a simple rolled-under edge, since that puts the emphasis on how the cables grow out of it.

I'm happy to leave some of the design for later in the project. I have ideas for the sleeves and the side panels that I'm hoping will be good, though. This sweater may or may not be a tour de force, but it will be a tour de as much force as I have. This is the thing I've wanted to be working on since pretty much the day I picked up needles.

Celtic Spiral Cable... Scarf Pattern

2008-09-03T15:52:00.001-04:00

I've charted out a cable, inspired to do so after looking at a sweater called Durrow and wishing its cables had just a bit more continuity. It's a transcription into cabling of a pattern on page 33 of Celtic Art: the Methods of Construction by George Bain, which I've had since I was a kid. (There are others in the book I'd like to try charting as well, but not until I see what's in the new Melissa Leapman book on closed cables that comes out next month.)

Here's the chart:

And here's the knitting:

It's a large repeat, but I'm happy with the way it knits up. For people looking closely: the top repeat in the photo is a perfect reflection of the chart, the lower repeat is not. Also, though I know it's a bit of a beast with a lot going on, it *is* well-behaved in that cables only move, cross, are formed or decreased on the right-hand sides. The over/under weave is regular as well.

I want this to become my first contribution to Ravelry, but they're not quite ready to handle stitch patterns as separate entities. So here is the (ahem!) pattern for a Celtic Spiral Cable Scarf:

Using any yarn and any needles that will provide good cable definition, cast on 31 stitches (17 for the cable, 4 more for a 2-stitch rev st st border, and 5 stitches of garter stitch on each side).
Work 10 rows of garter stitch.
Working a 7-stitch border on each side as described, work 6 cable repeats.
Work 10 more rows of garter stitch and cast off.

I think this cable, along with its mirror image, and maybe a horseshoe cable in between them, could also make a great sweater front. :)

FO: Chinese lace pullover

2008-08-24T09:23:00.002-04:00

Pattern: Chinese Lace Pullover by Angela Hahn

Yarn: Eden Madil 100% bamboo

Size: Small, with adjustments to the shoulders

Needles: Size 4 Knitpicks

Construction: in the round where possible, bottom-up, but I sewed the raglan seams as directed by the pattern.

Here, the sweater and I are wondering whether anything can be better than knitting AND coffee together.

Then we went back to the yarn's origins at Mind's Eye Yarns in Porter Square. The ribbing on this sweater really lends itself to weird pixellation at some .jpg settings -- weird! But here we are. (It was fun to pose here, because I knew anyone looking out the windows would know exactly what we were doing and why.)

We went in to see Lucy and her new yarns, which may have been a bad idea. Yarn fumes!! (That hank of yarn around my neck has a really high cashmere content, just so you understand.)

Lucy really does have some lovely new yarns. Way down in the bottom right corner you can see some of the bamboo the sweater was made from, but all the newer stuff is for fall/winter.

Then, home for closeups. The place where I found the pattern least clear was probably the directions on the body/sleeve increase area. Here is how I did it: lifted increases one stitch away from the edge of the expanding region. I did lifted increases because this yarn was incredibly unforgiving, and it was the ~~least visible~~ least disruptive increase I could find, and I did them near the edge instead of always at the center so that the whole section would appear mostly vertical instead of all flaring out from a central line. One last minor detail: after the armpit bindoffs I had 3 stitches left from this new rib on either side. I kept it that way as I did decreases, ending up with 2 visible stitches on each side of the raglan seam -- a minor variation from the pattern which calls for 1 on each side.

A closeup of the lace, where I didn't deviate from the pattern at all:

But what about those shoulder adjustments? Sorry, I couldn't get a good shot of them. Basically, to kinda-fit my square shoulders I had to add both width and height, so I have a few increases and a few short rows. I decreased away the increases after the short rows. I hid all the short row turns in the purl parts of the ribbing, which was a good idea, but I did the wrap-and-turn method, which left pretty visible wraps on the surface. Maybe if I hadn't done the wraps and left little holes instead, it might have gone better with the pattern... it does have lace, after all. But the wraps are a very minor flaw in a sweater I'm otherwise happy with, so meh. :)

Finishing: did I mention this yarn is unforgiving? It also frays like an 18-ply mofo. So, I dipped the end of each end in a thin solution of fabric glue and water a day before weaving them in, to stop the fray. It may have been overkill, but I'll sleep better at night.

And the future? Bamboo stretches, you know. I'm actually counting on it to grow a bit. I'll try to post a follow-up picture in a few months when I've been wearing it for a while.

Fables of the construction

2008-08-14T23:49:00.002-04:00

Ever seen this pair of fingerless mitts before? Yes, here is yet another one of the 6783 instantiations of Fetchings that people will admit to on Ravelry. I'm sure there are twice as many in the wild. Still, my mother likes these. I knit them up in 3 days for her birthday, and felt very competent doing them. :)

And, here is one of those pictures only a knitter can love. It's blurry on purpose -- I'm trying to get you excited about the NEXT post. And yes, that is a ball of yarn on my head. ;)

In between my monotonous chants of "never making a raglan again, never making a raglan again" I've been having a bit of fun with scraps. I finally learned the long-tail cast-on and an invisible caston for 1x1 rib, and have come up with a simple lace pattern to use with the Noro Transitions yarn that flew into my mailbox after I heard about it. This crazy-ass yarn changes fiber throughout the skein, always a wool blend but transitioning also between silk, cashmere, angora, alpaca, kid mohair and camel. I had to have it.

Also in the mail to me right now: Knitter's Guide to Stitch Design by Annie Maloney.

A torso and two wrists

2008-07-27T21:18:00.006-04:00

"...that's all we could find of her, Sergeant. In pieces. I haven't seen a case this nasty since '73!"

Here's the completed body of my Chinese Lace Pullover. I did it according to pattern (with the TINY modification of doing my decreases one stitch in from where the instructions called for).

And here's the lace part of the sleeves, all done:

Innocent-looking, huh? Looks like I'm doing them two at once on Magic Loop, huh? Actually, the bamboo yarn was so slippery that the only way I could cast on in the round was plastic DPNs, and after a few rows of that the only way I could bear to keep going was Magic Loop. Each sleeve has seven repeats of the lace panel, so I kept 4 on one side of the loop and 3 on the other; it seemed to work fine that way. Now that I've gotten to the plain ribbing, I've transferred to a longer needle for continuing them both at the same time.

The sleeves are not going to go according to pattern. For one thing, since raglans don't generally fit well on my square shoulders, I'm going to add some short-row shaping; for another thing, the pattern calls for the upper arm on these babies to be HUGE, 14" for the small size. Investigation shows it's because each sleeve is expected to have as many increases as each side of the body does.

So it's time for some mods. I know the pattern is cleverly written so that the body ribbing lines up with the arm ribbing along the raglan seams, and I want to preserve that, so I'm busy doing the math for a smaller-but-still-clever sleeve. I think I have a plan. :)

A meme and a KnitPicks order

2008-06-17T13:41:00.004-04:00

I got tagged with a meme by Vicki! My zillionth meme, but the first one on this knitting blog. It feels nice, like I'm starting to have an actual identity as a knitter.

1) What was I doing 10 years ago?

In June of 1998 I was... hmmm, I was in New Mexico, interning at Los Alamos National Lab, just getting going on my last stint of work for my thesis. I was making a quilt for my ex-boyfriend's wedding, and that was kind of fun; and I had just turned 21 and had just gotten a kitten who has been my constant companion ever since. The stint hadn't yet devolved into the mess it was destined to become in the fall.

2) What are 5 things on my to-do list for today?
Get a unit test working, go to ashtanga yoga, put sock yarn in an envelope to be mailed off to someone who's knitting small elephants for charity, fill out a reimbursement form for the class I took last spring, make this blog post. (Update: that was yesterday. I got 3 done out of 5.)

3) Snacks I enjoy:

Peanuts with a swig of orange juice. Cheese and Triscuits. Oatmeal cookies. Protein bars. The decadent cherry-apricot scones I sometimes get at our local bookstore cafe. Almonds with chocolate covered raisins.

4) Things I would do if I were a billionaire:

Pay off my mortgage; no, wait, I'd buy a nearby place with in-unit laundry so I don't have to deal with spiders just to have clean clothes. Figure out some deal where I could drop to part-time at work but keep working, or maybe go work for Kiva.org for free. I'd make sure my parents were set up right; I'd get an ocicat; and then I'd make my financial advisor a very happy man.

All of that's just with the first couple million though. A billion? I have no experience even thinking in those terms, but that would probably be enough to be a real player in the world of microfinance.

5) Places I have lived:

Kalispell, Montana
Los Alamos, NM
Boston, MA
Cambridge, MA
Somerville, MA

6) Jobs I have had:

Babysitter, bookstore stocker, Burger King worker bee, cafeteria server, mechanical engineering intern, software engineer, software engineer, software engineer.

7) Bloggers I am tagging who I will enjoy getting to know better: Lea and Krista, because they should post occasionally. :)

To keep this vaguely knitting-related, I got two books in the mail this week. One was Melissa Leapman's Cables Untangled, which taught me my preferred way of cabling without a cable needle a long time ago when I bought it for someone else, and the second was Cables: Volume 1, The Basics by Janet Szabo. What's that? Obsessed, you say? Nah, I am just making mental progress on an Aran sweater design and couldn't stand to go further without getting these two. I'm well beyond thinking I'll only make myself one Aran sweater, but the first one is special (right?) and I want to make sure I have lots of stitches to choose from.

If you have a Ravelry account, the cable I've chosen for the central panel can be seen here. It's from Annie Maloney's Cable Knitting Handbook, and I think it may be the perfect cable.

Worms, bird shit, and lace -- pick three

2008-06-15T14:49:00.006-04:00

My social life seems to be getting more knitterly. Last week I actually taught a friend to knit (my first time), and my mother sent me this very lovely silk yarn... with a small crocheted worm in it. "I told you it was coccoon-colored", she said. Awwww!

For those who don't know, yesterday was also WWKIP Day (worldwide Knit in Public Day) 2008. I went to Copley Square and got to see quite a lot of interesting things... how drop spindles work, what Handmaiden Seasilk feels like, and what laceweight merino is like. I even got to see six inches worth of a Morrigan, which I recognized instantly and with some squealing. Other people were equally happy to pet the 100% Madil Eden bamboo I was rocking. The only bad part was that I did get splattered all across the shoulders by a pigeon. Yes. Gross but true. The good parts of the bad part were twofold though: I had a spare tank top with me, and... the nasty bird didn't get my knitting. :D

I said I'd be doing the Chinese Lace Pullover next, and so I am. The yarn I'm using is eighteen ply... eighteen ply!... and it's very easy to split it in a 17-to-1 kind of way, resulting in an annoying little thready loop. However, this lace is many times easier to work in the round rather than back and forth, so I'm experiencing much less splitting with the real project than I did with my swatch. (Notice there is no picture of my swatch.) Here is the progress so far:

The lace on the body piece is complete, and about 3 rows of the ribbing above the lace. The fabric is starting to have a lovely heft and drape to it; the lace, which seemed limp and formless while I was working on it, seems much nicer now that I'm not.

FO: Hild is done!

2008-05-26T11:16:00.002-04:00

Pattern: Hild, from Elsebeth Lavold's Second Viking Knits Collection. In the end, I customized it, so be warned: if you knit it from the pattern you won't get the waist shaping or the wrist motifs.

Since it is my first sweater, I had to take bunches of "FO" pictures:

And here are some closeups just for the knitting blog.

The arm seaming was a bit dicey; I think the sleeve I knit first is also the sleeve I seamed first, so one side is way more beginnerish than the other. This is the one that came out more as I meant it to, though if I had it to do again I'd devote more stitches to the edging / central rib. And I probably wouldn't slip the edge stitches either; I didn't see until too late how that would limit my options with the actual seaming.

And here's how I brought the cables up into the neckline on the front, giving the stitches a few rows to migrate into the 2x2 design. I like the final effect and would definitely do it again... less nervously next time. :)

I've cast on for the next thing, the Chinese Lace Pullover in shiny red bamboo. It's going to be a very, very different project. Lea is knitting it too, so maybe there will be more multi-author action on this blog in the next little bit. :)

Things come together; the center can hold

2008-05-04T19:53:00.004-04:00

An exciting weekend for Hild!

Yesterday I split the front piece for the neck, and obsessively stayed up late finishing the front; between the cable pattern, shaping on the neck edges, shaping on the outer edges, and dealing with two balls of yarn, I was afraid that if I stopped I'd never get back into the right head-space.

I used Grumperina's stretchy bind-off on the front of the neck, fearing that a regular one would leave the neck too tight to fit over my head. I don't know if that really would have been a problem, but this neck-hole fits over my head easily, so I'm going to call it a success.

And to seam the shoulders I used a crochet slip stitch... I had already not left all my stitches live for the 3-needle bindoff, and as the Yarn Harlot taught me, crochet creates a nice stable line. Yay for hooking!

Of course I had to immediately pick up stitches for the neck (I did that mostly with a crochet hook too). And then I had to knit just one row to get the stitches back OFF the stupid DPNs, which didn't work well with the yarn at all, and onto circs. I may have to do one more row yet tonight... some challenges still remain, as I'm carrying some cablework into the neck stitches just enough to get gracefully from the stitches as they were to an even 2x2 pattern. Need to get to the mindless part by Tuesday so that I can work on the neck in lecture! What is it on? Oh yes, NP completeness... I won't want to be cabling through that.

Happy Hild says:

"I'm starting to feel like a real sweater!"

In the meantime these Francie socks make me grudgingly admit I might make socks again someday.

I declare a thumb cozy.

2008-04-03T19:05:00.002-04:00

I knit something for someone else! It's a thumb cozy, with attached I-cord bracelet to keep the end of the cozy down. Why would I knit a thumb cozy? One of my friends has a friend with a hurt/bandaged thumb, and let's just say it was either that or do my homework.

Un-pattern: cast on 3 stitches. Work in 1x1 rib, increasing 1 on each side on the RS, until the working edge is almost wide enough to go around the base of the thumb. Cast on ~3 more stitches, divide over 3 needles and work in the round until just past the tip of the thumb. Finally, k2g all the way around. Cut the yarn, thread it through all live stitches and through the center. Realize that a cute little wrist-cord would hold down the bottom corner. Curse self for not working in the other direction. Splice the end from your cast-on back onto the ball. Look up how to make i-cord. Make 2-stitch i-cord for a while; sew it back on itself to make a loop.

I'm amused to discover that I could get certified -- and pinned -- as a master hand knitter through a mail-order course. I checked it out on tkga.com; it's for real, all right. It does not tempt me though. I would probably have fun doing the swatches, but I don't want to make an argyle sock or a vest.

Airplane trips to the rescue

2008-03-23T22:13:00.002-04:00

Thanks mostly to a couple of cross-country nonstop flights in the last week, the back of Hild is done. Here's a picture of it (2 rows before completion, but when the evening light was starting to fail and I couldn't wait any longer to pull out the camera):

And here's a closer shot of the cables.

Part of me is kind of sad, thinking of having to make all those cables AGAIN before it's all over, but this is going to be by far the prettiest thing I've ever made with my hands. I can't wait to wear it.

By the way, those mismatched sleeve caps? The longer one is the one that fits. The short one has been frogged.

I can has sinusoid? No, I can not has.

2008-02-18T14:51:00.004-05:00

This is what Sweater Wizard 3.0 does to your sleeve cap design when you change the chest size from 30" (see the sleeve cap on the left) to 34" (see the sleeve cap on the right).

I understand why there are more stitches bound off in that initial bindoff row, I do. The number matches the bindoffs done in the body pieces. It makes sense. Why the second one is so much taller, though, I don't know, and neither one of them is a very nice sinusoid (as I complained about last time; but actually, the first one is better in that regard).

I'm sure this sweater will wind up looking okay -- I'll finish the front so that I can see which sleeve cap better matches the armscye, and redo one or the other -- but I can tell already that I'll probably crunch all my own numbers for this next time around.

More Hild progress

2008-02-13T22:01:00.001-05:00

I think it's more than half done, yo!

And this doesn't even count the tiny line of progress on the sweater back, which I started so that I'd have something mindless to knit during 1.5 hr lectures. (In the class I'm taking, I'm much better off trying to listen and understand than I would be trying to take notes). I've quickly gotten past the ugly-worm stage that so depressed me on the sweater front; six rows is just enough for the ribbing to start looking like ribbing. At home I plan to finish up that second sleeve cap and then get back to the front (no pun intended), which is not mindless at all anymore because it's all cables, all the time.

Knitting is really my first experience with natural fibers, with the exception of a black wool coat that, as a yuppie Cambridge citizen, I am required to own. I have to admit, what I'm not loving about natural fibers so far is the little bits of nature you get for free with the fibers. The little bits of straw (or whatever it is) in the Silky Wool I'm knitting with are annoying, and they're not nearly as bad as the things I got in a merino-blend sweater I ordered from L.L Bean lately. I can only call them micro-tumbleweeds, and their diameter is so close to the yarn ply diameter that I've near-destroyed the yarn in a few places trying to get them out. Out they must come, though, if the garment is going to be wearable.

Mystery stitch in storebought sweater

2007-12-24T12:36:00.000-05:00

Whatever this is, it's not in the Vogue Stitchionary.

Anyone have any ideas?

I had another thought about knitting recently (in the absence of interesting progress, my thoughts are all I've got for you). When I get done with the Hild sweater, I really might like to do some smaller pieces. Christmas got me thinking... despite my innate love of shiny wrapping paper, I've embraced the trend toward cloth bags and other reusable gift packaging like all the other good Cambridge yuppies. Maybe for next Christmas I'll knit up some CD or DVD cozies that are meant as gift wrap. That would be a nice way to swatch while getting something sort of cool and useful out of it. Lace patterns would have to be lined, but that's the only downside I can see.

Space invaders scarf!

2007-12-20T09:36:00.000-05:00

Ah, who could fail to love this!?

Honestly, the old-school gaming systems are the only thing that make me AT ALL interested in colorwork. I'd like to ask what this says about me, but, alas, I'm already clear on that. :)

What other games, error messages, etc, would be good for knitting up, I wonder?

Progress, Grumperina style

2007-12-16T17:25:00.000-05:00

Knit two, purl two, knit two, purl two... repeat forever. I'm knitting continental, so I find the ribbing pretty easy (and a lot of fun), but progress is slow enough that I can't bring myself to spend rare, precious knitting time on anything besides this. I'm turning out to be a pretty monogamous knitter.

I found it wasn't all that hard to make a schematic to color in, starting with the bitmaps the Sweater Wizard will export and going from there. And so, here's my progress on the Hild pieces!

Blue sleeve for Black Friday

2007-11-23T13:52:00.000-05:00

Due largely to my getting sick and spending Thanksgiving knitting on the couch, the first sleeve of Hild is a done deal. I never did have to do any gusset-type sleeve shaping, because the sleeve remained tight enough while I went along; I never really felt the need to slow down the increases.

I wan't sure about the sleeve cap -- the pattern I used was generated by Sweater Wizard 3.0 and looked a lot nicer than the one that came with the original pattern, but still isn't the smoothest sinusoid I can imagine. In particular, WHY would the slope get steeper right before the final rows with all the bind-offs? That basically guarantees a stupid-looking little corner of waste fabric on each side of the sleeve cap. Anyway, I followed the pattern, but because I had suspicions and I am anal, I pinned the sleeve into a sleeveless black shirt I have.

And it does pretty much seem to fit! So that is good. As long as I don't skimp on the measurement between my neck and the point of my shoulder, I'll be fine. Here's a closeup of the cable detail down by the wrist:

I'll be putting the mirror image of that one into the left sleeve.

Sleeve shaping for Hild

2007-10-21T20:54:00.000-04:00

It's a swatch! It's a blob! It's part of the sleeve of my first sweater!

Having decided to ignore the original pattern (only in two sizes, both way too big), I used a trial download of Sweater Wizard v3.0 to get a pattern based on measuring my favorite sweaters. Imagine my annoyed laughter when I discovered that the generated sleeve instructions were identical to the ones in Viking Knits #9, except for the much more detailed sleeve cap shape.

What I am supposed to do is increase steadily every 8 rows until I get to the cap, which is pretty wide to match the deep armscye. (I'm athletic, and have pecs and lats that make my armpits bigger than you'd think they are, so I want that.) If I do this, though, I'm going to get arms that are quite loose around the upper arms. I notice my commercial ribbed shirts seem to increase pretty regularly up the forearm, but then way more slowly on the upper arm; I also like what I know of armpit gussets, as nicely written up in this Yarn Harlot post. The idea's supposed to be to give men more room around the shoulder joint while not requiring a super-loose sweater... which is exactly what I need.

So, I'm thinking of playing fast and loose with this. Increase fairly regularly up to the elbow, then about half as fast until near the armpit, then do the rest of my increases in the last few rows (as if for a gusset, but continuing to form ribbing in pattern). I don't get many comments here, usually, but I'll ask anyway: does this plan sound reasonable to you sweater knitters out there?

First, and possibly only, but we'll see

2007-10-06T21:50:00.000-04:00

Did anyone wonder what I was swatching for? Probably not, considering that it took me over a month to knit the real thing (despite having lots of time to work on it last week). At any rate, it -- they -- are done, and it is my pleasure to introduce you to My First Socks.

Hello, socks!

Needles: #1 dpns
Yarn: Lang yarns, JaWoll color superwash (75% wool, 18% nylon, 7% acrylic)
Pattern: Wendy's generic toe-up socks, plus the pointelle lace pattern from the first Vogue Stitchionary centered on the top. Lace on socks seems like a nice idea, since the feet will always stretch out the lace -- no time-consuming blocking with every wash.
New skills learned: oh geez. Short rows, lace, provisional cast-on (not that I ever got it right), k1p1 ribbing (very enjoyable, I found), and tubular bindoff.

I modified one row of the lace pattern slightly at the beginning and end so that it wouldn't show any orphaned yarnovers in either place, but rather start and end the diagonal lines of holes gracefully.

The ribbing is p1k1, and the bind-off is the tubular bind-off. On the second sock I even managed to do it rather prettily. It's as if a single, tiny tractor tire had been driven around in a circle, leaving tread marks on top of my sock.

Short-row heel: quite a pain to knit, but they are what I'm used to in cotton. On the first sock, they caused one of my friends to squeal "ooh, it even has a line at the heel, just like REAL SOCKS DO!"

My cat didn't see the big deal, but my husband's cat REALLY didn't see the big deal.

A few new things

2007-09-02T10:16:00.001-04:00

It's been summer, it's been lovely outside, and I have been biking like a maniac. (Not today, as my husband managed to make the quick-release skewer holding on my front wheel explode.) Since I'm taking an enforced break until I get to the bike parts store, I thought I'd share a few things with you.

I made a sock out of some lovely sea wool.

I'm glad to say that my mother thinks it would make a lovely sea monster. That's my new emergency backup plan if I succumb to second sock syndrome. (The old plan was to find someone with one very small foot.)

However, my big finished object for the summer thus far is:

my linen phyllo yoked pullover! (Fair warning, anyone planning to knit this: mine is entirely different from the one in Knitting Nature, except having the same yoke stitch pattern. If you want my directions, just ask, they're quite simple.) It's lovely and drapey and soft after a little trip through the washer. On the other hand, it's also biasing around the waist and hips. I have no idea what made it decide to do that (unbalanced yarn? the euroflax didn't look like it had enough energy in it!). It's a small flaw in an otherwise perfect sweater.

Such wonderful socks!

2007-08-29T11:38:00.000-04:00

My sock pal, Julia knit me the most wonderful socks!

They make a great use of the Koigu (which is so nice and soft). I'm just thrilled :)

Even on top of that, my sock pal was so sweet. She sent a bunch of little treats along with the socks.

Merino for spinning, a little sock-project purse (which I've really wanted), a little cute book, and some lovely little lemon chocolates (which my husband is about to steal). Thank you so much, Julia!

Could it be?

2007-08-20T22:10:00.001-04:00

Baby's very first itty-bitty lace swatch. Everybody say awwwww.

Chialea's beautiful shawl

2007-08-19T11:44:00.000-04:00

The lovely shawl that Chialea made for me came home from California with my husband a few weeks ago, and I finally got the chance to block it last night.
None of the pictures I was able to take really show the quality or the lovely colors of Chialea's handspun, but I wanted to post a few quick shots now - will take more later if the sun ever comes out.
(Also in this shot, the back of my super-cute new haircut!)

Thank you so much, dear. It is really nice to have a hug from far away :).

Swatching for Hild

2007-08-18T19:34:00.000-04:00

A while ago I fell in love with Hild by Elsebeth Lavold. I was, at the time, rather furious at the conciseness of the pattern. One swatch later:

I think I'll be changing almost everything anyway.

I'm so damn new that even swatching is still a learning experience for me. Look at this -- you can see exactly where I remembered reading somewhere about slipping the first stitch on every row of something that's knitted flat.

And here's me messing up the beginning of the closed cable on the first pattern repeat:

Yikes, cringeworthy. It wasn't entirely my fault though. The beginning of the closed cable involved two sets of increases on subsequent right sides, with a plain wrong-side row in between; the end of the closed cable involved two sets of increases on subsequent rows -- right side and then wrong side! No wonder it closes up so nice and tight and pretty.

My second attempt is much tighter, as you can see, and also done over only two rows. However, it still has something I don't like: I did it right-side and then wrong-side, forcing me to do an extra plain right-side row before beginning to move the cables around. The better place for that plain right-side row would be between the patterns, so that all cable points can be 2 stitches wide on a wrong-side row and 4 stitches wide on a right-side row.

What else might I be changing about the pattern, you wonder? Well, my size doesn't have anything written out for it anyway, so, all stitch counts. The sleeve cap instructions don't make a nice sinusoid, so, the sleeve pattern. I don't want to change to larger needles for the cable section (no boobs), and I don't want to knit plain rib sleeves when a repeat or two of the cable pattern looks so nice on my forearm. And I don't want to roll back my sleeves the way that model is... I'd rather they fit me. I think I'm turning grumpanese I think I'm turning grumpanese I really think so...

I have company though. And like me, my kitty Nala always prefers patterns to written instructions. They make MUCH better pillows.

FO #2, the disco tee

2007-08-09T21:10:00.000-04:00

The disco tee is finished. It didn't take me long to do the yoke... I was doing it to chill out while trying not to think about certain other things.

The fabric, done on #8 needles with about 3 2/3 stitches per inch, is weird. If you hold this thing up and shake it, you get a Long, Skinny Tee that might fit one of those cheesy Spielberg aliens. Then if you hold it sideways, a shake will get you a very Short, Fat Tee that might fit a chubby 4-year-old. I only have one other thing with drape/malleability like this, and it barely qualifies as clothing:

Um, right. Not to get distracted... show them the tee shirt.

I think it came out pretty nice, definitely wearable, but not perfectly according to plan. Most especially, bringing the neck in to normal neck-size definitely pulled the sleeves up. I planned for the sleeve-line to be sort of straight across, but nope... I realize now I could have added short-row shaping to handle the fact that the path up and across my shoulder is longer than the path straight up the front of my body from my armpit-level to my neckline. Not a big deal though; nobody KNOWS I didn't plan it like this. And I'm pleased that my carefully calculated decreases still resulted in a pretty good fit across the top of the shoulders.

Behold the slits in the sleeves: laziness pays off in this case, as the extra ease around the arm circumference was needed and it looks cute.

Oh, and those certain other things I was thinking about? Other people, who might have decided my fate today, won't be deciding it until next week. Bleh. I need to knit something else.

Disco tee in progress

2007-07-31T07:18:00.000-04:00

Here's my disco tee, done up to the armpits. I had to knit the sleeves flat -- the very slippery yarn did hideous things when I tried to make little tubes on two circulars. That's okay, I'm planning to turn it into a feature by just NOT sewing them up, and letting each sleeve have a little slit on the outside. It should be cute.

That is, if you believe these pieces are going to become any kind of wearable garment at all. I'm a little dubious. The cat whose paws you can see? He was dubious too, but wanted to lie on the pieces anyway.

I need better equipment if I'm going to be taking a lot of closeups:

I got all the pieces joined last night; not sure when I'll actually keep going with the yoke, but at least now it's all on one needle.

Totally tubualar, man!

2007-07-17T10:48:00.000-04:00

It's tube time, over here at the California extension campus of Woolly Mammoths. If you've left a comment and I haven't responded, it's because I'm frankly boggled at how to do so now that they took email addresses off the pages. I've asked nicely for them to find some way to put them back up, but I understand the Blogger team is quite busy. If anyone wants to reach me, try chialea-insertAThere-gmail-insertDOThere-com. It sounds like people would like a bit more about short rows, so just let me know what you're curious about and I'll do my best to help out.

Tube #1: sleeve rendered in coned aqua euroflax sportweight on #3 Stumpi Bluntos.

It's the simplest sleeve you can think of (though there will probably be a deep hem there on the bottom). It's easy to knit while reading The Omnivore's Dilemma (which I highly recommend, btw -- what is more important than what we eat and the ability to keep ourselves nourished now and into the future?). It's easy to knit at the movies. It's easy to knit in the car at night (and not driving). If it were easy to knit on my bike, then I'd have a winner. Luckily I have two more complicated knitting projects for when I want to pay attention. The less complicated of the two:

Tube #2: Sidewinder in Melody sock yarn.

It's a sock! It's a tube! It's for my sockapalooooza pal! I really hope she likes this lovely yarn and fun pattern. Judging from her blog, she's not a patterned sock kind of person. I wanted to make something comfortable (thus a good number of alterations in the pattern) and interesting in a colour she'd like. (Technically she asked for "purple or green", but I figure this falls into that category and didn't see any purple at the shop or in my stash.) I promise better pictures when it doesn't look like someone skinned a sock off of a foot.

Note: I'm just getting this uploaded after two days of being unable to upload pictures. What fixed it? Plugging in the ethernet instead of using the wireless. Grr.

Tempting emergency!

2007-07-15T19:20:00.000-04:00

About two years ago - hmm, maybe 1.5 years ago - I knit the body for Tempting. Then I knit one sleeve, and then I knit the other sleeve, and then I ripped out the first sleeve due to - I don't remember why, actually.

Tonight, I finished reknitting that other sleeve, and pulled the body out of the bottom of my knitting bag where it has been languishing. And found this.This is not moth damage, mercifully. No, it's where someone didn't weave in her ends very well, and then left a project to get tossed around and pulled this way and that, and didn't take care at all.
It's, umm, about 1/4 of the way up from the cast-on edge of the body. It's beyond my repair skills at this time, but I could be convinced to give it a repair try with appropriate tutorials. Or I could be convinced to rip the body out and reknit. It seems a little loose right now anyway.

Suggestions? Sympathy? Help?

A red-letter day

2007-07-06T10:56:00.000-04:00

Guess what? I found the cable that connects my camera to my computer! That means I can finally share my exciting news with you: I brought home a little friend.

OK, it's a bigger friend than my old wheel. I got a Majacraft Rose, essentially because I wanted something that goes fast. In this, I followed the advice of the queen of speed demons with the help of someone who knows a heck of a lot about spinning wheels. (I also managed to buy a kate and leave it there, so I think I might have to make another trip sometime soon.)

My first yarn on the Rose is some merino top that I'm going to ply with solid purple merino. I'm still having a bit of trouble getting it completely even and smooth, because I find merino (at least this preparation) sticky. Is everyone's merino sticky?

There has been knitting around here, too. It's the summer of knitting for others; this Sea Silk lace scarf is for my extremely stylish and talented step-grandmother. I hope she's going to like wearing it as much as I'm enjoying the yarn. I think I might need some Sea Silk for myself... Perhaps Sea Silk would make a nice mystery stole 3. (On the other hand, Lucy dyed me some laceweight that is currently in the mail...)

Garments confuse me

2007-07-06T08:57:00.000-04:00

I've recklessly cast on for a pattern-free t-shirt made of ladder-style ribbon yarn. It's on #8 needles, not huge ones, but still definitely something to wear over a tank top. This is all IF I can find more of the stuff (I only bought one ball, the LYS is closed for vacation). But I'm enjoying the slippery cool not-remotely-like-wool feel of it. It's basically just for practice.

As I was looking for directions/ideas, I came across this nice striped raglan. It's cute, it's by a good knitter, but these directions for the yoke sort of amazed me:

2. First decrease round: knit 2, knit 2 together all the way around.

3. Knit for about 2.5 inches.

4. Second decrease round: Knit 1, knit 2 together all the way around.

5. Knit for about 2.5 inches.

6. Third decrease round: Knit 2, knit 2 together all the way around.

7. Knit for another inch or so and cast off in picot edging.

Those are some severe decrease rounds! Can anyone explain why it's a good idea to do these 75% decreases every 2.5 inches? Doesn't that cause some ruffling/rippling (yes; I think you can see it in the bottom picture on that page), and couldn't the same decrease be done way more smoothly? Also,why would one finish with an inch of straight knitting?

I also went to my second-most-local yarn store and saw this sweater in the window and kind of fell in love. Bought the book, bought a ball of the yarn. Noted the slightly rounder cable pattern in this other sweater and started thinking about substituting it in.

Worse problem: the pattern is only written for medium (and large), and it's pretty clearly because the designer really wants six (eight) of those cable repeats. So I guess I get to wing it on how to make a small. Four repeats with a couple of extra ribs on each side should work fine; but the designer didn't bother to do the math, and that's annoying. Dear designer, why do you hate me so?

Almost-finished object: Krista's new shawl

2007-06-30T13:58:00.000-04:00

Krista's new shawl is just about finished (I'm making her block it herself), even if I did wimp out for the last few rows and knit unfinished yarn straight off the wheel.

I'm sending this shawl out to Krista in lieu of the hugs I can't give her from CA. She's working very hard this summer for a very good cause, in a different city from her husband and dog. Let me correct that: her very sick, elderly dog. Norton has been a sweet, friendly dog as long as I've known him, and I'll be very sad when it's his time to go. Krista has known him for a heck of a lot longer; I think she would benefit for any sympathy you have for a knitblogger whose dog is slipping away.

Krista, I'm so sorry. I hope the shawl helps a little.

FO: celtic cap

2007-06-27T20:49:00.000-04:00

My first finished object is done. It took me a long time. Clearly this is the least efficient way in the world to obtain a hat. But hey, here it is!

This picture has been contrast-enhanced to get the top stitches to be more visible:

Seen from the side, the cap is clearly gumdrop-shaped. It's basically a cone almost all the way up before the serious decreases start. I'm a bit disappointed in that, because I like hats to be a bit more human-head-shaped, but it's not for me anyway... it was meant to be cable practice, and as that it was a complete success.

Yarn: Jo Sharp DK weight
Needles: circular US 6

I didn't make any changes to the pattern, and for those who have it already, I used Chart B. The only decision I really had was what to do when the hat got too small to keep on my original 16" circular needle: DPNs, two circulars or magic loop. I used two circulars, and after a couple of rows was really really wishing I had used magic loop -- same idea really, and every time I switched needles I was sliding the old needle down until all the stitches were on the cable anyway (that's how I was keeping an even gauge when switching needles). Ah well... next time.

The next thing I'm going to do is finish up those sweater pieces I showed you in my intro post. I bought pretty buttons already.

Ahoy, intrepid summer sailors!

2007-06-27T02:03:00.000-04:00

Yarr! Here at moving central, we be swabbing the decks.

(There has been literal swabbing of the carpets. Blame the cat for that one.)

We also be running out of yarn, spun from the finest wool from the colonies. We won't be producing any more until we unpack ye olde spinning wheel.

(More on this shawl later; the poor quality picture is entirely on purpose. (for once))

Some monstrous creature be eatin' me blocked swatches, so my new sweater must wait until laundry day be come and gone again'. Jaunty new socks may console my peg leg, though, for a time.

(I swear there must be a land of misfit swatches right next door to the land of misfit pens. I'm offering a reward to anyone who patches the wormhole in my apartment.)

An' if ye black-hearted scalliwags mutiny, it's down to the watery depths with ye!

(Kitty is actually taking a bath, if you look closely. I think he's defective. Aren't cats supposed to hate water?)

Hail to Purple ...

2007-06-19T22:34:00.000-04:00

Sometime last summer, a small LYS in Pittsburgh was going out of business, and was selling their sock yarn for ... I don't remember, very cheap. I was just about to head off to law school, and I picked up a skein of purple and a skein of black, which are my law school's colors. I thought to myself "this will make a nice Christmas present for whomever turns out to be my closest friend at law school!".
And indeed, by Christmas I had a very good friend at the law school, someone who helped me survive finals and ... the whole first year experience, really. I finished the first of these socks in the winter, and then was crazily busy, and working on a few other knitting projects, and didn't finish the second one until a few days ago.

So they were supposed to be a Christmas present, and weren't, and then were supposed to be a "we finished our big legal writing project" present, and weren't, and then were supposed to be a "end of finals" present, and weren't. So now they are an early fall-interviewing and football season present. They're not terribly impressive, but they're done, and I hope they'll mean a lot to someone who means a whole lot to me.

Yarn: Mystery wool. Definitely 100% wool, a bit splitty on the needles.
Pattern: General top-down sock pattern with heel flap. Size 2 bamboo needles, 76 stitches around. Nothing fancy here.

Next plan for the summer: finish Tempting! Really! I bought ribbon for it and everything.

Moving: the other end of the story

2007-06-15T10:14:00.000-04:00

Well, I've survived the start of my new (and rather fabulous) job, my sister's (four day long) wedding, and the preliminary stages of the move. If you remember my Boston apartment, my California apartment will look rather familiar.

Until we manage to obtain some furniture, we've been staying with my parents and their impressively underfoot dog.

I've been having fun at work, though. I swear it's not (just) because of our trip kayaking and to the aquarium just after I started working. Does anyone know if these jellyfish tangle irreparably like this in the wild?

I have been knitting, which I'll show you later, but I must have felt very insecure without my stash. I ran right out to my new LYS for some sock yarn and Pieces of String for some aqua flax.

I'm in a colour rut and I'm loving it!

It's real easy for you to play the victim here, yarnball.

2007-06-13T20:08:00.000-04:00

Everyone who knits/crochets and has a cat should read this comic strip.

Go, click, you will like it!

Adventures in midair cabling

2007-06-09T09:52:00.000-04:00

I just flew to Atlanta and back, and while doing so decided to start an actual Object to justify all the knitting-related reading I've been doing. I had the pattern for this nice celtic cap and had read what all the stitches in the pattern meant (hey, I even practiced the first crazy double increase while making a small increase/decrease sampler) so I grabbed it, and some yarn and some needles, on the way out the door.

What it may someday look like:

What it looks like:

The sad thing about flying is that you are far from any knitting book or possible help when the moments of confusion inevitably hit. For example, this is the first time I ever knitted in the round. I cast on 96 stitches as nicely as I could and then...? "Join the work and knit 9 rounds of stockinette." Um, but I have a line and not a circle, how do I join? I stared at it for a while. Finally I cast on one extra stitch, nudged the first stitch across from right to left needle, knit these two together, stared at that for a while, and proceeded. It worked.

Also interesting is that now I know my preference for cabling / twisting. The closed cables on the cap start with just increases, but to my surprise I got to the first row calling for swapped-order stitches while still in the air over the east coast. All right, said I, I have no extra needle so I guess I will do this the no-cable-needle way. And I tried doing it the way in which you rearrange all the stitches on the left-hand needle before knitting and purling them. And lo, the stitches tried hard to slip down into the fabric and sneak through each other while I did so.

Ouch, said I, maybe I can find something to use for a cable needle. And I figured out that my Palm stylus is not so far from a US 6 needle. And I used my cable needle, and lo, the stylus when holding only 1 stitch fell this way and that way and I didn't have enough fingers.

Sigh, said I, it is time to try that other thing I mostly remember from Chapter 1 of Cables Untangled. In this one you transfer the first batch of stitches involved in the cable/twist from left to right needle, actually knit or purl the second batch and THEN swap their order in the manner directed. Finally you knit or purl the first batch. And lo, order was restored to my knitting, because the only batch of live stitches you leave hanging in the air this way is the second batch, the batch that just got a nice, loose extra row added to it and is thus much more accomodating. Thank goodness. The only hard part about this is figuring out where to hold the yarn while transferring that first batch over to the right-hand needle, and I'd rather do that than deal with the squirmy stitches of the first two attempted methods.

New knitter

2007-06-09T09:20:00.000-04:00

New knitta on the block! chialea and krista were nice enough to let me come in, despite the HUGE gamble that I might turn out to be the kind of person who makes buttonholes really badly or something. Thanks to them for being so nice.

It felt appropriate to start with a picture of my stash, so... this is my stash. See the book of Aran stitch patterns, and those two giant cones of very sheepy aran-weight wool? Yes, I thought you did. :)

If you wonder how it is that I even have a stash already, it's because chialea gave me basically everything (the yarn, not the books). And that same event explains the sweater pieces -- this has some sort of tragedy behind it involving a person discovering she is pointy person, and not tubular person. And so now pointy person makes beautifully tailored pieces and tubular person gets to practice the finishing stages of a sweater without making all the stockinette. Tubular person is selfishly happy about this.

Calling LisaB

2007-05-25T19:56:00.000-04:00

LisaB recognizes my dis-en-head-ied torso! I'm going to regard that as cute rather than creepy. :) As I don't remember Lisa's email address and I received other requests for it, I'd like to point out that I wrote up a bit about the math behind short rows. (The Carolina Machine Knitting Guild will also be publishing this tutorial in an upcoming issue of their newsletter.) If anyone has any problems with that, please just email me at leakATEcsDAWTcmuDAWTedu (apply obvious transformation to email address). If it would be more helpful for me to go through the steps I take to create or transform a pattern, I could do that as well. Just ask! The FedEx truck and people who wanted free furniture showed up, so I'm almost home-free at this point.

Cool blue sahara

2007-05-25T09:25:00.000-04:00

In between packing boxes, I finished up my Sahara for the Sexy Knitters Club knitalong. I guess this makes me sexy. Or perhaps it makes me a knitter. Or perhaps a club. (I have been known to be a bit blunt.) The colour isn't quite true; it's more of a dark denim-y blue than a navy blue. In all the moving chaos, I haven't had a chance to block the sweater yet; I expect blocking will make it softer and drapier than it already is.

I made the following modifications:

Decreased the neck depth. I felt the sweater looked better proportioned on bustier people with a shallower neck.
Reworked the bust/waist shaping. I made the bust larger, the waist smaller, started the shaping further down (under the fullest part of my bust), and changed the shaping accordingly.
Added a bust dart. I put bust darts in all my sweaters. They fit much, much better with this feature.
Increased neck trim. I needed four repeats of the neck trim pattern to meet in the middle of the neck.

Yarn: Silky Tweed, somewhere around 7-8 skeins. I have a lot of this floating around, so it was a bit difficult to count in the moving chaos. Silky Tweed is soft and lovely, but a bit splitty, even with Stumpi Bluntos.

Needles: One Addi Turbo 16" circular in size 4. If these had pointy points, they'd be perfect! In this case, I appreciated the dull tips, because the Silky Tweed was splitty enough on its own.

Hi ho, hi ho, it's off to CA we go!

2007-05-25T08:47:00.001-04:00

We're moving. We're really, really moving. We're moving via FedEx (and USPS media mail for the books). This is actually the cheapest way to move, if you don't have really expensive furniture (or can just ship the few pieces you care about some other way) and are willing to sell/give away on one end and scrounge/buy on the other. Tips about FedEx:

They will pick up from your house. You'll need a commercial account (be sure to get one in advance), but then you can print out labels on your home printer, stick em on, and get someone to pick up the boxes.
Their online system can crash. You can then end up with 500 boxes entered instead of 92 and have to poke their system into being a little more reasonable.
If you try to ship that much stuff, FedEx may very well send someone out really early. They won't be there to pick up your stuff. They're there to check that you're not playing some weird data-entry-based practical joke on them. Then they'll see this:

Then they'll claim to send out a real truck. (I can't vouch for the real truck showing up yet, unfortunately.)

In fiber-related news, I finished spinning up virtually all of 8oz of Colonial Wool top. Please, keep in mind that this is the 5th yarn I've ever created and be gentle.

It's a bit underspun, so I treated it a bit roughly so it would full a little bit and help with the structure. I'm feeling ready to tackle a few pounds of BFL fiber for a cabled sweater for myself... once my spinning wheel comes out of a box. (Perhaps once I get a WooLee winder as well. I fear the Joy is probably not the best production wheel out there. I really want something with some higher ratios and a bit more oomph for big projects and to stop changing hooks all the time!)

I've pulled out the hemp from last summer to try to make an honest yarn of it. I've swatched and tweaked a bog jacket into a light summery cardigan.

Unfortunately, sitting in a box all winter has not improved this yarn. It's giving me chemical burns again. I'm not going to be smart and quit while I'm ahead; I'm going to be smart and get myself some latex gloves. Let no one say I'm not determined in pursuit of my art!

To give my hand a break, I'm trading off with socks made from Ellen's Half Pint Farm wool/nylon sock yarn. Aren't they wild? Socks with nylon are often too hard on my feet, besides Mountain Colours and Lorna's Laces, so I'm hoping these work out better than certain other socks.

Just a warning for those of you who are planning to move: moving brings out the evil in your pets!

How kitty beats the heat

2007-05-21T21:19:00.000-04:00

Shaved legs!

Sorry for the delay. I had to take kitty in to the kitty dentist (you can see how thrilled he was in the above picture), then ran off to Seattle for a bit, and now we're finishing the packing. We're doing a scorched-earth move: everything that doesn't fit into a box gets sold, donated, or thrown out. Anyone in the Boston area want a perfectly nice couch with included very nice soft green machine-washable cover (protects from kitty!)? How about some end tables (beat up but matching coffee table included) or bedside tables (IKEA)?

New Hampshire S&W part 1

2007-05-14T11:16:00.000-04:00

First off, let's take a look at what I didn't finish before NHS&W.

It's Phroggy! Everything fits remarkably well except for the bust. (What do I expect by losing 10+ pounds? Luckily, the sweater is fixable.) I've bound off the neck several times now and I just can't get it quite right. I think Montse Stanley will have to come to my rescue. I didn't worry about it, though, since it was too hot for sweaters anyway. Ah, the perfect time to shop for wool!

This was my first fiber festival and I had a blast, even though I found precisely nothing on my shopping list. (I didn't walk away quite empty-handed; a hank of sock yarn and a few ounces of fiber jumped in my bag.) Luckily, Morgaine of Carolina Homespun was there (a store from San Francisco called "Carolina" at a New Hampshire festival, no less) to soothe my fears of running out of fiber when I move to CA in a few weeks and find my poor packed wheel.

There was tasty, tasty fiber there (if not the BFL I've been craving).

We even found out what happens to Susan's hair when she's shorn.

Next up: fleece-bearing creatures other than Susan.

My goodness, I'm knitting from a pattern

2007-05-10T10:09:00.000-04:00

I've wanted to knit along with the Sexy Knitter's Club for a while, but quite a few people there seem to have a predilection for bra-unfriendly designs. Given that I (and probably everyone around me) would be happier if I wore a bra, I waited until Sahara came along. (Yes, I'm knitting from a pattern. Kinda.)

I've been knitting away at it in my last week of work (I'm now temporarily unemployed, pending the move to CA), during endless discussions about how to move (scorched earth option), and kitty's dentist appointment (he now has one fewer tooth, but all the drugs). (BTW, the muffin-top look is an optical illusion. I even checked after squinting at this picture for a while.)

Changes to the pattern:

Gauge. Knit with Silky Tweed at a smidge over 5.5 stitches per inch
Neckline. Closed off the neckline early for (I felt) a more flattering look on me and ease in bust adjustments.
Bust. Added quite a few extra stitches in the bust and a short-row dart.
Waist. Nipped in the waist more than on the pattern, and adjusted the seam decreases/increases to reflect this and the extra room in the bust.

Hey, for me, this is following a pattern!

You spin me right round, baby, right round

2007-05-08T16:24:00.000-04:00

I promise, not too many more terrible spinning references, if for no other reason than I'll run out of them soon. Here are a few things I've spun and dried lately: teal/white hand-dyed (my hands, no less) wool/tencel top and purple merino roving.

I was just playing around with these and trying to discover the many secrets involved in spinning yarn that doesn't suck. One lesson from the purple: pre-drafting results in far more even yarn. One lesson from the teal: I rampantly undertwist, so I can't spin a balanced yarn without rampantly underplying.

My current spinning seems to suffer from this problem as well (far more than it has to, as I'm trying to keep it consistently underspun), so I plan to make a cabled DK-weight yarn from it. Once I've spun that up, however, I'm pretty much out of fiber. New Hampshire Sheep&Wool to the rescue! I think that I might just have a little BFL fleece and some bits and pieces of other wools follow me home, wagging their fluffy little tails behind them.

Please, no more frog for Phrog!

2007-05-05T07:56:00.000-04:00

I'm hoping that I don't jinx myself by posting this, but I think I've finished the knitting on Phroggy. (See, spirits of knitting screwups, I said "think"!)

Phroggy now has sleeves with a pair of cables twisting in a helix around the arm. (Each arm has a different direction of spiral and and different direction of cabling.)

The sleeve is a rather odd raglan. The body is a standard decrease-every-three-rounds raglan, but I wanted something that fit my shoulder and followed the line of the body. I measured the distance around my shoulder (raglan-line to raglan-line) in several spots and simply interpolated between them to design this sleeve. I put a few stitches at the armpit (blue marker) to form the underarm, knitted straight for a while, then did a decrease-every-two-rounds decrease for the remainder of the cap. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that this works post-blocking, but it seemed to be fine pre-blocking.

Once Phrog dries, it'll have its seaming (har) moment of truth. Then I may need to take some of those increases out of the bust, because I've lost a bunch of weight. Perhaps it will be an appropriate temperature to wear Phrog at New Hampshire Sheep&Wool, which will be my very first S&W ever. I'm a woman on a mission, so Lucy said she'd help me avoid doing something terminally stupid. (No, I'm not buying another spinning wheel. Yet. Plus, I don't think Lucy would consider that terminally stupid.)

And... we're back

2007-05-02T13:08:00.000-04:00

I've had to stay away from the blog because I had news (such news!) and I simply couldn't blurt it out. First off, I've quit my job. While I liked the people I worked with, there simply wasn't enough work around to keep me entertained. Now my husband and I will be moving back across the country to California. Again. Luckily, I seem to have lured a new knitter into the fold, so someone can use my heavy wool. (Wave a bit of math in front of her and she's putty.)

I'll be working for a very well known company in the San Francisco bay area, doing exciting things in exchange for more money. I'm really looking forward to it, even though I'll miss my Boston friends.

Knitting updates next time, where I think I've frogged Phroggy enough to nearly finish the thing, the beginnings of a new sweater, socks for my mother, and enough underspun handspun to choke a small child.

My camera came a waltzin' back home

2007-03-29T07:08:00.000-04:00

A camera! With which I can take pictures! (Oh, and yes, my husband came home, too. I've been a little distracted since then.) Please blame the quality (or lack thereof) on the evident ability I have to forget how to take a good picture in only a week.

I've been staring at this sleeve for over a week now and muttering "rip? no rip? rip? no rip?". After a few days of that, even the voices in your head think you've got a screw loose. Anyway, I just can't tell if it's a little snug around this giant knitting muscle I seem to have developed in my forearm.

More than that: does this spiraling-cable motif look nice? There are really two cables, each spiraling around (and spawning extra ribs to increase the sleeve size towards the elbow). I have a plan for the shoulders which should look good... but how is this? If it's bad, tell me now!

Fresh Stripe Socks

2007-03-24T13:17:00.000-04:00

What? A finished object from Krista? That must mean I'm on some sort of break or something! Yes, here's what I have to show for two weeks of spring break.

Socks for the husband, Lorna's Laces Fresh Stripe Shepard Sock, size 3 needles. I had quite a bit left over from each skein, even with his size 11 men's feet. I'm pretty happy with how these turned out except for that weirdly baggy effect around the ankles, but he seems to like them :)

The pretty colours of spring (tra la)

2007-03-21T07:04:00.000-04:00

My camera walked away, so I can't show you the lovely teal/white wool fiber I dyed and am spinning up. Somehow my camera seems to have followed my husband to Switzerland and I haven't found the cords for any of the other cameras in the house.

But I'm thrilled with how these came out. Clockwise from top left: mohair boucle (purple with teal highlights), giant skien of (originally natural-white with brown tweedy flecks) teal, two little skiens of Cascade 220 (one largely green, one purple/black), merino/tencel sock yarn in red and ambery orange, giant skein of teal happiness, and crimson red silk. (I'm really looking forward to spinning up the silk, just to see what it's like!)

I hope you like them as well, Sandra D. :) I'm having trouble figuring out exactly why one needs to wear a mask when working with acid dyes, but Lucy suggested that people who inhale too much dye powder tend to acquire interesting neurological problems. I gave up robotics because of all the soldering already: I figure that sooner or later, I'm going to need my brain, so I'd better not screw it up!

What can I say: right now I have a thing for teal/ocean blue. I have some summery knit plans in those colours that I'm really excited about. Knit content is a bit delayed, though, because I skinned/bruised my hands belaying while rock climbing this weekend. I did spend part of my weekend doing other fun crafting things, though: pictures as soon as I find a camera.

Email problem

2007-03-18T08:27:00.000-04:00

If anyone's been trying to email me in the last few weeks, the email address I've been leaving on blogs and had here wasn't working. (I tested it, so I'm not sure what happened or how to fix it. My geek cred is taking a hit here, I know.) If you'd like to find me, you can reach me at chialea punctuation-here gmail other-punctuation com. I'm very sorry about that!

Dye yarn, dye!

2007-03-16T22:46:00.000-04:00

Lucy offers a class in dying. Never one to pass up a chance to mess up someone else's kitchen, I couldn't resist.

I'm also not one to pass up a chance to wear silly clothing. Nor am I one to pass up a chance to take pictures of other people wearing silly clothing.

I'm not quite as thrilled with the lightheadedness produced by wearing a mask for several hours. The words "neurological disorders" are enough to keep the mask firmly on, but I think the words icing colours" might be in my future instead of repeating this in my own kitchen. (Cornflower blue + teal might make a nice ocean blue...)

We squirted...

(Why yes, that yellow DOES make pee-coloured yarn. Someone checked. Does that blue liquid remind anyone else of diaper commercials?).

We soaked...

We played with intestines...

(I kid, of course. That's really a liver.)

Next post: the results!

Phroggy takes a step

2007-03-15T23:12:00.000-04:00

Phroggy is torso-ized!

Excepting the small matter of bra straps, I think it would be cute as it is. I may take a bit out of the bust to adjust for the weight I lost, but I think it's coming out pretty nicely. If it's bad, tell me now so I can rip before I get very far on the sleeves. (The sleeves are a bit wild, so I'm going to need some stylistic help on those!)

The flowers that bloom in the spring

2007-03-12T18:00:00.000-04:00

(tra la)

I always thought one of the first signs of spring is flowers. Apparently that's not the case in Boston. There's nary a bloom in sight, but the spandex is blooming all over the place. Hail the joggers, those rosy urban robins!

Kitty doesn't have enough fuzz

2007-03-10T16:05:00.000-05:00

Kitty has been shedding rather abundantly, and I believe he misses all that fur. Why would I think such a silly thing? He's either trying to be a cat in sheep's clothing or a cat filled with sheep's clothing.

He's sitting on my entire fiber stash right there. Sandra D, I need some help to catch up to you! (Actually, what I really need is some help in spinning this stuff into actual yarn. Does anyone know of a good book?)

Then he decided to eat the coned yarn I was skiening... this one earned him a time out locked in my husband's office to stand on his keyboard for a while.

Not all my fibery pursuits have been taken over by kitty, though. Here's a close up of the (former) raglan yoke of Phrog.

Instead of decreasing on the raglan lines, I'm decreasing up the center of the chest. While I like the overall effect, the cable join in that picture is just not helping. (Nor is the fact that the kitting is all scrunched up, but that's easily fixed!) True to its name, Phrog has been partially frogged again. I'm happy to say that the Silky Wool is holding up well to the knit/frog cycle. There is some grass to pick out, but that's a reasonable exchange for the nice feel of the yarn. (I'm told that processing the yarn enough to get out that last bit of VM is what makes some yarn feel odd.) I'm also thrilled with the yardage; I am going to finish the entire body in three skiens or just over! At about $7/skien, this is going to be a wonderfully soft, cozy, wonderful sweater at an impressively low price.

Lystessa, I'm so thrilled you like Phrog, and I'd be happy to write you out a pattern for your measurements. Phrog is actually a reasonably simple pattern, especially if you don't need a bust dart or a lot of waist shaping. I'm actually happy to write out a copy of whatever I've knitted for people, if they want it, just in exchange for asking nicely. (Bribery never goes over badly, either.)

Tagalong spinnity

2007-03-08T07:21:00.000-05:00

Something followed me home from knitting group last night. Let's all blame Lucy, ok?

I promise details later, but I spent over 11 hours at work yesterday before knitting group and need to run back over there now. I'm going to assume it's a good thing that work keeps on wanting me to come back, but it's cutting into my toy time!

Radioactictive phrog

2007-03-05T18:49:00.000-05:00

Phrog is moving right along, though slowly. Who'd have thunk that knitting a ribbed and cabled sweater in sportweight yarn might take a while? (To be fair, I've been writing a pattern for my lovely step-grandmother on the side and made some more roving into utterly unusable yarn.) (To be perfectly honest, I was also procrastinating on the four different pieces of math I needed to do, not even accounting for some rejiggering I needed to do to account for the fact that I lost 10 pounds in the last few weeks.)

It's a little more obvious now that Phrog is another variation on the tailored cables theme. The cabling serves as a straight line that contrasts to the curves on a woman's body. There's nothing that makes something look as much itself as the presence of its opposite.

Now all I need to do is split and knit the rest of the body flat before "swatching" for the sleeves. In this case, read "swatching" as "start knitting the sleeve. rip it out and call a mulligan if it turns out wrong." Knitting is all about deniability, unless and until it felts. Then you're just screwed.

Meet Phroggy

2007-02-27T22:54:00.000-05:00

I've frogged this green sweater so many times I think it's earned its name. Phroggy is a Delphine Wilson inspired sweater (I love her work!), worked in Silky Wool. Because I'm not sure how this lovely soft yarn will wear, I'm making the sleeves in a contrasting colour. That way, I can always replace them to 'fix' the elbow-holes I inevitably wear into my sweaters.

This is another "Chialea's wingin' it" original. If you click on the picture to enlarge it, you can see how the ribs are gradually shaped to give the sweater waist shaping. Silky Wool makes a much clingier fabric than I would have thought; Phroggy is actually designed with more ease than I put in my last sweater, but looks very curvy when worn.

Called to the dark side

2007-02-26T22:42:00.000-05:00

Why, hello there!

The dark side came calling this weekend. Oddly enough, it sounded a lot like Lucy. (Incidentally, she's not kidding about "full service". How many yarn stores will let you walk in dripping wet and offer you a towel?) Lucy's smart about teaching people how to spin. Firstly, she realizes really quickly if her students can't distinguish left and right.

Secondly, after she teaches you how to use the spindle, she lets you have a go at the wheel. Hot damn, is that thing addictive. Thirdly, she has incredibly cool relatives who would distract you if you thought that spinning was hard.

I'm sure that spinning is a lot harder if you're trying to make non-crappy yarn. This is my first yarn, a fluffy worsted-ish weight wool.

A fair bit of the crappiness of that yarn comes from my desire to have a spinning wheel. See, the spinning wheel lets you make the fiber go round and round at the same time you're drawing out bits of it to turn into yarn. As I have an incredibly poor sense of my own limitations, I started trying to do this about five minutes into spinning on the spindle. (I'm pretty sure that Lucy didn't see my poor attempts at this, because I didn't hear her thump on the floor laughing.) My tentative conclusion is that this spindle is not designed for this, because if you spun the spindle with one hand and drew the wool with the other, you'd end up stretched out at arm's length incredibly quickly. As hard as I tried, there's no good way to spin from there. Perhaps if the spindle were heavy enough to spin on its own after you got it started, you could spin standing up... or buy a spinning wheel.

So, I've come full circle (har har). I want a wheel. In particular, I want a wheel that will actually fit in our apartment and that I won't want to get rid of in a few years. I'm looking around for one, but in the meantime I'm spinning away.

Evolutionary contradictions

2007-02-25T17:11:00.001-05:00

Recently, my walk to work has looked like this:

While skating to work is rather fun, I'm not a fan of my cheekbones freezing right off my face. This brings to mind a certain oddity: why are Scandinavians known for high cheekbones when they live in such a cold place? One might think that having one's cheekbones freeze off would be evolutionarily disadvantageous. Spherical heads seem rather more practical, as (in three dimensions) they have the lowest possible surface area per unit volume.

I guess we can chalk this up to sexual selection, along with the peacock's tail. Me, I'm thinking of coating my head with putty until I reach spherical perfection.

Oopsies

2007-02-24T21:03:00.000-05:00

It's been one of those weeks. First, I got stuck on a grounded plane for several hours on my way to California and back. Because of this, I missed my connection. Then the airlines canceled/delayed the next possible connections. I was less than pleased when they offered me alternatives that involved red-eye flights and extra connections. Every time I went into an airport there was chaos that just couldn't be blamed on the passengers.

Oopsie #2: sea of foam!

Oopsie #3: I assumed that if dye was coming off my socks, it wasn't going to stick to other socks.

It looks like I was wrong. I loved this cheery colour (though I wouldn't wear it outside of my boots!), so I'm sad to see the green dye stains. I'm not sure that Socks That Rock makes socks as cushy and comfy as Artyarns supermerino, but I'm happy to give it a try. More warm socks are always good!

Yarn: Socks That Rock heavyweight in Sun Drops
Needles: Crystal Palace size 3 DPNs
Pattern: toe up socks over 40 stitches with magic cast on and 10-deep short-row heel over 24 stitches

Airline travel hell

2007-02-21T09:27:00.000-05:00

I've been traveling. While visiting my family was great (and the CA weather is lovely), getting here was a bit more complex than I had anticipated.

Apparently every single child has this week off. In combination with the fact that everyone in New England is going crazy with the winter, this means the airport was in full on Hieronymus Bosch mode.

Conveniently, there were no lines at security. Unfortunately, this was because no one could get checked in. Ultimately, they kept flights for 3+ hours waiting for people to check in. (I was early, because I know where the magic business-traveler-not-checking-baggage kiosks are.)

Now it's back to the airport for me and my Socks That Rock. I'm crossing about everything that can be crossed that it won't be like that again.

A sad day for socks

2007-02-14T23:03:00.000-05:00

Dear New Pair of Socks,

You sock!

Love and kisses,
The Feet

I knitted this new sock out of Socks That Rock in Sun Drops. Don't get me wrong, it's great yarn. (The colour is wonderful for the first real storm we've had this winter, too.) There are a few things that I've learned, though:

This yarn has a very abrupt tension at which it becomes stiff, and it's a good bit looser than I usually knit socks at this weight. It's just fine on size 3 needles if knit a bit loosely, so I needed to go down from 48 to 40 stitches to accommodate this.
This yarn isn't as forgiving in a heel. Because it goes stiff at the slightest bit of extra tension, my high instep is not getting along with this sock at all. See those stretched stitches? See the line where they're cutting into my ankle-foot junction? My feet just aren't up for being strangled in that fashion.

I don't know what to do with this sock. Adding more stitches will make it too loose. What it really needs is a deeper heel, but it can't be deeper unless I make it on more than half the stitches (this is the only solution that I think will certainly work). Anyone ever solved this problem?

Neverending carnival of excitement

2007-02-13T22:42:00.000-05:00

How could I have knitted so many pairs of Artyarns Supermerino socks and not know that they make self-patterning sock yarn? Cathy and Sandra D, you rock for picking out this yarn!

Aren't those fabulous? I love the spiraling stripe of different colour stripes. (Click on the photo to enlarge it; the entire sock is pink/dark stripes, but the spiral is formed of a bold salmon and grey on a background of pink and brown. It's a spiral of stripes on stripes!) I wonder if the other yarn I have from them will do the same thing. Sadly, these mark the last socks for my trusty bamboo needles, which started trying to kill me with splinters. They've been found guilty of pointy treason, and will be burned at the stake or put out to pasture.

Pattern: my standard 48-stitch toe-up sock with magic cast-on and 9-deep short-row heel (may I suggest an afterthought heel instead?)
Needles: treacherous size 3 crystal palace bamboo needles
Yarn: Artyarns Supermerino in colour 141

I've gotten tired of knitting random bits of a shawl while I wait for my tailored cables sweater to dry (every. few. inches.). I'm a bit tempted to leave the sleeve as-is.

It's kinda punk, don't you think?

In any case, I'm starting another sweater. Meet Phroggy:

All I have is a Delphine-Wilson-inspired swatch, because I swatched, washed the swatch, cast on, frogged, then totally ignored the swatch, switched to different needles and a different pattern, and started cranking away. I'm winging this one much more than anything I've done before. If the waist decreases work out, I'll let it out in public.

Now the kitty wants to be petted. He'll breathe his terrible kitty-breath in my face until I do, so I'd better go for now. Here's hoping for a bunch of snow so I can work from home and be productive tomorrow!

Just call me the crazy lady

2007-02-03T20:03:00.000-05:00

I went out today to be the crazy lady at the crazy movie with the crazy socks. If you were at Ruslan i Ludmilla today, hi from the crazy lady who kept giggling all the time. (A special "hello" to the woman in the row in front of me with what looked to be a hand-knit shawl in white mohair and cabled legwarmers.) I managed to pay enough attention to the movie to learn several valuable lessons, however:

Only trust blondes. (The hair dye manufacturers are obviously missing a huge marketing opportunity with this one.)
If the blond hero swings a sword in the general direction of your regiment, you should all fall down in unison. He won't bother checking whether he hit anything.
Women are either dark-haired (and thus evil) or blond (and thus dumb as a box of rocks wearing a silly hat.
Blond women wear white panties. Dark-haired, "magically seductive" women wear colourful, extremely shiny panties. Some of these magical women apparently got lost during the filming of Monty Python and the Holy Grail and wandered into the Russian Castle Anthrax, wearing only shiny panties and gauze. The other magical women apparently all had hip-high-slit inducing wardrobe mishaps.

I haven't even gotten into the flying dwarf with the 50-foot-long beard, so perhaps knitting socks was not even registering on anyone's weird-o-meters.

I've made some more progress on my tailored cables sweater. It's really a lot slower to knit something when you're both designing it and it has to be blocked to look reasonable. (Go, go oily coned yarn!) The good news is that every time I wash the yarn it looks better. The bad news is this means that the farther up the sweater you look, the worse the yarn looks. In any case, it's drying again, so I took some pictures. I've added a vee-neck and armscyes for set-in sleeves.

This is best shot I can get in this light of the detail of the shaping at the bottom of the sweater. I've twisted the cables together as they merge.

Yarny reprieve

2007-02-02T17:45:00.000-05:00

Do you know that feeling you get, as you move towards the end of a project, that you're going to run out of yarn? WEBS came through for me. I wasn't running out of yarn for my current pair of socks; I was running out of yarn for any more pairs of socks. (Cascade 220 superwash just doesn't cut it for socks, in my opinion.) Artyarns Supermerino to the rescue!

Kitty brought his passion for sitting on things to this new and challenging project. Unfortunately, even after I rescued the yarn from his fuzzy little clutches, I can't decide what to knit with next. Any opinions? (Colourways visible at Artyarns.)

101 Purple, Gold, Navy, Brown, Olive, with Turquoise highlights (it looks pretty yellow to me)
123 Sea blues and greens, with periwinkle (much more saturated in person than on their website, even when largely hidden under the cat)
141 Salmony pinks, red, brown, tan (more salmon in person)

Quarantine

2007-01-30T21:46:00.000-05:00

Poor, poor stash!

I opened a bag with the pieces of my alpaca wrappy sweater and a worm fell out on me! Two cones of yarn are freezing whatever insect larvae may or may not be in them... the rest of the stash is freezing in the garage, mixed in with some freaky moth-killing objects that smell like urinal cakes (or so my husband claims). I'm not sure what a "urinal cake" is, but if it smells anything like those moth-objects, I'm not getting it anywhere near my mouth.

Kitty will attack birds on the screen, so perhaps he'll take care of whatever moths we have around here. (Watch The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill with your cat today!)

I haven't actually seen any moths and my stash was all bagged, so this may not end up being a major issue.

There are only a few things out for knitting. I finished some socks, which ran me right out of worsted-weight sock yarn. I just had to order more Artyarns supermerino and a little bit of something new to try.

Pattern: Toe up socks using magic cast-on and short-row heel on 48 stitches
Yarn: 1 skien of Artyarn Supermerino per sock, a truly super boot sock yarn in colour 125
Needles: Size 3 Crystal Palace DPNs

After a truly dangerous bout of second-thumb syndrome, I finished up a pair of mittens for my SIL. To make them extra snuggly, I added a ktbl lining to the cuff (one mitten is turned back so you can see the dark blue lining).

Frankly, I'm not sure I'd use this yarn for mittens again. Sure, it's soft (though processed-feeling). Unfortunately, it doesn't stick together like the Finullgarn in my beloved Frostrosen mittens, so I don't believe these will end up being really warm. Since the entire point of mittens is to be warm, I'm going to send these off to my SIL with an offer to knit her something else as well. I love the pattern, and the mittens are cool... unfortunately, the mittens may well be too cool for Canadian winters.

Pattern: Latvian Mittens chart 69 with extra ktbl cuff liner
Yarn: Dale of Norway Baby Ull

Long time no... type

2007-01-29T19:13:00.000-05:00

I'm sorry about the long hiatus since the last real post. It's been an interesting few weeks. First, my friend and his girlfriend came to visit. More importantly for kitty, their luggage came to visit.

Then I went to the doctor a few times. I'm doing fine, but the cardiologist did find a few heart defects. If they're the kind of defects that take over 25 years to find, then they're not really the important kind. This did, however, coincide with an attack of the intestinal flu that's been going around Boston (either that or a lot of us have been eating the same tainted food, since I just thought I had food poisoning) and then the death cold that put me down for the last week. If I passed either on to anyone else, I apologize profusely. I haven't been knitting in favour of lying down and groaning occasionally, but I did finish up a few things for my inlaws.

Ah, blocking lace. I just love this Prime Alpaca. Frankly, I think everyone loves the Prime Alpaca. I'd never knitted anything in "feather and fan" so I made this little scrap of lace for my MIL.

I swear, blocking lace has got to be the most fun finishing technique of all time, bar sewing mattress stitch seams.

There it is: a soft little warm hug for my MIL. I really hope she likes it.

Yarn: Prime Alpaca in Mist Grey
Needles: Size 6 Denise
Pattern: Two repeats of feather and fan. Repeat until scarf-sized.

I also made a (much bigger) scarf for my FIL. I hope this will successfully replace his worn out golfing scarf! He likes bright colours, so what could be nicer than Noro in entrelac? (If someone knows of something he'd like better, perhaps I could him something else... knitting for other people is a bit of a shot in the dark for me.)

Yarn: 4 skiens of Noro Kureyon in colour 164
Needles: Size 8 Denise

So fly off, my little scarfies. I hope they'll be loved. Otherwise I think I might go kidnap them back (and replace them with something the recipients like better), because I certainly like them.

Quick update

2007-01-21T17:29:00.000-05:00

I'll have some finished presents for my inlaws soon (gotta keep them warm up there in Canada!), but in the meantime, here's a short list of things I learned this week:

The inside of my heart looks really cool on a screen.
Tiny bubbles inside my heart look really cool on a screen.
Tiny bubbles don't feel so small when you have tiny veins.
Cardiologists have the strongest adhesive known to humankind and apply it wherever possible.

In a blatant attempt to distract you from my lack of pictures, go and look at kitten fluff and contemplate spinning it into yarn.

New scarf and renewed desire

2007-01-11T22:23:00.000-05:00

I finished a scarf! It's just in time for the freaking wind of the arctic that's decended on Boston. My husband says it's not so cold. My husband's been working from home and not walking to work at 8:30am. My husband is full of it.

I wandered into Poor Little Rich Girl today while killing time after work. This vintage/consignment clothing store has an interesting (in a nice way) selection, including this lovely suit for $40 in my late grandmother's favorite colour.

I almost bought it, until I rememberd that I could knit my own with bust darts and waist shaping. I am way too excited about this. Given how badly hemp turned out for my poor fingers, I think some Euroflax is in my future.

Our houseguests are amusing kitty to keep him off my yarn, since he was all annoyed that we cleaned the house. Yes, we took the crap off of the floor and put it in... containers on the floor. It's a good thing kitty hasn't figured out the door handles, or he might try to smother us in our sleep. Instead he'll watch and wait...

I don't know about you, but I'm scared.

Yarn: Fleece Artist Baby Alpaca, a wonderful gift from my parents-in-law, in a burgundy colourway
Needles: Denise in #8 or #9
Pattern: Garter stitch on the bias, slipped stitch edging

Officially sponsored elevator

2007-01-10T09:43:00.000-05:00

Attention! Private elevator for the sole use of St. Joseph! All others will be fined... one SOUL! insert evil cackle here

As only one person guessed what the strange beverage was, she wins a yarny prize! May LittleLixie be further touched by His Noodly Appendage. As it turns out, she guessed something that I haven't even heard of, so I'm pretty sure she wasn't right. That drink was actually OJ, with sour cherry juice put into the bottom one straw-ful at a time. No, I have no idea why. My sister claims that cream cheese spread on graham crackers tastes like Oreos, so I suppose it could be worse. Lixie, email me your address and I'll send something fun off to you.

Unseasonable photographs of handknits

2007-01-07T07:49:00.000-05:00

Apparently it was unseasonably warm yesterday. Every time I say to a Bostonian that the weather seems unseasonable, they rush to assure me that it's normal for Boston. It doesn't matter what the weather is; I think they'd claim this if it were literally raining cats and dogs. My coworkers are starting to admit that highs of up to 70 degrees are perhaps a trifle unusual in January, given that we are not, in fact, in California.

My husband and I missed the lovely weather entirely, though, as we're both sick. He has a cold. I seem to have picked up a bit of food poisoning (or rather, I have no other explanation for the force and duration of my symptoms). Probably because I'm a vegetarian, I haven't had food poisoning since... well, over 10 years ago, when I wasn't a vegetarian. I think I'll stick to the "no food poisoning" plan in future. Kitty's not allowed outside, but he got as close as feline-ly possible when we opened the windows.

I traded off moaning and staring at my abdomen to see if some alien was making an appearance with knitting various things, so I finally finished my RFC-making socks. Here's the best shot I got of kitty modelling them.

I've given up on that for the time being, as kitty doesn't seem to be as pliable as Krista's dog, so here's a shot of my new socks investigating their new home. If you're looking for manly sock patterns and colours, my husband thoroughly approves of these. I think this means something coming from him, considering that he owns no non-black socks.

Yes, my ankles are small, but part of the giant boot effect is the fact that these are several sizes too big and require giant socks. (My new Bearfoot socks, while thicker than Lorna's Laces, are not thick enough for these boots.) Now I just need to figure out what makes good, thick socks. The Artyarns Supermerino I've used for thick socks in the past is great stuff, but not quite as thick as I need, even knitted on size 3 needles. I can wear any colour socks, since they sit inside my boots, but I really could use some more thick wool socks.

Pattern: Ringwood stitch pattern from Knitting Vintage Socks applied to one of my stock sock "patterns"
Yarn: Mountain Colours Bearfoot in the Red Tailed Hawk colourway
Needles: Size 1 Comfort Zone bendy plastic DPNs

Progress in toyland

2007-01-05T22:12:00.000-05:00

I haven't finished anything new (or rather, I haven't finished anything new that is dry yet), so I wanted to show you all my new toy. My friend got me something that's been lurking on my wish list for a long time: what Claudia calls a drug dealer's scale. I don't think any drug dealer worth his or her snuff (so to speak) would be using a scale that's accurate only to 1/10 of a gram, but yarn does have a certain crack-like quality. I've been wringing my hands yet again, worrying that I wouldn't have enough yarn to finish my current pair of RFC-reading socks. It's a little close this time, but I'll make it. (Four plastic needles weigh only 3.4g.)

I think this calls for a spree of stash-using, mixed yarn socks, once I finish these and the next two pairs waiting for me. What can I say: I owe my mom some nicer socks than the last ones. She was the recipient of the first thing I ever knit. Let's just say that my socks are nicer after a year of practice.

Here's a preview of my tailored cables sweater. It's grown, but it's still in the "wet" pile. I'm trying to write the shoulder shaping by hand, which should be an interesting exercise in applied mathematics. Thank heaven for bust darts, where the math is much more simple!

And just for kicks, this is my husband's favorite drink. A yarn prize to anyone who correctly identifies it!

An honest-to-goodness finished object

2006-12-31T17:43:00.000-05:00

Kitty and I have been lazing around all day

but I did get a bit of knitting done.

Here's my husband modeling his new string market bag filled with cans and other tasty food items.

Pattern: Market bag with the following mods: picked up radically different number of stitches for top of bag, then did trim and strap in stockinette instead of garter stitch.
Yarn: Valley Yarns Winsor
Needles: Denise transformer robots-in-disguise tree trunks (#15) and tree branches (#10)

My row and stitch gauge turned out radically different from those (not) specified in the pattern. I put the bag together anyway, to see how it'll work out. (I'm sure it can still carry OJ, which is what my husband goes out nearly every night to buy.) I'm not sure the stitch pattern is sufficiently dense to keep things from falling out. I'm not sure it is sufficiently structured to do much carrying of heavy objects. It's certainly worth a try, at least, but I won't be using the pattern in this form again.

As for the yarn, it's great for this project, since I don't care about it being knocked around/pulled on/stained, but it's probably too randomly tuft-y and rough for me to choose to use it in an actual garment. I like the texture, but there are spots where it just breaks down and becomes a big poof.

Happy new year to all and sundry. I think kitty and I will be asleep before then!

In which I distract you with cute kittiness

2006-12-31T11:16:00.000-05:00

I've made some progress in scarf-land, but I've been lazy about blocking. In an attempt to distract you from this fact, I have kitty with my current WIP and kitty with his holiday present.

See! Cuteness!

Anyway, my MIL was sweet enough to get kitty a catnip mouse. Perhaps he'll play with it instead of my knitting. I'm not holding my breath here.

Kitty has been trying to "help" with my first knitted item ever for my husband. No, it's not a sweater. According to my knitting group, the sweater curse is still active until three years after the wedding, and we're closer to three months. In a purely technical sense, my husband doesn't want a sweater. He doesn't want anything knitted. I've been racking my brains for something he might need; I think I've finally found it.

A string market bag in Valley Yarns Windsor cotton. I'm not sure this is really the right pattern for the job, though: I'm ending up with a long, skinny bag that was a real pain to sew together.

The side seams don't seem to add stability and are a pain to sew, even in whipstitch. I'll finish this off and see what happens. I know a certain someone up in frozen-land who might want something like this, so I'll have the opportunity to knit a refined version. (That certain someone might want to let me know whether she cares about the colour before I go look for yarn.) I won't be touching it for a while, though. The size 15 needles are driving me bonkers! I want my nice comfy size 1s (pictured for comparison) back! I'm thinking of knitting an all-over colourwork sweater in fingering weight just to get my nice tiny needles back into my nice tiny hands.

What on earth?

2006-12-30T13:44:00.000-05:00

Dear Lea,

What could this possibly be? A post? From Krista? My goodness.

And not just a post? But a finished object?

Yes. During my first semester of law school, I knitted about 1/2 of a scarf and about 1/2 of one sock. During the first part of my winter break, I finished the scarf - my first FO in SIX MONTHS! SIX! Law school is not conducive to knitting. You'll recognize this yarn as the Manos you bought my husband for his birthday last summer. I used one hank for this scarf, in a pretty basic mistake rib - he wants a long hat with earflaps and a tie from the other skein. Norton was happy to help with the unpinning.

I couldn't get a good close up of the ribbing, but here's the whole scarf:
It's been such a mild winter that I don't feel pressed to start on the hat right now. Instead, I'm going to make something from the Arctic Lace book that you bought me for MY birthday (you're so generous with the knitting related gifts) ... so look for pictures of that in another six months or so :)

Have a wonderful New Year's, everyone!

Krista

A life changing experience

2006-12-28T17:38:00.000-05:00

Lucy told me to get wool long underwear. She said they'd change my life. That's exactly what I was scared of when I got the package.

The model wearing the long underwear is obviously very cold, so the long underwear isn't helping her out at all. In addition, the long underwear may have given her the bad boob job. Better safe than sorry; no top for me!

Lucy is right, though. Mmmmm... waaaarm. For the first time walking to work wasn't an experience in being stingy-frozen-cold from my boots to my thighs. Moving to somewhere snowy is a continual lesson in how wool is the wonder fabric. Sometimes I feel like I'm in a wool-wearing contest: wool hat, pashmina as a scarf, wool coat, wool sweater, wool pants, thick wool socks. Long underwear is just going to give me another leg up when someone holds that contest. I'm sure it will be any day now.

Food is good

2006-12-25T20:14:00.000-05:00

Insert food here.

First insert this.

Then insert this. (I was somehow too full for this step.)

The happy abdominal snowman says hi!

Rudolph the Red Nosed Misogynist

2006-12-24T19:15:00.000-05:00

How did I never notice before how misogynist the movie "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer" is? A sampling of actual quotes:

"We'd better get the women back to Christmastown."
"You can't do this; this is a man's job."

Notice also that Donner's wife has no actual name; her name is "Mrs. Donner". One good thing did come out of watching this movie, though. My husband's belly has a new nickname: it's the abdominal snowman, because it's hairy and white.

While I'm up on my PEI yarn run (I did find some yarn, but I'll post pictures of that later) I've been working on a pair of Latvian Mittens for my SIL. She picked out the pattern and happened to like the colours of Baby Ull I had with me. The yarn is all kinds of soft, though processed-feeling, but I have to wonder how well it will protect against the weather and stand up against snagging. It's rather slick; I just pulled an inch of a ply out by brushing against some velcro!

The dark blue cuff is a lining for the cuff to make it fit more snugly around her wrist. Unless I've missed something in the book and pictures, Latvian mittens do not traditionally have the refinements of their Nordic cousins like thumb gussets and border stitches (to hide the jog at the beginning of rounds). It may not be historically accurate, but I think my mittens are going to look like a hybrid in future.

Dale of Norway certainly has some impressive designs, even besides the cutest baby designs ever.

Now if they only sold patterns for them instead of $300+ sweaters, I'd be in business. Here are my famous last words, right up front: how hard could it possibly be to write a pattern for that?

For those of you who celebrate a holiday today, OH OH OH

Merry Dog!

Fleece Artist/Handmaiden run

2006-12-23T06:47:00.000-05:00

I'm on my most long-distance yarn run ever: I'm on Prince Edward Island looking for Fleece Artist and Handmaiden. We were apparently so determined to get here that we drove directly through the water

and drove right by an incomparable opportunity to wash puppies.

Unfortunately, it looks like everyone else in North America got here before me, because Great Northern Knitters (believe it or not, it's also a yarn store) is out of pretty much everything but a few sad, disconnected skiens of BFL, cashmere, qiviut, and thrummed sock kits. I had a fun conversation a few times:
Yarn store person: Can I help you?
Chialea: I'm looking for any sock yarn, sea silk, or 900 yards of DK wool and a matching 700 yards of mohair.
Yarn store person: We have a kit for thrummed socks here.
Chialea: I don't think those will fit in my boots, somehow. I'll come back some other time of year.

At least I got to pet the qiviut and dream about buying a skien for mitten liners. (I was too scared to try on the $600 qiviut sweater.) I'm not sure I'm quite that extravagant, but this has reinforced my desire to get my hands on some nice yarn. I'm also rethinking the "sweater with mohair" idea; it's the first time I've touched that stuff and it sheds worse than my cat! To that end, I'll be heading to the farmer's market later today to meet the woman who knit my wonderful thrummed mittens.

It's holiday time!

2006-12-20T09:08:00.000-05:00

I finished my holiday knitting early (who'd have thunk it?), so I'm on to knitting something for my MIL. It's lace, so I hope she likes it. Currently, it's all crumple-y, but it is very soft and warm and squishy. Everyone likes soft and warm and squishy yarn!

I think I might need to make another one of these for myself. I also hope she likes the prospect of blocking on the carpet or the bed or something, because I don't think there's any way I'm going to finish it before I get there. I promise it won't bleed!

My poor mother spent her birthday at the hospital with her father. He pulled through the surgery fine, and we're counting on his incredible stubbornness to keep him on the track to recovery. Sure, he calls me stubborn, but I just don't know what he could possibly be talking about. As a bithday treat for her, I'll let her peek at the present I knitted for her. She asked for more knitted presents, which she'll recieve after I track down satisfactory yarn for them. (It's hard to track down specific colours of hand-dyed yarn during the holiday season!)

Ever environmentally conscious, my husband and I wrapped our presents to each other in our shirts and opened em last night. He didn't get me any yarn/needles this year, under the theory that I'll buy them for myself anyway. Instead he got me a Pimsleur language course to work through with my dad, the book of the Flying Spaghetti Monster (all praise his noodly appendage), and some great CDs that I'll listen to the moment this multi-day migraine goes away.

Let's just say that kitty was very pleased with his present, too.

Ankles we have turned on high

2006-12-17T14:27:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, I walked up a mountain and then back down again. Actually, since quite a lot of the "walk" is up rock faces, I climbed up a mountain and slid back down on my butt. Unsurprisingly, it's cold up on the top of a mountain in mid-December, though it is quite pretty. Note that this picture shows the hiking trail, not the side of a cliff.

As the title of this post might indicate, my ankles are either indicating their displeasure at this outing in specific or the state of my holiday knitting in general. I still haven't found the perfect buttons to finish off a pair of gloves, started a cotton washcloth, or started on the second fuzzy mitten. All of these things are being shipped out Tuesday morning, so I need to get on top of this!

One down: my aunt's socks. She has tiny feet, too.

Yarn: Cascade fixation
Needles: #2 crystal palace bamboo DPNs (hands-down, my favorite bamboo needles are from Crystal Palace)
Patten: Toe-up socks using magic cast-on and short-row heel on 64 stitches with rolled cuff

I was planning a more refined top, like a picot hem, but was thwarted by the hiking. I don't know if you can see this well in the picture, but each ankle has a rather impressive swelling on it. Given the amount of rock clambering, they're doing fine and will be back to a normal size soon. However, a normal size is absolutely necessary to check the fit of socks for my slim-ankled auntie! I hope she'll like these anyway.

To keep me laughing through the deadlines, I'll be watching Dildo Diaries. It's a documentary about some rather odd anti-sex laws and how they came about. Watch this hilarious clip of the movie, then run out and watch the whole thing.

No more David Lynch

2006-12-15T22:50:00.000-05:00

I saw "Inland Empire" the other night. I'm pretty sure that's going to be the last Lynch movie I see. I don't do well with creepy movies. I don't do well with movies where things jump and scream. I do not like that kind of violence. I really don't like watching it for three full hours. Still, all of that might possibly have been forgivable, but this is beyond the pale:

Two dropped stitches! I've never dropped stitches when knitting in a movie before. I'm almost done fixing them in this picture, but my extremely tight creepy-movie-induced gauge made it extremely annoying.

In more cheerful news, I'm shopping for yarn for my next designer-inspired sweater. I'm thinking of trying out Silky Wool in colours 9 and 20. What do you think? They may be too close in shade. I don't want it to look like I had a dye lot accident; I want it to look like the sweater contrasts interestingly.

One advantage of the non-matching sleeves is that when I inevitably wear out the elbows I can replace the sleeves!

Turn the gifting crank

2006-12-15T22:06:00.000-05:00

If you're related to me by blood, stop reading now. Then again, if you're related to me by blood, you're rationalizing to yourself right now that continuing to read is the moral equivalent to peeking in the corners of a package. My family has a long and glorious tradition of peeking, and they're probably feeling deprived of this since I'm so far away. So be it; surprise is in your hands.

My knee is oh-so-attractively modeling my sister's scarf in the "it's so cold I'm strangling myself" configuration. I tried to get the cat to model, but he was a bit disturbed by the amount of yelling I do when I watch Jepardy. This scarf is everything my sister asked for: big, fluffy, pretty, and soft. It's also geeky: if you look closely, you can see that I've used Fibonacci numbers as the basis for the striping. The number of ridges of Silk Garden in each stripe are {1,2,3=2+1,5=2+3,3,2,1}.

Yarn: Jo Sharp Silkroad Aran and Noro Silk Garden
Needles: Size 10 Denise
Pattern: Cast on enough stitches for length of scarf. Knit garter stitch until scarf is wide enough and/or you run out of yarn. Cast off loosely.

I have a surprise for a certain member of my family who kept fondling the same yarn every single time we went to the yarn store. I've been hiding this in my stash until now, when it begins to realize its destiny as mittens.

You can't convince me that Sinsation is for anything other than mittens. Why use that fuzzy yarn on anything other than your hands, where you get to actively feel it all the time? Seriously, I think Yarndex is insane when it suggests that sweaters would be an appropriate use of this yarn. (If I'm off base here, send me a picture.) First, it's thick and heavy, so it'll stretch out terribly. Second, it's thick and plushy, so it'll make you look like a caterpillar just before entering the cocoon. Babies look cute in sweaters like that, so I'll make an exception for them.

Anyway, I made a mitten using "two" size 10.5 Denise circulars and one ball of Sinsation. As I only have two of each size needle tip, I used size 10s to hold stitches while I knitted off of them with the size 10.5s. My pattern, however, was a little loose: magic cast-on, then increase like for socks until they were big enough, then knit until they're long enough, then knit back and forth to make a slit for a thumb, then knit a few rounds, then pick up and knit the thumb from the other end of the ball, then knit until you almost run out of yarn while decreasing around the base of the hand, then use the EZ sewn bind-off. Note the complete lack of numbers in this pattern. I was so worried that one ball of yarn wouldn't be enough that I didn't bother to note exactly what I did. Given the six inches of yarn I have left over, reproducing this mitten may be exciting in the "what do you mean I need to un-darn ends on a thick chenille yarn?" kind of way.

Tomorrow I'll attempt to reproduce this mitten while on the way to hike up a mountain. I will point out that hiking up a mountain in mid-December was not my idea, but it does sound fun. I even get to wear the least flattering pants ever made! They make me look like my bottom half has suddenly gained 30 pounds in some bizzare experiment to graft different-sized people together. Perhaps if I wear my fluffy down jacket I'll look normal again.

Sneak peek

2006-12-10T11:48:00.001-05:00

I tried on the beginning of my new sweater, so I thought I'd post a picture.

The stockinette portion has not been washed, so it's still thin and oily. When I wash it, it won't be see-through (like the lower portion).

My design theme for this sweater is faux-seams. The seams start in the lower portion of the sweater. Waist shaping causes ribs to come together and twist into cabled "seams" on the front and back. After I finish the bust, the front and seams will curve like on a tailored garment. I'm not sure whether they'll twist together at the shoulders or spread into arm seams (or both). We'll have to see where the muses take me.