It appears that I have finally found a use for my domain - I'm joining the world of knit bloggers and beginning a whole new adventure in my fibery world!
Stay tuned as I figure out how to work this thing - for an office applications guru, this web stuff feels a bit scary!
I'm quite the flibberdigibbet these days - there are just so many things calling to me. Top row, L to R: CeCe from ChicKnits, a very simple and fun lace pattern in Butterfly cotton; a take on Zib's Via Diagonale pattern that will become a felted bag when it grows up; and Annie Modesitt's lace corset top - I didn't buy enough of the buttons I really, really liked*, so bought more that I really, really don't like, and the top sits waiting for me to find the right buttons again. Bottom row, L to R: two socks on two circs from the toe up - all parts new tricks for me, in Lucy Neatby's lovely merino; A Tubey started in something by Gedifra I picked up on sale in Asheville - gotta take all this out because the sleeves are too tight at the shoulder; and almost half of the pound of corriedale wool spun up - the cakes are ball-wound singles waiting to be plied. There are many, many more that I just haven't gotten around to photographing yet - phew! I'm also working on test-knit swatches - can't show those to you yet. CeCe will be getting my attention this weekend while Ernesto brings us some much needed rain.
*Standard MO - leave the house without ALL the information I will need whenever I get where I'm going - like exactly how many buttons I need instead of "oh, twelve sounds about right."
I'm not sure what kind of sign, but it just must be a sign. So, late last night we were watching an old Eddie Izzard comedy hour on BBC - gotta love this transvestite - he makes me snort. I was fixated on the background he was prancing around in front of - all coppery, blue-y like light-stick blue, purple - really yummy. Today, after a chilly and windy trip to the beach followed by a bit of strenuous yardwork, I raced at the last 30 minutes of my LYS's special Sunday Blue Heron champagne reception. Mmmmm. But still pricey even on sale - I was talking myself out of it even as I touched all of it, then dug around in some bins assisted by a very energetic
salesperson, and laid eyes on this:
Some fiber(Domestic Wool, 4.2 oz.) flew up off the shelf and into my basket even as I was trying to make my getaway, 
and I'm not sure how those four skeins of Cascade 220 at 20% off for buttonhole bags got home with me... I have no control. And no pride. But I have tons and tons of pretty yarn and fiber. So sue me.
Zowie - just back from a quick trip to see my rockstar mom who's just had her second knee replaced. It was great to see her, help out, and relieve my sisters who have managed mom's surgery, two businesses, and kids.
Of course the first thing I packed was yarn, and projects, and supplies for my sis to try felting, and spindles and fibers to play with. I got a LOT of mileage out of the silk hankies - my mother was amazed by them. As I was describing my spinning and plying attempts, we were talking about singles vs. plied, and I did something new... I had balls of Butterfly cotton, Lopi, and Cascade 220 with me - I pulled them all apart, untwisted, and poof - I broke them all down to their natural state. I'm really not sure why this delighted me so much, but then I'm pretty easy to delight. It fascinated my mom.
There wasn't much time to knit or spin, and I forgot the pattern for CeCe that I wanted to work on, but then I hit the usual Bermuda Triangle I find when I fly to Florida, and spent most of Wednesday in airports. The final bit of my first half pound of Corriedale was just the thing to keep my head from spinning off! Now I'm chuckling at that term - how appropriate - and not intentional. Anyway, I spun for what seemed like hours, and entertained many at several gates while trying desperately to get home.
This fiber thing, whether knitting or spinning, is amazingly good for this mostly anti-social* hermit. I NEVER talk to people on airplanes - never. I spent the whole day gabbing it up, whether it was with the 10-year old triplets who watched me spin or the gang of us going from gate to gate trying to get a standby flight and being berated by hostile gate ladies! When I finally boarded and found my seat, it was next to a very fun guy who was part of our gate gang - and we had a grand old time yukking it up about all sorts of crazy things. What fun!
*I'm not THAT bad... but given a choice, I'd choose going home and getting in my jammies after work so I can knit/spin/snuggle cats over socializing any day!
Wait - strike that - reverse it please!
I've been on a psychic cleaning binge, which means that I've been removing clutter and finishing things dying to be finished. I organized all my knitting magazines into one place, in chronological order by mag. I had a major "put it away" session this morning. Lo and behold, I think I've found my brain under all that mess! I get so full of life stuff sometimes I have to stop and dump and clear and sort and file to get going.
Long way of saying I've finished some knitting/spinning pictured below for your viewing pleasure:
Cascade 220, a little more than one ball each of tan and red
Tweaks: I cast on less stitches than the pattern, double-knit the handle for sturdiness, and felted the whole thing. It's a great, strong fabric - I see carrying spindles, etc. in it.
In closeup:
Spinning, spinning, and more spinning on the drop spindles:
1/2 lb Corriedale roving, two plied:
That's all of it above - it's something like 480 yards. My plying skills are improving - here's some lovely merino, about 94 yards:
I sent the same amount of this roving to my SP - can't wait to see what PixelDiva spins up with hers.
Gratuitous kitten picture - Bluefish in action:
I'm not much of a frou frou type, and as such have never understood all the lovely, dangly, fancy stitch markers out there. I'm also big into functional as opposed to decorative, so I use the little plastic or rubber rings that I buy in packages at the yarn store often since they seem to like to wander once liberated from those packages.
I work with someone related to the creative brains of Zecca and was recently gifted a tin of her very lovely little markers. I've admired them for months, worn them on chains as pendants, and, finally, decided to use them knitting up some sample swatches. I am pleasantly surprised at how delightful they are to use - they sparkle and dangle and generally make me smile when I come upon them each row. Who knew?
For some unknown reason, I've been waking up at 3AM, forcing myself to stay in bed til 4AM, and then getting up and having what feels like a full day before I have to go to work. This has been going on since Wednesday - ugh. But I've gotten a lot done - some spinning, almost a whole moebius shawl, and the beginnings of another funky cable sample. Plus lots of housework too, in prep for our holiday trip to a sunny place where we get to see both my family and DH's in one fell swoop. Couldn't have planned that better - we save tons on airfare.
The moebius - what magic - incredible stuff here. I wish my brain worked like Cat Bordhi's - how did she ever figure this out? It's Blue Heron Petite Rayon Boucle in Water Hyacinth - only a few more very long rows to go. I'll finish this on the plane.
In spinning news, after trying the Welsh Top that came with my wheel (it wasn't Wensleydale as previously reported, but hey, it was at least a w sound), which is very coarse and hairy and more to Indigo's liking than mine, I went thin with some unidentified dyed roving. I think I'm so worried about putting too much twist in that I'm not putting enough. Don't the colors in that wool look remarkably similar to the moebius? I see a trend here, and it's unconscious so far.
I've spent a lot of today cat proofing - Bluefish the wrecking ball hesitates at nothing. She jumped on the counter and up onto a shelf from there, which she rode down from the wall as it crashed into the lazy susan full of seasonings and the crock with all of my utensils in it. Amazingly, and lucky for the Fish, nothing broke. Can't imagine what trouble she'll get into while we're away.
In the final exciting news of the weekend, we have mice in our 81 year old house - imagine that. Mice bold enough to, in broad daylight, come up on my counter to munch on the cinnamon sugar that lives by the toaster. I didn't witness this - DH did, but I now understand it's not crickets that Bluefush lays in wait for in the kitchen, it's the mice she can hear behind the dishwasher. Fun. This is the first time in my whole life I can't call the landlord to get rid of the mice. One of the many things that reminds me I'm a grownup now. Not gonna think about it til after turkey. And I'll come home with a tan, which always makes me feel better, so I'm sure the solution will come to me then.
Or madness. I can't stop. I LOVE these things! They knit up uber-quick, they're mindbogglingly amazing, and they are so organic just like Cat describes them. I have moebius projects lined up as far as the eye can see. Seriously - it's cutting into my spinning time!
These are moebii 1-6, missing #2 which was gifted in the Secret Santa baloney at work. I didn't like it so much - I tried to be crafty and do math in my head (this is never, ever a good idea) and upscale the thing by half. It worked - to a point. I didn't make any scale arrangements for the decreases, and ended up with a bit lot of puckering. I also used only a single strand of Cascade 220, so it was pretty very flimsy felt. The recipient doesn't know any better - and also seemed completely indifferent to the fact that the basket only had one edge. And one freaking surface! Don't you get it? It's a MOEBIUS! Phew.
Anyway, these are all drying after their fun hot water adventure, and the next post will feature them in all their one-surface glory. I love everything about them - right up to blowing up a balloon inside them to dry them in a lovely round shape. The pale pink/purpley thing is a double basket that is thisclose to being done, but I ran out of yarn. And you know, it's just hard to get to the yarn shop when you're a working girl who's got chores and things to do with DH on the weekend. And especially now, with all the absolute worst crazies on the road searching frantically for that perfect holiday present - traffic hell and more than my patience can bear. (Whine) I'll live, it will get finished, and I'll knit some more with something else. The turquoise blob in the lower right corner is a first for me in felting - it fused together. After trying my very best to slice it open, I gave up and now I'll cut it into embellishments - note the circle already cut.. WoolPak sure felts fast, hard, and thick!
Okay, so it wasn't morning, it was after work. But I do love the smell of wet wool. Makes me think of the time that, as a hurricane approached, my family was forced to pack up its tent village wet and drive home from Ocracoke with four adults and four children and two 50 pound dogs in a Bronco who were also all wet. Mmmm....memories.
Not really - I'm having waaaaay too much fun. May I present the latest moebius basket, BUNS!
Cat Bordhi describes this as anatomical in her Second Treasury, and I did consider the bare bum-ness of the pale pink when selecting colors, and I couldn't be more pleased with the results. It's the first time I've ever knint with Lamb's Pride - pretty nice stuff, and double-stranded on 13s it makes for a very sturdy felt. Stands up on its own. Hinies, IMHO, are always fun. (How in the world do you spell that nickname for fanny??) I have another on the needles and one waiting in the wings - I can't stop.
I even managed to do the teeny tiny bit of finishing required to make these socks an FO - finally. Made a pair for twin sis for our big birthday last January and then cast right on to make the exact same pair for me from the giant bag of Elann Esprit sock yarn I bought a ton of for a project it was absolutely wrong for. They've been moving between various knitting piles, and somehow ended up in the active pile in the corner of the loveseat I live in. Two ends to weave in - what have I been waiting for? It's a pattern from Interweave some time ago - don't ask, I don't remember. Slouchy socks - very comfy, and it's hard to beat turquoise anything.
Hohoho and merry merry to all - slugfest continues here through at least tomorrow!
At the Dream yesterday. Woke up at 4AM and proceeded to have a full morning before I went to work. First I fiinished plying the silk hankies, artfully displayed on the cat's bird watching post in the sunroom. This is 801 yards, and I'm almost positive now that I'll ply it back on itself for a bulkier yarn.
Then I set about dyeing the silk/wool fiber with the pokeberries, which turned into this:
I did my usual scientific method - I eyeballed the alum and cream of tartar in the dyepot and threw in the pokeberries loose. I mashed them about a bit and came up with a lovely shade of magenta - real, true, bright magenta. In went the fiber which immediately took on that bright hue. I wandered off for a bit, and when I returned, it had started taking on a few brownish spots, and then later completely changed into this strange pale, dirty apricot/peach (kind of like the baby loop I got in the CTH sale now that I think about it). I left it to soak in the pot all day, and found lots of color still left in the end. Silly to have left those mashed up berries loose in the pot - they had all firmly adhered to the fiber and took some work to rinse. If you look closely you may see some dark spots - berry bits. There are a very few faint streaks of that magenta buried in here. I have no idea - but I love that I've completed the circle started in the 70s when mom did some natural dyeing in the woods in rural Pennsylvania.
I unloaded the dishwasher, did the usual cat routine and then my own and worked a full day. During which I found out that carpet runners we had ordered were in and needed to be picked up, so I did that, lugged them and the carpet pads in from the car and did an instant redecoration of my halls. At which point, the UPS man turned up with my new desktop computer to replace the six-year old one that's become achingly slow. So, then I crawled around on the floor like a lizard to hook and unhook everything, during which time I made a feeble attempt to clean up the cable snare under the desk. I will be purchasing one of those newfangled devices that allows for those humongous adapter plugs that hog up space on your surge protector strip. I only made it worse and now have an additional cord snaking across the room, sure to trip the man when he gets home. Oy.
So, I am woman, hear me roar - all endeavors over the looooong day yesterday were successful, I'm freakishly strong for my size, I made my home wireless network function all by myself, and basically, I just rock. Thank you veddy much.
Random thought for the day: Do you find that, if your pants have more than the usual two-step closure, like two buttons, or a button and a hook, in addition to the zipper, you're more likely to leave your fly unzipped? Just wondering. If I have to think about more than the usual one-two, approximately 7 of 10 times I have to zip up, I'm likely to skip that third step altogether.
I could get used to this. Too bad I have to wait for President's Day to have another planned long weekend. The man had to travel for work yesterday, so I had a glorious span of time all my own. Since I'm still waking up at ridiculous hours, I got busy very early with all that silk. That pretty, pretty silk that I've been having a hard time keeping my (dry) hands away from, and have shown off at several opportunities, and only tied once when it came off the skein winder. It is suggested in all spinning references I own that you tie your skeins securely in several places - at least two. Why I can't possibly do such a simple task is beyond me, but yes, you know where this is going. I've invested a lot of time and energy into this silk, in a good way, and so after marinating for a few days, I finally decided Sunday night that it needed more twist if it was to grow up to be the four-ply I wanted it to be. So I rigged up the winder behind the wheel and attempted to put that skein back on the winder. It looked perfect - until I untied my one spot, and that damned end would not let go of the rest of the hank. You know that figure eight thing hanks are usually tied in? I somehow retained a twist, and almost two hours of cursing, yanking, re-winding, over/under-where-the-hell-is-that-going-now hell ensued. I only put it down because my arm was falling off from trying to hold the hank. Not only was it all tangled, those underspun areas are very grabby, making it look like tangles when really it was just sticky singles. Ugh.
So, Monday morning, back to the hank. I had coffee and most useful assistance from the cats, and we got sorted it out. And so I got it back on the bobbin after twisting the bejeezus out of it. All good. I even got it into a center pull ball over a tp roll sleeve. Then I got nervous that I'd wound it too tighly and it would go limp, so I hopped right back on the wheel and commenced the four-ply. Wheeeee! Until the center pull ball got lazy and I started pulling out that yarn barf from the middle - all energized and clingy and hanging onto itself for dear life. At which point I stepped away again. It's mocking me from the other room right now - I suspect it will be conquered tonight, and let me tell you, the Clapotis it turns into better be spec-freaking-tacular.
In the middle of all this silk excitement, I managed to finish a pair of socks that have been on my needles since last April, knit for two hours at my LYS with my new friend and her regular Monday gang, where I started My So Called Scarf with the BFL I spun up a while back. MMMM. What a lovely pattern - amazing, again, what one can come up with using just two little stitches. And amazing too, all those brains that come up with this stuff.
These are Wendy's generic toe-up socks in Lucy Neatby's Merino Dream, and I learned two new things on these plain stockinette socks - two at a time on two circs, and from the toe up for the first time. I was pretty queasy about the short row heels, but wore them today and they're sooooo comfortable.
I think I'll go back to one-at-a-time on dpns for my next pair of socks - less fiddly and perhaps more relaxing. I have some lovely Mountain Colors Bearfoot to play with.
Off to see about that silk - think good thoughts!
I've been humming since yesterday morning... Whew – I survived breaking my blog. It looked dicey for a few days there, but thanks to a rescue from my patient and smart blog hostess, I’m back in business and I can blather on and on some more. Funny how, before I had the blog, I had gazillions of things to say, and now I have it and find myself speechless a lot of the time – same thing during my blog break. Tons of silly things to talk about, and now that it’s back, nothing. Brain empty.
Good thing I’m working on keeping track better, and I now have two notebooks where I can jot down my brilliant ideas on the spot – the official Notebook of Spinning will now share pages with blog notes, and I have a little “I’m becoming my mother” notepad in my purse. If I don’t write things down – they’re gone daddy gone, and there’s no way of knowing when or if they’ll ever come back around. I send myself lots of emails to remind myself to do things when I get home. I forget a caller’s name as soon as they tell me where they’re from. It’s a big step to write these things down – whether I actually go back and use them remains to be seen. I have a voice recorder that I thought would be the perfect solution to carry around, but then I never listened to the “notes” I recorded – just kept carrying the thing around.
Have you read Susan Gordon Lydon? The Knitting Sutra, Knitting Heaven and Earth, Take the Long Way Home? Knitting Heaven and Earth jumped off the LYS shelf for me one evening, and when I hit the web the next morning, I learned she had just passed away that week. I think she’s amazing, and a darned great writer. I don’t know how to describe her, except that she spoke to me, through me, and with me in all these books – remarkable. I’ve got my own cobbled together spirituality so it was fascinating to read about her journey, and the amazing part fiber played in it for her, and for me too. I wish I could call her up to talk.
Besides the blog, I’ve apparently gotten my fiber mojo back. I was really struggling after the holidays – perhaps a reaction to having to go to work and use space in my brain for something other than what I might play with next. The cable swatches were fighting with me and I was making stoooopid mistakes ( I think I started one in a bad mood – it had bad juju), and I couldn’t commit to a next project. The spinning wheel wasn’t even calling to me, even after I fiddled with the yummy brown wool that I think is cormo cross from the VA Fiber Fest last fall.
But it’s all coming back now – whew again. Cable swatches going along swimmingly once again. I actually did a test ply with the bit of brown wool – and decided that, while it’s lovely as two-ply, I want a three-ply. It’s escaping me now but I recently read a witty blogger’s discussion about why three-ply looks more like commercial or “real” yarn and I want to try it. I’m hoping to spin enough to knit the man a cabled, buttoned vest. His request.
Finishing things:
And these:
ETA - Holy cow, I just realized what socks these are.... These are the socks I grabbed on the way to Florida when my father passed away suddenly in April 2005. They're the socks that kept me sane on the plane, and in the middle of the night, and when I didn't know what else to do. I didn't finish the second sock for a long time, so it's no wonder it's a different size. These are the socks that saved me, and they're the same socks that got me published for the very first time in Annie Modesitt's collection of essays called Cheaper than Therapy. I knit a couple of purl stitches in the toe of the first one just so I'd always know which ne I started that morning on the plane. I think maybe I'll put them away. Or maybe CA will wear them. I have no idea. Phew.
February is also for Frogging:
And for Figuring Out What to do with the Brown Wool:
Here's the first test, spun on the middle Lendrum ratio and double plied. From this test I decided I'd go for a tree ply I'm up to a bobbin and a half, and spinning is the plan for tonight's tv watching.
And other random stories in an attempt to catch up.
Let's see, what else? I finished plying from my three bobbins of CA's wool, and impressed the hell out of the cats with my eyeballing technique to making sure the bobbins were fairly evenly loaded:
I'm reading up on HTML for Dummies and WordPress in an attempt to get past my fear and conquer the layout of this blog. I've contacted my amazing blog hostess, Becky, and have an out should my attempt fail. My plan is to create a template from scratch following the book - and see what I can come up with. I get all flustered when I look at the stylesheets for the many templates I've tried, so maybe I can build one myself. Please don't hold your breath.
I've braved the largest fiber festival in the country and survived - what a scene. Getting dressed to mingle with several gazillion fiber freaks was like getting ready for a date, and I spent time laughing at myself as I made, and discarded, a name-tag so everyone out there who was dying to meet me would know who I was (the dork with the name badge), tried on several outfits to maximize the opportunity to show off handknits (dork trying too hard), and went with my usual long-sleeved t-shirt and jeans with my original Clapotis (for warmth).
I flew up to Baltimore to meet Captain America, the world's best husband. The TSA and vendors in the Norfolk airport must have been taking happy pills - everyone was grinning and by the time they had my knitting needles out of my bag, I had my foot up on the conveyor to show off the handknit socks I was wearing. I was in Southwest's B cattle call line, so I took a seat in the middle between a giant man and a tall man in the third row so I could get right off the plane. I'm a little skinny thing - the flight was less than an hour - cool.
CA was surprised at the loooong line of cars going into the fairgrounds - not me. We parked in another county, but it was a reasonable day and the walk was lovely. I know I read about a knitblogger who was going to be there in her yellow VW camper and CA spotted it - damned if I can remember but hey - great yellow camper!!
I lost my mind immediately as expected. Things I know about myself but choose to occasionally overlook for an event of this magnitude: I have trouble with visual overload. I have no sense of direction, so going into one building and coming out turned me completely around each time - good thing CA was in charge of steering. I'm not so good at crowds. I am incredibly indecisive and sometimes a little too practical for my own good. I needed absolutely nothing going in.
We did all the outside buildings (pavillions?) when we arrived. I was surprised at the amount of yarn - it never occurred to me that there were so many small producers out there. I hadn't given a thought to patterns, have tons of stash, and so didn't spend a lot of time looking at it, though I did accost someone in the STR line so I could question her about its mystique. (I'm not sure I figured it out - but I only saw her skein.) I was there for fiber, if anything, and I have to admit that not only was I worried that I might find something more delicious at the next turn, but that I was sure I'd do it wrong when it came to buying some. Didn't occur to me to observe - do you just pull a hunk of roving off the balls or out of the bags? Do you wait to be helped? These are things I need to learn before my next attempt.
About 45 minutes in, this called out to me, and I'm not even sure what it is beyond 3 2oz, carded batts - fluffy pink clouds of softness:
We ate a funnel cake, hit the exhibition halls for more stuff, stood in the loooong line for this (worth the wait):
I wonder if the S&W people would consider a day for claustrophobics like me - I didn't like cramming into the little booths....
We wandered out past these two characters - they win the silliest haircut prize:
A very sheepy, fibery, exciting festival - I'll go back. With a better plan, more research, and the hopes of actually taking a class. I feel like I'm still just at the outside edge of the spinning world - I need to break all the way into the circle (in my own mind anyway).
Or at least blogging from my corner of the couch, the place where all knitting and most other things happen in this house, because yes, I managed, finally, to get wireless! Zippity dooh dah. Here's how I did it: spent hours booting and rebooting and searching technical websites on the other computer over several weeks. Since about the second week of June I've taken a more desperate approach - avoiding the damned thing, and practically the whole room it was in altogether, with occasional delusions that if I just did that one thing, it would work, followed immediately with desperation and more avoidance. Until today, when I realized I could start with the lowest common denominator, the cheapest fix, and I bought a new adapter at Radio Shack (only because I was on a rare and stealth mission to the mall - no new summer purse, but a wireless card. I strongly dislike Radio Shacks, but I was desperate and braved the land of geeks.)
Anyway, $60 later, with absolutely no other pain whatsoever, here I am, in business on the couch. Yay me.
I have aboslutely nothing spectacular to talk about, and no fabulous new knitting to show you, so I took garden pictures. This is the clematis I hoped might be white:
I have a new dove pair on the porch - they spent most of this weekend deciding if it would work, building the pile of sticks that doves seem to prefer, and noodling around together up there. I don't think I wrote about the original mom, who was tending to her second set of eggs in the same spot. One morning in May, I was up at 4:30 and looked out the window to see her sleeping in the nest. I was knitting at 5AM when there was a horrible commotion and I ran to the window just in time to see the neighborhood alley cat making off with the mom dove. After he crashed the nest to the floor which crushed the eggs that were very near hatching. Awful. Horrible. I don't know why the universe decided I needed to see it all. I looked for her every time I went in or out for weeks. That event was the beginning of my apparently appointed role to bear witness to baby bird tragedies in the yard this spring - I found other unhatched and broken eggs and a baby who had probably fallen from the nest. I can only hope someday to know why I was chosen. So it's great that the doves are here - and I can now worry about them every time I come in and out.
I think the end is in sight with the cable swatches for Melissa Leapman - I believe I have the last two patterns in hand and one of them in process. When these are done, I will return to my little green tee. The design issue on the back has been rolling around and fermenting for a while and I think I know what I'll do to make it work, but my brain is a very dangerous place to keep this sort of thing, so I'm looking forward to pulling it out and getting to it.
Oh yeah - I've spun up a bobbin and a half more of the brown wool - not too exciting, but it's going swimmingly and I look forward to the day when CA wears it! I'm denying myself other spinning til I finish these three bobbins-full - that should give me close to 1,000 yards. I've found a rhythm with it and don't want to mess up by adding a different rhythm or fiber to the mix.
I've even made some inquiries around finding a way to make fiber my work... If you're reading and you're a yarn rep, I'd love to pick your brain!
Yep, that pesky neighborhood cat got the second nesting dove on my porch sometime between breakfast & lunch on Monday, and I just feel terrible. I knew the cat knew she was there, even though I haven't seen him since his massacre in May. I spent many nights falling asleep thinking about ways I could protect the dove - spikes, aluminium foil, a net, anti-varmint spray - but I did nothing. Mostly because I know you can't stop a cat on a mission... I had one of those cats who, back when I was making a lot of pottery, would not allow any other potter's work in my apartment. Anytime I brought something home, she'd find and "kill" it, smashing it to the floor. I bought a beautiful Malcolm Davis shino teapot - I was mad for it - and within 24 hours, my little Spike had found it, stashed on a high shelf behind lots of other pots, and smashed it.
Anyway, I feel like I set Momma Dove #2 up, and if any of her friends decide to investigate this lovely spot to make a nest, I will, even though the thought kills me, drive her away. Captain America is as sad about this as I am - we both enjoyed greeting her anytime we were on the porch and marveled at her tolerance and dedication as we watered plants hanging right next to her and generally banged around out there. RIP momma.
In fiber news, I'm up to the armpits on Cece, and boy, all that shaping in lace has tested my feeble brain! I persevere, and tonight I'll cast on for the sleeves - wheee! I also managed to fill another bobbin with CA's brown wool over the weekend - one more bobbin, a little plying, and I'm ready to make his vest. Whee again! And today I will mail off the final six cable swatches for Melissa Leapman - big WHEEEE!
1. Cast on for ChicKnits' CeCe in August of 2006, get through a few inches of the lace pattern and allow the thought "this is pretty simple - I think I've got this pattern down" to come into your awareness, and then of course, make a spectacular goof somewhere in the lace pattern that, after heroic attempts to repair, causes a total frog in desperation.
2. Start over. Try very hard to remain humble. Stumble briefly, but get into it about to the armhole shaping.
3. Get a spinning wheel for your anniversary and abandon CeCe, with its lacy challenges, completely.
4. Pull CeCe out of the WIP wasteland and try to figure out where you are and why that slipped-stitch edging looks so funky.
5. Give up on starting where you left off and start ALL OVER.
6. Sort of figure out your complete brain fart on slipped-stitch edging, so at least one front edge of the cardigan looks good, but don't realize your oh-so-simple mistake on the other edge until it's become a design feature. Plot the crochet edging you'll add to hide the fug.
7. To cleverly avoid sleeve island, cast on for both at the same time and knit four rows of ribbing. Now notice that the pattern says knit four ROUNDS of ribbing. Oh. Cast on the first sleeve, knit that ribbing again, realize you just can't read and you didn't cast on enough stitches and start the blasted thing over. Rinse and repeat (only once) for the second sleeve.
8. Somewhere in the yoke, decide that, after a bunch of decreases that sure, you have enough room on that circular needle to try it on. But you really don't, and so spend the rest of that evening getting a bunch of stitches back on the needle correctly.
9. Finish!
10. Realize that once again, you have horrible judgment when it comes to knitting the right size. Always. Several recent knits have been a bit snug in my shoulders, and this is meant to be worn over something, so I made the second size - which may well be too big in the shoulders. This can't possibly have anything to do with gauge or my unwillingness to keep track of my measurements. It's not a vanity thing - I promise. Just some weird avoidance of measuring and writing down.... Or maybe that this is heavy cotton and lots of lace - BonneMarie and Fluffa both used springy and light Calmer yarn for theirs.
11. Block. Hold your breath. Think about what friends you like enough who might also be the right size to give it to you if you can't shrink it or block it into submission.
12. Try it on two of your friends, unsuccessfully, and realize it's just too big.
13. Wash the sucker in hot water and dry on the long cycle hoping for shrinkage.
14. Come very close to throwing CeCe in the trash, but don't, because even though it didn't shrink enough, it's just such a pretty little lacy cardi that there must be some way to rescue it.
15. Take out the neck strap thing - and plan to shorten it by half, sew it on using every other stitch on the neckline to see if you can pull it in a bit.
I wasn't going to publish this post until I was able to show you an amazing photo of me modeling the damned thing, but it's going to hang out in the pile in the corner of knitting central (the loveseat) while I turn my attention to yet another sweater to knit in the wrong size. More on that when I get a swatch knit.
Ever since I got my Rockin Girl Blogger button, I've been singing Michelle Shocked's Anchorage:
Leroy says send a picture
Leroy says hello
Leroy says awwwww keep on rockin, girl
Where is she now? I saw her several times in the early-90s - one concert was amazing, another torture. The torturous one was at the new and amazingly acoustically perfect George Mason U's music hall, and Taj Mahal was her opening act. Well, some great snafu prevented a large number of band members to be MIA, from both bands - can't remember the details anymore. Taj handled it amazingly well and pulled off a terrific set - one that made me rush out to buy his music and to play Take One Step a thousand times. Michelle, on the other hand, flaked out and instead of singing, spent most of the show blathering into the microphone about her problems. Yuck.
Today Leroy says I figured out short rows all by myself for the long-forgotten sweater-copying exercise I started ages ago. I've been puzzling over the back neck and shoulders, and one night last week as I was knitting a garter stitch project, an image of the way short rows might work popped up, uninvited really, in my brain. I let it mull around for a bit, and then did some googling and studied a few short row tutorials. Feeling aaaalmost ready to attempt this great feat, I found a Knitty pattern that had the directions written out so I could see how it all came down - and I felt ready to give it a try. I had, in fact, pictured it in my head pretty well, and amazingly, even in seed stitch, it WORKED! I've never picked up those wraps better I tell you! I always tried to maneuver through the wrap and into the stitch it was wrapped around without moving it at all - very squidgy work. Slipping the wrapped stitch to my right needle, putting the wrap up on the left, slipping the stitch back from the right to the left, and knitting those two stitches together made for a great result!
This short row victory is particularly important since I consider myself challenged in the visual-spatial area. I can't imagine furniture in an empty room, and though I love maps - I have to put myself "in them" to find my way around. I'm the person who has to draw the outline of my face in the mirror to figure out if it's oval or square or round. So to have a short row solution, something I've barely wrapped my brain around even after having taken a class, pop up in my head out of nowhere is just plain REMARKABLE. To have let that solution stay and grow and then to have made it work - my god - spectacular! I'm well into the front piece now, and am happy to report that my note-taking so far has been good enough to make a matching piece. So far.
Leroy also says that Leroy shall hereforth be the name of the monster guarding my tomatoes this year:
Leroy has been with me and the vines from the beginning, and I've watched him grow from a little teeny tiny thing to this humongous creature - what I call a zipper spider. You should know that I'm terrified of spiders, that I leap and scream like a girl when they appear - and they seem to seek me out everywhere. I've come to a point of acceptance with them when they stay in their own natural environment, like the tomatoes. If they're in the house, or they make a web across the back steps I'm sorry, that's my turf and they have to die. I tried early on to convince Leroy that he'd be happier elsewhere, but he seemed to think otherwise. I really messed with him when he was little - twanging the super-strong support threads on his web, blowing on him, spraying him with the hose while watering, throwing things into the web to see if he'd think they were a bug - you name it. He shakes his web when he's threatened, and I wonder what he knows of me - he seems to know I'm there when I get up and off to his side - he starts rocking like crazy. I can't stop watching him - he's truly as large as he looks and he seems to still be growing. Note the tomatoes in the background of this picture - they're the size of large plums, and he's easily as long:
His girlfriend has been around this week - a very plain brown spider of the same general body type only about 1/8th of his size. I've spied her hanging on the web directly behind him but I haven't seen them actually interact. I'm off to google zipper spider reproduction so I can be prepared.
Leroy, my FEMALE spider friend, got herself a big 'ol cicada yesterday - she was wrapping its upper body when I checked on her before work, and by the time I came home, she had sucked it dry and dropped it to the ground.
Of course I know that female spiders are the showier of the species, and that at least black widows eat their mates, but I believe this is the sort of thing we learned in school that just, as time goes by, simply falls out of our brains. Like algebra. And in my defense for assuming that Leroy's size and position made her male: 1) I simply do not think about spiders unless I'm squealing and levitating trying to escape one - or I'm watching Debra Winger hunt a human version down in Black Widow (ooohhhhh - remember that French man in Hawaii - yummy); b) I spend a lot of time stalking my bird feeders with the cats, and when it comes to birds, the boys ARE prettier; and 3) did I mention that I'm afraid of spiders and just never give them room in my brain or my world? I check on this girl at least twice a day. I worry when I go to visit and she's moved around the corner in the bed - I have a moment of despair when I think she might be gone. Go figure - I have a spider friend.
In knitting news, I've just finished a quickie Ty Dye bolero for my wild and crazy mother. Sort of finished. I discovered, as I laid it out to block, that I had pulled one of my classic garment-making maneuvers, perfected way back as a teen sewing clothes: I sewed up one side inside out. Yup - even though I know this particular trick well, and work to guard against it, and thought I checked carefully while riding home from the beach last weekend - I now have to take that garter stitch seam out and flip it. I did find the perfect glass button when we stopped at Knitting Addiction on the way home. This store is one of the very few I've ever been in that has samples and projects knitted up for EVERY SINGLE YARN in the shop. The owner told me she and one of her staff knit all fall and winter to make sure they know and can talk about each and every product in the shop. Fantastic.
I've also just completed the front of the green Silky Tweed sweater, and I'm an inch in to both sleeves - I CAN do them both at once on this project, and these are little cap sleeves, so i expect to have photos by the weekend. I three-needle bound off the shoulder seams - the ones on all four shoulders that I managed to do short-row style (still reeling from the success) and draped it over myself - though I'd never say it out loud, it looks like this could fit. Shhhh - not gonna jinx it.
My first no-pattern sweater is finished and IT FITS!* I started this at the beginning of the summer, during a break from Ms. Leapman's amazing and numerous cable swatches, and then forgot about it once I had to start figuring the plan for the shaping. But as I discussed in my short row post, this thing really stayed lurking around in my head, quietly, until the next steps just sort of happened organically. Here's the first fitting, after I had the sleeves on and the sides sewed up:
It was hard to contain my glee and remain humble while finishing the other seam and knitting up the neckline, but I must not have pissed off the knitting goddess, because it continued to work.
Captain America wasn't home when I proudly wore my sweater to work Wednesday, so I had to fend for myself with the self-timer on my camera and a great little tripod that I can wrap around or perch on anything. Which ended up being the bird feeder pole, because I wanted to get the sweater in front of the morning glories it grew up with. You know that visual-spatial problem I have? Means I just can't get myself in front of the camera - I have twenty shots of my shoulder. I did manage this one:
So, I copied a little black sweater I own, and added a teeny tiny bit of design with seed stitch for the top third of the body and also the sleeves. I didn't hesitate to rip and redo when something didn't look right and felt good about it. I counted and kept pretty good track in my pretty little notebook and was generally able to figure out what I had scribbled in there. I used about four and a half hanks of Lasvold Silky Tweed and size 5 US needles throughout. The squarish neckline wasn't on purpose, and I can now see what I'd do to make it more rounded, but I love it. I'm delighted - tickled - proud. I'm not as dense as I once thought, and while I still don't see myself whipping off sweaters with no pattern on a regular basis, I proved something to myself. I walked around for a few days doing Kevin Spacey's "I rule" move from American Beauty. I bragged to non-knitters who had no idea what it means to make up your own pattern. Woot!
*Full story now - the sweater DOES fit, it just "hangs out" after wearing. When I first put it on, the break of stockinette to seed stitch was perfectly placed right across the top of my bust, but by the end of the day, as you can see in the picture above, it hung down to below my boobages. Still fine, still fits, but, as it should be, I learned another swatching lesson - wash & block baby - wash and block the swatch. It's baby steps for me I guess - I've grown as a knitter and I now at least knit a small swatch before I start a project, so I'll just have to break down and admit I HAVE to take the next step. Which I just did for my next project - the big swatch has had a wash. See - I can learn from my mistakes - just slowly apparently. S'okay - it's all good. Anyway, I have another sweater's worth of this yarn, in a great demin-y blue tweed, which I'll likely knit on a smaller needle. This yarn makes a terrific fabric - soft and light and drapey - but it's got 30% cotton - must be what contributes to its growth after wearing. I'm NOT complaining - still in love with my sweater and I'll just toss it in the dryer with a damp towel to shape it back up each time I wear it. I do that with store-bought sweaters all the time.
A delightful thing happened yesterday on the way home from our weekly pilgrimage to the Outer Banks. I drive down since it's early in the morning and I've usually been up for hours, so CA always drives back - which means I get to knit for 74 miles. (Which also means I don't have to see how close CA is to the car in front of him.) I was deep into the corrugated ribbing of my latest project and was jolted by a horn honking - beep beep beep-BEEP - not necessarily a good sound. My head whipped up to see, in the left lane, a woman grinning and pointing to the knitting she was holding up and waving out the window of her big SUV. Too much - I'm grinning now thinking about it. I'm not sure what CA makes of me and this club sometimes - along with my many other quirks, but he cracked up too. I explained that it's just like how motorcycle dudes wave at other motorcycle dudes, or how anyone who has a four-wheel drive vehicle will automatically tow another four wheel drive vehicle out of the sand no-questions-asked, or I don't know, a secret handshake. I wagged my knitting back, laughing. Good stuff - made up for all the idiots who apparently paid extra to lollygag around in the left lane (not talking about the knitter). On that - do they forget to talk about what the left lane is for in driving school anymore? It's seared in my brain after driving lessons with my dad and the time I was driving the Bronco on the Washington, DC beltway with other family members in the car and he got so embarrassed that I was passed on the right. I was mortified as only a 15 year and 9 month old driver can be, but to this day I feel like an idiot if I get passed on the right. I just went to the DMV to see if the Driver's Manual said anything good about what the left lane was for, and not finding what I wanted, I found this absolutely hysterical and perfect ink while googling. Captain America says I can't get one of these decals for my car - what a killjoy.
But I was talking about knitting, and about being part of this fantastic group of people. And about that corrugated ribbing for my Reynolds Whiskey Fairisle Pullover (scroll down - first pattern on the right). For which I made a proper swatch, simulating the in-the-round knitting by leaving big, messy strands hanging off the back of the piece. I'm too cheap frugal worried about running out of yarn to clip at each end, but this method worked quite nicely. I then washed and blocked it - alert the press. I even got gauge, though my quest for the proper needles in the proper sizes and combinations proved difficult. I have more to say on that, just not right now. Anyway - the swatch, front and fabulously messy back:
I've already done five inches of corrugated ribbing and I adore how the lavender glows from between the tobacco, and the tidy lines the stranding makes both front and back. I even carefully took all 200 stitches off the needles so I could try it on before starting the body - amazing how small this band looks and how nicely it fits so far. It did take doing the decrease round twice to remember how to figure "evenly" over the round and that it involves subtracting one after doing the division. I think out of all the crazy stuff I've knit, stranded knitting is my very favorite so far. Keeps me interested as I fall prey to the "just one more row" routine so I can see the next pretty colors go by. Appeals to my deeply buried neat-freak. Good stuff all around. Plus I'll potentially have a new sweater to wear BEFORE it gets cold.
She's gone. Leroy is gone. I watched her spin her web early yesterday, and then fed her a moth which she seemed most pleased with. It took three tries to get a moth to stick in her web - twice with the same wiley moth who managed to slip through somehow to freedom. I witnessed Leroy wrap her moth and dangle it below for later. I wandered by an hour or so later to find Leroy sucking the moth package and to see her catch another little bug for lunch. When I went out again late in the afternoon, she was gone. Her web too - it looked like something just blew through the whole thing. She was in a bed up against our fence - not sure how a bird would have flown through, but the blackbirds were back in force yesterday on their way south, so I'm assuming one of them enjoyed a crunchy black & yellow lunch. I held out hope until this morning since she'd gone missing once before when she moved in the bed, but armed with my lantern at 6AM I scoured the bed for any sign - to no avail.
This is all I have left of my friend Leroy, and I'll try to keep it safe through the winter for her:
Nature has been rough on me this summer - I'm sure the lesson has to do with how attached I get to fleeting things. From doves to baby birds to spiders I've been reminded to enjoy things while I can. Oy. I just miss her already. I know - I'm a freak. I've been trying to prepare myself for her natural death - but she's been such the queen of the tomatoes all summer that I almost expected her to live through our mild winter. I didn't expect to blink and find her gone. I had to look up Charlotte's Web quotes - this was an important book in my family and we even had a great german shepherd mutt named Wilbur. I wish I had the book because I know Charlotte says something profound about the cycle of life but I don't, so I'll go with some words from the narrator instead:
Wilbur never forgot Charlotte. (The Dream will never forget Leroy either) Although he loved her children and grandchildren dearly, none of the new spiders quite took her place in his heart. She was in a class by herself. It is not often that someone comes along who is a true friend and a good writer. Charlotte was both.
I have been knitting in between stalking Leroy and going to work, and this morning I bound off stitches at the armholes in my fair isle pullover, and tonight will test my gauge while knitting the front and back flat - ick. But better than trying to figure out how to get a steek in there, especially since I've never done steeks before. I will do them - I'm dying to cut some knitting, but I think I'll find an already-figured-out pattern for my first time. This photo of the glowing corrugated ribbing was meant for the last post, but since I don't have a current one, enjoy the indi-glo effect of the lavender and brown:
Shhhhhh - don't tell anyone, but it looks like I'm into my second sweater in a row that fits:
Love this Whiskey pattern, love the colors, lovelovelove stranded knitting. I could be finishing off the last bit of knitting on the body instead of writing about it before work, but honestly, the prospect of dealing with the profound number of ends and twists and tangles for a little bit of neck and shoulder is too much for me this morning. While as I said, I lovelovelove this sweater, it has helped me form some rules for stranded knitting from here on out:
1. No more back and forth fair isle. Period. This is the second Reynolds stranded pattern I've made that does this, and the PITA that is trying to carry two yarns on a purl side is officially off the list. I've heard that pattern makers don't think American knitters like to cut their work.
2. I must STEEK. Soon. Dying to take scissors to my knitting.
3. No runs of color more than five stitches long from now on! I'm sure there's a very efficient way to twist the colors over these runs - but I have developed my own method that is clumsy and oh-so-inelegant (especially going back and forth).
4. Did I say in the round only from now on? The lovely rhythm of stranded knitting is just blown to bits otherwise.
Even though the thought of those last 10-12 rows of shoulder/neck is too much at the moment, I can look forward all day to coming home to finish after work tonight - which means I can start the sleeves. Since sleeve island for me is just as bad as second sock island, I will do both cuffs in corrugated ribbing on two circs at the same time. At which point I'll finish one at a time - after some thought, I realized I would only be creating havoc and stress with eight balls of yarn going at the same time. (Clever me - BEFORE I started this time.)