Alpine Lace - Done

At long last, after many repeats, the Alpine Lace is completed. I like it. My mom says the variation in color makes it look like I folded it and stuck it out in the sun too long ... but I don't mind. The change is subtle, and I like it.

Vital Statistics:

• Yarn: 60 grams of Blueberry Graceful from the Yarn Place.
• Needles: Size 2 US/2.75 mm
• Blocked size: 19"x72"
• Alterations: Scarf worked with 7 multiples of diamonds, and 5 multiples of the center leaf pattern. 72 repeats.
• Time: 7 weeks

This was *not* a travelling project, so I had ample time to work on socks while gadding about. I've finished one pair (Regia), and am in the midst of another (Elann's Esprit). I'm not sure what I think of Esprit as a sock yarn. My daughter didn't even want to try on anklet #1, as it looked to small, but I stuck it on her foot anyways. It fits, but the ribbing has absolutely no life to it, despite the elastic. I just prefer fingering weight sock yarns, I guess. I'll finish the pair, call it a stash project, and go back to my usual.

Speaking of my usual, my mom washed her socks last week, and I stopped by while handknit socks were drying. They covered the freezer and dining room table ... she has supplied me with a LOT of socks. I need to get a picture of them some day. A picture is worth many blog entries, after all.

I'm now working on the Spinnery Jacket. Or at least I will be, once I undo my current swatch and restart it. I'm using PeaceFleece worsted weight yarn, and the pattern calls for size 6 and 7 US needles. I made my first swatch (swatch = right front) with size 7 needles, got enough done to check gauge, did so, frogged, and cast on with size 8 needles. That worked .. sort of. I've been staring at lace so much that I had myself convinced that 17.5 sts/4" would block to 16 sts/4". But after several inches and many internal conversations, I concluded that a jacket was not a lace shawl, and that the fabric was a bit dense, and that I should try size 9 needles. So I switched (without frogging), knit two inches, and checked my gauge. 17.5/4" again. So I knit another inch, just to see if that number could possibly be right. It was. By repeated (and repeated) measurements, I convinced myself that the gauge will not migrate towards the stated pattern gauge if I just WILL it to do so, and keep measuring. I thought about switching to size 10 needles ... but decided to ignore them and jump up to 10.5.

I *think* I have achieved gauge. The fabric is MUCH looser than it was with the size 8 needles, and so I will frog what I've got, cast on again, and start my swatch for a third time. If the gauge comes out AND if I like the resulting fabric, the swatch will become the right front. If the gauge does not come out, or if I do not like the resulting fabric, I will be doing some serious tweaking of the pattern, or declaring the skeins I have to be 'orphan skeins' -- skeins which have no project waiting for them.

The venerable dead are waiting in my library to entertain me and relieve me from the nonsense of surviving mortals.

Samuel Davies (1723-61)

I was a sump pump, once ...

My husband likes to begin stories by proclaiming, "I was a _______, once." The things he has been have ranged from a leaf, to a rain drop, to a grape, to a baseball. Except when he was a baseball, I think he started off as a steer, experiencing separation anxiety from his mother.

But truly, yesterday, I was a human sump pump. My legs are reminding me of that fact now.

Late last fall, my husband and some friends dug out our basement to a decent depth, poured a concrete floor, installed a sump pump, and did other things of that nature. Now it's spring, and the sump pump is working for the Very First Time. It works wonderfully.

But sump pumps require a tube to carry water away from them. And the tube connected to ours was full of cracks. Cracks, we learned, naturally happen in such tubing when people walk on them. "People" went off to the hardware store (25 miles distant) and I was the pump. Every 20 minutes, I trotted downstairs, scooped water from a deep dark pit whose name I do not know, and in which a sump pump is normally placed, and put the water in a large bucket. Every 10 scoops I stopped scooping and carried the bucket of water up out of the finished side of the basement, up a nice little 18" step, and emptied it. Then I returned to the pit and repeated the procedure, trotted back upstairs, and reset my timer.

Or at least, the first two times I trotted. The third time I walked carefully. The fourth time, I went down the stairs gingerly. I think I carried 30-40 gallons of water yesterday, twice. Think lots of deep knee squats with a half-gallon weight.

I was glad to hear "People" arrive back home. They'd had to check two stores before they found any tubing in-stock. The nice melt is occupying many sump pumps in our area, it would seem.

But - this is a knitting and schooling blog. And sump pump operations have nothing to do with knitting or schooling, except by virtue of their seriously interrupting either.

So - tomorrow will be the first time my students take the National Latin Exam. We've taken some practice exams, and I've been drilling my daughter on the geography of the Mediterranean basin. The countries aren't people, and she's not fond of squiggly little lines unless it involves knitting or crochet directions ... but she's got Italia down pat, and can tell Britannia from Africa now, at least on a good day.

I'm starting to muse about next year. Most of next year will be more of what we're doing this year. Singapore Math, finish up BJU Life Science and probably move into the next text, continue on in Classical Writing, and continue on in Latin, probably with Henle - although I may toss in some Vulgate, or early Church Fathers. That would be fun. But would it be fun for them? History is my bugaboo. Or else Literature is. I think that History will be my Thing to Add for next year, though. There's lots of good things to read in History, and I have a school of readers ... but how to organize them? And what to require beyond reading? I don't know yet. I do know, however, that Tapestry of Grace is not for my little Math/Latin/CW brain.

And knitting. I have 1.5 repeats of the Beech Leaf pattern to go before I can start the final border on the Alpine Lace Shawl. Woohoo! If all goes well (and I stop blogging), I will get that done tonight. Then I need to figure out how many stitches I increased, so I can decrease that number to get the right amount for working the border. Counting is an obvious solution, but I'm so used to keeping my 142 or so stitches tucked nicely on 4" of needle, and they're not very countable that way. I'll come up with something.

I'm also socking away. A second pair of socks for my mom is 3/4ths done. After that, I'm going to Knit from My Stash with some of Elann's sock yarn I have sitting around, pass on what I learn to a friend, and then tackle some more socks.

And back to the scholastic lines, I am still plugging away at Churchill's History of the English Speaking Peoples. I got a 1 volume edition from Half-Price Books some time ago, and am being faithful in reading it most (some?) afternoons when the tyranny of the seemingly urgent doesn't draw me away from reading time.

"Being good is an adventure far more violent and daring than sailing around the world."
~ G. K. Chesterton, The Club of Queer Trades.

March!

It's March, my cough is non-existent, we have a humidifier, and life continues.

Our recent blizzard did a good job on slowing down life. It was WONDERFUL! I borrowed a page from the script of some homeschooling friends. "School is cancelled when you have to shovel your way to the school table." Ds promptly asked for a chain saw so he could remove part of the roof. We were home, we were together, and it was good.

I snuck in some knitting time to make myself a pair of slippers without holes. The first slipper knit up incredibly fast - the second, not so fast. I realized as I was knitting that I had forgotten six rows of plain knitting (you know, the space where one's toes go before the decreases start?) After picking up stitches all around in preparation for snipping, knitting, and grafting, I decided that trying to graft short rows was not a good idea, frogged, and re-knit. The slippers are cozy, and if I don't get some soles on them soon, they'll have holes just like the old pair. They match my tea cozy beautifully. And -- they could count as my March Stash Project! The only problem is that I think I finished them last Sunday, which means they're another February Stash Project. I'm not sure what my stash project this month will be.


Unless a pair of socks counts? I finished Mom's socks in Bearfoot, and have started in on a pair in Regia. The yarn was bought and gifted to me ... so maybe it can count as stash. I'm halfway to the heel on the first one.

If you look carefully at the photo, or even not so carefully, you will notice that the leg on one looks nothing like the leg on the other. This is a result of a Knot In A Skein. The socks were knit from one skein. I clipped the knot, joined yarns, and merrily knit along. Maybe I should drop the company a note to let them know of the color discrepancy?
Quote d'jour:
It is far more seemly to have thy Studie full of Bookes, than thy Purse full of money.
~John Lyly

Beginning to move

While coughing isn't the greatest thing in the world, a moderate amount sure beats hanging around in a cocoon all day wondering if one is awake or not. And 3 days of coughing bouts an hour before the alarm goes off is enough to inspire an hour of extra knitting time in the morning. I can be a slow learner, but three days was enough of a hint.

Hat photos! Here, with no further ado, is the February Swatch Hat. (Minus the pom-pom, added to suit the recipient's fancy). The yarn is Stash Yarn, probably wool, two strands, two ply each. The motif is from Philosopher's Wool. The shot of the top of the hat could have been cropped ... but this way, you can see what represents half a day of miscellaneous reading in our house.


The Alpine Lace is coming along slowly, but surely. I had my Very First Dropped Stitch on it yesterday, and took a photo during the minor surgery it took to repair it. The colors are pretty true ... blueberry and blue-purple. I haven't hit a spot where both plys of yarn are purple yet, but one looks to be coming up. The pattern calls for 37 (or so) repeats of the leaf pattern. I have the dubious pleasure of knitting over 60 of them, I think. Twenty-two are done already, and the portion I blocked a week ago has, with a little bit of stretching, 8 leaves per 6 inches. The border is 5", top and botton, ... and that gives me a quantity of repeats I really don't want to think about yet. I'll keep knitting, block it again in a week or two, see how much it relaxes when off the board, and pick a nice random number of repeats at that time.

In the meantime, I have finished one modified Jaywalker sock, and am ready to start the patterned portion on the second. My felted slippers are saying good bye, so a pair of those is rapidly climbing up the 'to make' list (although it was above freezing today, and ds is plotting to bring out his summer clothes and go on long bike rides with dh.) I also got my Peace Fleece Yarn, so the Green Mountain Spinnery Cardigan is calling to me. I will probably start one or the other tonight, after I get a repeat or two done on the shawl. Knitting with worsted Peace Fleece after working with Graceful is going to be like writing with a chunky crayon after using a single-hair calligraphy brush. That stuff looks FAT! (113 grams = 200 yards; the same weight of Graceful would measure 2034 yards). The stuff is fat.

Of course, the slippers call for bulky yarn. A spate of quick projects seem to be calling me.

Quote to think about:

Silly sensitivity has displaced intellectual honesty in American education. We've produced a generation with no sense of national identity and little connection to the nation's collective memory. In the proces we've traded life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for fat, dumb, and happy.
~ Kathleen Parker

Going nowhere, slowly

My usual blog nite and large chunk of crafting time this past week disappeared in a pile of blankets surrounding my shivering self, bleary eyes, and a temperature - the sum of whose digits was a whopping total of three (no decimals included). I knew things were bad when I considered knitting and dismissed the notion out of hand. I did manage to listen to the last 2 cassettes of Turgenyev's Fathers and Sons, however. That only required wiggling a hand out of my cocoon, engaging in a small display of manual dexterity (the tape recorder was on the floor, and the room was dark), and returning the hand back to the cocoon.

I survived to make a 210 mile round-trip trek to dd's doctor the next day, and review a knitting submission once we returned home. I'm still on the tired side, though.

I do have pictures of February's Stash Hat, have finished one sock (doctor visits are good for that), and have made some abysmally small progress on the Alpine Lace (but I did order more yarn!)

No pictures today, though. That would take too much energy. Instead, I shall share my daughter's imitation of "Sing a Song of Sixpence", one of this week's assignments.

Knitting is creative fun,
Let me tell you why.
You can play with colors,
Patterns multiplyu.
Toys are soft and fuzzy,
And are knit easily!
They are delightful to be found
Underneath the Christmas Tree.

You can knit a blanket
Quickly to get warm.
You can knit some wool socks
To keep your toes from harm.
You can knit some mittens,
To give to charity.
While wearing handknit sweaters,
You can drink some warm mint tea.

It's nice having another knitter in the family.

I wonder what she'll do with "Rise Up, O Men of God"? Perhaps something along the lines of

Rise Up and Knit That Stash

Have done with buying yarn.
Devote yourself to using up
The wool stored in your barn.

Knitlore has wonderful possibilities for language studies. Whatever will dd do when we get to studying maxims and chreia? I can see the possibilities now ... take one of Stephanie Pearl McPhee's archived narratives, summarize it, create a maxim from it, recast it as a chreia, and write an Encomium paragraph for the maxim you have created. (Have I been doing too much editing today?)

Knittior, Altior, Fortior
Knitto, ergo sum.
Dum spiro, knitto.

Knitting wasn't around in the classical Latin period (unless, of course, you consider the Knitting Madonna to be an accurate representation of an event during Mary's lifetime), so there isn't an official Latin word for it that I know of. If you know of a semi-official one that has been coined since then, leave me a comment!

Alpine Lace - 1/6th done

The next month is going to see a lot of knitting to make little progress. My plan is to make the Alpine Lace Shawl 6' long or so. Last night I blocked out what I had knit so far, to see how much I'd knit, and if the ball I had would be enough.

My calculations tell me I've got enough to knit a 42" shawl. And that tells me I need to order another ball of yarn. One ball is either 1200 yards (per website) or 903 yards *(per ball band). If I'd've gotten a 100 gram ball, I wouldn't have this problem ... but I didn't, so I do, and the big challenge is going to be figuring out WHERE in the color pattern to join the balls. It's so subtly vareigated that it wasn't until yesterday that I realized I hadn't knit a full repeat of the color pattern yet. I thought that little blip of blue towards the beginning was it. It wasn't. Now, looking carefully at the ball, I'm pretty sure I haven't gotten to the purplest purple section either.

So, for the next month and longer, I shall be knit-knit-knitting away at this. It blocks 18" wide nicely, so I'm glad I added the extra pattern multiple (7 diamonds and 5 leaf motifs, instead of 6 and 4). I also didn't see any dropped stitches.

The Jaywalker socks are still on the needles for my traveling project, and I probably should put a pair of slippers for me on my to-do list. The felted pair I made two or three years ago has more holes than sole left. Resoling is an option, but the heel is just about gone as well, and there's a mild breeze on my toes as well ... so starting from scratch is probably the way to go.

One nice thing about the Alpine Lace ... I don't have to worry about the fine yarn catching on the needle join. Unless I'm spreading the project out for admiration/measuring/blocking, it never gets off the needle portion of my interchangeable circs. I could almost knit it on 5" sock needles, but I think a stitch or two might run off the end every once in a while.

Like like they did when my dog accidentally got tangled in the lace and dragged it halfway across the downstairs. EEEEK!

Alpine Lace on the needles

I've started the Alpine Lace shawl in earnest now. After a few days of work, my progress looks like a little black blob.You may have heard that blocking can be very important for lace items. I agree with this. The shawl looks quite different when pinned out.
I did decide to go with the 2.75 mm needles. I'm not so sure the swatch helped -- it had error after error in it, and I really didn't feel like frogging a swatch for accuracy, so I ended up with 8 error-stricken rows, tugged at it, contemplated, and decided that if I went with a 3.5 mm needle, I'd always wonder if the shawl was Too Open ... and went with the smaller needles. I can't find anyone (published, that is) who uses bigger than a US 2 with cobweb-weight yarn. I didn't care to be the first.

To compensate for the bitsiness of the yarn, I've increased the diamond multiples to 7. I debated adding repeats, but at this point, will probably stick with 3 repeats at each end. How many repeats between the ends is an entirely different matter... who knows how that will work out. Tonight's challenge is going to be determining how to finagle the mid-section with my current number of stitches. Let's see ... 18 x 7 - 50 = 17 x ? + fudge factor.

I finished the Fair Isle from the Stash, and gave it away before it even got home for photos. Stay tuned ... I hope to borrow it back for photos. I used up all my medium green, light green, and orange yarns. That's three colors -- does that negate the three skeins of sock yarn from last week?

I didn't think so.

Since I've got a Stash Project done for February already, I've begun work on my mom's socks. I like the yarn, and the pattern is working out nicely. The jury is out as to whether the sock is too big ... but if it is, that means I can knit THREE socks from this lucious yarn.
I was all set to fudge the pattern, since it called for 31 sts/4" in stockinette, and the gauge on the ball band was 5-6 sts/" on size 1-3 needles. So, bravely armed with size 3 needles, I altered the pattern, and started knitting. After an inch or so of the toe, I idly checked my gauge ... 8 stitches per inch. Argh. I know I knit tight, but in this case, I think there may be a typo on the ball band.

Musings on the Alpine Lace

Behold, the blocked Cherry Leaf Shoulder Shawl! The dimensions are 56" across, and 24" from neck to point. It's borderline too small, but I think with a nifty pin, it will do nicely (especially for someone who has reasonably sized shoulders). If I make it again with this yarn, I will definitely add more repeats, and probably try the insanity of knitting the border with the shawl, instead of later. The only tricky part would be getting two points going at the bottom tip and converting that into three stitches for the beginning of the shawl. That doesn't sound too insurmountable, though ... perhaps a provisional cast on, knit two points, then pick up stitches across the knit edge, and head on to the rest of the shawl!

I headed out to doctor's appointments yesterday with nothing on the needles but a stash reduction project - a hat using yarn from Sharon's stash (Sharon, who worked at the Weaver's Place in Baltimore, but that store hasn't existed for aboug 10 years....) and a motif from Fair Isle Sweaters Simplified (which, in general, aren't Fair Isle Sweaters). Waiting for me at the post office were two little balls of yarn (the cream and the dark blotch) from Yarn Place. Then, before we got to the appointment, we stopped at Yarnzilla and my mom decided she needed more socks ... hence the Bearfoot Mountain yarn, Tofutsies, and Regia. Did you know that Tofutsies has Chitin in it (as well as soysilk) and is antibacterial? Amazing stuff these days, yarn.

None of these things, as you may imagine, are going to be good for stash reduction in February. I'll get the hat finished, and then pop some socks in Bearfoot onto my needles. Here's a better picture of the colors. I'm not sure if I'll use a pattern, or go for simple stockinette. It will be nice to have something to ponder while finishing off the hat.

When I got home last night, of course, I had to swatch for my Alpine Lace Shawl. I found the end (major feat #1) without too much mess, cast on 40 stitches, knit an inch of stockinette (since the gauge for the pattern is given in stockinette ... but I'm not too sure about gauge, since I got gauge with my Cherry Leaf shawl, and came miserably short of the final measurements and yarn usage) and dove into the border pattern.

I learned a few things. Addi Turbos, size 3.5 mm are workable for fine lace. I can frog two half rows by removing the needle, pulling on the yarn, and picking up stitches. It's not alpaca, and doesn't run (much, with gentle handling. I wouldn't want to try it in a moving vehicle on a bumpy road. Not breathing may have helped too.) My two stitch garter border disappeared ... to be expected, if I'd thought about it, since one of those two stitches gets slipped, leaving me with a 1 stitch actual border. And the yarn is finer than a quilting pin.

The swatch is 5.75" wide and the lace portion is between 2.3 and 2.5" deep. That's about right for the shawl size ... but I'm not sure if I like how open it is. Would it be better on size 2 needles? It's that dratted 'Yarn Weight 1' category again. Sock yarn (200 m/50 grams) does not work up anything like laceweight (440 yds/50 grams) which is yet different from cobweb weight (+900 yds/50 grams). And the yarn used for the project in the book has weight/yardage listed as 'discontinued' (grr), but the alternate yarn is 114g/1250 yds. Should I knit this up on a size 2 needle, and add in extra repeats? That would mean chancing getting a different dyelot if I should need more yarn .. but it's vareigated to begin with, so that helps somewhat. A LONG vareigation.

Muse, muse, muse.

Winter seems to have arrived

I'm an unabashed fan of winter weather. When I read that tomorrow is our last day in double digits above zero for the forseeable future, I was delighted.

Still, being inside for warmth is not providing me with sufficient time to do everything I wish I could do. Editing, music, reading, writing (with my dip pens, of course!), knitting ... and of course, sipping hot tea while listening to good music, with a dog curled up by my side. This week in math we've begun to study solving linear equations. I'm having lots of fun, and my children are looking at me doubtfully. Really, though ... is there anything so much fun as a linear equation?


Here's my current project, pinned out in progress. It's the Cherry Leaf Should Shawl from Victorian Knits Today and --- surprise! -- the edging looks almost nothing like the edging pictured in the book. It's got points on it, and there ends the similarity. I finished the edging last night, and now have two rows of (gulp) crochet to work to finish the shawl. That's in the plans for tonight. Then I will virtuously work on my Hat from the Stash until such time as it either gets finished, or my yarn from Yarn Place arrives (tomorrow?!?)

My daughter has been knitting quite a bit lately. Here's the front of a sweater we're designing together. The yarn is Austermann Melody, bought in a lovely bag sale from Elann. The first sleeve is just about finished, and I'm not sure which part she's going to tackle next. It works up to 3.5 stitches/4" on size 10.5 needles.

Here's a puzzle for you: I was told this past week that cotton socks, or acrylic chenille socks, are much warmer than wool, and to avoid wool socks. Can this be true? I'll freely admit the wool socks which prompted the advice were damp, as they were encased in plastic braces with no breathing holes .. but would cotton be any better, or any warmer? All my fiber knowledge revolts against the very suggestion!

Stash-reducing socks

The house socks won the 'what gets knit next' debate. Here they are, in all their glory, warming the feet of the recipient. Since I was making them to use up yarn, rather than delight the eyes of the looker, they do not match. The recipient did request that they be 'similar', and so they are.
I am pleased to report I have no more grey yarn, and no more dark purple yarn. The rose and purple skeins have been significantly lightened. No pattern, toe up, ribbing at ankle and calf.

On that note, I can announce some new yarn purchases.

1. 50 grams of Graceful in Blueberry, destined to become the Alpine Lace Shawl from Victorian Lace Today.
   
2. 60 grams of Angel in Creamy White, destined to become a shawl.
   
3. 9 more balls of Elann's Baby Cashmere in Tapestry Blue, the current ball of which is rapidly becoming the Cherry Leaf Shawl (yes, from Victorian Lace Today. )
   

The shawl currently has 7 leaves travelling up the outside edge. I've 8 more to go, I think, and then the edging, and then the crochet (shudder), and then I can start in on the Alpine Lace Shawl. (Oh joy!) I really like working with the Baby Cashmere so far. It feels wonderful, splitteth not, and will be the perfect shawl for me. Yes, me. I may have to order a shawl pin from Celtic Swan Forge when I finish this one.

In non-knitting news, my fountain pen is en route to Massachusetts to have the converter repaired or replaced, and I am experimenting with dip pens. They seem to be a bit touchier than fountain pens, but between the lefty nibs I have from my mom, and some new nibs I got from Pendemonium, I'm doing well.

School is moving along nicely. We're making forwards progress in poetry, life science, math, and Latin. Reading has become a regular part of our afternoons, and penmanship is the next on my list of things to target. And, after a some steady work on my part, I have finished all 96 Calculadders. Finished and passed, I might add. I may not keep up with my children in biology, but math is one thing I intend to stick with them through. This week (and last), we're exploring the mysteries of the distributive property when applied to variables and negative numbers.

A habit I am trying to cultivate is that of daily jotting down quotes, poems, or other noteworthy items that come across my desk. (It's much easier to do this when you have a fancy pen crying out to be used.) Yesterday's quote suits my blog nicely:

"It is not a bad idea to get in the habit of writing down one's thoughts. It saves one having to bother anyone with them." ~ Isabel Colgate

Blocking

As I was blocking Shawl with No. 20 Edging, I saw something I didn't want to see.
My first thought wasn't panic, however. It was more along the lines of, "Haven't I seen something like this in Heirloom Knitting?" One of my bad habits is reading about things that might happen. When I was expecting a baby, I read a fascinating book by a pediatric geneticist about his residency and the children he saw ... learning, along the way, about all sorts of disastrous outcomes and chromosomal disorders. When I delivered (was delivered of?) my firstborn and learned she had spina bifida, I didn't panic. My thought was, "Oh, I've read about this." I knew we weren't dealing with a worst case scenario because in the book, the baby with spina bifida had such a large sac of spinal fluid along his spine that he got stuck and had to be delivered via c-section. Okay, too much information. Still, I saw a large hole in my knitting and knew the world had not come to an end.

I even knew what had happened. I knit the fuzz, instead of knitting the yarn. There's a lot of fuzz to this yarn. I traipsed to my knitting box, got my Lovely Sterling Silver Yarn Needle (makes all unpleasant tasks more lovely), my yarn, and headed back to the shawl. Then I retraced my steps to snag a camera and a piece of white paper.

Have you ever wondered if it makes a difference if you block something upside down? It doesn't, theoretically. But if you find a mistake, and are inadvertently blocking something wrong side up, it entails pulling out a few pins and turning things right side up for fixing. Unless you like fixing lace from the back side? I don't.

I threaded up my yarn needle, admired it's sheen, it's workmanship, it's nice feel in the hand ... and turned my attention back to less pleasant matters. Gaping holes. A bit of study, a bit of stitching, and it's good as new. Because it is new. It's almost as good as knit correctly, to boot. While I was correcting it, I noticed another stitch (which had the courtesy not to run) that was sitting all by itself, with no friendly stitches to hold on to. I marked it with a purple pin, and secured it with much less thought.
It's not invisible, but it will do.
Here's part of the shawl, blocking. Did I mention that, when selecting a space to block a shawl, it's a good idea to think how much space you need first? I ended up rearranging my craft room a bit, since I ran into the chair mat for my sewing table. Small matter ... I just settled myself firmly NEXT TO the pincushion, and gave a big pull. Chair mats must give way before the intricacies of lace blocking.

Here's a close-up of the shawl. You can see a faint tracery of the joins at the beginning and ending of the faggotting. No holes! If you're planning on thinking about this photo very hard, do remember that the wrong side is up.

One other note, with a caveat before the note. Caveat: I am not a crocheter. I can wield a crochet hook. I will use it as a last resort for knitting repairs. But it is not my friend. Okay - caveat over. Note: The directions for the picot edging say to do a row of sc, then to chain three, sc into next sc, etc. Now, when I knit and the directions say to knit the next stitch, I knit the next stitch. BUT if you study the picture in the book, you will see that the 30 stitches of the edging result in only 15 chain-3 loops. Either I don't speak crochet and the pattern is wrong, or I just don't speak crochet.

My edging looks nothing like the lovely edging in the book. A blocking wire through the sc would have helped, I think, but I instead pinned out every second chain loop. It'll look better without the pins.

Shawl detail

Martha, my current knitting twin, wondered what the joins looked like on my shawl. I took a photo, as close as my camera will let me, and marked them

The join at Join 1 shows where I picked up stitches along the edge of the first edging.. The line of pick-ups is almost exactly under the '1' of the label. I tried a few ways of picking up the selvedge stitch, and settled on going under just one thread (not the whole selvedge stitch), since I didn't like the effect of the chain running along the backside of the shawl.

When I began binding off the middle section I discovered the chain was going to be there, whether I wanted it to or not. That join is right in a line with the J of 'Join 2'. The big holes a few stitches outside the join are the yo/k2tog in the pattern. I didn't use a marker for the first edging, but found it very helpful when working on the second half. I placed it right after the first K2 of a right side row.

And, speaking of right side rows, I discovered, very early on into knitting the second strip of edging, that in my eagerness to get to the edging, I'd forgotten the last three rows of the middle. The (fortunately) resulted in having the right sides of my edgings be on opposite sides of the shawl. I caught it (phew), frogged, cut, knit three more rows, and started the edging again.

Then I realized that I should have purled that middle row. And purled a row before starting the faggotting pattern. Oh well.

I have less than two repeats of the edging left now, and a few too many stitches left from the middle section to work together with them. A bit of mild fudging seems to be indicated.

Shawl with No. 20 Edging ... moving along

Have you ever heard of someone being penalized for not having their payment in one day before the due date? I never had.

Until we received three phone calls in this past week from a company who is expecting a payment from us. The due date is the 20th. They're not open that date, and today told us they must have it by the 19th.

Don't you hate it when that happens?

No. There are more things than that going on in the world, and in any case, it's not a particularly good use of time. I'd rather laugh in bemusement over a bank deciding the Rockin' Sock Club was a scam.

I also have more pressing things to think about. I have no traveling project, and will be traveling tomorrow. I am also less than 2 hours and some crochet away from finishing Shawl with No. 20 Edging, from Victorian Lace Knits.

I like the shawl. I'm not sure about the Super Kydd. It loves static electricity. It is, at times possessed by static electricity. I can smooth it out, and hear the crackles. The yarn is clingy. Whatever will it be like to wear? What will it do to naturally curly hair? It's intended for a friend of mine, but I'm not sure it will end up there. I may spend the whole year making shawls for this particular friend, only to decide every single one isn't 'the right one'. Rats - a whole year of making shawls. I can handle it. I do need to pick a next one, though, and get some yarn for it. I've joined the Victorian Lace Today Knitalong. If you like lace but are trying not to buy the book, don't look.

I finished EZ's Very Warm Hat, a stash reduction project. I discovered that working 128 stitches around and getting 6 stitches to the inch somehow, just somehow, makes for a hat with a 19" circumference, suitable for youngish child.
I'm not exactly sure how that happened. I checked my gauge in both beige (from Denise's stash) and purple, and it's 24, perhaps 24 1/2 sts, per 4". Maybe it's the double-walled construction? Who knows. My son pulled a promise from me to knit a second hacky sack for his friend after I finished the hat, and said hacky is completed and delivered. It was made from yarn leftover from Marcia's socks, in a GB Packer color scheme. Somewhat.

What shall I knit next? A scarf? A shrug? A sweater? (Definitely, perhaps, and definitely, once I get the yarn.) I need to make some house socks / legwarmers for my daughter, who has been sporting purple and red legs with yellow blotches and feet like icicles. Strangely enough, when she wears homemade socks, her feet are fine. Sockless in Minnesota in the winter, they're not. I'll have to think about which yarns from the stash to use while I finish off the scarf.

Pipecleaners have an amazing number of uses. Here's Rex Rover Grossman on his Bengals rug, complete with food dish and personal fire hydrant. Penny included for scale. I think this tableau was created during Latin class while my attention was elsewhere.

It was a dark and inky day...

when I first tried to figure out how to use the converter for my new fountain pen. The ink was much darker than I thought it would be (but remember, colors on a monitor may vary!) and the writing was, well, blotchy.

I thought I was doing something wrong. I am, after all, a complete fountain pen newbie, and a lefty to boot. However, after disassembling the pen, carefully cleaning it according to the directions several times, and even trying a new bottle of ink (just in case the first bottle was problematic), I still have a pen that writes blotchily. Is that a word? Doesn't matter. If I wrote it with the pen, you wouldn't be able to read it, since the lines would spread, but you'd get the idea.

There are benefits to having a pen that is, for now, allergic to bottled ink. I no longer spend time browsing through oodles of Noodler's bottled ink colors, wondering what to get next. I'm saving time. I'm saving money. And I'm saving myself from writer's cramp too, since I would have to make serious inroads on one bottle of ink before permitting myself to order a second bottle. Now that I have to bottles, I think the third bottle may be some distance away. It's good for developing character, patience, forbearance, and a neat hand.

Anyone have wise ideas about why a fountain pen will work wonderfully with cartridge ink (the blue) but not with converter ink (the blotch?). I'm all ears! (or eyes, as the case may be.)

We're finishing up our first week of school in 2007 today. The standardized test results came back, with no surprises or anything requiring further testing. Our schedule seems to be working out pretty well ... a bit of chores here, a bit of Math, Latin, CW-Poetry, Life Science, lunch, reading, and music there ... and the day goes smoothly. Fairly smoothly, that is. I have one child that forgets about school every subject or so, and needs to be retrieved. I also ordered the National Latin Exam this week - it doesn't happen until March, but the deadline for early entry is next week.

I also spent some time tracking down Christmas presents that haven't arrived yet. One is supposed to come around the end of January (sigh) and the other, after 3 reports of imminent shippage, turned up out-of-stock with no restock date in sight. Argh. 'Twould have been nice to know that in the beginning of December when we chose that item specifically because it was in stock. That order was cancelled, a theoretically in-stock item ordered, and theoretically, it will be here in 7-10 days. No one is holding his breath.

Knitting has been rather boring of late... same projects, same yarn, same knitter. I'm working on the Scarf with #20 Edging, and there's not that much to see at the moment, beyond lots and lots of #20 Edging. I've 2 repeats to go before I can pick up 222 stitches and change the pattern, briefly, before I start knitting another 22 repeats of #20 Edging onto those 22 stitches, one leetle row at a time. There's a Knitalong for Victorian Lace Today, and I hope to join. I've not gotten much work done on the Very Warm Hat's inside, but it has grown slightly since the last photo.

The 11th day of Christmas

I couldn't find the description of what EZ did for her leftover yarn hats. That shouldn't have been a problem -- goodness knows it's not that difficult to take a simple hat pattern and use a plethora of random colors in it -- but the longer I looked at my basket, the more I realized how fingering and finer yarns predominate. I collected a bit of sport yarn, and decided to make the Very Warm Hat.


I'm picking up stitches around the cast on edge, and will now knit another identical hat, which will then be tucked up inside the first hat, to make it Very Warm. 128 stitches around, instead of the 91 needed with a thicker yarn, but quite doable.

This project got siderailed Wednesday night when a bear with a stab wound arrived at my home via ambulance. No, not exactly ambulance ... speedy transit? My daughter brought him home from church. The hat was set aside, the bear was stitched up, and ... he looked cold. And I'd been reading Knitting Around too much. Before lunch the next day, the bear looked like this.Yet more yarn from the stash (and a button from the stash) gone! This is a bear-sized version of the Moebius Vest. The amazing thing is the black was worked on size 8 needles over 17 stitches with no selvedge stitch (by my daughter) and the red was worked on size 9 needles over 18 stitches with a selvedge (by me). They came out the same size. Talk about judging gauge on the fly! The bear has been restored to his home.

And the hat has been relegated to a TakeAlong project. My yarn from Elann arrived today, and in a few moments, I shall ignore a gauge swatch, pick a random needle size (pattern calls for a 7, ball band says 2-6, eenie meenie miney moe), and cast on 30 stitches. I think I will like this yarn.

And lastly, the Weather Photo of the day. We've just about got the walk cleared off now, and may get some flurries tomorrow. Winter is here!

On the Seventh Day of Christmas

I knit.

You surely didn't think I'd make a New Year's Resolution not to knit? No, I didn't think you would. I was up dark and early this morning at 5:30 when my husband left to take a friend to the airport. There was an inch of ice on the roads, plus whatever snow had fallen or drifted over, and the wind had actually blow the car off the road here in town ... so the thought of a pre-dawn drive of 90 miles or so, one way, wasn't too thrilling to me. I must not be a guy.

I made myself a cup of hot cocoa, and finished Ball Band Washcloth #2 from -- what else -- the ball band of my white dishcloth cotton. Then I settled in at my Knitting Pattern-a-Day 2006 calendar to tidy it up before giving it to my mom, and opening my new 2007 calendar. As I was rotating all the pages back to their normal orientation -- a 'turned' page is my signal that something was interesting there -- I came across some patterns that both had caught my eye and used small quantities of yarn.

Before the day was over, I had a pair of booties. They're made out of purple Brown Sheep Nature Spun Sport Weight, from a 4 oz skein. Part of someone else's stash that I adopted in Baltimore.

I had so much fun knitting them (and altering the pattern ... the one on the right was made following the directions, with a provisional cast on and kitchnered bottom. The one on the left was made with a figure 8 cast on and no trace of kitchener) that I decided to spend the next few days until my yarn order arrives in working down a specific portion of my stash.

The Colorful Basket

This is a basket of odds and ends from various sources. There's blueberry from Green Mountain Spinnery, that I got to finish a shawl which I started with a full cone from the adopted stash. There's Manos Del Uruguay, which was a sweater, then got unsweatered, and which was not used in the Booga Bags. All sorts of goodies ... perfect for all sorts of small knitting.

Like Mr. Hacky Sack. He's a simple 10 stitch x 20 row garter stitch cube, with beans inside. This has gone over well with my son, who would like me to convert the entire square to Hacky Sacks. That is not in my plans ... but it does strike me that Hacky Sacks with self-striping sock yarn might be a Good Idea.

My next stash project will probably be something ala Elizabeth Zimmerman ... reach into the basket, pull out some yarn, and cast on for a hat. Knit a bit, snip, and pull out another bit of yarn. Either that, or a stranded baby hat. Or whatever catches my fancy between here and my basket.

I thought about weighing the basket to keep tabs on my progress, but nixed that idea as too calculating.

Did I mention a yarn order? Yup ... last night I put in an order for 3 skeins of Elann's laceweight mohair yarn, to use for a shawl. And, while I was ordering from Elann, I got one ball of their cashmere/wool fingering weight yarn to sample for another shawl.

I have some plans of turning the baby booties into a Baby Set, and by such maneuver making it eligible for entry into the county fair. Perhaps a Baby Surprise Jacket? Who knows what will come out of that basket. I certainly don't.

Our New Year's has been quiet. Our household has been reduced to its normal size, and, since we were planning on being elsewhere today, we had no festivities planned. Books, needles, and crochets hooks were about it for the day's agenda. And it was fun.

When forecasts are wrong

Today, we were supposed to get some snow mixed with rain. Somewhere around 2 PM, well after getting home from church, the annoying drizzle we've been getting the past plethora of hours was supposed to turn into sleet, and then snow. And maybe, if the forecast was correct, we'd get 1-3 inches of the white stuff before it melted tomorrow.
Around 10:00, it started to snow. It hasn't stopped yet. The trip home from church wasn't treacherous ... but we did travel at about half speed most of the way, and were glad we knew where the roads were. Our plans for tonight changed somewhat -- rather than go to the church New Year's Eve Party this evening and leaving our son there with a friend for a sleepover, and picking him up tomorrow morning at a New Year's Breakfast, we will instead stay put and keep said friend until such time as it's a wise idea to be out on the road.

The latest forecast calls for 6-10 inches. It's been a lovely afternoon for building snow forts, consuming hot cocoa, and looking out the window at a world which is not a dull brown.

My 'boring' projects are finished ... once again, nothing on the needles. Should I make it a tradition to have all my projects completed before I go to bed on New Year's Eve? Excepting, of course, the projects I don't want to count, like the leftover Rambling Road afghan that's been in a bag for a few years at my mom's house, in case I got stranded there with nothing to knit, and a certain quilt that's been languishing for not nearly that long? (although I do plan to finish the quilt in the coming year.)

First, we have the Doodle Doily.

This was made on size 2 needles, over 62 stitches, with a sampler pattern from Heirloom Knitting, and an old ball of Knit-Cro-Sheen that I happened to have laying around. I'd really like to know how old the yarn is ... the label said only J. P. Coats, Knit Cro Sheen, Boilfast. No color, no price, no nothing else. Another ball I have of probably the same vintage is a size 30 Clark Big Ball - for 29 cents. That's the printed price, not what I got it for. How long has it been since a Big Ball of size 30 cotton went for 29 cents? They look to be $2.19 now.

In any case, I cast on 62, knit for a while, then worked the Doris Edging around the rectangle, and grafted the edges together. I ran out of thread, but wouldn't you know, I happened to have some unlabelled thread of about the same size, so was able to finish it. It's blocking now, and I'll see tomorrow if it needs starching as well. I think I like it ... so now, to plot and plan the shawl!

The Leftover Sock Yarn Coast Project

I've gotten four coasters made (KnitPicks Simple Stripes in Vineyard, and Essential in Burgundy), and have just a few yards left of burgundy. What really surprised me is that the stripes lined up so nicely. I did not plan it in the least ... and probably will never repeat it. The coasters are a titch small, so I'm going to use a larger needle on the next set. Haven't made up my mind about fringing them yet either.

Today would be the perfect day to make a list of projects for the coming year, but it probably won't get done. I do know that I will be making a shawl (or several) from Victorian Lace Today, a sweater from a Green Mountain Spinnery book using Peace Fleece, and something akin to the Unst Lace Stole from Heirloom Knitting. It feels like 2007 might be a year of the shawl. Or maybe it will be the year of the S's. Socks, Shawls, Sweaters, and Stoles?

The Third Day of Christmas

was full, with doctors for mom, therapists for daughter, music practice for me ... and several hours of playing with friends for son. And after all that, we had to sneak in a library run to get a new batch of books. I'm not sure if all the Christmas books are read, but still, we can never pass up a library.

The Booga Bags are finished drying, and I've put the smaller one into service. It looks ... well ... rather like a Booga Bag. I am very glad that I had 15 mm needles handy, since I really doubt I would have been able to work the I-cord through anything smaller. If you are thinking of making the Booga out of bulky yarn instead of worsted, consider also using 4 stitches for your I-cord instead of 5. My current projects on the needles are rather boring ... a coaster (3 of 4) using leftover sock yarn and a lace swatch for a nightstand, using some leftover bedspread cotton. While I'm not joining Knit From Your Stash 2007, I am going to try and decrease the volume required for leftover sock yarn storage. I also hope to make some dresser scarves and such-like, and since I have fine cotton hanging around, I will probably use that.

In lieu of photos of non-fascinating project photos, I have some dog photos. Here, you have a cuddly widdle puppy dog expressing his displeasure at having a mob cap placed on his recumbent form.
And here, you have a photo which, once again, missed the pose with both legs stretched out. When we got him from the shelter, his name was Taffy. I think his stretching ability must have been what inspired the name. He'll crawl along at full stretch as fast as I can walk ... and it must be a great way to get a tummy rub. Is this common to terriers, I wonder?

And the second day of Christmas

On the first day of Christmas, I knit. And on the second day of Christmas, I uploaded photos of what I knit.
But long before Christmas, I was stealth knitting, stealth designing, and stealth correcting. I'd set up a lovely pattern for my son's gansey. All was going along quite well for the first 50 rows, and then I took a good look at it. I realized that one side of the diamond pattern had 1 plain knit stitch, and the other side, because of its adjacency to another pattern, had 3 plain knit stitches. I stopped, contemplated, and decided it was time for a mid-course correction.
Doesn't that look mid-course-correctiony? I ran back 2 stitches of stockinette, and reworked them to match the garter pattern on their left. If you look carefully, you can see the three stitches next to the diamonds at the left edge that are next in my sights to fix.

I am *so glad* that I stayed up late to fix both sides. It would have taken great fortitude to pick the sweater up the next day and continue correcting. There must be some anesthetic quality to shock which allows people to rework large amounts of mis-knit material on the same day the error is identified. I also had to fix the back when I got around to it, but that was only 15 rows or so.

It wasn't until I started working on the shoulders that I realized I'd mis-knit / mis-remembered the diamond pattern I had planned to use. I did not go back and revamp those, however. They were diamonds, they looked good ... and if they didn't match what I had on my graph paper, I'd just throw away the graph paper and keep the sweater.

The finished product came out quite nicely...
The garter collar didn't behave like I wanted it to, but the recipient is happy, the sweater fits, and the initials at the lower right corner of the sweater were a nice touch. He likes the matching socks too ... they keep his toesies warm.

Today is a reading and crafting day around here. And a day to continue writing an answer key. Merry 2nd day after Christmas, all!

The First Day of Christmas

For Theresa, who wanted to see the Harebell Lace Fichu ... here 'tis. The pattern worked out wonderfully. There were a few places where pen and paper were handy to keep tabs on how to do which kind of join, and working a sample of the lace was invaluable in figuring out the method behind the madness (and also decipher the chart symbols, since I didn't have the entire book to work from at the time). I used Schafer yarns in Anne and have a good chunk of the skein left. I'll have to weigh it and see if there's enough for a second fichu.







And here's the socks in Claudia's Handpainted Yarns, colorway John B, lace pattern Field of Flowers (mis-remembered) from Heirloom Kniting. I love how the yarn striping worked in the stockinette portion.

Right now, on my needles, I have a facecloth (aka washcloth, but can you really call a lace concoction a washcloth?) in white dishcloth cotton. It's my second of the day, using stitch pattens from my New Barbara Walker Treasury (4 vols plus Mosaic Knitting!).

My semiBooga Bags are drying in the window now. I couldn't use the silver yarn needle to weave in the ends, because it had stayed in a crevice in the couch at my mom's house. The side effect of this minor travesty was that I discovered that using a Fine Quality Tool can make an otherwise unpleasant task more palatable. Pity I couldn't use it last night with all those ends. The bags felted up nicely, and are perched over 3 volumes of the Encyclopedia Britannica (the large bag) and 8 volumes of Elsie Dinsmore (the small bag). The books are, of course, covered in plastic.

Coming tomorrow ... Stealth Project #3 photos!