KAL

usually KAL means Knit along ... but in my family  KAL is the initials of my Dad. Yesterday with only 22 days until Christmas I cast on a pair of socks for him. Our family takes Christmas quietly, there are traditions amongst us around gifts, for my dad we search high and low until we find a vintage tractor calender, and usually we add a generous gift card at a supermarket or hardware shop. This year I was knitting socks for both cubs and decided that my dad, their grandad probably needed a pair as well. The impetus was finishing the Bigger on the inside socks. So today there is the finished socks, the the socks that are one-point-four done, and new socks. With three socks discussed in this post today is indeed a sock day.

Bigger on the inside, all done, and on the lawn. This many daisies worries Bear, right now he is mowing the lawn. Details, Pattern worked toe up based on the cuff down Tardis Socks tribute pattern by Ellen Botilda, 2.25mm needle, circular, yarn a custom one off from Vintage Purls. Yarn left over = 11grams, Sock sized up to 72 stitches, as that cub has large paws. Interesting detail -  I worked the gusset in one by one rib, which may be something I do again.

You can just see the lines in the gusset that the rib creates, to get the lines running this way I placed the increases on the sole edge of the gusset. This was the bit that I frogged and reworked - just to get these ribs all neat and tidy - and they sort of work well with the slip stitched heel flap.

The Old school socks are making good progress, up to the gusset already. Once the heel is done on these - there is very little left to do as they are quite short. There is only one thing I would change if I was to work these again, so somehow integrate the pattern into the toe shape more --- I'm growing dissatisfied with socks where the pattern just starts once the toe is worked but haven't yet sorted out what my approach will be to integrating the sock instep pattern with the toe. Which leads me to ....

.... the KAL sock, here  I've tried to work the sock decoration inside the toe - in a very simple way. This yarn came with a sock club in 2009, Vintage Purls, and was intended for the sock design Mandorla. It was the most 'grandady' of the yarns I had in my sock drawer that I was willing to sacrifice for some one else. That sounds mean - but there is a lot of pale blue grey, and blue, and pink in there that wouldn't be appreciated by Grandad as much as by me. Selecting this yarn did make me aware that I should widen my colour selection if only to have yarns I want to use for other peoples socks. Pattern is one I made up, slip stitches in columns with a 'chain' or 'square' of slip stitchs every 9th and 11th rounds.So far so good and knitting up fast so promises to be done by Christmas - or perhaps it can be a New Year sock?

Take care, life here has finally returned to normal, the mad rush of ballet practices and concerts is done. There are no more weekend classes - although I do have a promise to older cub that once ballet was done he could have  sleep over for 5 friends, so there is that still to survive. there are only two more weeks of work, and school before the long summer holidays begin... and that feels timely and nice.

na Stella

Nearly the right size!

Hello
Short post today, things are busy - in a good way, not too busy to post but there is not a lot of knitting or other 'things' to post ... so short post.

First up - Bigger on the inside socks are nearly done. Elder cub is away at camp and with no need to keep the Tardis inspired colour work around the top out of his sight I've been able to knit and knit and knit. these should be almost done tonight. Wednesday night is trash tv night here, Big Bang Theory followed by the Borgias, both showcasing opposite extremes of behavior in an odd way. Two hours of trash tv should get me well into the  ribbing.

Second up is I've a new article out, in Entangled (I'd link to the contents page - but I can't find it - sometimes I'm hopeless that way). I'm feeling all starstruck as in this issue I'm rubbing pages with some of the fibre  worlds superstars like  Jacey Boggs has a regular column (Well done GrannyG - Editor of the stars !) Expert weaver Margo Selby explains her progress from new graduate to commercially viable hand weaver and designer- and I love reading how she came to terms with making her work affordable without loosing the craft designer. Then there is some hand knit fashion talk, Joanna Davies (Knit forward Fashion Back) - explores  how hand knits work in the fashion world. There is even an article on Tatting - a craft that I have dabbled in and one that I think is overlooked by many but possibly more portable and creative than knitting and crochet combined.  My article is titled Impoverished Craft, and I've tried to explore the relationship of scale in crafting.

so thats me ...
back in the weekend, two more nights of ballet rehearsals (4pm to 7pm for the nine year old) and then the show proper Friday night and Saturday - Sunday we might all need a relaxing sleep in and and brunch out some where nice and relaxing.

take care
Stella

Not just knitting

Hello, during the week Bear went digital, this is a man with a Nikon F5 film camera and previously no wish to use a digital camera at all. Digital is something I've encouraged, seeing my photos as I make them allows me to make better photos. I can't imagine waiting weeks for a film to be finished and then printed, but Bear is old school - and that is cool. The result of Bear deciding to try digital was my lovely Panisonic Lumix camera went out on a site visit with him and wasn't here for me to use - no mid week photos means no midweek post. Not that there was much here to blog, a sock is growing, I've plied two skeins (no photos sorry), and today I made a bag. The bag was a project that started out as a repair and before I knew it there was a new bag in the making. I'm working away developing a 'teachable' book for November continues to keep me busy - but the end is in sight. There are several 4pm to 7pm ballet practices this week, Monday and Wednesday, and a full ballet concert this Friday and Saturday, I'm not sure who will be the more tired, little cub who has to rehearse and dance or the parents who have to prepare, transport and feed the ballerinas and then watch the whole recital.

So a growing sock, Bigger on the inside the second is half done. The corner turned and the leg commenced. Soon I will be able to play with the colourwork at the top. There will be more opportunity this week as elder cub is away to school camp from Tuesday morning to Friday night. Without him in residence I can happily knit on his sock without discovery.

Little cub plays Ukelele, she has done for two years now. The classes are held at her school and are free - one of the retired teachers opens up the library and runs 3 classes a week, beginner, intermediate, and advanced. Thank you Miss G! Every Wednesday littlest cub takes her pink ukelele and trots of to class after school, most weekends, and some mornings we hear her singing and strumming away in her room down the hall. The bag it came in was thin and had started to tear in several places. As eldest cub is off to camp we had the sewing machine out and I was stitching labels to the things we least want him to loose. Seemed a good time to do a few repairs, stitch a belt loop back on, top-stitch a hat band in place, and repair the ukelele bag. The fabric of the original bags was - well it wasn't fabric, it was a thin non-woven with no structural integrity at all. Originally I thought I would over-stitch the popped seams, but on inspection I found the seams had torn, and there were holes and tears in a few other places. The next step in the repair ladder seemed to be to open up the seams and patch the thin and worn places ... so Little cub and I started to unpick the bag. As we unpicked it seemed that the best repair would not to be to patch such thin fabric - but to cut and sew a new bag.

I hauled out the last of a roll of denim that I had used to make cub-trousers when both were smaller, and my sewing box. Little Cub chose a cotton quilting print of Paua-shell  to accent the denim fabric. Little cubs nickname is Doodle ... so that seemed a fun word to personalize her bag. The applique was outlined in machine zig zag stitching, each letter in a different thread colour, and that seemed a nice feature to carry through to the handle and the zip. Little cub outlined the 'L' - didn't she do a grand job? She wasn't sure about the 'E' - as it had lots of corners and turns, and left the curved letters to me.

We even added a wee pocket to the back, to keep her picks in, with enough space to add a ukelele tuner later (she is getting one for Christmas but dosn't know that yet).

And I've been working away to develop a nice book to teach bookbinding with at Unwind next March. The class is only a few hours so I've been working out how much I can expect people to sucessfully get through in that time,  And I've been playing with materials, these two are stitched with different weights of linen thread. I like the thinner one better, less dramatic but the stitching holes are smaller and the thread adds less bulk to the book.

I've also been playing with this method of attaching the covers to the book-block (pages). The standard method dosn't use a flyleaf - which is something that 'nicer' books have. The problem with adding a flyleaf is how to stitch the cover to the book-block and not interfere with the unglued flyleaf. Took me the 'map' journal to get my mind around the 'how' and the yellow journal to refine adding the back cover so the inside looked the same. Soon I need to 'test' my teaching on some one to make sure that this is achievable for some one in my class, no point having a method that is so fiddly that no-one else can follow is there?

I've also been playing with paper, the ivory is 80gsm Claire Fontaine, and the white is 90gsm HP, both take fountain pen ink and pencil well which is important. I'm also playing with printing a knit grid on some of the pages, and different methods of stitch binding using the 'coptic' stitch. Heavier paper makes for a book with more of a 'high-quality' feel, and I've already discovered that the covers and flysheets are much easier to glue if thicker paper is used.

Take care - I'll be back with more knitting mid week if the ballet and camp and work dosn't derail me again. There is only 3 weeks until school (cubs) and work (mine) finishes for the year - then there is our long summer holiday break. The end is in sight!

cheers
na Stella

Progress.

Today it is all about the progress - two socks, one done, one nearly done with the impressive bits done. In keeping with progress - there is a decision to abandon a poorly thought through project and a new project jumps on and nearly off the needles.

First up - the Old School sock is one, and a second one started. I still have reservations about this sock - the frill is larger than I imagined - but the littlest cub coos and fondles and thinks they are so pretty I shouldn't change them at all. I will keep an eye out for lace edge that is smaller and suitable for use as an frilled edging on a bobby sock.

I've started the second toe and managed to reverse the shaping so the increases on each sock spiral out and mirror the other sock. I didn't want the usual toe, the one with increases at each end of the sole and instep stitches but I did want a toe increase with four repeats or sections. Figuring that the usual toe involved a cast on of two sets of 8 stitches then increased four stitches every second round I rejigged that to fit neatly on dpns. I cast on 8 stitches, increased in each stitch on the first round to get 16 stitches and then every second round increased in the last stitch on the dpn for the  first sock and increased in the first stitch on the dpn for the second sock. So now I have  just the boring bit - where I work the chart until ready to increase for the gusset now.

Second up in the report - Tardis socks made good progress this week - mostly as the older cub tended to work in his bedroom rather than watch 'boring tv' with his parents most evenings. He is off an age where reading Harry Potter or about Aliens is far more fun than watching tv - and I'm keen to promote the reading - so we are keeping him supplied with library visits to stock up on whatever he fancies. The sock is being worked in reverse order - toe up rather than top down.   The chart was easy to reverse - I just turned the page upside down. I also worked the colour work on needles 2 sizes larger, so 2.75 mm not 2.25mm, just because I needed to make sure the colour work would stretch enough to go over the heel and around the calf.  There is another 12 or so rounds of 1x1 rib and then this one will be done.

The next project is the one that is about to fall off the needles, frogged.  I've already reknit this one, adding more stitches. This is a whim project, as in one I cast on in a whim, thinking I knew enough to just wing it. Seems I don't or rather I didn't think enough about what was required to make this work. Now intellectually I know that cables draw knit fabric in, they reduce its ability to stretch - and the more cables and the more stitches cabled, the more drawn in is the knit fabric. So when knitting this I completely ignored the fact that having 5 cables around a tube that fits the wrist - would make that tube tight. This fits - but it feels tight. I had thought I would give this away  - there was an opportunity to have it knit ready for latter this week. I'm now rethinking that and this will be frogged and parked. Besides its spring, wet and warmish rather than cold - hardly weather to gift warm cabled hand knit wristers. Mental note to self - 60 stitches even when on 2.75mm needles, using sock yarn, cabled rib is not enough to fit a wrist comfortably.

And this is the fast and furious project that jumped on and then off the needles, a pair of red wristers. I've been invited back to teach at Handmade again. I've offered to enable new knitters by teaching them how to make a wrister. This is a project I developed first for littlest cub, then for WWKIP 2011 and it is designed especially to give beginners the skills they need to start and finish a project in one lesson. Working the wrister involves casting on, casting off (to make button holes), casting on again ( to complete the button holes), weaving in ends, and then knitting to the length you need. It involves only 25 stitches and a few hours. I know that this hasn't got purling or shaping - but in a 2 hour class I don't want to confuse people. I figure that once people have  knit a wrister or two - they will be ideally positioned to pick up purling and increasing or decreasing. So this sample is knit in Max - the Vintage Purls dk sock yarn - superwash merino with a hint of nylon for durability,  in reality this is blue-redder than this image but its a grey day here and my camera seemed determined to add a little orange to the red.

Well its raining, again, has been on and off heavily all day. It is now late afternoon and all the cubs have come home, as is Bear - late afternoon and time to bunker in for the evening. I'd best go and put on the coffee pot, there is lemon syrup cake (a glut of lemons has been gifted to us), crisp ginger lemon cookies in the shape of bunnies, dog bones, flowers and hippopotamus (Bears favorite), elder cub has made chocolate cake and wants a hand with fudge icing. Littlest cub returned home from a play date with afghan cookies. Rain does that - makes the kitchen inviting, and I don't mind one bit. I had planned nachos for dinner but perhaps we need something healthy and green to counteract all the baking? Then again perhaps Nachos is a perfect way to end the weekend?

Take care
Stella

Back - briefly.

Hello, I'm back. Did you know I was away? I can't recall if I said or not but Friday I was in warm and sunny Tauranga, just for the day. 1025 km away, up and back in one day, two flights there and two flights back. I'm away again next week, to Auckland this time, Tuesday and Wednesday - which would be neater if Bear wasn't away to Christchurch Monday and Tuesday. My Dad is coming to the rescue as the cubs are lovely and sensible kids but not old enough to leave on their own yet. I don't often flit around the country like this - but when I do I get a real reminder of how much weather patterns change in such a small country. Its November, early Spring here and in Tauranga it was very springlike, the students I was there to see all wore strappy sandals, the windows were open, the day fine and warm (by Dunedin Standards). Friday night I returned home to a much more chilly climate - and Saturday awoke to snow on the ground - all around! Today - Sunday it is much warmer, windows open kind of warm - but obviously winter is not ready to forget us yet.

I took along the Bigger on the inside sock, and worked it as I flew up and back. I made good progress, achieving the gusset increases, the heel flap and starting the leg. I would have made more progress if I had remembered to take a few stitch markers along. This yarn is dark, and I wanted the increases to run out from the sole (not towards the sole) - and that required keeping the increases next to the same stitch - not as easy to do without stitch markers. Discovering that I frogged back once and took a lot more care with placing the increases this time. I also wondered what would happen if I ribbed the gusset, so did that, I like the way the ribs sort of fan out, and may do this again. I had to do some quick calculations to make sure the leg had the right stitch count for the Tardis stitch pattern - turns out that after a day of flying I'm not so good at math, this also took me a few repeatedly  frogged rounds to sort out. Slipped stitched heel on this one - which pairs nicely with the ribbed gussets.

The other sock on the needles stayed at home, having achieved the same state before I left. This time I worked the gusset in reverse stocking stitch, and I like it. The little triangle of reverse stocking stitch pairs nicely with the ground behind the traveling stitches. Eye of partridge slipped stitch heel on this one. I'm thinking short with a fold down or a lace frill - what say you?

Finished object here - a wash-coth, in ribbed smocking. Rather nice I thought, and squooshy. The cloth is much smaller than I expected, smocking the rib pulls everything in quite a bit. I really would like to work this stitch pattern into a yoke of a little girls cardigan - as soon as I have a wee bit of time to work out how to increase for the yoke shaping keeping the pattern true. Any ideas?

Older cub is spending the day in the garage wood working, Bear is terrified that he will injure himself with sharp tools. Elder cub has not shown much interest in woodwork before, but has done several weeks of wood technology at school - where it turns out that they had to wear tough leather gloves whenever they used cutting type tools. To me that just seems to make the whole exercise harder and clumsier. I explained that snap-off craft knives are not the best for whittling wood, which is what he had been using - what do people use to whittle now that pocket knives are illegal to carry (at least they are in New Zealand). I've made it clear  that one keeps ones hands behind the blade, cuts away from oneself, and shown him how to secure things in the vice and where the tools are. He wants to make a wand a-la Harry Potter, and isn't to disappointed that we couldn't find a Yew dowel at the hardware store. He did have hopes of finding Yew - which I was pretty sure we wouldn't find.  I've left him with a rasp and a spoke shave to thin the end, sandpaper, and reminded him that he doesn't like blood and I don't like screaming so it would be best to avoid anything that results in that. I love that he wants to do things with his hands - love it.

take care -
Stella 

One photo, three projects

Just a quick update today, one photo three projects, but first a heads up about a very special fibre event to look out for in 2012.

First up the knitting event, Unwind, March 9, 10 and 11 2012, New Zealand. Special because finally us locals have a knit event close to home (thanks Morag) - which means more spending on classes and fibre and less on travel to get there. The site is live, registration is open and teachers and traders include New Zealands finest (IMO)! I'm teaching two classes, Norwegian Steeking and Coptic bookbinding ... and hoping to get into James Persian Poppy's class. Kaffe Fassett's Poppy's has been on my want-to-knit list for simply ages and Jame's class will give me the push to finally commit to finding yarn and casting on.

So that excitement over, and back to talking about my  knitting - look two socks on the go and a washcloth that snuck its way onto my needles. Oh I was totally aware of the washcloth happening, at the last KSG class there was discussion that the next class would be on smocking. Now smocking I know, and knitting I know, and I am sort of aware of a kind of knitting that looks like smocking so I thought I'd do a little bit of investigation. Of course that kind of thing almost always results in me wanting to just try the technique a little bit.

So, here we have a wash cloth, which is smocked, using the technique shown in this video by Audknits.The technique looked fun and it is - I suspect I might include this in a cardigan at some time soon, around the cuffs and hem and yoke ......What I have learned is this is fun, easy, surprisingly simple and pulls the knitting in amazingly, this is a 50 stitch washcloth and it behaves more like a 30 stitch washcloth. When I use this in a cardigan there will have to be be significant swatching to make sure it fits.

Also in the photo are the two current socks on the needles, first up the Ice Sock and then behind that the Tardis Bigger on the Inside sock. The Ice sock has kept me frogging, mostly as I keep being distracted by other knitting like the smocking and forgetting that the traveling stitches are not twisted. I spend one entire evening knitting merrily away twisting all the traveling stitches and not looking closely enough at my work to notice that what I was doing was different to what I had done before. The darker blue sock, Tardis Bigger on the Inside is looking good and is a good mindless knit. Both are nearing the point of starting gusset stitches so I'll have to so some sort of estimations to workout just how many and where ..... time to haul out my workbooks and see what I usually do. Might even be time to work out a semi standard set of guidelines for knitting socks for socks of any size- so I don't end up back in the workbooks working it out each time. Mostly my socks are influenced by things I read about how different people make socks and  a fair few keeper techniques gleaned from socks knit in the past. The most interesting find recently is this idea by Maia Spins, which was posted in 2007 but which I have only just thought now to search for. I'm keen to try that kind of flap extension with a slipped stitch heel, there is something neat about how the gusset stitches run vertical not horizontal.

Take care - knit or spin some, or at least read about fibre ...and investigate Unwind - even if just to temp yourself a little and dream.
na Stella

Done so something new or two

Toad is finished, yesterday, amidst sunny warm and balmy weather - yes finished a long sleeved sturdy warm hand spun hand knit jersey with lined collar and cuffs for double warmth on the day we finally get summer. Just as well we live in Dunedin, for today we are back to colder days, with rain and overcast and not a lot of sunshine to warm us up. With any project ending - comes the time to start a new project (or two) - so I've done that and now have two socks on the needles, different ones.

So - twelve year old sons are not good at standing still, they dance, they jigger, they move - and on an overcast day for a while it looked like this was the best photo of Tobe wearing Toad that I would be able to show you. For interest sake, I used up every single gram and part gram of the Sock yarn I was using to line the collar and cuffs, ending with about 20cm left - so this was an excellent stash buster. I have a skein of the Blue left, which might become a hat, sometime. And I have to remind myself this is my first finished hand knit sweater .......something I am keen to do again even if it means spinning fibre in larger than 100g batches.

Front on, Toad gives Tobe Shoulders, well he has shoulders of his own but they are lean, lanky, skinny boy shoulders.I think all saddle shoulder designs do that to some degree - add in a linear and boxy shape at the shoulder. Having said that I think it will soften with wear, and use .... next winter if it still fits.

Side on gives some idea of Tobe's dimensions, front to back he is a proverbial bean pole .... over all I'm quite pleased with how it Toad (and Tobe) turned out.

The new project is a secret Christmas present, knitted toe up to keep the design kind of hidden for now. I am making Tardis socks. So far reverse engineering the pattern has been fine, cast on  two lots of 8 stitches using Judy's magic cast on, honestly the best seamless toe cast on ever IMO, increase at either end of each side for the next five rounds, then every second round until there are 34 stitches. Condensing the increases in the first few rounds gives a more rounded toe which I like.

There might be a second new project as well, for some reason I felt the need to cast on a washcloth this morning, worked in 2x2 rib with smocked details - sorry no photo yet but there will be next time.

Take care
Stella