The big reveal....

Last night was swap night, and yet again there were amazing things unveiled. My swap was for Katya, some of who's work is on show here. Her sense of colour and texture are amazing, and when I read she loved jewel colours I stash dived and then ravelery dived. Katya dosnt have a big presence on ravelry, so I was a little bit on my own ... but went looking for something that was jewel like, and reflected her love of texture, beads and her amazing garden - without bring cluttered and ott. A little ott can be good, but too much is well .... too much.

I found Daizies, by Marisa Hernandez, a two tone shawl knit long and narrow. I loved the two lace patterns in this shawl, both highly structured, just as I like my decoration. My only worry was how well I could follow the instructions and if any mistakes would show.

The shaping of the shawl was new for me, with six stitches increased every right side row, three at each end. These increases make for a dramatically long and narrow shape, and the beautiful charts were all sorted ready to work with the ev increasing stitches. While the repeats were often only four or eight rows, the charts were divided up and shown for every stitch count as the shawl grew. It was amazing and simple at the same time.
I love the result that the rapid increases gave. The ends fall in a beautiful cascade, a ripple, or waterfall zig zagging back and forth - some times spiraling. And the two colours enhance the effect.

The edge finish was also new to me, but I'm a novice at lace shawls and lace shawl bind offs. It is a stretch bind off, with a yarn over and purl one, before two stitches are slipped over the third. The effect was of a mini icord, a two stitch one, and the purl bump pushed the edge to the right side. When blocked with wires woven through the edge looks like a twisted chain along the length.
The yarn is vintage Purls sock yarn, in two different colour ways both with undercurrents of purple, I don't have the details to hand but will fill in soon ....promise.
Take care and an update on what my swap partner made me in the next post
Na stella

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Plodding along

Its winter, no we haven't had any more snow, just wet and cold with good sharp frosts, but the days are short. We have turned the corner into longer days, more light in the morning and more light in the evening. Within a few weeks we will drive to work/school at 8am and we won't have to turn house lights off as we leave, and car lights on as we drive. I can't wait. Ditto driving home. Teaching bookbinding went well, as always three week intensive blocks are - well intensive, but fun, such fun sharing a love and interest with others.
So knitting, well .. I could show you but then I'd have to ....we all can imagine how that ends, in spy stories there is a threat to kill, in secret knit swaps ... I'm not sure what the threat is, to cut or tangle ones yarn, to steal ones placeholder on the pattern chart, to randomly knit increases in your project whilst you are not looking? To swop out the chart, yarn, needles for something that will cause problems.
Yes, I've been plodding along on my secret swap knit, at times having serious doubts about the colour (I think these colours are *** colours, what if my swap partner doesn't think they are?), and the pattern (I can't remember if I've ever seen them use one of these - is that because they don't, or because they don't have one?).

Meanwhile I can share what the cubs are up to, all three, eldest, youngest and the cat all tucked up on the sofa on a cold winters eve. Sorry for the blurry faces, the wont keep still and one is fuzzy by nature. It was dark outside so artificial light. And yes little cub is wearing pink fake fair isle slippers, described by bear as ugly, don't worry I didn't make them, we bought them in a discount store.
Take care, news of things knitting soon, I promise,
Na Stella

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New, new, and new

Hello, I'm still here, and still knitting, there are two new projects, one i can share, and one I can't. Little cub celebrated her birthday a week or two ago and at eleven she seems more grown up than ever before.

One of the new projects is a new hat for Bear. He starts a new job Monday, one that should involve more out and about than the previous job. Out and about on roads and off road, so a repeat of Hope he never needs this seemed in order. Here is the start, 156 stitches on 2.75 mm needles, exqctly the same yarn as the first one as I am using th left overs. Two by two rib for seven inches .... Might not be a lot of progress to show on this for a while.

And this is the other project that is new on my needles, something for this years secret swap partner. I could tell you all about it, the colour, the pattern, the idea, the gauge, the intended recipient ... But it's a secret so I can't. Suffice to say that this project got off to a rocky start, with a fair bit of ravelry pattern searching, two false project cast ons, several yarns wound from skeins to balls ...and abandoned, before settling on this project, this colour and this yarn. Reveal date is 6th July ...so not long to go now. And before you all go 'well i can see its grey', it's not, just a greyscale image.

And this is how little cub celebrated her eleventh birthday. She desperately wanted a cake-pop set from the Total Food Equiupment. That is one of those shops with le creuset pans, amazing coffe grinders worth more than our car, and chef styled utensils. Cake pops are a special set of top and bottom cake tins that lock together so the cake is cooked in small spheres. Even thought this seems like a kid type present - and by the time she finished dipping the pops in melted chocolate and sprinkles it seemed as girly as it could get, this aling with all her othr presents was a quit grown up gift, there were no toys amongst them at all. The cake pop tins a close to toys as she wanted, other gifts included a new gretch resonator ukelele and a pink touch screen phone. My baby cub is growing up, and I think I'm ok with it, she squealed when she saw th uke and the cake pop tins.
Well between the boring hat knit, and the secret project I'm not sure there will be a mid week post, I'm teaching bookbinding full time for the next three weeks, so there is lots to do for that as well. Back soon - with a reveal or progress.
Na Stella.

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Slow progress

Today its all about slow progress, I cleaned out my wip basket yesterday, and found:

1. a colour work tam (two years old),
2. one and a half pair of colour work mitts (nearly a year old and on 2mm needles),
3. the first ten rows of a shawl (now frogged),
4. an Elizabeth Zimmerman Pi shawl (six or seven months old)
5. the start of a pair of socks,
6. and most of a fine gauge cardigan.

There almost was a purple strip - but that is now done, and now the shawl that came to nothing is frogged that leaves me with five works in progress, the eldest being two years old. Im slightly uncomfortable with that, not having so many wips but that some have been sitting so long.

Some new projects are love at first sight, you know when something just has to be knit, other projects are selected to fulfil specific needs. The tam was for a tam class, the pi shawl because I had nothing suitable to take to knit night, the colour work mitts were also for class. For now I don't have a plan, other than to deal with the wips somehow, and by that I mean complete them - but that is the first step, and that is all I need to do right now.

The long purple strip is done - I'll fill in the details later as this is part of a larger body of work. I used yarn from the local mill, a 200g skein of merino, alpaca, and angora. I cast on 41 stitches using 4.5mm needles and knit a central panel of Horseshoe pattern with a wide boarder of moss stitch. Horseshoe can be found in Barbara walkers Treasury of Knitting patterns, on page 209.

I had a breakthrough on the cardigan, one sleeve done, and the other well and truly started. The cast off bothered me a little, I tried a tubular bind off on the single rib. In such a fine yarn it looked wimpy, so I frogged it and worked Jennys surpisingly stretchy cast off. That looked so much better, I think I also discovered I had been working the cast off 'wrong' until now. For some reason I had only 'processed' a stitch when switching from knit to purl in a k2p2 rib, this time I was working on a k1p1 rib so processed every stitch. The bind off looked different, not better, not worse but different, maybe more zig-zaggy. Given it was said to be super-stretch I worked the cast off with the same needles I worked the rib in - and it is super super stretchy. I like, I liked it so much I also spent the rest of that night casting off the hem as well. I had put the hem stitches on a holding thread until I had decided what cast off to use. It seemed more prudent to test on the smaller cuff with fewer stitches than the larger hip section.

I've also been getting ready, and so far have 8 book blocks ready for my bookbinding class at Unwind. The class is only a few hours so I will show how to stitch a book block, and have one or two there for students to practice on, but I wont get them to make their own book block, that would take too long. Instead I will supply each student with their own blank book block all stitched and taped, ready to go. I was extra lucky in that a local firm had a clear out of letterhead paper, so I scored a large pile of nice thick luxury white paper to use in these blocks. That way we can get into the fun stuff of making and covering the books. If you are into details the top blocks are made using 'proper' book binding tape, the lower blocks with twill tape from the haberdashery shop. Bookbinding tape is starched and easier, but I suspect makes for a book with a stiffer spine. This sort of stuff is all the detail that is missing from bookbinding instruction books, and for good reason. A book with that sort of detail would be tedious to read.
I've a few more blocks to make, and then I need to sort my self for the Woollen spinning class. I'd really like to have the class spinning woollen within the first 10 minutes or so, and then once they can, move over to making rolags and preparing the fibre. That might seem backwards but I think once you know how to do something you are in a much stronger and more informed position to select and prepare materials for doing it. Anyway - to have them all spinning that soon means have a few rolags for each student - no big drama - I just have to settle in and make them.

I've got my first night class for printmaking this Tuesday, so am looking forward to being distracted by that, and our students all start their study this week (tomorrow!) - so they will keep us all busy. There is also a wonderful new book, Knitting, Fashion, Industry, Craft by Sandy Black, brand new (published in Sept 2012). This book deserves its own post, not to be buried deep in a housekeeping post - so I plan to a proper review next post.
Till then, take care - na Stella

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A little knitting, a little scratching

I have been knitting, its just that I've also been distracted. There is a visiting exhibition on at our public art gallery (DPAG -Dunedin Public Art Gallery), of etchings, GéRICAULT TO GAUGUIN Printmaking in France 1820-190, which is on from the 15th Dec 2012 - 17th Mar 2013.As always the community education program is excellent, and as part that  a serries of talks, lectures, and guided tours was organised. Also in keeping with their long tradition of encouraging people to get active and 'do' art, explore the media, there was a three day workshop. Three days of print making --- count me in. Some where I had a vague notion of learning more about printmaking so I could explore adding title pages or book plates to my books, after visiting the exhibition I was also inspired by the highly naturalistic nature of the prints on show.  I do appreciate abstract art, and mix-media collaged works, but deep down I'm in stop and look with jaw dropping awe at a lifelike drawing, or street scene captured in detail by the hand of a talented artist.

 So until Thursday I knit, on the long purple lace with the moss stitch edges -- its over three feet now, and should be five. I'm expecting to get to five sometime this week, at which point I will have to make some decision about what to do with the remaining yarn. Thursday morning I abandoned the knitting and headed off to class.

 The first day, Thursday, we played with dry point etching, on plastic sheets. We scraped and scored and sanded and made all sorts of marks that would capture ink. We inked up, and used the etching presses, we had fun. Well I had fun, and the rest of the class all said they were having fun.  The second day I went armed with more knowledge, and an idea. Dangerous things ideas, but better used than ignored. The second day, Friday we were introduced to zinc plates, which meant etching - and allows for a wider range of tones.  which brings me back to my idea - of something I could print.
For as long as we have known Yoyo, our cat,  she has liked to sit in containers. Not any container but in pot plant containers, again not just any - but ones that are shallow and just the right size. Weird what cats will do, in summer and winter she seems happiest sleeping, sitting or even crouching in a dirt filled bowl outside. I've long given up trying to understand what goes on in that wee fur covered head, now I just accept that is what she does and we leave a few garden pots half fill of dirt just for her to use. Over the years we have all learned to spot 'Cat-in-a-bowl', and admire how well she takes command of such a small space. I went armed with a blog photo from way back in December 2011, and drew my Cat-in-a-bowl. Then because I was thinking of printing in terms of books, and books have text - I added the words Contained like a cat in a bowl. I played with other words, and adding a frog, but kept coming back to cat in a bowl. I liked the suggestion that a cat is not really contained in the bowl, but sits watching - ready to leave.
Keri, one of the tutors made use of modern technology to reverse the image so my text would be readable when printed.

Friday was spent preparing the plate, beveling the plate, covering the plate a protective ground (hard ground if you want details), transferring the image, scratching the image through the ground,  etching the pate in acid (in a well maintained ventilated fume box), and cleaning off all the acid and ground. I finished up on friday with a print of my line drawing of Yoyo, and plans to add lighter and darker grey tones the following day.

The third day, Saturday was spent learning about how spray paint and shellac can be used to create tones with the etching process. Then we were asked to proof our final plate - here it is compared to the line only version.

Once we were happy with the result we were challenged to print an edition of three on good cotton paper. Apparently there is a huge skill in  reproducing prints from a plate such that each print looks like the first print. I don't have that skill, yet. Every print is a result of fresh ink being applied and the excess wiped away, wiping a little more or a little less and the  print is a little lighter or darker. Saturday I developed a huge appreciation of the engraver and printers craft and a desire to learn more. Three days was not enough. There were other media, and other techniques that were introduced but that I just couldn't include in this work without turning my cat in a bowl into a propper dogs breakfast.

 In case you were wondering about the small embossed mark on some of the prints. Neil Emmerson , the lead workshop tutor called this the shop Chop. He explained that not only was it important to note the artist who made the image, but also the print studio in which the image was printed. As part of that he has a Chop which he makes available to all those who use his studio at the School of Art. Neil being Neil - tends towards the subversive, and he loves to call his teaching studio the P-Lab, short for The Print Laboratory, at the Dunedin School of Art.

 I enjoyed myself, and while I recongise that etching and printing etched pates is far too time consuming to become part of my bookmaking practice on a regular basis - I want to do more, I have no idea where this will lead, but the etching and printing process fits nicely into the kinds of line and tonal drawings that I like to work on. I enjoyed this so much so that I have enrolled in the night class. Eight weeks of classes, Tuesday nights, six to eight. There are spaces - if you are keen please join me, classes start on the 18th. When we began to work on zinc, I cut my plate in half, with the aim of using the first as practice, and the other half to do something when  I understood the process more. Now I have enrolled in the evening classes, I've coated the remaining plate in a hard ground and begun to etch the Cat-in-a-bowl again.  The practice plate is on the left, the second time around plate on the right. This time I think I will make the background grey so Yo-yo's whites can be white, and I won't have such a hard time removing ink from the plain areas of the plate.

There will still be knitting, I even have plans to print something knitting related .... how could I not?
There just might be a little bit of printing mixed with the knitting for the next eight weeks.
na Stella

Unscheduled holiday

Appears that I've had a blogging holiday, completely I scheduled, and lovely. No blog in two weeks, not really sure why - I've been on leave from work with both cubs underfoot. Although the elder cub was officially measured by our family doctor at 179cm tall, and still growing. That's just under six feet for the non-metric amongst you. I'm only 172 on a good day ... So he towers above me and yet oddly can still be under foot. We have had play dates, and school shopping, uniform shopping as elder cub is off to high school this year, official uniform and timetabled days, a variety of subjects and new teachers for us both to get to know. He starts tomorrow, younger cub In a week. Bear decided we needed a proper holiday so this past weekend we headed out for two days in the tourist mecca of Otago, Queenstown. Fantastic sunny days and warm nights, and fabulous meals. Even some knitting and souvenir yarn!

New thing

This is the newest thing on the needles, a purple strip. There is no pattern, just a case of guess, cast on, knit some, rip some, knit some, rip some ...again and again until it I liked it. This is a skein of 200 grams merino, alpaca, angora from the Milton mill factory shop. There is a need for purple, and long ....I decided the edges needed to be moss stitch to boarder a narrow lace,with a matching grand at the end. The lace is direct from Barbara Walker, horseshoe lace, page 209, the treasury of knitting patterns (volume 1).

Here is the first trial, I had gone shopping for purple yarn, in Aran weight, and found nothing I liked in a natural fibre, only acrylic. Buying yarn is not something that should be done in a hurry, as i settled on two balls of this, I tried to convince myself that this was purple, even to the point of asking people to confirm it was purple. Well blue, they would say, but it is a purple kind of blue isn't it i would ask. Ok they would say hesitantly - in that I will agree with the crazy knitter to keep the peace voice my family have.
I only had 100 grams of this, and the replacement yarn comes in 200grams, so my other worry about having enough to do want I plan has faded.

Before we headed away I had made some progress on the first sleeve of my cardigan, i am up to the ribbing at the cuff! I would have loved to knit this while away but travel knitting from a cone of yarn is not as simple as travel knitting from a center pull ball.

The other new project is the frog pond socks, which grow. But as the pattern is totally charted, and I am working the chart on my ipad (using knitcompanion) this was eliminated as travel knitting. I love my ipad, and I love how easy charts Are to follow in knit companion, but knitting in the sun from a reflective screen isn't ideal. There is a lot of squinting to 'see' the frogs in the lace, but the flare of their flipperey feet and the bend of long froggy legs are very clearly hinted at.
I also managed to sign up for another season of vintage purls sock yarn club ... A wee treat to look forward to.
Take care, stella

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Wow!

Look!

 Julia made me a cake, I suspect she was 'put up to it' by others who shall remain nameless, but she made me a cake. And not any cake, but a cake inspired by David Hockney's swimming pool art, all white and blue .... with dolls in jelly. Well there was jelly before the cake traveled home with me, a tsunami occurred, upon arrival at home the babies were found tumbled in a mass of blue jelly. Bear as an engineer pointed out that once one side of the pool had been munched - the collapse of the jelly water was inevitable. There is a back story, as would have to be with a cake like this. A few weeks/months ago the local knitters were discussing birthday cakes, and how as children we saw amazing decorated cakes in books .. I mentioned that as a child I had seen one formed like a pool with dolls swimming, and Julia remembered and recreated it. I'm happy to cut and pass slices to any who want any - and I apologize for the mess I made of the cake Julia crafted for me. 

Saturday night was the annual local Thursday night knitters gift swap - and I was gifted this amazing duo, a vintage toned crochet scarf and pencil case. I wish I could show you this in all its glory --- and as soon as Julia (yes the same one as crafted the cake  and so here is a link to her blog and much better photos). The colours in the scarf are all soft and tone with everything in my wardrobe ! The joins are amazing, Julia told me the details are all in the blog she links to on her blog, so I looked and I am further in awe that every sing side of every square was stitched to another that way.  I am one very lucky local knitter.

This was my humble offering for the swap, in amidst amazing illusion war of the words socks, and lace shawls and wraps and cabled tams, I managed a teeny little pencil case. Every year Ngaire organizes the swap, and every year we openly tease each other that all the gifts are actually for Ngaire. That way we can talk about gifts without really taking about who they are for. This year my gift was for Ngaire! Ngaire is amazingly artistic and loves all things grey, and draws like I imagine angels draw. When I saw Tom of Holland's Sanquhar pencil case - I knew I had to make it for my swap partner and fill it with things grey. I found this when I was searching out Sanquhar patterns, and now subscribe to Toms Blog, he has a great approach to visable mending that inspires me.

 The local fabric store had the perfect vintage inspired school print, with checkers that perfectly matched the folds in the pencil case.

And this is a new project, a Knit one Below inspired hat that I will introduce next post - because I want to go and admire cake and my lovely scarf, and amazing pencil case, besides my dad is here for the night so I really need to be a good host instead of tucked away with the computer, the internet and blogging.

na Stella

Another Tour de Fleece is over ...

and I managed my unofficial goals. I was a little wary about aiming to high for this years tour, because I knew I would be away for a good 3 days to Wellington sans wheel, and again overnight to visit my Dad and collect the cubs. I kept my goals somewhere between modestly achievable and slightly beyond doable, then there is the new sock, stitches back on the needles and growing well, a new set of Owls, and even a new completed shawl! Some one has been knitting and its not been me.

This year my tour de fleece goals were to spin 160g fibre on the Pipy Saxonly wheel - a wheel that I have not used much at all since the Majacraft Gem arrived 18 months ago. Those goals I achieved, last night - as the tour came to a close I plied the two 80g bobbins onto one Majacraft Bobbin. Whew! I had a wee moment during the day when I thought about how nice it would be to keep the skein unbroken and wondered about purchasing a Majacraft Plying bobin. Those bobbins hold twice what a standard majacraft bobbin holds. But between the wanting to ply while the tour was on, and thinking about I would want to add to my spinning kit should I be spending money - and browsing the Majacraft price list ... well I decided to order an upgrade for my flier to the Majacraft e-system and just ply with what I had. Good move, as the bobbin filled I found that it did indeed hold 160g of plied fibre, and that as it filled it was perhaps a little top heavy for the Gem. I ended up glad I had not ordered a larger bobbin for the Gem. So this is my Tour de Fleece 2011, 160 g 2ply perendale, dyed pinky mauve rose by moi, and 440 wraps of my longest ninny noddy. I'll calculate the final length after I've soaked and dried the yarn.

This week I have been knitting mostly on the new sock, and after making repairs earlier in the week the sock has grown and is well on its way down the leg. Scrunched up like this the pattern is not very noticeable- but stretched out as it will be when worn the baby cables and twisted stitches are pretty - in a very masculine way. This is a boy sock, for Bear, so has to be masculine

I knew that working on teeny tiny twisted stitches and traveling stitches and baby cables might not be a good thing to attempt in a traveling car - so I opted to work on the second (ah hem third) double knit mitten on the way up to Dads and back again. Look progress, much more of this kind of stuff and I'll have to visit my queue and decide what to knit next.

I've even managed to have one of the owls winking! I'm not sure how that happened - I guess a distracted moment perhaps. Eldest cub is quite keen on movies like Indiana Jones and local tv has been having an Indiana Season. Even though I have seen all of those movies many times ... the high action stunt scenes are still worth watching.

Since Thursday I have been wearing a new shawl, this was gifted to me in the local knitters swap. Pale silver grey (I'm told its Vintage Purls Lace Satinless Steel Rat !) and beautiful. I love this, love it, love it, love it! I had moved this shawl up to the top of my queue every now and again ... but just didn't know the right colour to use ... and this grey is perfect. The shawl is warm, stays put and looks amazing (did you see it had nups?), and a little silver feather broach by Peter McKay just suits the lace and colour perfectly. I have a couple of his pieces, Bear commissioned the 13th Metaphysical heart for a wedding anniversary and the feather was bought to fill the gap while Peter made the heart. Thank you H!



Today is Sunday, the cubs and Bear are on holiday this coming week, whilst I have a standard work week. We woke up to what we thought was a heavy frost - but turned out to be snow and hail and all things cold. So far we have swung from cold weak winter sun with soft flakes of snow to wetter hail and wind. Smallest cub keeps heading out to find enough snow for a snowman. A perfect day to keep warm and fondle knits and knit and spin and bake. Did you notice the cinnamon muffins earlier in the post? Part of me hopes for a snow day tomorrow so I can work from home ..... but snow here is a once a year thing and almost never stays for more than a single day so I expect it will be a typical work week come Monday.



keep warm - that is what knits are for.
na Stella

Busy

Oh there has been knitting and yarn related activity since the last post, but surprisingly not a lot of knitting to show for it. I do have yarn, and yarn making, and public knitting, and new projects, so here it all is.
Saturday was Knitters Study Group - and usually I have something new to report. I arrived at 11ish, in time for class set up --- and by 11:30 we had the local fire service mopping the hall and supervising a large fan to evacuate the smoke filled air. Some were between 11 and 11:30 a heater set a temporary curtain on fire, the fire dept was called, the fire extinguisher was emptied, smoldering bits were knocked down and a jug of water and broom used to put out the remaining flames. We were advised to leave the evidence for the fire service to evaluate rather than clean up - so we did. The fire service arrived promptly, said we did all the right things, suggested any one with breathing problems stay outside, set up their fan, opened all the doors and windows, worryingly uncovered the fire exit that was hidden under a table (stored on its end), and helped themselves to mops and brooms and cleaned up. I was impressed ..... but not up for a few hours of knitting in a hall opened up to the elements with no heaters so headed home for a cuppa-tea, so I have nothing to show. And people think knitting can be boring?

The follow up was our Dunedin WWKiP event, 1-4 at the Settlers Museum. Now the museum is a public place .. but it isn't cool to publish photos of people without their permission. The lovely J - taught knitting and took some lovely action photos of the action - and action there was. Hands were flying, people were moving and chatting and knitting ....the best bit was when J noticed the two nine year olds were completely relaxed knitting lying down and had to take a photo - look .....


I made a teaching handout with diagrams and links to cast-ons, knitting, bind off and finishing/weaving in simply because J and I couldn't teach everything a beginner knitter needs to know in 3 hours. Most people could already knit, or had knit at some point in their past but there were some newbies who as far as I could tell went away happy with the beginnings of a new skill.
I have been knitting - but shhh, it is a complete secret, my project for my secret swap partner. This is probably as much as I can show you - any more and you know the story, I'll have to frog your project and tangle your yarn (seems more of a knitters threat than killing). I am about 'here' on the chart, so only this many repeats to go before I work the ..... and the .....s

This is the wee project I worked on the bus today, I knit 40 minutes there and 40 minutes back ... more later. Another beginners wrister for the office lady who sorted all the yarn and the transport for my students and who admired the wristers I was wearing. She wanted Autumn colours - this is some of my early hand spun silk and merino and feels autumnal to me.

hh

Last night at spinning I plied my sock yarn, the Vintage Purls one, 75% superwash merino and 25% nylon delivered in a hand dyed pencil roving (hidden under Hand-dyed fibre on her shop). Wow .. this is probably the most even I have ever spun, I wanted a three ply .. but after sampling went for a two ply, from a center pull ball. This puffs up quite a bit ... and now looks like soft proper sock yarn ... I love it. 100g and 420ish meters ... now to find the perfect sock to knit ....
Today the Hand knitting Studio students and I trekked(by bus) to the mill, and had a wonderful tour of their processing, including dying, and blending and the woolen and worsted lines and the carding and ... well everything from when the fibre arrives to the dispatch room. The students were keen and asked lots of questions ... before heading out the mill shop to buy supplies for their knitting projects. As I went around the mill again, I couldn't help but be reminded of the magic by which fibre is turned into light warm yarn ..... so much fibre .....

Now this week I do have home work, I am teaching a wee-chap to knit, and have to find a way he can knit with only one hand. I've sorted him some smooth thick yarn in bright red, and long thick wooden needles with good points, and so far we have been working on a Scottish style with one needle tucked under one arm. I'm practicing myself so I am useful when I next teach him. Belatedly I Googled and found this blog which shows knitting this way with the use of a support. I was thinking if this wee chap kept up with his knitting I would show him my knitting belt and matching pins, and he is welcome to borrow them .... but for now I want to keep it simple, without to much extra drama and 'stuff'. The technique shown in the video is what he and I came up with on Sunday, but I think it can be more fluid with practice ... so I'm thinking we might have it sussed. Of course I'm not an on this expert so if any one has any hints or clues ... please share.

Take care - update this weekend, where maybe a new sock will be started,
Stella

Fling One and Fling Two

Acknowledgment: Title inspired by Dr Seuss's and Thing One and Thing Two - characters from the Cat in the Hat, 1957.

When I started working the double-knit mittens and discovered that my gauge was 'improving' I decided that I would forsake other knitting projects. It was a considered decision, I worried that working other kinds of colourwork in tandem with Double-Knitting would have all sorts of unforeseen gauge issues. As it turns out ... I kept fairly project monogamous for the past few weeks .. until this week. But this week I had a party to go to, J turned *0, or as the Germans would say had a 'round-birthday'. I'm told that birthdays ending in 5 and 0 count as 'round-ones'. There was a party, a knitters party instead of meeting for knit night as usual in the Link - we met at M's house and ordered food in .. and celebrated. We chatted, there was knitting and giving, and lots of fun. It was not the place to knit from a chart ... so I needed a simple project - enter knitting fling 1. The same group of knitters have a mid-winter gift exchange every year ... where we draw the name of one of the group members from a hat (knitted of course!), and stalk and plan and secretly knit something for them. Enter knitting fling 2.

So instead of my planned knitting project monogamy - this week I have indulged in two knitting flings.

Fling One
Finally a sock on the needles, yes it has been a while, lets see .... at least April the 16th, so at least 13 days without a sock on the needles. This is Heart of Glass by Vintage Purls, part of the Summer Sock Club 2010. I am knitting mine in Pastel Mist, having used the kit sock yarn as the contrast in my Nightingale. I like this yarn .. is it a little unusual as VP colours seem to be more vibrant and this is very subtle.

Fling Two
This is my super secret project for my Thursday night knit swapee. I have tried to disguise the project so it looks like knitting... but not any specific knitting project, and no it is not really pale concrete coloured grey. I'm looking forward to finishing the **** section so I can ****** along the **** and then work the rest .... and that is as much detail I can provide right now.

With all this flinging there has been no noticeable progress on the Double-knit mittens .. but tonight there should be some, I'm so near the top that I'm keen to see it done and compare it to the first one for size.

I have to return to work this week .... after a week and a half off .... I like work, really I do but I enjoy having my days to myself even more. Is that wrong, or right? I'm not sure.

take care
na Stella

Just going around and around

I'm still here, and thank you to all who left comments or other messages to ask if every one was OK. As far as we know, our relatives and friends are safe and have all survived ... but that news comes amidst the sad news that many many are hurt and worse. At the supermarket checkout I'm often behind or in front of a trolley filled with water bottles, and crackers, I don't know if people are stocking up or shipping supplies north. The isle that is usually stocked from one end to the other with bread ... is bare. Every bread rack has a printed paper sign ... that the Christchurch quake has interrupted supplies. There are other little reminders, Bread flour is sold out, and almost every point of sale has a sign that you can add to the sale an amount for a donation to the Quake fund. Many many retailers are matching shoppers donations dollar for dollar, and outside every supermarket and bank there are collectors on street corners with red buckets collecting. It all happened so quickly that there are none of the usual fund raising merchandise, badges and stickers proclaiming you support the cause - but this time it isn't about showing off ones generosity, its about just helping. We are fine, we have enough, enough being that we want for nothing, we always kept a fairly well stocked larder, had a garden and have spares of most dry goods, and have fruit, bread, and other produce in the freezer, so I've been glad to give what I can where I can. The newish TV channels are still providing news updates every hour, all the structural engineers from Bears work have been loaned to the Christchurch office to help determine which buildings are safe, and what to do with those that are not. They apparently work in teams of three, a Structural engineer, a Social worker and a Earthquake commission agent. Bear specialty is civil, not structural .. so we get to have him around. The cubs school has openly offered to include any Christchurch 'refugee children' in its classes for however long they need, and my work has made a similar offer to the match for our school in Christchurch. Many parents have arranged for their children to stay with relatives in other centers while they clean up.


In the meanwhile I'm knitting and there is a finished project and progress. The finished project I really can't share, more than this .. its a surprise, and group project and the time is not right yet. Soon all can be revealed but for now all I can say is that the now finished work returned to my house for blocking. It is now blocked, and flat and very very nice, in fact so nice it would be nearly enough to temp me to ..... so I might get given one myself from this group.
The finished item will be off to the last person in the chain Monday .... and then it is just a question of waiting until the right time, before I can reveal more.

The only other project getting needle time right now is the lace band around the Shetland blanket. Because I have already knit (and frogged) this section I feel obliged to work on this until it is up to the point before I frogged, but obligated in a good way. There are several good things that happen when one re-knits a pattern, the little things that occur to include but for which it is often too late ... get to be incorporated the second time around. This time I'm knitting the lace as garter, not stocking stitch, the green rows help remind me to purl. And I took the time to chart out the corner increases. This gave me space to play and add in a few lace repeats. When I knit this the first time the corner ended up very solid .. adding in lace motifs to match that in the band will just lighten it a little.

Row 16 of 26, 10 more rounds to go, and there will be 174 stitches per side when I'm done ........ this may take a while. I suspect the colourwork Tam will call out to me before too much time has passed.

Take care ...
na Stella