a simple yarn

So what’s on the needles? Nothin’ really.

Am I a seasonal knitter? Perhaps.
In the Dublin mountains, no on-site husband, no garden, no distractions.
In America, there are too many other summery pursuits.

The stair tread work is stuck in a suitcase.
Will probably run out of yarn and would hate to buy more for a ‘recycled’ project.
Received a lovely yarn donation from Holly to keep it moving along.
A bit too hot to manage a lengthy wool felted snakes.

The black lace bolero is history.
Love the daisy lace pattern.
Too distracted these days to focus on a fiddly project.
Dumped the pattern but will use the lace design for a manageable lace pashmina.
Backed with a silvery, shimmery fabric to highlight the lace.
Think it’ll be a stunner.

I would really like to buy a new knitting book.
One with lovely patterns that get the creative juices flowing again.
Haven’t found anything.
Guess that means I have enough patterns waiting in the queue.
Oh wait.

Stumbled upon Ysolda’s Liesl.
Pay Pal is just too easy.
Downloaded it in an instant.

Have some teal cotton I’ve been storing until a pattern came along.
Perhaps it’s enough yardage.
This just might be the incentive I’ve been looking for.
Next thing is to unpack my needles.

I suppose I ought to be kicked out of the world-wide knitting sorority.

This past weekend was Isobel’s birthday picnic, blending knitters and non-knitters. After lunch and before being rained out (as is common at any outdoor Irish event), Sara pulled out her knitting.

‘What did you bring to knit?’

Ah, the inevitable question.
Without pause, Sharon said she had done her knitting on the lengthy car trip to the picnic.
Birthday-girl Isobel had a traveling sock along.
And me?
Um.
Ehm.
Knitting?

Had to confess that I didn’t have any along with me. Oh. But more telling to this sad tale is that I didn’t even think about bringing any. Oh my. And sadder yet is that Sara sympathetically offered a small on-the-go-mobile-phone-sock for me to work away at, but…I just didn’t feel like it. Oh my goodness.

I must be slipping.

So, while I wallow in the dregs of knittingdom, let me share a little story in this ‘Knit on Monday’ post that has absolutely nothing to do with knitting…thankfully, it has a happy ending.

Attention: Non-Knitting Happy Customer Service Tale Ahead
One of the things I think Europeans do well is…wellies. You know, Wellington boots….rain gear for your feet. And having lived in a perpetually damp culture for the past six years, I knew one souvenir I wanted to take away, since the decision to move to the US had been made, was a nifty pair of wellies.

After lots of faffing about, I finally found a pair, which for me, is the quintessential pair of cool wellies, designed by Ilse Jacobsen. But, ack, none in my size in the local shops! Fair enough, off to the internet…

Apologies, Non-Knitting Post With Happy Tale Is Getting Rather Lengthy…Time For Highlights

1. Go to www.wellieart.co.uk.
2. Measure feet as instructed.
3. Order wellies.
4. Arrive in a few days.
5. Too big. $@£!!!$%&£@
6. Moving soon and starting to panic.
7. Send pathetic email, can I get them in time…will they ship to the US if not?
8. Send back too-large-wellies on Friday.
9. Receive nice email response, also on Friday.
10. Only one pair in stock. Order second pair in correct size, duh, on Friday.
11. Still panicked about remaining time in Ireland (21 days) and delivery time as website says something about 21 days delivery for orders outside UK.
12. Receive nice email from Lorraine on Sunday saying that while they usually don’t work on weekends, they went to warehouse, got my wellies, made a special trip to the post office and they were quite envious of my move to the US.
13. Get new wellies on Monday.
14. They fit. I’m totally chuffed.

Now, who says customer service is dead?

Okay, be honest… does anyone really enjoy swatching?

I find knitting little samples to assure myself of the right gauge to be rather boring and avoid it whenever I can. Yes, I know it saves time in the long run. But what then do I do with this 4×4-inch bit of worked-up yarn? I suppose if I were really creative, I’d keep every single one and eventually make a patchwork quilt. Sigh, I’m just not that ingenious…

Given such feelings, how ironic then that the time I’ve spent on the stair tread project has resulted in one oversized swatch. What began as a tangle of pre-felted I-cord knit to a random length of 315 inches (because I couldn’t be bothered to knit any more and didn’t want to cut off any unused length)…

…ended up as a tangle of post-felted I-cord duly shrunk to a length of 212 inches. That’s a fairly normal result of about 67% of the original length.

After winding it around and pinning into place, I come out with a mat that’s 4.5 x 21 inches. Hmm…what size should a stair tread ought to be? Oops, probably should’ve googled that one before starting.

Erm, regular retail braided rug stair treads measure 8 x 28 inches. Rats, not nearly there. But I have an impression (based on nothing at all really) that our cottage steps are not quite full size. Need Husband-Will to do a quick measure of ‘em before he comes to Dublin. After doing a bit of who-knows-if-its-relevant mathematical computations, I estimate that I need to knit at least another 315 inches of pre-felted I-cord to get a mat that’s nearly the size of the retail ones.

So, what to do with my swatch…um, a nifty trivet perhaps?

Lots of shrinkable, new wool in the yarn stash.

What I Need: Something to cover the wooden stairs in the new US house.

I love wood floors, don’t get me wrong. They look rather lovely in the little vintage cottage we’ve purchased in Alexandria (Virginia, that is, not Egypt). But having lived with wooden stairs before, they are loud under my Exuberant-Eight-Year-Old-Boy’s feet and, when the occasional tumble happens, can be quite painful. Carpeting? Huh-uh. Stair treads? You bet!

So, with that thought lurking in the back of my brain, I am now seeing all those accumulated leftover bits of wool as newly recycled raw material for just such a project, and feeling quite ‘earth friendly’ to boot!

Giving Credit Where Credit Is Due Diversion
Now, Leigh Radford has a similar idea in her ‘One Skein’ book, called the Labyrinth Circle Rug. But other than the general idea, it’s at this point that I digress from her pattern. Rather than knitting it flat and having to seam it up the back, I just knit i-cord.

After knitting what seem to be miles and miles of endless i-cord (changing the colours at random to keep from falling asleep), take the i-cord snake; pop it into the washer and felt. After drying, wind into a circle…or oval…whatever shape you fancy. Pin into place and hand stitch with sturdy thread. Presto, instant felt mat, kinda like this one from a few years back…

…but this time, it’s stair treads that I want. And the felting will make ‘em durable, which is also something that I want. The trick will be to figure out how long to make the ‘snake’ to get a final mat the size of each step. I’m in for a bit of trial and error it seems. So, I’m taking my scraps of wool and 2 extremely short and very innocent looking wooden dpns for some mind-numbingly-boring airplane knitting*. But honestly, the thought of those brightly coloured mats keeps my needles going!

Today is the day we do all the final signing of papers for the new house in the US. But it was yesterday when I found my ‘new home.’

It took no more than 14 hours after the Kiddies and I landed on US soil before the family walked by this shop in Old Town Alexandria.

Knit Happens

As you can imagine, the gravitational pull was overwhelming, and shamelessly leaving the others to find their own amusement, I dashed in. Okay, I say ‘dash,’ but it was more like a leisurely stroll, for who could zip in and out of this fine establishment without taking time to appreciate its ambiance, right?

Doing a poor job of controlling saliva glands, I tried to look like the Well-Traveled-Just-Arrived-From-Europe-and-Other-World-Destinations knitter, but I think they saw through that façade. In mere moments, though, I learned of their knitting night, community outreaches, drop-in-and-knit opportunities and (gasp) the Maryland Sheep and Wool Show going on this weekend with the Ravelry gang in attendance! Hey, don’t I live near Maryland now?

Well, it probably won’t happen for me this weekend (sigh), but there’s always next year…plenty of time for my Irish friends to plan a fibre field trip, eh?

Lace project is still waiting, but before I put away the cotton yarn, it’s time for one more go on an impromptu baby hat.

Been knitting for a few years now.
Have indulged in intarsia.
Have copped onto cables.
Have dabbled in design.
Am fearful of Fair Isle.
That is, until now.

The thought of Fair Isle has scared me, to be honest. All those strands of yarn thwoinging themselves into a shameless tangle, maintaining order only by my feeble attempts at manual dexterity. Ack! Had the same feeling when subduing the intarsia beast.

But something small was an ideal way to overcome my irrational fear. Right, so taking a simple design from a Debbie Bliss bootie pattern and adapting it to another pattern-free cotton baby hat, the result is, well, a fairly passable imitation of Fair Isle. Kinda wishing I’d put a couple of rows of ‘checker boarding’ above and below the main design, though. Looks a little plain, I think. But, something to consider for next time. And I have to say that I’m liking the ‘SKP’ rather than ‘K2TOG’ decreases on the top of this hat, creating a cute swirl on the crown, although the photo makes the hat look a little wonky…needs a cute little baby head in it!

And now that I have a few babies among my acquaintance, the opportunities for experimenting with various designs will be plentiful, I’d say.

In the midst of moving our family to the US after six years in Ireland, I ought to be up to my eyeballs in boxes, right?

Need to pack up the house.
Need to switch the utilities and forward the post.
So what shall I do today?
Pick up my needles and knit.

Need to finish the lace bolero.
Need that jacket for upcoming summer weddings.
So what shall I do today?
Knit a baby hat.

Spoiler Warning for Sharon, Cathal and Baby Rohan:
Not a lot of knitting going on these days and am desperate for a fibre post, so if you continue reading, please be forewarned that the package coming to you welcoming Baby Rohan into the world won’t be a surprise.

Where was I? Oh right, baby knitting.

Now I realise that in recent months, I’ve been suffering from a disease…well, more of a knitting disability. I can’t seem to knit a pattern as it’s written. A tweak here. An adjustment there. I seem incapable of knitting something without an alteration—and the simple baby hat also falls victim to my malady.

What I love about baby knitting is that it uses small quantities of yarn—bits and bobs of cotton—to become lovely little wearables. But what shall I knit?

Love this hat, but have done it a few times before. Yawn.

Candy Cane Hats by Penney Kolb, from this book compiled by Melanie Falick…

Love this hat, but not sized for babies. Sigh.

Jesse’s Topknot Hat, from this book by Andrea and Gayle Shackleton…

So, taking the baby measurements, rolled edge and knotted top of the first hat and marrying it to the two-row stripe and basic shape of the second hat, fiddling around and making adjustments as I go and presto, a new one-of-a-kind baby hat.

Well, he’ll have to grow a bit, as I certainly didn’t do any gauge swatches after all the diversions, but hopefully he won’t mind. Matched with a pair of baby mittens and there ya go…welcome to the world, Rohan.

It would follow logically that if I post Saturday baking on Sunday, then I would post Monday knitting on Wednesday, right?

Addendum (If you can put a postscript in at the beginning of a post after the fact, this is it…) Have had a few enquiries regarding the the patterns below. Here’s where they’re from:

Socks—Over the Knee Socks designed by Cindy Taylor, published in Handknit Holidays by Melanie Falick.

Lace Cardigan—No. 22 in Vogue Knitting Holiday 2005.

Back to the original post…
So, I’m still a bit off sync, but look for more orderly postings next week. Anyway…
While on our mini break in Cork, I did indeed finish a little knitting project. The second of the over-the-knee-lace-cabled socks is complete and I’m quite happy with the result.

I realize, though, that it would be difficult to wear these socks without the added help of the sewn-in elastic. I had yet to put in the elastic before taking the photo, and found the sock drooping below the knee. The elasticized one stayed up like a dream. Well, it was either that or resort to a garter…scary thought, I know.

What is more noteworthy is that winter knitting is finally done and it’s now on to spring-ier things. First up, a lace cardigan. Another VK pattern. Never content to leave well enough alone, this one is going to be shortened to bolero length and worn over a sleeveless summer dress. Never having had occasion to use Rowan’s Kid Silk Haze, it’s obviously the yarn of choice, but wait…

…uh oh, after knitting the gauge swatch, US10/6mm needles are called for. Hmm…I pull out the Denise Needles, but after a few rows, it’s gonna be tough going as the needle points aren’t sharp enough and I’ve already made a mistake after only 4 rows. Grr…

Oh well, will just have to rationalize an emergency purchase of Addi Lace Turbos. Er…am I correct or do they stop making them at US9? I…can’t…find…any…US10…argh…Not to be diverted from my mission (recognized by steely glint in eye), certainly there must be another way.

Aha, the solution…simple enough!
Take one set of unused cheap wooden needles.
Take one household pencil sharpener.
Insert needle into sharpener.
Rotate handle until any friction from paring is complete.
Take out needle and presto!
One (questionably turbo) lace needle.
A little light sanding to reduce any snags and hopefully I’m in the lace business.

So, IF this works, THEN I’ll be happy!

Bearing in mind I’m not an Irish speaker, the slaughtered phonetic pronunciation would be SHOK-ten na GWAYL-guh.

It’s Seachtain na Gaeilge at the Kiddies’ school this week…

Warning: Irish Cultural Interruption
Seachtain na Gaeilge is an annual Irish language-centred festival during the first couple of weeks in March in the run up to St. Patrick’s Day. More information (in English) can be found at www.snag.ie. Okay, advert over.

…and so, this week’s posts will have a wee bit more Irish flavour.

SnaG Trilogy Part One: Cniotáil*
It was raining and I was glad. Right, slap me. But the pouring rain gave ample time to finally finish the cabled yoke jumper in scrumptious Irish Kilcarra Aran Tweed. Just in time for warmish springtime weather…go figure…but yippee nonetheless! Certainly, this pattern tested my knitting abilities, so many alterations were there:

Body knit a few inches longer to lengthen a short-waisted me.

Elimination of 8 cables to make drastic reductions in neck diameter. Original neck measurement about 23 inches…altered version more like 16-17 inches. Also lengthened the neck for a higher collar, vain attempt at hiding middle-aged-neck-sag. Also bagged the zipper embellishment…why bother?

Didn’t fancy the seam up the raglan edge, so joined up the segments and finished off yoke on circulars. The down-side to this is that I didn’t correctly calculate the decrease and there’s a bit of a ‘pooch’ at the underarms, but I can live with that.

Despite complaining about the endless twisted rib, I think I like it better than plain ribbing.

So, sufficiently chuffed, I’m now drawn to spring knitting, but will be diligent (sigh) and finish the second over-the-knee sock so that winter knitting can be officially over.

*english = ‘knitting’

Bit of a boring post to reflect boring knitting.

Sigh…stuck in my own little twisted-rib purgatory. Been working on the cabled yoke jumper from Vogue Knitting, but alas, no end in sight. Have a few challenges to face. Didn’t think I’d have to rework so much of the pattern to get what I want.

Alteration No. 1
Thanks to Blog-Commenter-Britt, the jumper, which appears to have a nice stand-up neckline, is in fact a trick of the camera. Further exploration on Ravelry proves that the amount of cables make for a floppy or large roll-down neck. Hmmm…will need to fix that, most probably by taking out some cable segments and surrounding stitches on each raglan sleeve which decreases into the neckline.

Alteration No. 2
Don’t quite fancy the way the seaming shows on the reverse stocking stitch on the raglan edge. Think I’ll need to join up the front, back, and sleeves as soon as I can and knit the yoke on circulars through the cabling to avoid that. Should have channeled a bit of EZ-circular-thinking when knitting the front and back panels.

Ah, just when I get to the interesting-non-twisted-rib parts, it’s time to divert to the sleeves…more twisted rib. Sigh (again).

And yet, as boring as the knitting is, it makes for good DVD watching. This weekend, an Irish favourite… ‘Waking Ned’ (otherwise known as ‘Waking Ned Devine’ in the US release). Right, so it certainly has countrified Irish stereotypes throughout, but a great example of quick and cheeky Irish wit. Super soundtrack as well.

Love Saartje’s Bootees…love felted booties…why not blend ‘em?

With a few modifications to Saartje’s lovely design, here’s a nice variation for baby knitting. You can find her original free pattern on her blog with the following adaptations…

Use 4.5mm/US7 needles
Use worted weight feltable yarn…picture features Lamb’s Pride.
Knit the bigger of the two sizes, which casts on 35 stitches.

If you’d like a wee bit of a stripe between the main colour and contrasting colour, Rows 19-20 are a great place for them.

On Row 27 (right strap): k11, co15 (instead of 12).
Rows 28-29: k 26
Row 20: k26
Add a Row 31: bo26

Repeat these instructions for left strap.

I didn’t make a button loop, but rather sewed the button onto the strap itself and used (at Holly’s good suggestion) Velcro instead, trying to minimize fiddliness in dressing a wiggly baby. I suppose if you don’t want to use Velcro, you could either—

a) sew the button as normal and cut a slit into the strap or
b) before felting, make a little elastic button loop on the strap or
c) make a button loop with feltable yarn, remembering to make it a little bigger for shrinkage

Now while I’m quite happy with the end result, I have to confess that this isn’t the first try.

Attention: A Spot The Difference Interruption
Can you spot the difference between the before-washing and after-washing pictures (apart from the buttons, that is…)?

Yep, Noro Silk Garden doesn’t felt.

Ah well, no great loss. Daughter-Kate is quite happy as one ‘baby’ in the house is now the proud owner of new booties.

They’re orange-ish, they’re small, they’re sweet…what else would I call them?

Not so long ago…baby drought. Now…babies everywhere. Family, friends, children of friends all having babies. So I gratefully set aside the never-ending-jumper and not-yet-cast-on second stocking and knit some baby accessories.

Pattern: Fat Baby Booties, by Beverly Galeskas, published in Interweave Special Edition Felt Magazine, Summer 2007

Time to Knit: A couple of unhurried afternoons

Yarn: Hmm…

The yarn comes from soft Blue Faced Leister roving or ‘top,’ as it’s called here. Bits and pieces were dyed with Kool-Aid at the kids’ primary school Art Day last spring. Not being a proper feltmaker, what was I going to do with all those remnants of brightly coloured roving? My eyes came to rest on the usually-unused-and-gathering-dust spinning wheel sitting in the corner. Ahem, think I ought to spin up some yarn…

Warning: Quick Explanatory Narrative Ahead
Now, I’m a dyed-in-the-wool hack when it comes to spinning. Whether overspun or underspun, I can’t quite get the knack of a consistently proper twist. And you want to know the truth? I don’t exactly have the desire or the mental capacity to learn another skill. Think the few rapidly aging brain cells are quite busy enough at the moment. So, my spun yarn is really only good for a knit-and-felt project, meaning this mini diversion into felted baby booties is perfect!

While these little gems are cute, I’m undecided whether I’ll make another pair…admittedly, the buttons and elastic are a bit fiddly and there are certainly many lovely baby patterns yet to be tried…