robknits

The loom is gone, long live the loom! (addendum)

My floor loom has returned to Viriginia! Through the magic of blogs and the invisible web o' weavers,  Christine of SpinWeaveKnitandCake is the new owner of the Fannie.  And more magic -- I was able to turn the 45" Fannie floor loom into a 32" 8-harness Ashford table loom, with help from the Red Barn Farm.  And here it is, with help from a formerly unknown neighbor who brought over the heavy thing after UPS dropped a $700 package at the wrong address.

     I know.  Not quite as exciting as you expected, huh?  But here's the thing.  I am moving in something like 9 weeks.  Yes, 9 weeks.  Do I have time to assemble a loom, choose a project, put a warp on the loom?  No way in hell.  So as excruciating as it is, I think the smartest thing to do is leave it in the box.  It can move all protected and snuggly in its shipping box.  After seeing the towels on Sara Lamb's blog it is tough to walk away from the box, but I gotta do it.  Some day it will look like this.

    Walking away from the box is especially logical given that I came home from my conference in Philadelphia with the upper respiratory bug that has been messing with the Northeast for a while now.  I also came home with an extravagent purchase.  I visited Rosie's Yarn Cellar and walked away empty handed.  I was patting myself on the back until I visited Loop, another Philadelphia yarn store, and got stuck in front of the Helen's Lace.  And yes.  I succumbed.  To some VERY expensive lace yarn.  In the gorgeous Gold Hill colorway.  You can see a very good picture of it here.  And I am going to use that same pattern, which is a pie-wedge shawl pattern that uses short rows that comes with the yarn.  It is mostly garter stitch and short rows.  I honestly shouldn't have spent the money, but I am going to enjoy every inch of this yarn :D  In the meantime I am making progress on the hat for the Macuwita sni project - a Yahoo! group of folks knitting for the Cheyenne River Sioux. 

   

And finally, some cat pictures.  Maggie decided to gift me with some foundational cat-lover experiences. First, the cats-sleep-too cute picture:

and the cats-love-paper-bags picture:

Complete with cat-alien eyes.

P.S.  The hat has been finished and is going into the mail tomorrow to the Macuwita sni project, along with the slip stitch hat which has been hanging around the house for a while.

Ta-da, but where'd my weaving go?

(Note: By popular demand, some updated kitty pictures have been added to the end of this entry.)   

     Ahem.  On your right, the slip-stitch hat, which I will donate to the Dulaan project.  Modeled by the Head.  I still need to block it.  I usually block hats just by washing them, but I have a nifty little steamer that I use on my clothes (instead of an iron) so I think I will use that (being careful not to melt the Head!)  Actually, I'll use a bowl instead of the head.  This was a lot of fun and really very quick, even with the slip-stitch row compression. 
     Once again:
     Pattern: Slip-stitch hat from the book Knit Hats by Gwen Steege.  Yarn: Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride Worsted (my favorite), in colors Aztec Turquoise, Rusty Rose (I think they are now calling this color Rosado Rose),  and two colors that had lost their labels -- a lavendar and  a mulberry or wine color.
    Weaving.  Sigh.  I can't complain.  I really must not complain.  I am healthy, independent, with a more than decent job.  But especially in Septembers (the beginning of the academic year) that job sucks up all my energy.  My weaving focus seems to have receded, sunk down into the basement (where I have really got to go do some laundry).  So, here's the plan:

• as Laritza reminded me, my fantasies of just dumping this warp can come true and I can be free free of this mess!!!!!!!!!!  Though I did not have the energy to do that last night.  But that is definitely what I am going to do, the weaving equivalent of frogging a project that has gone wrong.
• Kathy reminded me of a wonderful exercise in the Deborah Chandler book Learning to Weave.  The next project I do will be that exercise.  You try different setts in both plain weave and twill.

I hope everyone is having a good week.  Today is Tuesday and my week has already been about a month long.  But I am getting together with knitting pal Kim tomorrow, which will be fun and restorative.

Kitty photos.

   

I did need to update my cat photos, but the cats are faster than my digital camera.  (Why does that thing keep flashing lights at me after I have used the flash?  Guess I should read the manual again...).  Anyway, here are some photos and narration.  First, on the right, the latest picture of Queen Maggie.  The flash did weird things to her beautiful eyes, of course.  Then we have Frannie, on the left, studying the weird thing that happens to the rug when the cats decide to use it for sledding.  They do, you know.  They take a running start, land on the rug and go sliding across the room. You see that net-like thing at the top edge of the rug?  That's the rubbery thing that is supposed to keep the rug from sliding.  Right.
The pictures of them playing all came out blurred, but there was t his one moment when they stopped for a cat-like moment to think about the next step in the game.  I have to go read the camera manual now, to figure out how to make the camera as fast as the cats.

In a rut or a groove?

     I sent off the two hats to Afghans for Afghans, and then let my knitting (and blogging) go for a few days.  Then I sat down and... started another hat.  Here it is. It is also destined for Afghans for Afghans, though we will see if it gets there in time for the Jan. 20 deadline for the next shipment.  Before I forget, here is the info about the pattern and yarn: it is a free pattern  from  Frugal Haus called a Quaker Ribbed hat.  They show it all in one color -- I just couldn't do that and pulled out two colors from my painter's palette of Lamb's Pride.  I am stranding the top for extra warmth, ad libbing the design.
     Robbyn mentioned a few days ago in her blog that she was feeling a lack of direction, feeling an aimlessness in her knitting.  She took the time to figure out what she wanted to do.  That discussion revived my concern that my knitting did not really feel like a very creative endeavor to me.  That is, while I do learn new techniques, and love just the feel  of knitting -- the movement of my hands, the tactile nature of the craft -- I think I get lazy about the creative aspect of it.  I have no philosophical problem with finding great patterns and working from them.  And I almost always modify the pattern to suit me.  But I have been lazy about tackling the complex color work that I want to do.  And this little hat is just about the only project I have done where I took it upon myself to use patterned color when the original called for a solid. I chose the colors for the other color-patterned hats I did but the color patterning was provided by the pattern.  So I end up feeling that I have to find a new creative outlet.  So I too want to think about my knitting, and why I am doing it, and how to get over that next hill and feel creative in my knitting.
    So, step one is giving myself a break and letting myself enjoy little projects like brightly colored hats or simple projects like the ribbed pullover.  But step two is paying enough attention to develop some more exciting stuff.  For example, I have several skeins of Manos de Uruguay -- solids in 4 or 5 colors -- that I bought eons ago for a pattern published eons ago (I've gotta find that magazine).  The back in the pattern is solid, the front made of large intarsia -- well, not blocks, more abstract shapes of color.  I never did make the vest of course.  And I don't want the intarsia color blobs now.  So I want to sit down and create my own intarsia design with these yarns.  I also have lots of the ancient Sirdar Colorsoft in as many colors as I could find, and have planned -- but never executed -- a patchwork jacket.
     My first knee-jerk response with the Manos was to look at every colorful pattern and article about color I could find.  It was an interesting contrast to the friend who is teaching me to spin.  She does not immediately run out to see what other folks are doing.  In fact she doesn't want to know what other folks are doing.  She just sits down with her materials, thinks, looks at the world around her, and creates. 
   So, amid my usual plans to finish some UFOs/WIPs, maybe it is time to tackle the patchwork jacket.  And not just patchwork.  I want it to look like crazy quilt, so it will start with intarsia crazy quilt shapes.  And then get embellished.  Now that sounds like fun!
     Oh, and spinning news:  Making progress on getting my yarn lighter in weight and more appropriate for knitting.  My spinning mentor suggested rolling commercial roving into rolags, and that has helped a LOT.  We have also both registered for an Intermediate (!) Spinning workshop at the Mannings for next month!!!

Hat #2 Finished!

   

I really like making hats.  Small projects, done quickly, a great canvas for creativity.  But I don't actually like how I look in any hat except a tam.  So these kids'  hats have been fun.  They also fulfil the need for bright in the winter gloom.  Here is the second Afghansforafghans kid's hat (and a piece of my solstice display).  My hands are a bit sore, I think from knitting two strands of Cascade 220 on a #8 needle for a dense fabric.
     For those interested in technique, here is a shot of the stranding from the inside.  I was pretty pleased with it when I first saw it.  I use the two-handed method of stranding and am now pretty comfortable with it, though I have to remember to keep the stranding with the right hand loose.  But then I turned the hat around and saw what I had left at the beginning of each round.  It is the sort of thing prissy knitters don't show off but hey,  I never learned to keep quiet about things like that.  So here's the vision that confronted me before I could declare the hat done: Oops.
I seem to have decided that fun and quick meant not thinking about jogless jogs and ends.  Oh well.  I wove in all those things.  I thought of pulling them to the outside and braiding them, which might be fun to do next time.
     The hats have to be at their receiving site by Jan. 20, so I think I will mail these two on Monday and then try to get a couple more done to mail separately.
   In spinning news, I have spun up all I had of some handyed and handcombed roving.  First time I had spun from batts instead of combed top and the differences are interesting.  I did NOT have to do all the predrafting before starting to spin with the batt.  It also made a more highly textured yarn.  I have not yet decided what to do with it, so I am leaving it on the bobbin as a single for a while. The colors were much more pastel than I expected (in the batt as well as in the single) -- it was called Candy Kisses so perhaps I should have expected the colors to be less saturated than they appear in the picture.  I may ply it with hand carded undyed white and then see what I can do with it.  I don't wear pastel peaches, creams and pinks. I actually don't wear more saturated peaches, creams and pink.  I am also spinning a multicolored Ashland Bay combed top called Sugar Maple.    Once again, colors I don't wear, but I have been craving colors like peach and copper lately.  I have been spinning this as a heathery color with soft color changes, and think I will try to find a coppery fiber to ply it with.
     Have fun this weekend!

Second hat for Afghanistan

I have just started the decreases for the crown on this hat, the second for Afghans for Afghans children's hat campaign.  I usually hate knitting to deadline but for some reason this hat-athon is entertaining me. Maybe the bright colors I've been using.  They are not really neon, by the way, but these colors under a full spectrum lamp surrounded by Pennsylvania January gloom.... On my monitor the larger picture, rather than the thumbnail,  seems to give a better representation of the colors. The next one though will have ribbing at the bottom.  A hat brim is actually the only place I like a rolled hem, but I think one with a cuff would be warmer.

Here we go

     Here is the beginning of the first hat for the Afghans for Afghans children's hat deadline of January 20. After making my sister's hat in just a few days, this seemed like an easy enough thing to do.  The pattern is from the 2005 Knitting Pattern a Day calendar, an easy slip stitch style, no ribbing, and the yarn is some Cleckheaton Country Style DK -- a nice soft wool.  I might reverse the colors to get a second hat out of these same yarns.  Then I think I will use a couple of patterns from the Knit Hats! book, which has some great, fun to knit, colorful patterns calling for my favorite Lamb's Pride.  I am also hoping to finally get hat math down, so that it will be easier for me to just pick up yarn and start a hat, without using a pattern.  It will be easy enough -- I just need to "get" the decrease math.

     In the fall I had my mitten frenzy, making myself 3 pair and making a toddler pair for the guild's giveaway program.  In December I made a hat for my sister, and spun enough yarn for a hat for myself.  Now, a few hats for Afghani kids are on the list.  Not a hat frenzy.  A hat hurry?  A hat flurry? A hatathon. 
    And a spindling success.  Using my lightest spindle and stripping off what to me looked like very thin strips of combed top, I filled a spindle with a much finer yarn than I had achieved before and managed to do it consistently a) until the spindle was full, and b) while talking on the phone with a friend!  Never dropped the spindle but I did knock the cell phone off the couch a couple of times!  Guess I need some kind of belt clip, and a more comfortable ear bud.  But a full spindle is not that much yarn, so basically I guess spindlers do a lot of splicing yarn when they knit with their handspun.

Going in circles

     Since I delayed the post about my sister's hat, it sounds like I am going in circles about knitting those fingerless mitts.  Well, yeah.  I go in circles about almost everything.   Eventually things shake out.
     Kim asked which Interweave Knits hat pattern I used.  Umm, when I can find it I will give you that date.  Basically, IK had a year or two (?) when each issue had a "Grand Plan" chart that gave you instructions for a basic hat, tam, mittens, vest, etc. in different gauge yarns and for different sizes.  After they had published them all in the magazine, they published them as a book: The Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns: Basic Designs in Multiple Sizes and Gauges by Ann Budd.  I used their tam pattern.  (And I am pretty sure Kim has the book!)
     Meanwhile, I spent most of today spinning on my wheel.  I appear to have passed some kind of milestone -- what my brain was beginning to understand about amount of fiber and about the spinning wheel ratios and what my hands were beginning to understand came together for a nice single that is much thinner than my earlier attempts.  The fiber is a multicolored teal colonial wool, bought from an ebay store (Annie May Spin and Wool).  That's it on the right.  I like these multicolored rovings, but if you separate out a long piece of it, and pre-draft it by pulling it gently til it lengthens a little, the colors will just blend. 
   What came together today?  First, I took much thinner strands of it, made sure there was a dominant color in each strand.  Then, I remembered that a thinner thread needs more twist, and finally understood I would get more twist if I moved the drive band on the spinning wheel to the smaller whorl.  And then, I tested the twist a bit over and over again by letting the twisted fiber curl up over itself til I thought it looked nice.  At that point I decided the twist was OK.  Here's what the second bobbin of it looks like, still on the wheel:
   I am pretty excited about it, because I want to ply this yarn.  This is also the first stuff I have spun that has "spoken" to me as a knitter -- it's going to be another one of those tams, this time for me.  So I am pushing it a bit with spinning it, trying to get it done, because I really want to get to try plying.  And that reminds me of the third thing I remembered that made this spinning project come together:  I didn't fill up the first bobbin, remembered to start a second bobbin, and so will have singles on two bobbins ready to ply. 
     While away I worked on the shapely stockinette sock in Sedrun.  I am at the point of starting the heel flap in the heel stitch which is then continued in a triangular patch at the back of the ankle.  I hope everyone else is having fun with their yarn.

FO, finished photo

Well, it has stopped raining long enough for me to take the finished hat outside, with the Head, to get decent pictures of it.  Mind you, the sun hasn't come out, and probably won't til April.  I could block this into a traditional tam shape, but my sister prefers to wear these hats like this.  I kid you not.  A direct quote: "No, don't block it, I want a hat that's kinda like a showercap."  Okay.

I used Froehlich's Blauband Maxi Ringel sock yarn, on a number 3 circular needle.  The pattern is a generic, any-gauge one Fran posted on the hats forum at Knitters Review.  If you go back an entry or two, you'll see the link to the pattern.

I have to remember to leave some knitting on my computer workstation.  Something is making the computer work very slowly if I ask it to open new windows.  So I am busy running programs like Spybot, and Adware, trying to clean out whatever invasive junk is in there.  I can't believe it is still legal for someone to load their own software onto my computer.  I am spending enough time watching the clean-up to finish those socks!

We interrupt this knitting...

to start some holiday gift knitting, on a really tight deadline.  My family is getting together for Thanksgiving, and decided since Chanukah starts only a week later, that we would celebrate it together at Thanksgiving.  Which gave me about a week to get gifts together!  Most of what I am giving this year is purchased, but my sister said that she would love another hat.  The one I made for her last year was quite a learning experience -- 4 hats later I had one that was right.  So I may as well put that hard-earned knowledge to work!  So yesterday I started a hat for her using some self-striping sock yarn  (Blauband Maxi Ringel).  I was a bit concerned about what it would look like, but really like how it's coming out. 

I am really motivated to get Kaleidescope done, so I hope to get back to it ASAP.  This is also a good experiment with using sock yarns for hats, gloves, etc.

Hats redux redux

Second post today, but I had to repost my Hat Redux message to show you this beautiful portrait of my Head. Having found the Head at Sally's Beauty Supply (what is some of that stuff for?), I am more interested than ever in making hats. Doesn't the Head look wonderful in her Playa Beanie? Putting the Noro Pillbox on her, though, did highlight continuing problems with the edge on that hat, so I am going to try something else to finish that edge.