Rockin' the Toes

Yup, those are my very own ten tootsies, each done in a lovely shade of "different". When my husband saw them he became highly conservative and reminded me that we are soon going on a trip to see his relatives.  As if they have no idea about color in their neck of the woods.

By nature I have always been adventurous and find humor in almost everything.  Recently a wonderful friend of mine was diagnosed with throat cancer and after his surgery his little daughter treated him to a pedicure that included every shade she had in her polish collection.  He proudly wore them everywhere and even though we were all shaken with thoughts of how serious his plight was, we had to smile.  When we realized that he too was smiling, it somehow lifted the gloom and doom.

Well as luck would have it, I too have been diagnosed with cancer this summer and have now decided how I feel about it.  Sure it's a bummer thing to hear, but if you have faith, and I've got plenty of that, why worry?  It's all in the hands of a far higher power than I.  Not to be preachy, but if you believe you are going to go through the valley of the shadow with a whole lot of spiritual help, you simply put on your cutest traveling outfit and ease on down that road.

And colors may be my key in this fight.  As odd as this may sound I had an epiphanal moment in Costco last week.  I am pretty sure there aren't a lot of people saying, "whee goody, we get to go to Costco" out there.  You go because the prices are good, the produce is in tip top condition and the selection wide.  You walk through several football fields of goods to the back where the cold room is.

You know that cold room...it's where they store the berries, mushrooms, broccoli and beans that need the coolest temps to stay crisp and fresh.  I run in and out as quickly as possible because it's way below my acceptable line for comfort.

However, when I stepped in I stopped just inside the doorway and started to look - really look - at the different types of produce.  The carrots were day-glo orange. There were many different shades of red from strawberry, raspberry, red/ purple and dark red. I never noticed how many shades of green there are out there.  Even the woodsy grey/browns of the mushrooms next to the golden corn brought me up short.  Talk about a color palette from which to choose and in this case, all edible.

Maybe it's my newest state of wonderment over the cancer still growing in my body (soon to be carved out and irradiated) or the realization that when we say to take one day at a time, it really means to slow down and appreciate the veritable feast of sensations in front of us.  I  never experimented with drugs in college, but have often heard how mind blowing colors became, from those who did.  Never have to wonder about that anymore.

I guess in the end that when something threatens your way of life, you can either screech about the entire unfairness of the whole thing, or you can just stop and think about what means the most and let those images sooth you.  Little did I realize that amongst the things that  would impress me was a visit to the cold room at Costco and the very spiritual realization that our world is a lovely, colorful place just waiting to be noticed.

Stop and smell the roses and the berries too.  And if you really want to put a smile on your face, paint your toenails and flaunt them in the face of Demon Cancer.  You'll make you own day and that of those who smile back at you.

Surprises

Here's why I love Christmas, my birthday, and Mother's Day.  I always get wrapped presents and the best part is just looking at them and trying to imagine what's inside.

I have found out that surprise boxes can come on other days as well, like my fresh farm veggie and fruit box that comes every other Friday except yesterday when it did not come.  I was so sad.  Just veggies, mind you, but I was entirely let down because my box of possibilities didn't show up...don't worry, they will send a replacement next Friday.

But today was really red letter.  Today the YARNBOX came.  Every other month a smallish box comes and when I open it, first thing I see is bright tissue paper with a wrapped candy stick on top.  As if that were not enough, I gently pulled the tissue aside and there were two hundred gram hanks of hand spun, hand dyed 100 percent Merino from Montana.  It's in my favorite shades of blues.

I didn't undo the hank for a long time because I was savoring the surprise.  The endless possibilities of what I might make out of this yarn made the wait to get going scintillating.  After dinner, I asked my DH to hold the hank while I hand rolled a ball.

Because I never know whether the yarn will be thick or thin, I don't pre-plan anything.  But this yarn is a good size 5 bulky with variations in thickness because of its handspun quality.  I'm a size 3 weight knitter and I knew I had some big needles somewhere because I  have the whole Addi-click set but since it wasn't in  my case, I had to go hunting and found the size I needed in an abandoned scarf project.

The pattern I chose was an internet freebie that called for bulky yarn and size 9 needles.  I found some 10s that weren't in a project and followed the pattern.  About 5 inches into it, I could see that the drape of the yarn wasn't there.  This brings up an actual lesson and that is, you can't just go by what the pattern suggests, you actually have to make a swatch.  Then you know what to expect and how to knit accordingly.

I carefully replaced these needles in the project from which I had robbed them and hunted down my thickest size 15s.  Believe me, once I did a few stitches, I could see that this was a far better choice.  This yarn is really thick and I know how I knit, so it was just about perfect.

Now, back at the pattern, I knew it was a scarf thus width and length aren't awfully important.  It said I needed to knit a "Goofed Up" rib over 27 stitches.  I just had to take them at their word because the picture wasn't enough to show me how this would look, and now, some 4 or 5 inches into the project I can see that the rib, chunky as it is, makes a thick, stretchy rib that pulls in the width of the scarf.  This is a good thing because 27 stitches on a size 9 needle is nothing like 27 stitches on a size 15.

Right now it looks a little less than neatly ribbed, but I think time, length and blocking will rectify that.  I was so excited by the new project I had to gush a little in this blog.  As soon as it's finished, I'll post a picture so you can decide if you like the results.

I don't recommend fooling around with a pattern if you are a new knitter.  It's better to stay with something that is going to work.  If the pattern recommends a brand, then try to find that.  At least then you have a far better than average chance of your work ending up to look like what you saw in the picture.

However, if you don't mind experimenting, then make the yarn you have work with the pattern you like.  Simply take the swatch and count the number of stitches in an inch, ditto the number of rows in the inch.  Then cast on to match the dimensions given in the pattern.  In my case, the pattern splits into about four strips that are interwoven and I knew I needed enough stitches to do that, but banked on the odd rib to pull in my width.  It worked, and if it hadn't I guess I would have looked for something different to do with my new yarn.

So today's great big surprise was the box of yarn and that made the whole evening challenging to adapt it to a pattern I've been thinking about.  And, like an icecream cone, I've got to keep at it until I've finished.  Never mind going to bed this evening - I'm knitting!

Come back soon and see how this turned out.  Hugs to you and your projects too,  Pat.

Who Taught You?

I was reading a survey about knitters.  The subject was whether or not knitting is DOA in these days in which we live.  The lady who put the survey together did a thorough job of it and the official answer is that ,"No, we are not out to pasture yet" with this art form we love so well.

Turns out that the bulk of active knitters fall in the 61 - 75 year old group, putting me square with the rest of that population.  Most of us learned from moms or grandmothers.  Some, especially Europeans, learned in school. Little English girls learned to knit in the dark during WWII when they spent hours in blacked out bomb shelters.  After I learned that fact, I taught myself to knit without looking.

My beloved mentor, to whom I shall be ever grateful, was named Janet.  I was a young mother with a tiny baby girl who wanted to learn to make her sweaters.  One day I was walking her down the street in her stroller when a fifty-ish lady came out and cooed over my lovely little one.  Of course she invited us in for tea and thus began a lovely friendship.

The thing about Janet B. was that she was an alcoholic, whose family had all but disowned her.  I didn't know what an alcoholic was, but she smelled just like my own mother.  And, because she wasn't MY mother, I was comfortable in her presence.  She was also a terrific knitter and she sat hour after lonely hour, knitting for her grandchildren who never came to visit her.  This is an insidious disease that separates families, or perhaps, in my case, put together a unique one.

In the course of our afternoon cups of tea - hers was liberally laced with Irish whiskey, we got on the subject of knitting and out came the needles.  Like any new craft, I was hopelessly all thumbs, but with infinite patience, Janet B. pulled me through the first and second projects.  She taught me that the knit side looked like little VVVVs and the purl side, like, well, little pearls.  The yarn came from the right side (you can see that she taught me to knit American style) and that if I really couldn't figure out which was the right side, to pin a little gold pin to that side of my work.

In due course we got only the subject of families.  She didn't have one any longer, and I tried like crazy to stay away from mine.  It began to dawn on  me that we shared a similar problem - alcoholism in the family unit.  But how could I want so desperately to avoid my own birth family when  I couldn't wait for my daughter to awaken from her nap so I could grab my knitting bag and go see Janet?

Much, much older now, I see that acceptance was the word I was looking for.  Janet accepted me and I accepted her.  She taught me that valuable lesson along with stockinette, cables and fair isle.  Let me tell you that we were fast and loving friends for about 4 years until she was whisked away by her family to a new, and I suppose dryer, living accommodation.  I never got to say goodbye or thank you, but I have done so many times since in my heart.

Because of our unusual friendship, I learned many things, knitting being only one.  I did make her proud of me, however, when I brought my first blue ribbon from the Ventura County Fair to her.  I had knitted my now toddler daughter an argyle patterned jumper.

I hope Janet's family finally came to accept her.  I hope her grandchildren got all of those sweaters and hats she so expertly knitted for them. I know that I found that it was completely necessary for me to learn to accept my mother just as I had Janet.  Sadly, my own  mom passed from the disease far too young, but by that time she at least realized that her daughter loved her.  Again, thank you Janet for showing me that lesson as well.

Think back on who taught you to knit and send a big old "bless you" out to the universe.  If you are reading this and wish you too had a Janet to help you learn to knit, we have free classes every Friday afternoon at Church of  the Chimes on Magnolia and Hazeltine in Sherman Oaks from 1 to 3.  By tradition, we serve tea around 2 p.m., no not Irish tea for heaven's sake, just tea!  We even have spare yarn and needles, both for knitting and crochet, and a lot of wonderful women who are eager to welcome someone else into the fabulous world of fiber art.

Come back soon, and hugs to you and your projects too,  Pat.

Oh the Places You Will Go - Dr. Suess

My DH and I went to sit just outside Disneyland yesterday.  We awaited our daughter and husband who were visiting Disneyland and, alas, we were blocked out until next week so we could only stay on the other side of the magical kingdom..  But since we love to people watch we sought out a sunny outdoor table at La Brea Bakery just at the end of Downtown Disney and drank our coffee as we waited.

Naturally I never travel anywhere empty handed and after the first sip of coffee I opened my ample purse and pulled out a nearly finished baby sweater.

I wish you could feel this yarn.  It's a hand painted one that came from Yarnbox in one of those surprise packages that's so exciting.  The hat is a helmet that doesn't show especially well here, but considering that we are heading into fall, this outfit will be warm and the hat will be large enough to fit well for the whole next year.  It's a free Paton pattern  that works up quickly.

As I was sitting in the sun and knitting to pass the time, I thought of the places these baby sweaters have been before finally finding a home on a little one.  Perhaps one day this child will return to Disneyland with no knowledge that one of his first sweaters preceded him there.  I never go to a meeting without my yarn, nor do I bowl each week without not only my current project but two or three finished pieces  to show the women I bowl with.  This portable hobby is the absolute best for whittling away wait time between frames, at the doctor's office, waiting to pick up grandkids at school - you name it.

I thought I'd comment on this particular style of sweater.  I call it the "Grow with Me" and it's  my own invention.  It will fit anyone from 6 months to well over a year.  See those vertical lines in the bodice?  They are an every other row "make-one" stitch that resembles a flat picot.  Worked every five stitches this allows the bodice to vent open as baby grows.

The second trick is that the sweater starts at the back of the waist where I cast on enough stitches to cover approximately 13 inches of width.  I knit an inch and a half of 2x2 rib with picot holes every five stitches  just after the last the rib is finished.  Now I am intent on using this important band as the width regulator for the entire sweater.  I really want a 10" back width (vents closed flat) for this sweater so when I switch into my back, I need to reduce evenly, keeping the picot holes that will lead to the vent lines as my guides.  Once achieved, I knit up and over the shoulders to the waist in front.  I finish the bodice with picot holes at the end of the vent lines and another 2x2 inch and a half rib to match the back.  Get out stitch holders for the two front sides and you are ready to capture the top of the sweater for later knitting.

This is really an odd way to knit a sweater, but by starting at the middle of the back you have control over the flare of the skirt and the venting in front and back.  This is the time to put in the sleeves, while the front and back are open.  I hate trying to inset a sleeve, so I'd much rather pick up the stitches along the armhole opening.  Be sure you understand your gauge so that you have a sufficient number of stitches on your needle before knitting the sleeve.  I added some vents near the cuff just to keep the theme going, but if you wanted to, you could add them right from the top on down.  Some babies have chubby little arms.

The intent of the sweater is to have it grow wider as baby increases in girth, but remember those picot holes just before the 2x2 rib?  These are for an I-cord to close the waist on the smaller baby.  After the arms are done, you will pick up along the front and back edges of the rib and add a second set of picot holes through which the I-cord can be threaded as the baby grows taller.  You have now given the Grow With Me sweater an inch and a half of waist length.

Remember that the 2x2 rib in the back was 13 inches wide before dropping to 10 inches for the back?  When you pick up, you are going back to 13 inches in the back.  This fullness expands as the baby does.  The vents open in the bodice and the back of the sweater adds another 3 inches.  The waist line drops an inch and a half, and now your sweater goes from a six month size to at least a 1 year or more.  It makes knitting a sweater very useful for a longer period of time.

Length, of course, needs not to be too long for the very small baby, probably 11 inches altogether, but the hemline hits at just under the top of the thighs and ends up on the hip before the sweater is outgrown completely.  The second waistline makes it look  fine too.  I might add that you should make a generous cuff on the arms so that you can make adjustments to fit in that area as well.

When you are considering fit for a baby sweater, let your mind think outside of the box.  Look at a size chart for babies and that's how you'll know what size to aim for.  But it also allows you to see where simple adjustments can add the inches you need to put the sweater into both sizes.

Come back again and see what's going on.  My mind is currently percolating a long snuggle sack that can be converted into a dress for a little girl.  All I know for sure right now is that it needs to be A-line with a detachable bottom...hmmm. Well when I work this out, I'll let you know.  Hugs to you and your projects too.  Pat

How to Work with Color

Anyone who knows me will tell you that I love color.  I rarely wear black unless I'm in concert and only then because it's the uniform du jour.  Naturally I was thrilled to find out a season or two ago that bright denim pants and sassy colored tops were now considered "in". Of course I translated that info straight away to my knitting.

As you can see, this sweater set looks like I ground up a box of Crayolas and painted  my yarn with melted colors. It is easy for me to cruise the yarn shop and find colors that will look wonderful together but I am asked more often than I would have believed if I would teach a color class.  If you are one who isn't certain what works with what, let's do a simple class.

Look at this color wheel. Bisect it from top to bottom and side to side. This means that these colors are as opposite from each other as they can be.  Now look at the colors that are to the right and left of each of these four colors. Note that they complement each other.  See how the neighbors to any color compliments  each other. Now you know what will work for your projects.  This doesn't mean that you can't knit opposites, but for the purpose of learning what works, stick with complimentary colors until you are more at ease with colorizing your projects.

Another way to find inspiration is to go to the fabric store.  If you find fabric you love, go buy an eighth of a yard;, find another and another - just buy more. Buy a big sturdy poster board and take it home. Start to make your own color wall.  If you are lucky enough to have a spot where you work, then you can leave it up, but a skinny little board like that will slide behind your dresser when not in use.

Add items to the board as you find them.  This would include yarns that are the same shades as your fabrics, buttons, other embellishments.  Snip a little off your fabrics of choice and put them into an envelope.  You can take that with you when you go shopping for yarns.  

Consider the seasons of the year.  In Spring you find fresh clear baby shades of yellow, pink, ,mint green and sky blue.  In Winter these same shades deepen into jewel tones, but they are the same shades, just different color values.  Summer and Fall are similar.  What is hot and brilliant in summer, darkens toward earth tones in Autumn.

Of course the neutrals are in favor in every season, but white, for instance, can go from snow white to linen to egg shell.  The trick is to know what shade looks best on you.  There are tons of studies on which season of the year each of us resembles, but you probably already know that when you gravitate to cranberry red, you'd never be caught dead in fire engine red.  We just seem to know!  However, if you really can't tell, go have your colors analyzed by someone who will charge you buckets of money to clue you in.

I'm a lucky one because I can knit any color I want and it will be perfect and that's not because of  me, but rather those who will purchase  or be given one of my baby outfits.  I do it for charity, sell it on Etsy for charity, and nobody ever threw anything back at  me...'cause they don't know who to blame.

And before we close, I took that shirred sweater I wasn't very impressed with to knit class yesterday and one of the ladies loved it so much she purchased it for a coming granddaughter and the Women's Association of the church received her check.  It really goes to prove that we are our own toughest critics and even after I pointed out what I had done wrong, she never saw it, only saw her new grand baby wearing it.

Please come back and we'll see what's new in our neighborhood.  Hugs to you and your projects too.  Pat

What I Learn From Others

I teach a non-profit, read that as "free", knitting and crocheting class each week.  It started out with three of us and now there are 18 who come.  Some are beginners but most are doing their own thing.

That includes charity knitting. Tana knits for Wounded Warriors, Terri knits for a Scandinavian club, I knit for preemies at USC Hospital. Ginger and LeeAnn knit for the church. Marlene also knits for preemies, and Ebba is doing scarves for the homeless.  I think some of the others are doing a combination of their own stuff, plus charity.

One day I was going around looking at everyone's show and tell when I saw that LeeAnn was madly stabbing a nicely knitted purse.  It turns out she was felting - needle felting to be specific - and it looked fascinating.  Suddenly she held up this gorgeous striped purse with stars embellishing it and I wanted that purse!

Lee told me it was the simplest thing in the world to make and said she'd teach me in five minutes.  I could barely believe that, but first you have to buy 100% wool that hasn't been treated with anything - no superwash works, only straight wool.  Then you get out big needles and knit a good sized rectangle or square a bit bigger than  the purse you want.  Make the other side, put it together and attach knitted handles if you want that.

Next comes the tricky part.  If you have a top loading washing machine, you're golden.  Just put the now assembled purse in with a couple of tennis balls, turn the water temp to hottest and add a bit of dishwashing soap. The heat and agitation shrinks the wool, while opening the cuticles in the strands and they clutch and grab at each other and when you take it out after a nice rocky ride with those tennis balls, it's not so shrunken side to side, but definitely in length.  To be honest. my first effort turned out to be more like a business sized letter than the small clutch I had envisioned.  Never mind, work with it and give it more length next time.

After pinning the damp object to a thick towel to dry in the shape you want it to be, the fun begins.  You need a needle felter that comes in single to multi numbered needles with a hand guard to save your fingers.  You need a felting mat or brush to put under the material and punch into. Then you need some more wool.  It can be actual already felted squares, or it can be wool roving as long as it has enough wool in it to grab when you needle punch it.

This purse was super simple with polka dots.  I just crammed a bit of wool roving into a round template form and stabbed away until the roving was a tidy little dot, permanently affixed to the felted front of the bag. Who doesn't like polka dots?

This is the other side.  I actually only had enough of the lavender heather wool to do one side, so I used another wool which didn't felt as tightly.  Maybe you can see that I ruched the white, then I tacked the ruching in place with white thread and finally I started doing some free form stuff.  I learned to blend two shades of roving for a new color as well as pulling the roving out as if you were going to spin it, then I felted it down with lots of stabs.  Great fun.

This project is going to my daughter Tory who has lots of things I've made over the years, but seems to treasure them, so of course she must have this beginner project.

You may wonder why it's a two sided purse - because that's the way I roll.  Its a blank canvas just waiting to be decorated and itf it vaguely resembles the other side, then that's what I do.  Nothing I make is free from that idea that one sleeve can look slightly different from the other and so on.

And for those of you who are thinking this might be a way to cover up a mistake in your knitting, how perceptive of you.  Tune is again to see some of the ways I've disguised my less than perfect knitting with a bit of needle felting.  Come back soon and hugs to you and your projects too.  Pat

Not Everything You Make is Worthy

After you've been knitting for a long time, you can get a little tired of the things you've been doing and suddenly a "What if...." moment pops into your head.  Just bear in mind that not all light bulbs flashing on are winners.  Sometimes you follow your moment and end up with something you wouldn't really want to display.

My summer has been a symphony of these moments and some have lent me some marvy new ideas while other, although finished, should probably not see light of day.

I refer to my liberal use of soutache to hide mistakes.  It all started when I mastered I-cord on my knitting machine.  Zip, zip, zip and about ten minutes later you've got 12 yards of cord.  If you wind it this way and that, you've got soutache, a nice pattern of whirls that you can tack down and cover things.

Here's what worked...those nice cross hatches in the white area at the bottom of the sweater.  I suppose you can see what didn't.  The soutache below the nice cross hatches was meant to cover a mistake in the number of rows.  It worked, kind of.  The other soutache was meant to offset the heaviness at the bottom.  Altogether I like the idea, but this first application just didn't do it for me.  I shall press on though.

Here's the second "What if..." moment.

I'm still knitting the sleeves, but that bodice of the sweater is just fine and the sleeves will be too.  I got thinking that I'd like to turn the stripes in the other direction on the skirt and shir them.  Again the I-chord, yards and yards of it, came into play.  I'm envisioning delicate stripes and gossamer shirring.  I end up with material that's too heavy and too wide in the stripe.  It's not fit to sell, or give away.

But here's what I learned for the time and energy I put into both garments. The ideas were good, but I need to experiment with a wider gauge of knitting if I want gossamer. Then maybe I should gather with a length of yarn, not I-cord.  I need to cut the yarn and begin a new color so the stripes aren't so wide.  The idea of soutache might be better done with a firmer yarn - the red yarn was wimpy and the heaviness of the soutache dragged the drape down.

All is not lost.  I have shown both items to friends who think they are marvelous, but it's not what I had in mind.  I now have a better idea of how to achieve what I really wanted in the first place.

Knit and learn, friends.  Keep coming back and hugs to you and your projects too.  Pat