Katzundyarner Bits

My husband is averse to everything handmade - the supplies, my time and attention, the clutter mid-project. That is an interesting characteristic considering the economics of our early, middle and latest married life. One of his many rules (always eat breakfast; get in a work-out every day; never exceed the speed limit; diet Coke is a staple) is that he prefers not to wear knitwear because he gets too hot. Just go with this sketch - don't try to argue counter-point.

So imagine my surprise when he suggested he needed a scarf. He is still deeply resentful of the Christmas stocking I made him a couple years ago (how else can a knitting wife shower such a dear one with love?). I have a feeling he was put-out by the knitting I was knocking back for the church sale - or again, just go with it. This is what I made:



Mission Falls 1824 (washable), sadly discontinued by a yarn company out of business, bought at a now-shuttered LYS (an additional irony is that he accompanied me to the sidewalk sale where I bought this yarn; I'm sure the 60% discount appealed to him). Knit lengthwise over 200 stitches, long enough for him but not the requisite length for the au couture loop at the neck. Maybe one color too wide.

He has already worn the scarf during the cold snap that hit Chicago last week. It's safely in the closet until the temperature drops to 20 degrees again.

One of my rules is strike while the iron's hot so today I suggested he might like some handknit socks. Apparently they would be too thick for his shoes. I'll try again later.

I think the smart knitter uses the holiday knitting magazines to plan, not to catch up. I spent the evening looking through Interweave Knits Holiday 2010 last night and am enraptured with a couple projects. I am making plans - for me or for others depends on who appears to be knit-worthy.

The Blooming Stole

Ingenious! I have discovered I am not kept interested in rectangular shawls for the duration. It's just the same thing over and over again; getting to 60" takes the stamina of a marathon runner. This shawl, however, has an interesting middle - call it a medallion - that is knit in the round, increasing alternate rows. You start with one stitch and finish with 72 stitches in each of the four sections. Then you work the side panels. The side panels could be tedious but I reflect back to making sleeves. Just when you can't take it any longer, you are done and then you only have one more piece to complete the project. We will see.

Fleur de lis and caernog pin cushions

I don't need a pin cushion and I can think of only one other person who might be interested in a pin cushion but when does a gift have to fill a need? Pretty! Little! Colorwork! These would be lady-like gifts that get finished while we are still having fun. I even have some roving to use as stuffing.

Fruit basket hats

When we went through the great baby boom of 2011, we talked about these hats a lot in our Wed knitting group but I didn't have a pattern in any of my baby knitting books. It was a secret pattern available on a need-to-know basis. But turns out I have the pattern! And I think the fruit depends on the color of the yarn so I don't feel restricted to watermelon or strawberry (I think the pineapple hat is just taking advantage of the baby not having any muscle control, i.e., can't take the hat off).

Short-row flowers

Another wonder of our Wed knitting group but I'm too lazy to get that book from the library (the Wed knitters know which book). I can make posies -

I can't call this a queue or a resolution because that implies chores and commitment but I hope to take a stab at these projects this year. Maybe my resolution should be to figure out how to borrow pictures from other websites.

Like when you have finished stowing away the Christmas decorations for another year, all the boxes neatly fitting inside each other and like a 3-D puzzle, snug against each other in the closet, you turn around and discover Santa and the reindeer on the bookshelf, I realize I forgot to show you one of my knitted creations.

The Snowman from Mini Christmas Knits by Sue Stratford:



Baby Ull, assorted sock yarn with some Jamieson Jumper weight for eyes and buttons. Size 4 dpn.

What an annoying tedious knit but the product is so gosh-darned cute! I might be able to manage one each year. The tip I got from Elizabeth, when I did a show-n-tell at Knot Just Knits where I bought the book, was to use a hacky sack or bean bag for stuffing the bottom which adds the necessary ballast to keep the snowman from tilting. If it didn't mean more sewing-up, I would open up this guy and fix that problem pronto! One modification I made to the pattern was to knit the two balls as linked balls (a la the ornament: co, increase, knit, decrease; increase, knit, decrease; co) instead of knitting the body flat which would require even more assembly. I used a running stitch in the same yarn to secure the hat and scarf.

Santa and the reindeer now live on the bookshelf.

Edited to add: I have also discovered the welcome mat decorated with presents outside the front door and the solar Christmas lights on the deck to be put away. !!

I have a backlog of knitting to finish. News about the reduced economy, hungry children, abandoned pets in foreclosed houses have made me feel very guilty about the abundance of yarn and numerous UFOs that need attention.

But first I started and finished new projects:

From Knit Your Own Dog, a mini Rogie for my boss:



Mini Rogie needs a blue harness collar and a red leash to match Real Rogie.

Knitting fans all over ask for their own knitted objects, though they are unwilling to learn to knit and make their own knitted objects. I spent 1/2 hour of my free time on each of my staff and made everyone an ornament (from Handknit Holidays):





The ornament in these pictures is made from Palette on size 2 dpns and is only about 3-4" in circumference - the 2009 Franklin Habit ornament provides scale; the staff gifts were of Baby Ull, a bit more than 5" in circumference, made on size 4 dpns. If I were to calculate each half-hour at my salary rate, my staff got a very nice present indeed but value-added for me was using up stash yarn and whittling away at that bag of a lifetime's supply of polyester fiberfill.

Here is the prototype for a gift I made for DD#2.




Sailor's Rib Fingerless Mitts, free pattern from Mountain Colors. I made these mitts from the yarn remains of other projects. The green is from Solitude in their early days at the DuPont Farmers Market (Washington, DC - I miss going to SfN~!) and the brown is handspun by Vera Videnovich, which I bought at YarnCon #1 (Chicago).

Imagine my surprise when DD#2 pulled out a pair of fingerless mitts I made some time in the past. Those were made out of Brown Sheep Wildfoote - I knew I made something out of that yarn but just couldn't remember what. I need to get a picture for my Ravelry page (largesse from donation made to a friend's knitting club).

I also don't have pictures of DD#2 gifts - I managed to use up the colorful parts of two skeins of Noro Kureyon for her mitts (greens and midnight blues) and some orange Lobster Pot cashmere (Brooklyn General Store) with some purple, unmarked (probably bulky Malabrigo from Nana's Knits). Amazingly, she was pleased with both presents and has texted to let me know she is wearing them. Gotta get a picture of that as well!

Knit knit knit
Knit knit knit
Knit knit knit

All I want to do is knit. Forget the dishes, shopping, cooking. I'll still sleep, bathe, and scoop the cat boxes. But once the essentials are addressed, just let me knit. I'm not so far gone that I want to knit while walking but I admit that I walk to work listening to the KnitPicks podcast, walk home listening to the KnitPicks podcast. I occasionally work out listening to the KnitPicks podcast.

I meant to catch you up on my summer:

After the Midwest Fiber Festival, I went to Boston for work where I watched a peculiar rush hour. My first picture had a bad glare from the window but trust me, the Charles River was clogged with little sailboats heading away from the city at the end of the work day.



I can't remember what I knit in Boston. I was happy to have my little knit scarves though because the air conditioning worked extremely well.

I endured until I got ready to go to Minneapolis for the Knit and Crochet Show. Far away, overnight, destination knitting. Megabus, $36 round trip. DH went farther north for a solo hike in 95-degree weather. I stayed with my BFF April at the Minneapolis Hyatt and helped celebrate her DD#1 16th birthday. We met Penny Sitler:


I took classes on entrelac (Gwen Bortner) and double-knitting (Melissa Leapman) - wonderful teachers, great pace, very interesting techniques. Did a little shopping


(Woodland Path shawl, Ivy Brambles - picture this in a red)

In these close confines, April infected me with her shawl fever. I cast-on in the hotel room, knit away on the bus, then finished this



Souvenir cashmere yarn from Lakeside Fibers in Madison, WI that I have hoarded since 2008. April copied a pattern from her library book but I bought the book by Martha Waterman - Fishtail Half-circle shawl. I was on vacation, I had money to burn. Now it's next to my bed and I read it before I go to sleep.

That's July and August.

I celebrated my birthday in Sept with a visit from DD#2 and the MIL. The whole family was together at DD#1's restaurant and then some of us went on the river tour. Definitely worth the 25-year wait.



There was a breeze on the river and when we got to the lake end, we were chilly. Autumn in Chicago can be warm, cool, chilly, rainy but you never know what, when. I was inspired to knit a sweater:



This is the best thing I have ever knit. I followed the instructions as written, just adjusted for length. Even when the sleeve cap seemed too pointy and long, I did as I was told. The sweater fits like a glove (that I didn't make) and I wore it every day the first week. Now I wear it when I need comfort or want to feel confident.

Augusta cardigan, New England Knits. Peace Fleece. Zarya Fog. Souvenir yarn from Brooklyn General Store.

I could knit this again. The only modification I would make is there should be just 3 buttonholes. This is more like a v-neck sweater so there shouldn't be the top button above the curve.

Next time will be occasion knitting. Christmas is coming but there have been occasions for knitting all year.

I work at a major research university that starts the fall term at the end of September. This has always been a great luxury because when the girls were in school, we were able to get through the hysteria of the start of school year separately - the girls got their new school clothes and the neat folders well before I had to consider the arrangements for new graduate students.

So I am now considering what I did this summer. Despite the dearth of blogging these past months (I mean on the blog because there has been plenty of blogging in my mind), I have been knitting.

Consider the socks.

Zauberball sock yarn I bought at the Brooklyn General Store



Regia from my yarn enabler or maybe donated by a grad student with too much yarn


Patons from Michaels


I attempted to deplete my sock yarn stash and thought I would abandon the interesting stitch-pattern socks that take time and concentration and crank out utilitarian socks - handknit woolies so why do I feel I compromised? Each pair can be done in a weekend with a good PBS schedule if I didn't pay any attention to the dust bunnies, dishes, food prep. The washing machine can work on its own (I want a roomba) since it's always a good idea to stir from the chair to switch the loads at least once an hour and get the circulation going.

I like the YH book Knitting Rules because it's a recipe book for basic projects. Once a knitter is experienced enough to take a step back from explicit instructions, this type of book is a lot of fun. One of the guidelines for socks is to make the leg as long as your palm. I tend to lose interest in knitting around and around before that happens but after seeing the Regia socks, I'm going to try to stay the course. The other socks just come up over my ankle bone but that little bit of extra room is really comfortable. I also have worked out a pattern on size 1 needles - these are all cast-ons of 64 but the yarns are so different that the Patons and Zauberball are different degrees of snug yet the Regia is loose enough that I gave them to my larger-footed daughter. And speaking of snug, I have remembered that I re-knit the toes on the Patons and Zauberball socks - instead of decreasing 2 stitches every other row to 50% of the stitch count and then every row to 25%, I kept the every other row sequence to the end. The smaller needles were too much for the accelerated decrease at the end and made the toe too narrow. A nice exploration - the advantage of not hopping from project to project.

My sock theme was supported by a class I attended at the Midwest Fiber and Folkart Festival at the end of June in Greyslake, IL. I wanted to take the twined knitting class but I seem to have been the only one who registered so I opted for another class taught by the same woman, Arnhild Hillesland, called Heel Appeal. We learned 4 heels that are traditional to Norwegian knitting. Unfortunately I secured my handout in a book or bag or notebook and can't work on these heels. The Regia socks have one of these heels and we had a good discussion in the class on the advantage of different heels but I can't remember how the heels are worked.

The beginning of the school year also seems the time to make new year's resolutions, not after Christmas. I think I will keep a stockinette sock going all the time and keep it in my bag for those brief moments of waiting. I do always have knitting with me but sometimes I just need something to occupy my hands, not my brain.

I used to compile a huge report each year in my previous job. I celebrated the end of the project when I put the page numbers on each page. Up to 300 pages, I printed the separate files starting the page numbers where the previous file left off, sometimes running form pages through the manual feed. Tedious work but satisfying to be handling the project one last time and seeing it all put in order.

I don't have to run these reports anymore, all that experience being aimed at other bits of academic administrivia. Not to worry, I found a counterpart in knitting - I-cord bind off.




The baby afghan is done - I got to handle the knitting one more time. With live afghan stitches on the left needle, cast on three stitches, knit two, knit the third stitch with the first afghan stitch; slip all three stitches back onto the left-hand needle. I don't know how many stitches there are in the edging. Maybe 300.