pinned

It can take a ruffled mess like this:

couldn’t look much sloppier

And turn it into this:

schweet!

The lace opens up, the peak at the center top disappears, and the ruffled edges turn into smooth scallops.

One long blocking wire took care of the top edge, but the scallops required pins. I didn’t go nuts on the pins, though. Each scallop is formed by eight yarn overs on the last right-side row, and I had feared I’d need a pin in each yarn over to finesse the scallops’ shape just right. Not so, fortunately: just four pins for most scallops (and a couple extra for those at the tips and at center bottom) did the trick.

worth the effort

Vital stats: Plucky Feet in Jazz Age, on 3.5 mm Signature Stiletto needles, using Half Leaf as the main stitch pattern and a variation of Swiss Fan for the edging.

Now, if only it would dry…

For months, I had been dreading the event. The idea of public speaking didn’t bother me – after all, I teach for a living — but the possibility that I didn’t have anything to say gave me the heebie-jeebies. I mean, in a classroom, I can talk for a bit, and let students knit for a bit, and repeat the process until the time’s up. But how was I to fill an hour by just talking? Without telling people what to do?

It was a silly fear, really. With charts as the topic, I have plenty to say. All I needed to do was figure out how to focus the presentation.

And finally I hit on it: Explain why I’m a chart fanatic and why charts are so cool by showing how I make use of charts in my design work. How the main stitch pattern in the Ogee shawl evolved from a very different pattern. How Molly’s stitch patterns are related, and how the V-neck was planned. How the ribbing on the Sidewinder socks came to be. That sort of thing.

charts made this possible

But before getting all lovey-dovey over charts, I figure it might be best to dispell a few chart myths. You know, in case anyone in the audience isn’t as into charts as I am. Busting these myths wide open ought to do the trick, don’t you think?

• Myth #1: Charts are hard.
• Myth #2: Row 1 is always a right-side row.
• Myth #3: Charts would be better if the symbols just said what to do.
• Myth #4: Somebody really ought to come up with a standard set of symbols.
• Myth #5: “No stitch” symbols are evil.

Ooh, it’s hard to tell which will be the most fun to debunk.

If you live in the Seattle area, c’mon down and attend the guild meeting! As a bonus, Acorn Street Shop will be there, selling copies of Charts Made Simple. Don’t forget that I’m teaching Slick Set-in Sleeves and Charts Made Simple on Saturday – contact Acorn Street if you’re interested.

ready for a pedi

I finished these socks just before leaving for Stitches South — as in, mere hours before, late last week Tuesday before getting up at 4:30am on Wednesday to head to the airport. (No wonder I didn’t think to blog about ’em.)

Through sheer luck, the placement of the stripes matches almost perfectly. If I had wanted to, I could’ve gotten the colors to match too. But that would’ve required advance planning, and starting the first sock at a known place in the color sequence. Eh. I’m not that particular. Besides, fraternal twin socks are more fun than identical twin socks, don’t you think?

Bonus: the socks are pretty comfy, thanks to a trip through the washing machine to soften the Patons Kroy a tad. I hope my mom likes them.

The funny thing about these pedicure socks, though, is that without a toe, it isn’t immediately apparent how you should put them on. Before dropping them in the mail, it’s tempting to add “This End Up” labels. Then again, if you put ’em on upside-down, you clue in pretty fast:

not ready for a pedi

It’s like sleeves that reach beyond your fingertips. Or a turtleneck that covers your eyes.

Classes on several topics call to me: brioche lace, colorwork tams, flawless zipper installation, understanding Japanese knitting patterns, and double-knitting with openwork or in three colors. Sadly, I won’t get to take any of them, as I’m scheduled to teach a whopping 24 class hours over the course of the four-day event. Oof! Whose bright idea was that??

crocheted samples...
not quite glow-in-the-dark, but close!

On my way to Stitches, I realized I had a chunk of free time on Sunday afternoon before my flight home – enough time to take a class, something I haven’t had a chance to do in years. Edie Eckman graciously said I could sit in on her Join Together: Six Join-As-You Go Crochet Methods class. This was gonna be fun! I’ve been itching to do some crochet for a while – many new books include fabulous crochet stitch patterns that just scream to be played with. And Edie’s class promised to share easy ways of joining crochet (or knit!) motifs.

But as I hadn’t planned on taking a class, I was left with two problems: 12 homework swatches, and no yarn to do the homework. Off to the Market! I scored a couple skeins of trusty Brown Sheep Nature Spun, in vibrant colors. (Hey, why do tan and light sage when you can do teal and purple?) And from that point, I snuck in a few minutes of crocheting every chance that I could… finishing the last swatch late on Saturday evening.

Come Sunday afternoon, it felt really strange to be sitting in the back of the room rather than standing in the front. Time sped by, though: we learned three basic techniques for joining two motifs, and a variety of strategies for applying those techniques. The circle motifs shown above, for example, were joined by working one extra round on each motif – this is a great approach when you want to work the motifs separately, as portable on-the-go projects, then join them with outlines in contrast colors. The squares, on the other hand, were joined with one continuous piece of yarn – just two ends to weave in! And for the hexagons? I used a combination approach: joining the purple hexagons together with teal, then joining the teal hexagons to each other and to the purple hexagons with purple.

But as much as I enjoyed Edie’s class, the most gratifying moments at Stitches were when students from years past came up to me and said how learning to read charts or to knit seamless set-in sleeves had changed their knitting lives. Comments like “I never work from written instructions anymore!” and “I love knitting my sleeves from the top down now” are really what make teaching worthwhile.

This Stitches held a special bonus surprise for me too. At the end of Socktastic Stitch Patterns, as the students were filing out, I caught sight of some fantastic socks. Of course I had to compliment the wearer. We got to talking, and when she discovered I had never worked with the yarn in question – Hazel Knits Artisan Sock – she gifted me with a couple (substantial!) leftover balls to swatch with:

don’t you just love the colors?
wish you could feel the yarn too!

Wasn’t that sweet? Thanks, Tricia!

ready!

Vital stats: Going Green from knit, Swirl!, in Mirasol Nuna, on 3.5 mm needles.

Oddly, the Swirl is an eensy bit small, despite substantial swatching efforts and my prediction that it might turn out a tad large. Oh, well. It’s still eminently wearable. And the fabric! Nuna’s blend of merino, silk, and bamboo is divine. I suspect this’ll be the sweater I reach for on cool summer mornings, to layer over a tank before the midday heat kicks in.

Unlike my size prediction, a different prediction held true: the stitches that I had cast on provisionally for the sleeves were wicked funky. I really, really should’ve worked one plain row before short-rowing the first half of the sleeves. (Chalk it up to casting on at a retreat, and the eagerness to get knitting.) Fortunately, working one plain row over those stitches let me fine-tune those stitches – and adjust the stitch count – before grafting the sleeve seams. Overall, the process was fiddly and time-consuming. Would I graft sleeve seams again, on another Swirl or some other sweater with dolman sleeves? Maybe, but before making that decision I hope I would engage my brain, and take a few minutes to toy around with some test swatches.

In contrast, the Swirl’s raglan seam – the one that runs from one underarm, across the back of the wearer’s neck, and to the other underarm – was a breeze… thanks to the right prep work. First I used stitch markers to divide the seam into sections:

orange markers along the neck opening, green along the collar

Then I used binder clips to hold the pieces together, subdividing the sections further:

matching orange and green markers, and holding with binder clips

Then it was zip! zip! zip! across with a crocheted slip-stitch seam. Oh, I love me a good crocheted seam — mattress stitch is fine if you’re matching rows to rows, but crocheted seams are fabulous when you’re easing one piece to another.

So! Early tomorrow morning I’m off to Stitches. With six classes, the Teacher Meet-n-Greet (fondly known as Speed Dating), the Fashion Show, and the Student Banquet, it’s going to be another jam-packed weekend! I suspect that before I know it, the weekend will be over… and then all of sudden it’ll be time to head to Seattle for a talk with the Seattle Knitters Guild and some classes at Acorn Street Shop. As best as I know, those classes still have room – so if you’re interested in Charts Made Simple or Slick Set-in Sleeves, go sign up now!

At each neck edge, I’m decreasing one stitch every other row, as called for in the pattern. But at the sleeve edges, I’m trying something a little different.

Rather than decrease one stitch at each sleeve edge on every row, I’m keeping all the sleeve stitches “live” by working short rows; later, I’ll graft these stitches to the ones I cast on provisionally when starting the sleeves. This’ll give me a totally bulk-free “seam” along the underside of each sleeve.

A stitch marker on each sleeve separates the stitches still being worked from the ones waiting to be grafted:

right sleeve in progress

You’ll notice that the stitches to the right of the marker – the ones waiting to be grafted – look a little uneven and funky, thanks to my short-row wraps. After completing all the sleeve shaping, I’ll work one more row over all these stitches, hiding the wraps and evening out the stitches, just as for a short-rowed shoulder. That’ll make the grafting easier.

I wish I’d thought to start the sleeves similarly, working one plain row over all the provisionally cast-on stitches before jumping into the short rows. As it is, those cast-on stitches are really funky. Oh, well. With any luck, knitting one plain row will even out their funkiness too.

one and a half pedicure socks

Before heading to the DFW Fiber Fest – which was wonderful, by the way! I hope to be invited back for an encore visit! – I had completed just a short bit of the first sock. By the time my flight landed in Dallas, I has finished the heel turn and started the gussets. The “Unraveling Ravelry” presentation on Friday night saw the completion of the gussets. And the flight home? First sock done, second sock done through the leg. You could practically see the fabric growing. Oh, I’d forgotten the near-instant gratification of plain stockinette and self-patterning sock yarn.

Since then? I’ve only knit the heel flap and heel turn of the second sock. Nope, I don’t get all that much knitting time at home; too many other distractions vie for my time.

Which leads me to wonder if I’ll complete my Swirl before Stitches South, as I’d hoped. Working backwards, let’s see:

• Stitches starts on the 19th.
• So I’m flying on the 18th.
• So I’m packing on the 17th. At the latest, the Swirl has to be dry and ready to ship out by the evening of the 17th, or the morning of the 18th if I want to push it.
• So I have to block the Swirl on the… let’s see… 15th. (Yes, around here it can take a sweater two days to dry at this time of year.)
• So I have to seam the Swirl on the 14th. Oh, I suppose I ought to weave in the ends, too.
• So I have to finish knitting on the 13th. Hmm. Friday the 13th. Is that a bad omen?
• So that leaves me with less than a week to knit 15 welts.

Huh. I better get knitting.

pedicure sock... some assembly required

I plan to produce socks that pretty much match the photo in the pattern that my mom sent: über-plain stockinette, with just a bit of k1, p1 rib at each end. But, true to my word, I’m not following the pattern itself:

• Seven stitches to the inch on size 3.5 mm needles? Pfft. For yarn this fine, I’m using 2.5 mm needles. I’m getting a much more durable yet still comfy fabric at 8.5 to 9 stitches per inch.
• A firmer gauge means bumping the stitch count up – in this case, to 64 stitches. So far, the sock-in-progress fits me, which means it’ll fit my mom.
• To get matching cast-on and bind-off edges, I started with a tubular cast-on, and plan on using a tubular bind-off. (Okay, yes, beyond the matchy-matchy bit I admit I’m going tubular for the fun of it.)

So there you have it: utterly mindless knitting to keep my hands entertained while traveling and while socializing at the DFW Fiber Fest. We’ll see how much I get done over the weekend.

Patons Kroy sock yarn, and freebie patterns

(What you need to know is that my mom is not a knitter. She’s an enthusiastic gardener – which takes some dedication, given that she lives outside Buffalo, NY – but she doesn’t knit, crochet, sew, weave, or spin. In contrast, I’m all over the knitting thing, I’ve been known to crochet and sew, and I’d love to find the time to get into weaving. But I’m a fair-weather gardener. Yet we get along anyway. Go figure.)

In the package was a letter that reads in part:

Enclosed are sock patterns! Different sock patterns, which you may already by aware of.

The yarn I’ve selected is enclosed and the pattern I’ve selected is starred. If & when you have time I would love to have a pair for summer.

Let me know if the socks are something you can do. If not, find a use for the yarn yourself.

I find this hilarious. Does she not know that I design socks? That I teach sock design? That I have stacks of patterns at my fingertips, and bins of sock yarn within arm’s reach? That a pair of plain pedicure socks count as mindless knitting?

I have yet to call and confirm, but I suspect what may have happened is this: She was trolling Hobby Lobby with a friend, or perhaps with my niece. (Unless Hobby Lobby has started selling gardening supplies, it would take a crafty friend or my crafty niece to get her into one.) She spotted the blue and brown marl yarn. She fell in love. (Blue and brown are her favorite colors.) She bought the yarn, snagged the freebie patterns, and ran to the post office.

Yeah. Sounds about right to me.

So, Mom, if you’re reading this… yes, I’ll knit you some pedicure socks out of the blue and brown yarn. I’ll probably make up my own pattern as I go along, ’cause that’s the kind of knitter I am. But your summer pedicure socks will have to wait until I’ve finished knitting my second Swirl… you know, the replacement for the one I gave you last fall.