KarenJoSeattle

H as in Harlot

Maybe half an hour before the start of Stephanie Pearl-McPhee's Seattle appearance last night, a man enough older than me that I'd call him an older man stood in the aisle and called out "Sue, Sue." He moved up the aisle directly across from us, looked at a sheet of paper in his hand, then called again, "Sue? Sue!"

"Frustrated?" asked Cindy from the end seat.

"Yeah," he replied, "she said to meet her here. She'd be easy to find. She'd be the one with the knitting needles. Right."

About an hundred women, all holding knitting needles, laughed - a very Harlot moment before the Harlot even appeared.

Stephanie was in her usual good form. Her talk touched on many of her usual themes - mostly the lack of understanding of knitters by non-knitters and the mystifying and amusing results.

This time she also talked of research on repetitive motion and it's uses and benefits. One of the studies, dealing with the mitigation of traumatic stress inducers by performing simple repetitive tasks, actually mentioned knitting as a possible repetitive activity, but concluded that it was impractical to routinely carry emergency knitting. That got a laugh, too - from a roomful of knitters working on portable projects.

I think slightly fewer knitters showed up last night than did last September, maybe 300 rather than four, but still the signing line ran about 2 1/2 hours long.  Apparently, despite the smaller crowd, Third Place Books ran out of books and had to bring in more during the talk. I and my friends were glad I'd made the trip to buy books the day before.

And, once again, Stephanie amazed me with how much she knows and remembers about her blog readers/commenters. She even remembered the date of my birthday, totally amazing my friend Ann. Chatting like she didn't have close to an hour's worth of people in line behind us, she said Sock Camp was a lot of work, but fun and she didn't have to get on a plane every day during it. She did not seem road-weary, but then, she never does.

As we walked out I wondered what she thinks of this life she now has. I doubt she expected it when she first started to post on-line. Sure, it's her job, but it's become so much more, so all consuming. I hope she feels it's worth it for her, not just for us.

Remember to comment by midnight tomorrow, Wednesday, for a chance in the drawing for the Schaefer yarn or a signed copy of Stephanie's book.

F as in Fiber Frenzy

Every Year for the March meeting the Seattle Knitter's Guild (Ravelry group) hold a Fiber Frenzy. Members can bring anything knitting or fiber related to sell.

Last year the Frenzy was my first Guild meeting. This year I cleaned out my Clover bamboo needle, labeled them, and took them to sell. For the last couple of years I've used my Addi Naturas instead.

There were a lot of people selling this year. We had to set up more tables. The quality of the yarn available was pretty high and included hand-dyed, undyed, hand spun and dyed, lots of Koigu in multi-skein lots, and many luxury yarns.

I did buy two yarns: about 300 yards of a cream Border Leicester blended with 15% alpaca and 2000 yards of 7 spi Jaeger 100% Alpaca in a golden brown (with one ball partly swatched.) I passed up a lot of beautiful yarn, though most got bought quickly by others.

I didn't sell all of my needle, actually not even half as I had a lot of needles, but I came out ahead for the evening. And I had a nice time chatting with Joy who had the table space next to me but who I'd not

met before, only seen around guild events.

E as in Elizabeth Zimmerman and her EPS

I don't purl, I knit back backwards when I knit flat. Really, it's Elizabeth Zimmerman's fault.

Mostly I knit in the round, which comes from various influences: my main knitting instructor Karen Alfke, a feeling that there's a body logic to it, my laziness about finishing work, and having bought a few of Elizabeth Zimmerman's books early on when I took up knitting seriously several years ago.

But when I knit flat, my purl rows run much looser than my knit rows. To get gauge I usually go down two or three needle sizes from the one called for in a pattern.

After reading several of EZ's books, I bought a set of the Knitting Around videos and watched all three over a couple of days. I rewound the bit about knitting back backwards a couple of times. It fascinated me, this technique that eliminated flopping the whole thing over at the end of every row.

(Note that that linked sites reverses the terms from the way EZ, Karen and I use them. What I refer to she shows as purling back.)

A couple years later, knitting back backwards came up in a conversation with Karen. I finally tried it out in a couple of small tests. Recently I finished an entire sweater using the technique.

Besides eliminating the flop, this technique also helps my hands. I've had tendinitis in my hands and wrists more than once. I pick, so mostly use my right hand, the one with the most issues. For me, KBB switches the hand that does the major part of the work and involves a very different set of moves. Each hand almost gets to rest every other row.

And it turns out I KBB slightly more tightly than I knit. Occasionally I knit back enough more tightly to get a bit of rowing out, but so far not so much that it still shows after blocking. I come much closer to pattern needle sizes - when I knit from a pattern.

Before I took Karen's Unpattern class, I'd had exposure to the idea of designing your own sweaters from basic guidelines in Elizabeth's books. It made sense to me, as I'm the kind of shopper who's alway looking for something that's not 'in' this season.

So, it came as a bit of a surprise when I realized this fall that I'd never actually knit any of EZ's ideas.

The EPS sweater I'm actually knitting for Margene's KAL is not the first one I started when I decide to knit an EPS project a few months before. It's not the second, either.

I plan on doing saddle shoulders for this sweater. I also have a three-rib braided cable on the sleeves and plans for a four-rib up the front - my first big cable project. And I want a steeked V-neckline with the ribs flowing up the sides as smaller cable. That last will be my first steek and a challenge, as I'm using a Merino though Aran-weight yarn.

That's a lot of new things to try in one sweater. But my first planned EPS sweater had trickier cable placement, a zipper, and a double-knit collar to also learn how to accomplish. The second used a sock-weight yarn in a simple hemmed stockinette body. After struggling with a provisional cast-on based on Judy's Magic Cast-on and tiny stitches that kept mysteriously increasing in number, I decided a larger gauge might be best for my first attempt at the hard-to-picture instructions for the saddle shoulders. I really want to try those saddle shoulders.

At this point I'm almost done with my sleeves, lacking an inch or two on the second. These did take a couple tries to get the cables and increases worked out the way I wanted them.

I want to try out some shaping techniques I learned at Madrona on the body - more new things in one sweater. These will fall before I connect the sleeves to the body. Though this sweater is the first where I've knit separate sleeves and body in the round, bottom-up, I think I won't feel like I'm doing an EZ sweater until I get to the point where I Unite the parts. That's really where Elizabeth's way of looking at things differently and coming up with logical and/or clever methods kicks in.

I think EZ's attitude in Knitting Without Tears that anything's possible and nothing except split yarn is really a mistake is good to pass on to new knitters. Beyond that, I think most knitters will need a bit of experience to understand and feel comfortable with her patterns. Her terseness seems to me based on an assumption of some basic knowledge that a few projects provide. How much experience is needed depends on your experience with other craft and construction techniques. Anything that gives you experience in imagining how things go together and what construction steps actually create will help you here.

So now I'll go imagine a bit more of my sweater.

Note - You know you're really tired and need to go to bed when you fall asleep not reading but while actually writing. Thus the Monday Musings tag on a Tuesday post.

D as in Dentist

I think I'm only a day - okay two - after deadline for posting my 'D' in the ABCAlong (Ravelry link) hosted by Vicki. Good thing she hosts things very loosely.

Right now two days behind is pretty good for my schedule. This week I'm dealing with doing things at my for-sale island house and keeping it primped for possible buyers around an Open House and showings. Today's planned outdoor work got rained out and needs to be rescheduled. Between chores I keep having to leave for prospective buyers to come through - a pain but actually the point of the whole process.

And I'm not getting any knitting done. I need to start a scarf or something else completely mindless. Something that doesn't involve both cables and increases, even ones that follow the same row count.

Next week I have to be in California for the closing of our new house-for-Mom/vacation-home-for-us and getting the contractor there pointed in the right direction (fortunately he's an old friend of my Mom's and very dependable). The house here will be on it's own.

But, we do have some very promising nibbles here. Unfortunately, they're leading to some things I have to be here on the island for that will completely mess up my schedule this week since the things I have scheduled are a ferry ride away in Seattle. But I don't yet know just when the messing up will happen. Pfft!

On top of all this, in the last week a red-headed woodpecker (though I think the variety here is actually called red-bellied) has decided to attack the cedar tree right behind the house. Next time I chase him off by flailing at him with an extendable pole-pruner from the upstairs balcony I'll try to remember to take a picture of him first.

Anyway, 'D' is for Dentist - as in I went on Thursday and am just now posting it.

I have a great dentist. He hires great staff and gives them plenty of time to deal properly with each client. Also gives them Fridays off.

I used to live three blocks from his office. Now I fight the traffic getting out of downtown to see him even though I'm sure I could find several dentists within walking distance - like maybe in the Dental Arts Building.

Actually, I know of another knitblogger who fights traffic from over an hour away to continue to patronize my dentist.

Never give up a good dentist with actual people skills - especially one whose office is over a large Starbucks.

And here's a photo of snowdrops just because I like them and because even with the rain it feels like Spring here. I really have nothing to complain about. But I do feel better now.

C as in...

...Calcite, Cacti, Canyons, Coyotes, Castles in the Air, and Childhood Memories.

I started to put together my 'D' entry for the ABC-Along and realized that, though I'd thought a lot about what I'd do, I never actually posted my 'C' entry. In the spirit of following the few rules that Vicki suggested, I'll do it before I do 'D.'

Earlier this month we took a trip to Arizona. We started in Tucson, where I was born but where I haven't been since. While there we shopped the ginormous Gem and Mineral show where we bought quite a few specimens and fossils, including this Calcite-filled fossilized whelk.

We also spent a couple of days in Sedona, arriving just as the snow melted off the roads and you could get there again.

I lived in Sedona as a small child between 1957 and '61. I wanted to show my husband why I have such vivid memories of the place. It's changed a lot since I could cross the main road to my Dad's gas station, the only one in town, all by myself at age five. But as soon as we drove into the red hill area, I felt I'd Come Home.

We saw Cacti in the snow, reminding me of the time my father carried me to the bus stop on his shoulders because of the snow and then I had to walk home on my own since school was canceled. Sedona lies at 4500 feet and counts as High Dessert where you have real seasons.

We saw vistas of Canyons much too big to fit in a photograph and with much too vivid a contrast of red rock and blue sky for little automatic cameras to believe those colors were right, so everything came out toned down.

We saw Coyotes who seemed completely unfazed by our presence (we were in a car.)

The Creek-side backyard of one of the places I lived lay just across from our hotel.

We could see Coffeepot Rock, a favorite of my mother's, from that house - actually more a shack.

On the way to Sedona we stopped at one of my favorite spots, Montezuma's Castle. Neither a true castle nor at all related to Montezuma, it always seemed like a Castle in the Air to me.

Though the town has grown badly now that paved roads get you there, the landscape really is everything you've ever heard about it. Go there if you can. Then imagine it with one gas station, one coffee shop, and a small, impressionable girl who learned there to love nature in all it's forms and mysteries we can't explain.

B is for Bordhi and little sock-heel Bowl

I'm wide awake, so you get a post before I head off to Arizona in the morning.

If you like to knit socks and can manage to get to a class with Cat Bordhi on her new sock architectures, do it. Go with an open mind for seeing the way socks fit a foot in new light.

One of the things Cat discovered is the the 'gussets' don't have to be in pairs or in a particular location on a sock. The 'gusset' on the mauve mini sock I knit in class spreads over the top of the instep and is created with yarn overs.

On this red mini-sock-in-progress the 'gusset' is expanding in the arch area on the bottom of the foot.

In the full size samples Cat brought you could immediately see that these new architectures give a traditionally shaped sock when finished. Despite all expectations and preconceptions to the contrary.

Cat now uses her version of Judy's Magic Cast On for almost all of her sock knitting, though she includes others in her book. She is currently encouraging Judy through the process of writing a book on the many ways to use this cast-on after convincing her to write it.

One thing that hadn't occurred to me - with this cast-on, if you just continue to knit flat on the first needle you end up with a provisional cast-on with a needle already threaded through it back at the start.

Cat insists she's not really that smart, just willing to suspend her beliefs and think about things in new ways. I think she'd need both the willingness and the smarts to come up with and work through the things she does.

Cat has also come up with a toe up technique for constructing a heel that looks like a traditional flap-style, but nothing ever flaps and you don't have to pick up stitches.

And she showed us a technique for picking up her short row wraps and putting them behind the stitch on the needle. This both hides the wrap and makes it much easier to knit it together with the stitch.

In class we made little baskets using the heel turn twice to learn the technique before starting our mini socks. This lovely little one was knit by Cat. Mine had a decided difference in gauge between the two halves of its bottom.

If you can't get to a class with her, get the book and then check out her YouTube videos of many of the new techniques in the book. The videos are very informal and a bit funny, like Cat, but very informative and clear, also like Cat.

A as in Absence, Air Travel, Allergies, and 'A Few Days Late'

...And an Apology for being away from the blog for so long.

I spent a week in California helping my mother to clear out 20 years of stuff and dust in her house so she can put it up for sale. If you remember when we last left our heroine, she (me) planned to replace a house with one to share with Mom that will suit Mom's current and future needs better than the ones either of us own currently.

We ended up with all of my siblings and a few accessory family members there for the weekend, too. I'm the oldest of five, so we had lots of help. Plus, my mother works much harder than most 80 year olds. I expect her to be around for another decade, at least, especially given her family history. And we finished the whole house in a week. Anyone who has been through this with a parent will appreciate the effort that took.

Fortunately for me, Vicki runs a fairly loose ABC-Along, so I can feel OK posting these Photos several days late for A now that I've re-emerged. They are still in alphabetical order.

I caught the Airporter bus just as the sun rose and the city started moving around.

Just as I ran out the door, I realized in my late-night packing I hadn't wound the yarn I planned to knit on the plane.

Luckily for me (I'm on a streak), Stephanie had recently blogged on Cornelia Tuttle Hamilton knitting from a skein. As in 'Don't Wind Your Yarn Into a Ball'. You just untwist the skein, lay it over your knees or other support, and twist it back up when you stop.

This works surprisingly well with the set-up on a plane - no ball to roll away and a handy tray as support for the hank. You do lose the ability to hop up quickly when the restroom becomes vacant.

Vicki-note the purple squares in that photo. I started on the group project. Unfortunately, that last square is not much further along, though it's been past that point twice since this flight.

I tossed the whole pile into my purse as I got off the plane, then managed to pull the needle out of the knitting while digging something out of my purse. The other tries related to techniques that didn't work as well as I liked.

That pretty much covers the last week and a half worth of knitting , until today. Today I attended the first of two workshops on socks with Cat Bordhi (of the knitting around on two circulars and Moebius knitting). See here for a good description of what a workshop with Cat feels like. Details tomorrow.

A is for Allergies - ABC Along 2008

I need to get tested to figure out what I'm actually allergic to.

Besides allergies to molds and mildew, mohair, dust mites, my cats, angora, manure, milk, basically anything with a carbon atom in its molecules if I inhale it, in the last couple of years I've developed allergies I can't identify with symptoms I haven't had in the past. These new allergies seem to be both contact reactions and food allergies.

Occasionally my eyelids react to something. The first time they did about 15 years ago, they got red, swollen and tender after we burned some probably moldy wood in the fireplace; then again very time we used the fireplace or the air pressure caused down drafts until we got the chimney cleaned.

Last year I thought I reacted to a pinkish eyeshadow. I still think that, but it seems to have opened some door to reactions to other, unidentifiable agents.

This episode may relate to something I ate. Unfortunately, it's likely not something we cooked but rather a meal out, so I don't know what it was.

On a more positive note, I've knit enough swatch to determine gauge for my EZ EPS Sweater. I've also had more wine than I'll mix with actually measuring for gauge at this time of night, so tonight I'll just admire the thing,though it looks like I'll be around 7 stitches per inch. Not too bad for sock yarn and I like working with this Fleece Artist Merino 2/6. I bought this through The Loopy Ewe, but it's currently out of stock.

The color still shows as less green in these photos than in real life. The color way, Olive, does have more gold than green. The photos at Loopy are closer, though each skein has slightly different proportions of the colors.