another knitting blog

ebb & flow

The past six months have been sort of rough for me--perpetual, debilitating fatigue; lack of focus on personal and professional goals; negative progress in the realms of diet and exercise.

And yet, on closer inspection, things haven't been really that bad. I still have a job I enjoy. I'm living in a nice, albeit messy, apartment. And, while nothing terribly good has happened in the past six months, neither has anything terribly bad.

Nevertheless, what makes these last six months seem so bleak is the relative happiness and ease of the four months before that. [I refuse to go back and read to entries from those four months to see if I am entirely deluding myself or not. One thing is sure: I was wearing smaller pants].

Or, I could go back to a year ago at this time when things were actually bad. I was pleased to get through a day without crying. Compared to that, stagnation is an improvement.

So, things change, circumstances alter, nothing stays the same--either good or bad--and the way things look depends on the direction you are coming from. [Instance #137 of learning this lesson].

Lately, I've been feeling that things are once again moving in a positive direction; although, neither very quickly nor very consistently. Some days are good, others...well, not so good. I hope that the good days start coming more frequently and that I actually manage to post on a few of those days.

I've gotten some questions about intarsia in general and garter stitch intarsia in particular. I knit a swatch today and took lots of pictures. It may take a day or two to get things pulled together, so look for a post on this topic some time this week. Also, the probable end of one project and the imminent beginning of another.

stripes the hard way

Sorry to keep those of you who were interested in my scarf waiting so long for the details. Deadlines, sinus, snow, blah, blah, blah.

Here's a bit less arty shot of the scarf than the last one. On the right you can see the "right" side and on the left you can see the "wrong" side.

Yes, those are very, very long intarsia stripes, in garter stitch. It had to be so. Why it had to be is a long and bor... tortuous tale that I will now relate; because, after all, this is a knitting blog.

Let's start with the yarn. It's Jo Sharp Rare Comfort Kid Mohair. I bought it from Elann.com a few months ago--of course, at a significant discount. [It's long, long gone there, but it's still available other places, although mostly at full price]. The bad news is that it's being discontinued as a Jo Sharp yarn. The good news is that it's going to be sold under the name Queensland Collection Comfort Mohair.

For those of you who are really interested, I used one ball each of colors 602, 605, 606, and 610. [Actually, I think I ended up using a little more than half a ball of each].

Originally, I had planned to try and recreate a crocheted scarf I had seen at a craft fair this summer. Unfortunately, I grossly mis-estimated just how much yarn that would take, especially since I wanted a loooong scarf.

I can tell you that it is a huge pain in the ass to reclaim previously crocheted mohair. I spent several nights doing that. I also spent several nights trying to figure out what to do next.

Part of the problem was that although I knew I wanted to use all four colors together, I was worried about running short on yarn again. I played around with stripes on the short axis, but the original scarf I had in mind was striped along the long axis. I considered casting on about a million stitches and knitting the stripes that way, but I was afraid that I would have the same problem that I did with my crocheted attempt and would have to end up ripping again. Mohair can only be frogged so many times before you kill it.

So, realizing that I wanted long stripes without worrying about exactly how long they could be, I decided to knit my scarf along the short axis and use intarsia to make the stripes. Next because I wanted to minimize the difference between the "right" and "wrong" sides, I thought I would knit in a simple garter stitch. [Intarsia garter stitch is something I hadn't seen nor tried before. It took me a couple of tries before I figured out the trick to it]. There is still a difference between the two sides, but I can live with that.

I knit, and knit, and knit. It seemed to take forever because every few rows I had to untangle the yarns; even so, this was still very relaxing knitting due to the warmth and softness of the yarn.

In the end, I'll call it a success, even though it's different than my original conception.

[Scarf, as modelled by knitter in Sunday morning comfies].

I declare

On this day, let's all read the Declaration of Independence and reflect on the grievances that the colonists had against the British king.

Perhaps, we may also notice how many of these grievances could be interpreted to apply against the President and his administration.

I'm not advocating revolution--unless it's a revolution of awareness and responsibility.

This administration was (more-or-less) freely elected, as will be the next. In the mean time--at all times--we should be thankful for our freedoms and guard them closely. It's apparent that we can't assume the best interests of "We the People" are the motivations of our current leaders or that our personal freedoms are of their concern.

I suppose, in some sense, that's always been so. That's why we have to be sure that we take on our own measure of responsibility whenever it's offered to us.

This is our time, this is our chance. In the next four years, we must stay informed and involved so that when the time to choose the next administration, we will be ready for the fight.

I swear

Sometimes I think people leave the house just so they can use their cellphones in public. These people are always standing next to me. [this links to a PDF].

a little blurry

One problem I've been having getting back into blogging is that I hadn't been able to pick up my camera for the last month. I took it to my parents' at Christmas, but it never even made it out of the case.

I don't know. Maybe I haven't wanted to look, or to see, or to focus. In any event, it's finally made it out of the case today.

This is a blurry picture of the scarf that I just finished. It's not what I intended it to be or what it started out to be. It took an absurd amount of time to knit for what it turned out to be.

Maybe now I can move on to something else.

Thank you, sir! May I have another?

As painful as defending my dissertation was, it was nowhere near as soul-sucking as it is to try and get it published.

"Here is your ego, dissected, and presented for your viewing pleasure. Please, eat up, like it, and ask for more."

BWAH!

I don't know why, but, BWAH!

The Internet is a strange thing.

Recharging

ATTENTION: This blogger is temporarily off-line for routine maintenance and upgrades.

Silk Garden Bucket

Back before Christmas, I got a very nice e-mail from Roi with a picture of a bucket-style hat she had knit as a modification of my Silk Garden hat.

With her permission, I'll share the the picture and message with you. [Click for a bigger view].

She says, "I’ve knit two – first with just adding one pattern of row repeats so the hat would come down further over my ears and the second with casting on 11 more stitches as I look better in a bucket type hat."

Isn't is cute? It's knit from Noro Silk Garden #47 and she said she did have to do a little "engineering" to get the gold band to fall at the beginning and the end of the lace section--a nice detail.

I just may have to get some more Silk Garden and try out this version for myself.

Thanks for sharing, Roi, and I'm honored that you used my hat as a jumping off point. Great job!

A few of my favorite things

my box of tissues

my sinus/allergy tablets

my pillow

02:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)