Absent!

It turns out that in the summer I don’t like to knit so much.

I would never have expected that, honestly. Last year I knitted all summer without a pause. Of course, last summer I was in England where there’s only a very slight difference between a hot day and a cold day. Now I live in Ontario where the weather is louder and prouder. It stands tall, spreads wide its arms, and envelopes us in its hot sweaty armpits.

Wrapping wool around your fingers in 38 degree Celsius weather? Not so fun, thank you. Give me an ice tea or die. It’s your choice.

However! It’s finally cooling off a little bit. Of course I write this while sweating slightly but that’s not the point. Even a slight improvement is welcome at this point. Most days are below 30 now and I can breathe when I leave the apartment.

I must admit that the hot weather hasn’t stopped me knitting entirely; it’s merely slowed me down. I am halfway through a crocheted shawl. While my friend Sophie was visiting I knitted her some purple fingerless gloves as a late birthday present.

A few days ago my girlfriend went to the CNE in Toronto and brought back some alpaca yarn for me. It was supposed to be a surprise and for my birthday but she left it on the side and I found it while I was tidying the apartment. It was from B lack Ash Acres, not far from here, and she met the alpacas. In twenty-four hours I had myself a pair of fingerless gloves. And guess what? I didn’t even use a pattern! I just knitted until it looked right and made notes for the second in my moleskine.

Okay, the girlfriend’s up. Time to relinquish the laptop. I’ll be updating more thoroughly when I get the chance, and visiting/commenting on all the blogs I’ve missed.

How to Mix Fandom and Knitting

The thing is… when a new fandom takes over my brain as the Avengers has, I forget everything else for a while. This is the nerd part of my life. I have spent the last few weeks watching Avengers, reading Avengers comics, and browsing Tumblr tags for pretty pictures. There has been little other substance to my life. Once in a while I’ll pick up my knitting but not very enthusiastically.

This will change soon; I have a few projects I need to get done. But for now my mind is on the Avengers.

So how can I mix knitting/crochet, my true passion, with Avengers? It’s something that I’ve been considering. My first thought was amigurumi. I could crochet myself a little Black Widow doll. I could make a tiny Thor with Mjolnir. (Adorable.)

I could, as I’m considering doing, knit myself a Black Widow shawl/scarf/sock. Sock, probably. I have it all planned out but just have to buy the yarn for them. Of course then I’d have to paint my nails red and black to match.

One guess who my favourite character is…

Other people have been considering this too. I found Avengers yarn on Ravelry earlier this evening which is what prompted this post. It’s by Sheepytime Knits and you can find it here. My favourite is the Black Widow which I bet is really surprising to everyone here. I love that the Hulk yarn is so much chunkier than the rest. I’d like to make myself some big ol’ mitts with that.

I don’t have any way to buy yarn online right now but if I did, I’d own these.

How do you mix fandom and knitting?

I Made a Purchase

On Saturday I headed to The Little Green House in Whitby with a rather fabulous new friend to buy the yarn for my first wearable garment (Coachella, though I’m doing a modified version found on Ravelry). It took a while to pick the yarn of course. I went with Cascade 220 Superwash in a greeny-blue flecked colour. I’m quite pleased with it and apparently I really like Cascade yarns. The last three projects I’ve done have been by them.

Like this one, a scarf made of lovely rich red cotton.

They had a little workshop going on where, for two dollars, you could try out needle felting and jewellery making. We decided to go ahead and try it, resulting in a cute needle-felted bookmark (or potential cat toy) and a pair of earrings. I spent rather too long trying to find the right beads and now I want to do this all the time.

Bad idea. I have enough hobbies already that I struggle to decide what to do when I have a moment not working.

Still, maybe one day I’ll have even more free time and can do it.

I’ll start hoarding any pretty beads I find just in case.

Anyway. At this point it was time to go and pay for my yarn, which was 15% off like everything in the store. Very exciting. I picked out some cotton to make more washcloths with and then looked for circular needles in the size I needed. Alas, there were none.

Except… well, except a set of KnitPro interchangeable needles that were, before discount, around $70. I picked them up. I stared. I wandered back upstairs to see my friend. I gave in and went back downstairs, debit card in hand, and put the cotton back as if that would somehow make a huge difference on the price. Fortunately this paycheque I had a little extra to spare so I don’t feel too badly about it.

From my excitedly blurry photo you may deduce I was definitely not feeling badly about it. Holy crap I am so in love with these needles. One is broken, but Martina from the store is replacing it when she can. This does not deflect from the glory of these needles. Knitting on them is delightful. They’re smooth and slick and pretty. The cords don’t twist like my cheap plastic grey circulars. There’s lots of sizes and lengths and I am SO EXCITED.

So I cast on my Coachella. I’m about 25 rows in now and getting more and more excited the further I go.

These needles? Definitely worth it.

The Importance of Nail Varnish

Honestly I hadn’t noticed before just how predictable I am. I know that colour is important to me and I know that I bask in it. I know it’s one of the main reasons I like the higher-end yarns instead of acrylic; the richness of colour available is beyond compare.

It was first pointed out to me when I joined a knitting group in Whitby, ON a couple of months ago. I sat down, pulled out my socks made of Tosh Sock in a gorgeous greeny-blue colourway, and instantly several fellow knitters pointed out that my nail varnish matched it almost exactly. As did the hoody I was wearing at that time, but that was more coincidental. I assumed the nail varnish thing was incidental too until next time I went along with some green yarn (lovely squishy Cascade 220) and it was noted I was, of course, wearing green nail varnish.

Okay, I thought. I’m clearly crazy.

But then I got thinking about it. My nail varnish does match my knitting more often than not which isn’t hard as I own quite a lot of bottles of it – some of which I unfortunately left in England when I moved to Canada. I like to be cohesive.

Like here, as posted recently. Not deliberate in that case.

It bugs me when my nails don’t match. I tried it the other day; I started knitting my scarf out of bright red cotton with my nails still green and I couldn’t do it. It felt wrong. I didn’t feel like knitting.

I know when a battle is lost.

I traipsed through Zellers to find myself a bottle appropriate to my project. I squatted down in the messy aisles and pondered between two different shades. Considering I didn’t have the yarn with me at the time, I’m a little afraid at how perfectly my nails match my knitting. Seriously. They even shine in exactly the same way.

It’s interesting to know I’m a little obsessive about these things considering I’m not much bothered about the rest of my ensembles matching each other, let alone my knitting.

I can only hope I’m not the only one…

Vintage Knitting Magazines Amuse Me

Knitting is such an old tradition it would be strange, nay, insane not to dip one’s toe into the history of it. Especially if you are a bit of a nerd. Sometimes I read up on the ancient history of it; I enjoy feeling like the latest knit stitch in the vast fabric of life. Today though I’ve been reading a little closer to home.

You see, my good friend Frankie gave me some vintage Vogue Knitting Books. I’m not sure when they’re from but the prices are displayed in shillings and pence, so it’s been a while. At

first glance, I’d say sixties at the very latest but probably earlier. So far I can’t find a single date anywhere in the rather tattered and well-loved magazines. Laziness stops me from trying too hard.

Who needs to be precise when they’re full of amazing gems of a time gone by? I’m not even talking about the knitting patterns which are generally quite shapeless and stiff-looking. No, I’m talking about the adverts. The awkwardly posing women with heavily-lined eyes and bright red lips looking vaguely amused at the cameras. Serious-looking men with big watches. Some of them have cigarettes. Even more astoundingly, some of the women have wrinkles.

The adverts are usually quite wordy and laced through with rather forceful heterosexuality. Take a gander at this example, shown below a jaunty couple sporting rather ugly jumpers (sweaters for you North Americans):

“Here’s Wendy M1 the super-speed quality that beats everything in sheer speed and ease of knitting . . . a superb pure wool that’s new, modern and exciting to use as the new M1 Motor-way itself.
In a couple of evenings you can now knit this glorious, open air sweater which is all the vogue for outdoor occasions – and has a carefree fascination for chilly days within. Chunky. Bulky. Deliciously warm. Knit it in that special colour he loves to see you wearing. And what better than to knit him one too!”

And it’s only 8d post free!

That was from the 59th in the series. I have another one that’s much earlier – 37th. Some of the designs are quite pleasant in an angular sort of way. Obviously this edition was published before the prohibition of visible waistlines.

Most of the adverts are illustrations rather than photographs. One picture has an impossibly thin woman reclining over a slightly nonsensical attempt at literary seduction:

“On being Sophisticated.
An obvious but unaffected air of quality with a nonchalant acceptance of current fashion lines is essential.
The unselfconscious air of quality in Marriner’s Heritage wool places it way up top and the latest fashion trends in Marriner leaflet design show the way to sophistication.”

Perhaps they were hoping to stun their audience with the sparkling (and repetitive) vocabulary so that they don’t notice the complete lack of substance. Which, to be fair, is the general idea of most advertising.

One column advises customers to enquire to “J. & W. Bastard Ltd. at Frog Island Mills”. Teehee.

BREAKING NEWS! I found a date as I was scanning the tiny print for more hilarity. The 37th is from 1950. That’s the earliest I have. The others are the ccc45th, 51th and 59th. By flicking through the magazines you can see time ambling casually by. Restrictive women’s underwear slowly disappears, abandoning the defined waist somewhere in the 51st edition. There are fewer ads for baby-related products the further you step into the latter half of the twentieth century. Nylon is introduced to wool and they hit it off right away, embarking on a glorious and long-lasting romance that ends in fabulously wearable sock yarn. Everyone faints as machine knitting becomes popular, a sure sign that we’ll be living on the moon a few years later.

And, over half a century later, I get to sit here (on Earth, since there’s no yarn on the moon) giggling and sharing it with you.

How to Knit in the Round

When I started knitting I didn’t really get it. Same with crochet. With both of these crafts it finally clicked when I started in the round. It seems to flow much easier and I seem to find it less awkward to keep track of where I am in a pattern. I’m sure there are a lot of people who would much rather knit straight but given the choice, I’ll usually pick something knitted in the round.

There are a few methods of doing this, which I’ll lay out here. I am not comfortable enough with some of the methods to be able to instruct from scratch, so I’ll provide you with the links and resources to learn as quickly as I did.

Double Pointed Needles

These are needles that do not have the stopper at one end. They’re pointed on both sides – hence the name – and they’re usually quite a bit shorter than regular straight needles. They’re used a lot in knitting socks.

This is my preferred method for knitting socks and mittens/gloves. It looks a bit fiddly but once you realise you’re only ever knitting on two of the needles, it becomes much easier. The only problem is trying to avoid the obvious line through the bits where the needles switch, something I haven’t quite got the hang of yet. I learned through YouTube videos such as this one, though if you search for ‘knitting on double pointed needles’ a lot of tips and tutorials come up.

The most important thing with knitting on DPNs is that you don’t get the first stitches twisted. If you do, your sock is going to look more than a little strange and will be rather unwearable!

Circular Needles

These are needles specifically designed for knitting in the round; they’re generally used for larger projects than socks etc. They’re two straight needles attached to a flexible cord which comes in a variety of lengths.

I recently used a 16″ circular to knit my mum a hat, shown in the previous post. I also used the same needle to knit myself a headband using an offcentre rib stitch which I’m sure has a name but I have no idea what that would be! It was entirely improvised. Knitting on circulars is quite useful because you can slip the project down onto the cord when transporting. I’ve never had anything fall of circular needles, unlike DPNs; I have also used circular needles to knit straight just for the portability factor.

Have a look at this tutorial or this video. It’s quite a simple process, possibly the simplest of methods knitting in the round. All you need to bear in mind is picking the right size!

Magic Loop Knitting

This is the newest method for me. It’s where you use one long-cabled circular needle and knit small projects in the round – for example, I’m using this to knit mittens. You split the stitches down the middle with the cable. It’s very clever. I understand a lot of people prefer this to knitting with DPNs.

I only tried it a couple of days ago and for some reason I’d expected it to be a lot more difficult. It wasn’t – it was easy peasy! Me and a friend were watching TV so I didn’t want to watch a video on youtube which is my usual method of learning a tricky new skill in knitting. Turns out I didn’t need to: this tutorial from KnitPicks was more than enough.

It may look complicated and confusing but I promise it’s not. I’m not sure I’m completely sold on it; I still prefer knitting on DPNs but that’s a personal preference. The best thing about knitting is that there are so many ways to achieve the same or similar effects and it’s fun to try each of them out when you’re learning to know your own preferences.

So how do you do it?

Vintage Knitting, Craft Books and Cats

They had great covers, too.

I love old knitting books.

Unfortunately I can’t remember where I got this link but wherever it was, I’m endlessly grateful. I’ve said before that one of the reasons I find knitting so fascinating is its long and illustrious history. The most well-documented of this being, of course, the 1800s. With easy means to mass-produce books and other resources they spun out many patterns that are still accessible today. The above link gives you a great insight into the kind of things people would be knitting at the time.

This wonderful online resource for vintage books doesn’t just cover knitting. There’s all sorts of arts and crafts related books but of course I gravitate towards a certain sector! The image to your right shows the cover of a book/pamphlet that cost one shilling and is written ‘by a Lady’. It’s how to knit in a floral style and it’s simply charming. I would love to hold the physical book, flick through its pages and absorb it that way but since that’s not likely to happen any time soon, this is the next best thing. And there’s a lot of variety there which can suck away hours of your life as you read through all the old patterns and advice given to so many women through the years.

There’s also a book on there entitled ‘Ladies’ Work for Sailors’ which is a pamphlet explaining all manner of useful projects for those not able to shunt their work onto their wives. The fact that it’s called Ladies’ work is intriguing considering sailors must have been doing these kinds of things since time began, or else walking in holey socks throughout their seafaring days. The history of gender and knitting is something I’m planning on researching at some point since it’s a fascinating subject.

In more personal news, I’ve recently received a skein of Tosh sock in the colourway ‘Fjord’. It’s to knit a pair of Christmas socks for my girlfriend and to be honest, I haven’t had the best start. The skein was horribly tangled and it took me many, many hours to wind it into a ball which simultaneously wound me right up! Still, it’s done now and all I have to do is find a pattern for it.

Not the best match for colours, but you get the idea.

I’m actually tempted to make an ordinary plain sock without a pattern. I don’t think I’d need one now.

And yes, I’m still ignoring the sock with the messed-up toe. I’ll get to it!

In non-knitting news I spent a week cat sitting for Jane while she and Sophie were in France and I kind of… didn’t leave. At the moment my house is devoid of cats due to Dad moving to Southampton and when Jane and Sophie said I could stay here, I jumped at the chance. Mostly because Jane is such a lovely person anyway. She’s making her beautiful glass beads right now while I write this post and we’re listening to a bit of Joni Mitchell. What more could I want?

Oh that’s right. Absolutely gorgeous cats. She has two, Lou and Ruby, and they are lovely.

Lou...

…is a slightly shy, standoffish girl with gorgeous markings and lovely soft fur. She took a while to get used to me I think but one morning I woke up and she was sleeping beside me. She wouldn’t let me get up for ages, demanding attention with rather fierce headbutts to the face and now she seems to have accepted my presence.

Ruby...

…is a much more social kitty who took about fifteen microseconds to start attacking me for attention when I showed up. She’s sweet and likes to hit me over the head with her tail until I stroke her. She’s lucky she’s cute! But seriously, this cat is absolutely adorable and I want to pack both of them up and bring them with me when I eventually leave.

Now to work out how to stop these two little fiends attacking my knitting…

Renaissance Dyeing

Natural dyers of fine embroidery threads – Renaissance Dyeing.

Once in a while I’ll come across a site I simply have to share. It’s not because I’m sponsored by them or anything – this blog is purely free range – but because I’m so stunned by what they have to offer that I keep the tab open for days just to occasionally flick through and see the gorgeous things they produce.

This is one of them. Renaissance Dyeing is a company that uses traditional dyes to produce modern yarn. Their reasoning sounds pretty sensible:

Plant and natural dyes give a light and tonal vibrance to your work that cannot be matched by staid chemical dyes and they help not only protect you and yours but the environment as well.

I have to agree with them. Their colours are sublime. Take a look at some of their designer knitting kits such as the Urban Troubadour which is a gorgeous pattern with rich yet not overpowering colours suited perfectly to one another.

2012 is the year I’m going to learn to spin and dye my own yarn, just you watch; sites like this inspire me. I can’t promise I’ll be starting out with vegetable dyes but it’s certainly not something I’d considered much before and this company has changed that. Especially since you can order the extracts online to dye this way!

I stumbled on the site looking for yarn made from Poll Dorset sheep’s fleece, a breed that originated in my county. I stayed for the beautifully rich colours and the ethos of the entire site.

Since I can’t afford these wonderful goods on such a small budget right now, I’m hoping someone can buy some so I can live vicariously through you!

Five Things I’ve Learnt From Knitting and Crochet

1. First and foremost: the crafting world is richer and more diverse than I could ever have imagined. From the little old man knitting a pink scarf on the coach to the younger members of our Weymouth Stitch ‘n’ Bitch diligently learning to hold needles, the love of fibre arts spans generations. More importantly, these generations are brought together seamlessly by the love of craft. I’ve made some brilliant new friends through the Stitch ‘n’ Bitch and become closer to some I already had. All thanks to knitting/crochet!
2. Even simple things are fascinating. Just look at that item of clothing you’re wearing. Chances are it’s either knitted or woven from thread/s, which means you’re basically wrapped in a piece of tangled string. This has entertained me greatly since I started knitting and I recently spent an entire bus journey staring at some guy’s hat working out how it was made.
3. Fibre is fun. Far from boring me, I could quite easily have a conversation about sheep breeds and their wools. I’m interested in the weirder or rarer fibres such as qiviut or vicuña, though my wallet is not.
4. Knitting/crochet turns you into a nutter. See above points.

   

   And apparently I want one of these bad boys. (© Jenny Rollo)

5. Finally, fibre crafts link you to the past. There’s such a strong tradition of knitting, crochet and other similar arts—tatting and lace and the like—in so many different cultures that you could never learn all of it but it’s there. I can pick up a knitting book from the 1800s and knit the same purse that a young woman a century ago would have worn in her skirts. I can find old patterns and needlework encyclopaedias online. I can learn about Dorset buttons in a way that links me not only to the past, but to my past and my hometown’s past. It’s a tangible link and one of my favourite things about fibre arts and related crafts.

I welcome anything you might have to add!

The Magical Sock Saga: Part One

Socks are important. No, really. If you live somewhere soggy like England and have to wear nice waterproof shoes, you want your feet to be cosy inside. If you live somewhere cold you need all the layers you can get. They can be decorative (rainbow toe socks) or just plain functional (my dad’s 20 pairs of identical navy blue socks).

Here’s what Wiki has to say about socks and yes I’ve left the [1]s in so you know it’s the real deal, man:

A sock is an item of clothing worn on the feet. The foot is among the heaviest producers of sweat in the body, as it is able to produce over a pint of perspiration per day.^[1] Socks help to absorb this sweat and draw it to areas where air can evaporate the perspiration. In cold environments, socks decrease the risk of frostbite. Its name is derived from the loose-fitting slipper, called a soccus in Latin, worn by Roman comic actors.

The earliest surviving cloth socks, thereby proving that ancient Egyptians were Nightcrawler.

Well, that told you. Who doesn’t need a loose fitting slipper to cling to their sweaty skin? Exactly. Now that I’ve made the art of socks seem positively divine, I can proudly announce that I’m on an epic mission to produce one.

First up, I bought DPNs (double pointed needles). I have 10 sets of 5 DPNs in different sizes, all bamboo. Ebay is wonderful for that crap. All of that only cost me six quid! I adore bamboo crochet hooks and needles so this seemed to be the logical choice.

Next up, I purchased a yarn which is pretty enough to make me want to keep going. I would not work well with a solid colour as my attention span is not great. I am lucky enough to have a couple of brilliant yarn stores in my town which a wide selection of beautiful fibres but as I cannot resist anything vaguely rainbow (as anyone who knew me at college will attend) I had to go for Lang Yarns – Jawoll Magic Dégradé which is 75% new wool and 25% nylon which, in my research, seems to be a fairly good percentage for socks.

It's almost as classy as my flower-explosion purse/glasses.

I mean, look at it. How could I resist?

The next bit was the fun part. I’ve already tried knitting in the round on circular needles, resulting in a cowl that was absolutely lovely until I cast off way too tightly and it doesn’t fit. Clever Polo. I’ve tried ribbing in the same project. I’ve never tried to use DPNs so working out to handle that many sticks at once was a bit of a nightmare! First step? Casting on.

I always cast on/off too tight so I learnt how to use the Long Tail Cast On – that’s a link to a youtube video that got me perfectly capable of casting on well in no time at all. It’s really fun and rhythmic! I ended up casting on way too many stitches just because I couldn’t help myself.

As for swatching, well… I tried. By which I mean I have the attention span of a dead dog. I managed a few rows before I got bored and decided it was a good time to start knitting a the sock itself. Here’s how far I got:

Not very far at all, as you can see...

Still, who needs to be sensible and actually follow the process? It’s much more fun to wing it, right? I’m an expert at that. So I cast on my sock and I’m a couple of inches in but you don’t get a picture of that until next time.

And there will be a next time. I fear a new obsession may be born!