forever forgetting about blogging my knitting life, I'm sorry about that.

currently feel like i've lost my knitting mojo. but i cast on Gail today and got through two repeats, so I feel optimistic about being able to continue knitting. I'm hopeful the 100% silk will also give me a beautiful fabric.

from the list of things i wish I knew when I was starting out:

Dear cee:

you know you're hooked, honey, shell out for alpaca. wool. silk. merino. yes you'll have to wash them by hand and lay them out flat but you'll do it gladly. you'll wear them with pride. you'll be amazed at the eager spring of wool yarn. you'll stop to pet the alpaca just because the feeling is so soothing. the silk will gleam in your hands and make you feel like an artist.

(elann.com peruvian highland wool felts really easily, btw. don't put that sweater in the wash. not even in its own mesh bag in the gentle cycle with cold water. it will not be ok. you will cry. you will still be upset every time you see that picture of you wearing that sweater. Just don't do it.)

You. Love. Addi Turbos. Stop. Stop buying a single pair of addis in the right size for a project. as of this writing you have easily spent $400 on KNITTING NEEDLES because you saw the sticker on a starting set of Clicks and your cheapskate instinct rose up and your brain shut down. Now you feel like you can't buy a set of clicks because it's too late. Oh sweetie. You're pretty, you're smart, and you deserve them. and you're going to keep buying $20 circulars because you don't *like* knitting with anything else. Christmas is coming, dear.

you really enjoy making scarves. and hats. and mittens and gloves. and legwarmers. Not so much for the socks, but you know, there's enough sunshine to go around. But you hate being uncoordinated. So step back from the single skein single items. Think in terms of accessory sets - hat, scarf, gloves, legwarmers/bootcovers.

you *can* knit out of stash if you're excited about what you're making. You can resist a bargain because you have enough yarn at home. Those hours you spend browsing ravelry patterns and filling up your queue with hundreds of items? you're filling the well of ideas when you do that with a yarn in stash in mind. NOTE WHICH YARN IN YOUR STASH when you press queue or favorite. you might never make it. so? five different ideas for the same yarn doesn't mean you can't go looking for a sixth!

A lot of your satisfaction with knitting comes from the speed of your knitting. Beads frustrate you because they slow you down. Think twice about beaded projects...after you've done Celestarium, of course.

love,
cee

Talking about Taikatalvi

I'm working on another design.

I've named it Kaikatalvi, "Magical Winter" and it's a top down funnel neck contiguous tunic knitted in the round, and I'm very, very excited about this project. I bought 20 balls of Elann Peruvian Highland Wool, which is about my favorite yarn for designing it seems. I have no idea how many of those 20 balls this project will take.

I don't try to design with current fashion in mind. I design to please my inner fantasies about clothes, and this design touches on so many different dreams, and for so long. I have to design because I rarely find things in the store that match my mind's eye. This is filling the need for a sweater dress that I can wear with knitted tights and boots (or ice skates) so I can stay warm in a hard winter beautifully. It needs to have ease so I can layer beneath it, and it needs to have flare so I can move in it (in winter I continue to walk for transportation, as well as ride my bicycle and ice skate outdoors. maybe one winter I'll add cross country skiing or snowshoeing.)

The visual interest is the cable running down the center front. No one is surprised, as cabling is probably my favorite knitting fabric texture. The cable makes me think of ornamental braidwork on coats and scrolling flourishes of script calligraphy and wrought iron - if I wanted to push the art nouveau feel I would do the cable in black - and I'm mighty tempted to do a swatch just to see what it would be like.

I'm not very good at writing my designs out. I'm much more prone to swatching it out. I'm actually working on a mockup in leftover yarn balls, just going on the fly to see how my guesses work out, and then I plan on binding the edge, washing it, and blocking it to see how the needle size works with the yarn and the technique, and get a nice accurate gauge.

I'm also going to do a shoulder sloper, to work out any of the faults I find in the first sketch. The problem is that I don't generally do this stuff on paper. I just knit. I don't write stuff down. I need to find a way to record what I'm doing, because what is natural and unthinking to me has been examined by other knitters as extremely difficult and complex, and when I try to explain what I did, I lose people in the bushes.

But I'd really like to have a detailed series as I go through this design, to help me articulate what I'm doing, so maybe I could write a pattern that someone else could follow. Maybe not for this pattern - I still feel like I'm learning my craft when it comes to designs like this, but in the future.

knitting while I don't really have knitting flow

i really don't have knitting flow. I know it's been a problem for all of october. i'm still only halfway through my weeping angels socks, and I'm knitting a mystery shawl, a new cowl design, and a swatch for a future cable design that i hope will actually be a dress. but I don't really feel like i focus long enough to accomplish any work.

so maybe I need to just have a bit of fair dividing on my project. Sundays is ufo day and i'll need to do some more frogging.  i think my other sock should be my travel knitting, so i'll work on it on wednesdays and thursdays. thursday is also clue day for my mystery shawl, so it might be good knitting night take-along. Fridays is my design day. I'm nearly finished my swatch for the big cable, and then that project is being set aside. so maybe i'll do it on monday....

The best laid plans

I finished my waistcoat, and it looks just wonderful, and I am so, so pleased with it

But we didn't go to the Tweed run. it was BEASTLY hot, 27 degrees, and not even remotely resembling tweed weather! now it is though, it's lovely and crisp and I should go for a ride tomorrow.

after marathoning the waistcoat I am just frazzled and so I'm not knitting anything strenuous for the alphabet Kal this month. I'm knitting a lace cowl in fine alpaca, and I'm renewing my love for the fibre. it's so soft! and very warm, warmer than wool is. I've got quite a lot of alpaca laceweight and I am not sure what i'll do with it. I have ... 2400 yards in a deep charcoal grey? which is a fantastic amount. I would love to make a gloriously dramatic stole out of it. with sleeves. so this fabulously drapey gorgeous lace...I'll have a look round ravelry and see what there is to see.

I'm also quite thrilled because I put up a picture of my port elizabeth cowl in progress and it's now featured on the pattern page! that's the first time I've ever had my work featured. it's quite exciting!

I'm still not finished my first weeping angels sock. Poor thing! It's in my bag as bus knitting and I haven't gone anywhere. I have so many projects on the needles and three of them are cowls, two of them are socks - I am absurd! i shouldn't be so scatty.

High learning curve, little time

One of my other interests is cycling, and luckily my city has a pretty good social bike scene. we've started a semi-annual event called the Tweed Ride. This isn't original to us here in Calgary by any means.

I didn't go to the spring Tweed Ride because... well I didn't have any tweed. I did want to change that in time for Fall Tweed, which is the last Friday of the month. And I still didn't have any tweed!

Well, I've changed that a bit. I now have a nice tweed blazer, and it's something that i will wear all the time, rather than relegate it to costume status. I also picked up a pair of tweed pants that I'm going to cut to calf length to wear as cycling knickers. I already have a couple pairs of knee high cuffed socks that would work well.

And i'm knitting a waistcoat of my own design.

i swatched for it eight times before I settled on the cable pattern I wanted. I took my measurements and drew a quick schematic and I just started knitting it today.

I have...twelve days to complete the knitting, so time for blocking, and putting on the buttons and such.

I haven't found the blouse I'm going to wear under it. I might just wear my merino base layer and call it good. But the designing was an interesting experience. I'll keep track of it.

So how did I do on that Queue?

July

[x] Finish Giulietta socks - b project
[ ] Finish the pink dress
[ ] Weeping angels socks
[ ] Finishing Sylvi
[ ] Finish Circles of Noro cardigan
[ ] Elysium cardigan

 August

[ ] Elysium shawl August c project
[ ] Brown brocade texture vest
[ ] Celtic knit cabled capelet
[ ] Colour work capelet
[X] Better bucket hat 

Lots of revisions to this. I wound up getting into an accident that meant i couldn't knit for a couple of weeks, and frustration with gauge on weeping angels made me frog them and use a different pair of socks for my august project. They were Cubist socks by Cookie A and I got them finished before the August 31 deadline.

the Better Buck Hat was a three day long knit, and I'm calling it a success.

So, September.

[] Weeping Angels Socks
[] Dido Scarf
[] Cabled Vest

five projects in a month, HA! I have Weeping Angels back on the needles and I've got until tomorrow to get to the first heel turn.  I haven't cast on Dido yet.

I'm swatching like mad for a cable knit waistcoat, and I keep frogging back and rejecting my swatches. I'm on attempt four right now, and the cable is complex enough that I'm giving it a bit before I decide that I hate it. It is a very complex cable and I have my doubts about using it, but I'll give it a chance for a few more rows before frogging and going with attempt 5, which will simply be Saxon Braid.

...I'm being constantly bombarded by Ideas. The latest one is double-knit in black and white on bitty needles with small sarquhar-like squares, and you decide which motif to knit next by rolling dice. It's amazing me because all I have to do is start actually knitting for extended periods of time and my to-do list grows and grows. but now I have yet another project for my queue, and I'm reminded of the fuzzy circle wrap I want to make, and and and and and. I need another one of me so i can knit more stuff!

Progress on the queue

July

[x] Finish Giulietta socks - b project
[ ] Finish the pink dress
[ ] Weeping angels socks
[ ] Finishing Sylvi
[ ] Finish Circles of Noro cardigan
[ ] Elysium cardigan

So now I am free to cast on for weeping angels but I'm going to wait until I make progress on the pink dress and that means all projects will be in coventry for the rest of the weekend while I knit stockinette in the round.

 August

[ ] Elysium shawl August c project
[ ] Brown brocade texture vest
[ ] Celtic knit cabled capelet
[ ] Colour work capelet
[ ] Better bucket hat 



Something I didn't note - I already have the yarn for all of these projects, save the Better Bucket Hat.

HEY LOOK WHAT I FOUND

It occurs to me that since I have a lot of projects I want to do that I could keep track of them on a blog that connects to ravelry so anyone who wishes to read more of my distracted rambling about yarn can see just how many times I have an idea and then it changes or gets abandoned.

So I will now list my queue. which is unrealistically long. I know. I KNOW. But I want to put an order on things here so I don't forget about things that I want to do.

 July

[ ] Finish Giulietta socks - b project
[ ] Finish the pink dress
[ ] Weeping angels socks
[ ] Finishing Sylvi
[ ] Finish Circles of Noro cardigan
[ ] Elysium cardigan

 August

[ ] Elysium shawl August c project
[ ] Brown brocade texture vest
[ ] Celtic knit cabled capelet
[ ] Colour work capelet
[ ] Better bucket hat




I know. that's way too much knitting. I will never do all that in the time provided. This is just a way to try and stay on track. I know that things are going to get deferred and new projects will pop up, but right now, I am only using knitting time on my Giulietta socks and the pink dress which is stuck in stockinette hell. 


this list will be revised and I'll talk a bit more about my knitting much more often. Promise.

Euroflax sport: An idea.

That damn high maintenance yarn has been laundered, but not yet wound into balls.

After knitting up the shawlette, I have an idea for what to make of these skeins...

and I think I'm going to need a third one. *sigh* oh well, I will see when the time comes.

Scheaffer Anne: Star stitch shawlette

This skein of sock yarn? Loved it.

but I hate knitting socks. this is a simple fact. so it laid around for a while, until I decided to make it into a shawlette while I taught myself Star Stitch.

It's nice. I just have to figure out what I want for a border...

Louet Euroflax: high maintenance.

I have been tearing my hair out over this stuff.


I bought two skeins of Wuroflax wetspun fine yarn in a beautiful shade of brown, and it defies me at every turn.

apparently it biases when knitted in stockinette, so my notion of a simple draping design is out. apparently it's best for lace.

I suck at lace.

it's also stiff as twine and it doesn't matter how tiny my needles are, the stitches come out huge.

well the good ladies at ravelry say that it should be prewashed.

I've already wound it into balls.

*headdesk*

Adventures in Bargain Yarn - The Sean Sheep Sweater

I think I'm going to frog it and start over.

But I stare at it, all those stitches, and I just kind of muppet flail at undoing so much work. but at the same time, I've made a number of mistakes, there are things about it I want to change, and changing them means that I have to start over from the beginning.

And I'm going to. it may be bargain yarn, but it shouldn't be *wasted* yarn.

Please hold this thread as I walk away...

Sean sheep generic raglan sweater

...I don't have it in me to do a whole bunch of complicated cables, at the moment. The sean sheep is just a top down raglan, very plain jane mindless stockinette I can pick up and put down.

and even that sparks future project ideas. I have some more bargain yarn stashed away, and I'm going to make a dress from it. crazy to knit fall and winter garments in may, but...

The linen is intimidating me, bigtime. I'm scared that two skeins aren't going to be enough for a top. I can't stockinette it because it will bias. I didn't really want to make a lace top from this yarn, but I don't see much choice. so the linen project is still percolating, while I think it over and decide what's going to be best for it.

And i'm looking forward to this sweater. I think it's going to be just what I want - a classic.

Adventures in Bargain Yarn - Sean Sheep Armytage

I'm not going to call this sweater an original design or anything like that. I'm getting the cable stitches out of vogue stitchionary, and I don't think it's quite cricket.

Yeah I'm doing all the work of calculating how it works and everything, but eh. this is more of an exercise than anything else.

I'm not going with an allover Aran. I'm just doing a motif down the center front and back and down the arms, and that's basically it. I'm not going to get the stitch definition I would want for a formal aran, so I will save that for a better wool. like cascade 220, because I love that yarn.

Right now I'm doing a bit of calculation about how to place the cable motif while I'm doing the raglan increases and such. it's just a bit of marking the charts I wrote up, really. then once I've done that I can get rolling on seriously knitting it. It'll be nice to have for cool days, and I know i've got plenty of those. I swear spring is never going to come...

Adventures in Aran Design - Cables that SHAPE.

I've been in a creative frenzy. The ideas never seem to stop.

Just now I was on ravelry, and someone was asking about a girly aran pattern - a cabled sweater with feminine shaping. and my first thought was, "do ribbing on the sides."

Then it became, "create a cable motif with the shaping built in." and i have an amorphous sketch in my mind.

I'm going to go chase it for the Sean Sheep bargain sweater....

Adventures in Bargain Yarn - Sean Sheep Armytage

I usually style myself as a fiber snob on a budget. I usually buy yarn from local, independently owned yarn stores, and while I don't generally have the money to blithely grab whatever without a good hard look at the price tag and the yardage, I want to spend what money I have on the best I can get.

But I was in Wal-Mart. and I wandered into the crafting section. And found this 100% wool yarn by Sean Sheep for two dollars and seventy five cents per 75 gram ball.

so I bought ten of them in colorway "Alabaster." *shrug* It's wool. How bad can it be?

But I'm suspicious. Highly suspicious. So the first thing I did was knit up a proper gauge swatch, hand washed it with mild soap, and laid it out flat to dry. Knitted on 5 mm needles back and forth, I got four stitches to the inch, and 5.667 rows to the inch.

With that much yarn, I think I'll do a sweater. Calgary being what it is, I'll get plenty of opportunity to wear it throughout the year... I'm envisioning cables, even though it is a self striping yarn. A pullover. I'll have to work out which cable motifs I want...

The freestyle top-down femme tee

I wrote plenty on this piece in my project notes, but a bit of a retrospective might not hurt.

This was my first project in a fibre that wasn't animal based since I started to knit seriously. I love the yarn. I adore the yarn. I praise this yarn to the skies. It's so very soft - something that turned me off cotton was the rough feel of cotton.

To knit it at first, my right hand got sore. But I set it down and worked with sproingier wool when I knew I had to stop knitting but didn't want to stop knitting. I think I will always have a sproingy project going at the same time as knitting something with cotton or...*gulp* linen.

I started this from the top down, in the round. It is one piece. I did not break the yarn anywhere on this project.

I used stitch markers to keep track of where my shaping was at. I kept four markers on this project, though their positions changed.

The noticeable bust shaping on this piece, it is joyfully deliberate. It's done specifically to draw the eye. It's my adaptation of a popular in the late 50's and early 60's bust darting, where the seam was definitely part of the point. the darts are in a V shape, meant to give the visual effect of more bustiness and to play on the fact that my overbust measurement doesn't have as much difference to the full bust measurement as my midriff to full bust measure does. And the visual effect works. *evil cackle*

The waist to hip increases are *not* where one would expect. instead of being at the center side, the shaping goes over the hipbones. The other good place would be at the back, where skirt darts would accommodate the buttocks. since I was looking to create a visual hourglass, I went with the increases at the hipbones, to emphasize the flaring from waist to hip. the curving is something I would really exploit in a ribbed/cabled style, and that's something I may do in a future design.

It is becoming evident

That I am going to need a design journal for knitting. I don't really mean to write to an audience, but if someone is looking for notes on something I made on ravelry, I'll do my best to tag it so those things can be found.

And post entires that are one thing at a time for simpler reference.

This post can also serve as a bit of an index, I suppose...