FO: Butternut Scarf!

I bought yarn and pattern for this project at Sock Summit in 2009 (Glory Days DK weight BFL, dyed by Briar Rose Fibers, pattern by Anne Hanson) and cast on last October.  Somehow I got very sidetracked and only just now finished it.  Still, just in time for fall! I tend to like my scarves on the long side, and I figured there wasn’t much point in saving leftover yarn, so I kept going for a while.  The finished, blocked scarf is 9.5” wide and 79” long. This is my first real lace piece and it needed to be blocked seriously, as lace does.  Luckily, my friend Gretchen has blocking wires, which I borrowed for this task.I also had a heck of a time photographing this.  I’m not sure the colors are done justice in these pictures.  Come visit, and I’ll show you my scarf!

Felici, di nuovo

I was at a conference last weekend so of course, I took my knitting along.  When I travel, I always worry that I’ll run out of knitting (doesn’t everyone?) so I cast on for another pair of simple socks and threw them in.  I didn’t touch them at the conference, but they’ll be perfect for my next travel knitting.

A plain vanilla pair of socks for Boy 2 out of Felici: When I was knitting the pink Felici socks recently, Boy 2 frequently petted them and talked about how soft they were.  (Felici is unusually soft for a sock yarn that includes nylon.)  I promised him a pair of Felicis and showed him the colors I have in stash.  He picked this one.  This is one boy who’s not afraid of color!  This is one of their older colorways, called Aurora, that has stripes of differing widths.

Boy 2 responds strongly to softness and texture.  I have a tiny yarn cake of cashmere laceweight yarn out in the living room right now which he immediately asked me about.  “Mama, what is that blue yarn? It is soooooooo soft!”  It was fun to be able to tell him about cashmere and let him rub it on his neck.  This is the first laceweight yarn I have ever purchased.  Lace normally isn’t my thing.  But was I entranced by one of Anne Hanson’s latest creations, the Campanula Scarf, and thought I’d give it a try.  I actually cast on and knit a few rows of this, but I struggled so with the slippery metal needle I had.  I think I need a different needle to work this.  I ended up goofing and frogged the whole thing.

But this scarf will be MINE – lacy cashmere scarves should NOT go to kindergarten!

Night watch report

This is the sock I’ve been working on in preparation for and since the sock design class I took with Anne Hanson.  The yarn is Dream in Color Smooshy in “Night Watch,” a gorgeous non-pooling colorway that is a study in blue and purple (and a pinch of green, too).  My sons gave me this yarn for my birthday a couple of years ago – what excellent taste they have!

This sock combines several stitch patterns.  The one on the top is “gulls and garter,” and I think the “gulls” highlight the handpainted yarn very well.  After an inch or so of transition (good old garter rib), I begin a twisted rib pattern that serves as the “water” in this picture.  Gulls flying over water at night… does that work?

Here’s a closeup of the gulls:

With luck, I’ll finish the toe tonight and be able to start sock #2.  I got distracted this week by some felted nesting boxes (which are knit but not quite felted yet).

Fiber Fun in Frederick

On Saturday, I went to Frederick, MD, for the Indie Artist Celebration held by Eleganza Yarns.  Many independent fiber artists were there (about 14 vendors), and Anne Hanson brought a trunk show:There were a lot of lace shawls and some sweaters, too.  Anne modeled the sweaters and talked about them.  Here is the sweater Ondulé:

It was so interesting to see the sweaters in person that I’ve seen on the blog.  I thought Sprössling was a bit of a celebrity in her own right!

If you looked at it just right, the trunk show formed a very inviting tent of handknits:

I met my friend Julie at the show and she was quite taken with several shawls.  (She had just taken Anne’s lace class earlier in the day, so she was definitely inspired!)

(This event took place in an antique shop, in case you’re wondering about that stuff in the background.)  I wasn’t the only one taking photos.  Here is Anne’s husband, the famous David Whitfield.  I was tickled to take pictures of him taking pictures of us.  I wonder if he noticed?  (Steven, your wonderful sweater is named for David, of course!)

Believe it or not, I only bought one skein of yarn, this sock yarn from Dye Dreams.  I love its dreamy blue-gray tonal colorway:

Julie and I did a bit of window shopping in downtown Frederick and ate dinner at a yummy Ethiopian restaurant.  We were seated at this basket and learned to eat properly with no utensils besides our fingers:

Today (Sunday), I went back for a sock design class with Anne.  It was wonderful.  I took a lot of notes and have a new sock sketched out.  I have about 2” knit so far – look for an update in the future.  Here we are, both in handknit sweaters (hers is Jackie, the female version of Whitfield, and mine is the Must Have Cardi):

And finally, here is a peek at the kind of work we did.  Look at that concentration from my tablemates Terry (on the left) and Connie.  Stitch dictionaries and calculators were everywhere (and now I have at least one new stitch dictionary I would like to obtain).  Connie was at yesterday’s lace class, too, and she said “I sat next to someone else from Gettysburg yesterday… her name was Gretchen.”  I just smiled and said “oh yes, I know Gretchen!”  Small town and all…

I had a thoroughly good time at all these events and am looking forward to more in the future.  What a great weekend!

Homework

I’m taking a Sock Design workshop with Anne Hanson of knitspot this Sunday at Eleganza Yarns in Frederick, MD.  Here is the course description:

Unleash your inner sock designer under the expert tutelage of Knitspot's Anne Hanson! This comprehensive beginning design class covers fit and sizing, working with textured motifs, appropriate design choices for the sock architecture, tips and tricks for achieving desired results, marriage of elements, charting, and pattern writing. Students will draft a sock pattern using a knit/purl stitch of choice. Students should have experience in sock knitting and be proficient with multiple needles (DPN's, 2 circs, etc.) and be comfortable with increases and decreases. Materials list will be emailed to participants prior to workshop.

I received the list earlier this week, and there is also a bit of homework:

Materials Needed: paper, pen, calculator, graph paper, stitch markers, one skein of sock yarn for project work (100 gr.), sock needles appropriate for yarn of choice. Additionally, students should bring a book of stitch patterns, and have several 4-6 stitch patterns marked as possibilities. Students should choose several stitch patterns for possible use in their design and work swatches in the chosen yarn to determine needle size.

A book of stitch patterns… I only have one true stitch dictionary, a Christmas gift from Steven and Jeff a few years ago (if I didn’t have that, I guess I would have gone to the Charlene Schurch books or put a call out to my local knitsibs for help).  I took one pass through the whole book and flagged a bunch of designs.  Then I took a second pass through the flagged pages and moved only 5 post-its to the side – those are my finalists:

And then I started swatching the Gulls and Garter pattern.  Here is what it looks like in the book: Here’s my swatch (the yarn is Dream in Color Smooshy in colorway “Night Watch”).  Gulls and Garter is at the very bottom.  Then I decided I didn’t like the Garter so much, but I thought Gulls could fly in a checkerboard pattern.  Oops, at first the gulls are too far apart.  Move them closer.  Nah, put them back in nice neat columns and throw some other stuff (not garter) in between them.  Hmmmm. Then switch to diagonal rib stripe.  Re-remember how to do a 1x1 right twist cable without a cable needle and without letting a loop hang.  Decide to make them all go left and learn why the left twist diagonal rib stripe is not in the book at all.

Then decide to wait until class to knit any more – I have 6.5” on this, which is practically a full sock leg’s worth.

But this is exciting, no?

I love homework. 

Hooray, Tesserae, Jr.

I finished a pair of Tesserae socks for my 5-year-old friend, Anna:

These went even faster than the ones I made for myself, as I only cast on 48 stitches.  The yarn is Dream in Color Starry (the Smooshy yarn base with silver sparkles) in colorway “Cocoa Kiss.”  Maybe you can see the sparkles a little better in my old stash photo?

Anna was abroad all last fall.  Before she left in August, she made a point of telling me that her previous pair of handknit socks was too small.  I told her I would make her another pair when she got back – what color did she like?  She surprised me with “black.”

But okay, sure, black!  I got sparkly black to be on the safe side (thanks to Twisted’s awesome inventory at Sock Summit).

When I saw her again earlier this month, I said “I have some yarn to show you.  Do you remember what color you said you wanted before you left?” and she said “PINK?”  Uh-oh. 

Luckily, the sparkles won her over.  She happily tripped out of my house wearing her new socks today.

Maybe I should start one of those big thermometer thingies to keep track of how much of my Sock Summit yarn I’ve knit. Let’s see, I think I came home with enough for 10 new pairs.  I’ve already knit the StitchJones Glam Sock, Kitchen Sink Dyeworks Luxe Merino Fine, Purl Up & Dye, and Dream in Color Starry. 4 down, 6 to go.

I haven’t started the Starry Deck the Ball yet, but I promise that I will soon.  (you know who you are!)  :)

Hooray, Tesserae

It always surprises me how quickly a project can be completed if you knit on it monogamously.  This was supposed to be my office knitting project, but I kept toting it back and forth between work and home, and the knitting went fast.The pattern is Anne Hanson’s Tesserae, a sock pattern I’ve had my eye on for a while.  I think maybe Gretchen has this pattern and that’s where I first saw it?  Anyway, when I saw the pattern again at Sock Summit, I grabbed it.  It is a deceptively simple knit-purl pattern that creates what looks like a traveling wavy stitch.  See it up close? Because this is all knit and purl, it’s sort of a rib, which means it looks different when it stretches – see? But I find it pleasing either way.  This stitch pattern would be gorgeous in a cowl – it would have the stretch to go over one’s head but then relax into the wavy line again.  Hmmmm.

This yarn is Kitchen Sink Dyeworks Luxe Merino Fine (80/10/10 merino/nylon/cashmere) and boy, is it soft.  It was downright luxurious to knit with.  I got it at Sock Summit, also.  The Kitchen Sink Dyeworks booth felt like a calm, soothing oasis in an otherwise tumultuous sea of color.  The sign claimed that these yarns would not pool – and this one did not!  I don’t normally buy grey-ish yarns, but this one just felt right.  Upon close inspection, it contains whispers of bluish-green, as well.  I have 17 g remaining.

I enjoyed knitting this pattern so much that I immediately cast on another pair in a new yarn.  They are for a 5-year-old girl, so I only cast on 48 stitches.  They are going even faster.  New photos soon!

Fall into a new scarf

I’m not a prolific scarf knitter, but I tend to get the itch about once a year.  It’s that time.  The bulk of the leaves have fallen from the trees.  Dusk is falling when I leave work at 5 pm.  The days are still warm, but it can be 40 degrees when I leave home in the morning. 

Scarf weather. I got both this yarn and pattern at the Briar Rose Fibers booth at Sock Summit back in August.  The yarn is Briar Rose Glory Days, a DK weight Blue Face Leicester.  Briar Rose yarns don’t have colorways – each skein is unique.  Many of them are quite large, too, so that you have enough for your project – this skein is 1000 yards/16 oz.  (I wish now that I’d taken a picture of one of those man-sized hanks we saw at the booth – truly impressive!)  This particular yarn seemed moody and contemplative, perfect for late fall.

I’m using Anne Hanson’s (Knitspot) pattern Butternut Scarf.  The pattern calls for a laceweight yarn and this is much heavier, so I reduced the number of pattern repeats from 4 to 2. 

The back of the scarf is different but no less attractive, in my book.  I hate scarves that only look good on one side.  You can always tell in photographs when a scarf has been styled to only show one side.  Bleh!  Real scarves don’t behave like that!  My scarves don’t have to be identical on both sides, but they do need to be attractive on both sides.  Here’s how the back is shaping up: This charted pattern is a 24-row repeat and requires paying attention on each row (no easy purl-back lace) so I’ve been knitting on it exclusively at home.  I need to step up the pace if I’m going to wear it this fall, though!