FO: Alva

I just released a new free shawl pattern on Ravelry: Alva. Alva takes one ball of Rowan Kidsilk Haze Stripe (or two balls of regular Kidsilk Haze) and is knitted on 5mm needles. My sample is knitted using sh. 200 ("Twillight").

I designed Alva because while I love the new KSH yarn, there was a real dearth of patterns available for it. I wanted a simple, straightforward knit which would showcase the colours. Alva is designed for beginning knitters which is why the lace edging is optional (and written out rather than charted). .

I find it is very different to design for yarn support (which I guess Alva is) rather than design for myself. With yarn support, I keep the end user in mind: who would be knitting this pattern? What skill level am I aiming for? How can I make this even easier to knit? I want my design to be accessible to as many people as possible. This is a fun challenge - and actually more than a challenge than it is to design for myself.

My Karise shawl is currently being knitted in a KAL on Ravelry. It was also designed for yarn support, but I took advantage of being able to play around with charts. S. of MooncalfMakes described Karise as having "..a kind of architectural quality to it, like wrought iron-work or granite carvings." I consider this a huge compliment: I find architecture incredibly inspiring and I hope Karise would have a certain sense of stillness to its lace. It is possibly the closest I have come to designing anything for myself.

I look around Ravelry and I see increasingly complicated lace shawls being showcased. In my own quiet way I guess I'm reacting against that trend. I just don't get it. I do not want to wear things that have 1001 details. I would feel overwhelmed, drowning in frills and bobbles and twisted stitches. I would much rather wear a carefully edited shawl, something understated, something knowing. Maybe it is the Scandinavian in me, maybe it is because I like sparseness in most things.

And William Carlos Williams and his This Is Just To Say was just as difficult to write as, say, Ezra Pound's Cantos (if not more), this liberal arts grad girl would like to point out.

On a whole other note, Fourth Edition is being moved about in the next few weeks. Stay tuned for disruption (unless I manage to work things out quickly).

PS. 'Tis now the season for CRAP light so until April, expect bad photos.

Almost There Or There-abouts

It's now November. Seriously, where did this year go? I remember I had plans to knit 11 hats in 2011. Clearly that did not happen. I look at my Ravelry page and I cannot see many finished objects - but I did knit and knit and knit in the 11 months we have had so far. 2011 has been the year of knitting swatches and tidbits relating to my work and has been sadly lacking on the personal knitting front. However, my dining table is currently littered with projects. Here is a list of what is on my table:

• One pair of fingerless gloves: almost complete. One glove just needs the thumb knitted and ends woven in.
• Rowan Kidsilk Stripes shawl: sadly not mine to keep but just needs another five rows + blocking and then pattern written up.
• Lacy shrug: Or how I turned one potential oversized knit into something wearable. I just need to crochet edging on one sleeve and weave in ends. (ETA: Done!)
• Snapdragon Tam: Alas, this is a tale of woe. I ran out of yarn 11 rows from the end. I bought the pseudo-Malabrigo as a one-off back in 2008. The hat has been ripped out and I'll need to consider what to make with the yarn.
• Lumley, or The Red Cardigan Of Doom: I need to reknit the lower halves of two sleeves, weave in ends, sew on buttons, ignore an unfortunate bit of grafting (that noone else will see, anyway), pretend it becomes me, and wear it on my London trip this forthcoming Thursday.

Apart from Lumley, all the other projects can be finished within a couple of hours, if that. And Lumley should only take half a day to complete ... (insert feet dragging)

One project that is not sprawling across the dining table? My Norn jumper. I finished knitting the lower half of the body, then split for the front and back, and am currently almost done with the back. It is just not on my knitting agenda right now with other things taking precedence.  I'm half-tempted to rip it all out (again) and knit the entire jumper flat like it actually states in the pattern. No real reason. Just a thought. Of course that way madness lies..

Future plans? I have a new design heading for release towards beginning of December and I need to knit the sample. I should quite like to make something from my Ravelry queue too - just a hat or some fingerless gloves as I really do not have the time for another garment-size project. And I need to make a rather big present in time for it to get shipped across to Denmark for Christmas.. fortunately this present is machine-sewn rather than knitted.

Phew. I think I need to get cracking. Fortunately my new needles have just arrived.

The Truth About Magic Loop

Ever since I discovered the Magic Loop method, I have been a convert. Not only do I knit everything on circular needles but if the pattern calls for knitting in the round, I will invariably use Magic Loop rather than seek out double-pointed needles. I confess that my love for circs has very little to do with current knitterly trends, but rather that I like knowing I have all the needles I need at hand. I used to spend hours searching for that elusive fourth DPN but no more. But using my circular needles for Magic Loop comes with a price. My needles do not last very long. The needle tips are not the problem; the cable is.The method puts an awful lot of stress on both the joins between the tips and the cable, and the cable itself.

I once bought a cheap set of circular needles off ebay. Friends did so too and are still knitting with theirs. The cable on mine snapped within a week. Then I bought some Pony Bamboo circs which quickly became my favourites (yes, above the much-praised KnitPro needles). They had a lovely grip to the surface which made them perfect for knitting with slippery fine yarns as well as thicker, coarser wool. The tip itself was slightly blunt which I actually tend to prefer for lacework and the cable was beautifully supple. It took three years of constant use before the cables started snapping - then within two hours this past week both sets of circs had cable-malfunctions.

I began looking into possible replacements. Sadly Pony no longer makes the exact same needles, so I opted for some wooden Addi needles out of curiosity. I wanted a strong cable (for obvious reasons) but I also wanted the friction you get with wooden needles. I did pause before placing my order: being a lace knitter I'm particular about the join between the needle tip and the cable and regular Addis irritate me with their annoying tiny little bumps.

Why not Knit Pros? I own and I adore my KnitPros. Their cables are very strong and the tips is simultaneously smooth and 'grippy'. However, I do have that annoying tendency to misplace things - KnitPro tips included. As I could not find non-interchangable circs in the required sizes, I had to look elsewhere.

I have a lot of things in the to-do pile and I have a lot of things in the almost-finished pile. Hopefully my needles will be with me soon..

Whatever Makes Her Happy

Pictured: everyday life in Casa Bookish. I am knitting. He is solving the cryptic crossword.

As for my knitting project, it is something I have been meaning to knit for years. I bought some pseudo-Malabrigo Worsted about three years ago, then Ysolda Teague released the Snapdragon Tam pattern and I just knew I was going to combine the two someday. But like most of those certainty-projects I have simply been saying "one day" for far too long.

I needed to knit something that was all about me after having done so many work-related projects recently. I cast on whilst heading north and then I pursued my project in a very fulfilling leisuredly manner. This means I have not had a set rows to finish every day, I have not picked it up at set times, and I have not come to groan at the sight of it. This is a satisfyingly selfishly slow knit.

(Insert Händel's cry of Hallelujah here)

I did worry (and continue to do so) that I shall run out of yarn. I took to Twitter to ask plaintively whether people could sooth my nerves (they could) and then I looked at my projects page. I made a Snapdragon out of one skein of Malabrigo Worsted just last year. They say your memory is the first thing to go.. but just to make sure I have also weighed the hat-in-progress and measured that against the remaining amount of yarn. Because I can get that obsessed about knitting.

(That reminds me of the time that my lovely knitting partner-in-crime E. walked up to waiting staff at our local haunt and asked if she could borrow the kitchen scales as she needed to weight a rapidly diminishing ball of yarn. They never looked at us the same.)

In other crafty news, today I attended a lovely crochet workshop with Carol Meldrum. Whilst I am a deft hand at crocheting, joining crochet motifs in an orderly fashion had always eluded me before today. I'm happy to report that not only did I manage to follow Carol's instructions and join four lacy squares - I also worked out how to join lacy hexagons .. all by myself! I was a tad smug until it dawned on me that I should have learned these tricks about thirty years ago. I foresee many beautiful crochet blankets in my future - I have several blankets/scarves favourited already and soon it shall be my turn.

Oh, whatever makes her happy on a Saturday night..

Swings & Roundabouts

This was supposed to be my first step into autumn knitting. "Grab some lovely yellow yarn (sure to brighten up the dreich days of Scotland) and whip up some quick wrist warmers". That was my plan last night and I felt quite pleased with myself when I found a very suitable pattern on Ravelry. Except I have now spent more time rewriting the pattern than I would have spent designing and writing my own pattern. Sometimes you get what you pay for with free patterns:

• spelling mistakes to the point of rendering the pattern incomprehensible
• using wrong terminology to explain specific actions (CB4/C4B clearly means something different to the designer than it does to me)
• Instructions that look like short row instructions - except there are no short rows in the pattern
• And if you follow the pattern you end up with a fingerless glove which looks very weird on my hand (the thumb goes where?)

Maybe I am the odd one as a handful of people have knitted these gloves and they all loooove the pattern? Or maybe they are best friends with the designer? I'm in a very cynical mood today. The lone glove is going to the frog pond to die and I am going to find a tried-and-tested pattern (at least 100 projects) for my autumn knitting.

Grumble.

But lovely, lovely things happen too. Look what landed on my doorstep yesterday!

Ms Mooncalf had run out of wool for a current project and I just happened to have ½ a ball of the right yarn in the right colour.

One swap later and I have the pincushion I so desperately need for my dress-making adventures - handmade and in my favourite colours! - and she even included some gorgeous coasters too. Bless her, Casa Bookish is not a household that uses coasters but I shall think of a way to put them to good use.

Thank you very much, dear swap partner!

Some Thoughts About Yarn

A long time ago I wrote about books. I remember one specific thing I wrote: how I built my library on the ideas of possibility and potential. My books were purchased because I wanted the possibility of spending a heady afternoon with lord Byron or a quiet, thoughtful evening with AS Byatt. Often I wanted the potential read more than I wanted the actual read. I think the same thing goes for yarn. The other evening I saw a moth fly out of the yarn cupboard. A tiny, beige creature of winged doom. I opened a bag and saw another moth perched on a ball of yarn. Gasp, splutter, this-only-happens-to-others, and I flung the offending bag into the freezer. I subsequently started rummaging through my other bags and only spotted one other bag with potential destruction (i.e. one very dead little beige monster). A bit of a wake-up call. This does not just happen to other knitters.

Luckily our local supermarket has a deal on plastic containers with lids. I bought three huge ones and started to re-pack all my yarn. It was time for another wake-up call. Three containers only scratched the surface of my yarn stash. I need eight more containers if I need to keep all of my yarn safe from moths (or the scourge of Glasgow tenements, carpet beetles). Eight. Eight.

I had to sit down on the (yarn-covered) floor for a moment. Deep breath.

The thing is, I have some lovely yarn in my stash that I cannot wait to knit. I have earmarked some of it for projects: Flyte, Shirley, Acer, Snapdragon, Miette, Still, Topstykke, and - oh - those thirty odd shawls I need to design. You know.

But the majority of the yarn is there because of the possible, potential projects. What to make with my three hanks of Noro Cashmere Island? Or the two hanks of Sirritogv Colour? Or the yak laceweight? The mountain of Kidsilk Haze? Often I think I want the potential knit more than I want the actual finished object.

When I moved across the North Sea, I had to get rid of most of my books. I marked them with tiny stickers. Red: We’re through. Yellow: we need to talk. Green: we’ll be together forever. Eventually I got rid of the reds and yellows (freecycle was useful). It felt like such a relief. A millstone removed. But six years later, I can still see the gaps, the ghosts. I still reach for books I no longer own.

I wonder how I will deal with my yarn stash in years to come.