You’d think I’d have gotten more done in two days. Beats me where those two days have gone, and I don’t even have alcohol as an excuse. Anyway, here’s the washed version of the second swatch, seen in the last post.

I really like the 2×2 basketweave pattern on the right more than the staggered 1×1 rib on the left, but it’s nearly obscured by the fuzziness of the alpaca. Also not so close to the row gauge of the Dura-Europos adaptation. So I tried enlarging it:

Then I realized that these two versions, 3×3 and 4×4, would fight the 2×2 rib I’ve settled on. So finally I elongated the 2×2 basketweave by keeping the k2b-p2 pattern for one more row, with only one row of plain stockinette after instead of two. It’s still a 4-row pattern, but instead of this:
R1: *K2b, p2*, repeat to end.
R2: *P2b, k2*, repeat to end.
R3: *K1b*, repeat to end.
R4: *P1b*, repeat to end.
…it’s this:
R1: *K2b, p2*, repeat to end.
R2: *P2b, k2*, repeat to end.
R3: *K2b, p2*, repeat to end.
R4: *P1b*, repeat to end.
And it pops a lot more, even with the alpaca fuzz. See?

Okay, it’s still kinda subtle, but I like that. Here’s a bigger version (158K).

So. Swatching is done. On to the math. Still might be able to cast on by sometime tomorrow!

I tried to take pictures at last night’s WeHo S’n'B, but the camera crapped out. I don’t know why, I’ve only had it six years. That’s it. I ordered a new one. In the meantime, Ellen B. got a bunch of good ones. (Laurie, we missed you!)

Swatching for a new sweater in Henry’s Attic Peruvian Tweed 100% alpaca from Catnip Yarns (scroll down about halfway). I get 6 stitches to the inch, which is sport weight, not really “light worsted,” so I’m holding two strands together in hopes that this can be a reasonably quick knit. In stockinette stitch, 2 strands together, I get 5 stitches to the inch. That’s worsted weight.

Now this being alpaca, it lacks the elasticity of wool. When the yarn stretches, it tends to stay stretched. The nature of knit fabric is to bounce back a little, but if the yarn gets gradually longer, so does the fabric. Two strategies I know of to mitigate against this tendency are (1) use a slip-stitch pattern; and (2) use a twisted-stitch (knit through the back loop) pattern. I’m trying out the latter here. The Dura-Europos pattern I originally had my eye on is a twisted-stitch pattern; that’s why I thought of it for this stuff.

I adapted the Dura-Europos I motif as an allover pattern. After knitting this swatch several times (I kept pulling it out and making further adjustments), I am very clear that I do not care to knit this throughout the entire sweater; it’ll take years. But I could do a panel of one repeat. Here’s the swatch:

This is one-and-a-half repeats. You can see here that the bottom of this motif “takes up” — it makes the bottom of the fabric curve upward. That’s because the part of the motif that’s at the beginning of the pattern uses increases in the center.

In the above swatch, where I’ve half-dropped the motif, you can see that I’ve smoothed out that upward curve using short rows in that part of the motif, but on the left side, the part of the motif that has decreases in the center, the lower edge curves downward. I didn’t use any short rows there. I did in an earlier incarnation of the swatch, below the garter stitch ridges, in hopes of pushing the motif edge up, and I didn’t like it. So I think what I have to do is make my short rows wider, still under the part of the motif that’s at the right.

The sides take in a little, too, but I think with some more solid fabric at the right, it won’t be so bad; the left side of the main motif, to the left of center on the swatch, is okay.

Here’s another swatch, checking out two “ground” patterns, also using twisted stitches:

The first thing to notice is the difference in row gauge! Obviously, I have to compare these two ground patterns with the motif swatch above to see which is closer to it in row gauge. Can’t do it right now, because I washed this swatch after scanning it; need it dry to measure it. I can tell you that the row gauge difference is still obvious after washing.

The second thing to notice is the biasing. This may be partly due to the strand running through the stitches at the end in lieu of binding off. The biasing seems much less pronounced after washing, but I won’t really know until it’s dry.

Another point worth making: This alpaca is fuzzy. Stitch definition is not all that hot (it’s exaggerated in these scans, it’s not really this crisp). One would be well within one’s rights to criticize the choice of twisted stitch patterns on this basis. However, my choice stems from the inelastic property of alpaca. So I’m going with twisted stitch patterns despite the relatively poor stitch definition. I’m leaning toward the ground pattern on the upper left, because its stitch definition is a little better than that of the one on the right.

Also: I generally work in the biggest possible pieces rather than seam stuff together. But side and underarm seams might well help reduce stretching. So for the first time in I don’t know how many years, I’ll be knitting a sweater in separate pieces and sewing it together. Maybe even the button band and collar (this is going to be a shawl-collar cardigan).

Need maybe one more thing to separate the main motif from the ground pattern, like a small cable or something. Or just a single twisted knit stitch flanked by purls. Hope to cast on by Saturday. If I work on it steadily, I could have it done by the end of November. However, I have other knitting plans for November as well (mwah-ha-ha…), so target completion date is around Christmas.

…and posted an “About Me” page. Gosh, I’m boring.

I noticed a slight error in the Preemie Baby Sweater pattern. Ironically, the error was in the “Finishing” section. For the collar, it said, “On Right Front, wrong side facing, beg 2 sts from center edge, pick up and knit sts from neck edge as follows: 19 sts from Left Front…” which makes no sense. So now it says “On Left Front…”

I’ve also referred the knitter to the Notes section (beginning of pattern) at those points where details for the instructions given are in the Notes.

Guess I should start a “Patterns” page. And an “About Me” page, too, huh. Does anybody really care about stuff like what decade I was born in, which coast, what religion I’ve relinquished, family structure, etc.? If anyone comments requesting an “About Me” page, I’ll consider doing one, I guess. I suppose I could keep it to my knitting history. Nah, too long. And too boring, judging by what people knit these days.

Almost two weeks since I last posted? How is that possible? I shot a couple of photos, but didn’t post them. I mentioned (and posted pix of) a baby sweater I’ve been designing for use in a finishing class. The yarn I was testing with was this horrible old, hard, scratchy acrylic. So I bought something yummy and redid it in that, which necessitated re-writing a lot since the gauge was completely different. Still, it came out fine. (The horrible old, hard, scratchy acrylic will be perfect for tying skeins before dyeing. See, everything has its use!)

Here are the photos I shot a week ago. The back and fronts of a very small sweater, plus a ball of the yarn used (in a different color; gotta knit this again for use in the class):

The pins are for counting rows (I put one every 10 rows), so I can make sure the front and backs match. Closeup of the yarn label:

Well, the sweater’s finished. Bought buttons, sewed ‘em on and everything. Here she is:

And just for laughs, here’s the pattern: Preemie Baby Sweater (3 pages, 184K)

So that’s done. Still haven’t gotten feedback from the yarn store that has my proposals. But she doesn’t have this pattern yet, either. I’ll email it to her, but she’s one of those people who need you to call them and tell them you sent them an email. Too late today, store’s closed; I’ll call her Monday (but I’ll email it tonight).

In Other News

I was a knitster in a “Knitty Gritty” episode shot yesterday! I have no idea when it will air, but it’s the show with Shannita, who designed a Rasta Hat. There’s a multi-colored sweater hanging on the wall at the back of the set that’s mine, I designed and knitted it two years ago, and brought it with me as one of several choices of things to wear on camera. I came in wearing a store-bought red sweater, which they said was too bright. So I thought I’d change into that sweater. But before I could put it on, someone had snagged it for the set! (Wore a different sweater, also of my own design, instead.) There’s a quick shot of it right at the very end of the show (if they don’t cut it).

I wound some hand-dyed laceweight yarn into balls today. It got slightly felted during dyeing, so I had to wind slowly. I actually snapped it toward the end of the second ball; so I have one big ball, one not-quite-as-big ball, and one really small ball. Didn’t think to snap pix, but I will tomorrow. Need daylight. The light in here at night is atrocious and the photos need hours of color correction; not worth it.

So now I think I can actually get to the Peruvian alpaca sweater I want to design. Swatching begins tonight! Stay tuned.

Okay, after sweating it and fretting on it for over a week, I finally got my proposal in to a LYS for workshops to teach. And I’m showing up at the store tomorrow to follow up buy yarn for the baby sweaters I’ll be using in the Finishing workshop (yes, sweaters, plural: one that I’ll complete before the class, and one that I’ll leave in pieces to work on during the class). So I can ask the owner what she thinks. And when I can start.

I’m proposing these workshops: Knitting Lace, Knitting from Charts, Finishing, Fixing Knitting Mistakes, and Cables. Outlined what to discuss in each, what I’ll need to bring, what the participants need to bring, and what they’ll do in the class.

Now that I’ve settled on what I want to do and how, I could, theoretically, start hawking these classes to other LYSs in the area. But I guess I’d like a little feedback from the first LYS before I do that. I’m new at this, never done it before, so I really don’t know what’s appropriate and what’s not, just wingin’ it. Oh, I hemmed and hawed about whether I should be using specific projects to teach all these things or whether swatches will do, whether I should ask the store owner if I could go through the patterns and the yarns she carries to pick out projects, and so on. She didn’t say anything about that when I met with her, so I kinda figured she didn’t want to get involved, that she wanted me to handle it on my own. But I don’t know that for a fact.

Oh, well. I’ll find out tomorrow whether I guessed right or not! Next time I’ll know what to ask right up front. There’s no substitute for experience, and everybody’s a dork the first time they do something, right? Just nod, that’s right, thanks.

The stash yarn I used for the baby sweater I’m designing (see last post) is way too dense, not soft at all. Fine for working out the pattern, but not good for a baby’s skin. So I need something else. Something soft. And washable. However, I still haven’t redone the sleeve, and I need to write up the pattern ASAP. Think I’ll go do that now.

In a minute. Just this one more point. There’s a sweater in my mind’s eye that I’ve been wanting to knit for myself, a cardigan. With the Peruvian Tweed Alpaca, with the Dura-Europos stitch pattern (see this July post). I’m looking forward to being able to start swatching for that. I need a cardigan! Actually, I need several more sweaters, I wore the same two over and over last winter. And see, now that I’m making knitting my career, every sweater I design/make for myself is a potentially marketable pattern! Gotta make myself several sweaters this winter. (Gotta write up some of the ones I’ve already designed and made, too.)

Now, off to the baby sweater.

It’s not like I have nothing to show you. It’s just that my life has been kinda weird. While I was in NYC, I was so busy I didn’t have time to think, let alone blog. Now I have no structure, and I’ve noticed a tendency I have when I feel pressured about something to want to get that one thing done before I do anything else. Which totally blows multitasking. And totally explains the condition of my apartment (no, I’m not posting photos of that). So now I have to find a way to do a variety of things each day.

I have just uploaded 22 photos. This’ll take awhile to get through, folks! Here we go:

I knitted this sweater last year for my Dad. (Mom gave it back to me when in was NYC.) He had pancreatic cancer and passed away this past March. He was always cold, so I made him this sweater. I’d been thinking about making him a gansey for years, and, well, it was now or never, so I designed and knitted this in about 6 weeks. He got it mid-November.

A few details. I knitted this in the round, starting with the body from the bottom up. I started with a nice rolled-edge rib:

Obviously, I had to join extra balls of yarn when I got to the underarm and work the back and front on either side of the neckline separately. When the body was done, I cast on invisibly for the neck gusset/shoulder saddle, and worked that from the neckline to the armhole, catching a stitch — sometimes two — from the front and back body every other row.

Then I picked up around the the armhole, letting the body selvage stitches show on the outside. The lower half of the underarm gusset is knitted with the body; the upper half is knitted with the sleeves, worked downward to cuff. The cables on the shoulder saddle are continued down the center of the sleeve.

He liked v-necks, so that’s what this was. I wanted to carry the center cables around the neckline, which posed a difficulty in matching the patterns on either side of the saddle. To solve that, I mimicked the v-neck at the back:

Finished off the neckline and sleeves cuffs with Kitchener stitch rib so they matched the cast-on:

One day I’ll write up this pattern. Along with a few others.

My Mom also gave me some socks I’d made for Dad.

The brown ones on the left were the last pair I made, last Thanksgiving. They’re meant to be bedsocks, or lying around the house socks, they’re worsted weight and a bit thick to fit into shoes.

The other two pairs I made two years ago for Christmas, the year everybody in the family got socks. They both have ribbed cuffs (the blue ones also have a cable), and include a little trick I have for shaping cuffs: Hide shaping decreases in purl ribs (assuming you start from the top; make increases when working toe-up). That way the cuff can be roomy and comfortable at the top, without the ankle being baggy, but no shaping is visible. The knit ribs stay the same. Here’s an inside-out shot of the grey socks:

The blue ones were done toe-up, so I did increases, not decreases (this is also inside-out).

These both have short-row heels with a gusset for extra heel depth, but I didn’t photograph closeups of those. It’s just this: Before starting the short-row heel, increase about 8-10 stitches over twice as many rounds each side of the instep, do the short-row heel, then decrease away the extra instep stitches. Works the same way whether you knit top-down or toe-up.

Here’s the socks I’ve been working on in between other stuff (in other words, hardly ever):

Here’s a closeup of the cables:

And this is the inside, showing decreases.

Let’s see, what else we got here. Oh, yeah. Last year I made these for Mom:

She loves them, and says she gets compliments on them all the time. So my sister thought she’d do me a favor and see if some stores near her, in Berkeley, would be interested in carrying them! Sorry, people, I am not about to sit around knitting cell phone cozies until they’re coming out my ears. But Mom kept pushing, so I allowed as how maybe a kit for knitting your own cell phone cozy might be okay. She went on and on about how fabulous metallics are, and so I wound up getting some Henry’s Attic fingering weight rayon yarn from Catnip Yarns. It was white when I got it. Not anymore.

I dyed it to look like copper. Even put in a little verdigris green, see:

It was a closeout sale; I bought the last 3 cones. The other two will be silver and gold. Then I have to write up a pattern that will work with this stuff, figure out how much yarn it takes, skein off the appropriate amounts and make little packages. More about that when I get back to it!

I mentioned watching John Pitblado spin mohair bouclé at the FiberFest. I thought I’d try my hand at that, so I bought a pound of raw kid mohair (online somewhere, sorry, I don’t know where now), and Mom and I dyed it. She had a ball! So did I.

Of course, I had to scour it first, but I didn’t take pictures of that process. Or any “before” pictures of the clean locks, either. Just didn’t think of it. Next time!

As promised AGES ago: The fiber I got at the the FiberFest. Here’s the bombyx silk from Nancy Finn, three 2-ounce hanks:

And here’s the soy silk from Conjoined Creations:

And finally, this is a baby sweater I’m designing for use in a sweater finishing workshop, to be donated to Stitches From The Heart when completed. It’s going to be a little more complicated than the usual baby sweater, so it can be used for teaching finishing techniques likely to be needed on adult sweaters, like front button plackets and necklines, and set-in sleeves.

Speaking of sleeves, the piece at the top is meant to be a sleeve, but it’s WAY too big, as you can see below. Gotta rework that!

That oughta hold yiz for awhile!

Okay, in a rush now because I’m going to a LYS to interview to be a professional knitting teacher in a little while. No pix to post at the moment. Just checking in, since I haven’t posted in about six weeks.

I got busier than I ever imagined possible in NYC. I have friends there that I never called the whole time I was there. I missed the birthday of a friend of 28 years. Desperately need a haircut. My skin’s a mess. Not to mention my body…let’s not go there, though. And now that I’m back, I don’t know what to do first. My apartment is a disaster area. I have mountains of stuff to throw out. So it looks like I’m going to be pretty busy here for awhile.

Have a pair of socks in progress, and a couple of finished handspun skeins, and some socks I made for my late Dad a couple of years ago that I could post pix of. Also the fiber I bought at the Fiber Fest that I promised pix of (cough, cough) weeks ago. And some mohair locks I dyed with Mom, and some rayon I dyed with the idea of making up some cell phone cozy kits. Got pix of two cell phone cozies I made for Mom last year, never put those up either. Jeesh.

Plus I decided I better get cracking on my TKGA Masters. I ordered Level I over a year ago, and read it but didn’t do it. If I’m going to make knitting my livelihood, seems to me I should get that credential once and for all (only been thinking about it for around 15 years). So I ordered an update to Level I. I’m giving myself one month to complete that.

Also started an outline for a knitting book. Two hours, six pages — um, I think I have enough to write about. I’m hoping desperately to get into Cat Bordhi’s Visionary Retreat - Self-Publishing for Knit Designers in January. I only found out about it Sunday from my fellow spinning guild member Janel, who got the last spot! I’m sending my $100 deposit today, even though I know all the spaces are filled, in hopes of getting a high spot on the waiting list. Here’s hoping that either (a) they decide they can fit in one more person, or (b) someone drops out, for a fabulous reason like they’re eloping to Las Vegas that week, or they have to go pick up their lottery winnings and have meetings all week with financial advisors or something. Wish me luck!

It’s Wednesday night, almost Thursday — it will be Thursday before I finish this — and I’m just getting to posting about the weekend. I’m really looking forward to my life slowing down a little. Wish I had a clue when that will be…

The weekend was cool. I worked Friday, Saturday and Sunday at the Fabulous FiberFest as the knitting consultant. I taught one participant to knit from scratch, and a bunch of others to do things like cast on, purl, make bobbles, work with two colors fair-isle-style, weave in ends as you go, assemble sweater pieces with mattress stitch, and more. I had no chance to take pictures, so it ultimately didn’t matter that I forgot the card and battery recharger for my camera (duh). Thanks to Jillian Neary for the photos below!

Here’s me at my table, with a student:

In front of me, Joan Ruane conducted various spinning events, including a blindfolded spinning contest! Congratulations, Mindi, on winning that both Saturday and Sunday!

Lots of great shopping.

A favorite booth was Habu Textiles:

Another favorite was Carolina Homespun (from whom I bought my drum carder), but I don’t have a photo of their (huge!) booth. Also bought a wpi tool from them.

At the Chasing Rainbows booth, I bought three 2-oz. hanks of handpainted bombyx silk. And I helped the folks at Conjoined Creations break down their booth at the end of the show, and they “tipped” me with a hank of hand-painted soy silk. Pix of this stuff tomorrow, since it’s just too late tonight. Gotta crash soon.

Got to see all my fellow guild spinnies, too. Miss you guys!

So I travelled all day Monday, worked Tuesday until 7pm and then went out to dinner with my Mom, my brother and niece, and my cousin David, who’s been living here in NYC but is moving back to his native Alexandria, VA. Then I spent awhile on the phone with my sister Val, who’s having extended computer troubles and really needs the help.

Worked all day today. Then more with Val tonight — she caught me before I left the office, so I was there until pretty late. And just as I was about to leave, my brother sent me an email asking me to do something that I should have left until the morning, but I didn’t, like a dope, so I didn’t get out of there until about 10:20pm.

There. In case you were wondering why I haven’t kept up with this blog more regularly, that should give you a clue!

Oh, yeah: I did get a chance yesterday to order a pound of kid mohair. Now I need some dyes. I’m considering one of these kits from Pro Chem. Or maybe I’ll just get some Kook Aid, so I don’t have to stuff Mom’s place full of thrift store dyeing equipment (or spend the time shopping for it). Then a little sewing thread (maybe some silk? maybe something from Habu?), and I’m ready to try my hand at handspun mohair bouclé.

Dumb-ass here left the compact flash card in the card reader — in New York. Also left the battery recharger there. All I have is the phone camera which is next to useless. But maybe I’ll try it.

It’s official: I’m getting a Strauch Fricke Petite Drum Carder with all the fixin’s from Carolina Homespun, a vendor at the FiberFest. They’ll ship it to me when I’m getting ready to return to LA from NYC. I won’t have any use for it in NYC, and anyway I don’t want to have to try to get it home from there (they’re BIG). But I got lots o’ stuff to card when I get back!

Watched John Pitblado, a fellow member of my spinning guild, spin some incredible mohair bouclé at the FiberFest today. Very inspiring. So now I want to try that! Gotta find some mohair locks…Or I could try it with some Shetland locks I have. Hmm…