alisonknits

Good Things

I feel that after my rather negative post yesterday, I should write today about some of the good things that are going on in my life, particularly now that I'm in a much happier frame of mind.

Teaching - yet again, I went into my class (beginning knitting every Monday night) in a wretched mood, and came out feeling totally refreshed and delighted. More than one person in the past week has told me I would have made a good teacher, and my response is, "duh, what do you think I'm doing?" (Um, and also "thank you.") While I'm pursuing many avenues in terms of a knitting career, I think teaching will always remain a source of joy and inspiration to me. And I think I'm getting pretty good at it. Mainly because I never run out of patience. This attribute does not necessarily serve me well in all areas of life - but that's another story.

Thanks to those of you who encouraged me to publish my Charleston Hat & Scarf pattern myself on this blog. As it turns out, Karabella will buy the pattern from me for a new yarn they're bringing in sometime next year, so all's well that ends well there.

And in related news, Karabella's running a full-page ad in Knitter's featuring my hats! I saw a proof of the ad last week, and I'm ecstatic. I want to frame it. (Of course, there are other magazines I would have preferred to see the ad in over Knitter's, but I'm not going to look a gift horse in the mouth.)

Everyone please wish me luck finishing Hank8 in time for Christmas. I'm getting a little concerned, since I haven't started the sleeves yet and I have a couple of projects that I'm being paid for that have to take precedence. But I'm inspired by Wendy, who can do two fair isle sleeves in about a week while working full time. I'm not as speedy as her (who is?) but it still gives me hope. There is no hope of me making a sweater for my sister's boyfriend, but I'll buy him something and also give him a choice of a sweater that I'll start for him after the holidays. It's gonna be just fine.

Scattered

Another week has gone by with me yet again neglecting my poor blog. I tried to write a couple times, but I've been so crazed I couldn't seem to put an even semi-coherent thought together. I can barely get out an e-mail these days.

Last night I told my husband Scott, "I want to do everything." And it's true. I want to do all the knitting-related work that's been tossed my way lately, and I want to knit Christmas presents and sweaters and other garmets for myself, and I want to work on my own designs. I want to see my friends from Vassar, and my friends from church, and miscellaneous other friends, and my husband, and I want to spend more time alone. I want to work on the Dean campaign, go to task force meetings for all manner of liberal causes (against the death penalty, working against racism, making my congregation a more welcoming place). I want to teach knitting classes and I want to teach in the church school. I want to write in my journal. I want to read novels and the Sunday New York Times and the Boston Globe and books about Native Americans. I want to take a nap.

I'm having some difficulty doing all of these things at once. What I want most of all today is to go away for a few days or a week all by myself, and that's definitely not going to happen any time soon. I'll just have to settle for sitting alone in a Starbucks for a couple of hours before I teach tonight.

All that said, I've been doing an awful lot lately, including some actual leisure activities. Most notably, Friday night I attended a play called, "The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark," a new play by Rob Grace. Rob is a fellow Vassar alum, and this play was produced by Studio 42, which is mostly Vassarites. It was pretty great. Rob's work is as out there as almost anything I've seen, and manages to be funny as hell and clever and shocking in a smart way, rather than just for shock's sake. And my friend Dan was in it - he was very good. And I'm not just saying that because he reads my blog. Some other Vassar actors who I'm a fan of were also in it, and I saw lots of familiar faces in the audience. Including people who I forgot existed, despite having worked with them on shows a mere 5-6 years ago. Oh, and in case you're wondering, the play has really nothing to do with the Shakespeare play of the same title.

And yesterday I went to high tea with a lovely group of ladies at Alice's Tea Cup on the upper west side. Best scones I've had in a long time, maybe ever. And the tea was yummy as well - the menu included about 6 pages of different varieties. I had "Symphony," a black tea with strawberry and chocolate. I couldn't taste the chocolate, which is probably just as well. I couldn't figure out what chocolate tea would be like.

Math Hell and other anxiety

After my reasonably successful class on knitting calculations on Saturday, I ended up in Knitter's Math Hell last night, working on changing the gauge on a pattern for a designer who is working on a new book. This project is overdue, and I spent hours last night trying to change the number of stitches and increases, while keeping row counts the same. It's an unusual shape, a pretty cool sweater actually, but sort of a nightmare to calculate, especially since it's not my design so I'm trying to keep it as unchanged as possible. I'm trying to look at is as a good challenge, but I have no time to work on it and I should have the thing done by now.

My anxiety level is generally pretty high right now, although I think I'm hiding it well. I just have too much going on, the madness of the holiday season looms large. I need a vacation! Instead I just keep taking more work.

Also my Charleston Hat & Scarf pattern were rejected by Knitty. I had expected as much, since the set is more traditional than the typical Knitty fare, but I'm kind of bummed. I may try and submit them elsewhere. Whenever I wear them, I get complimented on them, so I think it's a worthwhile design. I'm thinking hard about where they might be better suited.

Math, and Crafty Goodness

I had a pleasant day. This morning I taught a class I've never taught before, "Knitter's Math." I was pretty nervous about it, since I wasn't as prepared as I might have hoped, but I think it went okay. There were only two people in the class, which certainly made it easy on me. The class was all about the calculations necessary in designing sweaters or adapting existing patterns, and I think my first example was a little too hard (a raglan - what was I thinking?). But in the end, I think both of them grasped what I was explaining. One of the two has a blog that I've read, CurlsandPurlsNYC. It's so fun meeting other bloggers! She had recently plugged School Products in her blog, and showed me the cashmere sweater she's making from our yarn. It's beautiful! A Kathy Zimmerman design from the current IK that I've vaguely thought about making for myself.

While I was there teaching, Samantha, a former School Products employee from before my time, was buying some yarn. She told me she's been reading my blog, which is cool to hear. Hi Samantha! As I told her, I'm never convinced that anyone is actually reading this thing (despite what my stats say), so I'm happy to know that there are people out there.

Although I was too sick earlier this week to clean my apartment on my days off as originally planned, I had invited my friend Sara over today, so that motivated me to clean when I got home. I love having a clean apartment. I'm taking my place back from the roaches! Sorry, that must sound really gross. And it is.

Sara and I got crafty and made holiday cards with rubber stamps and other cool stuff. Last year I took a class at The Ink Pad, and spent way too much money on stamping supplies. I especially like my embossing powders. Embossing is so cool.

I was going to post a picture of the cards I made, but suddenly my computer and my camera don't seem to be communicating. *sigh*

I've just realized that I've been so busy that I haven't knitted a stitch today! Must correct that now...

Back to the Blog

Sorry I haven't posted in over a week. I've been both busy and sick. Well, I was only sick for a couple days... I swear by ColdEase zinc lozenges, which I think shortened the life of this virus. Fortunately. I have too much going on to be slowed down by a cold!

So here's my update: sometime last week I finished the neck of Hank. Here's a photo of the body:

And a close-up of the neck:

My gauge is a little loose, even though I'm on a size 2 (3mm) needle instead of the size 3 (3.25mm) that Starmore calls for (and which I've used for other Fair Isles). I've decided it's okay that it's on the big side. I've come way too far to start over now!

I haven't started the sleeves yet, though, because I have a new project. I'm working on a design of my own in a new Karabella yarn called Majestic, which is a merino-mohair blend. I've worked with it before and it's lovely. I'm planning on submitting the design to Interweave.

Other than that I've been busy with random pattern-writing stuff and teaching and socializing. My class continues to go well. Oh, and I've gotten completely engrossed in the book I'm reading, Ahab's Wife. The protagonist/narrator, Una, is a fascinating woman who gets in lots of adventures. I can't put it down. What a glorious feeling. As I've probaly mentioned before, my knitting obsession gets in the way of reading most of the time, but I absolutely love getting pulled into a good novel.

So I'm going to get off the computer now and get back to my knitting and reading...

Fabulous Class

I was a little nervous about my new beginning knitting class, because it is really big: 22 student. I always have a friend helping me the first 2-3 sessions while we do cast on, knit and purl. But even with two teachers, that's a lot. But guess what? They did great. Every single one of them managed to cast on and they were all knitting by the end of the two hours. This is two excellent groups in a row. Are the students getting handier or am I getting better at teaching them? Is that arrogant of me to ask? Anyway, it's probably both.

When everything goes fine, I really do love teaching.

wire knitting and other fun

As I mentioned in the comments to my last entry, I took a wire knitting class with Annie Modesitt on Saturday. It was so much fun! Oddly enough, I've never taken any kind of knitting class before, and one of the many good things about doing it was that learning something new in a classroom setting gives me more empathy for my own knitting students. Plus Annie's a wonderful teacher and all around hilarious and cool person, so it was a pleasure spending most of a day with her. We made a necklace first:

And then we made this cuff bracelet:

It was cool how different everyone's jewelry looked while we were all using the same pattern, and I liked that there was a wide variety of levels of experience among us, but we all came up with something beautiful in the end. And even though I probably could have figured out a lot of the techniques using Nancie Wiseman's book (which I bought months ago and never got around to trying), it was so helpful having a teacher to show things in person and give advice. For anyone in the NYC area, I highly recommend that you take this class when Annie teaches it again in January at Urban Knitter. (And you should also take my steeks class, which has been rescheduled for January 31.)

Speaking of steeks (ha!), I did cut the neck steeks on Hank8 and am done with the patterned part of the hemmed neck - I just have to finish the facing and sew it down. I meant to take a picture of it last night, but my apartment is such a mess that I couldn't find a surface big enough to photograph it on. (Scott went to bed early, so my usual photo spot was unavailable.) Hopefully I'll clean soon, or find time to use the bed. Probably I should clean. I might have to take a day off next week to do so, since I'm going away this weekend to a conference (non-knitting related). Fortunately, I've put in some extra hours at the church lately, so my boss will probably have no problem with me taking a day. The apartment really needs some major work.

Time for me to get some lunch. I really want sushi, but I'm nearing the end of the first phase of the South Beach Diet, on which white rice is forbidden. I'm happy with my weight loss, but it's getting hard to be creative about meals. I look forward to adding back some fruit and a few other carbs in a few days. That said, the diet hasn't been hard to stick to at all - even for me, who typically eats ice cream every single day!