alisonknits

Lace Jones

Every summer, I get a hankering to knit lace. Two years ago, I decided to make myself a lace stole for my wedding - which was only 6 weeks away. I thought I must be crazy, but I loved the knitting so much I finished it in only two weeks. (It was a small stole.) Last year, I made the Forest Path Stole from Interweave Knits. Later in the summer after that was finished, I also started a triangular shawl with some cashmere/silk yarn from School Products. But soon it was fall, and my love affair with lace waned with the change in season. I'm having the lace jones again, and I figured I'd better finish that piece before I started anything new. So I did! Here's a terrible photo:

I'll try to take some better ones later.

Here's what I'm going to make next. Woo hoo!

Listening

I've been struggling with charting the decreases on the "sunspots" sweater. On the one hand, I want to be sure to show clearly how to keep the raglan decreases in the pattern, but on the other hand, I don't want the charts to be humongous, so I have to come up with a way of showing the decreases in the context of the stitch pattern without showing the whole thing. It's a problem. But today the solution came to me! (It involves doing separate small charts for the decreases at each end of the row.)

Inadvertantly I used my favorite problem-solving method. It goes something like this: wrestle with the problem, trying my best to solve it. Wrestle some more. Then go do something unrelated like wash the dishes. Repeat as necessary until the solution appears as if out of nowhere. Works like a charm.

I feel like it's all about listening to that little voice in the back of my head that knows the answer... I have to remember to do that...

Life Goes On...

Thanks to all who sent consoling comments about the house. I'm feeling fine about it now, especially since my dad seems quite relieved that the financial pressure is off. We're going to resume our search next spring, so that Scott and I will actually be ready to move when we buy a house. I think my father was getting very stressed out about making the mortgage payments himself, finding a tenant, etc. while waiting for us to wrap things up here in NYC.

In knitting news, I've been working on my Sunspots sweater, and also trying to complete the pattern. Because of the complexity of the stitch pattern, I had to get creative with how to describe the raglan shaping. In the end, I decided to chart the decreases so that it will be clear how to fit the decreases into the pattern. But I'm finding making the charts quite time-consuming, and I'm worried that the boss will be angry with me that it's still not finished. On the up side, it's given me an opportunity to use the updated Stitch and Motif Maker software. It's definitely much improved over the old version.

Oh, and here's an exciting development: I'm going to be working at the Karabella booth for the TNNA trade show in Columbus. I think it will be an excellent opportunity to learn more and meet people in the industry. I'm psyched!

Don't Count Your Chickens

Usually, I don't count my chickens before they hatch. But with this whole house-buying thing, I find it difficult not to get emotionally involved. Sadly, the house deal has fallen through. The inspection revealed some potentially financially devastating problems with the roof, and the people who own the place wouldn't consider fixing the roof or substantially lowering the price. So we're letting it go.

I'm sad about this, but I'll get over it. We weren't planning on moving until next year anyway, so we have plenty of time to find the right house. Eventually I'll let it go, just like I let go of the first house we made an offer on.

In the meantime, I got some retail therapy at The Gap in the form of two bras and a skirt I've been wanting all season. And I also received a package from Webs, containing a whole lot of Cascade 220 that I'd ordered on sale - two sweaters worth! I got a rich heathery brown for Starmore's St. Enda for my sister's boyfriend (they've been together for about 8 years now, and I've only ever knitted him a pair of socks), and a deep raspberry for something for myself. I don't know what exactly it's going to become. It will probably have to wait a long while before being knitted.

Despite my busy schedule, I'm really psyched to begin The Artist's Way next week. I can definitely use some creative recovery right about now. And check out the beautiful logo Juni Moon created for our "Knitter's Way" group:

She also created the button on my sidebar. Thanks Juni!

The Knitter's Way

For a long time I've wanted to repeat Julia Cameron's 12-week course The Artist's Way, and this entry on Ellen's blog has inspired me to set up a discussion group for fiber artists doing the course (or just reading the book - but the rewards are really astounding if you actually do it). The last time I did it, it was with a group that met weekly, and I found that going through it with other people inspired me and also kept me with the sometimes challenging work, since I was accountable to a group. I've wanted to start another group for a while, but I think an online discussion group could work just as well, and also include more people.

My idea for the e-mail list is that people can post their weekly check-ins, and also have discussions about all manner of related things, including how the course relates to us as fiber artists.

So if you'd like to join, sign up here:

Click to subscribe to knittersway

Bootylicious

Ain't it cute?

This is from Zoe Mellor's book, 50 Baby Bootees to Knit.

Spring Fever

I feel like it's been a long time since I posted, but in truth it's been about the same length of time I usually go between posts. Maybe it's just been a long week. I've been fighting off a cold for a week - it's never turned into a full-blown cold, yet it won't completely go away either. Plus since I feel the academic calendar is a much more accurate reflection of the rhythm of my life than the Julian calendar, I'm experiencing that year-end craziness that always seems to happen around this time. My to-do list is so long that I feel quite paralyzed by it. I'm like a deer caught in headlights.

And it doesn't feel like I've gotten very much knitting done recently. I did finally start the corrugated ribbing on the cuff of Hank8 (the last bit of knitting left on this over-a-year-old project). And I finished the hood on Rogue, but it looks absolutely terrible so I have to take it out. Something about the decreases is seriously wonky, which I'd heard something about, but I think mine must be much worse than normal. Which is a shame, because I did an excellent job grafting the top of the cable border (if I do say so myself). So that one's going on the back burner for awhile, as I can't stand to look at it now. I made another sleeve of the Sunspots cardi, and started the front, and I made a baby bootie for a co-worker's shower yesterday. Yes, only one bootie; the baby's not due until the end of August, and I had very little warning about the shower, so I just showed her one, with a promise of a second. She seemed very pleased despite its work-in-progress status.

So... I guess I have been knitting quite a bit! But I haven't finished anything, so I have no sense of accomplishment.

Also I have two finishing projects to complete for pay, and it's becoming the season where I like to wear lace shawls (they are perfect in the summer for fending off the ridiculously cold air conditioning favored by stores, offices, and movie theaters), so I want to finish the brown leafy one that I started last year.

Oh but also! There is exciting news! (Which is so amazing it hasn't quite sunken in yet, hence my leaving it for last.)

My father just bought this two-family house:

And starting summer of 2005, Scott and I will be living there. It's in North Andover, MA. Hooray! I'll miss all my friends in NYC, of course, but I'm terribly excited to live in a lovely (big) house, in a lovely (small) town, in my lovely homestate of Massachusetts.

How a Sweater Becomes a Pattern

Ann comments:

Now. I don't know anything about how patterns come into the world, so help me out. Berta designed this, but left the writing of the pattern to you? Did she say, "I . . . see . . . spots. And sleeves. Make up a pattern for this." I always thought that the pattern wasn't a pattern until it was written. How does a person know whether a stitch pattern will make a good sweater without actually writing the pattern and, um, knitting it up? If you're writing up the pattern, then aren't you largely the one who's creating the thing?

Signed Puzzled in Nashville

Dear Puzz,

This is an excellent question, about something that garners confusion even from my husband who sees me working on patterns all the time. Many, probably even most designers write their own patterns. Even knit their own samples. Berta, however, usually does neither.

What typically happens in Karabellaland is that Berta (or sometimes another designer) will come up with an idea for a sweater design. She will swatch the stitch pattern with the yarn, work out the dimensions, and basically figure the whole thing out. Then she'll give it to another knitter to knit, with a pretty explicit explanation and/or schematic. The knitters she uses are mostly little old Russian ladies who speak little or no English. They are amazing knitters who really don't need much by way of a pattern in order to make a gorgeous sweater to Berta's specifications.

Then when the sample is finished, Berta will hand me the sweater, the Russian notes about how many stitches, inches, decreases, what needle size, etc. (fortunately it's all numbers, since I don't know any Russian), and she'll decipher anything I don't understand. We discuss the sizing, and then I'll go figure out how to do all the sizes and write the pattern in English (or more accurately, knitterese, i.e. knitting pattern language).

Sometimes if the sweater is very complicated, she'll give me the yarn to test knit my pattern. Or I'll test just the hard parts. In the case of this sunspots sweater, I could have done the pattern from the sample sweater with just some swatching, but I really wanted to make one for myself so I'm testing the pattern as I knit it.

So there you have it.

Seeing Spots

Sunspots, that is. I've started yet another project. I'm writing the pattern for a new Karabella sweater that Berta designed, and I agreed to do the pattern in exchange for the yarn to make the sweater. Usually I try not to trade my services for yarn, but this is a sweater that I really wanted to make (I tried on the sample at work on Friday, and didn't want to take it off), and the yarn is an expensive silk/cashmere/viscose blend, so I think it's worth it. The stitch pattern is from one of the Barbara Walker treasuries, and it's called Sunspots. I whipped up a sleeve this weekend:

Now, satisfying as it is to make such quick progress on this new project, it's sort of ridiculous that I'm so close to finishing both Hank8 and Rogue, yet haven't been working on them. Do I have start-itis or what?

Leafy goodness

Here's a snapshot of the leafy cotton sweater I'm making:

And here's a closeup:

I'm up to the armhole on the back. But now I need to figure out how exactly I'm altering the pattern.

More later....