Holes in the walls, in the knitting and in my head

Normally, at this time of year in Wisconsin, the ground is covered in snow and ice and we need to wear warm wool hats, mittens and scarves when we venture out of the house. Some of us also wear hats, mittens and scarves inside of our homes because our old windows leak dreadfully. Fortunately, earlier this week Great Mother Earth blessed us with a 50F day--the same day that the Window Men came to remove most of the windows in our house, leaving large gaping holes in our walls. Two capable, strong, polite and handsome young men arrived at 8:00 a.m. and proceeded to efficiently remove the 60 year old single pane windows that let in so much cold air that we needed to wear wool mittens to wash dishes! (Well, not really, but you get the idea.)
The day was so warm that I considered telling the young men to leave the holes in the walls for a few days--just so we could enjoy the unseasonable warmth. But, they had a job to do and they climbed right up on top of my sink and installed the new window!

The window installation is almost done. Just a few more trim strips and some finish work on the outside of the house and we will be cozy warm inside when the next blast of arctic air swoops down on us. No more holes.

The efficient creation of gaping holes in our walls followed by prompt installation of the windows is in sharp contrast to my progress on the Shetland Garden Faroese Shawl. Although I tried and tried to make sure that every stitch was perfect, sometimes the cobweb laceweight yarn conspired with some evil force to make a neatly twisted yarn over into a gaping hole.

Look above to the "southeast" of my knuckle. The line of nice, neat faggoting type yarn overs is broken by that large hole.
And in another spot the yarn over line is broken by a wayward sideways "ladder". I have no idea of what happened. Did I notice the mistake when doing that row and fall victime to the "blocking-will-take-care-of-that" syndrome? Or, did I miss the mistake altogether?

Now what do I do? These hole-y mistakes are tens of thousands of stitches away from where I am now. They sicken me. Can I fix the mistakes by the judicious use of after-the-fact darning? Or, do I pretend the mistakes aren't there?

I've been in the denial. Actually, I've been focusing on a rather inspired (even if I say so myself) decision to change the edging of the shawl. Sivia Harding, the designer, called for about 3-5 ridges of garter stitch along the 453 stitch long edge, followed by binding off!!! I couldn't do it. So, I searched and searched for an edge lace that would complement the stitch patterns in the shawl.

The patterns in the body of the shawl include roses inside of a trellis.
And pretty little flowers and leaves.


I took my stack of lace books to our Guild's weekend Knitting Retreat. Finally, I happened upon a pattern in "Victorian Lace Today." The shawl has the uninspired name of "Large Rectangle" on page 54. The knitted on edging is called "trellis border". OK, I thought that would be lovelier than three ridges of garter stitch.
Knitting on a border is quite simple, actually, in concept. You knit perpendicularly to the live edge stitches, knitting one stitch of the border with one of the live edge stitches in every other row. Easy, right? Well, I neglected to do the simple math ahead of time. If I had done so, I may have had second thoughts.

Six rows of garter stitch--to produce three ridges--over 453 or so stitches per row would have been 2,718 stitches, plus bind off of 453 stitches--meaning 3171 stitches until completion.

OK, my "simple" knitted border solution has approximately 25 stitches per row in an 18 row pattern repeat. This is a total of 450 stitches per pattern repeat. One "eats up" only 9 live shawl stitches per pattern repeat. So, 453 divided by 9 is about 50--pattern repeats that is. So, 50 times 450 is 22,500 stitches!!!! I must have holes in my head!!

My solution to avoid the constricting bind off of garter stitches has resulted in 19,329 extra stitches!!!

But, it's lovely, don't you think?? After two weeks of work, I have only 10 pattern repeats to go. Let's see, that's 4,500 stitches....
And then, I need to focus on fixing the yarn over hole issues and this dropped stitch.

Struggling towards monogamy

I have been trying, for about 20 years now, to establish a clear pattern of monogamy--in my knitting, that is. [Although sometimes my dear husband seems like he is trying to drive me away from monogamy--such as when he puts dirty dishes on the countertop above the empty dishwasher, and when he........But that's another story.]

Back to knitting monogamy. I'm afraid that I have a limited attention span for any particular project. I need different projects for different situations.

For example, I like to have an easy project that I can do in the dark of movie theaters, in the back pew at church, while at stop signs, etc. Typically this is a simple sock project.
Like his one. The fake cables on the side are two twisted stitches, side by side. The yarn is Trekking. This projects fits in a zip lock sandwich bag in my purse.

Then, I usually have a repair project or two. Such as duplicate stitching my mittens where they have worn out on the palms and inner thumbs, from driving I believe. Or such as this little breach of knitting know-how.
My dad is diabetic; his feet and lower legs swell during the day.I made him these socks, using the short row garter stitch heel as shown in the bottom. Lucy Neatby advocates using more than half of the total stitches for the heel. Usually her advice is excellent, but in this case it failed. The resulting sock had a heel big enough for an elephant with swollen feet. My dad's heels don't swell--his ankles, foot and calves swell. These socks bulged out over his shoes, creating other problems. He wore the socks as a dutiful father, but they were clearly uncomfortable. So I simply cut off the cuff, frogged the foot and heel and made my typical flap heel on half the stitches. The new (upper) sock fits perfectly. Now I need to do the same thing to the lower sock.

I also love to have a lace project in the works. To give me a little challenge. For when I have alone time to focus only on my knitting. My current challenge is Sivia Harding's Shetland Garden Faroese Shawl. Challenge is an understatement. This shawl brought me sobbing to my knees last week!!! But, I'm over that now.

You can't see in this photo, but I added a lifeline on row 151. (If you click to embiggen you can see the blue lifeline.) My bravado of knitting without a safety net failed me. No mistakes thus far, and I'm 2/3 of the way through the last pattern segment!!

Usually I have at least one present for someone on my needles. I long to knit cute little things for children, such as grandchildren. Alas, my dear husband and I do not have any grandkids, despite having children aged 42 and 32. The 17 year old has no business reproducing yet! So, we've "adopted" some surrogate grandkids: two little boys aged 6 and 4. The 6 year old started kindergarten this year, so in August I decided to make him a shawl collared cardigan for school. Well, Christmas knitting intervened and I never finished it.
Here are the back, two fronts and most of one sleeve. The project has languished because the ribbed pattern makes the pieces look as if they will never fit a real human. I'm hoping blocking will solve the problem. (don't we all!! ) The pattern is from Sirdar's Sweet Pea Knits. I've been hoping that this 6 year does not grow in girth this year!! I've added this project to my car knitting so that I can finish it for Valentine's day!

But, I would throw over all of these projects to concentrate solely and monogamously on this one:

It's for me. I thought I had lost it. I searched the house from top to bottom four times--in secret because if Dear Husband or Dear Daughters caught me searching for a lost project, I would be subject to long recriminating lectures about organization, too many projects at once, etc., etc., etc. Finally, when a pair of mittens fell to the closet floor I noticed this army green zipped bag from Knitting Camp. I opened it--my long lost love, waiting for me!!! A bag of discontinued Tiur. Two partially finished sleeves! A Dale of Norway yoke necked pullover for me. In my favorite color. In my favorite yarn. It is calling me. It has seduced me.

I am longing to commit myself exclusively to this seductive garment. The solid color body is worked in a knit and purl pattern stitch to hold my wandering attention until I get to the multi colored yoke.

However, the other projects are closer to being finished. They have entertained and occupied my knitting time and are close to fruition. Should I toss them aside for true love? How fickle am I?? Should I finish the socks for my dad, and the shawl for my mother and the cardigan for the little boy?? Or, should I selfishly focus only on myself and my heart's desire??

I am caught in a web of anguish of my own creation. If I were a monogamous knitter, I never would have started so many projects. I would have gone sensibly from one to the next, only after complete exploration of each relationship.

Ah well, now I need to clean the kitchen, mop the floor and put away folded wash. I'll think about the situation.....

Do NOT follow my example

This post is a lesson to lace knitters. If you are dutiful, you will follow my recommendation and learn from my painful lesson. If you are like me, well......read on.

I have been working on Sivia Harding's gorgeous Shetland Garden Faroese Shawl for months. Well, not consistently. I took it along for a two week car trip and quickly discovered that the slight rumbling of the car on the road made it impossible to do lace knitting with cobweb laceweight yarn. I'm using Cashwool color 988 ocean. Therefore, I waited to begin the shawl until I was on the steady unmoving sofa in my family room.

The pattern is challenging in that there are three or four designs in each row. One cannot simply memorize each row's pattern repeat and hum the mantra until the end of the row. One must slavishly follow the charts--at least I must.

So, after about 119 rows, progressing through various charts to Chart F, and repeating rows 24 to 39 of Chart "Center Panel" 6 times (are you with me??) I got to row 120.
It is "clear as day" on this fuzzy photo that after working rows 24 to 39 six times, one goes up to row 120 for the center panel. You can see that I use Post It notes to keep my place moving the note up each row, showing all previous rows. I guess you had to be there at the time because this was NOT clear to me. For some now inexplicable reason I returned to row 24 of the center panel and worked that along with rows 122 to 126 of the pattern. When thousands (!!) of stitches on my needle, I looked at the lovely photo of the shawl. I then realized that my Post-It note was hiding row 120 and I needed to rip back 6 times about 300 (or so) cobweb stitches that liked to enthusiastically fly off the needles when I wasn't looking.

"Oh, easy," you experienced knitters say, "Just rip back to your lifeline." I am an experienced knitter, but I tend to work without a safety net! No lifeline. Nada. Ningun. Rien. Rip, baby, rip!

Aha, I thought. I will just rip out the center panel stitches, put them on another needle and work back up. Theoretically, this sounded just fine. In practice....

After dropping back the stitches, here is what I had. Angel hair spaghetti strands, all wrapped around each other.

So, I tried to separate them.
Can you tell which is the bottom yarn?? Each time I thought I had the bottom-most yarn on one side of the center panel, it wasn't the bottom-most yarn on the other side.

I finally selected the order of the yarns, found new needles of the same size, and began to work my way back up.


After hours of ripping, sorting, taking time-outs to calm down, and drinking strong beverages, I worked back the rows. The inside of the panel was fine, but the side column of yarn overs was pure trash. Trash, trash, trash!! How did that happen?? I followed the chart exactly. Honest!
Do you think blocking would work it out? I almost convinced myself that it would, and I went to bed.
The next morning I ripped back again, used straight needles and worked back up.


Still trash on the sides.

Time to rip out six complete rows. Time for a retro-fit life line.
I threaded a needle with leftover sock yarn and tried to follow a straight line of stitches from one side of the shawl to the other.

This is harder, much harder, much, much harder, than one would think. Looks as if I had been drinking the Yarn Harlot's screech rather than some herbal tea.
As I worked my way along, dis-assembling the shawl stitch by stitch, I made another heart stopping discovery. I had actually pierced the shawl yarn in some places when making my lifeline. What are the odds?? The cashwool is about 1/4 the thickness of the sock yarn. I used a blunt needle. I cried.

When I had all seven or so rows ripped back I looked at the tangled web of yarn and cried some more. Then, I put down the camera and set to work untangling and rewinding the yarn.

I have now worked correctly to row 150. There are now 429 stitches on the needle. Surely, you say, you must have numerous life lines in the work!! Nope. Nada. Ningun. Rien. Non! I have continued to work foolishly without a safety net!! I'm following the chart in careful numerical order. I only have 25 more rows to go and then I do the applied border!! Lifelines take too much time............ I won't make another mistake that I can't fix!!!

Stay tuned.

Back in the Game

Well, I didn't fall off the face of the earth, but I did take a longer break from blogging than I had intended. During the interim my retired husband and I explored:

1. the coast of Maine. We stayed in Brooklin where E.B. White had a farm. If you wrote papers while in college you probably used his guide to writing and grammar called Elements of Style. Or, if you loved to read as a child or to your children you probably read Charlotte's Web--not the movie version. Here is the farm (now gussied up as a luxury vacation home):
And, here is the former pig pen at a neighboring farm that inspired the character of Wilbur:
2. the Bay of Fundy, location of the famous Tidal Bore. I wasn't so terribly impressed. I was looking for a wall of water similar to what is said to have occurred when Moses parted the sea, but the reality of nature sometimes is not as dramatic as the hype when on vacation.
3. Prince Edward Island (and Anne of Green Gables land). If you loved the Anne of Green Gables books, or even the movies, this is the place for you. Although Anne was a fictional character, thousands of tourists from around the world (particularly the Japanese!!??) look for the places that this young girl lived, went to school, first kissed Gilbert, etc. Great, great fun.

3. a bit of Nova Scotia. While in Halifax, I crossed the river and visited Lucy Neatby's home/office/studio. She was on tour but her able assistant showed me the yarn--impossible to resist. I loved handling the originals of her creations, seeing her piles of yarn and needles and stacks of her fabulous DVD's.

We also visited Seattle and the San Juan Island area where I purchased more yarn. (the summer was actually an Atlantic to Pacific knitting journey.)

Yarn purchased in Anacortes was destined for a blanket for my husband's daughter and her new husband, to keep warm in their vacation yurt on Decatur Island. I knit and knit and knit while on vacation--making uninspiring diagonal garter stitch squares out of Cascade's Ecological Wool. The result was better than I had dreamed:


I changed colors somewhat randomly in the first 24 squares, then duplicated them for the second 24 squares. I did not at all anticipate the star effect in the middle, but I love the unplanned surprise.

I cannot take credit for the idea of the blanket, as much as I would like to believe that I have such a high level of creativity. Rather, I brazenly took the idea from Anna in Finland, whose blankets are an absolute work of art. If you haven't seen her blog, check it out and stand in awe. She has made more than 125 blankets that she has given away to charities. I can no longer find the link to her gallery of blankets. Maybe if you sent her a message she would send you the link.

I love making blankets for other people. I think of the people wrapped in warmth, love and my best wishes for their well being. I certainly hope that the recipients find warmth, love and good wishes when keeping when wrapped in all that wool. But, blankets take a long, long time to make. I think the next one will be for me. But, I'm still looking for the perfect pattern whose color will go perfectly with my decor (or lack thereof).

Have you made a blanket for yourself? How did you select the color, yarn, pattern? Fancy or plain? In pieces or knit all in one large rectangle, square or circle?? How do I choose???

Providing comfort

I'm sure all of you know about the Prayer Shawl ministry that has been spreading across religions and the US. People in our church come from many different faith and non-faith backgrounds. Therefore, in our liberal church we recently began a "Comfort" Shawl ministry.

There is something very appealing in knitting a shawl that will wrap someone in comfort, care and warmth. At a time in his/her life when spirits might be low, physical strength might be waning and need for caring is high. I felt very good when I made this shawl, but sad knowing that it will be given to someone in the time of need, illness or great stress.

I stepped in to the Comfort Shawl ministry with great enthusiasm. I know that many comfort/prayer shawls are made of acrylic for ease in laundering. Because I believe that wool from an animal's back is more healing than spun petroleum, I decided to use a machine washable sport weight yarn from Lorna's Laces. The colorway may not be available; I purchased it as a "mill end" from the dying location in Chicago.

I wanted a shawl that would stay on someone's shoulders, so I used the Litla Dimun pattern from Folk Shawls--a Faroese style. by the way, I am very enthusiastic about the Folk Shawls book. I return to it often, to dream and plan and knit.

So, here's the finished shawl, blocking.
The symbol of our church is the "flaming chalice." I thought that the design up the middle panel of the back looked like chalices. Therefore, I added a lace-type flame from one of Barbara Walker's books. It is very hard to see the flame, but the recipient will know that it is there.
Here is the shawl with the patterning from the book.
And here you can see the entire middle back patterning, including the chalice.

I feel good about doing this, even though I don't know who will be the recipient. I hope it will be received in the spirit of sharing and caring.
The shawl was my big project. These Sockotta short socks were my "ziplock bag knitting." I keep a small project in my purse for knitting at stop signs, restaurants, in dark movie theaters and the like. My daughters have convinced me that wearing socks with sandals in the summer is just too out of style to be tolerated! So, I've been making short socks to wear with sandals. I don't know about you, but for some reason my feet are always cold, even in the summer. I think these socks are perfectly stylish, no matter what the muggles think!!

Still Stuck on Short Rows

Here it is the middle of June and I am still stuck on short rows. There is something so very soothing and hypnotic about every row being two stitches shorter than the previous row!! And, I had some Lorna's Laces sock yarn just begging to be made into something elegant. And, due to the end of school year rush at our house, garter stitch was about all I could tolerate. No more stress needed in our household when the 11th grader has tests, exams, reports, performances, recitals, SAT's, ACT's and so on and so forth. I am so glad that I am no longer in school and that I'm not a teenager any longer. I firmly believe that our schools expect too much of teenagers in terms of heavy load of homework, extracurricular activities, volunteer work, etc. Horrifyingly, I find that I am no longer surprised when a teenager commits suicide due to pressure; rather, I am surprised that more do not. We expect way to much of our children.

Back go garter stitch and short rows. Once again, Rachel Rocking Chair has volunteered to model my Easy Pie Wedge Shawl.


The mail color is Lorna's Laces pine, from the mill ends available only by visiting the dying facility in Chicago. I'm not sure if the color is available in stores.
I was concerned, unnecessarily so, that I wouldn't have enough yarn to finish the shawl and, therefore, I added a six row inset between each pie wedge, using Colinette's Jitterbug. Although the color of the camera is poor, the lime green really sets off the darker green--in my humble opinion.
Also, because I used only 100 stitches for the longest row in each wedge, rather than the 120 that I used in my previous pie wedge shawl, I was concerned that the shawl would not be wide enough to wrap elegantly. Therefore, I made 8 wedges, about 2/3 to 3/4 of the complete circle. this made for great drape.
Rachel Rocking Chair is about a wide as I am, but not as thick (shall we say) and the shawl still has a nice drape on me too.
I love the scalloped/pointed edging that is knitted into the shawl.

I seem to be at a point in my life these days when I need to knit simple things. Life is going too fast, my husband is too cranky, there is too much gardening that needs to be done, the flooding in Wisconsin and Iowa is so disastrous and worrisome, we are about to embark on a 2.5 week vacation (about 1.5 weeks too long in my estimation) and my soul needs simplicity. I bow to those of you who can knit intricate lace to relax. I find that I need peace in order to work on complex knitting.

I recall studying Maslov's hierarchy of needs in some psychology class ages ago. He posited that higher order thinking and creativity could not be accomplished unless certain basic human needs were met. In times of stress, I think that I revert to easier knitting because it soothes my soul and permits me to "veg" rather than think. Something I need these days.

Stuck on Short Rows

Since my last post spring has come to Wisconsin. Typical spring, that is. Some days with temperatures in the 60's and sunshine. Some days with temperatures in the 40's with grey skies and rain. All in all, still weather for comfy shawls.

The Easy Pie Wedge Shawl that I made last month has been very popular with knitters and non-knitters who see me wearing it. The photos of the shawl that I posted were not very good, so here is the famous model, Ms. Rachel Rocking Chair, sporting the shawl in a jaunty fashion!
Rachel here wears the shawl in devil-may-care fashion without any pin to hold the end on the shoulder. I, on the contrary, like to secure the shawl end with an understated blue stitch holder, on the shoulder, to keep myself together!! (Pattern was free on the band for Lorna's Laces Helen's Lace, but $4.50 here.)

For some reason, the rhythm of the short rows simply mesmerized me. Ordinarily, I'm not very entranced with garter stitch. However, the short rows were easy but seductive. So, I set out to use some mohair that has been in my stash for at least 8 years.

[I was in high school in the 60's, when v-neck cabled mohair sweaters were all the rage. I didn't have enough money to purchase one of those sweaters, so I've been compensating for my deprivation ever since. I have an entire of mohair! One hank has been calling to me but I never had the right pattern for it. Ellen's Half Pint Farms Brushed Mohair (one pound) in Northern Lights colorway. I once saw the Northern Lights while camping in Ontario, while floating in a river at night. thus, the blues, purples and greens were like a Siren song. ]

The pattern was another short row half-circle from Fiber Trends, Marvelous Mohair shawls and blankets. Each wedge of this mohair "pie" uses short rows going up to the maximum number of stitches and then going down, making a full pie slice. The previous shawl only made half of a slice, so to speak.

Ms. Rachel R. C. has again volunteered to model.


Rachel didn't like the flash of this photo.
So, here's a photo without flash. A little better. The shawl will be worn with my black winter coat, which is a wrap coat, unlined and uninsulated. Here in Wisconsin we need warmer winter wear, but I love the very simple black coat. So, I figured, rather than a scarf, I would wear a shawl over the coat. To make sure that the shawl would wrap sufficiently in front to keep out the very cold Arctic winds here in Wisconsin, I made five wedges, rather than the called-for four. This, I have 5/8 of the pie, rather than half!
Each pie wedge is set off by a yarn over inset that used Colinette's Jitterbug sockyarn, in a very deep plum color. I thought this would set up the glorious colors of the mohair, just as black sets off the glorious colors of traditional Amish quilts.


Here's the back.

I'm still not over the short rows. I'm making another Easy Pie Wedge Shawl using Lorna's Laces shepherd sock yarn in Pine green and some Claudia's Hand Paint (or is it Fleece Artist??) for the insert. Yes, I bought the Lorna's Laces yarn when the Guild's Knitting Safari visited the company in Chicago.

Meanwhile, back at Borders, the Yarn Harlot herself came to entertain us and sell her books. Believe it or not, she is funnier in person than in her blog and in her books! Her story about walking 14 km in the snow and cold of remote Ontario was even funnier when she told it--and I had already laughed out loud when reading her blog about it.
See her if she comes your way. The woman is very, very good and very very devoted to her fans. She sign books and is entertaining even when she should be in bed sleeping!



Thank you Stephanie!!