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.

BCN Ch. 2: Windows and Doors

I never really liked windows and doors until I went to Europe. The windows and doors there are outstanding. I don't know whether I like them because of their metaphoric quality, or because they are simply beautiful.

If the eyes are windows to the soul, are windows and doors the "eyes" to culture?? When I longingly look at the windows and doors of Barcelona, am I seeking an understanding of what it is like to live in and belong to a large European city? Am I metaphorically putting myself into the apartment, building or store by photographing the beauty? Do I want to go inside the building, or am I content to stay, admiringly, outside?

I don't know the answers to these questions, but I'd like to invite you to admire a few windows and doors of Barcelona with me.
This photo is from a chocolate store called "Xocoa". The style is "modernista". I don't know if the stained glasswork is old or new--but made to look old. If you ever visit Barcelona, check out one of the Xocoa stores and purchase some of their Jamaican Pepper Chocolate--made with pepper!!
I don't recall what building this is from, but the entry is pretty forboding and powerful! Wouldn't you love to wave to the throngs below from the window above the door?? Dressed in a lace mantilla and fluttering a fan??
Another chocolate/pastry shop!! Modernista style mosaic and stained glass. How can you not stop in to purchase some decadent pastry, or some chocolate to sooth your soul???
I'd love to live in this apartment building, if only to walk through these inner doors every day.
This window overlooks the back of the Boqueria market. Not a very scintillating view. But, at least, the apartment can catch some air on occasion, even if laden with smells from the fish stands. In the morning, you can drape your blankets over the railing to air out. Or, maybe, that is a beach towel on the left. Many, many years ago I was a student in Switzerland for a summer and rented a room from a single woman. Every morning, I carefully made my bed. One morning my landlady chastised me for making my bed so quickly in the morning, and covering up the night vapors. These Americans, she exclaimed, don't have any manners or good sense. Everyone knows, she continued, that one must hang the bedding out the window every morning, to air, for good health!!
Not many apartments in Barcelona have clothes dryers. Many windows sport clotheslines.
Sometimes its the stucco between the windows that is appealing. How I would love to have decorated stucco next to my bedroom window!! Wouldn't the decorations ensure sweet dreams??
Arriving home to Wisconsin, however, we found this view out of our bedroom window. A fierce thunderstorm knocked down many trees. This one fell onto the roof of our garage, and our patio. Luckily, neither the roof nor my gas grill (hidden under the brances) were injured. Getting rid of the huge tree top has been quite challenging. Hubby is not good with a chain saw, but we have hired a young man who not only has a chain saw but is a forester. We may need to hire someone with a truck and "cherrypicker" as well!!

WE MADE IT!!

I am writing this in Barcelona Spain! Thank you from the bottom of our hearts to Senator Herbert Kohl's office who arranged for an appointment at the Chicago passport office on the Monday morning after our passport fiasco!! By 4:00 p.m. Maddie had her new passport in hand. On Wednesday we were on an airplane to Barcelona! Thank you from the bottom of our pocketbooks to the airlines which put us on a later flight--with no additional charge!!
Maddie and I arrived in BCN tired but grateful! Ready to speak Spanish and ready to drink coffee in our favorite spots.

Being in another country always makes me feel as if I am in a suspended state of being. I don't recall any dates, I don't know what day of the week it is and I tend to treat the money as if it is a type of play, Monopoly-like money. Of course, reality keeps on trucking and I am the one who is lost in space, so to speak. Forgive me if I no longer remember what dates we arrived or did something exciting.

Barcelona hasn't changed much since our year here (2004-05). We stepped back into the routines, into knowing which subways to catch and remembering that everything closes from 2-5 p.m.

One great change is that the knitting group for which I was a founding member (one of two members!!) has grown rapidly. There are about 20 or more people who come on a rotating basis, depending on availability, to a Starbucks on Monday evenings. My good friend, Betty at www.sincontrol.blogspot.com continues to be the energetic leader of this group. My friend Jennifer has opened a new yarn shop called Personnes Llanas (it's Catalan and I'm not sure of the spelling)! And the group has expanded in both numbers and languages--including Catalan, Spanish, French and English speakers. And one man!! (Jennifer's husband).

Unfortunately, I can't seem to load photos into this post, because I am using an Apple computer I think. So, I can't show you the wonderful photos I've taken of my progress on the new Violets by the River Shawl I've been making here in Barcelona. Take my word for it, I have lovingly recreated nearly 2/3 of the shawl in many cafes of the city, on the airplane to Paris and back and in Paris cafe's as well. I have not seen any other person knit in public and I have received a number of stares, particularly when I hold the shawl up to photograph it in some interesting setting. Now I know how the Yarn Harlot feels when she photographs her socks. Maybe American and Canadians have come to grips with the knitting fever, but the Europeans seem to think that knitting is a very private activity, one that is done in public by only the most crass and low-class women. Now, I walked aroung the Pigalle area of Montmartre and I saw some pretty crass and low-class women "selling their wares", and I don't think I looked quite so crass with my knitting in my lap, but some of the stares I received implied otherwise!

Several bloggers have commented on La Droguerie in Paris as a marvelous yarn shop. But, no one told me that the air in the shop is charged with addictive substances and breathing it makes you want to spend inordinate amounts of money--NO SELF-CONTROL POSSIBLE!!!! Did any of you every read the Samuel Taylor Coleridge poem in high school, about the land of the Kubla Khan, that is a wonder palace of delights, written while high on opium??. Coleridge must have been a yarn-a-holic who stepped into La Droguerie!! Unfortunately, my pleas to the management to permit me to take photos were met with a polite but firm, "That is impossible." I even asked twice. I even asked after spending more than 200 Euros!! No, that was impossible!! Let me just tempt you by saying that the place is stacked from floor to ceiling, on hooks, in drawers, in glass jars and under glass topped antique display cases with yarns, buttons, ribbons, beads and every delight that an addicted knitter, beader, button hound or ribbon stasher could imagine--and then more. Hundreds, nay thousands, of spools of embroidered, plain, velvet, beaded, crinoline, imported and imagined ribbon from around the world. Millions upon millions of beads in glass jars--untouchable glass jars--on narrow and tall shelves and under display glass. If you like a bead, they have it in every color and size. Buttons--buttons to die for. Every color and every size in every model. Buttons created from stacks of buttons. Buttons of every substance. And yarn--hanging in loose skeins--to touch and admire--in colors and in natural states--in wool, bamboo, silk, linen, cotton and combinations. NO acrylic!!

And knitted items hanging from the ceiling, from the walls and every other cevice not filled with the above mentioned opiates. Each knitted item cuter, more stylish, more awe inspiring than the next.

Are you still brreathing??? Well, the shopping is quite an experience for an American. Someone will help you, someone who can guide your selection. Someone who will tell you that the patterns for their displayed items are not for sale. That is, you have to buy the yarn, to get the pattern. So, you don't know how many meters, kilometers or grams of yarn you need for the item you want to knit. You just tell the nice lady that you want to make that cardigan, the one up there on the right, in this color in your size. She goes and gets the yarn and the pattern. And comes back with the skeins in a bag with the pattern. Then you find out how much yarn you have. She gives you a little slip of paper with some french heiroglyphics on it. You take the paper to the man in the little wood cage in the middle of the store. He is the only person who handles money--or credit cards.

Oh wait, you forgot the buttons. Each model has about 20-30 dollars of buttons on it, it seems. The clerks will bring out the drawer of little tiny compartments with alll the varieties and colors of the model you desire. You sort through the hundreds of buttons of each type, size and color to find the ones you want. Perfection counts!!

I left the shop with yarn for four sweaters--bamboo, linen, cotton and silk--as I recall. I had no more time to go to Le Bon Marche to find less expensive yarn, nor to visit any other yarn shop. I also had no money left.....

We escaped Paris just in time to miss the crush of Bastille Day celebrations and to keep me out of more yarn shops.

More later.....

End of the semester!!

It's been a long time, it seems, since my last post. I have been overwhelmed with completing my end of the semester projects and papers. I can now say that I have finished everything!!! Last week, I had completed the work for two of my courses. This week, I completed one 17 page paper and two 2-page papers on Tuesday morning. I handed them in and took off for my parent's home, about a 3 hour drive from my home. My mother has had a very difficult year health-wise and she doesn't have the energy or strength to plant flowers. She has always had nice flowers around her house. This year she said she would not plant anything, because my parents will be going to stay at my sister's home in Colorado for 5 weeks. Mom was afraid that anything she planted would not grow--and besides, she couldn't plant anyway. Therefore, for Mothers' Day, I told her I would plant flowers for her as soon as I finished my papers. So, on Tuesday afternoon, I took off. I planted little pink vincas along the walk and geraniums and a trailing plant in the large pots. Someone will come to water the plants every week. I love doing these things for my mom, but I hate that she can no longer do them herself, if you know what I mean. Meanwhile, progress on the full body sock blanket (i.e. leftover sock yarn balnket) progress has stalled because I'm knitting the socks to get the leftover yarn!! I recently finished jaywalkers and the leftover yarn is the pale green and gold square in the bottom row. I'm currently working on socks in my favorite pattern of all time, the feather and fan socks from Socks, Socks, Socks. Meanwhile, the blanket has 39 squares. I'm planning on having 96 squares. You can see that I need to knit lots and lots of socks. However, I am reconciled to this being a long term project.

Meanwhile, I have been trying to finish my spring cleaning--in knitter's talk that means finishing old projects!. A few weeks ago, I finished the little girl's hooded sweater out of ancient but adorable yarn. Now, I'm trying to finish this sweater for myself, started before Christmas. It is a Dale of Norway pattern, using their discontinued yarn, Sisik. Since I am a woman of significantly more years than this lovely model, I plan to eliminate the little flower do-dad where the fronts join. I also eliminated the pockets because I thought they would make me look too hippy (that is, too big in the hips, not too much like the young flower child I once was). I have completed the back and fronts and am now finishing the sleeves. The sleeve on the needles is on its third iteration!!! Here's the StupidSleeve Knitter's History:
1. Knit sleeve #1. Too narrow. Leave as is.
2. Knit sleeve #2. Amend pattern. Just right.
3. Frog Sleeve #1.
4. Begin re-knitting Sleeve #1. Work about 5 inches.
5. Abandon for another project. (No longer recall which project.)
6. Months later, locate sleeve #1. Unable to locate pattern. Merrily knit away, using memory as guide.
7. Ready for sleeve cap decreasing on sleeve #1. Compare to Sleeve #2. TOO NARROW.
8. Frog Sleeve #1 for second time. My parents watch in horror. How can you rip out all that work????? Because I'm stupid, that's why!
9. Locate pattern and notes. Work on sleeve #1. So far, soo good.
10. Take vow to complete Sleeve #1 this weekend!! DO NOT START ANOTHER PROJECT UNTIL THIS SWEATER IS COMPETE!!!!
I'm in the home stretch, now. I plan to finish the sweater this weekend, if gardening doesn't intervene.

It is so difficult to convince my husband that knitting is much more important than yard work.......