Shawl we dance?



I'm going to a wedding this weekend and needed a shawl to match my new party dress. I've had this yarn in my stash for at least a year awaiting its transformation so it was time. The pattern is my own design and the lovely ribbon yarn is Filatura Di Crosa "Farfalla." I think it may have been discontinued since I can't find it on Yarndex. It's not quite done yet so I'll be knitting right up until Saturday night.

I bought it in White Plains at the Goldman's Yarns going out of business sale. I really miss that place. They always had a great selection and had the space of 3 NYC LYS's. The owners were retiring after about a jalopagon years. They were always overly strict if not obnoxious about closing at 6 pm on the dot and had the typical snobby yarn store attitude. But after the relationship ends all that fades and you just have the warm fuzzy memories of mohair on a spring day, ya know?



I took a pic here to document the perfect length of yarn I had at the end of the row to join the second ball with. I'm guilty of always trying to get that last row in before the end of the skein and run out mid-row 9 times out of 10. This time it worked out perfect. Ah, the little things in life....



Cosette says "Touch Ratta and die!"

Noro Obsessed



Ok, I've sunken to a new low by putting other people's knitting on my blog! I've never really been that into Noro. Somehow it never feels very soft to me and all those colors make it hard to imagine how it will look knitted up. My friend, Monica, however, is on a big Noro kick. Check out the neck warmer she made above. I never even thought to make something like that. She said she makes them sometimes when she's making a hat and changes her mind in the middle of the WIP!



There was something strange going on with the Noro Sakura she was working with last week at UES Knitters. When knitted up the yarn completely changed color 1/4 of the way into her scarf. The strand the colored ply was wrapped around changed from black to white drastically changing the look of the yarn.



Check out the closeup:



Anyone ever had an "out of yarn experience" like this?

Review of Yarn Harlot's Latest



I bought my copy of Stephanie Pearl-McPhee's Casts Off hot off the press at the KNYTTERS UNITE book launch in NYC last month. I'm not a huge fan of the cover since the YH bears a strong resemblance to a weasel. Having seen Stephanie in person I know that with a little work she could definitely look more put together even if she's not looking to go all out glam. It seems like her deal is to be very humble and approachable but I don't think it does much for modern knitters to have a frizzy haired woman in an old school fair isle sweater on the front cover.



The book is a guidebook to the "land of Knitting" which is a pretty cool concept. She discusses its "inhabitants" (knitters) and "embassies" (LYS's), amongst other metaphors.



The illustrations are really cute as you can see from the Sports Chapter above. Like the YH's other books it's an easy read full of interesting tidbits and observations and her trademark self-deprecating humor.



It starts out strong at the beginning but I found the material in the middle and towards the end a bit weak. There's only so many times I can laugh at the idea of gauge swatches being little liars and women being overcome by wool fumes near the sale bin at their LYS's. This book might actually be better suited to new knitters who would see this material with fresh eyes. The funnier parts are broken up by fictional letters and emails between a new knitter and her mother that are obviously just filler.



I figure the target audience is likely hard core knitters and personal fans. In that case this book is pretty much guaranteed to fly off bookstore shelves and (Amazon.com shopping carts). Keep in mind I have read the Yarn Harlot's previous books and check her blog fairly regularly so I definitely get her sense of humor and writing style. While I found 1 or 2 things that made me LOL in each chapter I have to say that overall this book suffers from Sequalitis. If it were a movie I'd say wait for it to come out on DVD.

America's Next Top Model



Here's a pic AM sent me of her babe wearing the hat I knit for her birthday. I've been gushing so much about my new cat lately I can only imagine what it must be like to have a new baby!

Oh, and speaking of my furry friend now the pet food recall has expanded to her wet food. Effective April 10th Menu Foods is recalling all the 3 oz cans of Nutro Gourmet Classics cat foods. Sigh...just when we found something she was willing to eat. I found a list of all the recalled foods but am wondering at this point if there's a list of "safe" foods I can feed my kitty!

Knitting Exhibit



Last week I finally got a chance to check out the now infamous exhibit "Radical Knitting and Subversive Lace" at the Museum for Art and Design. There's a strict no picture taking policy but JF was able to sneak these while I distracted the guards ;-) This was my second trip to the museum as I went last summer for the launch of Nicky Epstein's latest book. The museum is pretty small but I like that I can really see everything and read all the descriptions comfortably in an hour before my feet start to hurt. There were a couple interesting pieces such as the dress made from strips of dollar bills, the family garments made of old newspapers, and the sweaters done to 1/12 scale.



Upon reflection I realized I enjoyed the exhibits that showed some level of knitting skill combined with creativity. There were a lot of pieces that just seemed like a jumble of random stuff. When you read the accompanying information you realize that it's supposed to make some kind of political statement on nuclear bombs or the economy. As JF likes to say, "Eh."



Actually I enjoyed the accompanying exhibit "Contemporary Netsuke" more than the actual knitting pieces. Netsuke is the Japanese art of carving intricate miniature figurines out of materials such as ebony, exotic wood, and precious metals. Check out the Octopus above (I'll admit to taking this pic off the museum's website.)

Check out the exhibit and form your own opinions!

As you can see above I made my annual visit to the Macy's Flower Show in Herald Square.



The theme was exotic flowers. They had these neat garden sculptures of giraffess...



and even a zebra!



and of course there were the flowers...






I was so into looking at the flowers I was able to hold back from doing any actual shopping. I have to save up a bit as Maryland Sheep and Wool is fast approaching :-)

Post-birthday recap

Yesterday for my birthday I went to see The Fantasticks on off-Broadway:



I've heard about this show for the longest time and wanted to check it out. Plus it was one of the few musicals left at the TKTS booth by the time I got there!



I wasn't a big fan of the first act. It reminded me of The Drowsy Chaperone in that they use a lot of stage cliches and cheap comedic ploys. However, I really enjoyed the second act which depicts what occurs following "happily ever after." Call me a cynic or a realist but I just wasn't buying the whole boy meets girl, boy and girl fall in love, drama ensues, then everything works out perfect in the end. The lesson learned in the second act is that through pain and experiencing the world in all its cruelty we can then truly appreciate the things we had from the start.



A highlight was that Tom Jones, the creator and director of the original show, played a character in the cast. Afterwards he autographed my Playbill!



That night JF took me down to Chinatown. We found this vegetarian kosher restaurant Bodai Buddha that was pretty good. They make all the regular chinese food like Sesame Chicken and General Tso's but subsitute bean curd for the meat. Anyway, I finally got to open my presents from JF:



This beautiful Chai necklace and...



these tags I can sew into my FO's. (Thanks to everyone who has read this far...you knew I would get to knitting related content eventually!)

Happy Birthday to Me!


Yay, today April 4th is my birthday. Here's a kosher for Passover cake my sister got me that wasn't half bad. It can be a problem having your birthday over Passover if you're being observant since you can't eat any bread products that have risen. The kosher bakeries must have some trick though since it was hard to tell the difference on this one. Anyway, wish me a happy 27th. This is going to be my best year ever :-)

"Cosette, I love you very much...."

JF and I finally caved and adopted a cat. We hadn't planned on it Sunday when we went to North Shore Animal League just to look around. But then I saw this beauty:

At first we were a little hesitant to get her because she seemed a little down and had been labelled "picky eater" by the staff. We took her home and upon realizing she smelled like a foot proceeded to give her a bath:

Later she seemed curious as to what we were cooking but wasn't eating much of her own food:

Once she was clean and adjusting better she started eating some wet food. She wouldn't eat any of the dry food we put out. It was Wellness brand that she had recieved at the shelter. The next day we bought her Nutro dry food and she loves it!

I made her some handknit cat toys. To my delight she actually liked them and started battting them all over the apartment. Later we sprayed them with catnip and she liked them even more! Check out this purse she can take with her on shopping trips to Petco:

She was also keen on this fish toy I made:

I made these toys freeform without any pattern. I'm working on short row heel socks right now and started playing around with short rows on these toys. I figured I'd come out with either a ball or a mouse. I think these are more orginial though :-)


And for you theatre buffs out there; Yes, she is named after the character Cosette from Les Miserables. Of couse she is anything but miserable in her new home!

WIP's


Hedera number 2 is coming along. As you can see the leg and heel flap are done and I turned the heel. It always feels like a huge accomplishment to get to this point. Take that SSS (Second Sock Syndrome)!

A new woman who designs jewlery came to Upper East Side Knitters last night and we're going to trade skills. She's going to help me with wire wrapping so I can improve my stitch markers. I'm going to teach her to crochet so she can do all those fancy picot edgings. Then we're all going to live happily ever after in Craftland :-)

I was thinking as I walked home from work today (Yes, I know it's Sunday...no, it wasn't my choice to be there!) that we need a common project that is the opposite of the ubiquitous "garter stitch scarf." In conversation and blogversation (ooo, new word :-) people discuss the garter stitch scarf as often being the first project attempted by a beginner knitter (not that there's anything wrong with that!).

So in order for everyone to be on the same page I was thinking we needed a generic project to encompass something most advanced knitters work on. As I was trying to choose between Aran sweater and Entrelac socks I came to a realization. Like many things in life, as knitters, we all begin in the same place and end up in entirely different ones. Each one of us learned to cast on, knit, purl, and bind off either from a friend or family member or a book or website. We all sat there cursing the needles thinking we would never get the hang of it.

And for those of us that became enamored with knitting no two are the same. I know very skilled knitters who focus mostly on delicate lace shawls or cabled socks or steeked sweaters. Knitting takes you as far as your skill and imagination is willing to go. So I suppose the garter stitch scarf really has no equivalent on the other side of the spectrum. Anyway, "intarsia jacket in fingering weight yarn with bust dart" just doesn't sound as catchy!

I'm a little concerned about the pain I have in my left wrist lately when I knit. I thought at first I was just imagining it and if I ignored it it would go away. It started on the airplane ride to California when I knit for about 4 hours straight on my Secret Feet Socks. I was in the middle seat and even though I was on circular needles my arm tensed up and my wrist started aching by the time we landed. I think the small yarn and needles and trying to do those impossible left slanting M1's didn't help any either. It's continued on and off in the last week. I really hope this isn't a precursor to carpal tunnel. Maybe I should rest it for awhile. Does anyone have any experience with this problem?


Here's the hat I knit for A-M's baby. The yarn is Louisa Harding's Kimono Angora. It's the softest yarn everrrrrrr. The colors came out different when knitted than they did in the skein. It appeared semi-striped in the skein but then looked more variegated when knitted. Hmmm, wonder why that happens. I made up the pattern myself. Since it was my first baby hat I was worried it was too small because I was bad and assumed the gauge of 5.5 stiches to the inch on the label when mine came out closer to 7 stitches per inch. I came to visit and see the baby and when we put it on her head it was actually too big! Which isn't really a problem as she'll grow into it. It was just funny to me as I was all ready to take it back and make a larger size.


When I wasn't looking Merino went ahead and tried the hat on. The only way to get it out of his hooves was to promise to make him his own. Sheep hats....maybe I'm on to something!

JF has been telling me I should write more about my thoughts and perspective on knitting and not just provide pics of my WIP's. So in an effort to make this blog more entertaining and interesting I'm going to be writing more about my thoughts. I have to warn you: some of my ideas are contradictory to the general knitting culture. Do not read on if you are faint of heart.

I'M NOT INTO KNITTING FOR CHARITY. Wow, it feels dangerous to admit this to the knitting public. It's not that I'm against volunteering and donating to charity per se. It's just I'd rather knit things for myself and friends and family. I did make a few squares for a Project Linus blanket last year but that's it. I know the Yarn Harlot last night said something along the lines of 'A century ago it was expected that you would knit hats for your family rather than buy them. In less than a few generations it's now expected that you buy hats rather than knit them.' I think it sounded more eloquent when she said it.

Anyway when I think about people who are really poor and needy it does make more sense to me to send them, for example, one hundred store bought hats rather than 10 hand knit ones. I know about the whole concept where the person feels special because it's handknit. In the case of third world countries where they're just trying to survive I think they'd rather have that ubiquitious $1 Walmart hat rather than no hat at all while their neighbor is flaunting a beautiful striped Koigu beret.

I do make an exception for oncology patients or hospitalized children though. Maybe that's why I went ahead and made those Project Linus squares. In the former case it's hard to buy a hat soft enough that it won't irritate the scalp for people who have lost all their hair to chemo. In the latter case children in the hospital, even if their families are of limited means, still have access to blankets. Then having a one-of-a-kind colorful blanket would seem more special than the generic scratchy hospital linens.

I can also relate to people who make blankets for cats in shelters but that's probably more because I have a soft spot for cats than based on logical reasoning. In fact now that I think about it, it actually makes less sense since the cats do not have the concept of something handknit vs. machine made. If you took a really soft blanket and cut it up into cage-sized squares it would probably have the same effect for the cat. In most cases it probably just makes the knitter feel better.

The other reason I can see knitting for charity making sense is that most likely people will not go out and buy blankets and cut them up for cats or purchase one hundred hats at Walmart. Perhaps this is a way to get people involved in donating who otherwise would not. I also understand that there are charitable knitting groups at hospitals and churchs who enjoy the social aspect of knitting together. If that makes your needles click then go for it.

I think my overall problem with charity knitting relates to the pressure I sometimes feel that I'm supposed to be knitting for charity. Are other hobbies or interests like that? To bring up similar obsessive pasttimes to the ones Stephanie mentioned on the tour do Star Trek fans, fly-fishers, and model builders frequently donate to charities in the context of their shared interest? Not that I know of although feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. I spend all day at work helping other people and I have volunteered my time for causes in the past. Am I terribly selfish if I only want to knit myself a scarf or only make a baby hat if it's for a friend?

I just want to encourage knitters to think for themselves on a variety of topics and not feel pressured into thinking and doing things the way everyone else seems to. And please, don't take this as me urging people to stop knitting for charity. In fact go ahead and knit double to make up for me and thousands of other knitters who haven't knit for charity but are too ashamed to admit it!

Look at all the knitters! I was fortunate enough to attend the Yarn Harlot's book launch and "Show the Muggles Night" at FIT tonight. Nearly all the seats in the 750 seat auditorium really were filled. And for once I wasn't the only one in the audience knitting! I went ahead and bought a signed copy of her new book "Cast Off." Originally I thought the premise was her traveling around the country and writing about the knitting related places she saw and people she met. Then I realized it was actually a trip to the fictional land of knitting. I havn't had a chance to read it at all yet but will give a review when I do.


They handed out these pins to everyone who entered the auditorium. It took me awhile to figure out that the "Y" in knyitters was for "NY." Am I the only slow one this wasn't obvious to? Every chair had a bag on it containing a pair of Boye size 8 straight needles and a skein of Patons SWS (Soy Wool Stripes) yarn. There was a pattern for making a square for Warm Up America. The stated idea was for everyone in the audience to make a 7x9 square during the evening and hand it in the end to make into a blanket. I think this was a thinly veiled attempt to quell Stephanie's nerves by talking to a room full of bentover heads rather having to look anyone in the face as she spoke. I finished about 6 inches before my arm started to hurt. I'm not used to using straights when the seats are so close together. But I'll finish it at home and mail it in.

As for the event itself Stephanie came out wearing her Bohus sweater and jeans as I and other readers had recommended to her on her blog. I took pics but I was so far back that you can barely see her in them. The sweater did look really nice in person and fit well. At one point she started overheating and took the sweater off tossing it on the floor of the stage. The New Yorkers in the audience called out to her to pick it up off the floor. Apparently in Toronto the bitter cold keeps all the floors clean (note hint of sarcasm).

Her response was that wool is washable. I guess she has never lived in a NYC apartment where your bathroom is the size of a moth's balls, your two tables are constantly covered with clutter, and even if it's superwash you still have to treck to the laundromat and pay $2 for what they claim is a doubleloader. Sorry for the tangent but if you haven't lived here you just don't get how 8 million people can live together in such a small area and only kill each other occasionally (more so in certain neighborhoods). Things get dirty...really dirty...so we don't put our handknit sweaters on the floor!

Anyway she was totally nervous in the beginning. But once she opened up she gave a really funny speech; part standup comedy routine, part rallying cry for people to see knitters for who we really are and how many of us there are and not succumb to stereotypes. She used the acronym CHOKE which stands for Constant Humiliation of Knitters Everywhere. She told some really funny stories of people's reactions to her such as when a man literally withdrew his business card after a ten minute conversation with her when he realized she wrote knitting books. One of the funnier bits was when she told people what they should say should a non-knitter come across your stash in all its glory without any preparation. You could say something along the lines of "Thanks for noticing. It took me a long time but I'm almost there" or "This is only the amount of yarn I need for the week" or pick up and stroke a skein of yarn and call it your kitten.

The only downside to the evening was the so called "Question and Answer" part. Only about 3 out of 15 people who took the mic actually asked questions. The others all just gushed to Stephanie about how great and funny she was and then competed by comparing how far away they had traveled to come to the book launch. I think she liked this because she didn't get put on the spot but I really wanted to call out "She's just a normal person. Unless you want to go backstage and feel her up under her Bohus just ask a simple question and then shut up. I know we're all these happy feel-good knitters but it's getting late, I haven't eaten dinner, and I don't care that you caught the red eye from Sweden or that your 5-year-old cracks up when you read Yarn Harlot books as bedtime stories." Wow, I feel better now that I got that off my chest!

To end on a more positive note I was interviewed for the "Let's Knit2gether" podcast. You can access it here. I was kicking myself for forgetting to bring my fliers for UES Knitters but the interviewer was happy to let me put in a plug for my group on her podcast. Hopefully it'll get into the final version. I'm going to go read my new book now. Now I don't have worry about finishing "At Knit's End" and having no other good knitting humor to read!

I've been AWOL from blogland due to a much needed vaca in California :-) JF and I flew to San Franciso last week where we stayed for a few days before driving down the coast, stopping in Monterey, then continuing on to LA. I have about 500 pics and JF has another 350 or so but I'll spare you guys and give you some highlights:

Pacific Park at the Santa Monica Pier

Carousel also in Santa Monica
:
Morro Rock-it's actually made of lava!

Seals sunbathing on the coast

Fisherman's Wharf-you can see Alcatrez in the background

Muscle Beach on the "boardwalk" in Venice


Chinatown in San Francisco

Nemo at the Long Beach Aquarium

Mr. Friendly Seal

Coral

Lion fish-beautiful but poisonous!

Golden Gate Bridge on a foggy day

Buddha statue at the Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park

Waterfall in the park

Sonoma County

Barrels of wine

While JF was antiquing in Monterey I came across this knitting section of the store :-)

Anyone ever heard of this yarn?

Beginner knitting book from the '50's

Some patterns from the book

This is where the novel "Cannery Row" by John Steinbeck took place. Alright I'll admit I never read it but I did muddle through "The Grapes of Wrath" in 11th grade!

Knitting themed charm bracelet I purchased in San Francisco

"Till the sun comes up over Santa Monica Bld!"