just another blog

Get out your handkerchiefs

2009-10-18T09:53:00.000-07:00

I really meant get out your calculators. But I loved that movie.

Anyway, thanks for following along. I've been slow because I've been knitting. And I twisted my foot which hurt a whole lot and I felt sorry for myself, but it's better now. Just a little purple and swollen, but I can walk. OK, back to Tweedy Aran Cardigan.

One person reported trouble seeing the numbers on the schematic I posted. Sorry for the trouble. I was having photoeditting, blogger, and html trouble. Clicking on the photo in that last post will take you to flickr. Then, right above the photo you will see a mini magnifying glass and the words "all sizes". Click on that to see the schematic really big. Let's see what I can make work now though.

Ah, here's the back. Recall, this pattern comes in five bust sizes, 33.5, 38, 42.5, 47 and 51.5

So first look at the numbers of the schematic along the bottom of the back. Are they exactly one half the bust circumference? Mostly, yes, except not in the largest size. 25.25 times two is only 50.5. If that inch matters, then you will want to know if the error comes in the schematic or in the stated size.

Two issues. First, there's the math sloppiness. In order to know the true largest size, one would need to do some calculations.

Second. Where's the selvedge? I have seen way too many patterns that do not account for the selvedge stitches. Let me give an example. Suppose the gauge is 4 stitches to an inch and it is a pullover knit in two pieces. Design says finished sweater will be 36 inches at bust. So they say knit each of back and front to be 18 inches across, or 4x18 = 72 stitches. However, once you sew the two pieces together, you lose four stitches to the seam. That's a whole inch. The finished sweater really measures 35 inches. I've seen this in patterns for bulky weight as well, with the gauges of 2.5 or 3 stitches per inch. And I am not just talking freebies from random folks on ravelry, these are professional designers, both in magazines and self-published. I've browsed ravelry project pages of some of these and sure enough, for a decent percent of finished sweaters, the knitter mentions that it is smaller than anticipated. Pay attention. If you want to knit a sweater and a number of folks complain about the fit, check the numbers yourself. There's a decent chance the selvedge stitches weren't accounted for.

We do not know in this pattern whether the designer accounted for selvedge but just doesn't show us on the schematic, or if the design does not account for selvedge and thus will knit up too small. We'd have to calculate that ourselves.

Now, one of the best parts of this pattern is the waist shaping. Sadly enough, the IK stylists and editors from 2001 did not even photograph this aspect of the sweater! Fortunately we have ravelry and can browse the FOs to appreciate this detail. So, you choose a size, but how much of a waist shaping will you get?

Check out the schematic. My stars. If you make the smallest size, the waist shaping is in reverse, girth there will be bigger than at bust. The next size up, 38 inches, will give a waist decrease of two inches total, since the back indents by one inch. But then holy mother of saints! The largest size, with the 51.5 inch bust. According to the schematic, the waist shaping is NINE inches. Yup, that would mean a waist circumference of 42 inches. That is quite the hourglass figure, yes?

OK, so all this tells you is that the schematic figures are completely wrong. If you want to know how much waist shaping you will get you have to figure that out yourself.
We'll leave that for next time. Now I want to finish my sweater. See. I've knit the body as a unit and all I have left is to finish one front and then knit the collar. the second sleeve is already knit and ready to be sewn on.

Tweedy Schematics

2009-10-08T13:39:00.000-07:00

Knitting math. Or how to think for oneself. Or, you don't really need circulation in your arm anyway, do you?

Frankly, I should be knitting out in the sunshine instead of doing this. But it just keeps bugging me. I thought about posting it on ravelry, but there's too much "only say nice things" etiquette there. I thought about posting a review on the Interweave Knits storefront for the pattern, but I'd have to create an account and it seemed like a hassle. I ought to do that anyway though, I would LOVE to know if IK would allow such candid comments in their review.

Pattern: Tweedy Aran Cardigan
Designer: Norah Gaughan
Source: Interweave Knits 2001 and then in a special limited release free e-book and now available for purchase at Interweave Knits.

Pros. This is a really cute cardigan with nice attention to detail. The waist shaping in particular makes for a professional look. A combination of twisted rib, "fancy" rib (a rib created with alternating left and right twists, like mini-cables) and some elegant and simple cable motifs.

Cons: Unfortunately, you will not know it's cute or that neat shaping from Interweave. The only photos are of a size 42.5 sweater on a model with perhaps a 32 inch bust and stick arms. She's probably petite as well, as the sleeves are way too long. There are no photos of the back or the sides that would show the nice waist shaping detail. Ravelry is your friend here. Lots of very well fitting sweaters AND photos of the details.

There are three problems with this pattern. The first seems well known (from browsing ravelry projects) although not listed officially anywhere. The waist shaping decreases 5 stitches from each side of the back (and five from each front), all in the twisted rib section. This is a crucial design element. However, in the 33.5 inch size, there are only Three stitches of twisted rib on each end. If you follow directions, you end up cannibalizing the cable. Oops.

Following the directions will result in the elongated cable lying right next to a column of twisted knit stitches. This is wrong. One really ought to have at least one column of purl stitches next to the cable. I put one column in (by starting and ending the twisted rib with a purl instead of a knit), and now that I am about half done the body, I wish I had put two columns. If you look Very Carefully at the original photo, it sure looks like there's a purl column there where it should be.

Now here's an issue I haven't seen noted elsewhere. (Although, several knitters on ravelry did have trouble getting their sleeves to fit, and some reknit or added a gusset.) The sleeves are pretty narrow, and get more narrow as a percentage of bust size as one goes to larger sizes.

The 33.5 size sweater has sleeve size (measured around upper arm) off 38% of bust, or 12.75 inches. The 51.5 size sweater has a sleeve size of only 30% of bust, or 15.5 inches. For a cardigan designed to be worn with a shirt underneath, with some positive ease, these numbers don't make a lot of sense.

For numbers that make even less sense, look at the schematic (you can click and make it bigger). This is from the ebook edition and matches the original magazine version exactly. (The ebook did correct and errata in the cable instructions.) For anyone who likes math and likes being appalled at arithmetic errors, enjoy. I just have to say WTF? Either Norah or some tech editor at Interweave is either pretty stupid or is making a nasty comment about their audience.

Knitting question. Rant to follow shortly.

2009-10-06T19:03:00.000-07:00

Howdy poor neglected blog! Is anyone reading? Between Facebook and Ravelry, almost all my social networking needs are met. But I am reluctant to give up on this totally. Especially when I have a rant that I want to publish and nowhere else seems apt. :)

IF anyone who knits happens to stop by, would you mind answering a question?

Do you knit sweaters or garments or anything from published designs where size might be an issue? Do you care if the design has schematics? Do you check the schematics?

Public Service Announcement

2009-05-24T12:34:00.000-07:00

Attention Geoff Ralston, CEO of Lala.com
One of your investors is not happy. Moreover, he is completely flummoxed why another investor (Bain?) is happy and willing to give more money to you.

So this VC guy is appalled at your business model. Says "Bill Nguyen is always on vacation and the CEO just looks confused."

And if this information isn't for public announcement. Well then, Rich, don't scream it into your iphone in public, ok?

I ducked.

2009-03-04T14:00:00.001-08:00

One would think that having a new kindle2 and going to a book group would mean a show-and-tell. Alas, not the case. I had brought my kindle, in its gorgeous ultrasuede cover, but it stayed in my purse.

We even talked about kindles. Someone brought them up, someone else mentioned a Seattle Times article than "panned them." The career bookseller was pleased to hear that. (It didn't, not really.) Her livelihood is at stake. But most people had never seen a kindle and no one had seen a kindle 2. One person mentioned that a little wistful. But I was too chicken to get controversial. Little did they know they were about four feet away from one. The negative things they said about the kindle? Most of them weren't true.

Face it. Kindle or its competitors will change bookselling. And in some ways, it's about time. Sorry about that, but times change. There will still be a market for bricks and mortar bookstores, for real live booksellers, at least in the near future, but the times are changing.

Like holding a book in your hands? Well, actually I don't. I find my hands hurt after too long holding a book open. And some books are heavy and awkward to hold. A kindle is like getting ergonomic bars on your bicycle. All of a sudden, many other hand positions are available and no more cramping.
Multi-tasking. I like to knit, but that cuts into my reading time. I thought audiobooks would be the thing, but they aren't always appropriate. I can read a children's chapter book (big print) and knit, as long as the spine is already broken on the book. With the kindle, my reading while knitting options open up wide.
No backlight? I love the fact that it doesn't have a light! It's easy on the eyes, easy on the power consumption, all around a win. I am fine with greyscale. Color is over rated.
Weight of books. Several people mention being able to take lots of books on vacation, not running out if the plane is delayed. I also see this as the future of textbooks. My teen's backpack is lethal. There's no reason he should be carrying around all that weight all day. (sure there are lockers, but not enough for everyone and not enough time between bells to utilize it anyway.) Just think if all or most all textbooks were e-books. A savings all round.
Formatting pdfs and blogs and newspapers. So it's a work in progress. I downloaded the free sample first chapter of my graduate school Algebra text to see how it handled the symbols and it was fine. I haven't tried a knitting pattern yet. I expect some will be frustrating, some might be fine.
Not being able to share or resell books? I suspect that's a work in progress as well.

Carbon footprint? Saving paper, of course, but it does cost resources to make the e-reader. Saving trucking costs getting books to stores. Just thinking textbooks alone: My son carries at least 10 pounds of textbooks every day. So, 10 pounds by one million kids by 5 mile average round trip commute is using fossil fuels to carry 50 million pound-miles every school day. Account for absences etc and say 150 days a year. How much gas does it take to move 3.75 million tons of weight a year? (note, my numbers are very back-of-envelope.) I know laptops were supposed to be the end of carrying heavy backpacks, but that hasn't happened. I like that the e-reader has limited net access. I don't want a full bells and whistles browser, because I don't want the distraction and temptation. It's not going to happen tomorrow, but it will happen. And sooner than some suspect. Now I just have to get up enough nerve to admit my purchase to diehard book fans. I'll think about that tomorrow. Tomorrow is another day.

Grow Up, Young Man!

2009-03-04T06:12:00.000-08:00

Maybe we should read the classics more often.

Book group last night. Six women. Five questions of "Why is this a Classic?" and "Why do we have teens read this?" (One woman arrived late. But she wasn't asking those questions anyway.)

Most said they didn't really understand the book until they realized how depressed Holden was. Another woman brought up bipolar as I considered, but really, I don't think we can say bipolar to be exact, but Holden is seriously depressed and having a manic episode. Very depressed, very out of control. So the ending is bleak because, given the time and culture, there isn't much hope of him getting proper treatment. Someone mentioned the self-medication with all that alcohol. Without proper treatment -- that's going to come right back.

So why do we have high school kids read this? One woman -- the one who brought up the bipolar and self-medicating -- said that she had read it as a young teen and thought then it was an adventure story. Hmmm. Just like Huck Finn is an adventure story. There's a thought. When the American Character group discussed Huck Finn recently, many were struck by how challenging it would be for teens. That the themes of race and the characterization of Jim were so brutal and needed perspective. Many were also struck by how awful Tom behaved. Tom in popular culture is not such an awful bully and brute; he's a fun kid who likes adventure! I don't believe in censoring books to kids, but I have often gotten uncomfortable when kids are reading books as adventure stories but missing --- on the surface --- the book's darker themes. Are they absorbing themes without consciously evaluating them? Think Jane Eyre as a romance, even though if today our BFF were involved with a Rochester, we ought to be very worried for her.

We had a lively discussion. One woman had researched themes on the internet and another woman bought the Spark Notes. Wow, often we discuss a book for all of ten minutes! These women were serious last night, they wanted to understand, to think! So a theme that resonated the most was that Holden really does not want to grow up. His ambivalence about sex, his issues with "applying himself" and on and on. Sure, this would resonate with teens, this does make for legitimate reason for teens to read it. Teens are ambivalent about growing up. Independence comes at a cost. Holden seems to have had a decently affluent childhood, but then his younger brother died and he gets sent away --- as all the boys of his culture are --- to boarding school, a brutal existence with no adult protectors. When he was young, no one protected him. Now all he can think of is to protect children. (Hmm, Ender's Game)

Is it all about sex? Sparknotes would have us believe that. In a way, probably. Everything is about sex. Holden is immature in some ways, but actually seems pretty mature in other ways, in conflicting feelings about wanting sex, but with whom? Sex with someone you like --- but do girls want it? How do you know when a girl says no because they mean it or because they want it but want to be able to deny that later? Or sex with someone you don't like? That's easier, but harder. He sees his peers following this route without compunction --- just one more way in which everyone is a phoney.

I get that he wants to save kids. I get that he wants to keep them from falling off the cliff. The most vivid scene I remembered from my reading as a teen (the only scene I remembered) was him trying to erase the "Fuck You" grafiti from his sister's school. I took it on the surface, just protecting kids. But big themes go further, he wants to protect kids' sexual innocence. Is it just about sex? (ah, the joys of high school. the one woman who said they read it for high school said they never mentioned sex.)

Well, he does take those two young boys to the mummy exhibit, even though he knows it will scare them. And maybe this explains the carousel pony on the cover of my copy. When Phoebe is on the carousel he comments about how kids will attempt to get the brass ring. How it is dangerous for them to attempt this but how we just have to let them do it anyway. Then he goes home and gets help.

I am struck by how yesterday I was stuck in the depression angle. Then discussing the book, we started with depression but were able to move on and appreciate many different aspects of the book and Holden. While acknowledging the depression, we were able to view Holden's journey apart from it. Unlike the protagonist of many children's and YA novels, Holden has two parents. Two relatively normal parents. So for his journey to make sense, it comes with a different cost. I just wish I didn't get the feeling that the book says that growing up requires mental illness. Or maybe I just wish that idea didn't resonate with me so much.

America is still a pretty young nation. Are we still wrestling with growing up? With sexual maturity? Does a bear shit in the woods? This book then seems awfully prescient, given how the 50s and 60s played out.

Go West, Young Man.

2009-03-03T15:58:00.000-08:00

Another question about Catcher in the Rye, is why did the book group facilitator (an emeritus professor of literature) choose this book as part of a series on American Character?

On one level, the answer is trivial. Holden Caufield is considered a quintessential American Character. A teen, 50's, boarding school, all popular topics. Many people know of Holden even if they haven't read the book. But is that the reason enough to include it in the list?

I suspect there's a bit more than that. I don't think it's an accident that Holden ends up in a psych ward in California. Just like Huck Finn & Jim, just like Jack Burden in All the King's Men, he doesn't fit in civilization and looks West for salvation and a place to call home. We never know if Huck and Jim make it. Jack lies around Long Beach, creates his own god -- The Great Twitch -- and goes back East where he belongs. Holden? What has California to offer him? What he needs is family, connections, support --- as well as professional psychological help. All he wants to do is save kids, but who will save him? California does have his brother, but only for an occasional visit. It doesn't have his sister Phoebe who probably needs Holden by now as much as he needs her. California implies that Holden is the problem and he can get fixed in isolation. California for therapy, chosen by his parents. How is it different from Holden's plan to run away to California, get a job pumping gas and pretend to be a deaf-mute?

Did Salinger mean to allude to Twain? Or is it just burned into the American psyche to look West to follow your dreams. Are we all a bunch of misfits out here?

Why a duck?

2009-03-03T15:07:00.000-08:00

I have no idea.

I was planning to use some cut-up thrift store cashmere sweaters or other stash fabric to make a protective case for my kindle 2. But while I was at the fabric store this morning on an errand for Franz and was browsing the buttons, I stumbled upon the ultrasuede squares* and knew instantaneously that my kindle's case would

be made of ultrasuede
be made of these exact colors
have a duck on the cover
not just any duck, the duck from the duck stencil Zach had when he was a preschooler.

Even though I hadn't actually seen that duck stencil in years and wasn't even sure we still owned it.

We do have the stencil. Before committing to it though, I browsed stencils and images on line. How about a nice elephant? They never forget and could hold tons of books in their trunk? Or a goose? Y'know, Mother Goose-ish? Oh, then I found a really cute owl. But no, none of those would do, it had to be a duck. This duck.

*They are called ultrasuede squares even though their dimensions are 9x12 inches.

Why is this a classic?

2009-03-02T15:07:00.000-08:00

I just finished reading Catcher in the Rye, for perhaps the third time. I'm in two different book groups that are discussing it this month. Convenient for me. In one book group, we read children's and YA literature. We read a lot of newer work, but occasionally go back to a classic or two. The other book group is more erudite --- It has a theme. This year's theme is The American Character. In neither case did I have any say in choosing this book.

I really disliked the book the last times I read it, but couldn't have told you why. I found the ending so depressing, so hopeless. This time, I enjoyed reading the book. I liked the voice. I was surprised. But then, at the end, I realized why I disliked the book in the past, why I thought the ending was so depressing when other people seemed to think it was hopeful.

Here's the thing. The book is not what most people seem to think -- a teenage rite of passage, a teen facing the normal angst of growing up. The book is a first person account of a psychotic break. Manic break, I would say, but I am no expert. The signs point to mania though. Many hours without sleeping or getting tired, staying awake even after consuming a lot of alcohol. Grandiose thoughts, poor judgment with money. The hallucinations near the end when he is afraid of falling every time he steps off a curb.

Because the person having the psychotic break is a teen, because that teen is intelligent and aware and empathetic and all that, it looks like a teen event, and because he is so articulate, it looks like something readers can identify with. But it is not a teen event. It is a psychotic break from reality. You don't treat them the same way. And it's not really his first break. When his brother died, he slept in the garage and used his fist to break all the windows. And he tried to break the windshield of the car, but by then his hand was broken. So, he got hospitalized to fix the hand, but no one seems to have considered that the fractured bones were not the problem.

That's the reason I find the ending depressing. He's not being treated as someone mentally ill, he is being treated as someone who needs to grow up, to "Apply himself." That's different. He's not going to get better that way. I don't know the state of medical diagnosis and treatment for bipolar disorder or even serious depression in the late 40's early 50's when the book was written. Electroshock? Worse? We don't even have an avuncular Judd Hirsh to give us a Hollywood moment and make it all better. Holden, hater of Hollywood that he is, would have declared that phony anyway. He'd been right.

new best friend for a knitting reader or a reading knitter

2009-03-01T17:23:00.000-08:00

I'm happy, too.

Make sure you read the alt text as well.

Plans

2009-02-13T11:26:00.000-08:00

A friend just asked in email what I plan to do next week, since the teen is off school. Last year at this time we went skiing in Utah, but this year nothing nearly so exciting. As I was thinking about my list of things and what to reply, I figured this was a great opportunity to say Hi to the blog. Hi, blog!

My plans:

Nag the teen. He must

Finish Application for next year's school dream
Do homework
Figure out his LA Honor's project and get cracking
Work on two Merit Badge requirements
Practice the horn. Solo & Ensemble recital is just around the corner
Make dinner one night and do other various chores
Complete paperwork on service learning hours he's accomplished so far. He needs 60 to graduate, has turned in Zero, but has actually done maybe 15. Can't get credit if he doesn't fill out the forms.

Prepare the budget for a volunteer board position I've held way too long. (My term is up in December 2009!) This should have been done already. It should have been done this week, but instead the computer has been busy running thorough scans and removing viruses, thanks to the teen.
Watch eBay. That's my first edition/first printing signed copy of Twilight. Stephenie Meyer came to All For Kids on her very first tour; we were her very first audience. There were maybe a dozen girls and women present. Our buyer really liked the book, thought it would sell, but it was hardback and brand new. We had to scramble to get the dozen people to come so the room wouldn't be deserted for this novice author. My how things have changed! Last time she came to Seattle, she talked at Benaroya and tickets sold out in about a half hour. Erika is a dear and listed it for me, as I have never figured out how to sell things on eBay.
Nag the teen. Make him show me his application essays.
Knit! I'd kinda lost the knitting mojo, but a knit-blogger I follow started talking about her group challenging themselves to knit a dozen sweaters in 2009. Vests and short-sleeve tops count as well, as long as they are sized for adult. It was just the challenge I needed. I had some sweater quantities of yarn in stash, plus I had my eye on some new yarn. As much as I wanted to help stimulate the economy, I could not justify yarn shopping if I wasn't knitting. I have three completed (photos below) and two more in process. Details on my ravelry projects page.
Nag the teen. Remind him that merit badges are earned, not gifted.
Take the teen to his ortho appointment.
Provide ibuprofen and soft foods for a couple days.
Nag the teen to practice the horn even if his mouth hurts. The recital won't wait.
Knit some more. Maybe some lace, something different than sweaters.
Read! I have looming deadlines for two book groups. All the King's Men and Catcher in the Rye both need to be finished in two weeks and I haven't started either. (If only I had a kindle, would make knitting and reading simultaneously much easier.)
Consider signing up to purchase a Kindle if the eBay auction is a success.
Try to avoid reading the news. This never works though, I can't help it and end up reading all about how bad the economy is and why and what's not being done to fix it. As someone who'd been following Krugman and CalculatedRisk and other smart, logical, rational folks, I knew this all was going to happen, but it doesn't stop me from being pissed off at everyone who let it happen.
Maybe I should also start working on the taxes. Won't that be fun!
Get caught up in Lost. We haven't watched any of the new episodes.

1% for Jury Duty

2009-01-06T18:19:00.000-08:00

The second morning of jury duty, I sat and chatted with R, the FOF mentioned in last post. He had been called for a case Tuesday but was excused after questioning. It was a prostitution case and he was asked something along the lines of whose responsibility is it to prove innocence? R, remembering his constitution and high school civics, answered correctly and was promptly released.

Right before noon on Wednesday, our day two, the announcement was made that all the cases for the week had been settled and/or plea bargained and we were free to go. I know, it seems a total waste, but I choose to believe that we were important. I believe that our very presence upstairs was an important factor in the pursuit of justice, that our presence is what convinced everyone to negotiate in earnest.

Seattle has a "green" philosophy and an appreciation for the arts. Every civic construction project must include a 1% for the arts portion. Therefore, one sees random bits of art in the unlikeliest places. Since not many people get to serve as jurors in Seattle Municipal Court, here's some photos to show you what you are missing.

A nice little pocket park? Wee bit of green in the big city? Well yes, but

this bit of green is 12 floors up. This is the rooftop terrace abutting the jury room. The days I was there we had sustained winds of at least 25 miles per hour, but the staff assured us that was not typical. (It was also windy at ground level. I almost got blown over crossing James Street.)

Looking west and down, a nice view of the green roof on the City Council's digs.

I almost deleted the next photo. It's just a random skyline photo from the rooftop terrace. With dark grey skies and strong sustained winds and a little point-and-shoot, I just couldn't capture anything unique or worthy. There are lots of better skyline photos of Seattle.

Now for the Art.

I think these floating colorful mesh cloudlike things work as benign addition to the room, especially given that we are on a high level with a sweeping view, but that the view for much of the year will be monochrome grey.

Elevator buttons programmed to play Life. I hadn't read the wall text until the end of the day so didn't know what it was or that one could play with it to start the process.

These three watches are part of a larger display of approximately 150 watches, (identical except for 4 Casios with silver bands). The wall text said that they were synchronized when the artwork was installed in 2005. (Or was it 2002?) It was Tuesday Jan 6th at the time, at about 4:30 PM. I get the being an hour off, but I don't get being two days ahead. I thought this model kept track of the month. If there'd been some leap years, it ought to be behind a couple days. I suppose it doesn't track months, that probably makes the calculations work. When I first saw the art, I couldn't figure out what pattern it was supposed to be, were the watches in some sort of picture or abstractly placed?

It wasn't until I took the photo of the entire piece and looked at it in the view screen of my camera that I saw the pattern.

Jury Duty - live blog

2009-01-06T08:51:00.000-08:00

12th floor of muni building is kinda nice, big view of grey mist over downtown Seattle. Rooftop terrace. Free coffee. Comfier chairs than past experiences with jury duty. Free wi-fi.

Not big, maybe 100-200 people here. I'm used to county or Chicago Jury duty, this seems like a tiny pool.

Seattle compensates at $10.00 a day and bus tickets. The first thing when we signed in was a chance to donate that to the childcare center.

TVs set up to show us a "Make a Difference: Jury Duty in Washington State" video. It's almost nine, I bet it starts soon.

-------10:00 AM

Video was little cheesy but actually pretty useful. I wish I had seen that 27 years ago before my first jury summons. Muni court deals with small cases, misdemeanors, duis, etc. Six jurors per case, cases are often one or two days. I may be done by Wed afternoon.

Eliot Bay Books gives 20% discount with juror badge.

----11:15 AM

No one has been called to any courtroom yet. Some people cannot or will not read. I.e. they did not read their summons which was very clear what the length of summons was. Are people stupid or lazy or both.

The outdoor terrace (on the 12th floor) is lovely, what a great view. But oh so windy.

Someone brought in a hardboiled egg to eat. OMG! I love HBE, but only at home, boy are they stinky.

---12:05 PM

They called the first pool for a case after lunch. I was not called, but I heard the name of someone I know! I really would not have recognized him in a crowd, the husband of a friend of a friend, but I have met him a couple times. I wonder if we would have been allowed to serve on the same jury? Since he got called and not me, we will probably never know.

------2:40 PM

bored with jury duty, bored with blogging it. Went to Eliot Bay at lunch break (sorry F, they didn't have the book you want) and got a sub to bring back. Had nice chat with the FOF for a while before the bailiff came to take that pool away. He's is younger than me and said he's had like 8(!) jury summons. One other group has been called, but their bailiff hasn't come for them yet.

Safe Craft?

2008-12-09T13:50:00.000-08:00

Or can I knit with pencils?

From the Municipal Court of Seattle Office of the Jury Commissioner:

Waiting is an unavoidable part of jury service. [...]There is an extensive and current magazine collection but we do encourage you to bring reading materials, crafts and other projects to pass the time.

(further down)

Everyone entering the Seattle Justice Center, except law enforcement personnel, is required to pass through a security checkpoint. [...] You are also cautioned to leave at home items such as scissors, knitting needles or pointed objects over 2" long which are routinely prohibited from the building.

Knitting for a change

2008-11-09T08:24:00.000-08:00

I haven't blogged about knitting since June, when I started Amsterdam Cardigan.

I finished the knitting Tuesday night watching Obama's acceptance speech and finished the seaming Friday while listening to the President-Elect's first press conference. As I did so, I thought of many reasons this is an Election-08 commemorative sweater.

Color: I dyed the yarn specifically for this project. It is a range of

Browns -- 'nuff said.
Orange -- when my biracial niece was little, she did not get why people were called black and white; it didn't match reality. She was adamant she was orange. OK, she was three, I was fifteen and it was the Seventies. I have to admit it was fun to hear her insist she was orange. I may have asked her about it a few times.
Olive Green -- Damn, but we need a Green president! And olives? Well, we latte-sipping ~~volvo~~ subaru-driving elites like olives with our arugula.

International Cooperation: This Sweater has a passport.

The Blue-Faced Leicester is from England, milled in Italy and came to me via Virginia. (Thank you, Newly-Blue Virginia!) The pattern designer lives in the Netherlands, the stitch pattern is named after a French pastry.

Unity. I was going to run out of yarn, so dyed a second lot. The second lot was pretty close to the first, but not close enough. I only need about half a skein of the second lot, and it took work, some ripping and reknitting to unify the results.

All that unity meant that I had an extraordinary number of ends to weave in. I did much of the weaving in while at my doctor's office waiting for my annual check-up, which I am very privileged to be able to afford. May we all be so privileged in the future!

Conclusion: This is super soft wool in a super warm, comfy pattern. A great sweater to wear instead of turning up the thermostat. Knitting details on my ravelry page. (In the very off chance you care about the knitting details and are not on ravelry? Drop me an email.)

Random stuff

2008-11-06T12:35:00.000-08:00

Hey Sarah, so, I guess we all know now what a little community organizing can do, eh?

You didn't blink yet you didn't know who was party to NAFTA or that Africa was a continent? What's the fuck with that?

(And what the fuck with the Supreme Court and the fleeting fuck? If they really cared about what kids get exposed to on TV, they would ban Viagra ads. I'd much prefer to turn a fleeting expletive into a teachable moment than to explain erectile dysfunction to a six year old watching the Super Bowl. )

Hey neighborhood! What's with the White and Pollet signs still up? Both claimed to be the environmental candidate, so do your part and take down the signs. Christine, I love you, but your signs need to go as well. My only exception is for my neighbors with the Obama/Biden yard signs. Please leave them up a little longer. Maybe even until January 20th. They still give me goosebumps.

Making a difference

2008-09-10T13:16:00.000-07:00

Dear Dorothy,

Thank you for your special tribute gift to Planned
Parenthood. If you requested an announcement, a card will be
sent to the person indicated, notifying them of your gift.

Your gift will be directed to the area of our work that you
selected, and your support will bring us closer to our
shared vision of a world where every child is wanted, where
family planning is universally understood, accessible, and
accepted, and where everyone can exercise reproductive
freedoms in health and safety.

On behalf of everyone here at Planned Parenthood, thank you
again for your support and generosity.

Sincerely,

Cecile Richards
President
Planned Parenthood Federation of America

P.S. Your contribution to Planned Parenthood Federation of
America is tax deductible to the fullest extent allowable
under law. IRS regulations require us to state that we did
not provide any goods or services to you in consideration of
your contribution. You may wish to print or save this
message as your receipt for tax purposes.

Payment Information:
================================
Transaction ID:xxxxxxxxx
Date: September 10, 2008
Time: 4:04pm (ET)
Payment Amount: $xx.00
Campaign: Support Planned Parenthood! Honorary Giving
Name: Dorothy xxxxxx

Billing Information:
================================
Address: xxxxxxx
City: Seattle
State: WA
Postal Code: xxxxx
Country: US

This donation is on behalf of or in memory of:
==============================================
Name: Sarah Palin

Send acknowledgements to:
=========================
Name: John McCain 2008
Address: PO Box 16118
Arlington, VA 22215
United States

Jack Nicholson and Bobby Darin's little brother

2008-09-03T08:28:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I really wonder why I don't read many novels anymore. Then I get another example of how much real life unfolds in all its compellingly glorious messiness and why I don't miss fiction.

I won't even begin to tackle the how could those Republican's be so careless as to their vetting of family-values Veep they shoved down McCain's throat. Not that he had any problem with that, the op-ed pages are all over how this sort of impulsiveness is in character.

When over the weekend when I first ran across dailykos.com's stories on the rumors surrounding Sarah Palin and her infant son, I was flabbergasted, intrigued, and while not wholly convinced, thought the arguments that Sarah did not give birth to Trig had at least some merit. (the particular posts have been deleted from that site.) There are questions about the official story. But how on earth would mainstream media handle this? Seemed way too tabloid so probably wouldn't go anywhere. But you never know.

Monday I woke and, I admit, ready to get right back to the page turner that is real life. In novels, too many things that happen are either way too predictable or way too deux ex machina to be satisfying. Not so on Monday when the word was that in order to squash rumors surrounding Trig's birth, the Palins and the Family Values Party announced Bristol's conveniently timed pregnancy. Without any more evidence than their word, we are to believe that 17 year old Bristol is about five months pregnant and therefore is not 4.5 month old Trig's mom.

Knock me over with a feather.

First. Sarah said that they had hoped to keep Bristol's pregnancy private throughout the campaign. Was she really that clueless? That much lacking in common sense or the ways of the world?

Second. Not days after accepting the nomination, and thus making the decision that Bristol will be OK because they can keep her illegitimate teen pregancy a secret, who actually let's the story out? She does. Why? To squash a rumor about herself.

She, who had thought her daughter deserved privacy, instead threw her daughter out in front of the train. Wasn't there any other evidence, any evidence, Sarah could have used to prove she was Trig's mom without sacrificing her daughter?

And most ironical, I had seen nothing in mainstream press about the Trig rumors. But the GOP announcement of Bristol's current condition opened the floodgates. They were the ones who spoke of and therefore made the rumors legitimate to be reported in the mainstream media. Now we have Maureen Dowd calls it "broken-water gate" without explanation, because of course, by now, she doesn't need to.

A one word blog post:

2008-09-01T18:03:00.000-07:00

Eagleton.

Cardigan math

2008-06-07T11:13:00.000-07:00

I have 630 grams of BFL Aran to knit my brioche rib sweater. According to the pattern, it ought to take 750 grams of yarn. However, I am not using the recommended yarn or gauge. How close will I be, and if I won't make it, how much more yarn should I dye?

I have finished the back, which weighs exactly 180 grams.

Calculating from the pattern, I can figure the relative proportions of the back, fronts and sleeves.

Back: 7281
Fronts: 9082
Sleeves: 13518

total = 29881

means that back is 24% of garment and I would need 750 grams

Now if I make sleeves more narrow, reduce cuffs, make collar more narrow, I get it down to

Back: 7281
Fronts: 7970
Sleeves: 10536

total = 25787

means that the back is 28% and I need 637 grams. Sigh, so close.

Cardigan in progress

2008-06-03T09:46:00.000-07:00

Wool2Dye4.com sells some nice yarns, including a BFL Aran that is just wonderful. However, it is not common for indie dyers to dye and sell this yarn. When they do, it is often hand-dyed in small batches in bright variegated colors.

It's not hard to understand why. While many folks will purchase hand dyed yarn over the internet, they usually want it for a one-skein project, like socks or a hat. There's too much risk in purchasing enough for a sweater. And cost. Hand dyeing is labor intensive so the cost of a sweater's worth of hand dyed yarn would be quite dear.

Why would indie dyers create sweater sized dyelots? That's another issue. I doubt there's much of a market. There's a lot of capital invested in dyeing a large enough dye lot of Aran yarn for a sweater. Most of the BFL Aran that gets purchased from indie dyers goes into knitting wool soakers. For those not in the know, that's diaper covers. They are awfully cute and seem practical but what a use for a premium yarn!

So I figured I would dye this yarn and make a sweater.

I had in mind a brioche rib cardigan, although I really didn't know how to knit one. I just love the brioche stitch and thought the yarn would work well. I figured the internet was my friend in figuring out the How.

Well, I found the gold mind! Brioche stitch heaven. Nancy Marchant has created one of the clearest and most useful sites on the internet. And a pattern for a simple brioche cardigan as well! Frankly, given all the information she provides for free, anyone who understands sweater construction could figure out that sweater on their own, but it was only five bucks, it would save some math and damn! She deserves the money just for the information on her website!

Of course there's something I hadn't considered. Brioche takes more yarn than stockinette. I am not sure I dyed enough for the sweater. Lots of back of the pattern calculations estimating square inches to knit and square inches per gram of what I have knit --- I may be really, really close.

I did take careful notes on the dyes used, I can probably dye another skein or two close enough to work -- maybe alternating rows on the sleeves, but I'll finish the back and do more calculations before deciding if I need to do that.

Teaching the kid to fly

2008-06-02T10:52:00.001-07:00

Last weekend my husband took a brief vacation and left the kid behind. Sure, we've been away from him before overnight. He's been to sleepovers and sleep away camp. When he was younger we even occasionally left him with a sitter and went away for an anniversary or birthday weekend. But this felt different.

This time we told our 14 year old that we wanted to go camping without him and he needed to call a friend and get himself invited over to spend the night. And he did. Friday he rode his bike to school with his pannier packed with pajamas and toothbrush, because his sleepover friend commuted by bike. He would bike home the next morning (from Phinney Ridge! Crossing Aurora by himself!) then leave to spend the day with another friend. He could then come home, make himself dinner and keep himself occupied (that's what the internet and video games are for, right?) until we got home Saturday evening. We had the cell phone and alerted several neighbors who were happy to be available in case he needed assistance. And we were off. Did I worry? Of course! Independence is a long and gradual process, a process we have to encourage, even if it's scary. (More scary for me than the kid, actually.)

We went to the Columbia National Wildlife Refuge in the Channeled Scablands. Eastern Washington has the wildest geologic history I can imagine. No recent natural event has come close to the forces that have shaped that landscape. First, the earth opened and lava flooded the land, hundreds of miles covered fifty feet thick. Over about a million years, this happened over and over again. Enough lava in total to cover the entire continental US 39 feet deep. Then, some time elapsed and the world went into an ice age. Eastern Washington was not covered by the continental ice shelf, but Northeast of there, a finger of the continental glacier formed a dam in the mountains of Montana, creating a massive lake behind. The dam failed in a cataclysmic flood where all the water drained from Montana through Eastern Washington to the Columbia River and to the sea. Took less than a week and estimates say that the flow was more than the combined flow of all rivers in the world combined. This happened again and again, perhaps once every 50 years for a couple thousand years. The flooding tore up the land, eroding the basalt layers into a complex of channels and potholes. Giant ripple marks that are only recognizable as such from airplanes. Gravel bars the size of small mountain ranges.

The Columbia National Wildlife Refuge was formed because the Potholes Reservoir dam created by The Project in the 1940s raised the water table nearby. So the desert south of the reservoir now held water in the potholes and the lowest parts of the channels, water that attracts and aids wildlife of all sorts.

We hiked in the refuge and in the neighboring Drumheller Channels. Although we didn't time our hikes to optimize wildlife viewing --- the crepuscular hours are ideal for that --- we did see quite a variety. Birds, bugs, frogs, even a couple coyotes, but fortunately no snakes.

Saturday's hike we were treated to the sound of ravens making a fuss. We stopped and observed an adult pair and a juvenile pair up on the edge of a mesa. The adult pair each flew off the mesa, around the corner and perched back up top aways off. Then they called and called. Eventually the juveniles followed, but instead of flying out and around, they took the shorter path across the top, flying inexpertly no more than a few feet off the ground. Well, the parents did not sound too pleased about that and cawed up a storm.

That was the coolest thing we saw until lunchtime we were sitting in the shade under a cliff and noticed that a coyote was watching us from across the channel. Just standing on the edge of the opposite mesa and staring. He looked just like a large dog, but with the binoculars we could see the distinctive fur patterns and scrabbier body of a wild coyote.

That was the coolest thing until we were walking back in the bottom of a channel when we suddenly saw a huge bird flying away from us along the top of the mesa to our right. It stopped and looked back and had the unmistakable face of an owl! I've never seen an owl in the wild and what is it doing out in the day?

Right then another huge bird flew in front of us from the right cliff to the taller left cliff. We stopped and got out the binoculars and saw that the bird on the right was a juvenile, still fluffy and downy while the bird now on the left was an adult Great Horned Owl. Parent number two soon made its presence known and was also above us on the higher cliffs on our left. Unlike the ravens, these birds were not ignoring us and getting on with their teaching. We were being watched. Franz also got the impression that if we kept walking the trajectory we were going, we'd be pretty close to the fledgling and perhaps attacked by the parents. So after watching through the binoculars for a while, we continued on, passing much closer to the left side than the right. After we were through, I looked back and saw that the juvenile was now down in the channel, practicing flying maneuvers near the ground.

Our fledgling? Well, he managed just fine without us.

More fun with mathematics (and knitting)

2008-05-16T08:47:00.000-07:00

Just about anyone with a school-aged child is aware of the controversies in mathematics education. As a former math teacher and the parent of a ninth grader, I follow it pretty closely. The other day I read an article from a fellow arguing that algebra ought to be an elective in high school, that not many people ever have to use algebra in real life, so why make everyone suffer through it. He was especially critical of word problems and claims that there are no real life word problems that anyone would ever want or need to solve.

I guess he only knits rectangles.

I get lots of blog hits from folks looking for shawl calculation help. Many people knitting a triangular shawl from the top down want to know how many pattern repeats they can finish before they run out of yarn. I gave a method (using algebra) in this post and a follow-up in this post.

I recently started Ene's Scarf, my first triangular scarf/shawl knit from the bottom up. Meaning: cast on a terrific number of stitches, then decrease regularly until they are almost all gone, bind them off and block out to triangular shape.

Again, this isn't really a triangle, but a trapezoid. Cast on 375 stitches, decrease two stitches per row until you are left with 19 stitches, then do a bind-off that grafts them together.

This time, I know I have enough yarn. (Elsebeth Lavold's Silky Wool. Purchased to make Cozy from knitty.com, frogged for a variety of reasons.) All I really want to know is when I have reached the halfway point for the psychological assurance. However, if I were worried about having enough yarn, I would use the same calculations --- but factoring in the extra yarn used in the cast-on row more carefully.

First: Draw a picture and determine what I know and what I want to know.

For Ene's Scarf:

C = cast on = 375 stitches
B = end (not exactly bind-off, but close enough) = 19 stitches
H = number of rows = 179

note that if one really does decrease two stitches per row, the numbers are a teeny bit off -- one would end up with 17 stitches. That's because in this pattern, there are a few rows that don't follow the rules completely, but the difference is negligible for my needs.

Total number of stitches = Area of trapezoid = 1/2(C+B)*H = 35,263

I know that I will have knit half the scarf when I reach row h with r stitches where the area of the top trapezoid with base r is exactly half the area of the whole trapezoid.

I have two unknowns, h and r. Fortunately, I can solve for r in terms of h, so I will end up having an equation with one unknown and I can solve it.

h = rows left to finish
r = number of stitches in the row where there are h rows left.

So r = 19 + 2h

Area of top trapezoid is 1/2(19 + r) * h = 1/2(19 + 19 + 2h)h = 19h + h²

So we have to solve for h where

19h + h² = 1/2(35,263) = 17,631.5

h² + 19h - 17,631.5 = 0 is a quadratic equation, easily solved by the Pythagorean Theorem.

Do you want to see the calculations? I thought not. But I'll show you anyway. There are two real solutions to this equation, but we are only interested in the positive solution. Therefore, we only care about

(-19 + (19² - 4 * (-17,631.5))^.5) / 2 = 124 (more or less)

I will be halfway done when I have 124 rows left. 179 rows total, means I will be halfway done when I have finished 55 rows.

Blueberry Shawl

2008-04-25T08:26:00.000-07:00

I've been having trouble deciding whether to knit a new sweater using stash yarn or purchasing more Cascade 220 to remake Forecast. And if I do reknit Forecast, what color? (I could always choose to finish a work in progress, but that's never as fun as starting something new!) So I went browsing at A New Yarn which has a decent selection of C220, but not the color of the Japan sweater. They do have a different yarn in the most gorgeous blue (Sapphire in this link, I believe). That would make a wonderful sweater, but it would cost more than twice as much as a C220 version. And infinitely more than knitting a sweater from stash.

So instead I wandered around and looked at the odds and ends. A New Yarn is a non-profit yarn store that raises money for a Women's shelter. They stock some good basic yarns but also take donations. So you never know what odd balls of Rowan or Malabrigo will be scattered around. I found a skein of Shetland in a tweedy blue-purple. It has a really old looking label and the colorway is Blueberry --- not one I can find currently for sale.

It is probably not a coincidence that I chose a blue-purple colorway. Not exactly the same as the Japan Sweater, but pretty close.

In one week it became a Flower Basket Shawl. I chose this pattern because I wanted something I knew would be easy to do without stitch markers since I have kinda lost mine all over the house. I knew the pattern would be easy to memorize and I knew it would be easy to add pattern repeats to maximize using the available yarn.

US 7 addi lace needles
9 pattern repeats
86 grams, 340-350 yards used
blocks to 63 inch wingspan 24 inches deep (could have been blocked deeper with less wingspan as well)

I promise to stop talking about this

2008-04-20T21:24:00.000-07:00

What now?

2008-04-18T10:25:00.000-07:00

Thanks all for your comments and condolences on my sweater. I knew you would understand. And it's not like I knit Print o the Wave in cashmere only to lose it on a train. That was sad.

I packed lightly for Japan and the only sweater was my Forecast, which if you read my blog, you know I finished while I was there. I needed it mostly for the mountain visits, Takayama and Koyasan. And I did get to wear it both places. It was Cascade 220, easily replaceable. The knitting only took a couple weeks. I significantly modified the pattern with great results, but still have a couple things I would have liked to have done differently (like the collar) so I just might make another one.

The saddest part is losing the buttons. Nancy brought them back from her big Europe Adventure a couple years ago --- purchased in a little town near Nimes, France.

But losing the buttons isn't like I lost Nancy or anything.

Our last stop in Japan was Nagasaki. It got warm and I took off my sweater the afternoon we visited the A-bomb memorial, Peace Museum and Peace Park. When we got off the tram at the harbor, I realized the sweater was no longer in my bag. We contacted the tram line, we waited for that particular car to come back and checked, then I went back to the area and retraced all my steps. I didn't have time to contact the police lost and found, but our friend in Nagasaki said she would do so. As others have said, Japanese culture considers it important to return things via lost and found, so it is still possible that I will get it back. I just don't know where it fell out of the bag, so perhaps it ended up in a canal or something.

But what now? I am feeling the urge to reknit Forecast, but that would mean purchasing more yarn. I have yarn in my stash that would make fine sweaters, but nothing that would make a perfect Forecast.

Meanwhile, I've been uploading Japan photos to flickr. Haven't organized and culled them completely, yet. But my librarian knitter Cousin Jane (SockFetishist on ravelry) sleuthed them out already. If you don't want to wait for the polished slideshow, you can find them as well here.

I have also started uploading my mother in law's Japan photos. She let me take her camera's memory card home so I can get her started on flickr. It's great to see the different photos of the same places that she took, but the problem is, she took photos of me. And I am often wearing my sweater.

It could have been worse

2008-04-16T12:56:00.000-07:00

It's not like I lost my passport or my husband or anything, just a sweater....

If you are ever in Nagasaki, would you keep an eye out for it, please?

Kyoto, Sunday afternoon

2008-04-05T22:43:00.000-07:00

We were up and out early today. Yesterday F & Z wanted to visit a garden at one of the big shrines, but the line was too long. Z went up to the guard and asked (in Japanese!) what time they opened in the morning, got a reply which he understood so the three of them were planning to get there at 8:30 this morning. I went instead to the coinlaundry (my choice). It's just a hole in the wall, but it has a raised wooden floor with a no shoes sign and convenient and clean slippers to wear. That way when you drop your clean clothes or your skein of yarn on the floor they don't get dirty.

Then I went to Nijo Castle, the nightingale floor castle (or maybe all of them have such floors?) For touring the inside, I think I was supposed to get with a group and stay with them, but it was really just a solid line of people and I was unobtrusively going a little slower and on my own. Towards the end though I got shunted into a group of English speakers. We were in the Shogun's private quarters and the scene showed the shogun and several lady attendants. One is offering the shogun a cup of tea. The guide said that she was an apprentice and if the shogun accepted the tea then she would become a lady attendant, but if not, then she "wasn't his cup of tea." Everyone laughed and started murmuring - so that's where the expression comes from --- but then the guide shouted out "Joke!" So I don't know but am curious if the etymology of the phrase is known. Perhaps one of my faithful readers who aren't paying 10 yen per minute for internet could look it up and leave a comment?

Because internet is not free, I am reading email and blogging, but haven't emailed anyone yet. So hello and thank you for the comments and I am thinking of you all and will talk to you later.

Coins come in denominations of 1, 5, 10, 50, 100 and 500 yen. The first two are pretty useless and cannot be used in vending machines. Fortunately you don't get them often because almost everything with the included tax is a multiple of 10 yen. However there are some exceptions, like Family Mart coffee, so I did start collecting some 1 and 5 yen coins. Then today I was at a food stall and my bill was 1046 yen. And there was no one waiting so I counted out 46 yen in 1 and 5 yen pieces and handed her them and a 5000 yen bill. Then she said that she made a mistake and my bill was really 886 yen (at least that's what I think she said, since she spoke no English) so she handed me 4 1000 yen bills, my 46 yen and an additional 114 in coins. Sigh, so much for trying.

Next I went to the Kyoto International Manga Museum. I had thought that Zach would be interested but he said absolutely not. Well, I was on my own and it was nearby so I did. When I turned the corner and saw the courtyard I understood Zach's reason. CosPlay. What a cultural experience. I can see why he who scorns such would not want to be there and appear to accept it. But it was quite an interesting people watching experience for me.

The manga was not that interesting, there really wasn't much but a lot of books to read, but the building is a converted primary school built in 1869. It was lovely architecture. In the 1990s when enrollment had declined tremendously due to families with kids leaving the central downtown area, they made the painful decision to close and consolidate the elementary schools. One room in the museum was devoted to the history of the school and that's where I spent most of my short visit.

well, my time is about up, so I am off for now.

Kyoto

2008-04-05T14:45:00.000-07:00

I am wearing my sweater with its fashionable three quarter length sleeves! I didn't weave in the ends entirely, just wove them up underneath so I can access them easily when we get home. But I have photos of me on the Philosopher's Walk with the cherry blossoms in full bloom modeling the sweater. While it shows the sweater well, I am all squinty and washed out because I was looking into the sun, but whatever. it was hard to find a spot to take the photo. Everyone in Japan was walking the Philosopher's Walk yesterday -- it being Saturday in the peak of the blossoms.

I don't love Kyoto, but that's ok. there's some lovely and wonderful sights, but right now really crowded. otherwise it seems to be all tony shopping and tony people. but tony shopping includes Avril Yarn Store. I had printed out the address and map from their website while back in Seattle, but it is all in Japanese so I had no idea where it was. I showed it to the hotel clerk who marked it on my map and it turned out to be just a few blocks away. It's in a small two story tony shopping building along with a kimono shop, antique jewelry and fancy dolls. And a TinTin shop which is worth about 5 minutes. I saw about three men sitting looking really bored and tired on the stairs or huddled in corners. Poor guys. While I browsed the yarn store my guys were off exploring and stumbling across a museum devoted to the history of the canals and waterworks of Kyoto. They had fun figuring out what it all meant since the explanations were all in Japanese. But engineering is engineering and they were in their element.

The Avril building had one last notable feature. It had a toilet (ie restroom) but only for ladies. And of all the Washlets I have run across in Japan theirs was the fanciest. As I entered the stall the lid automatically rose. The bidet controls were remote, up on the wall with easy access instead of down near the seat -- which was well heated. And this one not only had the usual array of washing features, it included a warm air dry.

Starbucks in Kyoto doesn't open until 8 AM, and I thought the 7AM opening in Tokyo was bad!

Thoughts before leaving Tokyo

2008-04-01T14:14:00.000-07:00

First things first: While I have plenty of Casdade 220 in the appropriate color at home, I tried to pack lightly. So I have (had) one ball that I was pretty sure was plenty. But at the last minute, I picked up a partial ball as well as back-up. Well, I have about 30 rounds to go to finish the sleeve, and I have had to break into the reserves, but I think all will be well. I am not thrilled with the look of the first sleeve, but it is cute enough. I do think I have just enough yarn to make sleeve 2 look like sleeve one, and enough yarn in Seattle to redesign the cuffs later if I want.

Other thoughts as I wait for Starbucks to open and the rest of my family to wake and finish packing....

I had been afraid of Tokyo. Especially getting lost (addresses are non-existent) and getting confused on the subway and trains. The transportation has been very easy compared to my expectations. Just a few odd things, where we missed taking the train that arrived at the platform because we were not savvy enough or fast enough to tell if that really was our train. And there seems to be some hidden non-peak fare. While it is really easy for English speakers to get information from the maps, signs etc, I can find nothing in English about a non-peak fare. And several times while traveling non-peak hours we got our tickets back when we thought they would be just right. Then in some small print somewhere I saw a reference to a non-peak fare, but not what it is. A transportation tax on tourists. It isn't much and the subway runs well, so be it.

Stations have a ton of exits, all far away from each other, along with lots of spots to transfer to other trains. It could be very confusing. But there are mostly really good signs for finding your way to the correct exit. Yesterday though, at a station with 10 exits, I saw on the handy map that I wanted exit 6. So I followed all the signs to exit 6, but ended up at a point where I could still see signs for exits 1-5 and 7-10 but 6 had completely disappeared. Another map of the station showed that there was an exit 6 but not on that floor (?) and the stairs to get there were the stairs right behind me marked exit 7. I took the stairs, but no 6. Fortunately 7 was not far from my destination.

Lots of bikes, mostly on the sidewalk.　I think there is a protocol for where to ride and where to walk on the sidewalks, but no one seems to follow it. No helmets. I saw one child in a front basket with one, but no one else, not even the other children being carried. They aren't traveling fast on their old-fashioned uprights so it might not be as much an issue, but I still would want a helmet myself.

They drive on the other side. Since we are not driving that doesn't seem like it would be a big deal, but it means that everyone walks on the left as well. Except for a few places in subway stations where the arrows all point to walking on the right.

Restaurant prices are good compared to US but the portions are smaller as well. But that's a Good Thing! We never feel wasteful or stuffed. And it means that we can try more things. Zach wanted both a bowl of french onion soup and a strawberry pancake for breakfast. In America that would have been too much food. (well, maybe not for him) but here it was fine. My mother in law had a cobb salad for lunch and declared it the best she's ever had. Not only the right size, but more interesting seasoning and more ingredients.

...

Good thing blogger autosaves, because some window in kana popped up with a message that I now think was something like "new updates installed, shutting down now" at least that's what happened. Oh well, I am back from the coffee run with scones for the rest, we need to eat and take a subway to the main train station this morning. With all our bags. Won't that be fun.

Still knitting

2008-04-01T01:20:00.000-07:00

So, what do you think the odds are that in Tokyo I can find Cascade 220 in the same dyelot of the yarn I purchased two years ago at the Fiber Gallery in Seattle?

That's what I think, too.

I may have to shorten sleeve one to finish sleeve two, but I do not know for sure yet. Will try to keep you posted. But tomorrow we leave Tokyo for Takayama, a small town in the mountains and I doubt we will have internet access. And it will be cooler in Takayama. I plan to finish knitting on the train en route.

Lots of pictures to share, but they will all have to wait until we are home.

Ohiyo!

2008-03-30T14:27:00.000-07:00

Greetings from Tokyo!

Monday 6:30 AM hotel lobby, Asakusa. Starbucks up the street opens at 7AM.

We arrived safely, found our hotel, spent yesterday sightseeing locally, lots of cherry blossoms, lots of people.

Sleeve number one was finished somewhere over the Bering Sea. Sleeve number two is about halfway done. Will I finish in time for Takayama in the mountains? Indications say yes. But we will see. If I get too cold, I will just have to bind off wherever and make a fashion statement.

Sukoshi kanko-ga shitai-desu.

2008-03-26T14:24:00.000-07:00

We interrupt blog silence to say so long, we are off to Japan. We have passports, rail passes, hotel reservations, two cameras --- but no laptop or cables, so photos when we return --- and the list of things to do includes at least one yarn store.

I did finish the Victorian Lace Today Large Rectangle and it is large. I didn't block it to its extreme, but to the extreme of my blocking board at 32x82 inches. I could probably have gotten a couple more inches in both dimensions. I love it anyway. And as for running out of yarn, I had 300 grams and used 286 grams. The calculator on ravelry says that is 1359 yards. I am too lazy to double check or to double check my calculations from when I worried about running out. The pattern calls for 1200 yards? I used the same weight of yarn as called for, I knit on similar needle sizes, but my finished dimensions are larger. So whatever, I had enough yarn.

Here's a photo of me trying to get all arty. I am imagining being lost out on the moors in winter with nothing but the pile of shawls I grabbed as I ran away. Would Jane's have been lace?

My latest knitting is a sweater that I really want to wear in Japan. However, it's not quite finished yet. Using Forecast, from Knitty 2005, I did some modifications which I am liking. Details on my ravelry page. Body is finished, button band done, buttons sewed on, ends are woven in, but the sleeves aren't going to knit themselves, so I better keep this post short. We leave in about 36 hours.

Participatory Democracy

2008-02-09T16:29:00.000-08:00

Well, the caucus is over. Now I can lose my voice.

Yesterday afternoon I started getting that unmistakable tickle in the throat --- the first symptom of a cold. I woke this morning with inflamed sinuses, but overall not feeling too bad yet. I got to the school gym around 12 noon, an hour before the start time, as asked of the caucus chairs. To my disappointment, I found out that they hadn't asked for extra rooms, all 10 precincts were going to meet in the one space. We had two tables for our precinct, two of those standard picnic-style tables found in elementary schools everywhere. It wasn't long before people started showing up. The early arrivals were very helpful, making sure the sign-up process was going smoothly, going to get more forms, pens, etc. All in all it ran smoothly considering the size of the turnout.

When Gail asked me to be chair, she said that 4 years ago the turnout had been really high, about 60 people. Today we had 129. That's just our precinct. There were more than a thousand people in the room, 10 precincts all trying to get organized, sign everyone in, tally up the votes, choose delegates. Our precinct had the most attendees and also the most delegates to choose (number of delegates is determined by some formula using past voting data) so it isn't surprising that we were the last one done. 99 Obama, 30 Clinton. 5 delegates for Obama, 2 for Clinton.

The delegate votes have to be done on paper ballots. There was no easy way for the 70+ Obama supporters who stuck it out that far to do the balloting. But we managed. Everyone pitched in and it all worked so smoothly. I didn't get to knit much, got too busy right away. Mostly I stood on the bench seat of one of the tables and tried to project so that the whole precinct could hear me.

I had been worried, I had been kicking myself for my inability to say no. But it was great. Lots of neighbors came -- many that I see regularly, some only once in a while. I met some new people, and everyone was truly neighborly. Maybe the size helped. It really was too large and crowded for folks to try to politick. Everyone seemed to have already made up their mind and there was very little changing. Now I have to thank Gail for going out of town and asking me to volunteer.

But first, change into sweats, brew lemon ginger tea with honey, and curl up in a blanket. Pass me the tissues, please.

Is it Christmas yet?

2008-02-06T07:52:00.000-08:00

Zach's birthday is in November and this year we decided to spring for a big gift, one to cover Christmas as well. An mp3 player. He chose a Zen 30GB player from Creative. Only trouble was, they were out of stock everywhere.

January 3 I got email from Creative announcing they were back in stock. I ordered one.
January 6 It was shipped.
January 8 It arrived. It didn't work. It was a brick.
January 9 I emailed back and forth with customer service to convince them it was bricked.
January 10 Creative issued an RMA.
January 11 I sent the unit to OK for service or replacement. We paid shipping.
January 28 The replacement was shipped
February 1 It arrived. It was the wrong player. A smaller, cheaper player. It did, however, work.
February 2 I emailed customer support.
February 4 Creative issued the super-duper Advanced RMA --- will ship new unit and a prepaid shipping label to return the wrong one.
February 6 I got email notification that the RMA has been shipped. UPS tracking system doesn't have it yet.

Then there was the December 21 xkcd.com T-shirt order. Zach needs new shirts, he loves xkcd and the mp3 player was not coming yet. Something to open on Christmas? January 16 I got a weaselly apology from Paypal and a more straightforward one from xkcd. It was Paypal's fault but they erred in not contacting us sooner. T shirts arrived January 23rd. (A big hit, too.)

Then we realized Zach's ski pants from last year were a no show. He must have outgrown them so we would have passed them along. SierraTradingPost has quality merchandise at good prices. When I ordered the pants, the website said that a Medium was size 28-30. Sounded like they ran pretty small, but I've always had good shopping experience with SierraTradingPost. They arrived. They are huge. I contacted the friendly customer service. She said "Well, I am looking at the on-line catalog right now and the Mediums are 30-32." Was I going nuts? I got her to check and she called back to say that the catalog folks had "recently updated the sizing." Sigh. The new pants have left the warehouse and UPS expects delivery Friday February 8.

Other news: I've been either too busy or too sick or too boring to blog. Busy includes the bookstore, paperwork for the Board From Hell (yes, I am still in it. According to Mayor Greg's memo, I do my noble-citizen-duty until October 2009) and other things as well, including planning a two week trip to Japan for April. Franz has done a lot of the work, but it still has taken both of us many hours of internet sleuthing to line up accommodations and travel details. I have not knit much, the VLT shawl still needs a few more border repeats and one more corner turned. My last day at the bookstore is next week (yay!) Week after that is mid-winter break and we are going to Utah to ski (double yay!)

Odds and ends: I get so many hits on my blog from folks looking for the Triangle Shawl calculations, that if you Google "trapezoid formula" my blog post shows up on the first page of results.

I'm good at voting but have never attended a caucus. (Recall, I grew up in the last bastion of Taxation without Representation, otherwise known as Our Nation's Capital.) This year I got talked into volunteering to chair our precinct's caucus. It ought to be a zoo. Wish me luck.

New year starting out well.

2008-01-01T19:39:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year!

Blog was neglected for a busy December. Few random items from the past month:

Had a bit of a scare when I tried to get dressed and my jeans wouldn't go past my knees. To my relief, I realized I had grabbed the pair my skinny 14 year old son had outgrown and are destined for the Goodwill.
My car got graffiti tagged in the driveway one night. Was pretty creeped out by it, then found out that two neighbors had gotten tagged the same time. Then it seemed more random and less creepy. Plus, what seemed to be indelible marker came off easily with Citra-Solve and some elbow grease.
Working retail in December has its ups and downs. At least there are stories to share. Like the woman looking for a sudoku book for her "very smart" 8 year old granddaughter. I showed her Sudoku for Dummies and she was completely offended. Said her granddaughter was not a dummy.
December 3rd, I mailed 6 checks including the mortgage. All but the mortgage showed up as received and cashed within a week. I called mortgage company on Dec 17th, last day to pay without a penalty. No check. I paid on-line which cost me six bucks. Then what to do about the missing check? Just in case, I moved enough money from savings into checking to cover it. Sure enough, it appeared at the mortgage company on the 18th. Large mortgage company is fighting bankruptcy. Is it possible it is "losing" checks for a couple weeks just so folks need to pay a late fee?

But now it's January and things are looking up.

I just won a blog contest! Kris has been having contests to celebrate her husband Dana's birthday. I was one of the folks who guessed his favorite album from 1979 and I won a skein of Dream in Color Smooshy Sock from her on-line store. Yay for me! and Yay for Kris who just sold her house and yay for Dana for having a birthday. Check out her store. Kris sells a nice variety of commercial yarn and a great selection of Indie hand-dyed yarn.

Most of my knitting time has been spent on the Large Rectangle from VLT. I have only 25 pattern repeats of the border left (out of 82). Each repeat takes me 24 minutes. Therefore, at least 10 more hours of work. And I am thinking of knitting the Princess Shawl? Am I nuts or just very optimistic?

Fun with Dyeing

2007-11-28T08:52:00.000-08:00

Here's what playing with saturation can do:

Store updated with these new colors and a few repeats.

and some new laceweight:

Because they went digital and mothballed the mobile units.

2007-11-27T09:05:00.000-08:00

Note to self: When planning the bus route to take you to your early morning mammogram appointment in a part of town you've never been to by bus and the bus turns out to be a commuter express, stop and consider that commuters stay all day and that route might not run in both directions in the morning.

Fortunately, from First Hill it's downhill everywhere, including Capitol Hill. I know how to get home from Capitol Hill. And the weather was nice and I wasn't in a hurry. And if I had researched an optimal ride home, I might not have found out that __________ _________ now sells ____ _____ and therefore would not have found ___ ___ _____ that will surprise _____ on Christmas.

Note to coffee shops. How about moving the tip jars to be accessible to where one picks up the coffee? Aren't tips based on service? Tipping when one pays means that one gambles on getting good service. Unfortunately the coffee shop near where I work has terrible service. I stopped automatically throwing money in the jar. Now I hold coins in my hand and watch the barristas work. The longer it takes and the more inefficient they appear (ie chatting and flirting with one another), more coins move from hand to pocket. If there are any left in my hand when I get my drink, they go in the jar. Jar is on the counter where you pay, but is on the side where the drinks are served. So it's not too rude to reach over and tip. Yesterday I got coffee in a new neighborhood and automatically followed my tipping routine. Service was FAST! But then, the tip jar was completely inaccessible unless I was willing to push a whole line of people out of the way. (Sorry! Next year I promise to tip double!)

I found my stitches!

2007-11-20T06:47:00.000-08:00

It's not that they were lost, I didn't remember they existed.

Readers may remember I am working on a large shawl with a long name from Victorian Lace Today. After finishing one of my three skeins, I calculated that I would be 82 stitches short. However, the border gets knit on smaller needles, so I was carrying on and not worrying too much.

Yesterday I was rooting through my swatch bowl and stumbled upon this:

A swatch of Domy Heather. This is at least 25 stitches by 25 rows, at least 625 stitches. Not only is 625 greater than 82, I can add 625 potential stitches to my calculations for skeins two and three. I have a surplus of 1,793 stitches.

Speaking of looking for stitches... I am a member of an on-line social networking site for knitters and crocheters. A place to share information, finished objects, search for patterns, yarn and especially pattern and yarn combinations. It's really cool and useful. One thing about it bugs me though: its slogan. I don't get it. Why would people who probably do not speak in a particular (and controversial) vernacular adopt it for their slogan? Why would two White kids from Boston think it would be attractive to knitters around the world to use improper English grammar emulating a particular segment of Black culture? A piece of "culture" that has negative connotations and a checkered history. (See Thomas Sowell's Black Rednecks and White Liberals. He argues that Black English is really an adoption of the White Cracker redneck poor English, not something that denotes any proud African heritage.)

I mentioned this to a friend, a much younger friend, who also is a knitter and participant of this very useful site. Her reply surprised me, but it did explain things. It turns out that the slogan was not just some random bit of Black slang turned into a knitting/crocheting context, it is from a hip-hop song. One of those songs with words derogatory, offensive, shocking to some and just plain incomprehensible to many (including me). So now I understand better why those four particular words were used for the slogan, but I don't really understand. Why would a worldwide community of men and women, mostly women, who share a love for creating beautiful and useful objects with their hands want to use a slogan that is tied to a song with lyrics that are nasty, especially nasty towards women? Actually, there's more than one set of lyrics. I am not sure who wrote the song, who wrote which version, who came up with the line in the first place. Seems to be popular though, with cafepress t-shirts and everything. I've tried to read and reread the lyrics to see, perhaps the song is really a homage to women or a particular woman? A love song? I honestly cannot tell.

Accentuate the positive

2007-11-13T16:56:00.000-08:00

Checking in with a few random notes.

I ordered a laptop from the Buy One/Give One program of One Laptop Per Child. We've been following the OLPC program for years and happy to see that it is moving forward. Be a philanthropist and a geek at the same time for only $424 including shipping ($200 is tax deductible).

I made Pumpkin Soup with Smoked Paprika from Elise's Simply Recipes blog and it was delicious.

Progress on the Cambridge Jacket! I got the sleeves seamed acceptably and cut the steek and sewed in a zipper. By hand. My first zipper installation and it worked. The sweater fits Franz well and just needs a collar. How long will that take?

I've been knitting other things as well, including lots of progress on the Large Triangle from VLT.

Erika and I are doing well with our Hand Dyed Yarn Adventure. We've collectively sold 52 skeins of hand-dyed yarn. Oops, make that 53!

Hairy Math

2007-10-27T17:25:00.000-07:00

The Large Rectangle in leaf and trellis pattern with trellis border in Victorian Lace Today calls for 1200 yards of fine weight yarn.

Many people have found that they require more yarn than called for in VLT patterns.

I have three skeins of a fine weight Domy Heather, 100 grams, 475 yards each. A total of 1425 yards, 19% more than the requirements from the pattern.

Will I have enough?

You can skip the math and go right to the conclusions if you wish.

The main body is 94 stitches wide. 30 pattern repeats, 16 rows per repeat. Plus 5 set-up rows.

The border has an 18 row pattern repeat. There are 24 repeats on the long sides, 9 repeats on the short sides and 4 repeats at each corner.

The number of stitches in each row of the border varies, from 19 to 24, averaging 21.9 stitches per row. Not including the spit splicing, the ends woven in or the grafting of 20 stitches to finish the shawl:

Total number of stitches in shawl is 77,914

94 x 16 x 30 + 5 x 94 + 18 x 21.9(48 + 18 + 16) = 77,914

My first skein got me exactly 17 pattern repeats (plus 4 initial rows).

17 x 16 x 94 + 94 x 4 = 25,944

Therefore, I have enough yarn for 77,832 stitches.

25,944 x 3 = 77,832

I am 82 stitches short on yarn. But the border is done on smaller needles. I will optimistically knit on.

Getting Thing Done

2007-10-26T09:45:00.000-07:00

Don't you just love getting things accomplished? Especially the small niggling things that have been on the To-Do list for ages. Like this stack of Tupperware with cracks that has sat on the pile of crap behind my computer monitor for at least a couple years. Lifetime warranty and all that, I could not find the address to return the items on their website. So I had to sit on hold for 30 minutes waiting for that nice polite young man with the thick Indian accent to provide it to me.

There's still a pile of crap behind my monitor (and next to it as well!) but every little bit helps.

In knitting, also some accomplishments. In the airplane heading east, I finished knitting two socks. All I needed to do afterwards was graft the toes. Anyone with experience carrying a tapestry needle on board? I didn't try. Neither did the two knitters I accosted en route. But you know, tapestry needles aren't sharp or anything. And they are pretty cheap, so losing it at security wouldn't have been the end of the world. Maybe I should acquire a plastic one, but I just don't fly very often. Regardless. They were both second socks, so after the grafting session in the hotel, I had two new pairs to wear. Alas, while Seattle weather has been in the wool sock territory for a month now, DC was still pretty warm.

BFL DK weight, hand-dyed by me. Top-down, garter rib leg and stockingette foot, US2 DPN, 48 stitches wide.

Knit Picks Fingering hand-dyed by me. Monkey Socks from knitting.com. Us2, pattern followed except I did a slip stitch heel flap.

More fun than socks that were too hot to wear, I finished a shawl in time to wear it to my niece's wedding. Zephyr wool silk lace, hand dyed by me. Luna Moth pattern (free on elann.com). US4 needles, who knows what gauge (I knit tightly in general). I did 7 full pattern repeats, plus the extra half a repeat to get the scallops on the end to point in the correct direction (following the pattern instructions). This blocked out to be almost 60 inches wide and 30 inches from top to bottom. It weighs exactly 50 grams, which means about 600 yards.

My blocking tools were limited, just my container of coil-less safety pins and a hotel carpet, so I didn't get the scallops as open and pretty as the ones on the elann site, but it still looked nice and I can always block it again.

high score

2007-10-22T17:17:00.000-07:00

Instead of me talking about my trip, reunions, wedding or my numerous FOs, how about I wow you with my vocabulary prowess?

Your Vocabulary Score: A+

Congratulations on your multifarious vocabulary!
You must be quite an erudite person.

How's Your Vocabulary?

Only thing is, I found this on someone's blog who had gotten a B+, and the wording said "Don’t fret that you didn’t get every word right, your vocabulary can be easily ameliorated!"

Ameliorated didn't look right to me. Yes it means to make better, but I thought only in a specific way, as in, to improve from dreadful to not-quite-so bad. So either the quiz writer does know more vocabulary than me, or is being snide or is a poser.

holiday kal-cal Prize

2007-09-29T13:49:00.000-07:00

Marly and Sharon of She-Knits blog and podcast are hosting another knit and crochet along. This time with a holiday theme.

Marly put out the word for Indie Dyers like myself that she was looking for swag, prizes to offer the folks who join in the fun. I agreed, because prizes are such fun and it is a way to advertise Yarn Forest, where Erika and I are selling our hand-dyed yarn.

I pondered what to choose. Should I take something from the store or dye something special? They'll be giving out prizes in January, after the holiday season, so I figured I should think ahead, dye something someone would want to receive when they are fed up with holiday colors, deep into winter and thinking about spring. So I told Marly that I was dyeing some pretty laceweight wool in a happy spring theme. Alas, Marly, things didn't turn out well. Yes, there was a four letter word appropriate for the occasion, a four letter word beginning with an F.

Yup, Felt. I got careless or carried away and felted it to heck. Oh well, I live and learn.

So instead I am offering up some laceweight yarn that I am happy with. It may not be springlike, but the color is a wonderful dusky grey blue purple with a hint of fuchsia. It will make a lovely shawl or scarf or two.

Approximately 4 ounces, 1200 yards of 50% silk 50% merino laceweight yarn. If you want a chance at winning this, join the Holiday Knit and Crochet along.

Reading Lace

2007-09-19T06:52:00.000-07:00

Did I mention that I've gone back to my old job? I think I drafted a post but didn't finalize it. Yes, the day my kid started high school (full time after two years of part-time school/homeschool) I started back at the bookstore.

Some folks fantasize about working at a bookstore just as some fantasize about working at their LYS. Truth is, it's not all standing around reading and having happy chats with customers about good books. And the pay? Um, small business, retail, part-time, those are not words associated with getting rich. But it does have its rewards and it is only part-time. The owner pleaded with me to come back. I don't know how much of that is that I was a model employee and how much of that is that I'm a warm body and they were desperate. Probably a little bit of both, but that's OK. I felt wanted and that's usually a good feeling. She doesn't know about the blog, but I'll have to write as if she'll find out eventually. That's OK. She's a great woman but she does drive me nuts sometimes. And I may mention that here. But nothing that I wouldn't say to her face. I am pretty candid and there isn't much that I wouldn't say to her face, regardless.

I will get access to galleys again and the discount is nice. I already have a list of books I want to order. I'll space them out to keep purchases less than my salary, but that is hard! My knitting book collection could use some expanding, especially Lace books.

Lace! Oh, how I love you!

When I started reading blogs I would read about folks who memorized lace patterns. Patterns that seemed infinitely complicated to me. And sure enough, my first lace projects were hard. I never got comfortable with the pattern in Cece. I persevered and finished the sweater, but each row was slow. Cozy, well, I could never get that pattern figured out. So many mistakes I ended up frogging it. It was only a few different pattern rows, but I never could figure out where I was.

Either something changed or I chose easier patterns, because lately I have been able to read the lace on my needles better. Most of Estonian Garden Wrap was done watching TV. This weekend I cast on for the Large Triangle in Leaf and Trellis in Victorian Lace Today. And to my surprise, I have A) become faster --- already have 10 of the 30 pattern repeats finished and B) Memorized the pattern. I haven't checked the chart since about repeat number 6. And even then it was just a glance or two. What I still cannot get over is that it is so mathematical, so logical, so easy to read, yet the result is so fluid and graceful and curvy.

I am using some wool I got from a vendor at Madrona. The photo does not do it justice. I was told that it was dyed by none other than Judith Mackenzie herself. That's not on the tag, which just says Davidson Corporation. I don't remember the vendor, but she was clearly associated with JM and Jessica was with me at the time and seemed to know the vendor. Anyway, the yarn is a beautiful green, a richly heathered deeply layered green. I loved the yarn at first sight, but didn't realize just how heathered it was until I started knitting with it. How do you dye yarn so heathered? It almost seems impossible, like that it must have been dyed before being spun, but I don't spin so have no knowledge of that.

I've been dyeing some lace myself, some Zephyr. I don't like strongly variegated yarns for lace, but have become so attracted to hand-dyed yarns that commercial dyed yarns just seem flat and one dimensional. My method of dyeing the Zephyr is to slowly add one color after another to get depth and variation within a limited palette. So far I have sold two skeins and have two more available at Yarn Forest. I have one more that I dyed to keep, but it is red. And we've been finding that photographing red is a challenge. And silk is a challenge with its sheen. So getting a picture I like of that will have to wait until I have more time.

Contest Winners

2007-09-18T21:43:00.001-07:00

Thank you all for participating, a variety of sock yarn experiences for sure.

The winners, provided by my son's new-for-high-school graphing calculator's random number generator are the first Elaine (Elaine, are you the Elaine I know who used to keep a blog? Let me know) who will get the set of mini-skeins and QueenMeadow, a homeschooling, running, knitting blogger in Utah who will get the hard to photograph but lovely red skein.

Thanks all for the thoughtful comments. Funny how different people have different experiences. For me, the best socks have been my Koigu ones. I've machine washed and dried them repeatedly. They did fade a bit but have held up well. I don't have any holes in any hand-knit sock yet, but really I got my sock-knitting groove started last spring and I don't wear socks much in the summer. This winter will be the test.

I did get ideas though. Treesh's comment about long staple wools made me think of some fingering corriedale I purchased for lace. But the lace I made with the first skein doesn't stay blocked, it's too springy. Perhaps the second skein wants to be socks? Won't be superwash, but might make some comfy stretchy socks.

Contest!

2007-09-14T07:04:00.000-07:00

I thought I was going to have to blog about my dear departed chicken. The other night around 11 pm we heard her scream. I went out to her roost --- the rhododendron in front of the house --- and saw a raccoon hiding underneath. It ran off when I shined a flashlight on it, but no sign of Tasty. No signs of a struggle either, but it was dark. I searched again in the morning after it was light. Still no sign. An hour later, there she was on the back deck, perfectly fine! She's a tough old bird, she is. She did spend the day under the deck, except when I was outside she followed me around, sticking very close. I managed to lock her in the coop overnight. Will that work in the long run? Or will she seek out a new roost? Who knows.

Blog contest! I've been planning a contest to celebrate the opening of Yarn Forest, where Erika and I are selling our hand-dyed yarn. Tasty's escape gave me an idea of how to structure it. By far the most popular yarn for hand-painting and selling is sock yarn. By far the most common use for this yarn is knitting socks. What happens to those socks? How well do they hold up? We've been exploring base yarns and have our favorites, but by no means have we exhausted our search. So you tell us what you like.

Instructions: If you have hand-knit socks, tell me about the ones that survive the best. Which ones, after 6 months or 2 years of wearing and washing, do you still grab first to wear? Or which ones do you leave until it's almost laundry day and there's nothing else available? Leave your answer in a comment or send me an email (address is in my sidebar) and you will be entered in the contest.

If you don't have experience with the longevity of hand-knit socks, you can still be entered, just leave a comment about anything related to sock yarn or hand-dyeing.

One entry per person no matter how many comments you leave. Contest closes Monday September 17th at 11:00 PM my time (that's US Pacific Daylight Savings Time)

Two prizes! Two lucky winners will be chosen at random. One will receive a set of mini-skeins of our super soft merino we call Aurora 6.

The second winner will receive this skein of Aurora 6, one of a dyelot of two. Why? Because this yarn is prettier in person than we've been able to capture in a photograph. Frustrating but true. So while one of the skeins will be listed at Yarn Forest, the other is earmarked as a prize.

short post with pictures

2007-09-06T15:30:00.000-07:00

Erika has listed some of my hand-dyed yarn in her etsy store. Go take a peek.

Here's some of my hand-dye that I kept:

One sock, BFL DK weight, shows the length of the color repeat using my jumbo niddy noddy. I love this sock and have been wearing it while I knit the second one. It's thicker than fingering, I knit this on US4s with 48 stitches.

Monkey Sock number one is also done. (Number two is almost at the toe.) This was some of my very first hand-dyed yarn. Cookie's Monkey sock pattern in knitty.com comes in only one size. I was worried that it would be too small for me, but it isn't. Close though. Knit-Picks Bare sock yarn, knit on US2s.

Look what Franz built. this has already been used, then dismantled to reuse the parts for winder version 2.

Backpack part 1: When a tree falls in a forest...

2007-09-03T09:08:00.000-07:00

A couple weeks ago my family took a hike. A three day hike. It was supposed to be a four day hike, but we'll get to that later. We like to backpack, but don't actually do it that often. Before the kid, Franz and I maintained about a 50-50 ratio of car camping and backpacking. Well, maybe not 50-50, you know how memory is. Next I will be saying I walked 6 miles every day to school, uphill in both directions. After child, we continued the occasional backpack (starting when Zach was 10 months) but mostly turned to car camping.

So anyway, back to this trip. We hiked a popular loop in the Olympic National Park called The High Divide, although that name more accurately refers to just one section. Starting at the Sol Duc Hot Springs trailhead, the trail follows a river valley up through the forest. Our first day and night we remained in the forest. We have big trees here. Big trees. The day was overcast and damp. Rain was predicted but didn't fall. In the past, such a walk through the damp dark forest with the sound of the river nearby has felt peaceful. But this trip...

Try this experiment. Get a piece of paper and cover up the right side of that photo. Doesn't that look lovely? Peaceful, serene, green and full of oxygen producing old-growth forest? Now remove the paper. Newly shattered stump. Yes, shattered. What kind of force could do that? Just another tree falling over. And trees fall. We like it when trees fall, it is part of the circle, the cycle, nature at its finest. See the foreground. Trees fell years ago and are turning back into soil. Take your paper and cover up the top of the photo. Don't the logs turning back into soil look peaceful and quiet? Then take the paper away again. Does that look quiet? Do you wish you were witness to that event?

Here's another view. The tree that fell which shattered the other tree was at least 100 feet tall.

Nurse logs, fungus, termites, worms, all seem such a beautiful serene, slow part of nature. I never really concentrated on the dramatic events that start the process. But this hike, as I walked through the woods, every tree reminded me that behind their quiet beauty lies the capability for extreme violence.

I wasn't worried. I didn't expect something to fall on us. It was more a sense of power and darkness, the unknown and unknowable that fueled awareness and anxiety. I was glad to climb above treeline. More about that part of the trip later.

Coming to a store near you

2007-08-31T16:17:00.000-07:00

Ready for Erika to pick up tomorrow, destined for The Yarn Forest.

The smell of vinegar in the morning

2007-08-29T12:15:00.000-07:00

Looking at this photo:

one might get the impression that I've been dyeing today.

No, that's not quite it though. Long time readers of my blog know I started dyeing wool last spring as a lark, encouraged by the great dyeorama swap of 2006. I took to it like a duck to water, just loved the combination of technical details and artistic play. I dyed way more yarn than I could possibly knit, thought about selling some, but chickened out. That process seemed overwhelming and only for those folks who have more self-confidence than I sometimes feel. So, instead of filling my house with hand-dyed yarn, I stopped.

I've knit some, given some away, but still it was nagging me that I didn't take the plunge and sell some. The biggest benefit of that would be that I could dye some more. Well, Erika has seen my yarn, she's even knit socks from it. She got intrigued with the dye bug as well. But Erika adds something I was missing, an intrepid entrepreneurial spirit. We talked and talked, we dyed yarn, both together and separately and The Yarn Forest is born. It's an Etsy store for now, if it takes off, it will become a stand-alone store for more convenience for shoppers and sellers. She has "soft launched" the store but we hope to have a variety of yarns and colors available real soon now.

I went through my accumulated favorites getting them ready to list. One thing had been nagging me, though. I learned a lot through trial and error and didn't fully come to understand how to completely set the dye until I had been dyeing for a while. Since I could not remember exactly when I had dyed these skeins, I was nervous about selling it. Especially since I had had a terrible experience with a commercial yarn where the dye had not been properly set. Erika was able to take advantage of my experience right away. Just ask her how obnoxiously I demanded that she have patience and steam long enough and let the yarn cool for a long time before letting her look at her first hand-dyed! It was worth it though, her first skein rinsed completely cleanly.

This morning, I gave these precious babies a bath. As I immersed each one into the water, I held my breath. Would it bleed? A very small bit of bleeding and fading over time does seem inevitable. Even my koigu socks faded. I cannot promise a no-fade-ever yarn. The skeins that only very very faintly colored the water or left it sparkling clear passed the test. I rinsed them, added a touch of vinegar to the last rinse --- just to be sure --- and left them to dry in the sun.

The skeins that didn't pass are all getting a little help. These are immersed in vinegar-water and sitting in the sun. That will set the dyes better.

Next, they dry and get reskeined (they were skeined by hand and now I have a niddy noddy for a more professional and uniform size) and the next big test: how can I photograph them accurately? I've tried a variety of methods, but just am not good at photographing the colors well. See my flickr set of hand-dyed yarns, a mixture of yarns, some that will be for sale, some I have knit with, some in progress. Some photos stink, a few show promise. I just have to figure out a reliable way to photograph them well. Comments would be helpful.

One last thing, if anyone has read this far. What would you like to see in a hand-dyed yarn? I've dyed several base yarns and have my favorites, but what are yours? My signature yarn, the main one I have dyed, is a lovely, soft merino. I love this yarn. It knits up beautifully and feels so wonderful. But, it is thicker than most sock yarns and it is not easy care. It will felt if you machine wash it. But I do like my socks and wrist warmers and sweater and throw. I think this would make wonderful baby clothes for the parents willing to hand wash.

Therefore, I, like Erika, have been experimenting with more traditional sock yarns, mostly superwash. We are liking some of them a lot and will continue to look for more.

Virtual Vacation Swap

2007-08-29T12:12:00.001-07:00

KVVS
Originally uploaded by madorville

I got a virtual vacation to New Hampshire, courtesy of Amanda aka nhknittingmama. Although I got married in NH, I haven't spent much time there, so it was fun to get the tour.

Amanda sent maps and brochures along with some candles with scents evocative of New England, a note pad with a beach theme and a note pad with a rooster. I don't know if that's a New England thing or because she knows I have a chicken. Either way, I can never have too many note pads. There are some postcards, soap and even some genuine beach sand. I like to place candles in shallow trays anchored in sand, so that will have a good use as well. And a cotton bag Amanda knit using her own pattern, which was included in the bag along with some gum and candy. The yarn is a beautiful dark green, a color I love, hand-dyed by Amanda. She says it is her first foray into acid dyes. Wow. Given the quality of this color, I am sure she will enjoy more dyeing.

Multiple topics in one handy post

2007-08-18T10:51:00.001-07:00

First: Happy Anniversary to me! I've been extra stressed lately and I forgot all about it. I don't feel too bad because so did my husband. It wasn't until I read Canadian Dorothy's blog that I realized what day it was. Turns out that she and I have the same wedding anniversary. So go over there and wish her and her husband many more years of happiness.

Second: Although I am really good with numbers in general, and dates in particular, for some reason, I can never remember my wedding date. I wrote three checks yesterday, all of them accidentally postdated, since my brain insists that we got married on the 18th. Oops.

Third: We went out for dinner, and while it was fine, it was less than perfect. We ended up taking Zach, so not necessarily a romantic getaway, but logistically it made the most sense. Time for romantic meals sans offspring are being planned. As we have rediscovered our inner carnivores after a long journey into vegetarianism, we were hoping to go to Jak's for bacon cheeseburgers. Alas, we got a late start and the dinner rush was underway, the wait was an hour. So we walked across the street to Ciao Bella. We'd had some really nice meals at the old Ciao Bella, but have only been to the new location once, and it wasn't memorable. Last night was memorable because of the awful service. Was it because we had our teen with us on a Friday night? Was it that they noticed we came from Jak's? Whatever reason, they treated us like dirt the whole evening. And my salmon was way overcooked (but the rest of the food was good). Not that they were too crowded or busy with much besides stopping to flirt with the two thirty-something blonds at the next table. I am usually a generous tipper. But last night, no way.

Fourth: I managed to get a lot of errands done yesterday and for the first time in weeks, felt that I had gotten several monkeys off my back. I almost have some monkeys off the needles too. This one just needs a wee bit of decreasing then some grafting. The second sock is at the heel turn.

Fifth: Anyone who's been reading my blog for a while knows that I have enjoyed dyeing yarn and that I am a bit of a math geek. I think that the geekiness is one of the aspects of dyeing I most enjoy. I like to take the time to make very long skeins, so the final result is a bit unusual in that it won't pool or stack in the same way as many hand-dyed yarns. That's not to say it won't pool. I have seen hand-painted yarn with that assurance, but I just don't see how anyone can make such a universal claim. My latest endeavor involves at PVC niddy-noddy that makes skeins more than five yards in circumference. Using a dye process with multiple mason jars simmering in a roasting pan, I can make skeins that won't repeat their color pattern for 190 inches of yarn. But there are still so many factors, the colors may still stack or pool. It all depends.

This swatch is done with Brown Sheep Wildfoot that I dyed using the above long skein method. It has 75 stitches, started on US1 needles, I switched halfway to US0s. The ribbing on US1s gave 5.25 rounds til the yarn color sequence repeated. The stockinette on US1s resulted in 5.5 rounds til the colors repeated. After changing to US0s (and going from about 9 stitches per inch to almost 9.5 stitches per inch) the colors repeated at 5.75 rounds.

What does this mean? Well the long skein and the fact that it took at least five rounds for the color sequence to repeat means that even hugely wide socks in a pattern that takes lots of yarn ought to be able to get a couple three rounds before the color sequence repeats. That should alleviate a lot of dramatically disturbing pooling issues. However, it won't remove them. If the color sequence repeats at exactly N or N+.5 rounds, one could easily get a stacking issue that looks especially nice or especially unbalanced. And having a the sequence repeat at other intervals might end up with nice spirals or weird streakiness. You just never know, do you?

Sunday's cooking

2007-08-14T13:33:00.000-07:00

For a photo of this in the dye pot, see Erika's blog.

Some Summer Fun

2007-08-10T10:41:00.000-07:00

Our two weeks with a Japanese Home Stay guest flew by. I had been so anxious, but Hitomi turned out to be a wonderful guest and is now a friend. She was able to relax and feel right at home, fulfilling the philosphy of a foreign exchange program. Of course she was the tour coordinator and seasoned traveler, not a high school student on her first overseas trip, so it was easier for her. I heard that the high school students all had great homestays as well. We met one of the two teachers whom we took to Stitch & Pitch. This was her first trip outside Japan and she was having a blast. However, I heard that the other teacher was finding the whole trip kind of stressful. We taught Hitomi an American idiom to describe that sort of person: High Maintenance. She laughed and agreed.

Hitomi likes to hike, so what better way to show her around than to take her to the mountains. We did the easy Barclay Lake hike, with its dramatic view of Mt Baring looming 3000 feet over the lake. I didn't get any photos. Before coming home we detoured a bit on Route 2 to Skykomish, a small town with a big problem. For about 100 years, the railroad has dumped or leaked or spilled fuel and who knows what else onto and into the ground. In order to clean it up, just about every building in town is being picked up, the contaminated dirt dug out and hauled away, then clean fill poured in and the building restored.

Our second weekend we had more adventures. Saturday we hiked to Snow Lake, a popular hike with an easy access trailhead at Snoqualmie Pass. The parking lot (a large lot for the Alpental ski resort) was quite full and we had to wait in line at the trailhead at the self-register station (because we were bozos and didn't notice that there were two(!) registration stations) but the trail did not seem crowded and the lake front was even less so.

The Japanese student group had been to Snoqualmie Falls, but a local bus driver who got lost (argg) meant that they hadn't had much time to walk around. So we took Hitomi back, on the way home from Snow Lake. No pictures, but if you ever watched Twin Peaks, you've seen the Falls.

Sunday, our last day to be tour guides, we took a quintessential Seattle trip on a ferry boat. We took Metro downtown and walked on the Bremerton Ferry. Not that we wanted to do anything in Bremerton, we just grabbed lunch and came home, but because it's a pretty ride. This was the last day of the airshow and the Blue Angels buzzed the ferry as they were playing around getting ready for the show.

The water was full of jellyfish, more than I had ever seen. The view of Seattle was clear and pretty (yes, that's the space needle above Hitomi's head) but we didn't see any orcas. I don't think I have ever seen them from the ferry though.

Our tour-guide hikes with Hitomi served a second purpose. With an upcoming backpack, we especially need to get some hiking in for conditioning purposes.

Our family vacation will occur at the end of August, a 4 day loop of the High Divide in the Olympic Mountains. This area is popular, so to keep it from being overrun, the National Parks requires reservations and permit. Franz called and got our campsite reservations, plus information on the bear can requirements. Bears? Yes, checking the trip reports of the Washington Trails Association, black bears are common.

Yesterday, I took Zach to REI for new boots.
clerk: NOLS trip?
me: No, we're going to do the High Divide.
clerk: You mean in the Olympics?
me: Yes.
clerk: Awesome. I was just there in June. In one afternoon we saw 7 bears and some cubs. They were having so much fun, eating berries and glissading on the snow.
me: Seven Bears! I'd heard they were around. Now I am really worried about getting eaten.
clerk. Nah, black bears don't eat people, they just maul.

Swans or peacocks?

2007-08-09T10:06:00.000-07:00

Time for a question.

For Mystery Stole 3, I dyed some yarn. Melanie, the stole's designer, said that the theme would be best expressed in a black or white stole. (we now know that the theme is Swan Lake; a ballet I have not seen.) I chose to make a very dark green kettle-dyed yarn. This swatch is a pretty good representation of the result, which ended up more blue-green than green.

I kept up with the clues, knitting the stole, up through clue 3. Does it look swan like?

It's nice, but I am not feeling the love. Perhaps I am just not a stole person. Or maybe my idea of a stole is more like a wrap --- wider than 20 inches. My finished Leda's Dream is a generous 24 inches wide and I love how it wraps around me, but this one won't. The yarn, Henry's Attic Carrera, is lovely, but I just don't think it's the right weight for the stole. So I set it aside for a bit.

Meanwhile, after finishing Leda's Dream, I've been hankering to start something new --- Fiddlestick's Peacock Feathers Shawl. I dyed some yarn, Zephyr, thinking that I wanted something similar to the Carrera, a subtle variegated blue-green but also with an occasional blip of red and yellow, peacock-like. Well, I , um, forgot to add black so I got completely different results.

It's pretty, but not what I had in mind. So now I am stuck. What to do now? Should I keep going with the Mystery Stole and the Peacock Shawl or should I frog the Mystery Stole and use that yarn for a new peacock shawl?

Times like these sure make me wish I could knit faster. Then frogging wouldn't seem so harsh.

Leda's Dream

2007-08-06T07:24:00.000-07:00

Summer is in full swing, but Fall seems to be in the air here in Seattle. All it took was one chilly morning to get my neighbors, friends and random strangers at the grocery store all talking about --- and looking forward to --- Fall. And rain. And grey skies. Seattleites tend toward two camps: those that complain that only a dozen days with temperatures above 80 degrees F (26 degrees C) does not a Summer make and those who complain that four days of temperatures above 90 degrees (32 C) are just too damn many and when it is going to get rainy and cold again.

Me. Well, I'm in the latter camp. Sure, I am happy we've had enough warm weather that my tomatos are going gangbusters, that we've had so little rain I haven't had to mow the lawn for a few weeks, but shortening days and the need to put on a sweater occasionally are not things to mourn. I know we still have many weeks of good weather, more berries to ripen, more time to play and hike and camp.

A little crispness will give me a reason to wear something soft and cozy, Leda's Dream Stole, design by Melanie Gibbons. This was Mystery Stole number One. I wasn't even a knitter when she created this knitalong, but she sells the pattern for two bucks. Very clear instructions, very clear charts, well worth the investment.

Now what I really need to invest in is blocking wires. I blocked this by pinning it out and it looks much better than before, but still doesn't look finished. I'll get some wires and redo the blocking.

Details:
yarn is one strand of Zephyr and one strand of Madil Kid Seta knit together. Both are dark grey, the slight variation in the color along with the silk content of each yarn make for a rich depth of color I have found impossible to photograph.
US 6 addi lace needles.

Modifications:

slipped the first stitch of every row.
used a centered double decrease (slip 2tog, k1, pass slipped stitches over) instead of the slip 1, k2tog, psso in the pattern, except, I used the angled decrease for the wave edging.
cast on 12 fewer stitches that the pattern called for, and knit fewer repeats (26 of the Wing of the Swan pattern)

Blocked dimensions: 24x70 inches.

Too many holes.

2007-07-30T08:27:00.000-07:00

Caution. Minor HP spoilers ahead.

I used to work at a leading independent children's bookstore, owned by an energetic mover and shaker in the world of selling children's books. Therefore, just about any author of children or teen lit on tour would come to our store and I met a lot of them. I never met the author whose name rhymes with bowling, she only toured for her first book and that was before I started my job. The boss and manager had dinner with her way back then. Thought she was a nice woman and that her book had some potential.

I did meet, twice, a nice young woman whose name sort of rhymes with Hay Shears. On her second book tour, I had a chance to chat with her before her reading. I wasn't trying to be mean or anything, but sometimes I ask questions without thinking them through. I was trying to be sympathetic to the challenges of writing when I commented on (one of) the continuity errors. As she developed the characters and found it would really help to tweak the past, she must have had to wrestle with the editor? How did an author decide to change facts from book to book? She gave me a deer in the headlights look and asked what I meant. Well, I said, one of the main character's grandmother lived in one state and had had limited contact with her grandkids over the years. In the next book, grandma lived in a different state and the grandkids had (until a few years ago) spent significant parts of their summers with her. No. She had not realized this, nor had the editor caught it. Oops.

One European author who is popular abroad didn't need to tour the US so I haven't met her. I got to read the galley of her second book (second published in America that is, riding on the reading wave sparked by Ms Rhymes with Bowling) right after it arrived at the store and it was a good read, but oh dear, the climax of that book had a glaring error. At one point, two people are locked in a building as two other people leave. The building is being watched; any activity would have been noticed. Then someone sets fire to the building so as I was reading I was worrying about the folks trapped inside. Well, the author wasn't --- somehow they ended up somewhere else. The galley had a very friendly note asking for comments, so I very helpfully emailed the editor. I hoped this could be caught before the final version was printed? I got a polite thank you, but I don't think anyone actually read the email or else didn't care. The book was published just like the galley. Did anyone else ever notice, I wonder? (props if you did. let me know.)

Ms Rowling has written seven books with the same characters. Seven! She's done an admirable job overall with continuity within and between volumes. So consistent that I could forgive occasional lapses, such as the fact that at the end of one book, Harry has lost his Marauder's Map to someone not inclined to give it back. However, at the beginning of the next book it is back in his possession. And the lack of internal consistency on whether or not apparition makes noise. And on and on, actually. There are lots of continuity errors, but I've been willing to forgive them. Overall the books have been good stories with decent consistency.

I finished Book Seven and enjoyed it. Didn't like the epilogue. Really didn't like the epilogue. But my husband thought perhaps she wanted to stress that these folks lived regular ordinary boring happy lives and therefore she was Not Going To Write About Them Anymore. I also noticed in chapter one a squat man with a wheezy giggle who was on the Dark Side and who took special delight in the fact that the Ministry had been infiltrated. Who was he? Was he in the Ministry? JK is usually good about following up on these sorts of clues, so I expected him to reappear. Two short men with high pitched, wheezy voices did appear: Elphias Doge and Deadalus Diggle. Which one was an agent for evil? What would happen to the Dursleys? Well, nothing was said again. I was irked. But oh well. Easy to forgive. And no one else I have talked to found it troubling.

This weekend I decided it was time to restart Book Seven. I had memorized the edging pattern for Leda's Dream and figured I could knit while rereading, to see if I was justified in being irked about the anonymous short wheezy guy and maybe I would understand the whole Elder Wand thing better. But on page one, I started thinking about chapter one and the rest of the book and a huge plot hole became apparent. A quick check of a scene near the end of the book confirmed it. I was stunned. I was furious. How could such a major glaring error in time sequencing have been allowed?

This is perhaps the straw that breaks the hippogriff's back. I am surprised at myself for my reaction but I am really pissed off. Does anyone else know which error I must mean? Am I overreacting?

Seven Things

2007-07-23T11:39:00.000-07:00

1. I am not reading blogs or much of the internet at all, so I don't stumble across spoilers before I finish HP7. I ought to finish by this afternoon, now that F and Z are gone and there isn't any competition for the book. One blog exception is Erika, since I was pretty sure she wouldn't be posting any spoilers. She just have a birthday, so go over and wish her many happy returns, if you haven't already.

2. I finished the pillow and have sewn two bags.

3. My introverted family went out of our boring comfort zone and volunteered to host a Japanese student here on a student trip for two weeks. Zach studies Japanese and we are thinking of traveling to Japan next year. I've always wanted to host a foreign exchange student, but the timing never worked out until now. So this was a great opportunity. We said on the application that we would be willing to host an adult accompanying the students. It turned out that we did get an adult, H, which was fine by me. I have to admit I was a bit relieved to get an adult who has traveled before and knows English very well for our first experience with this sort of thing. H is the trip coordinator and works for a travel agency. While she has traveled a lot, in the past on these student trips she has stayed by herself in a hotel, which was quiet and lonely. She is happy to be with a family.

4. H is from Nagasaki. The flower of Nagasaki is the Hydrangea, and ours are in full bloom right now.

5. A few weeks ago, when a friend offered to pick up Stitch and Pitch tickets, while we were still debating whether to volunteer to be a host family, I went ahead and ordered an extra ticket, just in case. Would our student want to attend a baseball game with us? And would the student be interested in sitting with a bunch of knitters? I didn't know, but the tickets aren't expensive so it seemed worth the gamble. H is interested, in fact she asked about baseball, since the Mariners have a player from Nagasaki.

6. And she crochets. But she still thinks it's a little strange to have knitters attend a baseball game, but I think once she is there it will make more sense.

7. Last year Franz and Zach came to Stitch and Pitch, but it is looking like Franz will be going on a business trip to California the end of this week. But his boss is a little flaky when it comes to finalizing schedules, so we don't know yet. I am not sure about Zach, but I am guessing that without Franz, he might be less interested in attending. Therefore we may have two extra tickets. If anyone is interested in them, let me know.

Happy Yellow Pig's Day!

2007-07-17T07:39:00.000-07:00

On Ravelry

2007-07-11T12:08:00.000-07:00

I confess I am on ravelry. Didn't want to admit it because before I got my invite I hated reading folks blogging about it. But it's time to fess up so I can add my 2 cents.

First, some data. I first read about ravelry on Jessica's blog, on May 1. I immediately put my name on the waiting list. I got my invite on May 31st. I think the wait has grown a bit from one month.

What is ravelry? Mostly it's a database to allow knitters and crocheters to list their projects by various attributes. So if you want to see pea pod jackets, you search on that. All the pea pods show up along with what yarn the knitter used. Then you can go to that knitter's page and find more details. Any modifications, how much yarn was used, any blog post with more details, more photos. Or search on other designs by the same designer. Or fall in love with the yarn and search on that. We want this. I know we want this because that's the kind of searches that folks use to find my blog. Ever since I blogged about my flower basket shawl in Sea Silk I got tons of hits for sea silk. Isn't that what you would do? After taking the plunge and paying over 30 bucks for one skein of yarn, wouldn't you look for as many design choices as possible? And when you find someone's data, don't you want to know needle size and the size of the finished garment and maybe even how much yarn was left over?

Recently I blogged about Leda's Dream. Within 48 hours I got about a dozen hits from folks searching for this. At first I figured that it was the same person, but then realized that the searches were coming from all over the world. Sure, Leda's Dream is "hot" right now since it was Melanie's Mystery Stole 1 and so many of us are going gaga blogging about mystery stole 3. But still. Anyway, Jenny Raye has the most drop dead gorgeous Leda's Dream imaginable, if you want to see it, click here to get to her blog post.

Ravelry is designed to be more efficient than searching blogs. It is. Mostly. As it gets bigger and more folks' projects are listed, I worry that it will lose some of its charm and effectiveness. Remember, data is only as good as what someone has input. So when more people join, if they are lazy or sloppy or forgetful or clueless and don't add details and photos, using ravelry could get frustrating. Maybe Jess and Casey can implement some "how useful was this information?" attribute. Then when someone searches for a popular design, they won't have to wade through all the folks who just mention that they are knitting but don't add any valuable information.

So if you knit or crochet and are not in the ravelry queue yet? Sign up. In the meanwhile, get yourself a flickr account and start loading all your photos. WIPs, FOs, Stash, etc. Use flickr's functionality to record details about each item. Then you will be all ready to be a contributor to ravelry instead of just a consumer.

So why can't we all get into ravelry? Well even though I have a master's degree in computer science, before I got my invite, I was privately indignant about that and didn't understand. Even if I couldn't become a member yet, why not let me look? Now I understand. The number of members is a factor in scalability, but really what they have to limit is the number of folks using it at any given time. Each of those lovely addictive searches we members do takes bandwidth. Bandwidth that Jess and Casey have to pay for. At least until google or Interweave purchases the company or something.

A suggestion if they read this (and from seeing other blogs that mention ravelry and get a comment from Jess or Casey, it does appear that they might). For those in the queue, chomping at the bit, could there be a limited access available? Maybe 10 on the waitlist per day get a 24 hour window to play around with searches so that they can at least see what the fuss is about?

Oh, and Casey, if you read this. My husband's jaw dropped when I showed him the site. He's a computer engineer and understood exactly what it took to make ravelry. Some features that I took for granted he was flabbergasted about, saying that they were really hard. He said you were more productive in 6 months of evenings and weekends than his team of developers were in 6 months at work. So, everyone else., if you get to ravelry and find a bug or get irked that some feature isn't perfect, consider that.

Oh well.

2007-07-10T13:31:00.000-07:00

47%

knit, knit, sew, sew

2007-07-10T12:21:00.000-07:00

Just a few photos to show what I've been doing.

Mystery Stole 3. Clue 2 finished:

A simple sewing project using thrift store fabric. A grocery bag from The Impatient Patchworker, by Jayne Emerson. No, it isn't patchwork, but it was thrift store cotton and I am a novice at sewing. Just wanted something to practice with.

Also from The Impatient Patchworker, a pillow top. My first plunge into fat quarters will most likely not be my last. This will cover a garage sale pillow and live in the guest room, which has new curtains made of one of the fabrics (I believe it is the only fabric to be in each of the five rows. )
Now to get back to Leda's Dream. A dream of a stole and a dream of a yarn combo.

Only in Seattle?

2007-07-10T12:16:00.000-07:00

.EXCESSIVE HEAT WARNING IN EFFECT FROM NOON TODAY TO 11 PM PDT WEDNESDAY...

TODAY...SUNNY. HIGHS IN THE MID 80S TO LOWER 90S. NORTH WIND 10 TO 15 MPH.

Proof

2007-07-06T19:35:00.001-07:00

taller
Originally uploaded by madorville

that I am taller than my chicken.

Tomatoes

2007-07-06T14:38:00.001-07:00

Stupice
Originally uploaded by madorville

Early July and we have fruit! More proof that Seattle summer came earlier than usual. More photos and details on my flickr page.

Mysteries

2007-07-06T11:34:00.000-07:00

I have already finished Mystery Stole Three Clue Two!
just kidding! But it is downloaded, printed and 28% completed.

Since two of the big wheels in knit-blogdom, Bonne Marie and Stephanie, blogged about joining Mystery Stole 3 (signups close any minute now) the number of members doubled in a couple hours. I trust Melanie can take the excitement. Why would so many people be willing to invest their knitting time and money into a project where they don't know what it will look like? And me, I even dyed yarn specially for this.

The first two clues have each have about 5000 stitches. Not too overwhelming, especially in installments. I do expect to be finished with clue two today or tomorrow. Lace provides such a fun challenge. Melanie has added to that with a hidden theme. She won't reveal the theme for a while, but we do know that a stole closely following the theme would be either white or black but she warned us not plan to use this as a wedding shawl. Most likely the theme is a tragic love story. (Madame Butterfly? Swhan Lake? Othello? Knitters have been guessing.)

I do enjoy knitting for intellectual puzzles. New stitches, new stitch patterns, new yarns, new yarn combinations, new colors all stimulate the desire to knit. Erika offered a different sort of kntting challenge, when a while ago she discovered a handwritten cryptic pattern in her great aunt's knitting books. Numbers, letters in knitting shorthand and just a few words. Two important words --- sleeve & body --- told us that it's a sweater. The 'k' is clearly a knit stitch, but nothing else was evident. Page one seems to be missing, this starts on row 29. What's the size, the gauge, the cast-on? Can we reconstruct a pattern from it? To follow the discussion so far, go to Erika's blog, find the search box in the right hand column and search for Helen.

If you do, you can see many different interpretations were considered. I took a mathematical approach. How many k's, o's, sp's were in each row? How did the number of stitches change from row to row? In answering those questions, I finally narrowed it down. The only way I could make it work was to identify the o's as yarn overs and the sp's as a double decrease. That's the crux. Who, at first glance would think of a double decrease?

Basic pattern. multiple of 6 plus 3.

DD = double decrease. I slip two together knitwise, knit one, pass two stitches over.

Row 1: K3 *yo DD yo K3* repeat in asterisk til end of row.
Row 2: Purl
Row 3: K6 *yo DD yo K3* repeat til last three stitches, K3
Row 4: Purl

repeat for pattern.

Helen's notes look a lot more complicated because she's making a sweater from the top down, with raglan increases following the stitch pattern. Can you see in the swatch below where I increased? Swatch is done with Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece on US7s. This would make a nice simple lacy summery sweater.

Windows and Gutters

2007-07-05T11:18:00.000-07:00

Getting the gutters and windows cleaned today.

Our house is pretty easy, only one story, the roof pitch isn't bad. But the front picture window is right under a deep eave. A little challenging to access with a ladder. So as the fellow was standing in the shrubbery below with the ladder stymied, I said, "Well, do you have a longer handle for your squeegee? You don't need the ladder at all. That's how I'd do it." He replied, "Great idea, one would think you did this for a living."

Actually, I did. I worked for a window washing company one summer many years ago.

Dunno if that really is weird, but it's perhaps an unusual occupation. I did promise six weird things for that meme last winter and I only got to two. This makes three. Will I reveal more?

Sweaters

2007-07-04T12:01:00.000-07:00

I covet this:From Louisa Harding's Modern Classics.

The softness, the delicacy, the style! Hard to tell from the photo, but there are 4 different lace columns asymmetrically repeated. If I could only knit one more sweater in my entire life, this would be it.

The book has some wonderful designs and some terrible instructions. Charts where the keys don't match the symbols in the chart. Sweater sets where the outer sweater has two inches less ease than the inner one. Complex stitches -- such as p2tog tbl --- that are not described in the glossary, while pages are devoted to describing simple stitches. (Does every book need to explain knit and purl?) And the chart for this sweater is a confusing jumble that would be impossible to follow without previous lace experience. If I make this sweater, I'll use Ann Budd's book of sweater patterns for the details and use the pattern for inspiration.

Having used Ann Budd and Elizabeth Zimmerman's percentage system, I am slowly learning how *I* want a sweater to fit, which is different than either Ann or Liz. For instance, Ann tends to have the sleeve circumference at the armhole at 50% of chest measurement. EZ says to make this 33%. Well, Ann's proportions are part of my problem with Franz's Cambridge Jacket, the arms are too big. EZ's proportions, on the other hand, mean my Fibonacci Sweater's sleeves are turning out to be tighter than I would prefer. I suspect that the differences lie in how much ease one wants or expects in the chest measurement. I have not a clue how to modify a set in sleeve design for more or less ease in the arm, but EZ's percentage system for a raglan can be personalized just fine.

I am still puzzled about cardigan designs. I read over and over that the backs and fronts must match, and sure, in pullovers that's easy to accomplish. But Cardigans have button bands. Therefore, I would assume that designers would account for the width of the button band and make the fronts a wee bit narrower than 1/2 the back. That's not the case though. In almost all patterns I have read, each front gets exactly half the number of stitches cast on for the back. Why?

So far, the sweater on the left, Diamond Mesh from Knitter's Magazine, Summer 2007, is the only exception I have found. The back has six more stitches than the sum of the fronts. (I like this sweater a lot.)

Wait. One more exception. That red sweater above I covet? It has the traditional button band knit on sideways, 6 rows worth. But the fronts added together have two more stitches than the back.

Lace

2007-07-03T11:41:00.000-07:00

My list of finished knits includes a large proportion of lace.

Branching Out in Noro Cash Iroha
Mountain Stream in Madil Kid Seta
Cece in Elizabeth Lavold Silky Wool
Spinner's Shawl in Corriedale - Romney from Oregon Trail Natural Fibers
Flower Basket Shawl in Handmaiden Sea Silk
Estonian Garden in Frog Tree Alpaca

Lace satisfies an itch, an itch to try new technique, new fiber, new color, new pattern. And once you've bound off, just block and you are done! No sleeves to seam, no zippers to sew in. Well, Cece is a sweater, but is very simply constructed.

It's no surprise then that I have two lace shawls on the needles. Both are designed by Melanie.

Leda's Dream is almost half finished. I am knitting this on US6 addi lace needles (would have used 7's if addi would only make them) combining one strand of Zephyr and one strand of Madil Kid Seta. I love it, especially the Swan's Wing lace pattern, which I believe is from Barbara Walker. The central all-over pattern is also easy to learn and looks good. I could see a lightweight afghan knit with just that pattern and a garter strip border. She designed this as a mystery stole, offering the pattern for free in serial form two summers ago. Now she sells the pattern for a very affordable 2 dollars.

I joined Melanie's second mystery stole last summer, but never started. Turned out that the design never called to me. But I couldn't resist joining again this year. Why, when I have so many ideas of what to knit, would I join a group to knit a stole where I would not know the final design til late in the game? I don't know. Figured it couldn't hurt --- I wasn't required to cast-on. Well, we got the first clue and I have cast on, using some hand-dyed Henry's Attic Carerra and addi lace US5s. We still don't know the final shape of the stole, but it won't be a triangle. After 100 rows, there are 99 stitches on the needles, and Melanie says that's as many as we get. So, is this going to be knit on the bias or will it have pointy ends? Time will tell. The outer pattern is a variation of the Swan's wing pattern from Leda's Dream. I love the way she made that work, especially in the corner.

Holes

2007-07-02T09:55:00.000-07:00

I tend to have holes in my blogging. My intentions to blog, to record everyday happenings, tend to be stronger than my follow through. Sometimes it's just hard to justify the time to craft a post. But enough blogging about not blogging. Let's talk about holes. Knitting with holes.

I learned a lot of knitting from books. I don't have any fancy way of holding the yarn and picking or throwing, I just loop the yarn around the needle. Inefficient, but it works for me. Learning the basics of lace, I understood, or at least I thought I did, the idea of a yarn over. Just make that loop around the needle without having put said needle into an existing stitch. No sweat. I played with some swatching, but then I made the mistake then of looking at a book and good golly, there were six different instructions for Yarn Overs! That confused the hell out of me. I finally realized that all of them did the same thing. The instructions were just to show the most efficient way of getting that YO in there without actually putting the loop on the needle in a separate step. The six different instructions explained what to do when working between two knit stitches, between two purls, going from a knit to a purl, etc. Now I have found a knitting book that even gives them different names. Instead of instructing one to make a YO, the instructions have yfrn, yrn, yon, and yo. I ask you. Does any knitter need or want instructions that contain all four variants?

My kid, now a high schooler

2007-06-26T07:41:00.000-07:00

Zach finished middle school sans pomp and circumstance. He could have gone to graduation and played Pomp & Circumstance, but he didn't really feel like an 8th grader, nor, as a part-time student, did he feel the need for the ritual. Seating is limited so we were altruistic in not attending, gave up our tickets so some other student with more than two relatives could ~~force them to sit in a hot, crowded auditorium for a tedious ceremony~~ invite them.

Friday he biked up to Matthews Beach to meet with a group of kids for their own end of school celebration. Candy and Capture the Flag. Coming home on the Burke-Gilman trail, he took a tumble when he let his front wheel drift off the pavement. Nothing serious, just got some ugly road rash on his elbow and a scrape on his rib and hip. (In addition to helmet, he wears biking gloves. I don't know if his hand hit the pavement too, but gloves are great for avoiding road rash on one's hands. I never bike without them myself.)

We cleaned him up and he seemed fine. Even played some DDR Friday evening. Saturday we went to Icicle Creek Canyon to go camping, hiking and drop him off at music camp. Well, he ended up sleeping the entire three hour drive, then continued to nap on and off most of the afternoon while we set up camp and hung around. No wonder. I am sure he didn't break a rib or get a concussion, but he must have slammed pretty hard on the pavement and was feeling pretty sore. So instead of anything ambitious, late Saturday afternoon when he perked up we took a short hike, then Sunday did another short hike. The area is beautiful.

By Sunday his elbow was scabbed over with no sign of infection. We dropped him off at camp with strict instructions though, if it starts to look bad, streaky red or hot he is to alert the staff and make sure it gets looked at. His main question was ought he put a bandage on it, so as not to gross out the girls. Nah, I said. Just tell them he fell off his bike to avoid hitting a kitten.

What about the Monkeys?

2007-06-21T19:42:00.000-07:00

I realized too late that my last post's title was inaccurate, since monkeys never get mentioned. Here they are:

The net's latest viral sock. Cookie's Monkeys in knitpicks bare fingering, one of the first skeins I dyed last spring. Brittany US 2s. The pattern is easy and addicting.

Regatta with wool and monkeys

2007-06-19T08:18:00.000-07:00

I spent most of the past weekend at Green Lake, sitting by the water. Those of you in the Northern Hemisphere but not in Seattle might think that sounded lovely, pass the sunscreen and lemonade. However, Summer in Seattle begins July 9th, says Cliff Mass, atmospheric scientist and local weather guru. While we often have some nice weather in May, June invariably is cold and damp. This past weekend was no exception. I wasn't at Green Lake because the weather was so nice it forced me to go, I was there because my kid was in his first regatta.

Saturday we did have some sun, and Franz and I had the opportunity to walk around the lake (about three miles) so that was fine, but Sunday was cold and wet. I had volunteered to work with the finish line officials. I wore a T-shirt and a long sleeve shirt over it and brought my Knitting Olympics wool sweater, just in case. I brought my knitting bag, mostly to finish a Dulaan hat. Little did I realise that instead of sewing in all the ends, I would be wearing the hat instead. And was I ever glad to find my wonky fingerless mitts hiding in my bag. The ones where I never sewed in the ends because I wasn't happy with the bind off and intend to redo it one of these days.

Quite a fashionable outfit, eh? Believe me, everyone else in the officiating tent was envious.

Zach's first kayak race. This is sprint kayaking, Olympic style. If you've ever been in a nice stable sea kayak, you need to know that these boats are different. They are designed for speed, not for stability. It takes lots of effort to simply stay afloat. There were enough new kids to warrant a novice division. Therefore, several of these ribbons are in the novice division sans competition and demonstrate that he (and in some cases, three teammates) were able to stay upright and paddle 1000 meters. Two of the second place ribbons were hard fought; he finished right behind another novice team member, a bigger and stronger boy.

Gardening requires optimism

2007-06-14T08:25:00.000-07:00

Will we get enough sun for tomatoes? Will these tiny starts grow and produce by August? Will I water them enough to keep them healthy but not too much nor too sporadically so that the fruit cracks? Will this year's staking job work to hold them up or will it just break their stems? Will I be able to keep them weeded?

Will the crows leave the basil alone? Will I keep the container watered and the flowers pinched? Will we have enough for pesto?

Will my raspberries survive their recent move? Will they flourish in their new spot? Will they get enough water? Will I get a pie?

Tasty has shown a surprising appetite for strawberry leaves! Will the cover keep her off the leaves and the squirrels off the fruit?

Will Dumbledore compliment my agapanthus?

Estonian Garden

2007-06-14T08:09:00.000-07:00

My Estonian Garden Wrap (pattern by Evelyn Clark for Fibertrends) is done and I am most happy with it. The Alpaca blocked nicely to show the lace pattern and became very soft. It doesn't hold its blocking the way wool does, but for this stole, that hasn't been a problem.

Three and a half skeins of Frog Tree Alpaca Fingering weight, knit on Addi Lace US 5s.

There is one fault of this FO. Against all the warnings in every knitting resource, I used two different dye lots of the yarn. I had originally considered that I might dye the wrap after knitting, so I didn't care. But now I think I like the white and don't want to dye it. The color changes are almost unnoticeable. In fact, no one but me has noticed the different hues and I only noticed when I held it up in direct sunlight --- and the difference in colors was striking. Therefore, it is judged too flawed to give away, but not too flawed to keep. I just won't wear it on a bright sunny day!

Virtual Vacation Swap Questionnaire

2007-06-09T17:31:00.000-07:00

Well, I am lame and haven't posted anything in a couple weeks, but have been taking photos and thinking about blogging while knitting, gardening, reading, cleaning, cooking, chauffeuring etc.

Meanwhile, I got the travel itch. Had to run to catch the bus; it almost was too full to let me on, but they squeezed a bit and gave me room. Woo! Now I am going on a Virtual Vacation!

And here's my questionnaire. The answers of which will determine where I'll visit and who I'll get to show around Seattle.

1. If you could visit any state in the US, which would it be and why?

Maine, because it is far away and I have never been there. It seems wild and beautiful with big trees and a rugged coast and probably not too hot. And there's lobster.

If I had to choose a city to visit, I would choose San Francisco. Hard to believe I have been on the West Coast for almost 20 years and still haven't been there.

2. If you could visit any country in the world, other than your own, which would it be and why?

I fell in love with Australia back while watching Picnic at Hanging Rock, Walkabout, The Last Wave and Breaker Morant. So am not sure my sense of the place is accurate, but would love to find out. The number of poisonous critters gives me pause, but it still seems like a wonderful place to visit.

3. Have you ever driven across several states/provinces/countries?

Yes, I have driven USA from coast to coast twice and driven to Oregon, Utah, California, Yellowstone and more.

4. Have you ever visited someplace you consider exotic? Where was it?

Utah.

5. What was your favorite "travel" vacation? Why?

Hard to choose a favorite. Christmas week at Big Bend National Park in Texas as newlyweds was special, lechuguilla (which deserves the nickname shin-daggers) notwithstanding. Our trips to Utah have mostly been great, especially the first time we took Zach and he lost (and swallowed!) his first tooth. Miraculously the tooth fairy found him, even though we were in a tent in the middle of nowhere. Our only overseas trip, to France, was good but stressful and would have been better if the flipping museums hadn't been on strike the entire flipping week we were in Paris.

6. Have you ever played tourist in your own home city/state (if international, country)? Explain.

I've played tourist/tour guide in Washington DC (where I grew up), Chicago (where I used to live) and here in Seattle. Lots of our family travel involves acting like tourists, especially educational activities, national and state parks, etc. My son wrote up our latest such trip on his blog.

7. Are you a museum visitor, beachcomber or an amusement seeker?

Museums, yes. Beaches, yes, but I get bored quickly and hate getting sand in my food. I love to sleep close enough to hear the ocean though. Deserts, yes, mind the snakes. Amusement parks, maybe. Only if they aren't crowded or out of the way and only on rides that don't spin.

8. What's your favorite type of yarn?

Almost any natural fiber.

9. What's your least favorite type of yarn?

Angora makes me itch. Acrylic makes me sad.

10. What items do you like to knit/crochet?

Sweaters, Socks and Shawls; the big three, eh? So far I have been more interested in lace than cables, but would like to find a cable pattern that would draw me in.

11. What do you pack, knit/crochet wise when you go on vacation?

I've been knitting for only a couple years and I do not crochet. We travel pretty light for the most part, that means sock knitting. Here's a sock touring Sam Hill's Stonehenge.

12. What other crafts do you do/would like to do other than Knit?

I like to cook and garden. I am hoping to start sewing more, having only made a few things like curtains, halloween costumes and a dress or two, years ago.

13. Are you allergic to anything? (Yarn wise or treat wise)

I don't eat soy products. Don't know if I am allergic, but Zach is definitely allergic to soy and I think I feel better avoiding it also. Otherwise, no allergies.

14. What is your favorite color? Least Favorite?

I'm partial to rich dark colors such as eggplant, pine, burgundy, and don't love pastels, especially the mint greens and powder blues.

15. Sweet or Savory (Treat not personality)?

Both.

16. Anything else we are forgetting to ask that you think your partner desperately needs to know?

Can't think of anything. Go ahead and ask.

Two Finished Knits (and one new)

2007-05-07T11:40:00.000-07:00

Flower Basket Shawl, pattern by Evelyn Clark:
One skein of Sea Silk made on US 3 needles made a triangular shawl 60 inches across, 24 inches to the point. I used 94 grams of the skein and was able to make 12 pattern repeats. Previously I had calculated 12 repeats would use 86 grams of yarn. I still believe my formula was correct, but for some unknown reason, I had misweighed the yarn. I had thought that the tangled blob I had extracted from the 100 gram skein was 12 grams, but it was really only 7. How did I make that mistake? I don't know. The upshot was that I had thought the shawl weighed less than it really did. Fortunately I figured it out before starting pattern repeat number 13 which would have had to be ripped. I realized when uploading this photo that it was taken from the purl side. Oh well.

Micro Mini Clapotis. One half skein (about 60 grams) of AngoraValley sock yarn, knit on size 3 needles. I did only one or two increase sections (ended up with 45 stitches on needles) to make a skinny scarf. I am very happy with the size. Unstretched, after light blocking, it is 66 inches by 4 inches. I love it. Thanks, Erika, for the inspiration.

I have too many projects unfinished, mostly because they all need the sleeves finished. I think knitting sleeves is a royal pain because of those damned increases, so irregular, every 6 rows, every 12 rows, every what? So hard to remember to put them in correctly and you have to remember to do the other sleeve exactly the same. Maybe I am just cut out for knitting shawls and maybe vests?

To that end, I couldn't help myself, I started a new shawl. Also by Evelyn Clark, the Estonian Garden Wrap. The pattern calls for laceweight yarn and makes a wrap approximately 19 inches by 60 inches. I am using fingering weight alpaca. I wanted it wider, much wider would be fine with me so I didn't muck with the pattern. What I didn't know was how much yarn I would need. I had three skeins (50 grams, 215 yards), would I want more? How much? The pattern calls for a provisional cast-on, then knit the main body, knit the lily-of-the-valley edging, bind off, then go back and pick up the cast-on and knit the edging again. Instead, I did the provisional cast-on and knit the edging first. That way I could bind-off and measure, before picking up the cast-on for the main body. First edge weighed 40 grams and is about 14+ inches long (perhaps 25 to 30 inches wide?). I procured 2 more skeins which will make for a nice oversized wrap.

What a little warming can do

2007-05-02T15:30:00.000-07:00

My front yard contains a large unkempt rhododendron which nevertheless for a couple weeks a year looks stunningly purple. For the past couple months, ever since the raccoons left her an only child, Tasty has taken to roosting in this overgrown bush.

While in Seattle, many rhodies and azaleas, along with the dogwoods, lilacs and hordes of other species are already blooming, our rhodie is a late bloomer. She always starts to color up a few weeks later than most.

The tree is full of these tight little buds. At least a week before any will open.

But look, there's a bud opening. How'd that happen?

This bud is on the branch Tasty calls home. She parks her butt right next to this bud every night. The extra protection and warmth must have triggered the blossom.

Yes, I sleep in an ornamental tree. Wanna make something of it?

Victorian Shawls and Novels

2007-05-02T08:42:00.000-07:00

Knitting:

I will have two FO's soon, the Sea Silk Shawl and a mini-clapotis. Sea Silk just needs the last row knit and then the bind-off. Clapotis is long enough to start the decrease section, so I have to either find the instructions that I printed off or reprint them again.

After that, my backlog of projects will only (!) be five sweaters and Dulaan hat number three to finish, and knit hats four and five to complete my promise.

I am not in love with Sea Silk. It is slippery and has no give so it is hard to knit, looks pretty, but not so pretty to justify the expense. And when it got tangled, it fused together in nasty lumps which makes me suspect it will pill terribly. I don't yet know how big the finished shawl will be, not till it's off the needles and blocking, but it won't be big enough to qualify as a real shawl in my imagining.

So, even though those sweaters are all sitting there trying to make me feel guilty, I am dreaming of knitting a real shawl. Something very big, at least 72 inches wide. Something soft, perhaps with mohair for extra softness. Something warm, but also something very feminine, soft flowery lacy pattern of some sort and a silk content for a sheen. Still contemplating patterns, and will work on the sweaters until a shawl pattern and yarn grabs me. To that end, I have ordered Victorian Lace Today. I think I'll find something appropriate there.

Reading:

Although she remained a lurker and didn't respond to my Jane Eyre question in the comments, Nancy the English Lit PhD gave me some insights into Jane from modern feminist theory. (Nancy has not read Jane Eyre in years and gave me a simplified explanation which I most likely am misinterpreting, though.) Bertha Mason symbolizes the repressed female sexuality in Victorian times, how she is in some ways Jane's alter ego. Too much libido got women locked up in loony bins. I can see that, but I also think that Jane is not all that repressed. She does want a sex life. But she is not willing to have a briefly fulfilling sex life that might ruin her long term happiness (Rochester's improper proposition) nor will she commit to a sex life that won't be fulfilling at all (Rivers' marriage proposal). And the message about too much libido is a warning to men as well as women; Rochester's giving into his horniness pretty much screwed his chances of lifelong happiness. He had to lose his eyesight and a limb in order to redeem himself and win Jane. Probably a fair trade. Rivers denied himself his horniness and ended up feeling fulfilled with his life. His words to that effect end the book. Is Charlotte's message really for men, in telling them they cannot "have it all"?

I've ordered Wuthering Heights; figured I'd see how Charlotte's sister's view of men and women and sexuality compares. Will Heathcliff be as flawed and creepy as Rochester? In the meanwhile, I went back to the other Jane, Ms Austen. Mansfield Park. It's pretty good so far. What was Jane Austen like in person, I wonder? In her writing, she is such a snarky lady, every paragraph holds a zinger.

Farmer's Market

2007-04-28T14:06:00.000-07:00

Nancy took me to the farmer's market today. Although it is about two miles from home, I embarrassingly admit that I only attend occasionally. Good finds today. I got some fresh ricotta from Sea Breeze Farm and from some wild foraging dude, some urtica dioica. Along with my very fresh Tasty eggs, I'll turn this into manicotti filling. Sounds yummy, eh? And full of vitamins.

Erika, if you want, I'll save you a piece.

Trapezoid Shawl Formula!

2007-04-28T11:19:00.000-07:00

An update on the shawl calculations. We aren't knitting triangles, we are knitting trapezoids! That explains the formula Susan and I each derived.

Recall from Algebra I: Area of trapezoid is 1/2(Base1 + Base2)*Height

In our cases, remember N = number of rows
Base1 = 7 stitches
Base2 = 2N+3 stitches
Height = N

voila! Number of Stitches = N² + 5N

Oh, why didn't I do this immediately instead of working out the sum from i = 0 to N of (7 + 2i)? Just goes to show that too much mathematics is a dangerous thing.

Kmkat, the Gaussian addition thing is from a (probably apocryphal) story of little smart ass future famous mathematician Gauss as a child and a teacher who was fed up and wanted some peace and quiet. She asked the class to sit quietly and add all the integers from 1 to 100. Gauss figured out almost immediately that the answer was 5,050. So much for the teacher's quiet afternoon.

As for me and my shawl last night I completed pattern repeat number 11. According to my calculations, I have knit 74.4% of the shawl and according to my scale I have used 73.8% of the yarn! It will be close. That's using the 12 repeats/88 grams. Have to admit I am tempted to work some more on untangling the 12 grams and adding an extra repeat. If all goes well, if I can manage to untangle the whole thing, I can complete 13 pattern repeats and end up with about 2 or 3 grams left over.

Triangle Shawls and fun with algebra

2007-04-27T13:39:00.000-07:00

My first Triangle Shawl was Evelyn Clark's Spinner's Shawl pattern, modified to be stockinette rather than garter stitch. It's a bit small, but I did a pretty good job of using most of the yarn I had. I love it and wear it around the house a lot as a little extra layer around the neck. I even got so bold as to wear it in public; even though I am lacking an accessories gene --- wearing anything extra unnecessary to maintaining modesty and a normal temperature usually makes me feel exposed and awkward.

Triangle number two is being knit with Sea Silk. I only have the one hank, I want to use as much of it as possible. This requires a few things easy to find household items; a scale, a calculator and some mathematics.

Pattern is Evelyn Clark's Flower Basket Shawl found in IK. I won't bother to dig out the exact issue, because everyone has already knit this pattern. I chose it because the pattern repeat is only 10 rows and the edging is only 12 rows (10 pattern rows and a bind-off). It will be easier to squeeze in as many pattern repeats as possible instead of a shawl such as the Spinner's Shawl where one must stop with the pattern repeats in time to commit to 40 rows of edging. Admittedly it makes for a more interesting shawl to have a different and complimentary border, but so it goes when the Sea Silk is so dear. Flower Basket it is.

Jessica has a shawl calculator on her blog but alas, it is in excel, something my poor little mac cannot read. So I got some paper and a pencil and worked it out myself. Eventually I did read her spreadsheet on my husband's computer. It is fine, but hides the math. So I am glad to have done this work anyway.

Much calculation, much scratching out, much musing, some greek letters and that Gaussian addition trick and I found a formula to compute how many stitches have been knit given the number of rows knit. Before writing it up, I searched the net a bit more and found that Susan had posted an alternate calculation, much simpler. She didn't simplify into algebra, so I did and it resulted in the same formula I found. Although I'm a little chagrined that I took a more circuitous route, in the end having my formula be the same as hers gives me confidence.

Here it is:
While knitting a triangular shawl where one starts with 7 stitches (ignore the set-up rows which use a trivial amount of yarn in the grand scheme of things) and increases four stitches every right side row, if N is the number of rows that have been knit then the total number of stitches done is N² + 5N. (now that I think about it, I am guessing one could derive this from a simple area of triangle formula.)

How does one use this delightfully compact formula? Well, I have knit 10 pattern repeats so far. With 26 rows to prepare for the main pattern, 10 rows per repeat, I have knit 126 rows. Therefore I have knit 126*126 + 5*126 = 16,506 stitches in total.

My scale says this weighs 55 grams, or about 300 stitches per gram.

Looks like plenty of yarn for another pattern repeat or two. Keeping in mind that the finishing will require 12 rows, how much yarn can I expect to use if I knit a few more repeats?

11 repeats: N = 126 (rows so far) + 10 (11th repeat) + 12 (border/finishing) = 148

148² + 5*148 is 22,644 stitches. At 300 stitches per gram, this will use 76 grams of yarn.

12 repeats: N = 158 Total Stitches = 25,754 or 86 grams

13 repeats: N = 168 Total Stitches = 29,064 or 97 grams of yarn.

Now, to tell the truth, I have 88 grams of yarn. Yes, I started with 100 grams, but we won't talk about how the Flower Basket pattern was not my first attempt, nor what happened to that ~~tangled mess of crap~~ 12 missing grams. So I can knit two more pattern repeats, 12 total, then work the edging. I ought to come very close to using up the 88 grams available, and if I go over by a few yards, well, I might be able to resurrect a few yards from the trashed bit.

Isn't it grand? I just love quadratic expressions, this one is so tidy and clean! And the thought of knitting just two more repeats and the edging sounds infinitely doable, after all, I've already done 10 repeats, what's a few more?

Of course, anyone who has actually knit a triangle like this is smirking at that statement. Looking at it from a more realistic perspective, I have knit 16,506 stitches and I will be knitting a total of 25,754 stitches. Therefore, I am only 64% done.

Get it while it lasts!

2007-04-27T11:16:00.000-07:00

Seattle Craigslist has a posting of interest to knitters!

Someone is liquidating their retail business and will sell you 150 skeins of imported Italian Nylon/Rayon Eyelash yarn for only Five Hundred Dollars!

What you don't know can make a monkey out of you

2007-04-27T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you try to get to The Seattle Weekly website by typing into your browser: http://seattleweekly.com but you make a mistake and put only one 't' in Seattle, you find an ad for an anti-evolution book. Down-loadable for the small sum of $4.95 --- PayPal Verified.

Annoying as they can be, I love finding these little internet easter eggs. Makes me wonder how many almost legit domains this fellow purchased and how many of them actually result in customers for his book and his message.

Rochester v Rivers

2007-04-25T14:04:00.000-07:00

I stayed up way too late last night finishing Jane Eyre. Although I knew the basic plot line, this was the first time I've read the book. I was left with one big question. What did Charlotte Bronte intend for readers to think about St John Rivers? He gave me the creeps. I didn't get the charisma, but he certainly had some sort of charismatic sway on Jane. It felt artificial though, since I didn't share in it. Is that just because the author didn't do that good a job portraying that creepy (psychopathic) charisma or that times have changed and her readers in 1847 would have been drawn in? I did get the insidiously creepy psychological abusiveness. Jane didn't. On one level she was able to hold her ground and continue to say no to Rivers, but it was a close call. She almost acquiesced to his demands even though she knew he would kill her. Those were her words. I don't think she meant he would physically kill her, but he would certainly kill her soul and lead her to an early physical death. But even throughout the psychological abuse, she defended him as a great man. What did Ms Bronte mean by this? Did she want us to see him as the twisted nasty guy apparent to my 21st century eyes? Or did she want her readers to accept him as Jane declared, honorable and worthy? Maybe she constructed him simply so Jane could experience the polar opposite proposition as what Rochester asked? And as a symbolic plot device, he doesn't come across as fully fleshed out, three dimensional?
I don't know enough about Victorian society to figure it out. Guess I better surf the net for clues.

My week

2007-04-06T16:16:00.000-07:00

Snaked the bathtub drain.
Contemplated getting hair cut short to avoid that chore again.
Mowed the lawn.
Almost fell for Google's April Fool prank.
Knitted on but did not finish

sea silk triangle shawl
green pullover sweater (EZ meets Pippa)
mini-clapotis in angoravalley Lacewing
sleeves for fibonacci sweater

Renewed car license tag on-line.
Found out I had waited to long to have it mailed to me before current tag expires.
Took bus downtown to pick up car tag. Spent $2.50 in bus fare because I refuse to pay $4.00 to have the tabs sent to a local agency.
Treated myself to latte and muffin downtown.
While downtown, went shopping and bought myself new underwear. It had probably been 10 years since I bought underwear. I can now get hit by a car without embarrassment.
Took car to shop for 90K check-up.
Vacuumed car. Helped put roof box on car.
Arranged temporary stop of newspaper, mail and milk for next week.
Arranged foster care for Tasty Chicken for the week.
Looking forward to a week of car-camping in SE Washington, emphasis on Washington State History and geology. History because it is a state educational requirement and we are homeschooling history. Geology because geology is fascinating and Washington's geology is visibly fascinating.
Logged into checking account at credit union about two dozen times looking for IRS refund.
Once the refund arrived, wrote checks for and mailed mortgage and property tax bill.
Finished a marathon Harry Potter reread of all six books.
Inspired The Nerd to reread them also. He's also finished.
Discussed same with The Nerd and hypothesized about Book Seven.
Tutored math at The Nerd's middle school
Found out that he got into his first choice high school, even though for the upcoming school year, it has the longest waiting list of any Seattle public school ever. Very relieved.
Found out what a close call it was. District uses a distance tiebreaker. This year, the boundary for enrolled vs wait-list was 1.81 miles from school. Mapquest puts us at 1.79 miles.
Updated alumnae email and snail mail addresses for upcoming 30 year high school reunion
Started searching airfare prices for Fall trip back East.
Discovered that waiting a week to purchase airfare for reunion increased the cost by 35%
Found out that by flying into Baltimore instead of Dulles, I could reduce airfare back to original estimate.
Purchased ticket. I'm confirmed to attend Reunion and my niece's wedding on East Coast in October. Just me. Not going to disrupt high school attendance in the first semester.
Started thinking about what shawl/stole/wrap I should knit for the events.
Took The Nerd to an open house of a youth kayak racing club.
Passed a Float Test at a local pool. I only needed a renewal if I want to take another sailing class which is a long shot. Really I did it so The Nerd would have company taking his float test, necessary to take a sprint kayaking class. Float test: wearing long sleeves, long pants, tread water for 9 minutes, then put on life jacket while treading water --- not as easy as it sounds but there's a trick that helps. Nice lifeguards share trick.
Signed The Nerd up for the beginner sprint kayak class and braved Spring Afternoon Greenlake traffic getting him there and back again.
Walked around Greenlake for the first time in years. Anyone free on Tues or Thurs at 4 PM and want to walk the lake with me? (starting April 17th)
Rest of today will be packing, organizing, grocery shopping for trip. We leave tomorrow morning. Fort Vancouver here we come.

tasty chicken soup

2007-03-24T11:33:00.000-07:00

[Not Tasty soup. Tasty is doing just fine as the prima donna only chicken.]

Goal: A (new to me) Chicken Soup.

I make chicken soup a lot. We like chicken soup. Franz finally caught the cold that Zach and I are mostly recovered from. Franz wanted chicken soup. I'm bored of my usual soups and wanted to experiment. I had a hankering for something lemony. Inspired by ingredients on hand and whatever caught my eye at the store, I searched the internet and found a couple recipes that inspired me, then I concocted the following.

chicken thighs: boneless, skinless, package of 6
1/3 c kosher salt
1 T brown sugar
1 to 2 bay leaves (preferably fresh)
1 T olive oil
1 shallot chopped fine
1 bunch green onions chopped fine
3 carrots diced
1 bunch red swiss chard stems and leaves chopped separately
1 bunch cilantro finely chopped
1/4 cup lemon juice (fresh or preservative-free organic bottled juice)
chicken stock (1 32 ounce box Imagine Organic chicken broth)
1 cup orzo uncooked
salt and pepper to taste

early in day

Brine the Chicken: combine 1 cup water, 1/3 cup kosher salt and 1 T brown sugar in saucepan, bring to a boil to dissolve the salt and sugar. Remove from heat, add several cups of cold water, add the chicken thighs and more water to cover as necessary. Cover pan and put in fridge.

2 hours before dinner

remove saucepan with chicken from fridge. Drain the brine, add fresh water and drain a couple times to rinse chicken, replace with just enough fresh water to cover chicken and add bay leaves. Poach chicken on low heat.

Heat soup pot, add olive oil. Saute shallot and green onions til soft. Add carrots and saute a few more minutes. Add chicken broth, lemon juice and the partially poached chicken along with the poaching water and bay leaves. Simmer 10 to 15 minutes

Meanwhile, clean swiss chard, separate stems from leaves. Chop stems into quarter inch long units and add to simmering soup. Chop leaves finely and reserve. Chop cilantro finely and add to reserved chard leaves.

Remove chicken from soup to cut into soup-sized pieces. My method is irregular. While holding chicken piece over soup pot with tongs, I use kitchen shears to cut it into smaller pieces which drop right back into soup. afterwards, shears and tongs go directly into the dishwasher and there's no cutting board to clean.

About half hour before dinner, wash out the now empty medium saucepan used to brine and poach the chicken. Add 4 to 6 cups fresh water with a dash of salt and put on stove to heat to a boil. When it boils, add orzo, boil 5 minutes. Drain. add partially cooked orzo to soup along with the chard leaves and cilantro. [my package of orzo did not state how long it took to cook. I knew I wanted to precook it separately to avoid the soup getting too starchy. Five minutes of boiling separately was fine to get it mostly cooked.]

Simmer a few more minutes to cook the chard and cilantro and finish cooking the orzo. Add salt and pepper to taste and more lemon juice if desired.

serve.

result: I thought it was terrific, just what I was looking for. Franz wasn't expecting and didn't love the lemony taste, but he still ate two big bowl-fulls. Zach and I also each had two servings and there's enough for a couple lunch-sized servings left over.

some knitting content

2007-03-24T10:56:00.000-07:00

Vintage undyed Bawneen became this:

Inspired by Vicki's Fibonacci Sweater, I wanted a boxy, deep V neck cardigan.

Knit in the round using Elizabeth Zimmerman Percentage Formula.

provisional cast-on 160 stitches. worked body upwards til decided to start V neck. Steek planned for end of round where colors change
Body worked on US9 addi circulars at 4 stitches/6 rows per inch
V neck created by decreasing on stitch at each side of steek every 6th row.
at underarms, put 12 stitches on holder and provisionally cast-on 40 stitches
worked the usual raglan decreases til done
reinforced steek using crochet method
cut steek
picked up the live stitches at the bottom, worked K1p1 ribbing back and forth on US7 addi circular needle
picked up button-band/collar on US7 addis, worked 6 ridges of garter stitch including three buttonholes.

Now I am working the sleeves on DPNs top-down. I was too impatient to finish the body and see if it was actually going to fit. As kmkat noted, changing direction using a provisional cast-on does shift the stitches a half-stitch. I swatched to make sure this wasn't a problem, and sure enough, given the stockinette stitch and the rustic nature of the wool, this is not noticeable.

Catching Up

2007-03-11T11:49:00.000-07:00

Greetings from the family room.

I usually blog, surf the net, read the news, correspond with family and friends from my computer, situated in a sunny corner of the kitchen. Centrally located, it allows me to monitor meal preparation and offers easy access to the coffee pot. But the wooden chair is not super comfortable. Zach was given an old computer sans peripherals which he set up using our TV as the monitor. I hijacked it for the morning so I could blog in the comfort of a beanbag chair.

Time for some random catching up. Let's get the hard part over first. The sad part. Elaine, maybe you should stop reading now, ok?

My chickens. I haven't really blogged about the chickens in a long while. Well, recall that Amelia had gotten sick, was getting better but moulted and the other girls were picking on her? Well, we may have underestimated how much she was picked on until it was too late. She started escaping from the yard so we sent her to a friend's coop to see if she'd be happier. Alas, she started escaping from their yard and the third time she escaped, she was gone for good. We searched all the neighboring yards, but no signs of anything. We suspect coyotes.

The four remaining birds were doing fine, handled the cold and wet winter fairly well, but alas, more predation a couple weeks ago. Something came into the yard and ate three of them. This time, the carnage was obvious. Sigh. We suspect raccoons. Annie and Lucy were laid to rest in Nancy's pet cemetery aka side yard, and Orpie met her end at a separate event and is at peace in our yard, not far from gerbils Vivek and Rollie.

Tasty has surprised us all and so far avoided the same fate. She has also learned how to get out of the backyard, but not so much escaping as exploring. Fortunately the neighbors are all pretty cool about it, except for one neighbor's downstairs tenant who claims that Tasty scares her cat. They have a bird feeder situated in a tree about 10 feet from the entrance to her garden apartment. And of course right below the feeder is a great spot for Tasty to collect all the dropped food. When Tasty is over there enjoying a snack, her poor cat is too freaked out to come home. Tenant knocks on my door and I grab the tupperware of corn I keep in the fridge and coax Tasty home.

Chickens get lonely and need to be in flocks. (However they also are mean to each other; pecking order is not just a metaphor. go figure) For Tasty's long term health, we've had a note posted in an urban chicken newsletter offering her up for adoption. No takers yet though.

On to other topics.

The Nerd's application to Transition School, an early entrance program at the University of Washington, is in and being considered. We will find out this week whether he advances to the next stage and be invited to an interview. I have no idea what the likelihood of that and they interview about40 candidates for 16 slots, so the odds are still low. His grades and scores are mostly good. His ACT scores are respectable for a 13 year old, but are perhaps not high enough for Transition School. But he is in his first of two years of eligibility so there's a good chance they will say try again next year. That wouldn't be the end of the world, as we've been able to have him skip 8th grade next year so he will be in high school in the fall.

I've got a cold, my throat hurts, my head hurts. It's not too bad though, I've been able to listen to archived This American Life podcasts and knit. Franz offered to make me soup, but I made his volunteer efforts easier by having a craving for Chicken Tom Ka Gai from Marlai Thai. It hit the spot.

I've been knitting way too many projects, for my sake more than others, I will list them below in no particular order. I don't really mind knitting on multiple projects at once, because they all have different size needles --- easier on my hands to switch around --- and they require different levels of concentration.

Franz's Cambridge Jacket. while exploring the possibility of reknitting the sleeves, I decided to unseam the sleeve caps and see if reseaming them will help. I suspect it will. Current state: One sleeve is about 5/6th unseamed.
Ribbi Cardi. All done except one sleeve. I have started the sleeve but haven't gotten far. The stumbling block is that knitting the sleeve done entirely in k2p2 rib is tiresome and the increases look sloppy, although I have tried many variants on Make1. I'll finish eventually though. If I ever do something like this again, I think I might knit the sleeve cap using a provisional cast on, then pick up the stitches on the bottom and knit the sleeve proper using decreases instead of increases. Can't help but think it would be tidier.
Moebius shoulder bag ala Cat Bordhi. Her Moebius Cast-on is fascinatingly clever. The felted bags are constructed by knitting the shoulder strap as a moebius strip with an after-thought opening for the bag. I have almost finished the shoulder strap, using Lamb's Pride bulky. It has an i-cord bind off which is really really slow, given that I had about320 stitches to bind off. I have less than 100 stitches to go. I think the bag part of this will be a fast knit.
Tartan Plaid. Yup, the reason I have so much Lamb's Pride lying around ready for a felted bag is because of choosing colors for this jacket. I haven't abandoned it for good, but am unsure about its potential as a wearable FO. I love this jacket, I covet this jacket. I have the back and one front completed and one sleeve halfway finished. They look great. But I am worried that seaming is going to look like crap. The pattern has no specific instructions for how to seam the slip stitch pattern and I just can't see how it can be done in a tidy fashion given the bulkiness of the fabric. I plan to purchase some Lambs Pride worsted in the appropriate color for the seaming. I figure my next step will be to procure this yarn and practice seaming the pieces I have finished. If I can make it look good enough, that will encourage me to finish.
Pippa/EZ hybrid. Using my hand-dyed Aurora 6 which is very similar to DB Baby Cashmerino (the recommended yarn for Pippa) but is 100% wool, I've started a pullover using EZ's percentage system and the mock rib detailing from Pippa. Knit in the round from the bottom up, it will probably become a raglan crew neck. Coolest thing about it is the tubular cast-on k1p1 ribbing along the bottom.
Vintage bawneen cardigan. I dyed most of the rest of the vintage bawneen in semi-solids and started a striped cardigan. Knit in the round I will steek it where the colors change. I'm sort of copying a store-bought acrylic V-neck cardigan that I have had for years and always (inexplicably) get lots of compliments when I wear it. Seriously, I keep almost throwing it into the Goodwill bag, then every once in a while I find everything else in the laundry so I wear it and everyone notices and says how nice it is.
Micro Clapotis. Inspired by Erika's micro clapotis scarf, I started one myself. This is a portable project being knit on bamboo straight needles, which make it a quiet knit --- good for knitting in public during a talk or concert.

That's about it. A few random things in the closet go unmentioned, a Dulaan hat, a warshrag. And the log cabin which is a long term project, I knit on it occasionally when I want completely mindless garter stitch for TV watching. But I don't feel any anxiety about finishing it.

Out of the mouths of teens

2007-03-09T21:53:00.000-08:00

My kid just complimented me (I think) by saying that I ought to write a book, because I have a "coherent philosophy of life."

This happened just after he was rummaging through the fridge for a snack and whined that we were out of jam and I said "Yeah, life's a bitch. Deal."

Cashmere keeps us warm

2007-03-06T07:10:00.000-08:00

Our thirst for cheap cashmere combined with China's desire to participate in world economy has resulted in an overpopulation of goats turning millions of acres of grassland into a dustbowl.

Not only is the resulting pollution spread worldwide, evidence suggests that pollution from Asia blowing across the Pacific Ocean is changing weather patterns along the West coast of North America, intensifying storms and carrying warmer air to the Arctic.

who's the fool?

2007-02-28T14:26:00.000-08:00

Anyone who knows me in real life will tell you I am blunt and intolerant. I always think of myself as being someone who doesn't suffer fools. In fact, I've been secretly proud of it. But now I am not so sure. I've recently been taken aback by several folks who have announced that they don't suffer fools gladly. Hey, that's my line, I thought. And wait a minute, that's not the persona you present. One person just seems too nice to say such a thing. And in another case, I'm thinking: but you are such a fool, don't you see? At least this person comes across as someone I consider a fool. Someone I would have trouble working with or being closely related to. So how can this person say they don't suffer fools?

Oh dear, time for some introspection. I hope honest introspection, the only kind I want to think that I'm capable of.

does everyone consider themself someone who doesn't suffer fools?
what does it mean to not suffer fools?
is it just that different folks have different lenses, different definitions of fools?
or are we all fools, foolishly thinking we are intolerant of fools?

Wanna buy a horn?

2007-02-23T16:12:00.000-08:00

Gulp. We just acquired a new used french horn and discovered that our old horn is not able to be fixed after we spent an arm and a leg on it. Sigh. So you don't want to buy my horn. How about buying some yarn? My biggest challenge this past week has been photographing it adequately. Everyone knows that monitors vary and cameras are imperfect with regard to color, but still, I wanted better. I've got about 8 skeins with photos that aren't too bad, so here goes.

Photos on flickr. They are a 100% Merino DK weight yarn. Spun like Aurora 8, very soft. Supposedly washable, but I'd caution care. Each skein is 4 ounces (except for a couple which are two 2 ounce skeins) approximately 290 yards. My green socks weigh 3.8 ounces.

I'm asking $18 per skein, plus $2 for shipping. Interested? Send me an email, address in my sidebar.

Cambridge woes

2007-02-22T20:56:00.000-08:00

Franz's Cambridge Jacket, (Anne Budd, Interweave Knits Summer 2006). An update.

I am very happy with the body, happy with the crochet edging on the steek. And no, I haven't acquired a zipper nor have I cut the steek. I am stuck contemplating the sleeves. I hate the sleeves. I am having a hell of a time seaming the sleeves so that it looks nice. Side seams and the sleeve caps look fine. But the sleeves pucker and get all bunchy under the armpit. Sigh. I've unseamed and reseamed several times. Erika suggested something I hadn't thought of myself. Cut the sleeves at the cap and reknit downwards to the cuff in the round. Hmm. My first reaction was horror, but it might be a good idea. I should also point out that the sleeves are a tad too long to please Franz. So... I'm mulling it over. Perhaps I will get up the nerve to cut. There ought to be a way to cut just one stitch and unravel methodically and sanely from there.

Someday when I have lots of time and lots of patience and lots of sun.

There is no R in Warshington

2007-02-15T15:38:00.000-08:00

And there's only one R in Kitchener! I was taken aback at Madrona how many people called it "kerchner." Susan, I am ready for tomorrow's fool-proof lesson in grafting.

See how well the stripes line up? Quite a lovely pair of matching socks, I must say.

Ready for a toe

2007-02-14T23:22:00.000-08:00

I am caught up knitting the Seriatim sock, in fact, I have two socks waiting for tomorrow's Toe instructions. A pair of socks in less than a week. Before I show the pair, I need to explain.

See this? Genuine Bawneen Knitting wool. Genuine Fisherman's wool that is at least 40 years old. The label says it was spun for Merino Wool Co, 1140 Broadway, New York. No Zip Code. I have over two pounds of this wool, a craigslist purchase. While the photo shows some of the yarn still in its original package, much of it had been knit and unknit. Oh the stories it could tell. How many knitters have owned this lot? The woman I purchased it from had gotten it from Craigslist herself, so the provenance is unknown.

What to do with it? I haven't decided yet. The other day when Nancy suggested we resurrect our dyeing adventures, I grabbed a couple 2 ounce skeins of the Bawneen just to see how it would dye. I painted them boldly and separately. It was only afterwards that I thought about Susan's sock pattern. 4 ounces, just enough for a pair of socks. A Fraternal pair.

Seriatim

2007-02-12T16:41:00.000-08:00

A little late, I started Susan's knit-along in honor of her remodeled blog: a serial pattern. Pattern calls for worsted weight yarn that knits to 5 stitches per inch. I am using a bit heftier yarn, some vintage báinín --- authentic Irish fisherman's wool--- I found on craiglist and dyed. It knits up nicely to 4 stitches per inch on US9s. Without a swatch or a care, I started these on US4s. This will be a thick, scratchy, stiff sock, just what I want to keep my feet warm while puttering around at home. Perhaps the tropical colors will add to the warmth factor.

I started the sock last night and expected to get caught up this afternoon. Alas, the problem with reading a pattern on-line: what to do when the power goes out? We lost power for just an hour or so, but it was that 'free' hour between running errands and starting dinner. So I'll have to knit the heel flap and pick up the gusset tonight.

Milestones

2007-02-11T14:26:00.000-08:00

A year ago yesterday the solar panels were installed. As of noon today we've produced 2432 Kilowatthours, about half our annual electricity usage.

Our last backyard egg of 2006 was from Lucy on the Winter Solstice. This morning I noticed that Orpington's crest was looking a little more perky and red. Could this be a sign that she was getting ready to lay again? Yes. Let's hope the other girls follow the leader.

Sitemeter told me someone found my blog googling on Orpington lavender eggs. Our Buff Orpington lays brown eggs.

I just finished my first triangular shawl. A shawlette; I knit fewer repeats than called for and it's blocking to about 48 inches across, 25 inches deep. The Spinner's Shawl by Evelyn Clark, in hand-spun, kettle dyed Corriedale I purchased at Madrona from one of the small local vendors. The pattern is a garter stitch shawl. As you can see, I made it stockinette. Will explain more once I get a post-blocking shot.

Someone else found my blog searching for house of flying daggers shawl pattern. What an interesting idea for a shawl. I can just see it now, an interlocking dagger motif with a feather edging. As far as I can tell (by googling on the same phrase with quotes around it) no such pattern exists. yet.