A Knitter Is Born

Remember my co-worker, Alice? She decided to learn to knit. Fortunately, she knew someone who was willing to teach her. Two weeks ago she came to Westside Wednesday, where I put some pretty purple needles in her hands, gave her a ball of merino/yak handspun (I say start 'em with the good stuff early on.), and taught her the knitted cast on and then the knit stitch. After a few froggings and restarts, she had a pretty good little square knit.

She started carrying around the yarn and needles in her purse. She practiced everywhere. She became emotionally attached to that ball of merino/yak handspun. She bought bamboo needles. And she showed up at Westside Wednesday the next week, looped on painkillers from the dentist appointment she had that afternoon but determined to be a knitter. And her knitting improved: the tension was even, she remembered how to cast on, and she could knit and talk at the same time. Seeing as how she was so looped that she barely knew where she was, I thought it best to just let her knit and not tackle purling or anything else that night.

By last Friday, the merino/yak handspun was looking a little worse for the wear. Both from being frogged and reknit so many times, but mostly from being buried in her purse, so I gave her one of my knitting bags; one with hot pink and lime green polka dots because she loves those colors. I loaned her my copy of The Knitter's Bible and told her she could borrow it as long as she needed.

Today she told me that over the weekend, she bought yarn and found a pattern that she wants to knit. She even cast on all by herself. She was so proud that she even showed it to her husband, Mark. Then she read Row 2 of the pattern and realized . . . she doesn't know how to read a knitting pattern. I think we might have to speed up this lesson plan.

Fasten your seatbelts. It's going to be a bumpy night.

My apologies to Bette Davis, but this is a rather disjointed post. So hang onto your hats!

This is Devon, my new neighbor, and her mother, Nancy. Devon and her husband bought the house next door several months ago, but Devon's been in Phoenix trying to get their house there sold or rented and finally got here last week. ToolMan apologized for making so much noise in his garage (running the woodworking equipment making shawl pins), Devon said she was a crocheter but wanted to learn to knit and spin. Poor thing didn't know what hit her.



















When she came to, she was in the middle of Westside Wednesday, being forced to play with sticks and string. Nancy had been a knitter, but hadn't picked it up in years; by the end of the night, she was back to doing garter, stockinette, and ribbing like nobody's business.

Last week was unofficial "Sweater Night" at Westside Wednesday. There were "February Lady Sweaters" in abundance.



















And a "Hey, Teach!" was there as well.
























Kathleen presented a darling turtle sweater to Rachel.
























And trtlgrl herself finished teeny, tiny sweater dress! Some of us who are already mothers thought trtlbby might have already outgrown this one; hopefully, it'll fit long enough for her to wear it home next month!



















I finished, or mostly finished, a sweater for trtlbby this week, too. A BSJ made from Red Heart's Heart and Sole in the "Mellow Stripe" colorway. This is one of their fairly new yarns; it's a superwash merino and nylon blend which has been infused with aloe vera that's supposed to last through about 50 washings. It's didn't feel especially soft when I was knitting it, but it did soften a lot when I washed it.


















I had 2 balls and you can see how much was left over. I used US 6 needles and did an I-cord edge all around the neck/front/bottom. It's about a 6-month size. I didn't leave buttonholes; I think I'll add either I-cord toggles or loops for buttons.

The TKGA Spring Show was in Portland this weekend, so Tami and I rode MAX into downtown on Saturday morning to hit the marketplace. We met Kathleen and Sara for lunch; they were both working the Carolina Handspun booth for Morgaine. The lucky girls are getting paid in fiber!

We arrived at the marketplace about 11:30 but Kathleen didn't get out of her class until 12, so we went to Morgaine's booth to visit a few minutes with Sara and Sheila until Kathleen arrived. Somehow, in that short space of time, Tami bought her first wheel! Well, to be fair, she's been wanting a Lendrum for awhile; she's not been terribly happy with the borrowed Louet with the warped wheel, so it's not like it was a real spur of the moment purchase!

The four of us had a nice lunch (fried egg and bacon sandwiches, Reuben sandwiches, sweet potato fries, and onion rings) at the DoubleTree Inn and headed back to the marketplace. Kathleen and Sara went to work, and so did Tami and I; we methodically went up and down every row and every booth. Partly to look for the best buys, and partly to visit with friends and vendors. I tried to restrain my spending but there were a few things that fell into my bag.

Klaus at Crown Mountain Farms had this exceptional black silk roving. The picture just doesn't do this justice. It's a true, deep black and the silk sheen is beautiful! I bought 2 ounces which I think will eventually become a shawl with jet beads.

And from Morgaine at Carolina Handspun, I picked up 4 ounces of merino in a luscious turquoise and 4 ounces of merino in a heathered blue/green.

Good thing Tami and I got home early on Saturday because we were up bright and early this morning to meet Cindy and head for Islay Hill Alpacas. The owners, Jan and Jim Grammer, invited us to come for the spring shearing.

The shearers got an early start on the llamas and were almost done with them by the time we arrived.

Then it was time for the alpacas. Jim had separated the boys into a separate pen, and divided the girls into two holding pens. While the shearers finished up the llamas, Jim talked about alpaca babies, including one little cria who was absolutely adorable.

That low humming or moaning sound in the background is the alpacas. I thought they sounded like one of Andy Rooney's toys when the squeaker is almost shot.

The girls waited patiently for their beautification,

and then spent a few minutes recuperating afterward.

Then it was time for the boys, who were generally not as cooperative; it's all that testosterone, you know.

I know Tami had her camera and took some videos of the shearing; go over to her blog and check them out.

When everybody had their new "do's", it was time to head home.

By noon, all 6 llamas and 20 alpacas had new haircuts, Jan and Jim had fiber bagged and weighed and ready for sale, their daughter Kate had gotten a drop spindle lesson, a little white dog named "Perogi" had herded alpacas, and 3 fiber fanatics had fondled a lot of fiber. All in all, a pretty good way to spend a sunny Sunday.

Milestones and New Starts

Well, the first week of my new job went very smoothly! Even though I'm working for a very large international insurance company, it's a small branch office of 5 attorneys and 4 support staff. Everyone seems very nice, and they're weren't even freaked out when they discovered I'm a knitter and spinner. Confused, maybe; but not freaked out.

I did stop by the old office a couple times last week, just for a couple of hours on Tuesday and Thursday to take care of important items. Tuesday was my birthday, and after working a full day and then another couple hours, I was too tired to even enjoy it! I didn't get home until almost 8, and after feeding Andy Rooney and getting his insulin shot taken care of, I wolfed down a couple slices of cold pizza and collapsed in bed. I had originally offered to work a couple hours twice a week plus a few hours on Saturday to cover until a replacement was found; but after last week, I've decided that I just physically can't do it. Working just a couple hours means I don't get home until nearly 8 p.m., so I don't have enough time to eat and relax before going to bed; and that means I wake up exhausted the next day. I've offered to train someone, but I just can't keep doing the extra work; especially when they haven't even started running an ad for the job.

Now that I'm back to commuting 5 days a week, I'm back to commuter knitting. I pulled out the Heart and Sole that was in the swag bag from the TKGA last fall with the intent of making myself a pair of socks. Well, on the last row of toe increases, I found a knot. Dang! So, I did a Russian join, marked that side as being the bottom, and went on. Barely another inch knitted, and out popped another knot! Needless to say, I was really ticked off by this turn of events. Good thing I had the Harlot's latest book in my bag, or my fellow commuters might have been in danger. Knitting, in one form or another, has often kept me from maiming people.

Anyway, once I got home, I frogged out the sock and wound the yarn on the ball winder to find out if there were any more knots in there. Good thing I did, because I found 6 knots in one ball! Of course, there were none in the second skein. Well, 6 knots is just too many to deal with in a sock, so I wound both skeins into one ball and cast on for something else. I can't tell you what it will be yet. Yes, I know what it will be! But it's going to be gifted and I don't want to take a chance on spoiling the surprise for the recipient!



















I almost forgot; the spring TKGA conference is next weekend. I'll be going on Saturday to meet Kathleen after her class; we're going to have lunch in Chinatown and then back to TKGA for shopping. This year's marketplace looks even better than last year; I'll have a full report for you next week, provided I remember to bring the camera!

I've also been slogging away on re-designing that driving cap. It's going, slowly but surely. I'm not entirely happy with the way this one is turning out; or rather, not any happier with this version than with the first. I haven't discovered what works exactly the way I want it, but I have learned several things that don't work. To paraphrase Elizabeth Zimmerman, I'm "unventing" a driving cap, so I shouldn't expect success the first time around. It's a good thing the Traveling Stitch Markers arrived a couple weeks ago; I've needed every one of them on this project!



















Last week at Westside Wednesday, I started spinning the yak and merino blend. I did a little sampling of it, but I'm not entirely happy with the way it was coming out. It's so incredibly soft and I want to preserve that loft and softness, but I also want to stretch it out as far as I can. After sampling, I've decided to let it set for awhile and I'll go back to it. I'll go back to it in a couple weeks and see how it goes.



















After putting away the yak, I bought a braid of this beautiful merino from StitchJones in "Earth Angel." Yesterday was the May meeting of Portland Spinnerati and since the yak blend wasn't working out, I took the Earth Angel with me. I'm spinning it very thin; it should come out to a fine laceweight. I don't know what I'll do with it, but aren't the colors just beautiful?

ToolMan and I met our new neighbor this week and learned that she wants to learn to knit and spin! I'll be taking her to Westside Wednesday with me this week, and maybe to TKGA if she's game. And next weekend is TKGA on Saturday, and alpaca shearing on Sunday, so I'll have lots to report when next we meet. Until then, see you in the funnies!

I've got balls . . .

I don't have any knitting to show you this week. Yes, I've been knitting; actually, I'm working on a triangle shawl in Handmaiden Sea Wool that I bought at Knit Purl on the LYS Crawl this year, but it's not really blog-worthy yet. And then on Friday, I got a kink in my shoulder and haven't been able to knit for the last few days.

I did go to Westside Spinning on Wednesday afternoon; I had two 1/2 ounce samples from Abstract Fibers in her Sunset colorway, so I started spinning them. I've been wearing cowls or shawls to work this winter and that's where this will end up. I don't think there will be enough for a whole from just the sample, but I think it will look great as a trim with some leftover brown alpaca in the stash.


The gals at Westside Wednesday night were in rare form this week. Duffy was working on her own version of Queen Anne's Lace; she was afraid of losing her point protectors (again) but found the perfect place to store them - on Gail's brace.

While the rest of us were suffering hot flashes, Gail apparently was feeling a chill. Gail will be in this brace for another couple of months; she took a tumble on a slick deck during that last Arctic blast that hit our area.

Meanwhile, the rest of the motley crew were finishing projects right and left. Tracy finished a sock; which apparently, cracked up Jen.

From the look of pride on her face, I don't think she'll be suffering from SSS (Second Sock Syndrome) anytime soon.

Tami was just a little too excited to show off her finished project.



That's a heart with "Brandon + Tami" on the front. I had to promise not to blog this until after Brandon received it on Valentine's Day.

Lori finished not one, but TWO hats.



OK, so she might have knitted those before arriving, but she did finish them Wednesday night.

Last week, Kathleen asked about the dryer balls I had in the blog. When we bought the new washer and dryer back in November, they told us not to use fabric softener sheets. It seems the new dryer has a very fine lint screen, which gets clogged up by the residue left by dryer sheets. Since being diagnosed with sarcoidosis a couple years ago, I've been trying to cut down on the amount of chemicals, fragrances, and dyes we use in the house. That means going to "free and clear" detergents, fewer spray cleaners and air fresheners, etc. But I was still using dryer sheets to cut down on static cling in the laundry. I'd heard about people making felted wool dryer balls that are supposed to make your laundry dry faster and cut down on static cling, so I decided to make some for myself.

I used some very rough yarn barf from a couple of years ago when I first started spinning. It was unidentified, very coarse wool; totally unsuitable for knitting with, but great for felting! I just wound it up into balls, tossed them in the washer and dryer with a load of towels, and got small felted balls. There are lots of tutorials for these on the Internet, but here's the basic lowdown. Use only wool; if it's got any silk, tencel, nylon, etc., then it won't felt uniformly. And no synthetics or superwash - if it says "machine washable", it won't felt at all. Use the roughest, coarsest wool you can find; it felts much better than the nice, soft stuff. Wind it into small balls, loosely; if it's too tight, it won't felt properly. I secured each final layer to keep the balls from coming apart before they felted properly.




I used the ugly colors for the centers; I made them about the size of a plum and felted them. Those are the ones you saw last week. This week, it was time for the final layer which I wanted to be prettier colors. I made a layer of the base color, then wound on another color in a pattern and secured it by stitching down each section where the yarn crossed, making sure I stitched down pretty deeply into the previous layers. Again, wind loosely so the yarn will felt better.




I ended by burying the end deep into the ball, so it wouldn't come loose during the felting process.




I snipped off the loose ends before felting, but you could do it afterward, if you wanted.

I popped them into lingerie bags (from Dollar Tree), just in case they did come unwound in the washer.



Then, into the washer along with a load of towels.



I've heard people say that front loading washers don't felt things well but I've had no such trouble. I set it for prewash with hot water, wash with hot water, and extra rinse. Yes, that timer does say 1:28 - that's how long the cycle will take.



After the washer, it was into the dryer for another 45 minutes, and here are the finished dryer balls:




These are each about 9 inches in circumference - roughly the size of a tennis ball. I'll keep 3 for myself and the other two sets of 3 each will go to my SIL Faye and neice Jane.

I've been using my dryer balls for about a month now. Mine have been staying in the dryer and keep felting tighter with each load. My dryer senses the humidity and stops automatically when the clothes are dry and I have noticed that clothes dry faster using these; presumably because they separate the clothes. But the real difference is in the amount of static - it's not completely gone, but much better than without anything. When I take out clothes what have polyester or nylon in them, the little hairs on the dryer balls are standing on end from all the static but my clothes don't cling to each other nearly as much. And I'm not adding chemicals or fragrance to my clothes.

This week, I finished up that bobbin of Romney cross that Kathleen brought me from New Zealand. It took a couple of soaks to get the grease and dirt out of it, but it is much softer now. That's it drying on the bottom of the rack in the guest room.




Those other hanks? Those are from the cashmere sweater from Goodwill. Approximately 2,000 yards of beige lace weight 100% cashmere for $6.99. Eventually it will become a lace shawl. As soon as I'm done fondling it.

Some knitting, some spinning, and a sheep shearer named Nick . . . .

I finally finished the Big Black Scarf and managed to get a picture that shows the stitch pattern.



The pattern is the Graphic Designer Scarf I, from Karin in Ontario, Canada. She's got some great patterns over there; some free and some for sale. And be sure to check out her "Knitting Funnies"; the KISS musician cracked me up!

Anyway, here's a close up of the pattern, although Karin's in green shows up much better:



I picked this to go with the the Lillehammer hat; I think the angular stitch pattern reflects the geometric colorwork. And, that makes another Christmas present done and dusted and put in the box.

I'm still slogging away on "The Blob", but it's now getting big enough that it's not really a portable project anymore.



Yes, I did purposely wadded it up like that so the recipient can't tell what it is; and yes, I did purposely screw up the coloring for the same reason. While I wasn't all that enthused to be working with this yarn, I do have to admit that it looks a lot better in real life than it does here; enough so that I think I might make one for myself in another colorway.

Last week in the "Jonesin' for StitchJones" forum on Ravelry, Michelle, was lusting over a StitchJones roving called "Midnight Meadow", but she's not a spinner (yet) and didn't know what she'd do with it. I love spinning Sharon's fiber and volunteered to spin it for her if she'd pay for the fiber and tell me what she wanted. She agreed to pay for the fiber, Sharon would bring it to me on Westside Wednesday, and I'd start right away. My evil plan to convert all knitters into spinners was working!

When Michelle said she didn't know what she wanted because she's never knit with hand spun, and couldn't grasp getting to "design" her own yarn, I walked her through the process. I usually start backwards: What do I want to make with this? What weight yarn do I want? Do I want a tweed, a color shift, a solid color? Do I want to add some sparkle, glitz, or beads to the yarn before it's knit?

Michelle decided she wanted a scarf out of this so we decided on a 2-ply, sock weight yarn; and since it was the colors that attracted her in the first place, we want to preserve the color shift. I posted a picture of the first bobbin in my Ravelry stash, along with a picture from a skein with plied with strand of pearlescent Mylar. Michelle, smart girl that she is, liked the little shine from the Mylar so I'll add that in when I ply. I finished up the second bobbin and now they'll rest and let the twist relax until next weekend when I'll get them plied up and the twist set.



Speaking of Westside Wednesday, here are some shots of our little group 'o knitters and spinners and PDX Knit Bloggers:



Just over a year ago, this group didn't even exist; and we've already outgrown two venues in the past year!



We started out at a local coffee shop in a shopping area, but the lighting was too low for winters, and then when they started giving the evil eye to this raucous, rowdy bunch, we moved to a Starbucks for several months.



Pretty soon, we had attracted some avid spinners and we were using every single chair in the Starbucks. And, the employees kept raising the volume of background music to try and drown out our conversation, so we had to find a new place. A place with lots of chairs, readily available food and drink, good lighting, room for the spinners and their wheels, and empty tables for the indie dyers to spread out their wares:



Fortunately, in the same shopping area is a Haggen Grocery Store, which has a large seating area near their takeout food section. And it's mostly glass, so we have good light, there's no "background" music to shout over, there's plenty of space for us to spread out, and no one (at least so far) has seemed put out by our presence; in fact, some people have wandered in to see what all the laughter is about! I think we may be the only knitting group that meets in a grocery store! I mean, really, how many can there be?

Oh yeah, one of those PDX Knit Bloggers went on vacation in New Zealand, where she took some beautiful photos, went to the Ashford Craft Shop, the Cadbury Chocolate factory, and sorts of other wonderful places. And she brought me this:




My very own Australian sheep-shearer named "Nick"!