miscellany

and a Christmas cactus miracle!

The miracle here is that this plant is still living. I have not only managed to keep it alive (no small miracle I assure you), but it is blooming again.

This past Friday I met friend Kay at McDonalds for breakfast and chatter. Top notch way to start a day. She graciously shared with me some of the bounty of tatting thread she scored at a recent TOGA [Treadle On GeorgiA] gathering. Perhaps I was subconsciously thinking of the cactus blooms when I chose the colors I wanted? Thank you, Kay.

I know it has been awhile since I posted here. I think I'm going to have to blame the raking for part of that. I am happy to report, however, that almost all the leaves have fallen and I think I have almost finished the winter raking. So glad.

Now since I'm sure you are not all that interested in my cactus, I'll share of couple of things I have recently run across that are a bit more interesting.

The first is a video of Kaffeslabberas, and shows a knitting club in Copenhagen, Denmark whose members are pensioners. The video linked above is 11 minutes long with English subtitles. If you have the time, I think you will enjoy it.

I have managed a bit of knitting in between raking episodes, mostly working on gloves and

mittens. I finished the day before Thanksgiving the fingerless gloves.

I used maybe about 125 yards of the Malabrigo Sock in colorway Velvet Grapes and size 2 needles. They are ever so soft and very light. I hope, being 100% merino, that they will provide enough warmth. I then made a small neckwarmer with some of the remaining yarn alternating plain stockinette with three sections of three baby cable ribbing.

I have not yet gone back and knit the mate to the prototype using the Patons Kroy dark charcoal sock yarn. I had just had my fill of fingers for the moment.

Instead I moved on to a pair of mittens and finished them this afternoon. No pictures, but I'll try to get some soon. They are

standard ribbed cuff/plain mitten but I did make use of a fabulous book find that I lucked up on during our trip down to Jekyll.

We stopped off at a Book Warehouse just outside Savannah and I found this little treasure, The Mitten Book, by Inger and Ingrid Gottfridssson for 99 cents. 99 cents!

Most of the photographs are black and white, but there are many charts and also instructions for basic adult and children mittens. The designs are those originally collected and preserved by Hermanna Stengard which she published in 1925 and here made available once again in this book by Inger and Ingrid and with wonderful historic background. What a find!

While we are on the subject of mittens, do pop over to the Folklore Fashion website to have a look at some little works of art to keep your hands warm. At that same website, there is a stunning close up photo of knitted half mittens and beautiful bobbin lace in the children's costumes in this post.

Whew! A long post. Please indulge me to include this quote of Hermanna Stengard from the front of the book as I think it expresses much of what was in the Danish video:

"How would it look, do you think, if everyone, old and young, would sit down together to knit for awhile? Laughter and merriment and riddles and questions and folktales and anecdotes from each person's life would blend together in the stitches. Then later, when you recalled these events that have gone through your own fingers stitch by stitch, they would speak their own quiet language: Do you remember? Do you remember?" Hermanna Stengard, born 1861 Gotland, Sweden

Lo, a FO no mo

This is a rather sad story - at least for ME. Got your tissues handy?

I finished my Cabled Mitts a couple of days before Thanksgiving and they came out just right, fitting perfectly and very warm these past cold days. Never even managed to get a good FO photo.

These are the ones I adapted from a glove pattern in Veronik Avery's "Knitting 24/7" using her St. Denis Nordique yarn.

Somehow - and it is still a complete mystery to me - I managed to lose one Friday afternoon. I'm almost certain both made it to the car with me after work. I saw them and my sunglasses case slide off the center console onto the floor of the car. I made a couple of stops on the way home and when I went to collect things before coming into the house I had only one.

Well, this was SAD news. My new wonderful and warm mitts. And no yarn to make a mate.

But I can't leave you with this unhappy ending. See the tin under the lone mitt? That is my vintage Hallmark tin (c. 1987). In our house that means only one thing: 7-Layer Cookie Bar!
Nothing helps you get over the loss of a handknit like a thousand-calorie treat.

27 and sunny

You would think with the weather this cold down here, I'd be more inclined to whole mitts and not fingerless ones!

Oh, well, I have my hat to keep me warm, I guess. Besides, I couldn't resist knitting these wonderful baby fan fingerless mitts [Ravelry link] just one more time and I'm not even sure yet if this will be the last pair. They are that much fun to knit.

For this pair I used KnitPicks Gloss fingering weight yarn in color Porcini leftover from the Miralda shawl. Since it is 70% wool and 30% silk, they are light but still quite warm. Just looking at them makes me want to start another pair!

The Felted Bucket Hat has been worn two days already. If you need a quick hat and don't mind an extra run of the washing machine, this is the project for you.

Oh, and I almost forgot to post a picture of the first pair of mitts after they were off the needles - they were mailed off to a friend.

a bowl of fun

In the days right before Christmas it is good to have a small project or two to work on - something to soothe with the knitting but nothing too taxing for the tired, old brain. The miniature mittens have been a good project. I still haven't used up the first ball of 152 yards and it is entertaining to see how each one stripes up differently.

Hope your plans and projects and preparations are going well, too.

[pattern from the OOP Interweave book:

"Christmas Stockings: 18 Holiday Treasures to Knit" - Edited by Elaine Lipson]

Safe Return

Revisiting another back-issue project in "Piecework" magazine. This time it's Safe Return mittens, a project by Robin Hansen. This is from the (unavailable) Sept/Oct 1997 issue and is another one of those that I've studied and thought about for years! These mittens use 6 different shades of blue and gray yarn. [I see there is a kit at Nordic Fiber Arts.]

Now the last thing I need here in GA is a pair of thick wool mittens. No wait a minute. Let me rephrase that. The last thing I need here in GA is a third pair of thick wool mittens! Why then am I so intrigued with the pattern?! Two words: repeating pattern.

Today (10 years later!) I decided to get the book at the library (Juvenile fiction), an excerpt of which precedes the pattern. The jacket says that the story was inspired by a true incident in 1824 on the island of Gotland in the Baltic Sea which the author, Catherine Dexter, discovered while reading a book of knitting patterns [The Swedish Mitten Book: Traditional Patterns from Gotland, by Inger and Ingrid Gotfridsson.]

It's a lovely story and takes place just before Christmas. I think this will become one of those small volumes that I re-read every year at Christmas. Now I just need a 12-year-old girl to share it with. It just occurs to me that my girl was 12 in 1997 - but I wasn't knitting and I never followed up on the book. Sigh.

Once again my timing is way off.

Selbu Mittens? Ja!

Pattern: #7 Damevott from "Selbustrikk"

from Arnhild's Knitting Studio

Yarn: Dale of Norway (of course!) Baby Ull

#0020 cream and #0083 charcoal

165m/50 gr - less than one ball each color

Needles: Size 0 and size 1 bamboo dpns

I love them! I love the 'paper doll' part at the wrist best of all. In fact, the paper dolls are what led me on my QUEST to find this book.

.

I changed around the #7 pattern somewhat. In the book this mitten does not have the floral part in the cuff above the dolls. Instead it has a rather longish striped basic ribbed cuff. I didn't care for the stripes and I really can't get enough of repeating patterns, so I plugged in this part from another pattern.

.

They are quite snug, especially at the wrist, which is why I went up to size 1s. Once again, making things that come in pairs meant that I had to duplicate something in the second item that I would have preferred changing. I was lucky enough that they came out the same size anyway. Mitten 1 was finished back in April! Reading about someone else's problem with gauge issues on a second mitten made me resolve to wait no longer in finishing these.

.

Will I ever have my complete bunad? Who knows. But at least I've got mittens!

Selbu knitting

This picture was taken the other afternoon. I've finally returned to my Selbu votter (mitten) and since this was taken have knitted it almost to the finger tip.

You can see that I decided to put the year (and my initials) on the palm of the hand. I did this with my Estonian mittens and have decided it's (as Martha would say) a Good Thing.

I'm hoping a good wet blocking will miraculously smooth out my stitches. It sure seemed to work with the Red Light Special cap.

I'm still in love with these little "paper doll" designs, but I'm NOT looking forward to that fiddly tommel (thumb).

I love PIECEWORK

I love Piecework magazine. My bulging file cabinet attests to this, as does the two or three ever-changing back issues that can be found beside my chair at any time. This Interweave periodical was welcomed in my house long before I finally learned to knit and started buying their Knits magazine.

In early years I read with interest all the articles on knitting and looked with longing upon the wonderful related projects. Those instructions were like a foreign language, as strange to my eyes as the history behind the technique was to my knowledge.

The Nov/Dec 1995 issue (no longer available) had an article by Veronica Patterson on Poetry Mittens that particularly intrigued me. I must have pulled this one issue out once or twice a year to read again the directions and ponder upon those little wooden dpns. Having never seen dpns, nor anyone ever using them, you can imagine how puzzling they were.

Finally last summer I felt ready to try them and I knit Dorothy Parker mittens for my daughter's 21st birthday.

The newest issue of Piecework, Sep/Oct 2007, announces a new contest - on pincushions. I was pleased when my entry got an honorable mention in the 2000 contest.

[spot it in the group photo here?]

I'd like to enter something in this newest contest. But in the meantime (and by 'meantime' I mean when I'm not working on socks and things already on the needles!), I think I'll pull out the July/Aug 2000 issue and admire again the Plum Tomato Pincushion - a beaded confection crocheted with Silk Pearl thread! Yum.

.

Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might. Ecclesiastes 9:10