Monthly Archives: April 2014

Pattern Radar April 2014

Posted on by
9

April has seen an explosion of knitting patterns.  My favorites list can barely keep pace.  Today, I’ll show you ten of the patterns that have caught my eye recently.  I will start with the fabulous men’s fair isle waistcoat, Machrihanish, designed by Kate Davies.  I love Kate’s designs, almost as much as I love her blog.  I believe this is her first menswear pattern; hopefully, it will be the first of many.

© Kate Davies Designs

© Kate Davies Designs

Next up is the Artemis Sweater, designed by Anne Podlesak.  I think this is a really simple but effective design.  The ribbing gives it a good fit, with just enough of an architectural cabling detail to make things interesting.  I especially like the sleeves.

© Kristen Brooks Photography

 

I’m not usually one for pink but I am quite taken with the beautiful soft pink of the Dolores sweater, designed by Dawn Catanzaro for Quince and Co.  This is such a sweet sweater, pretty and feminine.  I am a fan of Quince and Co, both of their yarns and of their design portfolio.  Their sweaters are always beautifully photographed.  And the yarns really impress me, especially with their colourfastness and vibrancy.  I have knit with their Osprey and Chickadee wool yarns, but Dolores is knit with their Tern yarn, a wool-silk blend in a fingering weight.  Its definitely on my must-try list.

© Carrie Bostick Hoge

Dolores is not the only Quince and Co sweater to hit my radar this month.  I really like the clean lines of the Aisance cardigan.  This is designed by Kirsten Johnstone and incorporates really clever ribbing details on the back, as well as the beautiful columns of ribbing down the fronts.  Aisance is also knit with Tern.  I think the silk really gives it a nice drape.

© Carrie Bostick Hoge

You might think that April would bring mostly spring sweater patterns to the fore (how terribly Hemispherist of me!)  You would think wrong! I adore the brilliant navy and white graphics in the Enige Og Tro Genser sweater, designed by Arne & Carlos.  Isn’t it fun?  Arne & Carlos do kitsch is such a good way; their designs always make me smile.  This pattern is unisex and comes with a matching hat, but if I had a 20-year old guy to knit for, I would totally make him this.

© Norsk Flid

 

I tend to prefer winter sweaters, but this year’s crop of summer designs is pretty good.  There are quite a few that have caught my eye, including the Austin Tee, designed by Jean Chung for the Summer 2013 issue of Knitscene.  The lace is pretty and interesting, but I especially like the shape of this garment, in particular the wide neckline and the sleeves.  If I had this in my wardrobe I think it would get worn a lot; it could as easily dress up a cute summer skirt as be worn with cut-off jeans.

© Knitscene/Harper Point

The Twist Collective is one of my favorite knitting publications.  I eagerly await every issue and always enjoy their patterns and articles.  It is a well-designed on-line magazine and their production standards are very high.  Their were plenty of pretty spring sweaters in the new edition; I will just show you one – the lovely Finery by Karolina Eckerdal.

© Linus Ouellet

I think this is a perfect cardigan to dress up a summer outfit.  It has beautiful drape. To really appreciate it, however, you have to see a photo of the back:

© Linus Ouellet

 

And this brings me to the new Brooklyn Tweed release, Wool People 7.  Brooklyn Tweed has become a powerhouse of design.  The stable of in-house designers put together by Jared Flood, along with the subtle colours of the Brooklyn Tweed yarns, and the meticulous curating of the collections make each new publication an event in the knitting world.  Three of the ten patterns I’ve chosen for this post come from Wool People7; I could easily have included them all.  First up, Arabella by Ann McCauley:

© Brooklyn Tweed/Jared Flood

I’m not quite sure why I like it so much, but I love the casual ease of it, which still manages to be sophisticated.  (I am in fact considering knitting it with the four skeins of Madtosh Light in Tart which I posted about here.)

I also love Yane, by Tokuko Ochiai.  It is a very simple design, using the classic pullover shape (but extremely well-executed) and enlivened by intarsia chevrons.  I find it very appealing.  I also love this photo. You should definitely take the time to look through Brooklyn Tweed’s Look Books; the photography is always superb.

© Brooklyn Tweed/Jared Flood

 

I’ll end with Pente, a great, casual, comfy, drapey cardigan using two colours of Brooklyn Tweed Loft.  I love this one.  (I have a lighweight cashmere cardigan of a similar shape and drape which I bought close to 20 years ago at the KaDeWe in Berlin; I love it to pieces but it is looking increasingly threadbare.  I think it’s past time to knit a replacement.)  Pente is designed by Carol Feller, who regular readers of this blog will know is a particular favorite of mine.  (I also must point out that I adore this model; she is so gorgeous.)

© Brooklyn Tweed/Jared Flood

 

© Brooklyn Tweed/Jared Flood

That’s it for Pattern Radar.  I am very nearly finished with a new knit; stop by to see it next weekend!

 

Mom will find it!

Posted on by
8

“Mom will find it.”

This is a recurring phrase from my life; we could even call it a leitmotif of motherhood.  Along with its companion phrase:

“Mom, I can’t find my [insert any item]”

The latter is usually accompanied by shouts, whining, a bit of hysteria; the former by conviction and (a perhaps misplaced?) optimism.   I have spent much of the past 21 years finding things that no one else seems capable of seeing.   In my general experience these are frequently things that are right in front of our proverbial noses.  Why can’t they see these things?

Since I manage a cognitive neuroscience lab, I am aware of visual neglect, a condition often following brain damage, which affects vision on one side.  Here is a definition from WIkipedia:

“Hemispatial neglect […] is a neuropsychological condition in which, after damage to one hemisphere of the brain is sustained, a deficit in attention to and awareness of one side of space is observed.”

What I am describing in this post is not a form of brain damage but is nonetheless a well-documented phenomenon which I shall call “Mom-is-in-the-room neglect”.

“Mom-is-in-the-room neglect is a neuropsychological condition in which, when one’s mother is in the room, a deficit in attention to and awareness of any item which one wishes to find is observed.”

This condition is unrelated to the size of the object one wishes to find.  For example, while I frequently hear “Mom, I can’t find my glasses!” or “Mom, I can’t find my homework!” it’s not unheard of to hear “Mom, I can’t find my cello!”

The condition is also notable for the inherent ability of moms to see whatever it is that others can’t see.  What is it about the condition of mom-hood that mediates this?  My own opinion is that it is a Superpower, along the same lines as Superman’s ability to fly, or perhaps a more relevant analogy, his x-ray vision.

My kids have both flown the coop and I am now an empty-nester.  Yesterday, I had the house to myself, and needed my laptop.  I looked for it everywhere.  I looked upstairs and down.  I searched every room; not once or twice but three times.  I looked under things.  I looked around things.  I finally gave up.  I ate lunch.  I did some knitting.  Then, I walked into the living room and saw my laptop right in the middle of the couch.  Right out in the open.  Not disguised or hidden in any way but so apparently obvious that only someone with a neuropsychological impariment could fail to notice it.  Could it be that there is a statute of limitations on Mom Superpowers?  Do they fade away when one’s kids leave home?  Have I developed a new condition, called The-kids-have-left neglect?  Or maybe I just need my eyes checked….

Knitter’s eye candy

Posted on by
6

Today is a gorgeous sunny spring day; a bit nippy but the skies are very blue.  The perfect day to throw on a sweater and sit in the back garden knitting.  Having just finished my Carpino sweater, I was feeling a certain knitting freedom.  What to work on?  I started by taking out the half-finished Soumak Scarf Wrap, which had been sitting in the corner for a while like a naughty child.  Instead of knitting, however, I decided to spend some time weaving in some of the seemingly thousands of ends:

This is a portion of the edge of the shawl; on the right hand side the loose ends have been painstakingly woven in.  The little pile is of the cut-off ends.  I wove in 51 ends today.  Yes, I counted; I am obsessive that way. There are still quite a few loose ends to weave in (not to mention another 100cm of shawl to knit) but I feel a sense of accomplishment after spending some time on the task.

Alas for the Soumak Wrap, I was once again enticed by the lure of the NEW.  Yesterday afternoon, the postman had delivered yarn for a new project.  Who am I to resist?  WIthin an hour of ripping the package open, I had swatched and cast on.  As you can see, I have spent far too long today sitting in the sun knitting.  Hopefully my wrists won’t make me  sorry tomorrow.  And what, you may ask, is this new project?  That, dear readers, is the topic of a future post.  This post is merely for eye candy.

At some point, I got up to make a coffee, and in so doing tossed my new knitting at my feet, on top of the old knitting, and what should I see but this:

And this:

Oh my! Be still my heart!  For inquiring minds: the Soumak Scarf Wrap is designed by Lisa Richardson for Rowan 54 and is knit in 10 beautiful shades of Rowan Fine Tweed.  The new project is knit with Noro Silk Garden Sock in shade S356.  The fact that they have a very similar colour palette?  Totally serendipitous.

I had no intention of posting today, but having been dazzled with eye candy, it was impossible not to share.  Now I’m off to soak up the last of the sun and do some more knitting.  Or, maybe I will just sit and stare at it…..

I seem to be stuck in a purple theme

Posted on by
17

I finished knitting my Carpino sweater weeks ago.  After doing all of the finishing and trying it on, I decided it was too short, so I ripped out the ribbing, and re-knit it a few inches longer.  With my busy schedule, that took a while.  Then, it took an entire week to get some photos of it.  So, here, a little delayed but better late than never, is the finished project:

This is my first time knitting with Brooklyn Tweed Loft.  I must say the yarn is not what I expected.  The knitted fabric is very fleece-like; it really has the feel of a sweatshirt.  I am not sure what I think about this – after all, if you wanted to wear a sweatshirt then why knit a sweater?  On the other hand, I’ve only been wearing it a week so I would still like to reserve judgement.  There is no denying that the colours of Loft, like its sister worsted yarn, Shelter, are rich and tweedy and lovely.  I wish I had used one of the lighter colours to knit this as the lovely lacey pattern on the front is somewhat obscured in this dark purple.  I tried wearing it with a white tank underneath so that the lace would show up, but it wasn’t the most successful of styles:

Still, it is a nice photo of the shape of the sweater.  If I were to knit this again, I would use a different yarn and a much paler colour (I keep imagining it in a silk blend in a very pale blue or pearl grey).

The pattern is Carpino, and is designed by Carol Feller of Stolen Stitches.  I really like Carol’s designs, and as this is the third one I’ve knit, I knew that the fit would be good and the pattern would be clear.  I was not disappointed.  Except for making it longer and using my normal bindoff (rather than the super stretchy one she recommends) I made no changes to this at all.  It’s knit exactly to pattern.  It is an extremely well-written and intuitive pattern and quite a fun knit.   I have at least two other Carol Feller sweaters on my short list, so its unlikely to be my last.

I realize that my last three projects have all been purple.  I seem to be stuck in a purple theme here.  In a complete and total change of subject, for some reason this reminded me of the purple man, a character from my childhood.  When I was in junior high school, my dad lived in Manhatten, just off Central Park West, and my sisters and I used to visit him on the weekends.  One of the neighborhood characters was a man who was always dressed entirely in purple – purple coat, vest, shirt, trousers, socks, shoes, hat, tie.  He even rode a purple bicycle.  We would see him frequently and to us he was a beloved part of New York – like the pickle man on the lower East Side.  Once, after many years of seeing the purple man on his own, we were out walking with Daddy and came across the purple man walking hand-in-hand with a purple woman, also dressed head-to-toe in purple.  It was a magical moment, one in which I really thought that there was someone special out there for everyone.

Doug took the above photo in our back garden, just as the light was going, late in the evening.  I think its kind of pretty.   In fact, Doug took 171 photos of me in this sweater, so that I could find a few good ones to show you.  I’ve put on weight since I started knitting it (business school should come with a warning label – “Business school makes you fat!”).  There were photos that looked like this:

And photos that looked like this:

And there were about 150 photos that vanity won’t allow me to publish.

I submitted a big paper this week for b-school, so tonight I am on holiday.  I have poured a glass of wine and plan to pick up my needles and knit something not-purple.

 

Double feature

Posted on by
3

Perhaps some observant readers noticed that my last two projects used the same yarn?   I knitted both the Tolkien-inpired pillow for Leah and the super Batman-inspired mitts for Lizz with Quince & Co Chickadee yarn in the colours called Carrie’s Yellow and Frank’s Plum.  And, yes, I did manage to take a few quick shots of them together before giving the mitts to Lizz.

When I was planning the pillow, I hadn’t decided whether I would be knitting the back or whether I would use fabric instead.  So I ordered lots of yarn.  Then, when I realized that I had only two weeks to knit the mitts for Lizz’s Viva, and announced to Doug that I had to go buy yarn right away, he reminded me I had plenty of leftover purple and yellow.  “Will that work?,” he asked.  “Yes, quite nicely.”

I like the contrast in these two projects – the pillow is knitted with yellow on purple, and the mitts with purple on yellow.  The Chickadee is a wonderful yarn for colourwork.  The definition is really crisp and the yarn is sturdy and smooth and feels good on the hands.  You can find my previous posts on these projects here and here (the second link gathers all of the pillow posts in reverse order).

I also love the contrast between the medieval style script that Tolkien invented, all graceful and flowing, and the in-your-face graphic pop of the mitts, which anyone my age cannot help but associate with the 1960s Batman TV show.  From the elegant to the comic book.  Ain’t knitting grand?