Author Archives: knitigatingcircumstances

Missed yarn buying opportunities and other knitting thoughts

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Last weekend was the Unravel festival at Farnham Maltings, a favourite yarny event. On the Friday, Doug and I had tickets to a show at Ronnie Scotts in London, so we spent the day in London instead of heading to Farnham to buy yarn. We had a fantastic day, the trains were all working (shock!), we had a terrific lunch, spent hours walking and people watching, wandered around the Royal Academy of Art, and had a great time at the concert.

Unravel was open on Saturday and Sunday, too, but having taken Friday off, I opted to work all weekend. As it happened, I was very productive on the weekend and saved lots of money to boot (it is not possible to go to Unravel and not spend money).

I have just returned from a teaching trip to Helsinki. It was a quick trip, in on Thursday, teach all day Friday and out on Saturday morning. I could have carved out two hours before catching my flight to head to a yarn shop, but I woke up with a cold, and Helsinki was very cold and grey, so I opted to stay inside and work instead.

Two great opportunities for yarn buying missed! My wallet will thank me, but I do miss the camaraderie of hanging out with knitters. To make up for that, I have been participating in a KAL, which has a zoom meeting every Monday night. It is an hour to chat with a bunch of knitters while working on the Pressed Flowers Cardigan. I will not be even close to finishing this by the time the KAL closes, but I am managing to knit 2-3 rows a day, and it is turning out gorgeous:

I am kind of gob-smacked at how beautiful this pattern looks in these yarns. The Main Colour is Buachaille by Kate Davies, and the Contrast Colour is Road to China Light in Rhodolite. Together with my Piping Hot Sweater which is still waiting for sleeves, I have plenty of knitting on my plate and therefore don’t really need to be thinking of new ones. I have found, however, that whenever I have little free time available to knit, I covet new projects. My brain refuses to listen to reason. I am trying to decide whether to purchase a kit for the Polina pullover by Teti Lutsak.

© Teti Lutsak

I also cannot stop looking at the Karla Cape, by Anne Ventzel:

© Anne Ventzel

When I was a teenager, my mother knitted herself a jacket which I thought was the height of cool. Below is a photo of my mom wearing it in 2012 – 40 years after she knitted it. It is still cool! (I wrote about it in this post, twelve years ago.) Special shout-out to my mom: Sending you lots of love, Mom!

For some reason, the Karla Cape sort of reminds me of Mom’s jacket. It has a lot of differences, but it has the same kind of feel to it. It might very well end up on my needles later this year.

I don’t want to end this post without signposting this article in the Guardian, which tells of a nearly pristine 200-year old Faroese sweater which was found at the National Archives. It had been sent in a parcel on the ship, Anne-Marie, which was seized by the Royal Navy in 1807 during the second battle of Copenhagen. The package has only recently been opened and the sweater is beautifully preserved. It is simply stunning!

Hayley Mills, in the Bingo Room, with a Knitting Needle

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Did any of you see the new episode of Death in Paradise last night? In it, Hayley Mills (that’s right – Hayley Mills!) was the unfortunate murder victim, stabbed to death with her own knitting needle. With apologies to the boardgame Clue (Cluedo over on this side of the pond), in which you guess the identity of the murderer not the victim, I couldn’t resist thinking “It was Hayley Mills, in the Bingo Room, with a Knitting Needle”. Hee hee.

Two things struck me right away. First, that was the most un-lethal knitting needle I’ve ever seen. Where did the prop people even find that? Second, I guess knitting has moved up in the eyes of mystery show writers. You see, in a tongue-in-cheek post I wrote some years ago I noted that the show Midsomer Murders, which is shot locally, usually features multiple members of a club or society getting killed off. Beware anyone who joins a club or has a hobby in Midsomer! Interestingly, there is no episode killing off knitters. I wrote:

All of these years of hobbyists meeting their premature end in ever creative fashion, and no knitting club. Perhaps, I thought, this is the true definition of a hobby. Not that an alien would adopt it in order to blend in, but that by taking it up you would meet an untimely death in Midsomer. If that is so, I am pleased to declare that knitting is not a hobby. Which means, of course, that it must be a spot of self-care.

I suppose to be completely accurate, in this episode the hobby was Bingo, not knitting, so I am pushing this metaphor. Still, we knitters are moving up there in the Murder mystery genre. Our beloved knitting needles have reached the same status as the rope, lead pipe, and candlestick! Hayley Mills, in the Bingo Room, with a Knitting Needle indeed!

Of course, I reckon that it’s still a spot of self-care.

Whose hat is it anyway?

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Today I took my new hat out for a spin.

Who would imagine that this is what it looks like once its been knitted and blocked?

Does this look like a hat to you? There is no opening in which to put one’s head. But then, you tuck one half into the other, and voila! You either end up with a white hat with a blue brim, or you can turn it inside out and you have a blue hat with a white brim. Magic!

It really is a lovely hat, and the wool is soft and bouncy. I used the pattern A.N.T. (A New Take) by Aimee DeBaun, with a couple of skeins of wool from stash, which I had purchased in Copenhagen a few years ago.

It has a very nice crown:

Since the hat is a double layer of wool, and the brim is a quadruple layer of wool, it is very warm and cozy.

But wait, what can this be?

Someone has nicked my hat! And he is brazenly wearing it! He looks rather pleased with himself, no? I hesitate to say it, but…..it looks great on him!

Whose hat is it anyway?

Piping hot temporarily cools

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I’ve got a lot going on right now, and as a result, I’m spending less time knitting. I am fully hoping to devote lots of time to knitting in the second half of the year, but until then, as a chronicle of knitting, this blog leaves something to be desired.

I finished the body of my piping hot sweater weeks ago:

I am worried it is a bit short, and that I may need to rip the ribbing back and add an inch or two to the length. I sensibly decided to wait until after it is blocked to make that decision. In the meantime, it has been sitting in a pile on the coffee table in front of my sofa, giving me occasional exasperated looks and trying to make me feel guilty. Sorry, piping hot, I am not falling for this manipulative behaviour!

In the spirit of having something mindless (and small) on the needles, I decided to cast on for a hat. Everyone these days seems to be churning out double layered hats with a fold up brim; there are quite a few patterns out there to choose from. I decided to use the A.N.T. (A New Take) pattern by Aimee DeBaun. This pattern starts in the middle with a provisional cast-on, and then you knit up to the crown, pick up the provisional stitches with the second colour, and finally knit the second side down to the crown. I found some nice yarn in my stash which I had purchased some years ago in Copenhagen, and cast on. I am nearly ready to start the crown shaping on the second side:

It doesn’t look like a hat, of course, until the one side is folded into the other and the brim turned up. Trust me, it will look pretty cool when finished. The important thing for me at the moment is that it is fairly mindless TV knitting, all you do is knit around and around and around in stockinette:

The fact that I am not doing much knitting doesn’t mean that I am not finding time to dream about knitting, which has led me to make two purchases today. The first is to join a Pressed Flowers KAL with the lovely folks at A Yarn Story in Bath (which starts tomorrow). I am rationalising that I don’t need to actually keep up with the KAL, but it does give me a reason to have a weekly zoom chat with other knitters, which I think will do my poor lonely knitter’s soul some good. Also, I am pretty sure I have something in my stash that will work. I will start a swatch during the first call. I’m not sure yet whether to knit the cardigan or pullover (or the vest, for that matter). It will depend a lot on the swatch.

The second was to pre-order the new book by Kate Davies and Felicity Ford, Colour at Work. They are both so creative and I am really looking forward to reading this book in which they, together with some fantastic collaborators, explore colour.

I took the bus home from work on Friday and noticed that the sun is setting later in the day. It may be grey and windy today, but that extra few minutes of daily light is definitely impacting my mood. Have a good Sunday, everyone!

It runs in the family

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It occurs to me that the title of this post could be an ironic reference to our covidfest of a Christmas holiday. I tested positive on Christmas Eve, managed to not pass it on to the family through creative and annoying isolation techniques in a small space, and then, the day after New Year’s, Leah came down with it, followed by Doug, followed by Emma’s partner, and then Emma. Much of the holiday was spent playing board games (I ruled in Catan, but Doug swept the board in 7 Wonders), so perhaps it is not so strange that we fell like dominos to covid.

The title reference however, is not to passing covid through the family, but rather to the passing on of a love for craft, a much more enjoyable and fruitful inheritance. This year, Emma, Doug and I gave Leah a cool present: we secretly took one of her completed needlepoint projects to be professionally framed. It turned out great, and Leah was very surprised. Here is a photo of her with the framed needlepoint (still wrapped in plastic) on Christmas morning:

Isn’t it a stunning piece of needlework? This is a piece that she finished in 2022. It was purchased as a kit from Ehrman Tapestry, and was designed by Alex Beattie. She has quite a few completed pieces, but this is the first one that we have had framed. (Perhaps you have noticed the crane pyjamas? Or the origami cranes – also made by Leah – hanging from the plant overhead?)

Leah and I had some great conversations over Christmas about how we use craft to regulate our mood, specifically about how picking up a piece of needlework allows the mind to focus on the craft and also disengage from worrying. Both Leah and I tend to be news junkies, and with the news being increasingly depressing these days, we found that we both find solace in craft. It helps to tune out the noise and put things into perspective, while at the same time creating beautiful things.

Here is a photo of her workspace at home, where she was busy making origami stars:

They make great Christmas ornaments, buntings, even jewelry:

Another creative thing that runs in the family is the love of all things cooking: we love to shop for food, prepare food, talk about food, eat food, and doing all of these together is the best. Here are Doug and Emma at Granville Island on December 30th shopping for our traditional New Year’s Eve feast of fish soup (which this year was the best fish soup ever in nearly 30 years of cooking it):

And here they are on January 2nd (felled by Covid, not the soup):

I spent some time thinking of titles for this post. Here are some of the rejects:

Felled by Covid, not the soup

Cook, craft, and cough together: the secret to family happiness

I hope you are enjoying some family happiness this weekend, with or without a dollop of craft on the side.

End of year round-up 2023

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The end of the year approaches, which means it’s that time when I usually show you the projects which were completed during the year. I finished eight knitting projects this year – two cardigans, two tees, two hats, a shawl and a pair of mittens. (I will link to the relevant posts about each project at the bottom of the page, which contain information on the pattern and yarn.)

The cardigans were both knitted from the same pattern – Hirne by Kate Davies. I really enjoyed knitting this, as evidenced by the fact that I knitted it twice; I rarely knit a pattern more than once. I think I’ve worn one or the other of these for half the days of the year.

I also knitted two hats: one for Doug and one for Leah. I have been very remiss in my blogging this year, and did not get a modelled photo of Leah’s hat. I include a photo of it as a project-in-progress. Hopefully, we will get a sunny day soon, so I can snap a shot of her wearing it.

I knitted myself two tees using yarns with interesting blends. The white tee is made with a blend of linen and wool, and the red one with a yarn blended from lyocell (from wood), silk, and linen. They haven’t gotten much wear since I finished them both well into the fall, but I think they will be wardrobe staples in the summer.

And last but not least, a pair of mittens for Emma, and a striped woolen shawl for myself.

This was not a year in which knitting took a front row seat. I have spent the year dealing with the symptoms of Long Covid that resulted from my June 2022 bout of covid. These included fatigue, but also a curious lack of brain power for knitting; I found it very difficult to focus on pattern instructions and to execute complicated techniques. Blogging also takes effort and this year it has been hard to invest the time and focus into posting regularly. This is my 27th post of the year – half as many as I would normally write per year.

I would like to say that I am now back to normal and will be knitting and blogging up a storm in 2024, but I have managed to end the year by getting covid again! Doug and I flew out to Vancouver just over two weeks ago to spend the holidays with the girls. I got covid nearly as soon as I got here, and have been sick the whole time. We have been practicing an elaborate ballet of attempting to keep everyone else from catching it while all staying in a small apartment in Vancouver; isolating isn’t possible in this space so we’ve been relying on open windows, heavy duty masking, meticulous hand washing, and me sitting as far into the corners as possible. It seems to have worked, since I’m the only one to test positive, but this is not the holiday we were anticipating. 

Please don’t think that the year has been a sad, long slog; lots of great things have happened, too. After a few years with very little travelling, Doug and I have had four holidays this year: we went to Sicily in May, Freiburg and Konstanz in July, Geneva in August, and Vancouver in December. We met up with many old friends, ate beautiful food, re-discovered favorite places, and explored some new ones. I have taken on a challenging project at work, which is exciting and engaging. We feel enormously lucky to have each other, and the girls, and good friends.

Happy New Year, everyone!

Here are links to the posts about the projects here:

Hirne: Hirne: a beautiful cardigan, Hirne 2: The one that pops!, Knitting the Hirne cardigan without a steek

Doug’s hat: Opus Hat

White tee: Joy in simple things

Red tee: Strawberry out of season

Shawl: Satisfying stripes

Emma’s mittens: A little sparkle

You had me at mittens

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It’s that time of year again, when the temperature drops and I start composing my annual mitten post. Below is a selection of the patterns for mittens, mitts and gloves that have caught my eye this season. I hope they tickle your inner knitter’s fancy. (If you are in the southern hemisphere, it gives you lots of time to prepare for your winter while knitting small things in the heat.)

Expo 67 Mittens by Espace Tricot

© Espace Tricot

I love this pattern, which combines bold colour with an architectural feel. The latter is not surprising as the pattern is based on the architecture of the 1967 Montreal Exposition. Each time I look at them, my brain starts trying out colour combinations. I think I may need to knit more than one pair. And, since they are knitted with DK weight yarn, they should be pretty quick. There is also a matching hat pattern, and a cowl as well, if you are into the matchy-match look.

Snow Treasure Gloves by Mary Jane Mucklestone

© Laine Publishing

This pattern can be found in the new book, Grand Shetland Adventure Knits, which Mary Jane has co-written with Gudrun Johnston. I try not to include too many patterns here which can’t be individually purchased, but if you like these, you might want to check out the other patterns in the book (my favourite is this stand-out vest, also by Mary Jane). I really love how these blues work against the red background, and also the juxtaposition of the three patterns (from the cuffs, the outside, and the inside of the hands). It makes for a really pleasing glove.

Pico Mitts by Belén Fernández

© Belén Fernández

There is something so satisfying about these mitts. They have great lines, and the contrast of the rich earthy green and the pale lavender really works for me. This pattern also has a matching hat, and as you can see, they look smashing together. If you are looking for a mitt with a clean line, these may be for you.

Constellate Mitts by Hunter Hammersen

© Hunter Hammersen

The first thing you notice here is the pretty stitch pattern in which the yellow pops against the background like fireworks. But then, the eye is drawn to the way that the increases are worked in the opposite direction of the thumb; taking a simple gusset and turning it on its head (or, in this case, its hand). It is so clever. I am really drawn to clever. You can make these in a single colour, but for me there is joy in the splash of yellow.

Sankta Lucia Mitts by Maria Björnståhl

© Maria Björnståhl

Every once in a while, you need a bit of whimsy. I think these are adorable. In Sweden, the Feast of Saint Lucy (Sankta Lucia) is on the 13th of December; there is a procession and traditional foods and songs. Sankta Lucia wears a white dress and a crown of lighted candles. I love the expression on her face in these sweet mittens and the pretty yellow-topped candles.

Tak Six Kloos by Hazel Tindall

© Hazel Tindall

I do like clever, and these mitts are a very clever experiment. The description on Ravelry says; “Hazel has taken six colours to see how many handwarmers she could knit from the same pattern, using the colours differently each time.” Such a simple concept, and I imagine, a lot of fun to experiment with. “Tak” means take and “kloo” is a ball of yarn in Shetland dialect. You know you want to do it: how many different variations of the same six colours can you knit?

Bevel Mitts by Emily Greene

© Emily Greene

In this colour, these look more like spring mitts than winter ones, but they are sure to be cozy. I really like mittens knitted with twisted ribbing; they hold their shape well and hug your hands. Plus, the twisted stitches can be a lovely fabric for cables to jump and dance across.

Green Blue Lithuania Mittens by Donna Druchanas

© Donna Druchunas

Donna’s patterns always catch my eye. She uses traditional motifs and techniques and makes them feel fresh. I love the contrast between the cabled cuffs, the pretty star-like motif, and the checkerboard pattern. They work together really well. I also love the way that the motif fits so perfectly into the triangle at the top of the mitt; it has a very nice geometry. Like some of the other patterns here, there is a matching hat as well.

I hope you’ve found some inspiration. Mittens make a nice gift (for yourself as well!) and are fun to knit. If you want to check out my previous mitten posts, here are the links!

Merry Mittenmas! (2014)

A dozen great patterns for fingerless mitts (2015)

Mittens! (2015)

To gusset or not to gusset (2016)

It’s mitten time again (2017)

A show of hands (2018)

Warm hands, warm heart (2019)

Mittens redux (2020)

My mitten post for 2021 (2021)

Mittens galore! (2022)

Enjoy!

Strawberry out of season

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I braved a cold and windy day to take some photos of my newest top – once again, a summer top in time for winter. This is the Anker Tee designed by PetiteKnit.

I usually fall for a pattern and then search for the right yarn. In this case the yarn – Isager Trio 2 – came first. I was intrigued by the yarn content – 50% linen/flax, 30% cotton, 20% Tencel/Lyocell. The last is a fibre derived from trees, so essentially paper. I wanted to know how it would behave. I thought it would have a good drape and that the fabric would breathe. I thought that having a bit of paper fibre blended with linen sounded cool. All of this was intriguing enough to consider it, but the thing that really sold me was this gorgeous red shade, aptly called Strawberry.

I cast on for a size 5, to give zero ease. But I decided pretty quickly that the yarn was stretchy and what I really wanted was something between a size 4 and 5 to create a bit of negative ease. My row gauge was a bit off too, and I managed to fix both of these issues by making fewer sets of raglan increases. Basically, I cast on the number of stitches for size 5, followed the instructions for making the bands of ribbing with the associated increases, and then ignored the rest of the instructions and just knit it to suit me. I do this frequently with top-down knits – once I get the yoke in, the rest is usually organic and I just improvise.

I didn’t take notes, so I am not sure exactly what I did. I did put in a couple sets of waist decreases and corresponding hip increases. I ended up with about 2 inches of negative ease. The yoke pattern is lovely; it’s a really clever design, and it seems to suit nearly every body type.

I gave it a good soak, poured a cup of white spirit vinegar in the rinse water to stop the colour bleeding, rolled it in a towel to soak up excess water and then laid it out on a towel to dry. I didn’t need to pin it to shape, as the size was perfect as is and it came out of the bath looking just right. The ribbing, especially in this blended yarn, looked a bit wonky before the bath, but really smoothed out after a good soak.

I like this one a lot. I am a bit worried that the yarn may stretch with use, but I am going to be optimistic until proven otherwise. I think it is a nice summer tee, but also a great work tee to wear under a jacket. And, yes, it is definitely my colour. It is indeed a scrumptious strawberry, even out of season.

A rocky start

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My blog posts are fewer and farther between this year, but knitting continues. I have just finished my Anker tee, but you will have to wait to see a modelled shot, because it has just been enjoying its spa bath and is now taking its time to dry. Here is a sneak peek:

In the meantime, I have been working on the piping hot sweater. This pattern by Lily Kate really appeals to me with its clean lines and bold piping.

This is the first time I have used one of Lily Kate’s patterns. I am very impressed with how well it is written and at the way she lays the pattern out. It is well illustrated and explanatory, and contains all of the necessary bits that make a good pattern, like detailed schematics. So, I want to be clear that my rocky start is not due to any fault in the pattern, but rather to me. Specifically, in my continued post-Covid state, I find it difficult to focus on patterns, to cast on new things, and to fight through fatigue. The construction of this pullover is genius, but it does take some concentration. It starts like this:

The next bit involves picking up stitches along the shoulders and casting on for the back neck. I made the mistake of trying to follow the directions precisely. You see, I am left-handed, and although this doesn’t usually get in my way, I am completely incapable of picking up stitches along a border from right to left. I must pick them up with my left hand, from left to right, and I don’t “pick up and knit” but rather “pick up without knitting” which means that my first row after picking up stitches is a knit row and not a purl row. Now, I have been knitting for over 50 years, so I have over time learned to fudge instructions liberally where stitches need to be picked up in order to compensate for this. I have a bunch of strategies developed over time by trial and error to get things to work for me. Here, I was too fatigued to do that, and attempted to pick up the stitches as written with my right hand. Big mistake.

I ended up with a huge mess, and had to rip everything out multiple times and try again, and again, and again. I may have accompanied this with some yelling and screaming about my general knitting incompetence. I think I spent 2 hours on that one row. It was chaos.

And then, without fanfare, the chaos settled down and the back of the garment began to emerge:

This is what it looks like this morning (I have pinned it out so you can see the lovely shaping):

Crisis averted. Now that I’ve put the rocky start behind me, this is totally fun to kint, and the yarn (Di Gilpin Lalland DK) is fantastic.

Despite its effect on my knitting focus, I am steadily recovering. I still have pockets of fatigue and brain fog and those seem to have a disproportionate affect on my knitting because I tend to knit at the end of the day, when these are maximised. In fact, I am immersed in a new creative project (of the non-knitting variety) which is both fulfilling and challenging. In time, I will report on that here. Happy Sunday, everyone.

Provenance of a Norwegian pullover

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A few weeks ago, I was in Copenhagen. As always, I found time to spend with my friend, Erun. We had plans to go out for dinner, but after a long day of teaching I was tired and she volunteered to cook. When I showed up at her house, this was casually draped on the table:

“I thought you might like to see this pullover, Kelly”, she said. “It was knitted by my great grandmother.”

Long-time readers of this blog will know that this is my catnip – I love beautiful knitting that survives the decades, lovingly worn and cared for by generations of knit-worthy recipients. My grandmother was a knitter, and my mother, although no longer wielding her needles, is a great knitter and even better seamstress. I wrote about some of their beautiful pieces in the three blog posts called Retrospective Knits, from 2012, which you can find here, here, and here.

Erun’s mother, Liv, is also a fantastic knitter and I have written before in these pages about her knitting (see this post for an unbelievably beautiful version of a Norwegian classic). But this sweater was actually knitted for Liv by her grandmother. How wonderful! Do you think I tried it on?

Isn’t this amazing! (When I sent this photo to Doug and the girls, they insisted I needed to recreate this sweater, exactly, for myself…and for them.)

Erun’s great-grandmother Grethe (Margrethe Marie Jørgensen Glad) was born in Tved, Ebeltoft, Denmark, on December 19th, 1907. She was one of 14 siblings. When she was 17, she emigrated to Arendal, Norway, where her brother lived and worked as a fisherman, so that she might earn a living. She married the cousin of her sister-in-law, a man named (Sverre) Normann Tjøstolvsen. (Erun says: “everyone called him Normann, which simply means “Norwegian” or possibly “Nordic”.) The photo below shows Grethe and Normann, holding their great granddaughter Erun.

Grethe knitted a lot. Erun also remembers her amazing garden filled with flowers and large family dinners at her house, where she lived and managed on her own until she was around 90. It was sometime around 1970-1973 that Grethe knitted this pullover for Liv. I wonder if Grethe could imagine that someday her great grand-daughter would be wearing it too! (My guess is, yes; they knitted them to last in those days!) Here is a photo of Erun wearing it in 2013 on holiday in Lofoten:

I love this photo so much! Everything about it is beautiful – Erun, the sweater, the view, the framing, the bright red shawl!

Liv tells us that this pullover was knitted with a now-discontinued yarn called Triplex. Apparently there were extensive protests in the knitting community when Triplex and Perlekrepp (“pearl-crepe”) were discontinued in the 80s. There is even a still-existing FB group (with over 700 members) demanding that Sandnes should restart the production of these yarns. The yarn is 100% wool and you can see it has great stitch definition and no pills, despite being over 50 years old. Here is a photo of the reverse side for all of you other knitting fanatics out there (you were hoping I remembered to take one, weren’t you?)

I really enjoy recording the provenance of hand knits. My enthusiasm apparently triggered lots of memories and family discussions. Erun tells me that she even called her mother’s uncle, Grete’s son, to chat with him about his mother and her knitting. He has just turned 90. I love to be an enabler of multi-generational knitting recollection.

Now, in addition to posts about my knitting, my mother’s knitting, my grandmother’s knitting, and Erun’s mother’s knitting, I am thrilled to add this post about Erun’s great-grandmother’s knitting. Liv and Erun – thanks for sharing your memories of this wonderful pullover with me and allowing me to share them here!