We're on Vacation

See you in September.
Stay cool.
(And Godspeed to the crew of Discovery.)

summer un-knitting...

It's hot. Summer is hot everywhere, and like everyone else, I'm too hot to knit. Even my hubby noticed, "You haven't lost interest in knitting, have you?" My eye sweeps the corner where I have huge piles of bags of unknit yarn and my bookshelves housing a plethora of patterns, books and magazines, my minds eye sweeps the dark depths of all the closets that hold my huge unknit stashes (notice the plural), and I assure him that I haven't.

I have taken stock of my WIP's and I'm bound and determined to complete them all before I start another project, AND before I buy more yarn. Oops! too late for that! I couldn't resist trying some of the new yarns offered by Knit Picks. Who can resist that dropped stitch shawl for only $21.26? Well, actually I did, but I did plunk down a bit of small plastic for some of their sock yarns, and I'm waiting for that package as I type.

Back to the WIP's, I'm determined to complete David's Once Again Sweater and the Ballet Top (Teva Durham design from UK Summer 2004), then I'll frog the rest. There! That makes completing my WIP's a bit easier and I can cross them off the list I keep on my blog (it's getting a bit embarrassing since the list hasn't changed at all in a year).

In the meantime, I'm not going to read any books or magazines, peruse any catalogs, or visit my LYS or online stores - I WON'T be tempted, and I AM going to complete my WIP's . . . just as soon as it's cool enough to knit again.

note: I just used the blogger spellcheck and it seems that I've misspelled '21.26' and, get this, 'blog.' The suggested spelling is 'bloc.' Go figure!

Linky Love

As I commented in one of my earlier posts, it's now officially too hot to knit. At 85 degrees F and 85 percent humidity, it's so hot and moist that just the thought of wool makes me sweat. (But then, just sitting makes me sweat!) On the other hand, at work the A/C is cranked up so high that I'm getting a lot of use out of my old and very well-worn shawl.

So what does one do when it's too hot to knit? Surf the Web, naturally!

If all you can do is shake your head at some of the knitting designs offered over the past couple of years, check out, "You Knit What??" Presented by punk rock knitter and knitty kitty, YKW?? aptly points out, as my 23 year-old daughter says, the YUK in HYUK. (via the comments on The Knitting Curmudgeon)

When an old knitting friend showed up from the States for a few day's visit last month, she brought with her a garter stitch, corner-to-corner washcloth made out of a yarn that is new to me; South West Trading Company's Bamboo. Oh dear, this is the first time in a long time that I've had yarn lust, even at USD13 a skein. The hemp yarn looked interesting too. (OK-Step.slowly.away.from.the.credit.card!)

Then this week a friend from my old knitting guild, Oasis, sent me a note saying that she'd just knit her first ever knitting pattern in Hebrew. She received this pattern from her local yarn shop owner.

This is interesting in a couple of ways: one-that she has a local yarn shop owner (after all, we do live in the Yarn Deprivation Zone) and second, the pattern is in Hebrew. To the best of my knowledge, knitting patterns in Hebrew stopped being published about the same time that the local spinneries stopped producing yarn. That was probably about 12-15 years ago. Besides Polgat (a major garment producer here), there was also Vitalgo and Stork Wool. All gone, except in my yarn stash. The Teddy Wool that is being distributed in the shops here now is made elsewhere, lots of cotton from Turkey and wool from Italy, but the local distributor gets to put his own label on, which generally doesn't include little, unimportant things like, oh, recommended needle size or yardage.

(Woah! I just got back from a trip down Memory Lane after hunting up my old Hebrew knitting mags and meeting lots of dust bunnies on the way. Most of the designs look like fodder for "You Knit What??," but to be forgiving, they are the products of the 90's and look like they're trying much too hard to be trendy. Hm, see first paragraph...)

Ever since the London terrorist attacks, I've been thinking about going to London again. Even after visiting there four times, there's still so much I haven't yet seen and done. October/November is my favorite time to visit, especially during The Knitting and Stitching Show at Alexandra Palace (make sure to check out the picture gallery from last year), followed up with a Rowan Workshop at Liberty of London or John Lewis. (You think I might miss my knitting guild? Nah!)

Lastly, this has nothing to do with knitting (other than there's a knitting basket on the floor and Granny's bun looks just like a skein with needles in it), make sure you have Apple's Quicktime installed on your computer and then go watch Le Building.

OK-time to go have an iced coffee and a lie-down. Only 2 or so more months of this heat to get through...

Summer of Lace Redux

Well, at this point I'm having second thoughts about knitting my "Knit 'Til You Quit"; Shawl. I finally tracked down the three hanks of Jaggerspun in my yarn stash and it turns out that I misremembered the source. The yarn was actually purchased from Moonrise, Sandy Terp's website and the Jaggerspun is prescoured. That is a good thing, but it also means that the yarn has "bloomed" as a result of the prewashing and is now closer in gauge to a worsted weight yarn than a sport weight. (Correct me if I'm wrong, but I seem to recall that Jaggerspun, like the Harrisville I knit the original KTYQ with, is actually meant for weaving, so there's a bit of sizing left on the yarn surface that needs to be washed out before using it as a knitting yarn.) The bottom line is that the yarn is pretty heavy stuff for knitting the KTYQ, which is a very open and light lace pattern.



So I'm flipping through my books and my magazine stash to see if I can find some potential pattern candidates. So far, the list is:

• the Garter and Lace Shawl that appears in Knitter's "Shawls and Scarves" is my first choice (and I have a vague recollection of having knit this once).


• the Wool Peddler's Shawl in Cheryl Oberle's "Folk Shawls." I also like the Stora Dimun Shawl, but it's a bit larger than what I want. (Provided the eyelet lace pattern along the edging has the right stitch repeat, I could probably leave out one of the garter sections between the eyelet rows, right?)


• the Paisley Lace Shawl in the Spring 2005 issue of IK.


• the Flower Basket Shawl in the Fall 2004 issue of IK. Both are by Evelyn Clark (Is there anyone left out there besides me who hasn't knit these shawls?)

If I don't make my choice soon, it'll already be too hot to knit!