Knitting and the Art of War

Beginners lace scarf      

As I learn how to knit, I am beginning to see the art of knitting along the lines of Sun Tzu's ancient Chinese treatise The Art of War or some 'conquer-your-inner-fears' self-improvement book. Knitting can be a battle, it is 'knitting vs you' and you need to get past that to 'you, knitting'. So here are some of my 'knitting self-improvement/art of warfare' lessons:

• Start with a plan.  Stick to it.
• Know where you are. Use stitch markers. Use them often. 
• Have a backup plan. Use a lifeline. Use it often. You WILL need to use it.
• See the patterns within the pattern. 
• See the pattern in your mind. See it with your mind.
• Know your weaknesses. Recognize them to avoid them.
• Know your stitches  Know their strengths. Know how to use them to your advantage.

I knit 3 inches in a month.  Then when I put my battle tactics into play, I was able to do another 53 inches in the last two weeks.  I am winning this war!

Sleigh ride - Malahat style

[Photo: Click to see a bigger picture of  3
lanes of traffic, the middle going north
 and the 2 outer going south]

Christmas day on the wet coast (aka west coast). A day to spend time with family, so we headed south to Victoria. But up on the infamous Malahat the wet rain turned to slush and then to snow. The west coast style snow--slippery. This is where you can categorize cars and I can tell you that while Jaguars look good parked along the side of the road, we saw three hopelessly stuck in 2 inches of snow. No traction whatever. Now this may be a fault of clueless drivers or drivers who don't spend money on good winter tires or bad snow design. But three, 3, THREE, Jags! By the way, vans, Cadillac and motor-homes towing a car are also bad bets in this snow.
It is hard to knit while all this excitement is going on: texting, a friend who had kayaked across in the storm and was wondering what the road conditions were as she was an hour behind us; phoning my sister who was 30 minutes behind (and wisely decided to turn back) and receiving emails from my brother telling us the conditions were terrible and here was a link to the road web cam to prove it. I emailed back with a picture showing we already knew that but to keep an eye on that web cam as we were coming up to it and would wave as we passed it. Modern technology is wonderful.

I did manage to knit 3 inches in 3 hours, but only had two inches to show for it, having had to rip out one inch. However, I think I am 'getting' it. It's all about eye patterns (as opposed to project instruction patterns) and knowing how to see them. This instruction pattern is based on 6 rows, but every second row is a plain purl row, used to bind things together. So really it is just a three row pattern. Easy as pie, really. Except, somehow I can't make pie easily but I am working on it.
The yarn is 70% Romney wool, 10 % mohair and 20% Alpaca, purchased already dyed and in a roving from Hummingbird Fibres. I spun it up to a fingerling weight which I thought might be perfect for a simple lace scarf. I am hoping to have the scarf done as a Christmas gift for next year.

Yippee! It is done.

Remember this <----? It is finally finished and is now this ------>
Holden shawlette by Mindy Wilkes. 5058 ravelers have made this oh, make that 5059 ravelers have made this pattern making it one of the most popular patterns on Ravelry. Me, I made it four, maybe six times, if you count all that ripping out and re-knitting. I may even make a second one now that I know how to knit.

Never-ending Project - UFO to NEO/NEK

[Photo: My UFO weaving]

I have discovered fibre people have their own language. Their use of weird words (e.g. nep, noils, niddy-noddy, nostepenne and that is just the n's) and acronyms (KAL aka knit-a-long, VGM aka vegetable matter) can leave you confused and/or mystified. Knowing that once you understand what on earth they are talking about, you will have arrived. You can announce to the world 'Yes, world. I AM a knitter. - insert weaver, spinner, tapestry weaver, tatter, spranger, etc. Side note: And yes, I know, those last two are tough ones as only tatters and sprangers know who they are. Which means they have already arrived. In other words sprangers and tatters are born not made.
In any event I was curious to know what UFO's were and was not surprised to find that I had lots of those UnFinished Objects. Take my weaving on the 24" loom.  It just sits there waiting for me to be once again, inspired.  I am working up to it, now that I have a couple of weaving workshops under my belt this year. But I am very embarrassed to admit that in January 2010 my blog complained about it being unfinished.  My Gowd, that is almost 3 years of complaining!  

[Photo:My Never Ending Knitting (NEK)
 It just keeps repeating.
 Undo.  Redo.  Undo, Redo,
Unravel, knit, unravel, knit...]

Related to this but by no means the same, is a new acronymn, and maybe every knows this but I have a feeling I may be one of the few who knows and has this--NEO or to be more specific NEK. Never Ending Object (note NEProject or NEP has already been taken)or Never Ending Knitting. NEO or NEK is a type of UFO but the worst type. It is the project that is active and never ending. It does not sit around waiting, wishing for attention. No. It is that dastardly project that you have to work on, rip out, redo, rip out, redo, repeat. Yes, dear readers you have met my NEK, that colourful Holden shawl, the one that is so easy to do. The one on me needles for, oh, say, 10 or is it 12 months. The one where I learned about life lines. Yes, I find myself unraveling yet another row. Again. It had been living the life of a UFO for so long that I had forgotten on which needle side the un-knitted yarn should come from. And so, I knit backward instead of forward making half the shawl longer than the other half. Sigh.
On the other hand, thank god for those life lines and, I now have a WIP (Work In Progress) and not another UFO.

Learning to knit - it's the other stuff

I am now well into (month three?) project #2 - a 'shawlette' -- a mini shawl which I thought would be a perfect project. Not too big. Not too small. Not too artsy. Not too plain. Not too hard. Just right, wearable and useful. That was the theory. I picked the 'Holden Shawlette' from Ravelry, one of the most popular ones and suitable for the beginning intermediate knitter.
I saw I am well into the project, meaning I have now ripped it back four, 4 four! times. But, on the positive side, I am beginning to 1) understand the pattern and 2) am beginning to understand what learning to knit really means. It does not mean learning to knit and purl....well, okay, it includes that but, it really means knowing:

• what row you are on!
• what side you are knitting, the front or the back
• how to unravel
• why, when and how to use stitch markers
• how to keep the stitches on the needle
• how to count stitches
• how to fix mistakes
• knowing when good enough is good enough and when it isn't!

[Photo: Note the use of paper clips
 as stitch markers!]

A lifeline

[Photo: The red yarn is a well used life line.]

frog

v.
to unravel a knitted garment. Also frog stitch v., to intentionally rip out a seam, and 
n., 
an intentionally ripped seam.

un·rav·el

v.
1. to separate or disentangle the threads of (a woven orknitted fabric, a rope, etc.)
2.to free from complication or difficulty; make plain or clear;solve: to
unravel a situation; to unravel a mystery.
3.Informal . to take apart; undo; destroy (a plan, agreement,or arrangement).
4.to become unraveled.

rav·el

 v.
1.to disentangle or unravel the threads or fibers of (a wovenor knitted fabric, rope, etc.).
2.to tangle or entangle.
3.to involve; confuse; perplex.
4.to make clear; unravel (often followed by out ).
5.to become disjoined thread by thread or fiber by fiber; fray.
6.to become tangled.
7.to become confused or perplexed.
8.(of a road surface) to lose aggregate.
Note to self: funny how there are three words used to describe ripping out (there's another one!) your knitting, and only one for knitting up.

frustration

 n.
1.the condition of being frustrated
2.something that frustrates
3. to become unraveled (okay I put this one in here, but it does fit).  See ravel, unravel and frog.

life-line

 n.
1.a. An anchored line thrown as a support to someone falling or drowning.
b. A line shot to a ship in distress.
c. A line used to raise and lower deep-sea divers.
2.a. A means or route by which necessary supplies are transported.
b. One that is or is regarded as a source of salvation in a crisis.
3.A diagonal line crossing the palm of the hand and believed to indicate the length and major events of one's life.
4.a length of smooth waste yarn which is inserted through the sts of a row or round of knitting using a darning needle, usually while working a complicated lace pattern. If you make an irreparable error and need to rip back, the lifeline provides an easy point to rip back to, and ensures that you will not lose any stitches.

re·lief

 n.
1.alleviation, ease, or deliverance through the removal of pain, distress, oppression, etc.
2.a means or thing that relieves pain, distress, anxiety, etc.
3.money, food, or other help given to those in poverty or need.
4.something affording a pleasing change, as from monotony.
5.release from a post of duty, as by the arrival of a substitute or replacement.
6. a feeling of relaxation after tenseness when you can take the life line out without having used it.  (okay, another one I added)

A project for Cuba

 January brought a quick trip to Cuba.   This was a pure R & R trip.  With only seven days, the idea was to sit on a beach.  Oh, sure, I admit to having a weak, ill-thought out plan to find the bee hummingbird (the smallest hummingbird in the world) but once I saw the beach, that quest was put away for another trip. We did manage to drag ourselves to Havana for a short day where I found a group of women learning to knit, but then it was back to the beach and a couple of novels.

[Photo: A group of women
knitting in downtown Havana]

With hours of flights and just as many getting to the airport and sitting waiting for the plane, I decided I needed a project and since I am behind in my spinning homework, I thought it wise to pick a project that would get me a little further ahead in my homework.  For my major project this year, I have to spin a yarn and then knit or weave it into something.  From start (preparing the fleece) to finish (a usable product), the project should take 50 hours.  I have so far spent 25 hours sampling (1 hour), cleaning and teasing fleece (8hrs), blending and carding (4hrs)  fibres (40% mohair, 40% alpaca and 20% silk), preparing skeins for dying (2 hrs), mordanting (1 hr) and dying the skeins (4 hrs), plus 1 hour on calculations.  This was to be for a woven scarf, but at the end of all this work, my weft which was to be a soft pink turned into a rather gaudy, vibrant, purple.  I had enough purple for a scarf in itself.  I was still happy with the yarn a soft 2 ply suitable for weaving or knitting lace.  So if the planned weft was too harsh to go with the soft, subtle colours of the warp, then knitting would be a good alternative, except I can't knit anything more complicated than knit and purl and even then my knitting is questionable.  This I decided was the perfect time to learn how to knit and knit lace at that.

[Photo: My first lace knit project]

So I 'googled' beginner knit lace and found this pattern from Knitty.com.    Perfect.  The description says it is good for beginners.  that's all the time I had to read before printing the chart, downloading a 'How to Knit ' app for the I-phone (complete with how-to videos, and packaging my purple yarn off I went to Cuba.

[Photo: From Knitty.com]

I want to point out a couple of items of interest in my photo of my WIP (Work in progress).  First, note the turquoise thingy, it is a Knit Kit, advertised as 'never lose your knit knacks ever again'.  I bought it from Knotty by Nature on my way to the airport, and am so glad I did.  It has a row counter, crochet hooks for those darned stitches you drop by accident, stitch markers, tape measure and even scissors apparently approved for air travel (personally, I think it is because they fold so cleverly that the x-ray machine can't see the sharp pointy bits).  If you are a knitter, never leave home without it.  The second thing I want to point out, is if you look closely about an inch below my needle is a blue yarn sewn into the knitting.  It's called a lifeline and it is. My knitting has improved but I tore apart the first 3 inches probably a dozen times, and even now, with a seasoned 164 rows behind me, I knit three rows ahead and often rip five rows back.  The lifeline allows me to rip back to the start of my ten row repeat pattern.  Every ten rows I use the handy dandy darning needle which came withe the Knit Kit and darn through the row.  Then when I have to rip out a few rows to get back on track, I can rip away right back to the lifeline without having any lost/dropped stitches.
On getting back home, I went back to Knitty.com to re-read everything and that's when I realized this wasn't actually a 'beginner's' beginner's project, it was for advanced beginners who are ready to tackle something more difficult. As the instructions say 'So, once you've knit this scarf you can knit just about any lace pattern.'  
And it is true ....I think.

Reward time

My spinning has hit a new high! It's payback time. Reward time. In the last couple of weeks photos of my hand spun yarn, turned into objects have appeared. No longer are my spinning attempts orphans, sitting in the back room waiting for someone to bring them to life. They have. At least two objects of beauty have been created. First, on materfamilias's blog is a picture of her beautiful daughter wearing a cowl made from my hand-spun yarn! The yarn, the cowl, the daughter -- all gorgeous. I am lucky to have such a becoming young woman model the cowl.
On the right was the yarn before being knit. This was a special yarn, designed to reflect a poem to respond to P.K. Page's poem, but that's an old post over here.

I also received a photo by another friend whose daughter spun the yarn into booties for a friend's baby. They are sooo cute.

Knitting Mecca

[Photo: Fair Isle knitting on display
in the Shetlands]

If I were a knitting fanatic or, I suppose, a serious knitter, or just a good knitter, which I am not, but if I were, then knitting mecca would be the northern Scottish Islands: the Shetland Islands, Fair Island. Think Shetland lace, wedding ring shawls, FairIsle Knitting with multi colours And, of course, knitting meccas need fibre, lots of it, and spinning techniques designed to use the best characteristics inherent in that fibre. So knitters and spinners should head north to those islands.

[Photo: Knitted lace, with wool
 spun thinner than thread]

The Shetland Museum is a modern museum where many objects, too many to display, are also accessible in pull out drawers or pull-out wall displays. The museum, thoughtfully, provides lightweight plastic stools, useful when you just need to sit and gaze in awe for hours at a lace-knit bodice, a FairIsle vest, or try to see the ply in the cobweb yarn.

[Photo: Cathy's shawl based on a
design  of a shawl over
100 years old]

We quickly connected with a visiting spinner and weaver from California and joined her in an impromptu textile talk by two of the staff, appropriately sporting FairIsle vests as part of their uniforms.
Cathy show us a lace shawl she knitted for Cushla to wear at her daughter's wedding in New Zealand. See the picture to the right.  Cathy made up the pattern based on a 100 year old shawl on display.  No pattern, she just thought it through.
While in the Orkneys we also stopped in the small textile museum run by the Shetlands Islands Spinners, Weavers and Dyers Guild.  A small museum but someone is always there to demonstrate spinning or knitting or just to chat with you.  They have a small collection of knitting and woven goods on display.  Well worth the visit.
They told us the best quality lace knitting is done by the women of Unst.  So off we went to Unst, one of the smallest and most northerly Shetland Islands.  There we found another small museum with some exquisite knitting on display and for sale but the best pieces knitted with cobweb yarn had already been sold, leaving the very fine lace weight (and I had previously thought that was the finest until I saw the cobweb yarn).  Next door was a wonderful boat museum with a varietuy of small open boats and related gear on show.

[Photo: Unst bus shelter]

While on Unst and having done some advance reading before leaving home, I knew to look for the Unst bus shelter, the most northerly bus shelter in the UK.   Apparently the locals decorate it and each year pick a new theme and given the Tall Ships event in the islands, they picked a pirate theme.  We almost blinked and missed it but here it is.
Only a couple days after we had been, BBC did a 3 minute video on a Day-in-the-Life of the Unst Bus Shelter  The bus shelter even has it's own web site.
There isn't much on Unst but what there is is impressive.

Knitting from the heart, err, colon.

[Photo: untitled (heart lungs)
2007
knitted human hair
courtesy, private collection, sydney
photographs: danny kildare]

You have to admire this knitting!  I mean, look at it.  First, the idea of knitting underwear is a little far out but a, well, an intestine, a colon, lungs even, now that is different! And after the shock of the idea comes the realization that these objects d'art  are knitted (stocking stitch if you are curious) with ...better sit down for this... human hair.  Artist Helen Pynor even confesses 'It's an act of madness'.

[Photo: Underneath 2007
knitted human hair, courtesy, private collection, paris
Photo: danny kildare]

Thinking about the women who wove their lives into the Afghanistan rugs (see the blog of Dec 26th) certainly connects you in a much more meaningful way to their work, but think about knitting the hair of many women into something. say a colon, is a whole new level of meaning between the shorn women and the knitter.  Read more about Helen Pynor at her website: http://helenpynor.com

Transcending the Material

Photo by Ben Cuevas from his
installation 'Transcending the material'.

Every once in a while I get deeply inspired by some unique knitting project. Inspired enough to make me want to pick up some knitting needles and knit madly, furiously, intensely. Knit until I feel I really and truly understand knitting, that I know it so well that I can create my own patterns. So well, that I can eclipse and exceed the pattern, not needing any pattern, not even my own. I would rise above and go beyond being just a good knitter. I would triumph over tricky stitches. I will see something in my mind's eye and using my own stitches, my own designs, make knitting do anything I want. I could control it and knit anything I want. I would transcend the material.

Photo by Ben Cuevas of a
closer view of his skeleton.

Photo by Ben Cuevas showing the knitted
detail of the hand.

Recently, I came across someone who had reached that pinnacle of knitting, Ben Cuevas, philosopher, artist, knitter.
Check out his installation available on his blog. And, here is an interview with him.
Ben Cuevas interview, 2010 Wassaic Artist Resident from The Wassaic Project on Vimeo.

Knitting Music Video

Here's an interesting music video. Done entirely using knit animation. Over 700 unique knitted pieces were created for the video by designer Lysanne Latulippe of the fashion label Majolie..

PS  For locals, don't forget the knit and spin-in at VIU on Thursday.  See the blog below.

Doily bombed

It has happened again. Only this time, the campus has not been yarn bombed, it has been doily bombed! I am not sure if this is more serious than yarn bombing or if one reads a lighter sense of play into this format.  
As you can see, the lampposts along the walkway have all been 'doilied'. Note the yellow 'comment' card that has been attached to each doily bomb, along with a pencil to capture your thoughts.
I Googled doily bombing and was surprised to find other locations where this deed has taken place. This picture of a doilied tree shows a beautiful collection of vintage doilies gracing the tree like a lace glove.
Further Googling brought up a BBC new segment which may provide a hint of how yarn bombing came to Canada. At around the 1minute 40 mark, two seemingly innocent looking women from Vancouver are interviewed and state that they will take this new knitting trend back to the west coast of Canada. Have we found the guilty importers referred to in my earlier post?

Noodle Knitting

I had to share this video. It inspires one to try it but perhaps a bigger project, say a lunch bib? Or something Italia-style? I suppose crocheting would work just as well, although it is hard to find chopsticks with a built-in hook.

Socks to Dye For

I don't knit. Well hardly ever. When I do knit, it usually ends in a 3/4s done project or a mass of knotted fibres heaped into a bag for years as if expecting a fibre fairy to find it, fix it and finish it ... fabulously. Once in a while something gets completed and a poor soul has to live with my project. The last one was felted slippers for my father. Even after felting they are still size 22. Not exactly something that at age 80 his size 9's will ever grow into. 
So I am not sure how on earth I ended up in a socks-to-dye-for workshop. Socks for pete's sake! With heels and toes! But wait. I am getting ahead of myself. I never promised to actually knit socks, although the thought is festering in my mind. The inspiration came from the idea of dying the yarn to knit the socks. It's not your average dye job. The white yarn for the socks is knit two strands together into a long rectangular block which is then dyed. There is enough yarn in the block to unravel and re-knit into two socks, guaranteeing that each sock will have the exact same dye job. I even bought the sock blank already knitted. My now dyed sock blank just needs a sock knitter, someone with a knack of knowing how to turn a heel, and once I have found a sock knitter, then I'll re-post this blog entry and add the finished product. In the meantime, the picture above is the dyed sock blank...dyed in manly colours.
Posting date has been back dated for when it should have been posted.

Cowichan Knitting - Fleece questions

I wonder what type of sheep fleece were traditionally used for Cowichan Sweaters. Judith MacKenzie McCuin, spinner extroidinaire and author of a couple of recent spinning books, told me years ago that she thought the sheep were a mixed breed of down sheep, that had adapted to the Cowichan Valley area. They would produce fibres that had a lot of crimp which would produce yarn that is light, holds insulating air, hence very warm and bulky without the weight. They also had a lot of lanolin which was kept in during the spinning to make a very rain resistant garment. I remember her telling me that a friend, Marg Meikle (who took the photo on the left), also known as Canada's Answer Lady (from the CBC) had researched Cowichan knitting and had written a small book on the subject.   So I contacted Marg. Marg has had Parkinson's for over a dozen years now, but that hasn't infected her famous 'need-to-know' drive. Marg told me that she had uploaded her book to wikipedia, and sure enough, there it is (all 78 meg worth). But in Marg Meikle's book that accompanied a Cowichan Sweater exhibit that traveled across Canada in 1986, it was mentioned that traditional sweaters were very heavy and that helped prevent commercial knitting machines from replicating the Cowichan knitting. I wonder if they really were heavy or if it was the lanolin that prevented machines from duplicating the yarn? Anyone know?
If you'd like to download Marg's book, click on this link and ignore all the ads as you don't have to buy anything to download it, you just need patience for it to start downloading. After a 30 sec pause in which they hope you will have second thought and buy something, it will start downloading but beware, it is 76meg, so if you have a slow connection it will take a while.

From the Bizzare world of Knittied Nerds - frog dissection

Here's an interesting knitting project - dissected frogs and rats!. Check out the Knitting 101 Photo Gallery from Discovery Magazine. here's a rat in the dissection tray and here's a frog. These are made by a student who is trying to make a living from her art. Help support her. Check out her Crafty Hedgehog Etsy store for more bizzare creatures.

Portugese Knitting

I am working away on my ten sheep breeds project (somehow I have increased it to 15), where I spin a woolen and a worsted sample of each breed, plus knit up a sample of each. Therein lies my challenge...knitting. I can knit and purl and that is about it. I thought I should take this opportunity to better my knitting skills and embarked on journey to find out how to knit continental style as many say it is more efficient. I tried it and found it better but the purl was a challenge. And then I discovered Portuguese Knitting. I had seen pictures of Spanish knitting where the yarn is wrapped around the back of the neck and thought that strange, but after learning Portuguese knitting I know why, and why it makes it so much easier for knit and purl! Check out this video: