Tiger changes its stripes
I started a post last night, full of links to movies I’d seen recently, etc. Right when I decided to save it, Typepad was declared unavailable: of course, with my perfect sense of timing I chose to post just when they were doing scheduled maintenance! So here I am again.
At the top in the picture to the left is the Shepherd sock I made sometime back on size 1 needles, cuff down, with 60 stitches. You can see the 1×1 ribbing and the regular heel flat. For some reason I didn’t take to this sock: the fabric was a little loose and I could feel the purl bumps, and the ribbing was too tight.
At the bottom is the second sock, also with 60 stitches but toe-up and on size 0 needles. Isn’t it strange how minimal pattern variation results in such differences in striping? The white stripes are much more prominent and I like that, so I’m going with the newer iteration. Will frog the first and reknit. Also, it looks like these will be longish socks, because there’s an awful lot of the yarn left.
Aside from this soothing stockinette, I’ve been trying to write up the pattern for my cabled rangoli hat after getting a few requests for it. I read fleegle’s post about charting with Excel, and downloaded a few fonts that she mentions there. Since I recently moved to a Mac and left my stitch and motif maker software behind in my past life, I was excited at this prospect of not buying more charting software. From Fleegle’s review Knit Visualizer seems very nice indeed, but I don’t know if I want to put down $135 for it just yet. For some reason, though, even though I downloaded the fonts and they show up in my font list, I can’t see them or use them. Restart? did it. Reinstall? did that too. Swore at the machine? Of course. Finally, one of them did show up, but with a tremendous reluctance to behave properly. Admittedly, I am not an Excel whiz, but I cannot figure out why some of the symbols don’t fit into the boxes, or why some of the boxes don’t appear clearly. Maybe it’s just the type size? I tried increasing the box size but that didn’t work. Some symbols are also lighter than others. But there are upsides to this experiment. I know I am really late to this party, but I was insanely pleased when I realised I could chart simple patterns with the Wingdings font.
Still, do bear with me; I’ll put the chart and pattern together soon, in words if not in pictures.
I think you can access something called a Charmap from your Control Panel. Ooops, Mac, never mind! But yes, you can do a lot with Wingdings and Dingbats. Have fun. I’d love to see your pattern written up, and more rangoli experiments.
I’d like to combine Norah Gaughan’s tam base and your rangoli motif- to see how well that works. I’m not allowed to buy any new yarn though…in the interests of domestic harmony! Sigh.
Cute tiger socks!
I don’t think I would have the patience to try to chart something in Excel!
Hey there! Thanks so much for visiting my blog and commenting! Glad to have found you–I am adding you to my bloglines, as I can never read enough blogs of academics trying to survive school while still having ample time to knit! I am also thinking of knitting your cloverleaf socks; my next round of socks are all going to be sock patterns created by some of my favorite knitbloggers–I figure it’s a good way to appreciate my blog friends and give them each a little bit of exposure and hopefully get other people knitting their designs. I’m adding yours into the bunch, if you don’t mind!
Hi,
I came across your blog by accident, I was amazed with your work, I have been knitting since high school, but I have stuck with simple easy patterns. I think I have not been daring enough to try difficult and challenging patters, I sure am inspired enough to try , I wonder if you can suggest an easy pattern for socks, Can you believe it, I have never knit socks. I would love to try one.
Looking forward to more of your knitting designs.
Aparna
The socks look great!
I’m a Mac person too, and I’ve been doing some software prospecting myself. What I want to be able to do is chart color patterns AT GAUGE, so that I can see what they will look like. I currently do this with a pencil on knitter’s graph paper, and I know it would be quicker if I could experiment on screen, and it seems insane to me that I haven’t been able to find an easy way to do it. It seems easier to find programs that will deal with complicated things like cables than it is to find one that will let you do colors (or even symbols — I’d take black and white symbols!) at any gauge you want.
End of rant.