Adventures of a Desi Knitter

Remember when this was a knitting blog? I actually have some updates to post, of new WIPs. I have been knitting a bit on and off, mostly on the sampler shawl from Victorian Lace Today. Surprisingly quick progress for the amount of time I have been able to devote to it.

So far it’s been smooth sailing, except for one major rip (hence the lifeline). It has faggoting on the edges, and I decided that I dislike faggoting. Not enough visual interest for the work involved. But now it’s there, so I’m going to continue it. The samples are a mix of knitted lace and pure lace (with patterning on both sides), with leaf motifs. These are simple patterns with just enough variation to keep them interesting. I think basic samplers like these are great to avoid the monotony of stoles. I am on the brink of finishing one major set in the pattern, but another travel stint is coming up, so it’s going to be set aside for a week or so. The red colour and the lace is very hard to photograph correctly (I don’t have pins and a carpet handy), so let me distract you with another blurry, artsy picture. The yarn is so fine I keep worrying about breaking it.

Here is something else I started for knitting while travelling, a pair of simple socks for my sister. Yarn is some Regia something. She wanted some multicoloured grey-blue; that’s what she’s getting. Right now, though, she can’t even bear to look at them, cause it’s nowhere near wool-sock-wearing weather, so they’re going to take a while. I also have to find buses with good suspension in which to knit them. Knitting is such a Nov-Dec activity here that it’s really unusual to see anyone knitting in public here outside those times. The fun thing about this project is that it’s a joint project; my niece Gargi shows up every now and then and knits a few rounds. This is her first project on DPNs and she coos every few minutes - such thin needlllllllllllles!

Finally, remember my yarn for the Cobblestone pullover? I had one 750 yard hank left over, and my mum has cast on for a Clapotis with it. Should look good in this yarn, no? I have a feeling she’s going to get bored with it once the increases end and both Gargi and I will pitch in, but right now she’s heroically at it. It’s worsted weight on size 8. Any suggestions about how wide to make it to get a long enough stole? I tried looking online, but was hit by an avalanche of Clapotis posts and suggestions.

I have a feeling all three projects are going to be WIPs for a while, though.

Tags: Shawls, Clapotis, Socks, Lace work by desiknitter
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Hey, all! Thanks so much for all your good wishes for my trip - here I am, on the other side of the world, recovered from jet lag already.

Plane travel is exhausting, disorienting, annoying and many other things. It also infantalises travellers like none other mode of travel. It’s not just the security staff who speak to you slowly but loudly as if you were either deaf or retarded, barking out orders in elaborate legalese-politese and processing you on a long and complicated assembly line from dangerous unknowns into government-deemed safe travellers. It is also the feeling of being strapped into the small, uncomfortable seat for so many long hours, with food brought to you every few hours. You sleep, you eat, some sort of entertainment hovers in front of your eyes to keep you diverted, and then you sleep and eat some more. This is how babies must feel - slightly out of focus and irritable and trapped. The flight attendants also treat you with a combination of firmness-laced-with-nice that parents whose patience is about to snap use on kids running wild. If the airlines provided diapers with the headphones and acrylic blanket wrapped in plastic, I imagine our regression to infanthood would be complete.

Speaking of actual babies travelling, there seemed to be many more than usual on this flight. Or maybe my claustrophobia was conjuring them up all around me. They wailed and howled throughout - sometimes in unison, sometimes in harmony, but always in dreadful cacophony. It occurred to me that anyone unsure about whether they want children would do well to travel on a transcontinental flight surrounded by infants and toddlers before they make a final decision. But I do feel bad for the parents, who always have this hunted, apologetic look about them. It must be awful to juggle discomfort and disorientation with a shrieking baby and dark looks from people all around you. I was virtuous, though - in keeping with the whole kids theme, I took refuge in The Sound of Music. (Btw, these are the Regia socks I began on another transcontinental flight in February - 64 stitches on size 0 needles, very plain and simple.)

That’s one point for Continental, I gotta say, even if they do, rather horrifyingly, charge for alcohol on international flights (WHY do American airlines do that?) - they have a whole set of very diverse films for you to choose from on your own little individual screen. Along with Julie Andrews, I also indulged in Jane Austen, with the wonderful, smart Emma Thompson adaptation of Sense and Sensibility, and the godawful Keira Knightley adaptation of Pride and Prejudice. If you permit me to rant about this for a second, I wonder what Austen herself would have made of some rather odd moments in this adaptation. I didn’t mind that it took liberties with the dialogue - the S&S adaptation did too, but the ones in P&P somehow didn’t work as well, mostly because they seemed to turn this elegant narrative of manners into a faux-historical teenage drama. “Don’t you dare judge me, Lizzy!” Charlotte Lucas says (after choosing calmly to marry that horrible Mr. Collins), and that wooden Darcy, who looks like a confused, drowned rat with that oddly dishevelled look, unpardonably blurts out “I love you” instead of the glorious “You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you” to Elizabeth Bennet. She, in turn, yells “Leave me alone!” to her family, slamming the door and running upstairs. WTF?? Ah well. At least the von Trapps were as familiar and saccharine as ever.

It is hot here, and very erratic and strong thunderstorms are allowing the electricity department to cut power even more than usual. But it’s also cool and breezy and deliciously overcast in the evenings, and I started a longue duree lace project to keep me company on my equally long research project. It’s the Beginner Sampler stole from Victorian Lace Today, in Jade Sapphire Lacey Lamb, in tomato red, on size 3 needles. I am already loving it, but expect an FO only sometime around December, I think. My mum is convinced that my eyes are going to get worse from squinting at the tiny yarn and needles.

Oh, and I’m eating a lot of Alphonso mangoes. Mmmmmmm.

Tags: Shawls, Travel, Socks, Lace work by desiknitter
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I finished it, finally, and here it is:

I raved about this shawl pattern when I began it, and it is really one of the simplest, yet prettiest triangular patterns. If I could actually knit about 70% of it in 100-degree-plus weather, you can bet that it was special. The fern leaf motif is quickly memorised, the edging is elegant and it’s easily adaptable to different weights. It’s quite a well-known pattern by Polly Outhwaite, but still, if you’re new to it, the free pattern is here (.pdf).

I’ve been knitting it for so long, it seems though, that I have a strange sense of anti-climax and irritation, that is amplified by the smell of the wet wool. I also can’t help feeling strangely dissatisfied with triangular shawls after they’re done. They are definitely process projects, the complete opposite of rectangular stoles, boring as hell to knit but totally worth it when done. I wrapped Kiri around me this morning after unpinning it, and even though it’s fingering yarn and the wingspan is nearly 80 inches, it still feels small, and as if most of it isn’t really going towards the warming effort - large bits hang down your arms and hug your bottom.

I know, these are meant to gently, airily take the chill off an early fall evening, not keep you warm in a winter gale. This one is going to England, just in time, to Bua, my husband’s aunt who generously gave me a suitcase full of yarn one summer, with some stashes of Rowan and Jaeger in it, when I visited her. Thank you, Bua, this little knitted thank you has taken me a long time!

Project Notes:

Yarn: Brown Sheep Fingering 100% wool, in a big-assed cone. I have no idea how much I used, but I’ll weigh the shawl at the post office today and then calculate the approximate yardage. The colourway was Maple something, which bled in the wash. The colour is fairly accurate in the first picture. The yarn is soft, but one word that describes it well is durable.

Dimensions: 70 x 27 before blocking, 80 x 38 after blocking (not very severely, am thinking of steam-ironing the border)

Repeats: 17 repeats, plus the initial leaf and the edging

Needle: Size 4, with size 6 for the edging, and size 7 for the cast-off row. This going up a size for the edging and cast off is highly recommended!

Finally, since I finished this before the start of term and Labor day, I am totally claiming this as a project started and finished during summer. Now, onward to fall, garments, holiday gifts…

Tags: Shawls, Lace work by desiknitter
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I just couldn’t help thinking of a boomerang as I photographed what I’ve been knitting the past few days:

It’s the Kiri shawl from Polly at All Tangled Up, one of the earliest blogs I began reading, and which still remains one of my favourites. Doesn’t it look like it’s about to take off?

This post is a rhapsody for Kiri. Why haven’t I knit this shawl before? Why hasn’t everybody who loves lace work? It has everything a good lace shawl pattern should. It is easily memorised, it has that beautiful rhythm that you settle into after finishing the first repeat and figuring out how the k2togs balance the SSKs, and it produces an elegant, gorgeous fabric that looks way more complicated than it actually is:

So all the non-knitters around you ooh and aah over what requires very little effort on your part. (The designer, in other words, has done all the hard work for you, all you do is ease gently into the pattern!) It has a fern leaf motif that grows surprisingly quickly: all that you see above was knitted in the last four days. Instinctively figuring out the pattern was key; although similar to the Leaf Lace and other Fiber Trends patterns, this one is turning out to be much more fun. I have been watching some dreadful old Hindi films on cable as I knit it. Although that means altogether too much mindless activity, the results are very pleasing overall! So thank you, Polly, for a lovely pattern. I know lots and lots of people have knit this and all of you probably know this, but just in case you don’t, I should mention that it’s free! (.pdf link)

The yarn is Brown Sheep Fingering Naturespun, workhorse wool in a maple-something-or-other shade. Wears like iron, I’m told (the yarn, not the shade). I brought it to make the Gracie Faroese Shawl, but like an idiot I left the book in Delhi. I found myself itching to knit lace when I got here, and voila, happened upon Kiri. Which was just as well.

Incidentally, the colour of my tongue totally matches this yarn right now, as I munch on Jambhul (Jamun in Hindi). They’re fat and engorged, and the blackish skin yields purple fleshy goodness within.

Tags: Shawls, Lace work by desiknitter
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One of the best things about a lazy weekend is having an old friend to share it with, someone who knows your rhythms, your likes and dislikes. Even better when that friend is visiting, and not only sits around and talks to you nineteen to the dozen so you can knit and finish a project, but also helps you pin it out while blocking, and then models it for you. So this past weekend was a delight. My friend Latha visited me after  a long time, and between reminiscing about university, walking around the Italian neighbourhood and Chinatown in San Francisco and eating and drinking lots of good stuff, I managed to finish the North Sea Shawl from Cheryl Oberle’s "Folk Shawls" book.

This shawl has a fair bit of bounce before blocking, due to the garter stitch panels. But once blocked, it flattens out into the most gorgeous undulating pattern. The colour on the photo to the right, with the blocked shawl, is closer to the real shades. You can see the Malabrigo laceweight working its subtle shade magic. This yarn is too gorgeous for words.

Pattern notes:

Pattern: North Sea Shawl (Folk Shawls by Cheryl Oberle)

Yarn: Malabrigo laceweight in Damask Rose, used double throughout, on size 7 bamboo needles

Gauge: 26 st to 4 inches over the main lace pattern

Modifications: I shortened the number of repeats to make for a narrower shawl. I cast on 85 stitches instead of 109, and got a final width of 15 inches. The finished shawl is about 75 inches long.

I loved this project: it was quick, simple and beautiful. Minimal
effort, maximum joy, just a variation of Feather and Fan, with a short
central panel. You knit one side and the central panel, then the other
side and graft the two together, which took me quite a bit of time. But
I did 14 repeats on each of the side panels, and got a stole of decent
length. If you’re looking for a simple rectangular stole, I highly
recommend this pattern. It has the right mix of pattern to keep it
interesting and garter to keep it going.

I thought of the process of knitting this stole rather like knitting a largish
sock: 80 plus stitches, an 8 row repeat with a 12 stitch pattern
repeat, to be done twice and with light and portable enough for me to carry
around. Before I knew it, it was done! I think it’s a good idea to
think of it this way, because the tedium of a long, 75 inch rectangular pattern is somehow made much more tolerable that way.

Tags: Lace work by desiknitter
23 Comments »

I have frogged so much in the last few days that I could croak. Seriously. I decided to take a chunky wool skein and make a quick version of the Odessa hat with fewer stitches because I wanted to send a friend a gift, and I had to frog the whole thing no less than thrice. Once because I cast on too few, once cause it got too big (yes, I did swatch) and once because I twisted the join. Who does that, ever? Like anybody ever reads the pattern instructions every time there’s a circular join: "join, taking care not to twist the stitches." Evidently, I needed to this time.

(Aside: But these instructions are like the ones for cables: "slip x stitches to cable needle, knit y stitches, knit x from cable needle." I have never used a cable needle ever, and am convinced that the idea of cable needles was invented to make writing instructions easier. Otherwise we’d be reading something like "Now slip the first two off the needle, suddenly pucker up your knitting so as to not cause them to run, hold them with the base of left thumb, try to shove the right needle into the third stitch at the same time, put them all back on to the needle…" you get the idea.)

Anyhow, I used Elann Highland Chunky for this so-called quick project, and finally gave up. This yarn looks all soft and friendly but is really rough to work with! My hands really burnt after a few rounds; I’ve never had that happen with a yarn, not even Red Heart. Needless to say, no chunky Odessa. This thing will someday be felted. (like some life sentence!)

Also, I have frogged the Jaywalker sock several times too, and I’m barely past the heel. I don’t know what it is. I first made the foot too long. Then I tried to do one of those toe-up heel flap things and messed up a couple of times. Then I forgot to continue the pattern all around the cuff. Now I’ve realised that I forgot to increased stitches after the heel and I might have to frog yet again. It’s sitting in disgrace in my basket. It goes without being photographed.

But Malabrigo is much more well-behaved. Here’s the progress on my North Sea Shawl. I’ve done twelve repeats and will most likely do three more, before I start the center portion. Then it’s another 15 repeats done separately and the two pieces grafted together. I cannot *wait* to finish it.

Tags: Lace work by desiknitter
5 Comments »

Thanks so much for all the sock pattern suggestions, everyone. I am eyeing all of Cookie A’s patterns, especially the new ones! But after swatching for "hedera", and for the "smoking hot" ones for my variegated skein, I decided that this particular Trekking grey yarn was meant to be a pair of Jaywalkers. I’ve said this before, you know how a yarn sometimes almost wills itself to be something no matter how hard you try to do something different with it? The dark shades in this skein made it quite difficult to try something complicated, although my efforts introduced me to something wonderful in the process: The Walker Treasury Project. What a wonderful resource! I was trying out some lace repeats to develop a sock pattern of my own from the Barbara Walker volumes I have, and when I googled the names
of the stitches a lot of them showed up here. I’m planning to join the project myself in the summer.

Like Spud, I also reduced the number of stitches for the Jaywalker pattern (76 cast-on was waaay too large for me) and with 64 and just two repeats, it’s nice and snug. I’m doing them toe-up, short-row as usual, and might increase a few stitches from the ankle up. So far I quite like this Trekking yarn, although I imagine I’m going to be left with quite a lot of it after the pair is done.

I also started something else. Seeing the lovely pink flowers all around me here (and also the gorgeous pinks cropping up on various blogs) made me pull out my Malabrigo laceweight in Damask Rose. Mmmmmm Malabrigo.

I had set this yarn aside for something complicated like Frost Flowers or the Sampler Stole from Gathering of Lace, but once again, it seems destined to be something else. I got a lovely pink and grey silk salwar kameez as a gift that this yarn shade will go well with. So I thought I might make a light wrap out of it first, and then maybe use the rest for a cropped shrug/sweater of sorts. Let’s see.
So this is the beginning of the "North Sea Shawl" from Cheryl Oberle’s Folk Shawls book. The yarn is held double on size 6, but after an initial blocking I think I might frog, reduce the number of repeats and go up a size to make it a little drapier. I knit this very quickly; the pattern is a variation on Feather and Fan, and it’s the right combination of mindless and interesting knitting that I need right now.

Spring break begins tomorrow! I have a paper due for a workshop that I have to do during break, but just not having to go in thrice to teach means I have some time to actually sit and write something (other than a blog entry, ie!) and I am excited about being able to do that. Am also looking forward to seeing the Namesake tomorrow.

Tags: Socks, Lace work by desiknitter
9 Comments »

Thanks so much for all your input! I tentatively decided to set aside the variegated for the Spirit of the Southwest, because the colours are just right and plus, I bought the yarn in Colorado during a trip of the Southwest…. somehow seems right. And I decided it’s not a problem if it’s warm, really. I also wound a skein of the pink Malabrigo and actually started the F&F shawl. But then, somehow, my hands reached out to the yarn I had left over from the Clapotis I made this spring. And before I knew it, I had cast on for the Leaf Lace shawl.

It’s weird. The yarn almost chose itself for the project. I was a little wary of doing something big with the leftover since I have no idea how much I have left, but I think I’ll get a medium size wrap out of this. Whatever the size, I think it’s going to look gorgeous. And it goes fast! I’ve already done six repeats in two days.

I think the key to lace and variegated yarns is to pick a relatively simple motif, and to knit at a slightly looser gauge than you would for a solid yarn. This allows the YOs to show up more clearly through the mist of shades. It’s definitely more difficult to see the SSks and the K2togs clearly, but
if it’s an identifiable motif like a leaf, then it works very well.
I love this colourway, just knitting with it and watching the shades come up on the needles is a joy.

Tags: Leaf Lace Shawl, Lace work by desiknitter
6 Comments »

I had this post almost completed, links and all, when it froze on me and I had to restart. I thought people moved to Macs to avoid this but clearly, hanging and rebooting is still something I have to do.

I have been casting around (instead of casting on) for a new lace shawl project, and cannot decide for the life of me how to pair yarn and pattern. So I thought I’d ask for your opinions.

Here are the shawls: Kimono shawl, Print O’ the Wave Stole, Leaf Lace Shawl  and Spirit of the Southwest shawl.

The yarns: Variegated ochre-green jumperweight  and Malabrigo "rich earth" (the wound up skeins), both 1700 yards or so each. I also have 3600 yards of pale pink Malabrigo laceweight like the shade in Eunny’s kimono shawl.

Questions: 1) Will the variegated yarn look good in any of these patterns? In terms of retaining its hues and not obscuring the stitch patterns? I don’t like any of the Koigu-derived garter stitch triangular shawls.
2) Which one should I do with the "rich earth" Malabrigo?

3) For the 3600 yds of pale pink, I thought either the Irish Diamond Shawl or the Frost Flowers and Leaves Shawl. But the shape of the first, especially when people hold it up like that in photos makes it look weird and I don’t know how it drapes. The second, well, it’s easily the most gorgeous thing, but folding it in half? Feels almost criminal and that is making me think twice about circular and square shawls. What do you guys think? Any recos for this yarn, or should I just swap two skeins with someone for another shade?

ed. to change the link to the Frost.. shawl. It was the earlier one that was causing my machine to hang by asking me to download some weird plugin. Hopefully nobody clicked on it before I managed to figure it out.

Tags: Lace work by desiknitter
9 Comments »

So I’d ordered some laceweight handpainted yarn  sometime last year, from handpaintedyarn.com. I made this lace shawl with it. I’d ordered a bunch of other colours and returned some, in exchange for more of this pale pink colour and this reddish rust shade. It never came, and after some fretting I cut my losses since the yarn was cheap, contact with those folks was tedious and I had too many things on my mind, among them moving house for the nth time (some of you remember my kvetching about my landlord from hell.)

But this morning, voila une belle surprise!

The current tenant called and asked us to pick up months of mail, since she’s had it with that flat too and is moving out. Amidst the credit card offers was nestled a bag of yarn! It’s four skeins of Red Java and Damask Rose, about 850 yards each. I now have four skeins (I already had two) and nearly 3500 yards of the Rose, and am in search of a lace shawl project. Something springy and flowery, perhaps. Hmm. I know I paid for it and all, but after nearly a year it still feels like some gorgeous free yarn dropped into my lap.

Btw, I highly recommend this yarn. Its colour variance is high, as I found out with some panic towards the end of my lace shawl. But the yarn quality is great, the shades are luminous and the price unbeatable.

Tags: Lace work by desiknitter
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