Prairieknitter

Kittens!

Small disruption in knitting schedule due to two new arrivals:

This is Mel.  Mel turned out to be a girl.  Anyway, she is a reverse-ground calico, meaning she is calico-on-black, not calico-on-white.  She is like a rainbow, to quote the Stones.  If you turn her around in the sunlight, she changes colors. 

No, I'm not kidding. 

This is a picture of Walt.  Walt also turned out to be a girl.  This picture was taken in extreme close up because she seemed to like that sort of thing.

Walt is actually the name of one of my Answering Service customers.  He calls up every night at the same time and says exactly the same thing:  "This is Walt, setting up nightly communications."  My Walt sets up nightly communications loudly, every night at about 9 p.m.  I love both Walts, although I've only met Walt the Cat.

Anyway, both kittens are having a tough time learning not to climb on keyboards.  I have not dared to expose them to yarn.   They are too young to be declawed (don't send hate mail -- I live in a house I do not own and this point is really not negotiable), so we are all trying to learn to love scratching posts for a couple weeks.  The litterbox seems to be a winner, so that's a relief.  Not all barn cats like them immediately and some barn cats have trouble learning to cover up afterwards but these two caught on.  Whew. 

Smmmooootheeeee

A famous sandwich-and-coffee shop nearby offered Green Tea Smoothies.  Sounded great, right?  Nope.  Too sweet and not quite tea-like enough for me.  But my favorite online tea shop offered this:

The Mighty Leaf Smoothie

Mix 1 tsp (more or less to taste) of Mighty Leaf Matcha Tea powder with 1 cup milk.  Mix well.  Put in a blender 2 cups of ice, 2-3 rounded tbs. sweetened condensed milk, tea and milk combo, and blend until you like the consistency.  Makes enough for one tired, hot person or two to three less exhausted persons.

Mighty Leaf sells the best tea-in-a-bag, too!  Check them out!

Now, on to knitting content:  This is the beginning of my Zitron shawl:

I eventually decided to use a size 8 needle.  The smaller sizes made a lovely, dense pattern that showed off the variations in the yarn well, but the fabric was stiff and not welcoming.  A shawl needs to welcome you in!  It's all about comfort.  But, Triple Mohair comes first.

I finished "The Summer of the Great-Grandmother" yesterday.  It was not an easy read, but all of L'Engle's books are rewarding in their own way.  Her generation was the first to really have a choice of putting extremely elderly parents in nursing homes or keeping them at home and they had to make up the guidelines as they went along.  It also amazes me that she knows so much of her family history.  My family is not so fascinated by their past.  They are very forward-looking and our whole family credo is that the future will be better than the past.  At least, we hope so....

Swatching!

I have swatched both the Zitron Paradiso and the Triple Mohair Shawl, and the Triple Mohair wins for first up on the circular size 8's.  The Rowan KidSilk Haze in blood orange and burgundy, plus the Filatura di Crosa in goldenrod do make a nice autumn tweed which does not show well in the scan.  There is more depth to the colors.   The Fiddlesticks pattern is simple and well written, and the whole thing will be a breeze.  With the extra goldenrod, I have plans for several scarves.

The pattern has garter stitch rows (8) with a yo/k2tog row every so often.  There is lots of lovely fringe, and the whole thing gets a nice zig-zag eding.  It is not fancy but the yarn is pure luxury and speaks for itself!  I am looking forward to this! 

I will post the Zitron swatches tomorrow.  Time to knit!

Time out for a SEMINAR!

No work for me on Friday.   Drove up to Minneapolis for a seminar on Powerful Communication for Women!  The speaker was great, and she was indeed modeling Powerful Communication, but some of the information was off track for a small, family-owned company like the one I work for.   In our company, the managers do support the supervisors, they do notice your progress in your department from week to week, and they do reflect your good work in the annual raise.  In turn, as a supervisor, I also support my reportees, I notice their progress from week to week, and I recommend them specifically (or not) for annual pay rewards.  If my reportees started drowning me in paper and emails to remind me of their good work (for visibility's sake), I would be surprised and annoyed.  If they also cc: 'd MY supervisor on all that email, just to make sure everyone noticed them, I would be gravely offended.  And MY supervisor would be annoyed.  But mostly it was good. 

That left a long, happy weekend ahead in my favorite hotel (that I can afford) in Minneapolis!  Room Service!  Knitting!  Has anyone else noticed what great chaise lounges they have at the Hilton Garden Inns? 

I am de-stashing.  I have some lovely Paradiso in blue/green/white cotton in a fingering weight.  It is fussy, busy yarn.  It's a strand of each color cotton (not really a ply) and this colorful cotton sausage is encased in black netting.  It's not Paton's Paradiso, it's Zitron's.  Anyway, I found a lace pattern in "Gathering of Lace" that is the essence of casual knitting:  What yarn to use?  Any you have.  What gauge?  No one cares.  Just find a needle that makes what you like in terms of body density and size of holes.  How much yarn do you need?  As much as you've got!  Follow the increase pattern until you've used up about half your yarn and then start decreasing. 

I love that kind of a pattern!  My only problem is the needle size.  This yarn is BUSY BUSY BUSY color-wise and in order for anyone to be able to tell I bothered to make lace with it, I will need BIG HONKING HOLES (BHH).  Size 9 gives BHH, but the body looks messy and out of gauge.  Size 8 also has BHH, and body improving.  A real possibility.  Will also swatch 7 and 6, but with less hope. 

I brought all manner of knitting necessities in my lovely project bag from last years TKGA's conference (did I tell you my smart mom got all her conference teachers to sign her bag?  not me...) but I managed to forget my lace pattern.  So, I made up something similar.  Sometimes, you just have to get ON with it.

Busy Bee

Ever had a canker sore?  Ever have one for thirteen months?  Guess what -- it ceases at some point to be a canker sore and becomes leukoplakia, a pre-cancerous lesion.  That's what I've been dealing with lately and it surely cuts into my knitting time!

I decided to resume blogging, though, and I will spare you any further details about about tongue lesions. 

Just promise me this-- IF YOUR CANKER SORE LASTS MORE THAN A MONTH, RUN TO YOUR DENTIST!  My family practitioner and an ear, nose and throat specialist both shrugged it off, but my dentist nearly had a heart attack.    SEE YOUR DENTIST!

Thank you.  Be well.  Knitting content coming soon.  Two shawls, placements and socks!  Also, will try to photograph the elusive Piewacket in his native territory.

KNITTING CONVENTION - Day Two, in which I make a run for it ...

Continuing my Convention diary....on the official Opening Day of the convention, I made a run for it.

I managed to pry myself out of my Heavenly Bed. Westin Hotels says it has a Heavenly Bed, and they aren't lying! You can buy one for yourself here and it will only cost ya $2,565! This includes all the many pillows, the Heavenly Duvet, the Heavenly sheets and the Heavenly mattress and boxspring. It is the most wonderful bed on earth. I thought I loved the Palmer House Hilton in Chicago best of all, but they don't have Heavenly Beds.

ANYWAY, we started out with Breakfast and a Fashion Show! Pretty neat! We had scrambled eggs on biscuits which was fairly unusual for this Prairie Woman, plus potatoes, OJ, coffee, etc. Did I mention TKGA charged us $25.00 for this event? Our teachers modeled sample sweaters from the vendors in the Fiber Market. Lily Chin is really a doll, and her sample shawl from her new beaded knit/crochet book was a real hit. Nancie Wiseman is a very, very good sport and quite the model! Laura Bryant and Barry Klein did the honors introducing the pieces. There was a sweater from a Twisted Sisters kit, "Building Blocks", that really caught my eye. It was hand-dyed yarns, entrelac at the shoulders and then modular knitting. Up close in the FiberMart it looked messy, but from a distance it was a knock-out! Great Yarns of Everett, WA had the kit.

And then I ran away!

I paid $440 for the 3-day conference pass, plus another $30 for pre-conference seminars on Thursday. I listed six first-choice classes, and six second-choice classes for the regular conference schedule. I paid my money. This was back before Valentine's Day. Guess how many first or second choice classes I actually got into? ONE. I was assigned to the rest. Now, some of these were very, very fortunate assignments. But it is a cautionary tale -- register early. Very early. As soon as you have the money, as soon as you see the schedule posted.

I got assigned to Embellishments for Tote Bags. Not for me. Besides, I had the little monthly Atlanta Arts guide in my hot little hands and they had a real gem to tempt me away.

Anne Truitt at the Michael Carlos Museum of Emory University

How can I explain what Anne Truitt has meant to me over the years? She is a remarkable woman, writer and artist. Her work is very minimalist, with all that the Minimalist school means. Many slender, colorful columns. Think about borders and edges -- she likes you to look at places where context and meaning change. The sharp edges of her columns meeting empty space. The places on the columns where there are color changes -- do the colors at the borders where two colors meet change the way the individual colors look? Go up the column and think about that pure color, then look at where it meets the next color -- both colors look different at the border where they meet. She is very concerned about pure color.

She also has published her diaries. She is now 80 years old, and she has decades of diaries describing her struggle to be a wife, mother, daughter, and artist. She has not had extraordinary advantages and she created her life from no more than most of us have. She made interesting choices along the way, and some of them did not work well. She lived adaptively and tried to make the best life possible while remaining true to her committment to a creative life. Her three diaries are fascinating (Daybook, Turn and Prospect).

Below are pictures of the Michael Carlos Gallery building, designed by architect Michael Graves. Emory has a gorgeous campus, full of notable buildings. The gallery is full of wondrous artwork, but I must admit, I loved the cafeteria. I had a smoked turkey sandwich (on focaccia, with fresh mozzarella, avocado, bacon, and mustard), penne pasta salad, and a luscious fruit tart for $15! Delicious! Go there! See art! Eat great food, cheap!

Left, the Michael Graves design
Right, Michael Carlos Gallery building at Emory University

Knitting Guild National Convention

This April, The Knitting Guild of America held its National Convention. So, I left Blue Earth (home of the Jolly Green Giant), hopped a plane in Rochester, MN (home of the Mayo Clinic), and off I went to Atlanta, GA! In answer to your unasked questions, YES! We do have a huge statue of the Jolly Green Giant in a park in Blue Earth! We even have huge, huge red and white striped scarf for his neck during Christmastime! Seneca Foods, parent company of Jolly Green, is here and our surrounding countryside grows, cans, and packs most of the green peas, corn and carrots that arrive in your grocery stores. Seneca provides a lot of seasonal work for students and year-round employment for many.

BACK TO OUR STORY...

I decided to attend the WHOLE convention, from the Thursday Pre-Convention seminars to the Sunday night Trunk Show Knit-In. I even asked My Mom to come along, especially since she is a Knitting Goddess and can explain all the difficult parts to me. My Mom said she too would leave Blue Earth and the Jolly Green Giant and venture forth to Atlanta. Since I haven't read anything in the blogs about the convention, I thought I would take some time to let you in on my experience.

THURSDAY
Creating Intarsia from the World Around You, Kay Summers
What a delightful lady! She takes pictures, artwork, photos, and even her daughter's Christmas memories and designs intarsia sweaters from them. She makes incredibly intricate designs and has broken down the process into a series of truly managable steps - she believes anyone can do it, and by the end of the workshop, we believed it, too!

BEST QUOTE: Kay has a degree in art history and a great deal of work experience in interior design which she left to raise her family. After reciting all of this, Kay smiled and assured us, "I am only DULL on PAPER!" And this is very true--Kay is like champagne come to life.

BEST HINTS: I think TKGA would revoke my membership if I published too much information that might belong personally to the teachers, but I think I could divulge a few hints. Kay doesn't use bobbins. She cuts everything into 1-2 yard lengths and just runs her fingers through the strands to untangle them! She taught us a weaver's knot that is so strong and so small that it is easy and clean to add more yarn if you run out in an area. Kay's sweaters are neat as a pin on the back and breathtaking on the front. She did an intarsia that ran across the entire sweater from side to side and across the back in a design of a bookshelf with all the books, all the book titles in incredible detail. She added ribbons as bookmarks and found for buttons tiny ceramic books! Amazing, amazing.

History of Knitting, Janet Johnson Stephens
I love knitting history. Did you know the American Red Cross has reissued their World War II soldier sock pattern in a little kit? It comes in a little tin box with the pattern, olive drab wool yarn, and needles.

Janet started with the first knitting -- genre paintings of the Holy Family engaged in everyday activities, including the Madonna knitting in the round on five needles! Socks for Jesus!

Janet warned us that until very recently, many textile researchers misattributed knitting samples to weaving. (sigh)

In 1571, in order to encourage the home knitting industry, a proclamation was issued in England that everyone over the age of 6 must wear a hat on Sunday. Knitted, felted hats became very popular. Knitting guilds of the time required samples that demonstrated the members' proficiency be submitted, and many of the wonderful pieces on display in British museums are the result.

Janet also showed us her own collection of historical knitting and knitting tools. Oh, I love old needles! She had celluloid needles from the 1930's, sterling silver needles, tortoiseshell needles -- just wonderful.

Threads: A Journey with Laura Bryant, Laura Bryant
Have you seen Prism Yarns? Yummy, right? Laura Bryant designs and hand-dyes Prism Yarns from her workshop in Florida. She has had an amazing journey, but if you want to know all about it, you'll have to tune in later in the week...I took a six-hour color class from her and I have the swatches to prove it!

To be continued...

Pictures are *not* fun

Here I am, boldly going where every blogger has gone before...embedding pictures in my blog. Sometimes, it's not as easy as it looks. This is the sock yarn from my Secret Knitting Buddy! Hooray!

I continue to be obsessed by my two-sided double knitting. I have finished the border, but it's not pictureworthy yet. K1 P1, knit = front color, purl=back color. It isn't very impressive until there is enough done to flip up one corner so you can see the back is the negative of the front. I am designing the pattern as I go, too, so it is slow going. For the basic cat pattern, I am using a peyote stitch bead pattern I have. Should be cute!

I am the editor of our Hospital Auxiliary cookbook this year. Crock-pot recipes are the theme -- hmm... would rather knit than cook, maybe I'll stick in instructions for how to dye yarn instead!

Secret Knitting Buddy

THANK YOU Secret Knitting Buddy! Socks are my favorite, favorite thing and look at what I got in the mail on Friday! Fantastic! I have decided to try Wendy's toe-up socks for these beauties. (Sigh) I have to put the pics in the picture album because I am still trying to find instructions for how to post pics in the body of a message. Also check out my very first gift from my Secret Knitting Buddy, beautiful stitch/row markers! Buddy, I promise to figure out the picture posting thing so that these lovely things will be posted front and center for everyone to see! Thank you also to Sandy for hosting the Secret Knitting Buddies.

What I am currently obsessing upon, for unknown reasons, is double-sided knitting. It was a major knitting fad in the 1970's. The stitch pattern is always the same, K1 P1, but the knit stitch is always the color on the front side (whichever side is facing you), and the purl stitch is always the color on the back side. You end up with an extra thick piece of fabric with stockinette on both sides, and you can knit in two colors with both sides being the "right" side, only they are a negative image of each other! Well, this made me think of Critter Knit-A-Long, and I made up a pattern with a border and a cat sitting in the center. It has proven trickier than I thought, so my lovely socks will have to wait out this obsession.

I sent MY secret knitting buddy the Blackberry Ridge Dancing Violets Sock Kit. I don't know if she likes socks, but who could resist THESE? Nanette at Knitting in Color has finished one. Okay, I bought a kit for myself as well!

Stupid batteries...enough juice to TAKE pictures, not enough to upload them. I am truly camera-challenged...off to the store!

Couch Potato

Did not feel well this weekend, so got quite a bit done on my side-to-side up-and-down vest from Sally Melville's book. This is what I bought all that green yarn for! It works up very quickly in super bulky yarn and will be so cosy in those Midwest winters. But spring is in the air here! Pictures tonight...