Home Again, Spin Again!

Returning home (well, Jaime's home) was such a relief. I didn't drive one bit but even still, as soon as we got home, I collapsed into bed and slept for two hours. And those two hours gave me the strength I needed to kitchener stitch up the toe of the completed sock and ply 8 ounces of yarn. Whuff!

Behold, the sock!

Ignore my goofy toddler-shaped feets.

Yes, one sock. The other is in progress and at the rate I knit socks it should be done in time for next winter. And that'll be nice because this is an absurdly warm sock. I knit it out of Patons Kroy Sock on US 1 (2.5mm) needles. I'm a tight knitter and that sock is about 7200 tiny stitches, making them very thick socks indeed. It's 72F (22C) outside... my foot is sweltering.

I spun and spun and spun and produced 500 yards of beautiful 2-ply fingering yarn, spun from fluffy romney sheepies grown here in North Carolina.

Again, my feets.

It's currently in two skeins of roughly the same size but I'm thinking I might split it into 5 100 yard mini skeins and dye each skein a different shade of blue. I'm imagining a beautiful, lacy gradient shawl, going from pale to dark blue.

... after I finish this sock.

Intrepid Knitting Part 3

On the way home we took the longish way and enjoyed 34 miles of Skyland Drive, a scenic bit of highway with lots of little places to stop and enjoy the views. It was a bit cold - the mountains still have snow and the wind was fierce but the sock still had a good time.

The sock even spied a kinsman down on the rocks. We considered a rescue mission but thought better of it - it was pretty far down and who's to say the sock wasn't just resting in the middle of its own hiking trip? Meanwhile, I got exactly three feet up the Appalachian trail before I tripped. There are no pictures of that (I hope). 

Intrepid Knitting Part 2

Have you read everything the Yarn Harlot has ever written? Of course you have! But in case you've temporarily forgotten... she goes on at length about her rather poetic feelings about the humble sock and how she likes to show her socks a little bit of the world before they get stuffed into a pair of shoes. A fair amount of her (awesome) blog is taking pictures of places she takes her sock knitting. I think that's pretty cool, so when the youngish man swept me off on an excursion this weekend, I was excited to show my socks a little bit of the world. This has nothing to do with me spending half a king's ransom on sock yarn this weekend and needing to get really, really into knitting socks to justify it. It may have something to do with my desire to both knit and prove to the youngish man that I was thoroughly enjoying myself on this birthday excursion1 .

Shortly after parking the car and working out our sleeping arrangements, we went for a stroll along the Hawksbill River Greenway. It was a really cute greenway with lots of literature and small bits of historical rubble and I wanted to show all of these things to the sock... Unfortunately, there were also lots of ducks. It must be close to duck mating season because, uh... there were unspeakable things happening along that river. It seemed best to protect the sock's delicate sensibilities and also I wasn't in the mood to embark on a career of amateur pornography so I kept my camera tucked away.

After a fabulous meal at the Mimslyn Inn, we retired in order to be properly ready for our adventure the next day - heading deep into the Luray Caverns. These are limestone caverns and I don't want to get into a frothy rant but limestone is one of my pet passions, left over from my concrete and cementitious materials research. It was a good choice of excursions for my youngish man to surprise me with... though I have to admit I was less interested in the prettiness or the size of the various formations and more interested in what they implied, chemically and geologically speaking. I *mostly* kept my mouth shut and didn't chatter too much about crystalline structures, erosion, or precipitation of minerals. Especially since the poor tour guide was being constantly pestered by an excited teenaged boy with no concept of personal space and a million questions.

The sock has simpler tastes and was awe-struck by the natural beauty of the caverns.

And made vaguely hungry by this slab of "Cave Bacon"

And hungrier by these fried eggs!

One of the unique things about the Luray Caverns is its stalactite organ. A series of rubber mallets on wires are strung throughout a large cavern and, when played, the mallet strikes a stalactite to play a note. They are, I think, 36 or 39 notes and they echo, slightly warped and haunting, from all directions. It's very beautiful but it made me feel uneasy, for reasons I can't quite explain. I kept staring at the components while the song was played and watching the mineral rich water dripping on the mallets and wires. I thought about how it would be if people were to move away from these caverns - the water would drip and drip on these components, until new mineral formations grew around them. The notes change very slowly as the stalactites grow - about a cubic inch in a hundred years. Hundreds of years from now would archaeologists or explorers find the remains of this organ and play the warped, out of tune notes?

The plaque next to the organ talks about man's genius and god's hand being in perfect harmony. But I spend a lot of my time thinking about the cost of progress, the implications of our decisions and the damage we're doing. These caves are carved from limestone, the skeletal remains of ancient sea creatures. We take that limestone and we grind it up and cook it at 1450 degrees until it releases a single carbon dioxide molecule. We use the resulting calcium oxide as the primary ingredient in cement. Every ton of cement produced releases about a ton of CO2 into the atmosphere. We have built our civilization on top of and out of that cement, filling our atmosphere with the last breath of ancient creatures. It is hard to believe that we're living in perfect harmony with anything right now.

1. There are strange, sad people in the world who think that knitting distracts from your ability to participate in and enjoy the world. They are wrong. Knitting soothes nerves and allows the knitter to enter a Zen-like state where only joy and serenity exists. Unless the knitting is on a deadline, then all bets are off.

Intrepid Knitting Part 1

This weekend my youngish man took me on a surprise excursion for my birthday.

Boys and girls... I loathe surprises. I try to be a pretty outgoing person and to take a great deal of joy in the moment I find myself in... but still I loathe surprises. I dislike surprise parties. I don't like it when people show up unexpectedly. Heck, I prefer to know exactly what my presents will be. I'm not a surprise kind of girl. I had recently filled two bobbins with 4 ounces each (227 grams total) with the finest singles I have yet spun. It took hours of work - combing the wool, pre-drafting, and learning the new wheel's quirks so that I could get something fairly consistent. I was so looking forward to plying these two singles together into a beautiful fingering yarn that I packed my new spinning wheel to the youngish man's house. The new one. You know.. the expensive and delicate one? The one that's meant to live at home and be delicately cherished while my sturdy and reliable Louet travels? So excited was I about my plying that I also packed 4 ounces of beautiful blue kettle dyed roving I'd made a couple weeks back.

So when the youngish man revealed to me that we'd be driving two and a half hours off to some unknown destination for activities unspecified (despite constant questioning), it was hard for me to be properly excited and grateful to my thoughtful boyfriend. I began to feel better when we arrived at the Knit Wit Yarn Shop in Sperryville, VA.

Like an oasis in the desert...

Knit Wit's had the most glorious selection of sock yarns. Opal, Trekking, Saki Silk, local handspun... It all went straight to my head and I could barely restrain myself from buying everything with a hint of blue in it. They even carried all my favourite needle brands. I wandered around fondling everything before I finally settled on some little notions for Jackie and two matching balls of Saki Silk sock yarn (a mix of wool, nylon, and silk) so we can make matching socks.

© rmethvin

... Assuming I let her have one.

Giving the (Terrible) Gift of Needles

I recently sent Jackie a set of interchangeable circular knitting needles. This is just a terrible gift to give someone. Terrible. Do you love a knitter? Don't do this. A person's preference in knitting needles is an intimate and wildly personal thing and you'd be hard pressed to find a pair of knitters who will agree on what the perfect needles are for any given project. Some people like sharp needles, some people like blunt. Different people like different sorts of material - wood, bamboo, brass, aluminum, nickel, chrome. A knitter may like a brand of needle when they are fixed circulars but hate the joins for the interchangeable circulars. And what they like may change wildly depending on whether they're knitting socks or, say, a sweater. Or on the material they're knitting. Unless you know exactly what your knitter likes, you should never try to surprise them with needles. Never, ever, ever.

I did it anyway.

But! I have an explanation for my foolish and reckless behaviour! See back when I first started knitting, I bought a set of Knitter's Pride Dreamz interchangeable needles - which are colourful wooden things - and sat back to wait for them to arrive, content that with one good purchase I was never going to need to buy needles ever again. (I'll wait while all you knitters laugh hysterically. I was a sweet, sweet summer child.) Alright, while I was waiting for my Dreamz I got itchy, wanting to start all the projects I'd lined up in my Ravelry queue. and it turned out a local yarn store was going out of business so before I knew it... I had bought two pair of circular needles and a pile of yarn. Only at the time I didn't realize how different needles can be so I'd just bought needles that the store had in a size and colour that I liked. Not liking a lot of colour, this meant I walked out with two Addi Turbo knitting needles which were brass needles with nickel plating and a very flexible blue (there's that blue fetish showing again) cord. I didn't realize at the time that I'd accidentally bought some of the more expensive needles in the world or that this would doom me forever.

See, the Addi Turbos are very, very slippery needles and also a little blunt and I spent two weeks knitting feverishly on them. When my wooden Dreamz needles arrived I quickly tried them out and discovered a couple things. First, they're really sticky. Wood has more "grip" to it than ultra slippery nickel plating. This can be good for some kinds of knitting but I'm a tight knitter and going from the Addi Turbos to the Dreamz felt like trying to knit in quick sand. Second, I'm also what's called a "pusher". It's this terrible habit where you use your finger to push against the needle while you slide more stitches forward. This wasn't a problem with my blunt Addi Turbo needles but the Dreamz needles were sharp enough to *hurt*. It's a terrible habit and I need to break it but dang... those needles broke my heart. I really wanted to love them.

Eventually I discovered the Addi Turbo Clicks - a set of staggeringly expensive (I'll wait while you laugh again) interchangeable needles with the blunt, slippery Addi Turbo feel I'd grown to love and a particularly clever spring join system (upside, it doesn't come undone while knitting. Downside, it can be obnoxious to get the join lined up, especially if your eyes aren't as young as they used to be). After a lot of agonizing I bought them and proceeded to be deliriously happy with my purchase. I'm not saying I sleep with them cuddled in my arms... but the Theo cat is suddenly sleeping at the foot of the bed and is wearing a distinctly disgruntled face.

While comparing toys with Jackie over Christmas, I discovered that she uses a set of Boye interchangeable circular needles which... uh... are the subject of some controversy in the knitting world. They have their pros and cons.

They are inexpensive, aluminum needles which are colour coded by size. The best thing they have going for them is they go all the way down to 2.5 mm (US 2) needle size in the default purchase case. A lot of interchangeable sets only go down to a US size 4 or maybe 3 because they are limited by the size of the join mechanism. So that's a major plus for the Boyes. On the downside the cables are really stiff, the needles often unscrew themselves in the middle of your knitting, and on the really small sizes the cable can be larger than the needle itself making for some very awkward knitting. So those are some major negatives for the Boyes.

Jackie had mentioned an interest in learning to knit with the Magic Loop technique (which I'd stumbled into by accident when I owned one circular needle that was about 8 inches too long for my bag) and the stiff cable of the Boyes doesn't lend itself well to that. Though I'm told you can do some creative DIY stuff to use your beloved Boye needles for Magic Loop - including making your own cords. Crazy.

So when I found someone online who wanted to trade two sets of Knit Picks Options needles for a set of wooden needles, I went to do some research. The Knit Picks Options are very similar to my beloved Addi Turbos in that they are brass needles with a very slippery nickel plating, but they have sharper tips and use a screw join. They're also compatible with Knitter's Pride cords allowing you to sort of pick and mix your accessories. So I decided to go for it and traded my Dreamz for the two identical sets of needles and set one to my lovely stepmother Jackie. Even though it's a terrible, terrible idea to give someone knitting needles... if she didn't like them I would happily take them back and cuddle them until they felt better. I also sent her an Addi Sock Rocket on a 60in cord in her favourite sock knitting size. I'll gush about the Sock Rockets some other time but they are my absolute favourites and the long flexible cord means you can do two at a time socks, which I knew Jackie wanted to try. And again, if she didn't like it - I'd take it back! Clever girl, no?

There was a brief moment of hysteria when I found out Jackie is allergic to nickel. But it turns out her fingers are tough enough that she can use the needles without problems. If you have allergies though, your mileage may vary - some people are fine and some people get itching and swelling and all sorts of problems. She's raved about the sock rockets and after decades of aluminum dpns announced that she's never doing socks any other way again.

... It doesn't look like I'm going to get those Options needles back either. :P

Accidentally On Purpose

I accidentally bought a spinning wheel last week. I blame Jackie can't really blame anyone but myself.

Despite the fact that I am an indecently lucky lady with a beautiful Louet S60 spinning wheel that my lovely and generous stepmother Jackie gave me for Christmas...

Seen here being guarded by very grumpy cats who would prefer I pet them rather than spin.

My Louet is a wonderful wheel and I adore it. It's so sturdy and well made that I don't hesitate to put it in the car for a trip to a guild meeting or to spend the weekend with my fellow. It's also an fantastic workhorse. The bobbins are enormous - I've run out of the will to spin before filling one but I've been told a single bobbin will hold up to 250g (nearly 9 ounces!) depending on how you spin.. That's fantastic - I kept getting frustrated with Jackie's Ashford Traditional because the bobbins filled up so darn fast (they hold about 100g or 3-4 oz). Louis has an upright posture that's easy on my back and the broad single treadle allows me to easily work the wheel with either or both of my feet and my legs never get tired when I'm using it.

But it's an Irish Tension wheel - I can explain this in detail some other time but the long and short of it is that it's much better suited to doing thick yarns. This doesn't mean I can't spin fine, delicate threads on it - I absolutely can. It just takes more work than it did on the Ashford Traditional - a Scotch Tension wheel - that I originally learned on. So I've been playing around with the idea of acquiring an Ashford Traditional if I could find one that didn't cost too much.

Right about when I was considering a desperate 13 hour drive to pick up a wheel that the seller would absolutely not ship... Jackie asked me to pick up a wheel for her. If my life were a movie, this would have queued the ominous, dramatic music. Jackie's been looking for a wheel for a friend of hers and found a Kromski Prelude. I was already plotting against Jackie when she asked me to get it, I knew there was a possibility that I'd want to keep it after using it for a month and she said that'd be alright. I almost changed my mind when I picked it up because the seller had bought it as a toy and not loved it properly. It'd barely been spun on, dinged up quite a bit over a couple years, and hadn't been oiled since dinosaurs walked the earth (approximately).

Still I wanted to play with it! So I rolled my sleeves up, got out some oil, and got to work. I oiled everything that moved, reseated some connections, tightened some bolts... and after a couple hours she was spinning silky smooth.

And by golly is she ever a beauty.

The Prelude is an interesting piece. It has a smaller footprint than the Ashford Traditional and the orifice seems taller, which is easier on my back. It doesn't feel as stable as the Traditional and is more inclined to hyper dog-related upsets. But the bobbins are larger (I've heard claims of a 120g or 4.2 ounce capacity. I put 4 ounces on one bobbin last night without a lot of effort to pack it carefully and it's still got loads of room) and there are really solid ratios. One of the things I love is that, like the Louet wheels, the Kromski wheels all use the same bobbins... so if later I wanted to add another Kromski to my herd (*cough*pay the mortgage first*cough*), I know they'd be compatible.

I'm such a trouble maker...

Last night I was talking with my dad on the phone (I'm a total daddy's girl, we talk several times a week) about knitting my boyfriend a hand towel.

That's his favourite colour.

I'm slowly edging my way into knitting for my boyfriend - we've only been dating three months and I'm not sure how knitworthy he is.

"What's knitworthy?" asked my father. And I explained - knitting takes a fair amount of work and the yarn isn't exactly free so if you're going to knit for someone you want to know they're worth it. And you don't want to get crazy, knitting for an significant other, until you know they're going to stick around.

"Oh," said my dad. And there was a long pause in the conversation.

"What, um. What has Jackie knit for you?"

"One pair of socks."

Now socks are a labour of love, boys and girls and nothing to sneeze at. But surely a husband of more than a decade is worth more than a pair of socks? Well, that must be what my father thought because today at work I got a text message from my (lovely, wonderful, talented) stepmother...

"Because of you, your dad wants me to knit for him!!"

Apparently he has a list of things he wants - a hat, mittens, a scarf.

"Are you going to give in to his demands?" I asked.

"Not yet."

Pass me the popcorn! I can't wait to see what happens next. :D