Random Weekends

Over the past month or two I have had some very fine weekends.  Pennsylvania is a very good place to be in the Spring.

We were in Philadelphia several weeks ago.  In the first photo, you can see the office building where someone very close to me works.

Both of the sculptures were nearby.  The last one is in front of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University.  (I think that I should actually go there one day.  Another someone who is very close to me is a student at Drexel.)

But on that day in "Philly", we went to the Franklin Institute, and we saw their exhibition of actual artifacts from the Titanic.  Very interesting.

On another weekend, we revisited The Lands at Hillside Farms in Shavertown.

I really enjoyed the expansion in the number of restored green houses.  There was a weird kind of randomness to what was growing in there.  These are mostly succulants.

I took photos of some of the animals as we ate our ice cream.

Then came Father's Day weekend.  We had lunch at our favorite Mexican restaurant and dinner at our new favorite Italian one.  In between there was a boat ride at Harvey's Lake and a "Rattlesnake Roundup" in Noxen.  (Hard to believe that this was my second time to that particular event.  It is both weird and interesting... a little creepy... but a good time for people watching.)

This was a very hard post to write, to re-write, to edit (to finish, once it was started).  I do have a hard time deciding how much to reveal about my loved ones.  And I am not yet a total blogger because lots of things are happening all around me and I am not always taking photos! 


Photo Credit Franklin Institute:  https://plus.google.com/106251580418573776406/photos?hl=en
Photo Credit barn at Hillside Farms:  http://www.thelandsathillsidefarms.org/about-us/  

Colorwork Meditation #7

Josef Albers, Homage to Square, collection

Independent of harmony rules, any color 'goes' or 'works' with any other color, presupposing that their quantities are appropriate.   ~ Josef Albers

Photo credit: http://igetitart.com/tag/josef-albers/

Previous Colorwork Meditation: #6 (Ruskin)
 

Reds

Would you put these two reds together?

I plan to.

The colors are Crimson Red (left) and Garnet Red (right).

Two of the skeins are Reynolds Lite Lopi (which has been discontinued), and the other two are Ístex Létt-Lopi.  The Lite Lopi (one of each color) was leftover from this Fair Isle Zipper Sweater I made for my daughter more than three years ago.

I actually had a whole skein of each of these two colors left.  Though I do not think that I would ever have thought to put them together (just the two of them) I kind of like the total redness of the pair.  This fact came to me when I pulled them out for my Taiga #1 and #2.  (See them in my recent posts here and here.)  I used the crimson for my temporary crochet on Taiga #1 and the garnet for my actual crochet on Taiga #2.  My appreciation of their paired redness lead to my ordering another skein of each color from Webs.  They are all different dye lots, and in the case of the crimson, they are even two different color numbers.

I don't think that will matter.

I plan to make a simple vest, bottom up, using each skein of the garnet followed by each skein of the crimson.  I enjoy planning projects like this even when I do not know when I will get to them.  (It will not be any time soon.)

I am happy to have this redness to look forward to.
I love the honest purity and light woolen goodness of Lite Lopi.
These colors have really grown on me.

"If one says 'red' - the name of color - and there are fifty people listening, it can be expected that there will be fifty reds in their minds. And one can be sure that all these reds will be very different."   ~ Josef Albers

Super Sweet Blogger Award

I often feel like blogging is just a job that I must do.  As an aspiring knitwear designer, I feel that I must have at least this little bit of a presence (my own little corner) on the world wide web.  At other times, when I write a post that I am happy about, I have to admit that I do really enjoy it... blogging can be a very rewarding activity.  The second anniversary of my humble little blog is now approaching, and for the very first time I have been nominated for a blogger award.  I was very surprised to be nominated for something called the "Super Sweet Blogger Award" in a recent post by Linda Marveng.

Linda Marveng is an extremely talented and accomplished Norwegian knitwear designer.  (My link here is to her Ravelry designer page which is in English.  Please go see it!)  Her knitting book, To rett en vrang. Designstrikk, was published in January 2012, and is currently available only in Norwegian.  If I remember correctly, Linda and I first became acquainted, not so very long ago, when I favorited or commented on this design from her book.

© Kim Müller, from
To rett en vrang. Designstrikk

 I do very much love this design, Morbearsilkejakke,

 and I do hope to see it in English one day.

On being nominated, my thoughts were... what do I do now?  I know that I can answer the five questions, but I also know that I cannot, at this time, nominate twelve other blogs.  I regularly read many more than twelve blogs, but not so very many bloggers read mine.

I began by reading some of the blogs of the other nominees.  Some were in Norwegian (or other languages).  Most of the English language ones, even now, have not responded to being nominated.  But one blog in particular, "My Retiring Life", not only responded, but amazed me, with this post: "Everything goes so quickly for us..."  She, Tracy, included a complete description of the Grandfather Knitting Clock from a recent post by Linda Marveng.

To repeat, my Two (New) Great Blog recomendations:
Linda Marveng
My Retiring Life

Now onto the five questions.  Let me be brief.

1.  Cookies or cake?  I really do not eat very much of either.  But when I am at a wedding, a baptism or first communion celebration, a graduation, or even a birthday party, I always eat a couple bites of the cake.  I feel like it is just good manners.  Cake it is.
2.  Chocolate or vanilla?  Chocolate!
3.  Favorite sweet treat?  I do eat chocolate.  My current favorites are Ghirardelli Intense Dark Sea Salt Soiree Bar (with sea salt and roasted almonds) and Lindt Excellence A Touch of Sea Salt Dark Chocolate Bar.
4.  When do you get hit with cravings?  Mid to late afternoon.
5.  Sweet nickname?  I do not have one.  My father had the nickname "Sweets" at work, so I guess I am "Sweets' Daughter".

Tracy, of My Retiring Life, nominated only four blogs.  She said that she had the option of nominating up to a baker's dozen.  I was glad that I read that, because I knew that I could not nominate twelve.

I will nominate six.  I enjoy reading them all.  I know that only some of these bloggers read my blog.  I do hope that anyone I nominate will participate only if they really want to!

Black Bunny Fibers

Blue Peninsula

My Next 20 Years of Living

Spinning First

Swatch Diaries

The Rainey Sisters

A Crocheted Steek & Other Taiga Mods

As I was saying in my last post "Taiga #1 and Taiga #2", I made several modifications to a sample Taiga Cowichan vest/cardigan that I knit for
Gosh Yarn It!  I then wrote up the modifications and taught a three session class at GYI which ended in early May.

Class 1 -- Why?  and how to start and how to steek.

Why?  Creating a steek for the colorwork, allows you to knit the stranded Fair Isle in the round, which is so much easier than knitting it back and forth.  (If you followed the Taiga pattern without this steek modification, you would be purling every other colorwork row with your floats in front.)

You might ask, why not knit the entire body in the round?  I would answer that while that is not a bad idea, I did not want to lead (five) students through so very many changes (in a few different sizes).  I would pretty much have to re-write the entire pattern.  My greater goal was to provide a kind of quick-and-easy steeking experience, and to share the whys and hows of the knitting modifications that I made.

I considered that the steek stitches would be like a front facing after the garment was finished, and I decided to extend this facing from top to bottom.  We added stitches (3 on each side) for the front facings beginning with the neck cast on.  In the photo these facing stitches are on each end beyond the red stitch markers.
 

Until we got to the colorwork, the facing stitches were the only modification.  At the start of the colorwork, one additional stitch was cast on to become the middle of the (7 stitch) steek.  Then the work was joined to knit in the round.  Steek stitches are more secure if you alternate colors in vertical stripes or in a checkerboard pattern.

After the last colorwork row, the center stitch was bound off.  After one row, we turned the work and returned to knitting back and forth for the waist shaping rows.

Class 2 -- About the pockets... and be ready for steek cutting next time.

The "pocket facings" were knit next with the 3 extra stitches at each front edge.  After they were finished and placed on a waste yarn, the back began with casting on 17 (20 less 3) stitches for "pocket linings" on each side.  Before we began our lower ribbing, we knit the bottoms of the pockets closed (much like you would when working a 3 needle bind off).  This knitting together begins with the 7th stitch from the edge of front facing and the first stitch of the pocket lining.

The bottom ribbing also had 3 extra front facing stitches on each end of row.  The students worked to finish the ribbing before Class 3.  For the sleeves, they were on their own, and could work on them before or after Class 3.

Class 3 -- Crocheted steek, and cutting the steek!

When I made Taiga #1, I first worked my crocheted steek with red yarn (for some instructional photos) and later replaced it with purple.  My first instruction to my students was... Find the center stitch of steek.  You may mark it with a pin.  We will be crocheting half of this stitch to half of the adjacent stitch on each side.  We will work from right to left.

With hook in position shown above, notice that it is inserted through half of a purple stitch and half of the green center stitch, you will first pull through a loop with your crochet yarn.  Insert hook in next two half-stitches. Pull a loop of crochet yarn through them and the crochet yarn (all yarns on hook).

When we reach the end, we will rotate the piece and work back.

It is fairly easy to pull the crochet to each side for cutting.

Four students cut their steeks in class that day!  I am very proud of all of my students.

To end the class we went over the basic finishing including the front bands.  I told the students to carefully determine a correct number of stitches to pick up for bands.  I like to pick up 3 stitches for every 4 rows.  (I would not pick up one stitch in each row as the pattern suggests.)  You could also measure how many stitches are in one inch of your previous ribbing, and then calculate  a total number of band stitches using a length-in-inches measurement of the front.

We discussed the sleeves in a general way.  Some students had seen long sleeves on some Ravelry projects and at least one Raveler wrote about how she had made hers.  Ravelry is such an endless source of information.   

I am very glad to end this post, because I really must put my Taiga #2 away.  It is 90 degrees outside!  When I resume work on it this fall, I can post about my long sleeves (I knit them after the last class) and the zipper that I plan to sew into the front.

[ETA:  I eventually posted in February 2014 about the sleeves, and in April 2014 about the zipper.] 

Taiga #1 and Taiga #2

As I mentioned in my February post, My Current Pallete, I taught a three session class on colorwork and steeking at Gosh Yarn It! in April and early May.  The class project was a modified Taiga Cowichan vest/cardigan, by Svetlana Volkova.  I named the class sample Taiga #1.

Taiga #1

I am a lover of all Fair Isle knitting, and have taught several beginner and intermediate Fair Isle Classes.  It was suggested that I create a more advanced Fair Isle class for Gosh Yarn It! that would include steeking.

When I saw some Taiga project pages on Ravelry mentioning the use of a steek just for the colorwork rows, I realized this might be the right project for the class. 

I was also attracted to using this pattern because it requires bulky weight yarn, making it a quicker knit for a multi-session type class. Most students would be able to keep up and be ready for each session. 

As I knit the sample, I took notes on my modifications.  I typed up all of my notes and added photos in order to make a couple of multi-page handouts for my students.

I began my Taiga #2 as I started teaching the class so that I could show the work in progress.  This Taiga is one that I will keep for myself.

Taiga #2

You can see that my Taiga #2 is not yet finished.  But it is getting much too warm here to work on a bulky weight (and, yes, long sleeved) cardigan.  I thought that before I put it away for a summer hibernation, I would write here summarizing my modifications, and include some photos.

Change in plan.

This post will be way too long by the time I mention all the mod's with photos... so stay tuned, until next time...

In Keeping...

...with flags, here is something that my Aunt F gave to me yesterday.

She did the machine embroidery with her Brother sewing machine.  The machine has at least a couple dozen designs in its memory.  Last month my Aunt F, who does not live far from me, called and asked me to stop by to help her download several holiday designs that she purchased online.  I was glad that I could help.  She is also my godmother.  She has lung cancer, and is doing well for now, but like she says, "I still have cancer." 

This is the towel she gave to me just a week after I had helped her.  It was shortly before Easter.

I will treasure these towels for the rest of my life.  I have been thinking about my Aunt F...

Though I have long felt that I was most inspired to live-to-create by my parents and my paternal grandmother (who sadly are no longer with me) my Aunt F (who is my father's sister) has also lived a life in keeping...

Like me, she "just likes to make things".  Her illness may have slowed her down, but she keeps on...  I so love that.
      

Midweek Meditation

"Do something, do something to that, and then do something to that."   
             ~  Jasper Johns, American contemporary artist, born May 15, 1930.

Flag, encaustic over a collage, 1954-55.

"In the place where I was a child, there were no artists and there was no art, so I really didn't know what that meant. I think I thought it meant that I would be in a situation different than the one that I was in."

Detail of Flag (1954-55). This image illustrates Johns' early technique of painting with thick, dripping encaustic over a collage made from found materials such as newspaper.

"I have no ideas about what the paintings imply about the world. I don't think that's a painter's business. He just paints paintings without a conscious reason."


Photo credits:
http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4243628742988805386#editor/target=post;postID=2279236680656121072;onPublishedMenu=allposts;onClosedMenu=allposts;postNum=0;src=postname
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Jasper_Johns,_Flag_%28detail%29.jpg