The Portland area loves visitors — most of all visitors who will settle in and stay for awhile, enriching the community. And ones that can dig their toes into our mud and enjoy our rain are much appreciated.

I’m not sure if This little flock of geese is a hold-over from those who headed for sunnier climes last fall, or if they belong to a group who headed north a bit out of season, but they don’t appear to be bothered by our gray drizzle.

The topography around where I live features a couple of small mountains and some gently rolling hills divided by marshy streams and small, mostly man-made, lakes. Quite a few ducks and geese of different sorts find the area a fine place to hang out for the summer and raise their kids. I have seen busy, rush-hour traffic come to a halt while mom and dad goose herded their little goslings across a busy 5-lane avenue. And no one seemed at all annoyed. In how many cities would that be the case?

~Kristie asks:

I’ve been noticing that whenever you knit socks that have YO’s, you usually replace it with a M1. Is this because you live in a cooler climate & the lace look would let in cool air, or is it the “look” of lacy socks you don’t prefer? Just wondering.

I had to think about this question for awhile.

It’s not the climate. It’s really not that cold here, usually. And wool socks are warm – even when they feature holes.

I love the look of lace. One of my favorite pair of store-bought socks were cotton lace anklets that I wore year-round until they were totally beyond any further help and, with heavy heart, I was forced to retire them.

I love to knit lace. Two of my unfinished objects are lace projects. They are not unfinished because I don’t enjoy knitting them. It’s just that I got… distracted.

I do knit lace socks. I offer as proof the Mermaid socks I knit for #1 Son’s friend and the Tipsy Knitter socks from last year.

So why don’t I knit more of them?

Sometimes it is because of the look I’m going for. Would the Rooster Feathers look so feathery or the Snake River Socks have that lovely faux-cable look if I had used YOs instead of M1s?

I think the real reason, though, is because socks are for me the meat-and-potatoes of knitting. Not something I really need to think about. Mindless knitting in a small package that I can carry around and whip out whenever I have a few minutes and want to keep my hands busy. Lace, while beautiful, adds a certain amount of necessary thoughtfulness. When looking for a stitch pattern for the next pair of socks, I usually skip the lace patterns because those will be harder and require thinking. Which is a silly excuse, of course, as there are many lovely lace patterns that are easily memorized and have short repeats. And, while I wouldn’t want to knit lace in the dark as I could with a simple ribbed pattern, I’m not often knitting in the dark anyway.

I need to branch out more.

And this is the perfect book to dip into for a little inspiration.

Jane Sowerby’s extensive research into Victorian-era lace knitting patterns has culminated in this gorgeous book of modernized patterns and lace history. The samples are knit in bright modern colors – hot pink, acid green, periwinkle blue – that fairly glow on the page. Alexis Xenakis used locations in and around Cambridge for his photography. The artiness of some of the shots is in no way obtrusive.

The primarily-charted patterns are mostly rectangular shawls and scarves with knitted-on boarders. I would characterize them as being of easy to advanced intermediate level. There is plenty here that’s accessible to the beginning lace knitter. I don’t think the patterns are as complex as some of those in Meg Swansen’s A Gathering of Lace.

My one quibble is that there is no general index of all of the patterns. It’s a small quibble, as I don’t mind leafing through the book again and again and again. But it’s annoying if I’m looking for something specific and can’t remember what section it was in.

If you are one of the few knitters who has not dipped into Victorian Lace Today, please do treat yourself to a viewing.

Confidential to #1 Son: I’m quite pleased and proud of you. Reading the review in the Wweek Local Cut was a treat. I do have a bone to pick with you about that last paragraph, though. The way I remember the conversation, it went more like this:

#1 Son: We’re going on tour.

Mom: I’m not too happy with you doing that. But I’m not sure you would listen if I said no.

#1 Son: I would go anyway.

Mom: That’s what I suspected. Please be very careful and stay safe. I love you and I want you to come home happy and healthy.

Yeah. It’s that post. The one where I look back on everything I did last year, bemoan the things I didn’t do, and resolve to get in gear during the coming year.

I actually finished quite a few things:

• 14 pairs of socks
• 7 pair-of-socks bookmarks
• 6 hats
• 1 pair of gloves
• 1 lace shawl

Even if all of the bookmarks are counted as one object, that’s still nearly two finished objects per month. That’s not too bad, if I do say so myself.

The 2006 FO list has been removed from the sidebar, and a new list and new gallery for 2007 have been started. Nothing in them yet, but I’m working on it.

There are unfinished objects over in the sidebar. Sadly enough, a couple of them were unfinished last year at this time. But since both are items that I’d really like to have, I will keep slogging away at them.

This is a bronze Roman key, made sometime in the 1st to 3rd centuries AD (or CE). It was most likely made to fit a small chest or casket that stored valuables.

Who was it that used this key? Did it belong to a woman? The wife of a merchant? The daughter of a general? Did the casket break and the key was thrown away? Was it lost and searched for but never found?

What secrets and treasures did the little chest guard? Jewelry? The spices of the Orient? Important papers? Plots against the emperor? (several of the more interesting ones fall in that time period) Plans for conquering the rest of the known world? A precious book?

Dare I say it… yarn? (ok, ok… I know that knitting hadn’t been invented yet, but spinning and weaving had)

Let’s go back 2000 years and use this key… unlock the chest… peak inside… what do you see?

The key is strung on a chain because I am wearing it as a pendant to remind myself that things that are locked away and hidden may be safe, but they are also not of much immediate use. This year I resolve to look for hidden treasures to be unlocked.

Yesterday dawned clear and warm – just demanding that the day be spent outdoors. How many more days like this will we get?

And, conveniently, yesterday was the second day of the Oregon Flock & Fiber Festival in Canby.

What great timing, eh? So I had a wonderful fiberish day, starting with a whole barn full of fiber-on-the-hoof. And now my city-girl roots will show. (I had horses when I was a kid, but I do not pretend to know anything at all about other kinds of farm animals. I went to the country to ride my horse – she lived in a farmer’s field – and then I went back to the city. OK… the town.)

This happy goat owner was kind enough to let me pet her friend – who apparently really likes both people and cookies. I fantasized about taking this boy home to serve as a bed-warmer on those cold winter nights. Can you imagine running your toes through that lovely cashmere all night? The owner helpfully suggested that the horns would also keep the blankets from weighing down my feet. I doubt that the resident kitties would appreciate a new bed-buddy, though. Alas my fantasy had to be abandoned.

And then there were these lovelies. Look at all that beautiful angora! Doesn’t it make you want to grab your needles and start knitting?

OK… I know there’s a bit of prep work that needs to be done before this fiber is ready for the needles. And since I’m not a spinner I rely on others to do that prep for me. But I am aware of all of the work that goes into it.

Later in the day, as I sat knitting socks and listening to music, one of my fellow fair-goers stopped to chat and ask about my sock techniques. She is a spinner, and has been spinning fingering-weight yarn lately. She hasn’t knit socks for years, but wants to try again. She was interested in my two-socks-on-two-needles knitting. I taught her the Magic Cast-On and asked her about spinning. Oh, she said, If you think you can spend money now…

We both laughed, but she’s right in that I probably don’t really need another money-sucking fun hobby.

And lest you think, gentle reader, that I’m fixated on goats, here are some lovely Jacob sheep. Who wouldn’t fall in love with their spotty beauty and those amazing horns?

It was dark in the barn, and my pictures of the alpaca, the other wonderful kinds of sheep (there was merino, just walking around!), and the bunnies weren’t very successful.

I can report that no living creature so resembles a tribble as an angora rabbit does. With some of them it was hard to tell which end was which! Both ends, though, are covered with amazingly soft fur. They would make good feet warmers, too.

I do think there were fewer animals and more vendors than last year. I hope that’s not a trend, as I really like the animals. Actually, it would be great to have a ton of animals and a ton of vendors.

For those who prefer their fiber a little more processed, there were two buildings crammed to the gills with all things fibery, from bags of fleece to roving to silk to yarn.

Want a new spindle? There were several booths with gorgeous spindles. Organic, natural-color cotton? Nostepinne? Books? Cashmere socks? Lace shawls? It was all here.

And yarn… yarn of every fiber that could possibly be spun. Yarn of every weight from the finest cobweb to the heaviest bulky. Yarn for knitting, yarn for weaving, yarn for crewel, yarn for tatting — yarn just for the sake of yarn. What more could a yarn collector ask for?

I knew I was in heaven.

Of course, one of the first booths I came across was Blue Moon.

Did you know that Sock Candy comes in about a gazillion solid colors? That whole rack in the front is all Sock Candy.

Look, under the windows… that’s all Socks That Rock. All of it. In three different weights. In amazing colors that I’ve never seen before and that aren’t available on their web site. (I don’t belong to the sock club, and some of these colors might have been introduced there.)

I’m sorry for the blurry nature of the picture. My hands may have been shaking. Just a little.

Outside there was sunshine, food, spinners, spinners and more fiber.

A whole circle of spinners – both women and men – sat in the shade under the trees doing cool things with their wheels. There were spinners everywhere. See at the table? Someone spinning with a drop-spindle.

Everywhere I looked there were spinners. I kept thinking I’d really like to know how to do that. It looks so cool! Thus my comments about learning to spin to the fair-goer who asked about my socks.

But one hobby is probably enough.

Music at OFFF this year was provided by The Standing Stones from the Bay Area.

They played songs from their CD Give Fleece A Chance, an international collection of songs about sheep, shearing, wool, spinning, weaving, and all other things sheepy. Shearing songs on harp. It was great!

Unfortunately I missed actually getting the CD. I was busy knitting and talking. Several people came over to ask me about my socks. One woman asked if I was knitting two socks at once in order to make sure they striped the same. I looked at the randomly-striping Trekking and thought to myself that if that were the case I wasn’t succeeding very well. Out loud, to the vast amusement of those around, I told the truth: I do it this way because I would never otherwise knit the second sock.

When I finished chatting, I noticed that the music had stopped. I turned around and the band was gone. I looked for a website for them, but can’t find one. If anyone knows where to get this CD, please pass the info along to me. It would be was great music to knit by!

One more picture from the fair. And sorry that this picture turned out so badly. Forgive my horrible photography, please.

On the left… a sheep. On the right… a dog.

Notice that, although they are the same color and have almost the same length of pelt, the dog is about 10 times bigger than the sheep.

That dog is bigger than some of the alpaca I saw in the barn.

That is easily the biggest dog I have ever seen in real life.

It was a very nice, dog. Very mellow. I was tempted to ask the owner if she shears him yearly, but I restrained myself. And, before you ask, the sheep was being led around on a leash and didn’t seem to mind at all. A most satisfying end to a most satisfying afternoon.

On the way home, I took the opportunity to ride the Canby Ferry.

I’m a sucker for ferries.

It’s only a short ride across the Willamette River. But I still think it’s fun. And at $1.25 per one-way ticket, it’s a pretty cheap amusement. I held the camera out the window of my car to take this picture. I was first in line so I’m right at the front of the ferry. See how beautiful it was on the river?

Now… Last year I didn’t buy anything at OFFF. I was so overwhelmed by all of the yarn, that I couldn’t choose showed admirable restraint by coming home empty handed.

This year…

There might have been just a tiny, tiny, wee amount of stash enhancement.

At the bottom on the left are a hank of cobweb-thin angora lace weight and a hank of merino lace weight. There is about 1300 yards of each, so there’s plenty enough for a couple of really nice shawls.

At the bottom on the right is bulky weight organic, naturally colored cotton. The color washed out in the picture. In real life it’s a bulky strand of something between an ecru mixed with celery wrapped by a thin strand of cream. It’s unbelievably soft. I haven’t decided what to do with this yet. I have about 270 yards. Maybe a hat, or a scarf?

All of the rest is sock yarn, and so doesn’t count. It’s for the yarn collection, y’know. And if it seems like there’s a preponderance of Blue Moon yarns represented… yeah… well…

You know that old saying about living in interesting times. Yeah…

My life always seems to oscillate wildly (and widely) between the same-old same-old and running full-steam-ahead like there’s no tomorrow. I’d really love to learn how to strike a happy medium, but I’m not really holding my breath that will ever happen.

First, there has been some knitting going on!

The Victoria Socks are finally finished! (I’ve only been home from Victoria for what… a month? sigh In what passes for normal circumstances, I can knit a pair of socks in a week or 10 days or so. At least a pair for me – my feet aren’t that big.

But I did stop to become obsessed by the Swallowtail Shawl. But still, these socks took longer than normal to finish.

I wanted to get a natural-light picture, but two things stood in my way:
1) I’ve rarely been home during daylight the last few weeks.
2) Autumn has returned to the Pacific Northwest, at least for now, killing any light I might have used had I been home.

These colors are pretty true, though — at least on my monitor (maybe a touch too blue). They will be were bright and cheerful to wear on dreary winter days during the current blast of autumnal chill. I can tell that these will be a favorite pair of socks.

To guard against any knitting slow-down, as soon as I finished the Victoria Socks I immediately cast on a pair for #1 Son. He likes his socks to be fraternal, so I am knitting these from both ends of the skein.

This is Trekking XXL in colorway 101. I’ve actually gotten a couple of inches beyond this. But we’ll start with this pic, so you will be duly impressed by my progresses when next I report. (or at least that’s my hope)

I think it’s rather fitting that the other night as I knit away, Moo Cow had unbeknown to me crept under my chair and one strand of Trekking had fallen within her grasp. My first clue was a slobbering, smacking, chomping sound. I hauled up the yarn and found it neatly – and wetly – sliced in two. So #1 Son’s socks have a join in the yarn, courtesy of his cat. Why this is fitting will be revealed below.

And why hasn’t she been blogging? the reader queries…

Well, first, I’ve been totally slammed at work. The hours have been crazy, and the weeks long. Concepts like weekend that I used to take for granted became meaningless. I came home late and tired, and zombied in front of the TV for an hour before falling into bed for a too-brief-nap, only to wake up the next morning and to it all again. I did try to read. But writing seemed beyond me.

The crunch ended, my body relaxed, and a cold hit me. Last night I went to bed with a sore throat, a hot toddy, a hot water bottle and a couple of warm kitties. Today I feel achy and blah. I think I need another vacation. Not that I’ll get one. But having one would be nice. A cruise to someplace warm, perhaps. Someplace where there’s sun.

The other thing that has happened that I haven’t blogged about is…

#1 Son moved out.

After he returned from his last tour and found a job (yum, those pastries!), he made a very reasoned case for taking the little grubstake I’d set aside for him and moving out on his own. He’s not going to school and is concentrating on his music. And he had a place to live that was close to work.

He is an adult now. And he is mature beyond his chronological years. So I agreed, with some normal mother-trepidation, that he could have his grubstake and strike out on his own.

When his living situation turned out not to be what he had hoped for, he handled the situation with poise and grace. I have every reason to believe that he’s going to be just fine. He has focus and drive, and is the kind of person who the universe blesses most of the time, and will land on his feet when it doesn’t.

I’m very proud of him.

But I haven’t blogged about it because… well… I’m not sure how I feel about this. I certainly didn’t expect to keep him at home forever, and he is ready to fly. But it is a little strange not to have him around – although I didn’t see him that much anyway. He’s good about touching bases with me every day or so and I know he’s doing well.

My heart still skips a beat every time I hear that there’s been a car accident, or 18 year old man shot by police, or bicycling teenager hit by SUV. I know that most likely he’s just fine. I mean, really… He’s a good kid and the cops have no reason to shoot him. He’s also a good driver and a careful cyclist. But I have to physically force myself not to pick up the phone and make sure he’s OK.

It’s a mom thing.

I miss him. That’s another mom thing.

And Moo Cow misses him very much. When he visits home, she bounces around him, squeaking like a little puppy, until he picks her up and gives her a good cuddle. That’s why it’s so fitting that his socks will include a little Moo-present in the form of a yarn join.

I need to get his socks finished, so his feet will be warm even if I’m not there to make sure they’re warm. It’s a mom thing, too.

I’ve also purchased yarn for the blanket I plan to make for a house-warming gift for him. At the rate I’ve been knitting, it might be awhile before it gets knit. So it might not warm the first place he lives. But… it’s the thought that counts, right?

The yarn is Karabella Aurora 8 in colorways 39 (not pink), 50 (turquoise), 258 (mocha) and 1145 (dark teal); and Aurora 8 Space-Dyed in colorways 16 (the turquoise/green/brown) and 18 (pink, teal, brown). There will be several 12″ (or so) squares of each color in different stitch patterns.

Please remember when looking at these colors that many words may describe #1 Son, but conservative is not among them. Alice and I, along with the resident Tangle teenager, tried about a bazillion colors before coming up with this combo. The teenager pronounced it perfect. And, yes, #1 Son is “OK with pink,” just in case you wondered (several other knitsters did). He used to have pink hair. A partially pink blanket should be OK.

But, most importantly, his mom will know he’s warm, no matter where he’s living.

[ed. 09/17/06 5:34 pm] Anyone who has a burning desire to hear #1 Son’s band… They played live on KPSU radio this afternoon on the show Sound Judgement. You can download an MP3 of the show here for at least the next couple of weeks. They start playing about 1/2 way through the hour. That’s #1 Son doing the song intros. That’s not #1 Son swearing at the end. It’s punk. You’ve been warned. 😉

Labor day… I hope you all had a fabulous weekend!

I worked. All weekend. Stuff for my day job. And this week my life has pretty much been work-sleep-work-sleep-say hi to #1 son-sleep-work. Not fun. But I have to keep reminding myself that it does pay the bills. But I haven’t been knitting.

There. I said it with my out loud voice.

The problem is, I’m typing virtually all day right now. By the time I get home, my hands just won’t take any more use. So I sit in front of the TV like a zombie for an hour, and then I go to bed.

I did get a tiny bit of knitting accomplished before the boom lowered. I had so much fun on the Swallowtail Shawl that I decided to go back to the Pacific Northwest Shawl for a bit. You’ll remember that I was having a lace jones just before I went to Victoria, and I planned to take this project with me but I couldn’t find the blasted pattern, which I had successfully put in a “safe” place hidden even from myself. With the pattern now in hand, I managed to work about 4 rows of the pine tree lace.

Here’s a blob-on-a-stick pic.

You may notice it’s on one of the Knit Picks needles. I finally caved and bought the set. I really like the cables and the points, and I like the joins on the classic needles. I checked the joins on all of the needles and cables in the set, and everything appears to be hunky-dory. I seem to have escaped the problems with quality that some people have found.

The needles don’t seem to me to be as fast to knit with as Addis – probably because they are nickle-plated rather than chrome-plated. But that’s OK with me. I don’t always want a really fast needle. And the points are so much better!

Anyway… School is starting, fall is here, and I’ve made a few autumnal knitting resolutions:

• I will finish the Victoria Socks. I’m half-way up the ankles, I need to get them done.
• I will make a pair of long-promised socks for #1 Son before the weather gets too cold.
• I will make the two pairs of socks I need for Christmas presents, and they will be done on time for giving.
• I will finish Clapotis #2 by the end of the year.
• I will finish the Pacific Northwest Shawl by the end of the year.

Those last two projects were UFOs at the end of last year, and I don’t want them to suffer the same fate at the end of this year.

Are there projects in your bag that have languished for ages? Let’s make an “off the sticks in 2006” pact together and cheer each other on!

Mailbag

First, thank you to everyone for the nice compliments on the Swallowtail Shawl! I really appreciate all comments here!

Kristie asks about the Swallowtail Shawl:

How in the world did you find time to knit this in a week?

Kristie, I truly did nothing else that week but knit obsessively on that shawl. Work was not so crazy, and I had some evening knitting time. And I knit until the wee hours of the morning because I was having so much fun. And then the sleep deprivation caught up with me…

Monika writes:

Did you really only use one skein of Sea Silk? I’ve purchased two and am still thinking of what to do with it. I also read on another blog, that the swallowtail pattern is not the best to knit. Was is easy for you. Would you recommend it to a lace knitting newbie, like myself?

I really used just one skein of Sea Silk, and I had some left over. But this pattern, while called a “shawl” is really more of a large kerchief in size. I had enough yarn left over that if I knit this pattern again, and chances are good I will, I would probably go up a needle size. But I knit fairly tightly. I read on a blog (don’t remember which one, sorry) that the knitter went down a needle size on the edging because she was running out of yarn. Like everything, your mileage may vary.

Was it easy? I thought it was a fairly straightforward lace pattern. Most of the shawl is the same pattern repeated over and over, so it’s easy to memorize, and the edging is the same pattern repeated twice. The only tricky part is a P5tog. I was knitting with blunt Lantern Moon needles — lovely needles, but way too blunt for lace. I just could not get the needle through 5 stitches. So I slipped two, purled 3, and passed the two slipped stitches over. The result is visually the same. But I was glad to be through that part of the chart.

The pattern stitches include a YO, a K2tog, a SSK, and this thingy I forget the abbreviation they used where you slip 2, K1, pass the two slipped stitches over. If you can do all of those stitches and like a challenge, I would say go for it! (I’m an adventurous knitter.) If it turns out that you’re not having fun with it, then you can always rip it out and start something else. No harm, no foul.

Run a lifeline periodically.

Another pattern you might consider, since you have two skeins — Wendy has made available her Fir Cone Wrap pattern that is made with two skeins of Seasilk. I haven’t knit this pattern, but the lace looks very straight forward and the results are really nice.

You will remember that during my trip to Victoria I purchased a skein of Handmaiden Seasilk in a lovely, one-of-a-kind colorway. I had only 400m of yarn – enough to do only a small project. Interweave Knits serendipitously published the Swallowtail Shawl pattern at about the same time.

I was afraid that the colors would get lost in the lace, but that didn’t happen. Instead the negative space around the solid portions served to enhance the color changes.

And here we have the finished product, displayed against my grape arbor. Its insubstantiality is shown by the fact that it is being held up by grape leaves twisted together because I forgot to take a few pins out with me and didn’t want to go back in to get some.

The yarn was a joy to knit.

In fact, I knit obsessively on this project until it was finished, which took about 1 week. The whole time I was knitting it, I showed it to everyone who would stand still long enough to look (even non-knitters, bless them) and insisted that they feel the fiber and exclaim about the colors. Be forewarned, the yarn is addicting.

I would have continued to knit obsessively on it had I not come to both the end of the pattern and almost the end of the yarn. I have only a small handful of yarn left.

I love the pattern that the lace shadow makes against the leaves in the second picture.

Swallowtail was made as a birthday present for the lovely LT. She was happier than she looks in this picture. Really.

You can check out the blob-on-a-needle and blocking pictures over at the Swallowtail Project Page.

The Particulars:

• Yarn: Handmaiden Seasilk – most of one skein; 70% silk, 30% Seacell; colorway: unnamed, one of a kind
• Needles: Lantern Moon ebony, US#4 (3.50mm) – note: not recommended for lace knitting. The points are too blunt.
• Pattern: Interweave Knits, Fall 2006, Swallowtail Shawl