too long

Once upon a time there was a knitter named Frizzylocks who loved Cat Bordhi’s Cables & Corrugations Socks and wanted to knit them more than anything in the whole, wide world.

Now Frizzylocks was one of those knitters who never follows patterns. She always changed something, or tweaked something else, or just plain threw the pattern away and did her own thing. But because Frizzylocks loved the Cables & Corrugations Socks so much, she really wanted to knit them just exactly the way the pattern said to.

So she started knitting, and she knit and she knit and she knit. She followed all of the directions until she was ready to turn the heel, and then she tried the socks on. And, although the gusset seemed a bit wide at the top, for the most part they fit pretty well and the length was great. Smiling happily, she began knitting again, following the heel instructions.

What Frizzylocks hadn’t realized when she tired the socks on was that the heel portion of the pattern would add an entire stitch-pattern repeat, making the socks longer, and the set-up for the sock would add quite a few more increases and make the heel even wider.

When the heel was finished, Frizzylocks tried the sock on again. It was too long. It was way, way too long. And the heel was way wide because Frizzylocks has skinny heels. And Frizzylocks was no longer smiling.

too short

So that’s enough third person fairytale. Because this, unfortunately is most decidedly not a fairytale of any kind. The sock was way too long. The heel was way too wide. There was just no getting around it. You can see it in the first picture up there. It was huge.

The width through the foot was OK, though. And that was certainly nice. You will recall that when I first knit the toes I did not trust the pattern and added extra increases and the toes ended up way, way too wide. I think these socks hate me. And really, I like them a lot and I am trying not to take it personally!

So, anyway, I frogged the heel.

I frogged the heel at knit night at Tangle, and there were gasps all around as I took them off the needles. But it doesn’t fit, I explained. Alice tried the glass slipper red sock on. It fit her. Alice offered to take them off my hands (or feet, as the case may be) once completed. I politely declined. Alice started knitting on a gorgeous basketweave sweater that’s been a UFO for a couple of years now because she’s not feeling the love. I suggested that sweater might be swapped for socks. Alice politely declined.

So I frogged the heel and ripped back two pattern repeats — the one created during the heel set-up, and one extra for good measure. My plan was to knit my standard heel, which is narrower. I really like Cat’s heel – I think it’s lovely and brililant – but it doesn’t fit well on my skinny heels. 😥 So I felt forced – forced, I say – to deviate from the pattern. (I think Cat would understand.)

There’s something about the phrase for good measure that does not bode well when my pursuits are concerned. You will, perhaps, remember the never-ending moebius? The one that 11 knitters fit into? Yeah. I cast on just a few extra stitches for good measure.

You can see from the second picture above that the heel is not too wide. But the sock is also now too short. Way too short. I should have only ripped out one pattern repeat, not two. < sigh >

just right

Third times a charm, gentle reader.

I knit one more pattern repeat. Then I stopped and worked my standard heel. It’s not exactly like Cat’s heel, but it’s visually similar. Actually, the flap is pretty much the same, but the turn is different.

And, as you can see from the third picture, this one is just right! The heel fits, it’s the right length. And Frizzylocks is very happy.

Now to do the same thing on the other sock, and I will be back in business heading up the legs. I may need a few extra stitches on the ankles once I get the cable going up the back. But I’m not worried about that at all since I know from experience that increases are really easy to hide in the purls along the edges of cables.

I almost titled this post Why I Don’t Follow Patterns, but then I went into my little fairytale instead.

But that did send me off on a little navel-gazing tangent — Why don’t I follow patterns? Is it just that I’m a rebel? Or is it fit? Or process? Or maybe all of these? Probably the last. But following the Cables & Corrugations pattern has been difficult, even though I fully intended to follow it. I just keep wanting to stray, and the heels gave me the perfect excuse.

What about you, gentle reader? Do you follow patterns? Why or why not?

Are you more enamored of the process of knitting itself, or is it the finished objects that you create that keep you coming back for more?

Would you prefer to knit objects similar to those you have knit before, or would you rather knit something completely different?

When things go wrong — patterns have errors, the swatch lied, you loath the way the yarn is knitting up, the thing looks sucky on you — what is your reaction? Are you angry at the time lost or the pattern author? Are you discouraged or invigorated? Do you want to fix it at any cost and make it work, or bury it 20 feet deep and never see it again?

As I said, I seem to be in a period of thoughtful introspection, so I would love to hear what you think. There are no right answers or wrong answers – and there are probably different answers for every knitter. If you don’t want to answer in comments, email me at Judy at persistentillusion dot com. I really would like to hear from you…

In the Magic Cast-On article, I mentioned that it could be used to start small circles, like top-down hats and bottom-up bags and such. But I never really explained how one would do that. A few people have asked, so here’s a little tutorial. You can click on the pictures to see a larger version.

In this picture, I’ve used the Magic Cast-On to place 5 stitches on a pair of DPN. As usual, the tail is over my index finger and the working yarn is over my thumb.

The first stitch cast on is on the right on needle A. Because I’ve cast on an odd number of stitches (5), the last stitch is the one on the left on needle A.

In this picture, I’ve rotated the needles. I’m going to knit the stitches from needle B using needle C.

Note that I’m holding both the tail and the working yarn together. I’m going to knit all 5 stitches using the double strand.

Now I have knit 5 stitches, and I have 10 yarn loops around the needle — one loop of tail and one of working yarn through each of the original 5 stitches.

On the next round, I’m going to knit each individual loop. By knitting each pair of loops individually instead of together as one stitch, I will double the number of stitches I have on the needles from 5 to 10, without doing any M1 increases.

And here is the result of the last step. I now have 10 stitches on the needles.

I’ve added another DPN because that makes it easier to knit around the circle.

Here is the circle after several rounds. After the second round, I used regular M1 increases to increase from 10 stitches to 17 and added in a fourth DPN.

There’s nothing significant about the number 17, I just wasn’t really good for this demo about increasing at a regular interval. You, of course, gentle reader, will do better.

But note that I have a neat, closed circle. There’s no hole in the middle. And I didn’t have to mess around with tightening anything up or trying to close the middle.

Using the tail held with the working yarn to double your stitches is optional. But sometimes that first increase round can be intresting. This can make it a little easier.

The double-yarn increase method works great as long as the last stitch you cast on is on needle A. If you need an even number of stitches to start your circle, simply start the Magic Cast-On around needle B instead of the more-usual start around needle A. By starting around needle B and casting on an even number of stitches, you will end up with the last stitch cast on around needle A, just where it needs to be.

And there you have it! This works well for hats, round bags, pinwheel blankets and star toes on socks. I used this method to start the Spanish Lavender Basket Wave socks with 6 stitches.

The method can be used with DPNs, as I’ve shown it, or double-circs or magic loop. I demoed with DPNs only because it’s easier to keep them stable when having only two hands to juggling lighting, props and camera.

Have fun!

Rockin Girl Blogger

Today I would like to pick Leanne of Curious George Knits as a Rockin’ Girl Blogger.

Back in early 2006, Leanne was in training to compete in the Ironman Canada triathlon — that’s a 2.4 mile swim, followed by a 112 mile bike ride, ending in a 26.2 mile run. Any one of those would do me in, let alone all three one after the other. In her post of March 10, 2006, Leanne wished her readers an enjoyable weekend. She would not post after that for quite awhile. On her way to the coast with her husband and one of her children to enjoy their own weekend, their car hit a patch of black ice, spun into oncoming traffic and was broadsided. Husband and child walked away from the accident. Leanne’s pelvis was broken in five places and her foot in two. The triathlon was, needless to say, off. Even walking would be a struggle.

Over the days and weeks and months of her recovery, Leanne kept us informed of her progress with amazingly good spirits. She was realistic, but not fatalistic. And she knit. For awhile she knit a lot, because there wasn’t much else she could do. But as her pile of FOs grew, she also worked hard on getting better. Every small milestone was noted, and the next goal was laid out — over and over and over: walking with a walker, then walking with a cane, visiting the LYS, going to the grocery store. I can remember how excited she was one day in the LYS when she demonstrated how she had progressed from simply walking to skipping.

On August 26, 2007, a mere 17 months and 16 days after the accident that left her unable to walk — let alone run or bike — Leanne crossed the Ironman Canada finish line in Penticton, Canada, with her family around her. Because of the miracles of modern technology (the race was streamed over the internet), I saw the big grin on her face as she finished.

Leanne, you rock!

letter and ladybug markers

Well, it turns out there’s no need to wait for the official markers to use with Cat Bordhi’s new book. (Of course, if you want to wait you can.)

Look at these lovely little markers! They are brought to you by J L Yarnworks’ Etsy shop. Cat’s patterns require the letters A through F. This stitch marker set comes with A through H. I really like the “knit to A then do blah then knit to B and do yadda” directions in Cat’s book, and I see using the same sort of marker philosophy (if you will) for other projects like lace. A couple of extra letters could come in handy. J L Yarnworks’ Etsy shop mentions that the entire alphabet is available. Cool! Maybe next secret pal whatever I’ll spell my pal’s name in stitch markers as a little extra goody. 😉

There are a bunch of different beads available, so no matter what your preference I bet you could get a set that’s your favorite colors. My markers are black and a really pretty silver-blue. These are nicely made markers with no rough edges or pokey bits to snag the finest yarn. And at a very reasonable price! Love ’em, love ’em, love ’em.

socks with markers

Love the little ladybugs, too. OK. Who doesn’t love a lady bug? Sometimes my larger projects need a little bling, too. I’m using one of the ladybug markers on a top secret project (shhhh… ), and every time that little lady bug comes around, I just have to smile at it looking up at me with its beady little eyes. I fancy it’s saying, OK. But I’d really rather prefer eating aphids in the garden.

When you were a child and a ladybug landed on you, did you used to say the little rhyme Ladybug, Ladybug, fly away home. Your house is on fire, your children will burn. When I was little, my mother taught that to me and to this day I still faithfully recite it to the ladybugs in the garden. But it is rather morbid, isn’t it? A rather strange sentiment.

But I digress.

I would love to show you how fun the little ladybug looks flying around my needle, but it’s a secret project. So, it’s… secret. All will be revealed in time.

By the way, there are other really cute little beads where these came from: penguins and fish. You must go look at the little penguins! You will die from the cuteness.

My socks feel so nicely balanced, now that I have the right stitch markers on both socks. Ahhhhh….

sock progress

This is the instep side. I have one more pattern repeat to go, and then I turn the heels. These socks are almost knitting themselves. Maybe it’s because the pattern repeat is only 6 rounds, or because the cables turn every three rounds, but I always feel like I’m making progress. And before you know it, I’m almost done with this section. Except they’re on hold right now. Because I have to work on the secret project.

No, I can’t tell you what it is. It’s secret. (shhhhhhh…)

On another topic, you parents out there with newly-adult-ish teenagers… How are you coping? This was the conversation I had with my son on Tuesday:

#1 Son: Hi, Mom. Just wanted to let you know I’m on my way to California.

Mom (attempting to shift mental gears quickly): You are? Why? Don’t you have to go to work?

#1 Son: I don’t have any hours scheduled until Saturday. A friend has a family member who is very sick. She needed someone to go with her and there isn’t anybody else that’s available. We’re taking her car. I’ll be back Saturday morning.

Mom: Where are you going? Bay area?

#1 Son: San Luis Obispo. But we’ll probably spend tonight in the Bay Area then drive the rest of the way tomorrow. Her car is a little car with standard transmission. Driving a stick is really fun.

Mom: I love you. Please drive carefully.

Gentle reader, if you are the parent of an almost-adult-ish teenager, how are you coping?

One of the things I do to cope is to concentrate on other things. Like the software under the covers of this blog. I use a lot of plugins to do various cool things like the little gadgets in the sidebars, and the spell checker, and the doohickey that closes commenting on a post after a particular length of time. Sometimes one or the other of the plugins has issues. And sometimes it’s darned hard to figure out which one it is.

Lately, every time I publish a post, the sidebars would only load a little way down the left hand side, and then nothing more would load. The only way I could get the site to load all the way again was to turn off some of the plugins. So, one after another, you may have noticed things disappearing. And coming back. And disappearing again. And going wonky.

Yesterday I finally figured out what it was. It was the little word cloud in the left-hand sidebar. The plugin that builds the cloud takes all of the words from every post I’ve ever written, sorts them out, eliminates words like the, and, but, takes the top words, and makes the little cloud. Well… it turns out that I’ve been kinda wordy. Go figure! The poor thing was just choking on the number of words that my fingers have typed over the years. I’ve taken pity on it, and limited its cloud-making effort to the most recent 500 posts.

Can you believe I’ve written more than 500 posts? Me either.

At any rate, when I hit the Publish button, all should be well. Or, at least that’s the theory. Keep your fingers crossed. Here we go…

[ed.] And everything is OK. Yea! And #1 Son just called to report he is just north of Redding, they will be driving all night, and he’ll be home early in the morning. My request that he be careful and drive safely was met with: Why do you worry? I’ve done this millions of times. To which I can only reply, I worry because I’m your mother. It’s my job.

MOO cards and MOOPocket

I have a couple of quick things to tell you about today.

First, I’ve been an admirer of those bloggers organized enough to actually have cards with their blog address, etc., to hand out at functions. It’s been a big help to me more than once because I’m truly name-challenged. I know that’s my issue, and not that of the lovely people who I meet, but try as I might I can’t seem to find the technique that will help me remember their names. 😥 So cards are such a great idea!

I finally have my own.

Here are the PI MOO cards. If you haven’t seen MOO cards before, this is such a cool idea. They are smaller than a standard business card, so you can carry a bunch of them. And you can put your own pictures on the backs. The pictures can be anything you want. I went with mostly fibery goodness. But I do have one of the beach at Lincoln City, because it’s so pretty, and one of Moo Cow, because she should be on a MOO card.

Although the cards are printed in London, they arrived safe and sound all the way here in the Pacific Northwest in only about 10 days after I ordered them. So now when I go to functions, I can hand them out. And because I have 100 of them, I can hand them out willy-nilly without having to conserve.

So I needed something to keep them in, I think you will agree?

The Clip-on MOOPocket is from Splatgirl’s etsy shop. She has tons of cool fabrics (or leather), and several different styles. Mine is not only clip-on, but has a little window in the front so I can display one of my MOO Cards, as the mood strikes me (currently it’s one of all my little sock bookmarks). Splatgirl had my special-ordered MOOPocket to me in just a few days. I wanted to show it to you last week, because it’s so cute. But I had to wait for the cards to get here, too.

Now, the second thing I wanted to talk to you about, gentle reader, is retirement. If you are in your 20’s or 30’s, please start saving for retirement now, because it will come a lot faster than you think. And remember that many people have to live on quite fixed incomes during their retired years.

Yarn doesn’t spoil. So go ahead and stash. It’s saving for retirement. 😆 In honor of this thought, Knitnana and I have created a new button: 401(k)nit. It’s over on the left-hand side-bar, right above the Yarn Collectors button. If you, too, are saving for your retirement, feel free to proudly display this button on your blog or website. But please don’t link to my image. Download the button and upload it to your own server, thankyouverymuch.

Same goes for the Yarn Collectors button, also. If you are a yarn collector, don’t be afraid to shout that out! We collectors and savers must stick together.

yarn crawl

The yarn crawl last Saturday was such a blast! If you have never done this in your city, you should organize something similar. We went to five LYS, a cafe (OK, that was in one of the LYS) and a patisserie — all in 7 hours. Whew. Sara did an awesome job of both organizing and herding us around from place to place to make sure we got everywhere we were supposed to be going. Maia was here from out of town, and it was so cool to get to meet her!

We all gathered at Abundant Yarn & Dyeworks. Because almost everyone was a blogger, there was a lot of picture taking going on. Here Cindy and Rodger are engaged in a shoot-out.

There was a bit of yarn shopping that happened at AY&D. And, since they also have a cafe, some lunch happened as well.

yarn crawl

Our next stop was PIX Patisserie for a little dessert. Because it was, like my birthday, and while I don’t really celebrate that any more, still some dessert is called for, dontcha know.

I know that this is a rather glum looking crowd, for some reason. Except for Chrispy.

Chrispy and Cindy braved my taxi-driving skills and drove around with me. Have I mentioned that I’m sometimes easily distracted? I don’t think we had to go around the block more than twice because I got interested in the conversation and forgot to turn.

But I’m really a safe driver. Mostly. Really.

So I don’t think it’s my driving that has caused the glumness. I think it’s because we’re waiting for our dessert to be served. It was well worth the wait.

yarn crawl

Here are a few of the dessert choices. I couldn’t decide between two different goodies, so Maia and I split them.

I can’t begin to tell you how good this stuff was. OMG

And, to make it just a perfect place, I looked up in the rafters and there was a sock monkey, swinging from a fake vine. 🙂

From there we headed up to Yarn Garden. They were a bit low on sock yarn, so I didn’t aquire any new things there. But I did have a great time petting the cashmere and silk.

I don’t seem to have taken any pictures there, either. I think I was overcome by yarn fumes.

yarn crawl

The next stop was Twisted. They have a whole wall of sock yarn there, and much of it is from indie dyers.

I managed to do a bit of stash enhancing at Twisted. Or non-stash-enhancing, since sock yarn doesn’t count. All of us petted the yarn and admired the lace scarf (a pattern for their lace class) and fondled the yarn some more, and then waited patiently to make our purchases, while fondling the yarn.

From Twisted we drove across the river to Knit Purl. Usually finding parking is a challenge there — although well worth the challenge! But I found a place right in front of the door. I like to think of it as a little b-day prezzy from the gods of parking. I don’t expect it to ever happen again.

The nice ladies at Knit Purl were waiting for us with cookies and iced tea. They have a wall of Koigu at Knit Purl. Just in case you didn’t catch that, it’s a wall of Koigu. I madly snapped pictures at Knit Purl, but none of them turned out.

I really, really want a new camera. But because I have other discretionary expenses that I’ve already committed to, I have resolved to learn to take better pictures with the camera I have. Sometimes that works better than other times. Ah well.

yarn crawl

Our last stop was Farmhouse Knit Shop. Despite driving by there on a fairly regular basis, I had never actually stopped in. It’s a really cute little shop.

Sara is fondling the Blue Moon. That entire display case is all Blue Moon of all different kinds. Just in case you didn’t catch that, the entire display case is Blue Moon.

And that’s not all of the Blue Moon, because the sock yarn is back in another room.

I showed what I consider to be a great deal of restraint. I did not get anything at Farmhouse. But they should expect I will be back.

birthday swag

The day ended with dinner at a Thai place with Maia and Roger. And fine company they were!

Chrispy and Cindy, bless them, both brought me a little b-day rememberance. Although I really felt I should be giving them something instead, for having put up with my driving the entire day.

I had a very, very wonderful day!

Top row L-to-R: From Twisted: Ashabee’s Fiber Oasis, Cheeta and Eclipse, Knitted Wit in Eat Your Veggies; from Knit Purl: Koikgu KPPPM in P117 and 116
Bottom row, L-to-R: From Abundant Yarn & Dyeworks: Araucania Ranco in 310 and 306 (love these descriptive colorways); a prezzy from Cindy: a cool little notepad from her blog and Shibui Sock in 3601
Right side: gift from Chrispy: Silk scarf, indigo dyed by herself! She also gave me a little hand-made soap that is not in the picture.