Success in Several Areas
Baby Beanie! Go Lisa!
First off! Brilliant student Lisa has sent me photos of her Cashmere Baby Beanie. Lisa was in a beginner class and then signed up for the beanie class, and somewhere along the way she found this awesome Peter Rabbit button to finish the beanie off.
Can’t see the Peter Rabbit Button? Lisa sent me a closeup:
There it is!
I feel like Hannibal in The A-Team: I love it when a plan comes together. The beanie class is fun because often I get to see students’ faces light up when they cast off and pull the tail through and suddenly…look at that! It’s a hat! OK, I have now used up my entire exclamation point quota for the month, so we’ll move on.
Except…wait…there’s more.
More, after the jump. Read more…
Faith, Hope, Baltimore’s Killing Streets
Shameless Plug: Blanket Class in June!
It’s morning at St. Elmo’s, and maybe morning in our house as well. One of the things about having interests and goals that aren’t, say, mainstream is that one needs to have a lot of faith: faith that what one wants to do is a calling rather than a silly dream, faith that one is not just lazy or childish for wanting to have a different career. Bah! Stupid faith! Some days it’s easier to come by than others. After the jump: gleaning hope from the decidedly pessimistic David Simon. Read more…
Hungry? Pick Up the Crochet Hook.
I wish I were better at crocheting…I would use KnitLuck‘s Teach Someone to Knit (or crochet) pledge as an excuse to strong-arm my left-handed, vegetarian sister into making these.
So let’s hear it for NeedleNoodles and the knit sushi and the crocheted bluebird patterns. NN recently posted a pirate captain pattern that might entice my sister’s boyfriend into learning a handcraft or two (that’s just me dreaming, you understand. but he does have a thing about pirates…). Check out the book, Creepy Cute Crochet: Zombies, Ninjas, Robots, and More! (amazon, powells, indie), the Etsy shop, the blog, the Twitter feed, the Flickr group…
It’s almost as enticing as the clouded leopard cubs. Almost.
Pledge to Teach, Google Mania, Cub Obsession
First up: pledge to teach someone to knit! Angela at KnitLuck reminds us that the knitting industry and our local yarn shops all depend on…knitters. So teach someone to knit today and support the economy (or at least the knitting side of it). Angela is teaching her boyfriend to knit, which makes her most impressive. Devoted as Mr. Trask is to me, he is utterly uninterested in learning to knit. It’s sad, really. Check out Angela’s super-cool blog for an impressive collection of deals and information from all over the knitting blogosphere.
If you sign up for the pledge by April 15, you’ll be eligible for a drawing to win some lovely Claudia yarn. Free yarn! Everybody wins!
As I prepare to go to England, I am spending more time than I like to admit Googling “England yarn trip,” “Oxford knitting circle,” and similar.
Search results (and clouded leopard cubs) after the jump… Read more…
Yarn! Books! Mountains! Yay!
This weekend was the first book party for Karida and Libby‘s lovely Pints and Purls (buy at Amazon, Powells, or your favorite indie bookstore!), at A Tangled Skein in Hyattsville, Md. I’d never been to the store before – it’s lovely, in an old bank building, with all of my favorite yarns and lots of little nooks in which to sit, knit, and (of course) drool over yarn. There was a huge crowd when I was there, and I got there early. Folks were buying books and Karida’s lovely Neighborhood Fiber Co Yarn…and, of course, drinking beer from the keg (a keg in a yarn shop? who ever thought…?).
My student Laura showed up (and let me know she has finished her Flair Cardigan (rav lnk), all but the buttons…which, honestly, is where I’m at my with my Flair as well). She grabbed some gorgeous Penthouse Silk Lace (and a little Debbie Bliss yarn too).
By the way…new classes are up at Knit-A-Gogo, in case you guys are interested. Spiral blanket, top-down sweater, much fun.
Meanwhile, Mr. Trask joined with me on this outing, because I had the two patterns in the book (and probably also because Sunday was my birthday). This man is a keeper. He patiently stood in the shop, looking interested in knitting and all the accoutrements thereof. His advice for surviving a yarn shop? “Bring an iPhone and pretend to be looking up things while you’re actually checking out Google Reader.”
Finally, it was indeed my birthday on Sunday, and Andy and I had brunch at the Evening Star and then drove into the Blue Ridge Mountains for some peace and quiet (and, ok, some homemade preserves at roadside stands).
Even did some knitting on the way – photos of my spiral baby blanket for a family friend coming later this week.
Things to Read, Things to Buy, Chi McBride
Good morning and welcome to another week. This weekend was mostly dedicated to weird little tasks (buying new hamper, fixing insane printer which has been plaguing me for the better part of a year), but I did do some sketching of pattern ideas.
Not-So-New Discovery: drawing is not my strong suit. When I was in high school, I so wanted to be able to draw, paint, sculpt, whatever. Many of my friends were visual artists, and we spent lots of time in the art room at school, and you know how that is: one wants to belong. At any rate, I did not throw any artistic materials at the wall or the cat or into the garbage, which is a mercy.
On to the update.
I Knit London (which I look forward to visiting this summer) has posted their Knitting in Film and Television Awards (KNIFTAs). Of course, Nick Park of Wallace & Gromit fame cleaned up big for Gromit the knitting dog and others – he received the Outstanding Contribution award (akin to the Oscars’ Lifetime Achievement, evidently). Aardman Studios supplied some clips from Park’s knitting work to be shown at the Awards Ceremony (flickr photoset). Chi McBride won “Best Knitting Scene” for his Knitting P.I. Emerson Cod of the sadly-canceled Pushing Daisies.
There are lots of fun knitting books on my list this year, and Joanne Seiff’s Fiber Gathering: Knit, Crochet, Spin, and Dye More Than 20 Projects Inspired by America’s Festivals (amazon, powell’s, indie) made the cut. She’s writing on Amazon.com’s Amazon Blogs and contributed to Powell’s Books’ PowellsBooks.Blog. She has a wry, witty voice and knows how to explain what many of us feel about fiber festivals: that they’re our modern time of “gathering in the market square.”
Finally…an intrepid knitter has invented a nifty TSA-friendly Knit Kit (just in time for my trip this summer; it’s all about me). It looks like a little Swiss Army Knife for knitters, with a stitch counter, thread cutter, and a tiny crochet hook in place of that toothpick thing that always fell out and got lost. The back pocket has scissors, point protectors, and stitch markers…there’s a tape measure coming out the bottom…what more could we want? I have yet to see one of these in person, but I am mightily intrigued.
Sheep Art
Okay, YES, it’s exciting to be going abroad, and YES, it’s exciting to be a little bit published, but you know what’s even more exciting? A video of sheep wearing LED-light-covered vests, herded in different patterns to create little light shows on a hillside. More after the jump. Read more…
Lovely Things
On Wednesday night I received an advance copy of Pints and Purls: Portable Projects for the Social Knitter. It’s a lovely little book by Karida Collins and Libby Bruce of Winelips, and (here’s the shameless promotion part) contains two of my sock patterns: Fox in Socks (rav lnk) and Weaving Way (rav lnk). [Those of you who know I drink tea rather than booze these days will find this most amusing.]
Personal attachment to the book aside, I love the little details: its cover is waterproof (or beerproof…whiskyproof…wineproof), and there are sidebar essays about finding a good bar in which to knit, correcting mistakes made while knitting and drinking, etc. Plus, photos of Karida and Libby’s Works-in-Progress and their notions bags, and wonderfully inventive modeling of the other patterns. What else is in there, you ask? Danielle‘s gorgeous Linden wrap, stunning creations by Olga, and some lovely socks by Holly. There’s going to be a book launch party at A Tangled Skein in Hyattsville, Md. Nifty, nifty.
In more personal news, I found out this week that I’ll be spending six weeks in Oxford, England, studying British literature on my way to a Master’s of Arts in English Lit. I’m really excited about this – it’s a program I’ve read about and dreamed about for several years, ordering the catalog and then not applying (over and over), and this year I felt brave enough to send my application in and give up the results. Result: six weeks in England! Of course, I’m already researching places to drink tea and knit.
I’m a little overwhelmed at leaving my home (and my partner-in-crime) and my nice routine for something that will definitely be intense and new. But I’m also excited. I lived in Oxford fourteen years ago, during a junior semester abroad, and while I’ve been back since it will be interesting to compare actual life there Then and Now. And the classes – oh, the classes! You will fall asleep so fast if you get me started on the classes. So – there’s that.
In the spirit of Drinking Tea and Knitting…I’m drooling over the new book Knitting and Tea: 25 Classic Knits and the Teas That Inspired Them. Was this book made for me or what? I don’t know how many other people will be interested in the overlap between two of my addictions, but, jeez, this one’s just in time for my birthday. Thank you, Knitting Gods!
This post is long overdue (must admit the first week of non-posting was not wanting to bump down Coraline!) but more are on their way…I’ve been emailing myself links with the subject line “blog” for way too long now. Happy Friday!
- Pints and Purls at Amazon, Powells, or your favorite indie bookstore.
- Middlebury College’s Bread Loaf School of English.
- Knitting and Tea at Amazon, Powells, or your favorite indie bookstore.
A Patienter Woman Than I
If you’re a closet semi-geek like me, you’ve been looking forward to the movie Coraline, based on Neil Gaiman‘s lovely ‘tween (definitely NOT twee) book of the same name.
It’s a stop-motion animated film in the tradition of Nightmare Before Christmas and The Corpse Bride, made all the more exciting because the story is by one of the most imaginative writers of our time. [Not that I gush or anything.]
If you’re an out-there knitting geek like me, your interest in the movie just got a lot bigger.
An interview on Don’t Panic with Miniature Knitter Althea Chrome (what a name!) is making the rounds of the blogsphere and amazing one and all. And Focus Features put out a promotional video (see above) about Althea, as well. Evidently she knit up to 50 stitches per inch in her projects for the animated film. Gorgeous, gorgeous items.
My lovely student Katie let me know about this, and said, “I’ll never complain about regular sock knitting again.” [And well she shouldn’t: sock knitting is one of the best things out there, for goodness’ sake.]
You can see some of Althea’s work on her ravelry designer page, too. Congratulations, Althea! You are definitely Knitting Like You Mean It.
In Honor of the Day: Hand Mitts
Scaefer Sock the Vote: Michelle and Hillary
I had planned to post this pattern with a photo of me wearing the mitts on the National Mall today, during the inaugural festivities. I was slated to accompany some of our kids down to the Mall, but I have a terrible head-and-chest cold, and am set to travel next week…and at the last minute the school’s plans changed to include a mile-and-a-half walk in this cold weather. I had to make the extremely difficult decision not to go.
Therefore, here’s a photo from the wimpy comfort of my couch, and if you’d like to try to make some of your own I hope you will. The yarn is one of my favorites – Schaefer Anne (rav lnk) – in the Sock the Vote! colors Michelle and Hillary.
Why not make some in complementary colors (they have Sarah and Cindy as well!), or in some of Schaefer’s other Memorable Women colorways, and celebrate the spirit of unity in whatever way the fancy strikes you.
WARNING: I have done my best to make sure the math is correct, but I have not yet run the pattern past an outside tech editor. I will be having it thoroughly vetted, though, and will update the file with corrections if necessary.
Without further ado: Women’s Inauguration Hand Mitts (PDF).
Knit Like You Mean It. 