For those who appreciate the little things…

…here we have Fratello en Nostepinne.

This is my first properly hand-wound, center-pull ball on the nostepinne. It took approx 2 evenings for all 575 yds of Wollmeise-ee goodness. I’m very proud.

(Pardon the fuzz & the hair. Ooo, embarrassing…)

Of course the yarn is Wollmeise Sockenwolle 100% superwash in Fratello and is from Yarnissima. The nostepinne is from Ma & Pa Spindles, and it is a beautiful piece of craftsmanship. If you’re in the market for a drop spindle, nostepinne or niddy noddy consider checking out Ma & Pa. Added bonus, they are located in Monona, WI, just a hop skip and a jump from my States-side residence! And finally, Hatchtown Farm has some outstanding instructions for winding a flattop/bottom ball.

I am very very very jazzed about digging into this yarn cake.

Progress: Charmer Corriedale

Started: 22nd April 2008
Finished: WIP
Yardage: maybe 40 yds, so far?
Fiber: Hello Yarn Corriedale Combed Top (Charmer, 4 oz.), acquired  last fall from my Secret Pal, Siercia.
Spindle: Butterfly Girl Designs Blueberry Quartz 1.8 oz Top Whorl, doubled up on the whorls to try to get a heavier weight yarn… not so much!

I am filled with an enormous sense of fiber well-being. Of course, there have been socks, socks and more socks (oh and SOCKS!), largely inspired by the desire to participate in Project Spectrum. (Go, check out the Flickr pool! It’s just overwhelmingly cool!) I cannot describe the joy of having a plethora of newly knit socks to choose from when getting dressed in the morning. And of course, being Sweden, the lovely spring weather still accommodates sock wearing!

But the other joy of joys was the wellspring of inspiration flowing from Bockstark and Elemm this week, sending me running (not walking) back to the spindle. Man, the interwebs are great, spreading inspiration like a sickness! Only was able to get a start before passing out (a consequence of jet lag– did I mention I was in New Orleans?), but it feels good to be spinning fiber again!

FO: Sheldon de Schildpad

De Schildpad, he likes to perch…

Pattern: Sheldon by Ruth Homrighaus (On Wisconsin!), Knitty (Winter 2006).
Needles: US 3, 3.25mm.
Yarn: Garnstudio Muskat

Another one for Project Spectrum (”Earth”).

Did you know that the “Sweater Curse” has it’s own Wikipedia entry? In fact, if you search “Sweater Curse” on Google, it’s the first thing that comes up! It really is an impressive entry, well referenced, with a great deal of thought put into comments about the term itself, mechanisms and avoidance.

The “Sweater Curse” has been on my mind lately, as I fulfill a request for an item for a crush. Well, not for the crush, exactly. For the crush’s baby niece. The idea was that it had to be something easy, as I think that knitting time and effort should be proportional to emotional investment and I don’t yet know how emotionally invested I am. Fortunately baby knits often rank low on the time and high on the easy scales. Having never met the child in question, I can’t really say with any certainty if she is bigger or smaller than a bread box; consequently, wearables were out. So I began perusing my Ravelry queue, I came across our little Schildpad friend here. And the rest as they say…

I took a little trip over to Ljungqvist Garn in Odenplan and picked out some reasonably priced, washable Garnstudio Muskat. I opted for the green-yellow motif after I found they didn’t have enough dark green for the true-to-the-pattern green-on-green turtle. I had regrets about the color choice almost immediately, as I worried that the colors wouldn’t be bright enough for an infant. However, after putting in the work to knit Mr. Schildpad, I’ve decided that the colors are fine. Besides, I’m running out of time before my gift giving opportunity next week.

For whatever reason, the head on my Sheldon turned out very skinny and long. This doesn’t look bad, per se. I just liked the fat head in the pictures better. Otherwise, this is your standard Sheldon. Knitting the shell and attaching the belly piece with i-cord were definitely the highlights, for me. Every time I do i-cord I am surprised all over again by how easy it is! I may have over-stuffed him a bit, but I think that just makes him extra huggable. His eyes are embroidered; I took some tips on filling an area with Satin Stitch from last summer’s Crafty Daisies Embroidery Tutorial.

I can’t wait to gift Sheldon de Schidlpad! He was a joy to knit and I’m optimistic that this little fellow will get a lot of lovin’… and if not, I likely wont be the wiser! Go team!

FO: Noroshins, with a hint of spring

Pattern: Widdershins (cabled) by Brooke Chenoweth Creel, Knitty (Summer 2006).
Needles: US 0, 2.0mm.
Yarn: Noro Kureyon Sock (S164)

Another one for Project Spectrum (”Earth”).

Lots of edits to make this pattern work for the skinny skinny Noro. Cast on 20 stitches, increased up to 72, making for four cables across the top of the foot and eight up the leg.

Let me interject here… learn to cable without a cable needle! This is an important life skill generally, but oh so much more for these socks… And the Noro sock yarn is super forgiving on this front– the perfect yarn for learning. It sticks to itself like velcro, so those held stitches aren’t going anywhere. Don’t dread round 5, LOVE(!) round 5 and cable without a cable needle.

There are several design features I am head-over-heels for in this pattern. Straight off, I really like the toe on these, not as pointy as typical toe-up construction can be, as a result of increasing every round for the first five before switching to every-other round.

Next, I was totally thrilled to incorporate a heel flap into the toe-up construction. This was one of those few design features that I really missed as I switched over from top-down knitting. Furthermore, I find the gusset joins to be much more attractive with the toe-up heel-flap (vs. top-down heel-flap): rather than picking up slipped stitches on the heel flap, here you p2tog or ssk with the live gusset stitches, making for a much more seamless join, IMO. One more tick in the “toe-up” column of my preferred knitting sock style list.

This is my first gusseted sock (I think) and I love it! Makes more a much more trim, form fitting sock. And it looks quite smart. HOWEVER, I found the Widdershins instructions for the heel turn to be completely baffling (I ripped and reknit 5 times on the first sock!). As far as I can tell these instructions are for some sort of “nontraditional” short row heel. As to not completely lose my mind, I chose to follow the more traditional instructions from Firestarters (Ravelry link), which were very clear and made me feel far less CRAZY! Given all of the happy Widdershins knitters out there, I’m sure it’s me that’s nutso, not the pattern, so please to not take my confusion as a deterrent from trying these socks.

I’m happy to have learned about toe-up heel flaps, gussets, and the more rounded toe; these three design features will absolutely be added to my own basic sock recipe!

The Spring 2008 Knitty reminded me of a couple other things I wanted to mention about the Noro Kureyon Sock yarn. So continuing from the previous list…

6. Says Knitty… “Pulling from the center of ball became very tangled:” I took this tip at it’s word and didn’t attempt to center-pull.

7. Says Knitty… “The suggested needle size makes a very loose fabric:” (I suppose this goes along with the “saggy” comments mentioned before but anyway…) I agree! I am a tight knitter and I sized down to a US 0 (2.00 mm) and was very happy with finished fabric. But loose knitters beware… perhaps a swatch is in order.

If you still are on the fence about the yarn and my comments aren’t enough to convince you one way or the other, there is another great review over on Knitter’s Review.

As I finished photographing the socks this morning, I looked out the window to find that the view looked EXACTLY like my Noroshins: the clouds (grey), the sky (turquoise), the trees (pine green), the grass & ground (electric green and brown), the buildings (yellow), the street and cars (black). (It’s kind of a crap picture, but you get the idea.) I ask you: Nature imitating knitting or knitting imitating nature?

Spring has sprung in Scandinavia!

The Triplets

Last week was a pretty wonderful one, stash-wise.

For the past year I’ve been saying that when I came to Europe I would order some yarn from the Wollmeise. I’d been trying to do that, albeit half-heartedly: I always forget that on Fridays there are shop updates and when there are updates they always sell out immediately, no surprise. So, if you’re not vigilant, it can be a bit of a hassle.

But then I thought, ‘oh! I’ve always wanted to knit something by Yarnissima, so why don’t I just order a kit, complete with the dyed-to-match Wollmeise?’ I went online and, amazing-of-amazings, Yarnissima had just gotten a new shipment of yarn in and had all three of the kits in stock! It was meant to be!

I pondered for nearly an entire afternoon, trying to pick out which pattern I would most like to knit… and, surprise-of-surprises, I couldn’t make a decision.

…so I kinda just ordered all three kits. (Oops!)

This was last Monday and… oh thank you gods of the post!… I had the triplets in my hot little hands by Wednesday night.

It was as if it were my Birthday! The yarn itself was wrapped so nicely, in tissue paper corresponding to the color of the fiber. Each skein was wrapped in plastic and came with a little candy treat (the Spina di Pesce also came with a little seashell!), a feather and a bow. The packaging was so beautiful and thoughtful! Such a treat!

And the pattern layouts are beautiful. Each booklet is about 10-12 pages long, complete with info about Yarnissima, the inspiration behind the pattern, very detailed instructions, and lots of charts and pictures. Oh, the photography is just stupendous, doubling, tripling, quadrupling my excitement about knitting the socks! Also included were laminated cards with the charts for the top of the foot pattern for each sock.

I am so over-the-moon happy and completely blown away by the care that went into the packaging and the beautiful presentation of the patterns. The whole experience made me feel so special and cared for as a customer. Three cheers for the Yarnissima! If you can swing it, pick up one (or two or three) of her kits. You will be supporting supporting an amazingly talented artist, designer and business woman. (And the Wollmeise is pretty great too!) The kits are worth every Eurocent.

(Oh, like I needed another reason to love the Netherlands…ha.)

Noro Kureyon sock, early thoughts

First, a couple of words on “Self-Destructive Knitting…”

Do you ever knit when you know you shouldn’t? When there are other things to be done, and putting them off is just going to make your life more difficult, but you knit anyway. It’s not that you’re in denial, per se. It’s more about acceptance: the future (days, hours, minutes) are going to SUCK, so might as well approach them with hands and mind relaxed from a few minutes (hours, days) of knitting.

This is where I am right now: sitting at my desk, on a work day, with a stack of paper a mile high to sort through, knitting. I’ve just gone for a cup of coffee and rather than ramping up, I am settling down into one pattern repeat on my Noroshins (Ravelry link).

So, a couple of early thoughts on this Noro Kureyon sock yarn (actually they are more reactions to the hype/other reviews):

1. “The yarn is harsh on the hands:” Eh, I think this critique is over-stated in the media. No, this isn’t Shibui or that Austermann Step stuff with the aloe and the jojoba. It’s rough, but it isn’t far off from something like Vesper or Fearless Fibers, which (as you know) I’ve knit with lately. Frankly, it’s not the yarn that’s hard on my hands while knitting these puppies… it’s the US 0s. How many times can one nearly poke a hole in one’s finger? I need to buy a thimble.

2. “The yarn is harsh on the feet:” I don’t know about you, but my feet are far less sensitive than my hands, so see above. After finishing the first sock, I found that I actually really like the feel these slightly scratchy socks. They remind me of those wool ragg socks I used to wear in high school (oh yes, with the Birkenstock clogs. I was that girl. But then again, so was just about every girl in my high school). And in addition to the mental warmth brought on by nostalgia, they are actually very warm. If you are sensitive to wool, this is not the yarn for you. And I think that statement would likely apply to most wool from Noro. Sorry.

3. “The fabric is saggy:” This one has been popping up all over and I can see how this could be a problem. So my strategy here was to be proactive and choose a smaller needle size and a tightly knit pattern to make a firmer fabric. I know, I know. I too was lured by the siren song of the “Kureyon colors + plain stockinette” to let the color changes shine. But you must fight this feeling! There are plenty of simple patterns out there that will not overwhelm the Kureyon colors, but will tuck in the fabric. A little browsing through Ravelry led me to the cabled Widdershins, and this has seemed to be just the ticket (although, I’ll let you know after a “wash&wear” or two). The cables go a long way to keeping sag in check. Cables still too fussy for you? Well at least consider some ribbing. Hopefully this will do the trick… hopefully.

4. “The knot-to-yardage ratio is a nightmare:” I’m about 2.5 inches into my second sock, just passed the halfway point in the skein (hopefully), and I’ve only come across one knot. This isn’t so bad in my book, especially as I was expecting something more along the lines of 5 knots per yard! (I suppose having low expectations can be helpful.) We shall see how it goes from here on out.

5. “The colors are pretty:” Yes, yes they are. Although I’m at a bit of a loss as to the neon green action in the S164s. Who’s idea was that? It just comes out of no where!

So there you go. More when I finish the socks… soon-ish, I expect.

(Sorry for the recycled photo. I forgot my camera at home.)

FO: Bridging-the-Gap Charades

Pattern: Charade (pdf) by Sandra of I May Be Knitting a Ranchhouse.
Needles: US 1, 2.5mm.
Yarn: Knitterly Things Vesper Sock yarn (Afterglo)

Tick another one off for Project Spectrum, this time bridging the gap between “Fire” (pink) and “Earth” (brown). I love em, but man, it is hard to photograph these colors. These fraternal twins were knit toe-up, one from the middle of the ball, the other from the outside.

The herringbone pattern is charming and fun to knit! I imagine it would pop a bit more if the yarn were not self-striping. Regardless, I like the crisscross, thatch effect that comes of the herringbone and color stripes. For me, this yarn was always meant to be a pair of Charades.

I had to jog my memory here and there about the toe-up details from the Marigold pattern. Toe-up just keeps getting better and better! People always talk about how much they love top-down heel-flaps. But for me, in terms of process, I do not miss them. It could be that, in terms of wear-and-tear in the future, I will find short-row heels to be lacking… but until that day, toe-up for me! I am particularly proud of these heels. I very much like the way the colors striped, cupping the heel, and the look of the contrast along the wrapped/picked up stitch seam.

Next on the sock docket… Noro!

FO: The long overdue Marigolds

Pattern: Marigold Socks (pdf) by Flint Knits.
Needles: US 1, 2.5mm.
Yarn: Fearless Fiber Superwash Sock Yarn (Butterscotch)

Also tick one off for Project Spectrum.

Yes, it’s been so long! And I’ve missed you!

Well, in the spirit of things “long-lost,” I finally have something to show for myself. Indeed, this project has been a long time coming. I bought the yarn back in August for a swap and picked up an extra skein, always intending to use it Flint Knit’s fabulous Marigold socks. This was one of those patters where you know that you MUST knit it the second you see it. It reminded me of my childhood. A summer past time of mine was sitting in my backyard, plucking off the dried up heads off of marigold plants and sending the seeds to the wind.

I am really getting the hang of toe-up socks. I was a bit shy to try out the recommended short row toe, preferring instead to stick with the tried and true figure 8 method (scroll down a bit). The lace pattern was easily memorized and super speedy. And, I mean, hey… you can’t really argue with such a fabulous finished product. Thanks for the pattern Pam!

The Fearless Fibers superwash merino was a joy to work with and looks so beautiful knit up. I love the effect from the “rainbow dying” technique Deb uses. The yardage is really terrific too– I have rather large feet and it was so nice not to have to worry about running out of yarn before I ran out of foot to cover. In fact, I think there’s probably enough left for some Saartje’s Bootees or some such.

I found a great rhythm with these socks, sitting down every night to knit a few rows, and I was careful to cast on for number two immediately after weaving in the ends of number one, as to stave off the dreaded Second Sock Syndrome. When they were done I found myself a little bit sad and contemplated casting on for another pair, just so I wouldn’t have to stop! But my queue is long, so instead I plowed right into a pair of Charades… and stay tuned for those!

The Queen of Lake Mälaren, Golden Room, Stadshuset

I am still here.

FO: Gretel Beret

Pattern: Gretel, by Ysolda
Yarn: Malabrigo, Anntorps Väv
Needles: US 8 (5.0 mm), US 5 (3.75)

I got this hot tip that there was one… single… solitary yarn shop that sells Malabrigo in Stockholm.* If you recall, I got hooked on this stuff (as you do) after the Koolhaas back at the end of 2007 (when I should have been studying). I wanted to pretend that it was going to be some sort of adventure to find the shop, sort of like orienteering (very popular in Europe, I do believe)… but google.maps kinda killed the thrill. But I pretended that it was an arduous journey: there were dangerous pitfalls (read: the gaps between the train and the platform), treacherous water crossings (read: the t-bana has to cross some water between Södermalm and Gamla Stan), and some terrifying one-eyed beasts (read: tourists with digital SRLs)!

Anntorps Väv is a very small shop but is full up with wonderous fiber. Lots of Noro, Debbie Bliss, beautiful lace and yes… Malabrigo. The color selection was less than thrilling: largely navy, forest green and natural. I was about to just pick the natural/off-white, when the shopkeeper mentioned that they hand dye the yarn on site and showed me a couple of skeins. One really piqued my interest– all sorts of purples, from an almost irridecent to grape to mauve. Perfect! Although, I discovered later a bit of a downside to the hand dying– the fiber bled *a lot.* I think I’ll only be able to use my US 8 (5.0mm) 16″ circs with dark colored fiber from now on. After 9 rinses (two with vinegar) of the finished item, the water still wasn’t running clear. Here’s hoping my forehead doesn’t end up stained purple!

The pattern was wonderful. I thought maybe I could squeek out a Slouchy sized beret, but it was pretty clear as I came to the end of the second cable repeat that the Malabrigo would only get me as far as a Regular. The intertwining cables are beautiful and really pop! The only thing I’m unhappy about was totally my fault. I opted for a “lifted bar” M1-incerase and it didn’t really work out so well (a bit hole-y). I was really worried about it because these increases are right at the brim of the hat, framing the face. But fortnuately blocking helped a lot: the increases faded into the pattern and are no longer noticable (except to me).

Love the pattern, the yarn and the finished product. And I love feeling all Euro wearing a beret!

*As it turns out Maria’s Garn has Malabrigo too… but I didn’t know that until later.