Midwinter Inspirations

Brilliant design course with Debbie Abrahams yesterday, held at Get Knitted's shop in Bristol. We were asked to take an inspiration with us and I took this Midwinter saucer, designed in the 1960s. I've been wanting to do something with this as a piece of knitting for ages and this seemed a golden opportunity. Debbie showed us how to sketch out some ideas and then develop these into a knitted swatch so that we could begin to work out the tension and then do the calculations for a whole project. The pattern was too complicated to copy exactly and in any event I'm not a great fan of Intarsia knitting, which is what an attempt at the starry flowers would require. Debbie suggested browsing her pattern books to find a suitable Fair Isle design. Amazingly the stash she had brought with her for us to use included some Rowan Handknit Cotton in exactly the right shades of turquoise and pink, plus some grey and black. I picked up some cream from the shop downstairs and got to work on my swatch. I'm really pleased with the end result and am now working on the actual project, a small purse/spectacle case.

To Spin or not to Spin...

There hasn't been much time for knitting lately - lots of nights away for work and leisure have led to very slow progress on my throw and I've also been feeling very tired. I've missed having solid blocks of time to get on with my knitting projects and I'm looking forward to giving it a bit more attention over the coming weeks. A trip to Bath last weekend led to a walk along the Kennet and Avon canal where I was struck by the patterns on this bridge: there must be a way to translate these interesting colours and textures into a piece of knitting! It just goes to show that inspiration can be found all around us, if we care to look. As well as working on my throw I want to finish off the written pattern for the lacy leaf collar that began this blog last October. This, and two of my lace scarves will be on sale at the Oxford Artweeks show of my local Guild of Weavers Spinners and Dyers at the end of May Bank Holiday weekend. Details at: www.artweeks.org/


In the meantime, I've been wondering what to do about my own efforts at spinning. I've not made much progress over the past few months and have thought maybe it's not for me. But I didn't want to give up on it without making a further attempt. So on Saturday I joined up with Kate and Sarah from my knitting group for the afternoon and had another go. This was really helpful, as I learned that a lot of the problems I was having with my wheel were things they struggled with too. By the end of the afternoon I'd certainly made some more progress and there were even aspects of the process that I enjoyed! I'm still not sure that all the preparation of carding, washing, spinning and dyeing a fleece is for me, especially when I could be knitting instead. But I can see that once the skills are acquired there is something satisfying in working a piece from scratch and I won't give up until I've had another go, with Carol, in a couple of weeks' time.

Design Your Own Knits

As you know, I've been having a go at my own knitting designs for the past few months. I guess knitters have always adapted and altered patterns to some extent but there can still be an element of following slavishly someone else's ideas. Going beyond patterns and exploring my own creativity is a big part of how I want to explore knitting today. My impression is that this is also part of the zeitgeist of the resurgence of knitting in the modern era. So I've been really pleased this week to acquire a copy of Debbie Abrahams' long-awaited book Design Your Own Knits.

Although there have been some US publications on this topic and also Alison Ellen's excellent books, this is the first UK publication to offer a really straightforward introduction to knitting design. The book is clear and well laid out, moving from creative inspiration to putting ideas onto paper, then knitting swatches and mapping out a design project for completion. There is advice on using proportional graph paper and on how to use different yarns and needle sizes for particular projects and to get the look you want. I particularly like the fact that the book covers bags, cushions, hats and socks as well as sweaters and cardigans. The sections on calculating yarn quantities and writing up patterns are very useful, especially if you want to be able to make your designs available to other knitters. One obvious omission is how to work out the number of stitches to be picked up for the front bands of a cardigan, and the font size, which varies a lot, seems unecessarily small in some cases. Overall, though, this is a generous book, building on the design courses Debbie runs around the country, and offering a professional's guidance to the amateur knitter who wants to express her or his own creativity.

On the actual knitting front I have made some progress on my throw, moving from brown to yellow on the big piece and, because it is getting a bit unwieldy to carry about with me, starting a smaller side panel in Irish moss stitch. I've not done any spinning: this is becoming a hurdle to be overcome. Although I've booked another lesson with Carole next month, there's a wider question about commitment to learning to spin that I need to think about.
Meanwhile I've finished off the socks I was knitting for my sister-in-law's birthday on Wednesday.

Nurturing the Artist Within

Not a whole lot to report on the knitting front this time, as I'm working on the main part of my throw. This is the workhorse bit of the project - solid knitting of ball by ball across 200 stitches on circular needles. There's something satisfying about this; I'm trying to do at least 1000 stitches a day. It's a good thing that it's an interesting stitch pattern, though, otherwise it might feel quite boring. I'm really pleased with the look of this diagonal moss stitch, which I adapted from a pattern in Knitting magazine.

Apart from this I've knitted a pair of socks in Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino and have been browsing a lot of books and magazines for other ideas. I'm particularly enjoying a book called Design, A Lively Guide to Design Basics for Artists & Craftspeople by Steven Aimone (Lark Books). I highly recommend it for anyone involved in any kind of artistic endeavour, from painting to photography, pottery to patchwork. It's a book that works on several levels, whether browsing the wonderful illustrations for ideas and inspiration, reading the text on different aspects of design, or working through the exercises to develop your own skills and technique. Another book I've discovered recently is Drawing for the Artistically Undiscovered by Quentin Blake and John Cassidy (Klutz). Blake is one of my artistic heroes anyway, and this is a terrific book for anyone who wants to draw but thinks they can't, or who, like me, had their early artistic efforts ridiculed in childhood. Here are my efforts at rain and umbrellas...

Knitting Circles

Having completed the first panel of my throw, I've developed a version of diagonal moss stitch to do a larger section. This has forced me finally to venture onto circular needles, in order to support the large number of stitches (200). Apart from a moment when I only had 199 (= misery) and some slight frustration about not being able to find bamboo circulars in the right size, this has been a real addition to my knitting world over the past fortnight. Although I'm using them to knit rows not rounds, there are still substantial benefits. The weight of the knitting is nicely balanced as it grows, it's a neater "package" to carry around on my weekly commute and I can spread it out to look at it, which isn't possible when it's all stuffed onto straight needles. My cat is happier, too, as I don't jab him with my needles when we're curled up on the sofa together of an evening.
By coincidence I've been reading a lot about Elizabeth Zimmerman's enthusiasm for circulars this week and there was also a good letter in this month's Knitting asserting their benefits. The writer was keen to promote a vision of knitting garments that is not about knitting, then blocking out, five flat pieces and sewing them together. I can go along with that as the cardigan I've been designing is still languishing in its basket waiting to be progressed. I don't know why I didn't begin using circulars for that project and why I've felt scared to try them out. There's something very strange about these blocks we put on our creative and artistic endeavours, which leads me back to take a look at such helpful books on this subject as Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way and Skolnik and MacDaniels' The Knitting Way, which I've mentioned before. There's an odd juxtaposition of fears around both success and failure, somehow, which I've experienced but don't really understand.
Circles have been in my mind in other ways this past couple of weeks, with a very nice meal out with my knitting group, a successful recycling of some of my furniture to a member of the group, and a quick break from my throw to knit a pair of socks. Have also had a link with the worldwide Knitting Circle, with a lovely e-mail from Donna Druchunas, author of Arctic Lace, giving me permission to sell the scarves I've knitted from her book as long as I give her the design credit. Of course, Donna, and many thanks!

Obsessed with moss

Another fortnight has gone by - how? Lots of work preoccupations and, last week, several trips to the ballet, including my first visit to Covent Garden, which was wonderful. Meanwhile I've been continuing to work on my moss stitch throw and have nearly completed one panel strip. I'm quite pleased with the effect - am rather obsessed with these mossy colours at the moment - and think it succeeds in looking like the Shetland picture I posted last time. Now I'm experimenting with other moss stitch based panels to go alongside it.









My cardigan design has rather run aground, I think for several reasons. I've finished the fronts and the back and can't quite work out the best way to do the three-quarter length sleeves. There also seems to be a problem with the fronts not quite matching because the fabric has been pulled too tight on the side where I've changed colours doing the slip ribbon stitch. This has happened before when I've been doing coloured stripes and the thought that I could have avoided this if I'd knitted the project on circular needles is providing quite a lot of inertia at the moment. I'm also really enjoying working on the throw and trying out different samples and ideas and want to concentrate on that for now. This means that I've not been practising spinning either, although I have another session booked with Carole for this week. I've always been concerned about setting aside time to learn to spin when there's so much I want to do with knitting and this is proving to be the case at the moment. I need some incentive, like a sense of making progress from my current complete incompetence at the task!

Meanwhile my Tuesday knitting group is one year old this week and we're having an anniversary dinner. Like the time between these blog entries I can't quite get my head round that a year has gone so fast. It's been such a great addition to my working week, the Tuesday night stop off on the way home to catch up with everyone's news and latest projects.

Musings on Moss Stitch

Where has a fortnight gone? Sometimes I seem to distract myself to the point of not achieving anything at all. And yet when I look back I can see that it is all grist to the mill of learning about knitting - construction, texture, design. This picture is of the first piece of knitting that I've spun and dyed myself; it's really wee and will just be a buckle on a knitted bag but nevertheless it's a symbol of an emerging craft. It's knitted in moss stitch which has been one of my obsessions lately.

When I was on Shetland last year I spent quite a lot of time observing mosses and lichens and the various yellows, browns and greens they produce. And this week I began working on a design for a throw that would incorporate these colours using variations on moss stitch. Yes, I know I've got a zillion other projects on the go... but this feels different, a development towards properly designing my own stuff. As far as I've been able to research it so far there are three kinds of moss stitch. Single moss (row 1 K1, P1; row 2 P1, K1) is the one that is also known as seed stitch. It gives a really firm texture and is a great alternative to ribbing for welts, edges and borders. (Indeed, sadly, I may have to undo quite a lot of work on my throw to add in a moss stitch border instead of the garter stitch one I began with before my ideas started to develop - must learn to swatch, swatch, swatch!). Double moss stitch (rows 1 and 4 K2, P2; rows 2 and 3 P2, K2) produces a slightly more open fabric with a brick-like effect. I'm also using something called Irish moss stitch (rows 1 and 2 K1, P1; rows 3 and 4 P1, K1) which gives a somewhat blurred result and is an excellent infill for a diamond-panelled cable as suggested by Pam Dawson in her book Traditional Island Knitting. The shades of green, brown and gold I'm using come from a pack of Shetland double knitting wool that I picked up from Jamieson's when I was up in Lerwick last summer. (Which, as an aside, reminds of the recent press report about the Shetland Viking fire festival, Up Helly-Aa, which described Shetland as just off the North coast of Scotland. Yes, just a bit, only 250 miles or so! But there was an excellent article about Foula - "just off" the North coast of mainland Shetland - in The Guardian last week so we must be kind to these English folks. Up Helly-Aa, by the way, is held on the last Tuesday in January and is definitely worth a trip. The men of Lerwick dress up as Vikings and run round the town shouting "Ra, ra" and in the evening they set fire to a boat. It's a wonderful spectacle: you can view some pictures on my other half's blog: http://rossmac.blogspot.com/)

Meanwhile, I've finished my Arctic lace North Star scarf and it is pinned out to dry in my dressing-room. I found that I had exactly nine pearl-coloured beads to put in the centre of each of the stars and I added a simple garter stitch lace border at each end. And my cardigan design is also progressing. I've finished the back and should get the two fronts done today. Which leaves the last of my triplets: spinning. Have not found any more time for this recently but have booked another session with Carole in 3 weeks' time.