Knitting Hiro

The old blog has been long neglected, and I'm only too aware of that. The crisp weather and a sudden burst of inspiration may change that for a bit: I'm starting a sweater after a longish hiatus.

On 6 November, which was also Election Day here in the US, I started Hiro.  It has a circular yoke with a bit of stranding in three colors in addition to the main body color. The colors pixelate upward and downward from the yoke in a way that is both cheerful and geometric, yet not too busy. Spurred on by a half-price sale on discontinued colors of Berroco Ultra Alpaca that's half wool, half alpaca, resistance was futile. The Marsh Mix (6296) colorway reminds me of the beautiful heathered wools of Scotland, very similar to Jamieson's Fern (SP249), with loden, chestnut, amber and warm blue-green heathering. It took a nano-second to decide to make this my main color. Complimentary colors are Ultra Alpaca Fennel (6249), a warm chartreuse-y green, Ultra Alpaca Cerulean (62170), a heathery blue-turquoise, shot subtly through with a gray lilac and deeper turquoise; I chickened out on my middle transition color by using Queensland Collection Kathmandu Aran Cream (135) with very subtle taupe/aqua/turquoise/camel tweedy flecks. The flecks seem to pull all the colors together in the merest suggestion, as they are few and far between. I like the nuance. It didn't hurt that I already had the Cerulean Ultra Alpaca and the Cream Kathmandu Aran in my stash, either.

I knit an embarrassingly rough swatch, to see how I should place the colors and figure my gauge. The blue looks a lot better up close to my face, so I am opting to knit it like the left side of the swatch. Onward through the fog.

Having never knit a yoked sweater, this is a learning experience for me; I love a challenge. Knit from the bottom up, it's hemmed instead of ribbed at the bottom edge, a nice, elegant finish. If I only knew how to work steeks into a pattern, I'd of done that, but since I have no clue how to set it all up, I am (miserably) knitting the body back and forth in one seamless piece. My purling is looser than my knitting, so I will place my trust in the blocking gods once the thing is finished and hope it evens out with a good bath and a block.

The hem is folded and knit together with the front side stockinette, which is a very tidy, sturdy finish. Love it! The last few days have been miles and miles of stockinette, and I've achieved 10" in length, incorporating some gentle waist shaping. My shaping differs from the pattern here and I'm working it out my own way; it'll be an inch to an inch and a half shorter in total length, too.

Stay tuned, and wish me luck.
PS: For historical purposes, Barak Obama won the presidential election. (Whew.)

I can knit, I can purl, but can I get it on the needles?

On returning to Austin from the crossing, I made for the closest store that had yarn, a Hancock Fabrics, which pretty much carry Lion Brand yarn exclusively. So I loaded up on a dozen skeins of LION WOOL, and a few balls of MYSTERY to make the heretofore mentioned scarves. But before the scarves, I was on a mission to make a tea cozy for moi.

Prior to the Austin move, I lived for 22 years in the DC metro area in Maryland. My dear friend and back door neighbor there has relatives in Ireland who make a pilgrimage to the US every couple of years for extended visits. Her Auntie Nyna was a knitter, and she made both of us the most remarkable tea cozies: they were honeycombed in texture, giving them fabulous thermal properties. Her cozy would keep a pot a tea hot for over two hours, better than any carafe on the market. But over the years, my grey and salmon cozy slowly but surely lost it's elasticity and most of the buoyant thick texture that made it function so well. I still have it (sentimental fool that I am) but it is pretty much useless. Auntie Nyna died several years ago, and with her the tea cozy pattern. No one knew anything about it. The first project idea that lept into my head was finding a similar tea cozy pattern and actually and knitting it. Myself.

God Bless the Internet, long may it reign. On the ship, Ann told me there were veritable storehouses of information about knitting on the Internet, including video tutorials and patterns. Once home, a Google search produced not only the tutorials I needed, but also a nearly identical tea cozy pattern! I couldn't believe my luck. It had the same double walled (I call it honeycomb) construction as my Auntie Nyna cozy. The pattern called for worsted weight 100% wool yarn, so I chose two skeins from my new stash: Lion Wool 'goldenrod' and 'winter white', and dove into my first project on my own. Then a real dilemma then arose: I had never learned casting on while under Ann's protective custody. The process just stymied me. Instead of belaboring it and delaying other progress, she merely did it for me ... as did others in our group. A definite disadvantage, but one that I could fix when I returned home with Internet video tutorials, she reasoned.

I sat before the computer armed with needles and yarn, replaying the long tail cast on tutorial over and over and over and OVER. I just couldn't figure it out. My youngest daughter wandered in, and sensing my frustration, came to see why I was so near tears. "Let me try" she said, having never even seen a knitting needle in her short 16 year life. She studied the tutorial a few replays, then took the needles and the goldenrod yarn and cast on 40 perfect stitches!

Another knitaholic was born.

Claire knitting Christmas gifts for friends,
with Sophie placidly snoozing in "her" chair.
Claire made all the baby hats on the table.
She's a natural!

I'm all for role reversal, especially when it's my kids teaching me. Over and over, Claire cast on and demonstrated the necessary finger movements. Once again, I started to feel like a knitting retard, until suddenly it just CLICKED. We were both jubilant. Claire quickly learned to knit and purl, and suddenly we had a new interest we could share.

Once the cozy was on the needles, I was fine. My first solo project had colorwork! Every four stitches I had to change colors, but it wasn't a big deal. Claire made one for her own small teapot in Lion Wool 'lemongrass' and 'purple'. Both cozies were made on size 6 needles. With her usual flair, Claire added two amber glass beads to the tails of her bow.

Happy teapots are cozy teapots. On the left, large cozy in Lion Brand Yarn, LION WOOL. Colors: 'Winter White' and 'Goldenrod'. This is a 48 oz. pot (large!), and I cast on 84 stitches to get the correct size. Right: Small cozy in Lion Brand Yarn, LION WOOL, colors 'Lemongrass' and 'Purple'. Claire cast on 76 stitches for the small teapot.