Knitting stick

We are supposed to be on a flight to the US, from Manchester via Amsterdam, at this very moment, but because of the  Eyjafjallajökull eruption in Iceland, Manchester airport is still closed so we are still here.  I'm feeling thoroughly miserable - the purpose of the trip was primarily to visit our daughter whom we haven't seen since September.  I have no idea when or if we shall be able to rearrange the flights, so I'm blogging instead.

Earlier this month, John went to the Newark Antiques Fair with some friends.  It is supposed to be the largest antiques fair in the country, and he had a great time there and bought lots of things.  (Mostly very cheap, he claims.)

He gave me a knitting stick that he bought at the fair - a lovely gift (even if partly intended to salve his conscience).    It's a simple turned shape, with nothing to show who it was made for, or when or where, but I imagine that it's 19th century and maybe from the north of England.

   

The end of the stick is hollowed out, with a brass knurled ring set into it, and an ivory or bone (?) ring set into that, to hold the end of the knitting needle.

The stick is intended to be  tucked into a belt or waistband, so that it can hold the right needle steady.  It allowed knitters to knit outdoors, while they were walking.  An article by Kate Davies on Knitting Outdoors, in Rowan Knitting and Crochet Magazine 47, discusses how knitting sticks and similar gadgets were used to facilitate knitting while on the move and doing other things at the same time.  She also has a blog post with photos of plain and fancy knitting sticks.  

It would be interesting to try knitting with my knitting stick, with double-pointed needles, although the bone ring doesn't seem to be very firmly fixed so maybe not.  Knitting with a stick ought to be similar to knitting with the right needle fixed under your arm, which is what I do,  so maybe it would make it easier for me to knit in the round.

Updating a Classic

I have had a copy of Marion Foale's Classic Knitwear for years (though I think that strictly speaking it is my sister's and I have it on long loan).  It was published in 1985, when I was not knitting, so I have never made any of the jumpers in the book (although I did persuade my mother to knit one for me).   Since I started knitting again, I have had it in mind to knit one of them some time. 


The jumpers and cardigans in the book are quite simple designs, and the stitches are not complicated.  They are all knitted in one colour, too. But they are all, I thought, very wearable - classics, in fact.


However, when I came to look at the patterns in detail, with a serious intention to knit one, I saw that they won't do.  The shapes are wrong for today - they are mostly very loose-fitting, in the body and the sleeves, and they all have dropped shoulders, which makes for bagginess around the armholes. Many of the jumpers have a close fitting rib, followed by an increase in the number of stitches, as well as a change to a larger needle.  That means that the waist is much wider than the hips - nowadays we make jumpers much more close-fitting.     


The jumper I wanted to knit, Badminton, is actually described as "a long slender shape", though to a modern eye it looks very roomy, especially around the waist and armholes. The waist is 6 inches bigger than the waist size it is intended for, and the tops of the sleeves are very wide too. 

But it still is basically a very appealing jumper, I think.  I love the  vertical lines (each is a single stitch in moss stitch (aka seed stitch)), and the square neckline, also in moss stitch.  So I am attempting to knit a slimmer version with set-in sleeves. I am using a straightforward modern pattern for DK yarn, and morphing that into Badminton. 

 The yarn I am using is Wendy Supreme mercerised cotton (DK weight)  - thicker than the yarn originally  intended.   The colour is a sort of blue-green (teal?). I'll report progress later.

And Another Scarf

The scarf in Regia sock yarn that I wrote about previously is now finished.  It is about 140 cm. by 25 cm. (The fabric is rather stretchy, so the measurements are  approximate.)  Who would have thought that the yarn to make one pair of socks (two 50g. balls) would make a scarf that big?

I have been wearing it in the house this week because the weather turned cold again - it looks very  good with a lavender coloured top.

I should stop knitting scarves now and knit other things - at least until next winter.  On the other hand, I have been musing about a scarf in double knitting (the technique, not the yarn weight) - a two-sided reversible scarf in two colours, with the colours switched from one side to the other.   I have never tried double knitting and possibilities are intriguing, although it also sounds very fiddly and slow - not sure I have the patience.  (I can do slow, as long as it's straightforward enough to do something else at the same time.)  I found some tutorial material on the web that suggested starting with something small - a pot-holder.   But what's the point of knitting a pot-holder in a fancy two-colour pattern?  Either you never use it (wrong),  or you do use it and it gets burnt and covered with food stains (very wrong).   (I feel that I am about to start reminiscing about knitted dishcloths, so I had better shut up for now.)

Palindromic scarf

Our friend Mary has  an important birthday today.  She lives in the Highlands of Scotland, several miles from the nearest town (or settlement of any size).  The winters are cold  and long, and so we thought that she would like a warm, soft scarf. I chose alpaca yarn - King Cole Baby Alpaca from my local yarn shop, in double knitting weight.  There is a range of natural colours - brown-ish and grey-ish - and I chose the camel colour.  

I have knitted several scarves over the past year, but they have all been lacy patterns with a definite right side and wrong side (and inclined to curl inwards at the sides, because based on stocking stitch).  I had already decided that the next scarf should be reversible - although maybe palindromic is a better (and fancier) word, because I wanted it to be exactly the same on both sides, rather than just equally presentable on both sides.  Plain rib is the same on both sides of course, but (a) it would be boring to knit and (b) the fabric would be too thick - I wanted it to drape nicely. 
 
I chose the Asherton scarf by SmarieK, available as a free pattern.  It uses diamonds of stocking stitch, reverse stocking stitch and  moss stitch.    

(Moss stitch is the term that the designer uses, and is the American term for it, apparently, whereas what I call moss stitch is what Americans call seed stitch. I don't think I have a name for this stitch. How confusing.)  

The pattern is absolutely the same on both sides. And every row  is the same in reverse, if the knit stitches are swapped with the purl stitches. And it's symmetric lengthways too. So the design is cleverly worked out, although the basic elements are simple.  The diamonds of stocking stitch and reverse stocking stitch give the overall pattern a lot of texture and depth, too.   

   
The finished scarf does drape nicely as required, and is very warm and soft.  In fact, we thought that it would be much too warm to wear until the autumn.  But Scotland is getting a lot more snow this week, according to the weather reports. So it will be useful straightaway, if only the post van can get through the snow to deliver it.      


Happy Birthday, Mary.

Booktown

Last weekend,  John and I went to Glasgow for a wedding.  We stopped on the way at Sedbergh, a little town on the western edge of the Yorkshire Dales National Park, although nowadays it is in Cumbria.  It is in beautiful countryside and surrounded by hills and has been designated England's Book Town, which was the point of the visit.  (Who chooses England's Book Town?  I've no idea.)

There are several secondhand bookshops in the centre of the old part of the town, which consists of two streets, Main Street and Back Lane, and not much else.  We had been to Sedbergh once before, and I spent most of that visit in the Sleepy Elephant bookshop on Main Street, which has a good selection of knitting books, as well as clothes and other crafts.  Last time, I bought a copy of Kaffe Fassett's Glorious Knitting and a very nice handbag.  They also sell a range of soaps and other toiletries, and there is a strong (pleasant) smell of lemon from that around the knitting bookshelf.

Vogue Knitting 1993

This time, I found several copies of Vogue Knitting magazine, from various dates between 1987 and 2001, priced at £1.50 or £2.50.  Many of the patterns in the earlier issues are BIG jumpers with REALLY BIG dropped shoulders, which would not be wearable without adaptation now.  But even when there are not many enticing designs, there are interesting articles.  For instance, in the Autumn 1993 issue, there is a piece by Elizabeth Zimmermann on the history of i-cord, which I had never heard of before I started knitting again, but seems to appear quite often in knitwear designs these days.  Idiot cord is what we English call French knitting (don't know what the French call it), which we used to make when we were children on a wooden cotton reel with four nails in the top.  Elizabeth Zimmermann  figured out how to knit it on double pointed needles and then developed various ways to use it.  She says that she renamed it i-cord because she thought that the name "idiot cord" was rather rude.

So that was a very successful bookshop visit.  We also went to Westwood Books at the far end of Main Street, which also has a section of knitting books.  More useful still, since it's a very large shop and John spent a long time there, it has coffee and very comfortable sofas.

Huggy Jumper

I have just finished a jumper in chunky yarn that I started two weeks ago.  I saw the pattern on Mooncalf's blog - she had knitted it in a weekend.  Apart from looking good, the attraction was that it is knitted on a circular needle from the top down.  There are lots of evident advantages to knitting that way, but I have not much enjoyed previous experiences of knitting in the round.  This seemed a good opportunity to try again  - it wouldn't take very long and I could see if the advantages make it worthwhile.    


The pattern is the Oatmeal Pullover by Jane Richmond

also viewable on the Etsy website,  where the pattern is for sale.  (Although my finished jumper is recognisably the same pattern, she is obviously a lot slimmer than I am.)

The description there is: "This fitted pullover is knit from the top down and requires very little yarn. The body is generous in length featuring deep ribbing and raglan sleeve shaping. The 3/4 length sleeves require no shaping and are fitted to flatter. The entire garment is knit in the round and requires absolutely no seaming. Perfect for trying on as you go for that perfect fit."  

The pattern says that the pullover is designed with negative ease, for a very close fit, i.e. it is designed to be smaller than you are.  I decided that actually I would rather it was bigger than me.   

 I knit it in Sirdar Hug yarn (from Kemps Wool Shop, only 99p for a 50g ball). The recommended gauge for the yarn (on the ball band) is 13 stitches and 17 rows to 4 inches on 8 mm needles, and that is what I was getting in my test swatch.  The pattern is for a chunky yarn, but the gauge is looser, even though on smaller (6.5 mm) needles.  I was glad that Mooncalf had been there before me, because she said that "even on 8mm needles my gauge was a little tighter than that specified on the pattern", so I felt safer about using 8mm needles myself.

I calculated how many stitches I would need to make the finished jumper the same bust size as me ( to avoid the negative ease thing) and decided that I needed to knit the size 48 - this is at least 10 inches bigger than I would normally choose.   (The 48 in. size is designed to have a finished body circumference of 43 inches - the extra shrinkage down to my proper size is due to my tension being tighter than recommended.)

I also took Mooncalf's advice to add three extra rows to the yoke.  She found that the shallowness of the yoke pulled the neckline out sideways, whereas it is intended to be slightly square, and the 3 extra rows have made that work.  

I was a bit doubtful that it would turn out alright, being on the wrong size needles and in theory 3 sizes too big.  So it was especially useful to be able to try on while knitting.  And it is fine - a close fit, but not too small.

What's the verdict?  I definitely like the jumper - it's warm and soft  (although slightly draughty round the back of the neck - because the back and front are the same, the neckline is quite low at the back).  And there are some things about knitting top-down and in the round that I really like.

• I hate sewing up, so it's wonderful to avoid that.   
• I loved being able to try the jumper on as I was knitting.  (Of course, that's because it was knitted top down, as well as in the round.)   It did make a difference to the finished jumper - I was originally planning for the sleeves to be shorter, but didn't like the result. 
• It's kind of geometrically satisfying to knit the whole garment at once, rather than  separate pieces.  

 On the other hand, I still find knitting on a circular needle unnatural.  My right hand has to hold the right needle as well as moving the yarn - on straight needles, the right needle is held under my arm.  So I feel all the time that there is an extra thing to do.  The fact that it was such a large diameter needle created problems too - the stitches on the wire tended to shrink so that they wouldn't slide easily back onto the needle.  I found that I had to stop frequently to shove the next batch of stitches back onto the needle from the wire.  Does anyone else have that problem, or is it just me?  It seems unavoidable, given the disparity between the diameter of the needle (8 mm) and the diameter of the wire (2mm?).  All the pushing and shoving slowed down the knitting.  It didn't help in keeping the stitches even, either.  On straight needles I can get into a rhythm (at least if it's a plain stitch like stocking stitch or rib) - that never happened.  I suspect that I would knit more evenly on straight needles, as well.

I'm still not sold on knitting in the round, so the experiment wasn't altogether a success.  But at least I have a nice jumper out of it.

Steel City

This has nothing whatever to do with knitting.....

On Saturday John and I had a shopping trip to Sheffield, my home town.  We had lunch in a cafe on Division Street, across from the old fire station, where thousands of years ago I had several training sessions for my Girl Guide Emergency Helper badge.   It was a beautiful day, and the sun was picking out the arms of the city of Sheffield high on the facade of the fire station.  I had never noticed them before - back when I was a Guide, the stone was probably black with grime.

Sheffield is known for steel making, and especially for its cutlery, which has been famous for centuries  - one of the characters in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales had a Sheffield knife.  Sheffield people are very proud of its steel and cutlery industries, and when I was a child, the city arms were seen everywhere - not least on every bus and tram.  We all knew that the sheaf of arrows and the three sheaves of corn on the shield are a reminder of the River Sheaf, that runs though Sheffield.  (The river itself is not in fact an important feature in the centre of Sheffield  - it's a very small river and much of it runs underground  these days.)  And the supporters are Thor and Vulcan, the gods of metal working. 

Thor and Vulcan are often shown in the Sheffield arms resting an elbow on the top of the shield, though they aren't usually quite as casual as here. They look to me like a pair of old men in the pub, standing at the bar -   they've just taken a break from smiting things, and are discussing the finer points of iron working and how no-one appreciates proper craftsmanship these days. It made me proud to be from Sheffield.