purlsandmurmers

This and That

When I began knitting, my mom was kind enough to give me a swift and a ball winder, and I have made great use of them over the years. They were wonderful, functional, Japanese plastic devices that worked very well.  Then, a couple of years ago the swift broke -- goodness knows how, I think a cat was involved somehow, and I needed another.  I was given this nice wooden swift and the lovely wooden ball winder shown next to it.

These are beautiful devices.  However they have one problem.  The swift does not fit on my sewing table or any of the counters in the house.  You see, the part that is supposed to clamp to the table top is about 1/4 inch to short to fit around my counter edges or table top edges.  The old swift was made with a clamp much like the ones shown on the ball winder and it could fit anywhere, but the new swift has this lovely wooden clamp that is just a smidge to small, and it fits nowhere except on the room divider between the entry hall and the dining room.

I set it up some weeks ago to wind the linen, and as I intended to wind more yarn, I never took it down.  Now I am wondering if it can just become a permanent or at least moderately permanent part of our decor -- I might be convinced to take it down for parties for example if I could just leave it up for every day.   I would be more than willing to compromise -- for example I could stop complaining about the pile of sunglasses and other things that are stored on the kitchen counter near the coffee pot -- in exchange for permanent swift mounting.

So far most visitors to the house have no idea what it is anyway and this leads to some interesting conversations.  People come up with the most outlandish ideas.

The two missing blue yarns arrived for the Anny Blatt sweater.  Now I just need to finish something so I can move on to this project.  Something else arrived in that box as well.  You would be completely naive if you think I can call a yarn store and only request two missing skeins of yarn without ordering something else -- it would hardly be worth the postage after all.  But you will just have to wait to see what that something might be.  I WILL get to it this summer, even if some other project gets bumped further down the list.  Life is a constantly rejiggering of lists after all.

And I am knitting on the linen tanks.  I am about 5 1/2 inches above the armhole shaping and making good progress.  After a period of just not wanting to pick up the needles I have returned to a more productive frame of mind and I just can't wait to sit and knit in the evening.  May this bit of knitting fever continue.

Crashing through

All week I had been looking forward to Thursday.  Thursday is knitting night.  But there had been no knitting the last few weeks and I sorely missed these get togethers.  In fact I was feeling a little desperate for a girl's night out.

Thursday started out bright with promise.....

But then I hit a wall.  A personal wall, but still a wall I could not walk around, or climb over, or even ignore any longer.  Tonight I had to take down the wall.

And I did.

It started with work.  When we closed the office G brought home tons of stuff which has all been piled up in his den.  30 years accumulation of office stuff and files were crammed into that small 8 x 10 foot room and I dreaded going in there.  But I had to.  The office files were there, piled willy nilly on the floor and on boxes and furniture.  The household files have long been stored in that room, but I could not get at the file cabinets through the piles of s.t.u.f.f.  that blocked the path. There are two computers -- one still running office files, and G's personal computer which I couldn't even find space to set up because I still needed access to the other computer as well.

Today when I got a call and needed a chart right away to discuss something that was scheduled next week when I had been told that it was months away yet,  I couldn't access what I needed.  I couldn't find anything.  I felt out of control.  And I felt stupid.  And I hate feeling out of control and stupid.  I vowed that something had to be done today.  I was literally locking myself in the den and not coming out until there was some order and at the least the beginnings of a workable system.

I succeeded. And it feels good.

There is still a lot of stuff that G has to go through and make some decisions about, but we can both work in there now, and I can get to the stuff that I need.  And you know something?  That pile of stuff was a big weight around my neck.  It kept me from really being able to relax and work on things I wanted to do, like knitting.  I knew I had to face the wall, but I dreaded it so. 

And so only a few rows have been knitted on the linen tank.  And only a few rows have been knitted on my socks, but some of the chains that have been holding me back have been lifted.  My needles are ready to fly again.

Idle Hands and Wandering Thoughts

Very often my knitting time is also my time to let my mind wander explore whatever thoughts happen to pass by.  But what happens when I am not knitting?  Do I stop thinking?  Do I stop daydreaming?  Well I hope not because I would be an incredibly crabby person if that were the case.  Yet, I am still a little crabbier when I have not been knitting, as I have not of late.

It is not like my life has been fiber-free.  I have been fondling my yarn, imagining sweaters knit and imagined, more imagined that actually knit at this point.  I love these imagined sweaters.  They fit beautifully.  Imagined sweaters are always perfect.  But one can't actually wear imagined sweaters or crush them between one's fingers, or feel the softness or weight, or admire the beauty of the stitches.  Oh well, I suppose I shall have to knit again.

And I will.  Knit that is.

But this week I started reconstructing my database.  It is a slow process because I can't just pull out the yarn and count it, record it and forget about it.  I have to try to remember what dreams originally prompted the purchase, I have to imagine its future life, I have to savor its presence.  This all takes time, and it takes time away from knitting.  I am finding projects that had slipped into the back recesses of my mind, projects I want to knit soon.  Projects that will have to wait a little longer, because truthfully every time i hold a bit of yarn and imagine it as a sweater I want to be knitting that sweater RIGHT NOW.  But I can't knit them all right now, can I?

Actually I am having trouble knitting any of them right now, due to the simplest and most stupid twists of fate.  I have a paper cut.  Actually it is a cardboard cut, incised on the edge of one of those cardboard storage boxes used to start files and charts.  I never realized that such a thick piece of cardboard could be so sharp, could cut so quickly, could be such an inconvenience.  I think of a paper cut as a simple thing.  But a cardboard cut, quickly made yet wide and deep might require stitches.  A cardboard cut on pad of the index finger puts a bit of a brake on one's knitting output, but not on ones knitting dreams.

The painful part is almost gone.  The stitches and the little cut are beginning to heal up.  Knitting will resume.

In the meantime, the life of the mind continues on as well.  I actually read a book for the first time since all this other stuff in my life started. 

The book led me to think and let my mind wander and once my mind was wandering, of course it wandered from ideas to fabric and yarn and dreams of future projects. The hands may be idle but the perigrinations of the mind go on, and there are enough dreams to supply a lifetime of knitting (not to mention yarn).

Updates and Responses

The Rice Stitch cardigan is coming along, I have begun the sleeve cap for the last sleeve.  I do want to sew the body of the sweater together and baste in the sleeve before I block it.  The yarn is lovely but it does come unplied after washing and I would hate to have to rip out and reknit the sleeve with the post-wetted yarn.

The spring issue of Knitters arrived and it is the last issue in my subscription.  I am not going to renew as I have been somewhat disappointed in Knitters of late.  However this issue had two sweaters I like, and one that is rapidly moving up to my must knit list for this summer.

 

The sweater that has so taken over my knitting thoughts is this one:

The photo only shows part of the sweater, it is basically a long vest with a combination lace and cable pattern in cotton.  I really think I will get a lot of use out of this, and it fits right in with the kind of loose basic things I have been craving of late.

Anyway, our dear friend whose son is a successful meteorologist, in private industry, tells us to expect a late cool spring and a short cool summer, so perhaps vests are the perfect thing. 

The other sweater I really like is the lacy mohair cardigan:

which is another sweater that might be right on if the weather prediction is correct, and even if not, I suspect that there will always be times when it is just the perfect thing.

Susan asks how many sweaters there are in my collection, and I must truthfully answer that yes there are more than 75.  There are actually closer to 100 if I count both parts of sweaters sets as separate sweaters.  I know they are separate sweaters, but I think of them as a unit. I really hadn't wanted to know.   I did not show the photos to count, or to brag, just because I think they look so pretty.  There is about a 25 year collection of sweaters there, as the oldest sweater in the bunch is 25 years old.  The problem with buying and making things you love, and developing a consistent sense of one's taste over the years, is that things seem to accumulate. 

Obviously they are not all hand knitted, and I have not saved all my hand knitted sweaters.  Still 49 of the sweaters in those photos are my hand knits although there are a couple that might be weeded out soon, and of course there will be new additions.

Some of them rarely get worn but are no less treasured because of that.  Some of them go through cycles of heavy rotation and cycles of rest.  There are one or two that are so unusual and have such presence that I can only wear them rarely, like nice evening clothes, but since they never go out of style, they have been worn once or twice a year for all the years I have had them.

Progress on some fronts

I had fully intended to get the body of the rice stitch cardigan on the blocking board today but I was foiled by G, who got home from the gym before I did, thereby beating me to the washing machine.  He wanted to run a load of gym clothes.  I wanted to soak and spin the rice stitch cardigan as a preface to pinning it to the blocking board.  Although I was eager and attentive, sitting and knitting on the sleeve in close enough proximity to the washing machine that I would hear when the cycle stopped.  I did not get the sweater in the machine in time for it to be out before darkness fell, robbing me of adequate light. 

The sewing room cutting table is still piled with work and various projects so the only opportunity to block is in the guest room which is unfortunately devoid of adequate light at the moment.  One floor lamp is not adequate for my aging eyes, and the sweater will have to wait until morning.

Unfortunately I have reached the point on the sleeve where I should be ready to begin the shaping for the sleeve cap, but I want to be certain of the length first, and this requires blocking and assembling the sweater.  I am tired of ill-fitting sleeves.  I suppose I might have to slip the first sleeve off onto waste yarn and begin the second before the cap is done.  Better that than knitting and ripping.

In the meantime I got all my sweaters stowed away back in their home in the Sewing Room Closet.

Everything fit but the space is full.  For future sweaters I will either have to eliminate existing garments or use up some fabric to clear more space, or use up the yarn that is hogging two shelves.  I wonder if those shelves hold yarn for the same quantity of sweaters that would be produced, or if there is actually room for more sweaters than yarn.

As you will note, not all sweaters are hand knit, but a significant proportion are, and there are even some you may recognize.

 

Knitting and Thinking

Friday night we were at Avery Fisher Hall hearing the NY Philharmonic conducted by Colin Davis.  The concert was utterly fabulous and we had a lovely time.  Mitsuko Uchida played the Mozart Piano Concerto in F major, K459, and the entire program was just sumptuous.

But what stuck in my head is something I read in the program notes.  In an article on Sir Colin, the author commented on how he has relaxed with age and become more ruminative and zen-like.

   

"He also learned to knit; it helps him think."

And that thought has stuck with me.  Well, I love to knit and it does help me think.  I love knitting and letting my mind wander through the various machinations of its thoughts.  I love the idea that as my hands can purl, my thoughts can wander around where they will like the purling of a brook.  I love the juxtaposition of the meanings of words with the activities of life.

Mostly however that sentence stuck with me because I have not been knitting that much, or more exactly that my own knitting rhythms have been interrupted.

I have not been knitting, I realize now, precisely because knitting helps me think.  It helps me reflect.  And lately I have been avoiding thought and reflection.  You see my beloved G has lung cancer.  We learned this two weeks ago, and I have been keeping things mostly bottled up for much of this period because G thought he could keep it a secret and tell no one, including his children, his family, or his office staff.  Eventually he had to accept that this could not be and so we are closing the office, seeing doctors, and preparing for lung surgery. 

We are lucky in that the cancer has not spread (as far as can be determined) beyond the lung and it is therefore a surgical case.  This is the best possible hope at this point, and I am substantially relieved.  But not relieved enough that I want to sit and knit and let my mind wander over the changes, options, and risks ahead.  Oh I do knit.  I knit in doctor's offices to keep from pacing and making the other patients and their families nervous.  I knit on the train.  I thought I would knit on the train back from the city as well, but I did not.  I started listening to my book and thought I would knit, but instead I slept, some of the best sleep I have had in weeks, perhaps the drone of the voice reading stilled those brain waves enough that they could just let go for a while.

There will be more doctor's offices, and more knitting, and eventually knitting in a hospital and knitting beside my beloved's bed while I watch over him.  And there will be periods of non-knitting too.  I have said that my projects often remind me of what was going on in my life while they were being knit.  This sweater will have many powerful memories.  Let us hope that the joining together of yarn, and the texture of the fabric will be dense and strong and will help hold us together well into the future.

Mail

Lovely things have come in the mail:

This lovely belated holiday (which holiday? perhaps it is actually an early Easter gift?) gift came from my 2 "two step granddaughters" (two step is the term I affectionately use for my step-daughter's step-daughter's even though I have no idea if they know how to do a two step or not).  These soaps came from a small shop near one of them (they are young adults) and the aroma is heavenly.  It was enough for me to seriously consider heading right off for a bath the instant I opened the package.

Today's other package contained the remainder of my brown cashmere yarn for the rice-stitch cardigan and an Anny Blatt pattern book I had requested.

I love the cover sweater and it was the sole reason I ordered the book.  As soon as it arrived however I made my self a double-espresso (why?  considering I have not been sleeping well of late this may be foolish) and curled up to ogle the patterns.  These two stood out:

I love this second sweater and initially thought I had the perfect yarn for it.  On further reflection I am not so sure.  I believe that Fine Kid, the yarn called for is a sport weight yarn, and the yarn I originally had in mind is definitely either 4 ply or lace weight.  This is not a tragedy because I already had a sweater planned for the 4 ply yarn I was just temporarily seduced by the prospect of a new pattern.  There are other sport weight yarns in my collection however so this might materialize on the needles some day.

Of course you know I have no other patterns and projects waiting in the wings, right?

Conspiracy Theory

Although it has basically been a short winter, and the cold wintry weather didn't truly begin until well into January, I have a complaint.   

It has come to my attention that in the 4 or 5 weeks that have encompassed our season of cold, nasty, wintry weather, the weather has interfered with my Thursday knitting circle three times.  This strikes me as completely unfair.

Worse, none of those nasty wintry storms actually turned into anything -- there was just enough slick, icy, sleet/snow mix in the early evening to make the roads treacherous for my 40 minute drive down to Yarn Central but then, just after I got settled in and reconciled myself to the thought of not going, the evil weather stopped.  I think that if I have to miss knitting, Mother Nature should at least leave something on the ground to compensate my for my pain.

Yesterday morning I dutifully salted the driveway with the requisite 15 gallons of calcium chloride:

And all I got for the hour of my time and very tired sore arms was a little rain and sleet which has now disappeared. 

G is trying to console me by telling me that I had I not salted the driveway it would not be bone dry now.  It was a sheet of ice this morning and the steepest parts of the driveway are "blessed" with an almost complete lack of winter sun.

Although it has been a short winter, I hope this slow torture ends soon.

Back Home Again

Our long weekend in Tucson was lovely.  We soaked up the warmth and sunshine and were lucky enough to come home to a mini heat-wave hear as today was quite warm and sunny as well.  A little breather before the next snow I suppose.

Very little was accomplished on the knitting front however.  Usually I get a lot of knitting done on the plane, and although I did not anticipate knitting on the flight home (we took the red-eye, leaving Tucson at midnight and arriving at Newark at 6 AM), as I have no trouble sleeping on planes, and I knew I would be driving home when we landed, I fully expected several hours of uninterrupted knitting time on the flight to Arizona.

Instead I slept.   I will probably never know what happened on the NJ Turnpike Friday afternoon, but this was one of the worst drives to Newark I can remember.  We left early, as G was a little worried about rush hour traffic, leaving at 3:00 for a 7:40 flight.  In normal conditions it takes 2 hours to get to Newark from my house, maybe 2 1/2 in heavy traffic.  Not so Friday.  We got to the NJ Turnpike exit off of I80 in good time but then the world stopped.  It took us over two hours to go the five or six miles from the I80 exit to the toll gates on the Jersey Turnpike.  We were stopped in traffic as we received several phone calls confirming our flight and later informing us that the flight was delayed.  We were grateful for the delays, but our airline, Continental told us we still had to check in by the original final check in time of 7:10 or we would not be allowed on the flight.  At 6:50 we were just barreling toward the Newark Airport exit off the turnpike.  Then the parking lot was backed up, with people lined up blocking the street and no one moving.  Another half hour later our car is finally at the front of the queue and we wait for the shuttle bus, and waited, and waited, with a bus load of people all worrying about whether they will make their flights.  Our flight was delayed until 9:30, but we had no idea if Continental would let us on and in fact, when we finally got to check in, at 8:10 we were refused.  Insistence and friendly staff got us around that obstacle and we were very glad to be on that packed airplane to Tucson.  We finally took off by 10, and I, tired and stressed, having been the anxious driver on this trip, fell promptly asleep. 

Luckily the rest of the trip more than made up for the inauspicious beginning. While we were there we saw butterflies:

These were in a special exhibit at the Tucson Botanical Garden and I did not manage pictures of most of the butterflies, but apparently several other people got photos of a lovely specimen that decided to ride around on my backside.  Too bad I missed it.

And I love the texture of this cactus:

Now that I am home, and caught up on sleep, knitting resumes.  Hopefully I will have some progress to show soon.

Scenes from a Weekend

Sometimes a weekend is best spent just puttering about, engaged in a variety of activities.  How can such a weekend be a bad thing?

We had pancakes, pumpkin pancakes with bacon on the side.  I am not a big pancake breakfast person, they don't seem to last till lunch, all that filling up on simple carbohydrates and sugar.  But they are a nice occasional treat:

I knitted while we listened to a couple of new CDs.

And there was a little more knitting while watched a couple of movies over the weekend.  We watched the original 1977 version of "Fun with Dick and Jane" and "Pride and Prejudice"  The brown cashmere rice stitch cardigan is progressing nicely.  This project will take a little longer than the past couple but it is pure pleasure to knit. And who can resist a late afternoon movie on a dreary day with a cup of espresso?  Not I, and I can't get that at my local movie house either.

There was still time for some reading:

And a little time to play with scissors and glue as I cut up magazines and started collecting pictures for my Spring 2007 inspiration collage notebook pages:

I haven't found all that much knitting inspiration yet, mostly sewing inspiration, and there is no telling if I will make any of it or just dream.  But I love cutting and pasting, and I love looking back at the things I have saved over the years, they provide a constant source of inspiration and joy. 

And last, but far from least, G came home from the florists with a beautiful big cymbidium orchid.  He had been struggling with the idea of what to get for Valentine's Day, as we are going away on Friday for the weekend, and it seemed a shame to send me a dozen yellow roses (the usual choice) when they would just wilt.  He decided to stop by the florist's anyway and while he was there he saw this huge cymbidium, and, although it is near the end of its bloom, I love it and know I will get lots of future flowerings of it.  Besides it makes up for the one which was allowed to die while I was in Knoxville in September.