The Knitter's Downfall

Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you:

The Knitter's Downfall

Dramatis Personae
JEMIMA - A knitter
JEMIMA'S INNER VOICE
MUM - Jemima's Mum


Enter JEMIMA, knitting, and JEMIMA'S INNER VOICE

Jemima: Oh, what a clever knitter I am! I should have this jumper design ready any day now. I'm already up to the armholes on the sample!
Jemima's Inner Voice: Hm...Are you quite sure about this yarn? I mean, it's nice, but it's not quite looking like the original version you made that you were so happy with.
Jemima: No, it's fine! I'm making improvements on this version and I'm sure it will look just wonderful when it's blocked, and even though it may not have that nice shine to it from the silk in the original and it does seem to be slightly looser than my old sample was but...what am I talking about, I'm up to the armholes! I can't stop now! One must press on!
Jemima's Inner Voice: Ok, it's just that the tension looks kind of loose, and have you noticed how it's turning out to be rather larger than you were expecting? Maybe you should try and dig out your notes from the original, just to check.
Jemima: Ssh! It's fine. It will be fine. I'm sure it was 2.75mm and 3.25mm needles that I used before. 2.75mm for the rib and 3.25mm for the lace. That sounds right. I'm sure that's right.

Enter MUM

Mum: Oh is this the new jumper design? It looks a bit looser than your original doesn't it? I think I preferred the original yarn but it's very pretty - let me know when it's written up!

Exit MUM

Jemima's Inner Voice: *pointedly clears throat*
Jemima: No, no! It's fine! Everything's fine! It...it..maybe it's just the yarn, it just appears looser. Because it doesn't have silk. Or something? Well, maybe I should just check my notes, although I'm sure you'll see that it's fine..

Jemima examines notebook.

Jemima: Ah. 2.5 and 3mm. Ok.
Jemima's Inner Voice: ...
Jemima: And you know, this yarn...well, it's not quite right is it? Maybe I should use this yarn instead. Like the original. With the silk, you know, it does just look better, doesn't it.
Jemima's Inner Voice (sighing): Yes it *does*, doesn't it...

Exit JEMIMA and JEMIMA'S INNER VOICE 

*several days later*

Enter JEMIMA, knitting

Jemima: This is fantastic! This yarn looks so much better! And now I'm using the correct needles, and everything's great. Except for having to knit 4 inches of ribbing. Why do all my design ideas start off with 4 inches of ribbing? Anyway, this is great, I just need to push through and get to the lace pattern, then it will start flying off the needles! What a clever knitter I am!

Exit JEMIMA, knitting

*several more days later *

Enter JEMIMA, knitting, and JEMIMA'S INNER VOICE

Jemima's Inner Voice: Er, Jemima...?
Jemima: Not now, I'm knitting!
Jemima's Inner Voice: Yes, I see that, it's just - 
Jemima: Not now! I've finally finished the ribbing and I'm enjoying knitting the lace so much on these lovely fine Chiaogoo needles, they're so thin and pointy...
Jemima's Inner Voice: Yes, they ARE quite thin, aren't they?
Jemima: Yes, they are from my lovely new Chiaogoo Mini set, it's so lovely having a 2.5mm interchangeable needle so that I can do fine things with them, like the ribbing...on a sweater...oh...
Jemima's Inner Voice: You forgot to change the needle after the ribbing, didn't you?
Jemima: ...yes.

FINIS

************

Oh dear! All I can say in my defence is that I have been distracted from my knitting over the past week by finally making a large purchase that I have been saving up for for a looooong time and, well...does this look like the face of sanity to you?

But now the sweater is underway again, I have my MacBook, and both of these things are PINK. So all's well that ends well, eh?

Weekly roundup (with added pink)

This week (OK, OK, week and a half; I'm still getting back in the swing of this blogging thing, mmkay?) I have:

1. Bought some beautiful roses, that are doing extremely well considering they were £3 from Sainsburys. This is important, as these roses will feature prominently in the rest of this post.

2. Done a whole lot of knitting on my Bowland cardigan. I am completely obsessed with it. Yes, I chose pink in the end, not red. Yes, there is also extra pink in the middle. It's completely girly. #sorrynotsorry.

Bowland in all of its pink and girly glory

Bowland and roses, because pink

3. Put together three (!) Ikea wardrobes together on my own. No photos, because I'm sure you can picture what three white Ikea wardrobes look like. Although they do fit so perfectly along the wall that they look almost like fitted wardrobes, which is quite impressive!

4. Manage to scrape a fair bit of skin off my thumb putting together said wardrobes, then managed to burn myself on the same thumb a couple of days later. My thumb is now very sore and covered in plasters, so that I can still knit (see point 2.). Naturally it would be my right thumb, which is what I hook under my right needle so it comes into contact with the wool the most. Ouch!

5. Made, photographed and ate lemon drizzle cake. It was actually incredibly easy (I used this recipe: BBC Good Food Lemon Drizzle Cake) and definitely edible, so we can add lemon drizzle cake to my baking range (so far: rock cakes, scones, cherry sponge cake). 

Told you the roses would feature a lot

6. Started teaching a lovely little group to crochet at my Beginner's Crochet class at Loop, London on Wednesday evening. I decided to make the most of my ticket into London by popping in to the V & A Museum during the afternoon before my class. Wandering through the Fashion collection is always fun (I may have also done a little bit of damage in the shop too. The notebooks were just too lovely to resist!)

The most beautiful shade of pink, ever.

I hope you also had a lovely week (with or without all the pink)!

Expanding the Skill Set

I've decided it's time to get a bit more disciplined about my knitting/crochet skills. After Lyra, I feel I'm able to tick lace off the list for now. Although I'll always love my lace, and there is always more to learn (and there will absolutely be more Nieblings in my future!), it's probably the area of knitting that I feel most at ease with. So, although I am currently designing a sweater that is all about the lace - watch this space for that - I'm going to focus my non-design based knitting on expanding my skill set. First up, colourwork!

I've been wanting knit the Bowland Cardigan by Susan Crawford ever since it came out last year. I didn't get it together enough to join in the KAL she ran, unfortunately (honestly, I'm a bit useless at KALs...) but now, finally, is the moment! I'm knitting it in Spindrift by Jamieson's, which is a Shetland 4ply, perfect for this sort of knitting - light and "sticky" and available in a huge range of colours. After much um-ing and ah-ing and with a lot of help from my lovely friend Sophie (one half of the amazing Pomcast *cough* name drop *cough) we picked out the following colours:

Left to right: 567 Damask; 1160 Scotch Broom; 595 Maroon; 768 Eggshell; 769 Willow

Of course, choosing the overall colour palette turns out to be the easy part - deciding which colour goes where is hard! I knew I wanted my main colour to be Willow - it's such a gorgeous 1930s eau de nil sort of colour - and I loved the combination of the mustard and the deep red (thank you, Sophie, for picking out the perfect red when my eyes failed me!). I knew I wasn't going to do a straightforward conversion of the pattern colours, as I didn't want a contrasting rib/button band - the more Willow, the better!

So I pondered, and I pondered, and I cast on the rib in the meantime so I could ponder a bit longer:

Ah, vintage style knitting patterns. I love them, and constant possibility of 1x1 rib-induced insanity just adds to the excitement, no?

Side note: the pattern calls for 2in of the rib before you start the colourwork. I had intended to do a good couple more inches than that but I'm not sure I can handle any more rib. So much rib. And darn it all, I want the pretty colours to start now. Speaking of which, when I couldn't rib anymore, I decided it was time to take a break, stop pondering and start swatching:

I'm pretty happy with the main band, although I think I will tinker with the middle line that goes through it and do it in the Damask instead of Willow; I think that will make the flowers a little more solid. However, I really didn't like how the original small band (along the bottom of the swatch) was coming out. The Maroon is such a strong contrast with the background that it felt far too stripy. The top two small bands are my attempt to fix this problem, by either breaking up the red line with the yellow, or toning down the stripe to pink. I have spent a l-o-n-g time staring at this swatch (and posting on Instagram for advice - thanks, guys!) and I think I'm going to go with the upper red and yellow combination. The pink is lovely but just a touch more girly than I really wanted it to be (yeah, I know, it's flowery and green and pink and red and pretty solidly girly already but hey...) and I think once I fill in that middle row of the main band with a darker colour it should hold its own a little better. And yes, I know I should be doing more swatching to double check it all first but I really think doing it on the garment will make it all clearer anyway and I can always undo it later if it doesn't work and also I just want to get started already, mm'kay? You understand, I'm sure.

Oof, what a lot of waffling about a swatch! Hopefully you are vaguely interested in this sort of thing as I'm sure there will be much more to come now I have leaped aboard the Good Ship Colourwork.

Right, back to the ribbing. The constant, endless ribbing...

Jemima

Bad blogger, no cookie

Oh boy, could someone let me know where the last few months have gone? Because I have no idea...

But, you know, I do have some knitting to share!

First up: Lyra by Herbert Niebling

After spending most of the last three years languishing in a bag in a half-knit state, it is finally finished. Completely beautiful and completely impractical but there is nothing wrong with that! Plus, one day I will have a lovely big leather armchair (oh yes, I will) to drape it over.

I love how textural Niebling's lace is, which is something you don't see all that often in modern lace. In Lyra you have the double yarn over mesh background, the standard yo, stocking stitch areas and twisted/crossed stitch areas to give four different densities of fabric and allow for 'shading', as though one were painting with stitches. Definitely something to be logged away as future design inspiration.

Another recent (as in, two days ago) FO: the imaginatively titled #30 Vintage Lace Blouse from Vogue Knitting Early Winter 2011

This is what victory rolls look like post-stock room tidying...

The yarn is Tosh Merino Light in the colourway 'Coquette' which is the most fabulous pink and perfectly matches this fashion print from 1840 I found in a Cambridge bookshop a couple of years ago and have been swooning over since. 

Hot pink and pale blue - gorgeous!

I decided to wear it with a flower in my hair because, well, you can never have too much pink!

Of course, finishing something always means starting something else! More on that next time (and it won't be another four months, I promise!)

J

Introducing the Harlow Cowl!

I have a new pattern out! Ladies and gentlemen (maybe?), please allow me to introduce the Harlow Cowl!

I wanted to make a beautiful laceweight cowl, but I also wanted it to be versatile and I'm so pleased with how it turned out. It can be worn like a shawl (but it won't fall off!) or doubled up around the neck or (my favourite) over the head. Perfect for keep delicate pin curl arrangements in place on windy tube platforms.

Shockingly, these pictures were taken at around 7:30 on a Sunday morning. It is a credit to my husband's photography skills that I don't look like a red-lipped zombie.

More info on the Harlow Cowl is available on the Ravelry pattern page so please do head over and have a look!

J

Reasons To Be Cheerful

Roses! I love having flowers in the flat so am always on the lookout for the reduced bouquets 

Apologies for the silence recently; I managed to come down with yet another cold so have mostly been sneezing and sniffling and generally disgusting. Seem to be getting over it now but this (along with noticing a bit of weight gain) has led to the decision to make some healthy life changes: back to the gym on a regular basis (weightlifting, rawr!), more fruit and veg, no more biscuits at work etc. I'm feeling really positive about it and feeling a lot better after only a few days, so I thought I might do a quick little post listing some of the other things that are keeping me cheerful at the moment!

Rooibos Earl Grey from Waitrose

A new kind of tea always perks me up. Although my tea collection is now occupying half a cupboard so I should probably slow down there.

Buttons! I bought these on a whim at the Knitting and Stitching Show last year but totally forgot I had them until recently. I can't wait to find the perfect project for these, will need to be something special!

Spirit, the new book by Kim Hargreaves

The postman delivered this today! There are quite a few things I want to knit, although after going stash diving I don't have quite as much cotton as I thought I did, so there may be some yarn shopping in my future. I'll do a proper blog post on this later.

Butterick B5895

A and I are heading off to Download this summer for some rocking out (yup, I like vintage AND metal) and I've decided this will be my festival outfit. Assuming that I a) manage to work up the courage to attempt sewing trousers and b) have a flat enough stomach after all this gym going to whip it out (tastefully of course) in public! We'll see. Either way, a girl can dream!

What about you? Tell me what's rocking your world at the moment, I'm always open to more reasons to be cheerful :)

J

Old Friends

My mum and I are often quite different in our approach to knitting. When she loves a pattern she will quite happily make multiple versions in different colours; I've lost count of the number of times she's made Tender, which looks amazing on her, and she always has a Maia Shawl on the go in her handbag. I've often told her that I would go mad knitting the same thing over and over again. With a 25-page Ravelry queue, making multiples of a project feels like a waste of valuable knitting hours, even if I really loved it the first time.

When I was searching on Ravelry for a new project last night, however, I realised that this wasn't entirely true. There are now a huge number of triangular shawl patterns on Ravelry - I've contributed to their number myself - and many of them are beautiful. Quite a few of them are in my queue. But as many as there are and as beautiful as they are, I've yet to find any that look as lovely to me as three of the earliest patterns I tried when I was a new lace knitter.

I'm sure nostalgia plays a large part in this. The Swallowtail Shawl was one of the first shawls I ever knit, my introduction to the world of lace knitting that I have loved ever since. I knit my first one in a few days in December '08 then a second one in January '09. No pictures here as the photos I took were absolutely awful, but anyone curious can have a look at my Ravelry page! A couple of years later I knit another, larger version which is now one of my favourite shawls:

Later came the Aeolian Shawl, which I still think is one of the most beautiful shawl patterns on Ravelry and introduced me to beaded lace. I've made this twice, the first time in a very fine silver silk yarn, the second in a warm alpaca blend.

Photo by Adam Stanley

Finally, there is the lovely Haruni which I made in a gorgeous bright blue silk (these three shawl pattern also seem to have cemented my silk addiction!)

Photo by Adam Stanley

In my opinion, these three patterns have such beautiful proportions and flow so perfectly from lace pattern to lace pattern that they deserve to be made multiple times; every time I wear them they remind me of the feeling of pride I had after knitting my first lace and the wonder I felt in being able to create something that lovely with my hands.

I think the time may have come for another Haruni...

What about you? Do you have any 'old friend' patterns that you make over and over again? Is there a lace triangular shawl that you think should join these three? Let me know! 

J