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February 25, 2007
Blustery
Some knits jump off the needles so quickly, uneventful or unremarkable, they race from skein to wardrobe without ever being scrutinised here. Like all those pairs of socks for Mr Raitte, darned, redarned, worn out and replaced, the humblest knitting. Another one of those was this little vest. The plainest, quickest knit, started on a whim and finished in a week back last October, there was nothing to say about it. Wouldn't you know, it turned out to be one of my favourites? It has one little pocket, and all the ribbing is cast on or off tubular-wise.
Here's a secret: many of the pieces I design, I hardly ever wear. My day-to-day style is somewhat, let us say, understated. So when one works its way into my wardrobe like Pippa, or Jemima (now well and truly exhausted, worn out, and needing replacing), or now this, it's unexpected and comforting.
Posted by Anna at 11:44 PM | Comments (56)
February 21, 2007
Yarn sale!
I have arisen from my fainting couch. Thanks to you all for your fortifying words and yarn-tracking abilities, I now have five balls (probably more than I need, but better safe than sorry) of the requisite discontinued yarn.
In Scotland, my favourite job was feeding the sheep. They lined up in a perfect, orderly queue to come in for their breakfast (headed by Precious). After their breakfast, they trotted, again in an orderly queue, back out to their field. Lovely.
My second favourite job was reorganising my aunt's wool/fleece/yarn/fibre stash. She has wool at every stage of production from 'on the hoof' (see above), through fleeces, tops, rovings, handspun and machine processed. It was quite an undertaking.
We agreed that there were several largish lots of yarn that could be 'let go', to find new, loving homes where they can fulfil their destiny, after years of waiting. They were inherited from my uncle's mother, who sadly can no longer knit having lost most of her eyesight to macular degeneration.
I'm selling eight lots on auntie's behalf, including some gorgeous fuchsia pink 4ply (I wish it was my colour) the bubblegum pink laceweight above, some Jaeger Celticspun... won't you take a look and see if anything takes your fancy?
Posted by Anna at 03:51 PM | Comments (6)
February 14, 2007
In which your heroine expires
Jaeger Extra Fine Merino Chunky has been discontinued.
I'm four balls short of that cabled cardi-coat I was on about. While I continue to phone every Jaeger stockist in the country, Darlings, please scour your stashes, gather your remnants, and sell me, at inflated price, your EFM Chunky in 'Teal': or I shall surely perish.
Posted by Anna at 02:59 PM | Comments (35)
February 05, 2007
Tantrums and tweed
I threw a mild but prolonged type of tantrum. Based on working ever-so hard on patterns to, one day, be collected on pages between hard covers, and being unable to share them with you, and not knowing where to turn to discuss my concerns, or, even more basically, my yarn choices.
(While I have your attention, what is your very favourite yarn to knit with? I know, I know, how long is a ball of wool - but for garments. For a classic ladies’ cardigan? What about for a baby’s layette? You see, I’m over-relying on Rowan, Jaeger, Debbie Bliss, and an American readership may not take kindly. Is anything out there really comparable to Rowan Wool Cotton?)
Anyway, the upshot was finding other people’s designs immensely more compelling than my own feeble ideas (for the love of all that is holy, what made me think that an interminable tube of stocking stitch would keep me interested for as long as it would take to knit it?). Most especially, Stella McCartney’s knit coat, dangled in front of me by both Andrea and Jo. Over and over again I visited Get Knitted adding skeins of Blue Sky Dyed Cotton in Indigo to my shopping cart. Click away. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.
I’ve negotiated a compromise: enough Kilcarra Aran Tweed (cheap, and quite soft) to make ‘Harvey’ (Oh Harvey! How we miss you still!) from Rowan Studio Issue 1. Which, to bring us full circle, I bought on Andrea’s suggestion to see how they engineered pleats in the thought that I might replicate the technique for a Stella-coat.
I’m away up to Scotland on Wednesday, for a few days. I may learn to spin! If on my return, and having finished ‘Harvey’, I’m still distracted, maybe I’ll buy that cotton - after all, there’s only a small matter of 16 new designs to attend to. I’m hoping the crush will wear off, as they so often do, and that by then I’ll be enamoured with my own adventures in yarn once more.
Posted by Anna at 10:33 PM | Comments (66)
February 02, 2007
Feb 2: A (Silent) Poetry Reading
Prayer
Some days, although we cannot pray, a prayer
utters itself. So, a woman will lift
her head from the sieve of her hands and stare
at the minims sung by a tree, a sudden gift.
Some nights, although we are faithless, the truth
enters our hearts, that small familiar pain;
then a man will stand stock-still, hearing his youth
in the distant Latin chanting of a train.
Pray for us now. Grade I piano scales
console the lodger looking out across
a Midlands town. Then dusk, and someone calls
a child's name as though they named their loss.
Darkness outside. Inside, the radio's prayer -
Rockall. Malin. Dogger. Finisterre.
Carol Ann Duffy
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Poetry reading by Grace's Poppies via Cara.
Posted by Anna at 10:20 AM | Comments (15)