Orange You Glad...

...I didn't say banana?

That's the punch-line to my second favorite knock-knock joke of all time. I am amused every time I see something orange, because I think of that phrase.

Well, just imagine how amused I have been over the last three weeks:

Five different blended orange yarns, all lace-weight (more or less--there is that one, lower right, that is sneaking into fingering country). There are approximately 250 yards per skein, and there are multiple skeins of some of the colors, for a total of 1642 yards, all from just under 400g of fibre. That's .9 of a mile, 1.5 kilometers, of skinny little yarn, spun from 295 hand-blended rolags and rolls, over a grand total of 12 days. Perhaps, someone needs to get out more....

There is a plan for all of this yarn, and it has already been set in motion This will be the first of four shawls, inspired by the 4 elements: fire, water, earth and air. Since I am a Leo--a fire sign--I have started with fire. The blending begins next week on water.

Meanwhile, the orange yarns are all neatly wound and are being knitted into a rather fabulous sunburst, using EZ's Pi formula and a pretty basic eyelet lace pattern. (I'm up to the 288 stitch rounds, and things have suddenly slowed down. Funny how your productivity gets cut in half when you double your number of stitches!)

By the way, for those of you who were wondering, this is my all-time favorite knock-knock joke:

Knock, knock.

Who's there?

The interrupting sheep.

The interrupting sheep wh...BAAAA!

Darn It!

I knew this was coming, but I held out hope.

I knitted and blogged these socks last May, shortly after Noro had introduced a new sock yarn. At the time, I speculated (okay, ranted) that the yarn construction was pretty useless for socks and that holes would appear. Here we are, 10 months later, and lo and behold:

Yep, The dreaded holes in the heels.

Now, you may say, "Gee, Michelle, most socks will get holes in the heels after being worn for nearly a year". And my reply would be, " Not my handknit socks!" But, to put things in a little better perspective, I will give you a brief history of these socks.

I put the socks into my sock drawer in May 2008. It was warm and I felt no need to wear big old boot socks anywhere. And in the sock drawer they remained until November--a time lapse of 5 months.

Now, November in Northern Alberta can get mighty chilly, and this winter seemed to be especially harsh. Putting on a thick pair of woolly socks under my boots seemed just the ticket. Out from the drawer came the Noro socks.

They were actually quite warm and cozy, in spite of the scratchiness Noro yarns are infamous for. And they softened (and pilled like crazy) after washing. Maybe they weren't as bad as I thought....

The socks went into regular rotation, meaning that they were worn and washed about once a week. From November to early March, they held out okay, though thin spots were showing up, and I occasionally had the thought that I should keep an eye on those.

Then, the first holes appeared. But, March being the insanely busy month that it was for me, I ignored them. So the holes grew.

It took me nearly an hour to darn the holes up. The big hole got a patch darn, and the thin spots got a Swiss darn. Unfortunately, I couldn't find my leftovers of the original yarn, so I had to sub another sock yarn, meaning that there was no hope of matching the colors.

On the other hand, considering how unhappy I was with the original yarn, it was probably a good call to darn them with something sturdier. Sadly, though, I suspect the darned patches will far outlast the socks!

In 20 years of sock knitting, I have had to darn 3 socks. The other two belonged to young men who did not necessarily feel that wearing shoes in parking lots was a part of daily life, and that handknit socks were indestructible. (I don't know where they would have gotten that idea!)

All of the other socks I have made have been outgrown or passed on until I don't know where they are anymore. I have heard of a few toe repairs done to gift socks, but I blame those on folks who have not yet discovered the joys of a good pedicure.

So, all in all, these socks did live down to expectations. Cool to look at, cozy and woolly for winter, and not the least bit durable under pretty light wear and tear. (Remember that I sit on my bum, spinning or knitting, for the large part of the day!)

I hate it when I'm right.

(On the other hand, I wore them last week, after they were darned, and I couldn't feel any unevenness where the darning had been done. I'm just that good!)

Six Short Stories About March

So much has happened in the last couple of weeks that life has become a blur! In lieu of my usual long, rambling blog post, here are some quick snapshots of my March:

1.) I bought A LOT of Angelina fibre. I'm all about the glitz these days, and I set out to order 3 or four colors. But Laura from Legacy Studio kept tempting me. In the end, there are 18 baggies in 8 colors. Oooooh, sparkly!

2.) My son's production of The Rocky Horror Show opened last week, and it's fabulous! Funny, sexy, and waaay over the top! I designed the set (sort of), Steve built it, Brendan produced, directed and designed costumes. A bit of a family affair. Brendan has done a marvelous job of surrounding himself with passionate, talented and...interesting people, and will probably not need his old Mom the next time around, but it was a thrill (and a bit of stress) to be involved with this project.

3.) For some reason, it seemed like a good idea to handcard 60 orange heather rolags one afternoon. Then for some reason, it seemed like a good idea to have a hot bath and rub Voltaren on my shoulders and not do anything for two days.

4.) There was a lot of orange spun. The darker orange is a Corriedale/silk blend. Spun worsted, lace-weight (about 50 wpi), 320 yards. The heather is still being plied, but so far, I have one skein of 305 yards, woollen, about the same grist. There is one more orange yarn in the planning stages, then the project will take shape. One hopes!

5.) To relieve the stress, I spun a little corespun mohair yarn. There are 95 yards at about 24 wpi. The core yarn is lace-weight Corriedale top (with a little left over), spun S and plied Z, and the outer layer is hand-dyed mohair locks that were loosely carded. Mmmmm, soft and fuzzy!



6.) You may have read about Karen Wolverton, co-owner of Lush Canada, painting herself red and laying on a bloody Canadian flag to protest the seal hunt. Well, part of that is a lie. She did not paint herself red, my daughter, the lovely and talented Miss Lexi Boyd, painted her.

Those are just a few things that happened in March. There was also a sweater completed, a soccer tournament (knitting + soccer mom=tink), a birthday, exams, and a minor collapse from exhaustion.

Bring on April!

No Strings

Hey! Remember me?

Yeah, it's been a while. I was trapped in that time-warping black hole that is Theatre again.

On Tuesday, March 10 and Wednesday, March 11 Thickwood Heights Theatrix presented their 24th annual production. This year's show was No Strings Attached, a Pinocchio story with a singing and dancing cast of 58 children ranging from grades 4 to 8. And, of course, a stellar set design by yours truly.

We started about a month ago, with Steve and his crew building sets and me and my crew painting the backdrops...

...while the kids rehearsed in the music room and the gym....

...then we hit the big stage at Keyano Theatre.

Here are The Cricket and her bug chorus, giving Pinocchio what-for.

And there was mayhem when Pinocchio and his buddy Dipstick run off to the land of Hedonia and get turned into donkeys.

My favorite piece of the set, though, is the giant shark that swallows Gepetto. This guy was so much fun to design and build. He is a wooden boat with a copper tube frame covered in an amazing translucent silver fabric from the bargain corner in Fabricland. (I wanted to buy the whole bolt, but cooler heads prevailed.) Mr. Sharky opens his mouth to reveal Gepetto sitting in his boat inside. Too clever, by half, if I may say so myself.

Sadly, Mr. Sharky wound up in the dumpster on Wednesday night, which is the downside of set design. I all gets torn apart and thrown away when the actors are done. Which is sort of a downer for the designer, let me tell you. But, as my very wise husband told me once, " Nobody goes home from a musical humming the set."

I've been thinking about the old metaphor that making theatre is like having a baby, and I see it clearly now. The first few months, you're all excited, but a little nauseous. Then things start to grow, and you start anticipating the future. And when you get to your due date, you are pretty sure you don't want to go through with it. Then it happens, and you're thrilled and exhausted, and pretty sure that's the last time you'll ever do that! After a few months, though, the stretch marks fade and the memory of the pain becomes blurry, and you start talking about when the next one will come along. This is why I have 3 kids, and why I have done the Thickwood Heights Theatrix productions for 10 years now.

(The big difference is that you get into a lot of trouble when you throw your baby into the dumpster! Oh, my poor, beautiful Sharky!)

I also pitched in backstage as the make-up designer and artist, and to offer moral support to my Miss Julia, who played Pinocchio. I believe I may be taking the stage mother thing a little too far, but I have yet to yell "Sing out, Louise!" for real.

All in all, it's been an exhausting couple of weeks, and I have been away from my spinning wheels so long that there is dust on them!

So, to sum it up, I have spent the last 3 weeks making No Strings!

(Ba-dump-dump Ching!)

Beyonce Stole My Bling!!

In a fit of creative genius, I sat down to spin an art yarn a couple of weeks back.

Inspired by a pack of red sequins, Dorothy's ruby slippers, and the Queen of Hearts...

...BLING! Though I often wrestle with the merits of art yarns, this one is a beauty, spun up strictly for the fun of it. The fibres involved are Ashford Corriedale top and nylon/polyester metallic thread, along with hundreds of little red sequins. A soft thick'n'thin Corriedale single was plied with metallic thread threaded with the sequins, then I plied again with the metallic thread, using an uneven ply and the technique for making "cloud" yarns to create spots of metallic red twist throughout. The end result was a little overplied, but a good hot bath and a hang with a little weight fixed that up nicely.

Oooh, the soft-focus glamour shot! Sexy!

So, as my lovely little bit of glitz was hanging from the knob on the door of my entertainment unit to dry, I was watching the Oscars. Not a bad show, overall, until the tribute to the musical movies of the past. I was about to go fix myself a snack until it was over when this little number caught my eye:

What's that Beyonce is wearing? And why is my sparkly yarn dangling from it?!?

I actually had to glance over to the side of the entertainment unit to make sure the yarn hadn't just crept into the TV. It was till there. I was stunned. How could this be?

It seemed a little strange to me that 50 g of fibre only made 95 yard of yarn. Could someone have snuck in and stolen some for Beyonce's costume? Surely, Teagan the Wonder Schnoodle would have protected the yarn from intruders--or licked the intruders to death--so the theft scenario seems implausible.

Could I be psychically linked with Beyonce? I have been listening to the song "Single Ladies" a lot lately....but no, that seems pretty implausible too.

The only conclusion that I can draw is that Beyonce's spies have been watching me spin this yarn and they told the costume designer about it. It couldn't possibly be just a coincidence. No way!

So from now on, I have to spin with the blinds drawn.

Or stop making such damn sexy yarn!

The Rebirth of Knitting Cool

ATTENTION ALL KNITTING GRANNIES!!

This little news story came to my attention via Ravelry this morning. There was some mildly indignant discussion attached to it, with many knitters pointing out that knitting has been growing in popularity since long before the economy tanked and not as a response to the current economic woes. Or that not all knitters are grannies. The biggest beef, though, seems to be with the closing comment that "this is one hobby that doesn't take a lot of dough". Many of the forum posters point to this statement as clear evidence of the reporter's ignorance of our craft. Speaking as someone who is currently knitting with a yarn that cost me $25 a skein, I would have to concur!

There are a great many of us fibre lover types who seem to get quite agitated when non-crafters misrepresent our beloved techniques. (Don't get me started on the whole spinning wheel thing in Disney's Sleeping Beauty! ) The stereotypes of knitting grannies and frilly little toilet paper cozies abound out there. But this weekend, I had the pleasure of seeing two movies that countered those stereotypes. Two movies about "cool" fiberistas! I was blown away!

We have been working hard to get caught up on our movie viewing around here. We're usually big movie fans and see lots of great and not-so-great flicks, and now we have about a dozen movie channels on cable, but we've fallen woefully behind. We have, however, accumulated all of the summer blockbusters on DVD and have been chipping away at the pile.

Friday night, we watched Wanted, starring James McAvoy, Morgan Freeman, and Angelina Jolie. I'm a bit of an action movie fan anyway, but everyone told me that I had to see this one. Now I know why--it's about the most kick-ass gang of weavers ever! I will not give away the plot details, but suffice it to say that there is a little preface that tells us that 1,000 years ago a group of weavers established this elite assassination squad. I actually had to skip back and check the DVD because I thought I had misread. But, no, it said weavers. And, let me tell you, if more weavers acted like the characters in this movie, nobody would ever mess with us again!

So, that was pretty cool.

The next night we watched Zach and Miri Make a Porno. (WARNING! Not for the faint of heart! Pretty damn raunchy, actually.) I am also a Kevin Smith fan, though I totally understand that not everyone appreciates his sensibility. But, as we are watching away (and laughing our asses off), I commented that there were a lot of conspicuously handknit scarves and hats (some of which, frankly, were pretty bad). Then Miri says that she got to try some clothes because she gave a sales clerk a deal on wool. SHE WORKS IN A YARN SHOP! The movie is crass, but hilarious, and remarkably sweet. I loved it a lot. So we're watching the deleted scenes, and there is a scene where Miri is getting dressed while Zach starts the car. She runs into her room, and there, right beside her bed, is her stash!

I think I actually squealed a little.

I've also heard rumors of knitting content in Lars and the Real Girl, but I'm having trouble getting my hands on a copy.

And, lest we forget, Marge Simpson is a knitter. As is Emerson Cod on Pushing Daisies.

So, for every Ford truck commercial that tells us that you can settle for a lesser vehicle "if all you're hauling is yarn" (Clearly, the folks at Ford have never seen my stash!), there is Angelina Jolie catching a flying shuttle with her bare hand. And for every knitting granny, there is Seth Rogan wearing a chunky blue scarf and talking about pornography. The cool is beginning to balance those stereotypes.

And, for those who still wish to cling to the image of knitting or spinning or weaving as the domain of little old ladies, may I remind you that we are little old ladies with pointy sticks. And we know how to use them!

Zen and the Art of Hand Knitting

I have come to the conclusion that I just cannot follow some one else's pattern anymore. Or, rather, that I will not follow some one else's pattern. It's not that I don't want to. There are so many great patterns out there! But I just can't seem to do it.

Case in point: my Almost Annetrelac Socks.

Oh, they look great, but the closest I came to following the pattern was to look at the picture. You see, this yarn (Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock) was given to me for my birthday, with the proviso that I make myself some socks. Yay! And after a fall and winter of making socks for others, it seemed like a thing to do in January. But I was tired of knitting basic socks, and, frankly, I thought that both the yarn and I deserved something a little spankier. So I started perusing patterns on Ravelry and Knitty.com. The Annetrelac Socks from Interweave Knits Holiday 2007 fit the bill. I wound the yarn into balls and pulled out my Lantern Moon rosewood dpns and away I went.

Now, I will admit that I did skim over the text of the pattern. I cast on the wrong number of stitches out of habit. So, instead of starting over and adjusting to the pattern, I made the right number of base triangles to suit the smaller number of stitches. Once I started working, I found myself stopping and thinking "Oh, crap! I should check the pattern!" Which I did, then discovered that I would have to tink out several squares of entrelac to get back to where the pattern said I should be. So I tucked the magazine away and knit on.

The socks are great--I'm wearing them as I type--and they look just like the Annetrelac Socks (as well as any number of other entrelac socks out there), but there was no actual "following" of patterns involved.

This is certainly not an indictment of the pattern--in fact, I read it over before I sat down to blog and found that, aside from the fact that I cast on and worked with my own number of stitches, it was pretty much what I had done anyway. So did I follow it, or not?

Well, I figured, socks are one thing. I mean, aside from stitch patterns, knitting a sock is knitting a sock (hush up you Kat Bordhi fans!). Perhaps a larger project would be different. And it just so happens that I was looking for inspiration for a shrug. So off we go to Ravelry's pattern search again. And, lo and behold, a perfect shrug pattern, from Knitty.com, presented itself. I printed it off, balled my yarn and cast on. And frogged out. And cast on. And frogged out. And cast on, and knit 4 inches, forgetting to decrease. And frogged out. And cast on and knit 6 inches before I realized that I really didn't like the way the lace pattern was working out in the handpainted yarn.

So I pulled out my Barbara Walker Treasuries, and Nicky Epstein's Knitting On the Edge, found a lace pattern I liked, cast on and away I went. There are 7 inches on the needles and it's looking fab. And I am happy with the knitting.

Okay, so maybe this was more a case of choosing a pattern that didn't suit the yarn. But it also reminded that I just don't like following patterns. Even as a novice knitter, I would alter patterns by substituting yarns, changing the ribbing, adding a stripe or a cable. As the songs says, I did it my way.

It hasn't helped that I have been reading a great deal about the nature of craft and its place in history lately. That sort of reading always seems to lead to a bout of navel gazing, making me ponder each thing I do in way too much detail. Some authors seem to trigger more pondering than others and the current crop are far too effective in that department!

Right now, the culprit is Soetsu Yanagi, a Japanese Zen Bhuddist art critic from the early 20th century. He was a great proponent of the preservation of traditional craft in Japan and Korea, with a soft spot for pottery, but his comments on craft, handwork,and art, should be inspiring to artisans in any field.

Yanagi writes about craft as "true art", springing from instinct, with none of the pretensions of fine art. Once the craftsman had mastered the form of the craft, anything is possible and instinct dictates the actual execution of the product. There is expression of the individual through the process, not through the brilliance of the intended message. And it is the improvisation of the individual maker that makes each piece a work of art, rather than the cleverness of a preconceived design.

So, as I read this, and I struggle with the words some other clever knitter has laid out to lead me through her/his design, I find my own Zen state of being. This is what I make, and this is how I make it. It is what it is.

And I'm okay with that.