knitting for Vermont

On, August 28, Hurricane Irene -- no longer a hurricane, but still terribly destructive -- caused massive flooding in Vermont and upstate New York. Thirteen towns in Vermont were totally cut off when all access roads were washed out, and many, many families lost everything they owned. It is cold in Vermont in the winter, and cold starts early. This week, I sent them these:

On the left, 4 pairs of socks (Peace Fleece, Baghdad blue) and a pair of mittens (Araucania Panguipulli) from my sister. On the right (bigger picture below, because I cut off the righthand side, but it's the same things), 1 pair of socks, 3 hats, and 4 pairs of mittens from me, all from yarn I already owned. The brown hat is Morehouse Merino (exquisitely soft); the purple hat and the green hat are Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride bulky. The socks and all of the mittens were made using Bartlett's Maine wool:

I am glad to know a few people will be a little bit warmer.

Red Scarf Season

I was surprised -- and relieved -- to realize that I hadn't done as badly as I thought in keeping to the schedule we set out at the beginning of the year. Detailed report to come. But I have been busy knitting the first of this season's red scarves:

Pat and I have knit for the Red Scarf program for years, even before it became wildly popular. This year, while looking for something else, I stumbled across red yarn I'd bought last year, so here it is. Webs' own Valley Yarns Superwash. Very nice yarn -- but must stay strong and knit what is here already!! I am using a simple stitch, which must have a name, but I don't know it. Cast on a multiple of 3 stitches (for this scarf, I cast on 30). Then work every row the same: *k2, p1* all the way across. It's totally reversible, and you never have to stop to figure out what row you're on. And it's suitable for men or women, and it will make someone happy and warm this winter.

I know you'll be seeing Pat's very soon.

we are still here!!

Pictures and posts soon, promise. You will see what happened with that rainbow of yarn, and what happened with our schedule for the year -- yes, the absence of monthly updates tells the truth, and it did indeed take a tumble, but we continue knitting for others . . .



Today in Pennsylvania it is cold and dreary, and I must get back to knitting the thumbs on a pair of mittens destined for Vermont, where so many people lost everything in floods a week ago. If it's this cold here, it's colder there.

a taste of things to come

+

=

Watch this space!

April Hat Knitting

In April, Elizabeth and I knit Chemo Caps for A.I. duPont Hospital in Wilmington, Delaware.  I've finally photographed mine.  They've been done for ages but I couldn't find anyone to model for me, finally I bought a head and now I  have a full-time model.

Hit me with your best shot

I believe this blog has had a bad case of spring fever. We may be back now. . .

It is widely known that my sock yarn collection defies reason. It's causing me a bit of panic, to tell the truth. In honor of the upcoming sock-knitting season (some call it summer), I'm giving some away. You can do any or all of the following:

• tell me your favorite color
• tell me the color you find intolerable
• give me carte blanche, i.e., invite me to "hit me with your best shot."

And I will send you (up to 10 people)  a skein of sock yarn from my copious archive.

Send your color preferences plus your name and mailing address to me at yarnystuff@gmail.com -- do not post it here in the comments, because you don't want strangers with ill intent to get hold of it.

It's April!

And it's neither raining nor snowing -- which is good news, considering it was doing both, at the same time, yesterday morning.

I finished 3 pairs of mittens, with 2 still in progress, in March. Photo after they're dry and looking their best.

April's project is chemo caps for kids -- which means toddler on up to full adult size. Unfortunately, it means easy care and non-irritating fibers, and I really don't like either cotton or acrylic. But, for all the kids and their parents, I can do that. Because heads that are bald as a result of treatment have very sensitive skin, I'm not even going to try washable wool blends.

I plan to stick with very simple patterns, roll brim caps and the first couple from this site; I like numbers 1, 5, 6, and 8. For teenagers, I have my eye on the London Beanie, which has been found to be very popular with young men. (Ravelry lists 1012 projects, and the pattern was around long before Ravelry.)

Anyone who wants to is welcome to knit along. We're donating ours to the A.I. duPont Hospital for Children in Wilmington, Delaware, which is not far from us. If you live nearby, you are welcome to give caps to us for delivery (and, although I used the plural, just one cap is one more comfortable kid so don't feel you have to go into mass production mode); if you don't, your local hospital will be happy to have them.

I have track meets and soccer games in my future -- knitting round and round mindlesslly (mindfully?) is a great way to fill the gap between the time when you have to get there with your player and the time the action starts.

The Best of Intentions

Really, I started out this year knowing that I would blog here each week.  I knew that I would discuss in detail all my knitting but I didn't deliver on that promise.  Writing isn't my strong suit... anyhow, here I am and I am ready to write the epic January, February and March, Knitting Tell All!

January, the "Something for Me" month.  I finished my Noro afghan.  I started this on my birthday last year and only had the finishing to go but it was a lot of work knitting it together and putting on the edging and finishing in the ends.  It's done, it's for me and I love it.

 

 February, the wool mittens for Maine month, but I found a need much nearer to home.  A dear friend mentioned to me that she didn't have any hand knit socks and it was her birthday month.  Of all the sad stories I've heard, I just had to put down my mittens and make socks.

Once finished with the socks I went on to make my husband a knit cap.  This is yarn we bought last summer in England and he carried in his bag all the way home.  It's so soft and nice and the colorways are wonderful.  I've got mine on the needles now but have so many other projects distracting me...

 

March, the Afghans for Afghans month, found me knitting (as I was suppose) to a little vest for A4A.  I enjoyed knitting this thing.  It was a simple design, I scaled it up a bit by using heavier yarn and I made it longer so that it would fit a larger child.  The pattern has no real finishing except sewing the shoulder seam and putting on the buttons, which I got my mom to do...yeah, my mom still helps with my knitting!

Beyond the knitting mentioned herein, I've knit lots of other things but they gone off to be worn before I got pictures.  I also cast on a Nimbus sweater, knit 11" and then decided it might be a few inches shy of fitting around me.  It was then that I decided to find a pattern knit from the neck down and try again.  It's put away right now, to age and allow me to forget the 11" of stockinette that I need to pull out...meanwhile I've cast on anther sweater for me in Denim that might work out.  I'll discuss it in detail if I get it right.  That's about it for now.  I'm looking forward to the next few months.  I love knitting caps so the chemo project will be a breeze.

*All the projects discussed in the blog entry have full details of pattern used, needles and yarn at my site on Ravelry. 

Pat

first daffodil

Yipes! Stripes!

I like striped mittens.

There may be a reason I don't make them more often.

visual interest coming soon!!

1. I do not have Pat locked away in a cell, away from her knitting and camera. She is well, and knitting, and taking pictures, and will emerge at some point, as soon as the sun gets a little higher in the sky.

2. No pictures from me either. I have a new camera. (The old one is still in hiding. I'll probably find it in a bird's nest in a tree down the street.) Cameras no longer come with convenient little booklets -- they come with the instruction manual on a CD that you read on your computer. So you have to run back and forth between your subject and your computer (or send it to your phone, where you can read it in 3-point type), and it is remarkably frustrating and inefficient. I'm having a little trouble getting settings, color, etc, to work properly, and I don't want to post any more bad pictures. Mastering this lovely little machine is at the top of the list of things that will happen in March.

3. February mitten review. Um. I started the month with two pairs in progress, found a third I'd forgotten about, and cast on two more. That gives me five pairs of mittens in progress. Do not even try to figure out the logic; there is none. March is a wild card month, and I plan to finish all of the February mittens.

4. And -- ta da! -- Pat and I have discovered a very cool project, which supports one of our favorite efforts, the Heifer Project. Thanks to Kaleidoscope Yarns in Vermont; it's their newsletter that led us to this great idea: Hats for Hunger.

Details to be firmed up soon, but Pat and I will do something for this group during the month of March. We thought we'd put the link up right away in case you want to play along.

P.S. The first 3 crocuses opened up yesterday.

Not mittens

Hmmm. As part of the very small committee (n = 2) that laid out this year's TLF schedule, I seem to be breaking the rules pretty enthusiastically!! To start, I did not knit myself a sweater in January. (I did, though, make myself a hat and some mittens, so I might qualify on a technicality.) Now it's February, and our schedule says to make mittens for Afghans for Afghans if there's a campaign that calls for those, or for someone else if there isn't one. But -- I had to finish this blanket for the February 14 Afghans for Afghans due date:

I call it "24" -- 4 large blocks, each of which measures 24 by 24 inches, and each of which is based on a multiplication fact. The first one I knit was 4 stripes, each 6 inches wide (4 x 6). Then 6 4-inch stripes, then 8 3-inch stripes, then 12 2-inch stripes. Seven colors of Peace Fleece, using more than 1 skein per color, and all from my stash. The colors are so much warmer and richer than this picture says, and this thing is WARM! I love garter stitch stripes; you'll see more.

I do have two pairs of mittens in progress, so I will finish those up for February, hitting the assigned target. And there's a sweater that needs only a sleeve and a half; that's on my list as well. Not to mention, as soon as I've crocheted the shoelaces, some outrageously adorable little red booties. Watch.this space!

Dear Witness Protection Program

Please return my camera, which has been in deep hiding since two days after Thanksgiving. Accept my assurances that all threats to its continued wellbeing have been neutralized.

Without it, how can I adequately horrify Pat with this week's wild binge of casting on new projects without finishing older ones?

my love affair with the post office continues

Tomorrow I will send these to Afghans for Afghans:

Blue mittens by RTDD, gray mittens (they are gray, not white) with turquoise edge and green mittens from me, stripey mittens and blue socks from Pat. There's also a dark gray hat that did not make it to the photo shoot.

And these to the Red Scarf Project (I missed the deadline, but I wrote and they said OK to send -- I always check first):

      

The scarf on the left is Knitpicks Swish worsted, using the Corrugator pattern; the scarf on the right is Knitpicks Shamrock, a hefty tweedy yarn that did not want to be ribbed. I used a 2 x 2 basketweave pattern instead.

All of the knitting is from 2010; I just never got these things into boxes. It's time.

Begin again

January 1. I make one New Year's resolution every year. The rules are (1) it does not fall into the "become perfect" category, and (2) it has to be fun. For instance, one year the resolution was "see more movies." So this post is not to be seen as a resolution! It's a plan.

Pat and I both believe in knitting for people in need. Sure, we write the checks, too, but both of us think that, in addition to helping someone stay warm, there's an intangible benefit to receiving something handmade. The energy of the work, the knowledge that someone cared enough about you, a stranger, to make this thing -- we think the benefits go beyond the immediate and physical. And we've been knitting in this spirit for years.

It was Pat's idea, enthusiastically welcomed, that for 2011 we do a project each month that falls into that category. We both loathe the phrase "charity knitting" -- it sounds, to our ears, condescending, and has a certain "Lady Bountiful" sense to it. In the knitting guild I belong to, I changed the name of our charity committee to Knitting for Neighbors; Pat and I call our efforts KFO -- Knitting for Others.

We've made a schedule for the year. Unlike last year, we're posting this at the outset, in case anyone wants to follow along or jump in for a month or two. Subject to change, of course, because stuff happens. And Afghans for Afghans sometimes has quick, intense projects that can't be deferred. For now, though, here's the schedule. Each of us has three free passes, so we can skip a month if necessary, without penalty or need to justify. And the year doesn't really start until February 1; in January, permission is given to knit something for ourselves. Another new rule -- the project can have been started before the first of the month. As long as it's finished during the month of the challenge, it counts. (I can't count the finished red scarf sitting on my desk right now for next September, for instance.)

Other knitting will continue, too, and you'll see that here as well. We're looking forward to the variety!


We have participated in all of these projects before, and know them to be well run and successful at getting the knitted items where they need to be:



January -- knit for yourself 

February -- wool mittens, for any organization (e.g., Nest Maine, afghans for Afghans, one of the reservations)

March -- wild card (project or organization of our choice; we may both do the same one or we may choose different projects)

April -- chemo caps for A. I. duPont Hospital in Wilmington, Delaware, one of our many wonderful local children's hospitals. Any size kid, infant to age 18.

May -- scarf for Safe Harbor for next winter. Safe Harbor is a local organization (West Chester, PA) that helps formerly homeless, recovering addicts get back to normal life. Mostly men, they sleep at Safe Harbor but must go out during the day. Many are those guys you see selling newspapers at intersections.

June -- wool socks for Adopt a Native Elder (supports Navajo elders living in the traditional way)

July -- blanket squares for any organization: Pine Ridge, A4A group project; South Africa; other. Overachievers can just go ahead and knit the whole blanket. What? Stop looking at me like that!

August -- Caps for Kids, to be delivered via Knitter's Day Out, a small, annual Pennsylvania event every September that Pat and I always attend and where both of us usually teach. It's very early this month, so knitting will be done in August.

September -- red scarf for the Red Scarf Project

October -- wild card

November -- Hats for the Homeless (in New York; if we can find a Philadelphia equivalent, we'll donate there instead)

December -- wild card

A Year in Socks…

OK, I didn’t knit a pair of socks every month in 2010.  When I look deep within myself I know that it’s alright, I’m not a sock-a-month person.  Unlike Elizabeth, I have lots and lots of socks; my daughter has lots and lots of socks.  I’ve knit a lot of socks in my life.  I like to knit socks; I always have a pair of socks on my knitting needles, just one pair at a time but always a pair of socks in the project bag.  I got all the way through June before the project began to wear thin, we traveled to England and I didn’t finish a pair for July.  That was the beginning of the end of this project for me.

 

Just so’s you know, I’m OK with not finishing the year.  I did spend my first year in our newly renovated house, hanging pictures, figuring out what went in each kitchen drawer, finding a spot to display my mug collection, the list is endless. I posted a photo a day on my art web site.  I traveled to England.  I lost 22 ½ pounds.  I took care of my family.  It was a great year and 2011 is going to be even better, the mind boggles.

I did lots of charity knitting this year.  I’m a very fortunate person and I believe in giving back; I hope to give back even more in 2011.  I’d also like to lose another 20 pounds, exercise a bit more, knit more, travel more and grow less facial hair.  I expect to reach most of those goals and the ones I miss; well it just goes to show you that I’m not perfect.

Retrospective

Pat and I had discussed knitting a pair of socks each month in 2009. I think we made it to mid-January that year, although we agreed we'd still really like to do that. So in 2010 we decided to try again, this time blogging the project. Somehow, that was what we needed. I was motivated by several things: (1) the pure fun of the challenge; (2) a large collection of sock yarn; and (3) the fact that I found out that both my sister and one friend each had more than 15 pairs of socks I'd made for them, but I had only three. I needed to fill my own sock drawer!

I started out strong, managing not only to meet the monthly challenge but also to finish up a pair or two that had been languishing on needles for months or years. Then I started missing deadlines, just by a day. By fall, the thrill had diminished somewhat; finally, Pat and I both agreed that we'd come close enough, and that it was supposed to be fun. I tried to make the November sock, but it didn't work out as planned. I have all year to fix it, so that's on the list.

January: green socks, rainbow stripes pair finished -- 2
February: Afghans for Afghans socks and a series of sock-knitting lessons on the A4A knitalong blog; another languishing pair finished --  2

March: Socks that Rock; green and yellow socks finished -- 2
April: blue socks and contemplation of stash -- 1
May: purple cables -- 1
June: solstice socks (flew away to a friend just in time for December 21) -- 1
July: Afghans for Afghans; 3 worsted pairs, 2 pairs using a double strand of sock yarn -- 5
August: wild card; I finished two pairs in progress, so actually knit more than one pair -- 2
September: golden socks -- 1
October: we made mittens instead
November: no socks, but hats for 6 homeless guys
December: crash and burn, illustrated by the fact that this is the first post of the month

Total pairs knit: 18, 9 of which stayed here with me


I learned: blogging is fun and easy; knitting to a challenge is entertaining; and having a lot of wool socks is wonderful. I already knew that there's no sense in continuing to push yourself to do something that's supposed to be fun once it turns into a stressor and that a project is much more fun if you do it with a friend..

Two Left Feet has a new project starting January 1. Not socks this time, but no need to change the blog title, because we do, indeed, still have two left feet.

Hats for the holidays

Pat and I both know we've been lucky, especially when we compare our lives to the whole rest of the world. That's not to say everything has always been perfect, and we've had our share of stresses and sadness, but we've never had to live on the street, and we've never had to raise our kids in a war zone. And the list goes on. That's one reason we both like to knit for people who have less. . . so when we found the web site for Hats for the Homeless, we both cast on immediately for hats.

I took a bag of yarn I'd stumbled across -- bought I'm not sure when, probably for mittens, and made these:

Fast, easy, and very very warm.

Pat found some leftovers at her house and made these:

(Please note, I used a highly paid model!)

They went to New York in yesterday's mail. We like to think they'll make a few people's lives just a little easier.

Sure don't feel like love

Pat and I have been starching our upper lips every morning and trying valiantly to soldier on. . . the fact is, the sock love has gone AWOL. So in a chat this morning we agreed that the year of socks came close enough, and we have freed ourselves to work guilt-free on whatever knitting speaks to us until at least the end of December.

Ahhh, that feels better. . .

You will still see great and wonderful things!! But they may not be foot-shaped. Off to knit without that nagging little voice in the back of my head. (I am wearing, by the way, the green January socks -- and yes, they still seem to radiate green light.)

simplify, simplify, simplify

The category for November is "holiday" socks. So far, I've got to the point where you print out the sheet of graph paper you need to chart the design. . .

I just read the Process Pledge on a quilting blog, and it seemed to apply to us too. So, here's the very beginning of the process, represented by the yarn I plan to use (click to make it bigger to see the sparkles):

Yes, it is green and sparkly (Black Bunny Fibers, Stella, colorway UFO). But -- it is not the green and sparkly yarn I meant to use. That is in a Safe Place, from which it will emerge when it's just a little too late for this pair of socks. (Yes, I can see the future.)

I want these to be festive, but I did not want them to be socks that can be worn only at Christmas time. So I've eliminated all plans to add red, and probably even gold, and have to rely on this yarn alone for the design. I'm trying to chart something out -- my original idea was way too complicated, because I would have had to follow a graph for every single stitch. In that case, I would have finished one leg of one sock and then put the whole thing away for some imaginary time in the future. I'm hoping to do better than that with this pair. So I'll be off to print out another sheet of graph paper (I just made an awful mess of this one) and try to formulate a more rational design.