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Dear Jan,

Remember how Mom used to try to get peas and potatoes planted for St. Patrick’s Day?  Well, I thought I might do that this year as it has been unusually warm and the frost is out of the ground, but I think I missed my chance.  They are a cool weather crop, and it is already in the 80’s here in Minnesota.  Heck, the Iditarod isn’t even quite over (as I write this, three mushers and their teams remain on the trail) and we are wearing shorts in Minnetonka.  I, for one, am a little scared of carbon dioxide.

My concerns haven’t stopped me from enjoying the warmth.  We headed down to the U of MN Landscape Arboretum for a day of hiking with our friends Gary and Sharon.  Not expecting much beyond bare limbs and leftover leaves from last fall, we were delighted by the variety of buds in a state of rapid expansion.  Flowers won’t be far behind (the maples are already in bloom).

We were delighted to have a mourning cloak butterfly join us, though he quickly left when another of his own species fluttered by.  I know what they have on their mind!

Even nicer was spotting a male bluebird…

…and then his mate.  We saw them flutter in and out of a bluebird house, so I know what is on their mind, too!

We did see some snow in piles in deep shade and there is still ice in the lakes, and plenty of snowdrops.  They look so simple from above, but tip up their blossom and it is a lovely, complex bloom.

I don’t think I’ve ever hiked in a T-shirt to see snowdrops.

We got home in time for me to finish my Iknitarod project while there were still four mushers who had yet to make it to Nome.  I made the Knit Vested and Stylish vest,  a free Red Heart pattern.

I don’t like to bash free patterns, because, after all, they are free, but this was a case of you get what you pay for.  The pattern left many details out - I could figure my way around them, but a less experienced knitter may have had trouble.  Things like specifying what decreases and increases to use, how to make them symmetrical (and in a worsted weight, it would have been noticeable if you didn’t make them symmetrical), poor description of mitering the points, no description of how to pick up the right number of stitches…  and on and on.  The design had weaknesses, too.  For one, the attached back belt is done in garter of worsted weight yarn, pretty clunky if you ask me.  I wasn’t going to live with that.

Instead, I made a 2-ply yarn from the 4-ply Cascade 220 used for the vest.  First, I reversed the final twist on my wheel until the plies were no longer twisted together.   This took a few tries to get it right - I simply pulled the yarn off the bobbin and wound it on my hand then ran it back into the wheel with the appropriate twist to adjust until it was perfect.

I then separated the plies, running two to a bobbin winder and wrapping two on my hand.

Next, figure out how much twist to put back in and get a reasonably balanced yarn.  How to discover the right twist?  Water - it releases the set twist of the fiber and lets it relax to where it wants to be.

The damp two ply next to some that had not gotten a bath gives me guidance on how much twist to put back into the two ply yarn.

I plied it on my wheel, and then knit these little bits right off the bobbin.  That was convenient, as it let me put a bit more twist in as needed.

I was quite happy with the weight and look of the little belt.  That extra effort almost always pays off!

A day in the sun, the last push to finish the vest, and even some spinning leaves me ready to make the effort to get to bed early.  I hope your day was as full and productive as mine was!

Love,

Ellen

Dear Ellen,

Do you like your peckers downy or hairy?  Sorry, upon reading my opening line, I realize it sounds way to much like the language of our spam commenters, but to be clear, I am talking about woodpeckers.  I believe this lovely bird is a hairy one.  The two are remarkably similar with differences only in their beaks and outer tail feathers as far as I can tell.  If those are black bars/spots on her outer tail feathers (yes, I can tell she’s a female — no red patch on the back of the head), then I’m wrong, she’s a downy.  But I would expect to see the black spots a bit better and her beak is far more chisel-like than I saw on the pictures of the downy.  Tough call.  I’ll let you know after I post this over in the “Knitting Pipeline” group on Ravelry.  Paula’s an expert.

I’ve made good progress on Manly.  I have almost reached the “joining of sleeves” point in the body entirely with the first skein of Eco+ — was very pleased to see how far it went.  I started the next skein, but realizing I’d need sleeves to join soon, decided to work on those before I continued on the body.  I’ve got one ready to go and am about a third of the way up the second.  I’d be there in no time if I hadn’t picked up two new projects that I need to crack out quickly.

The first of these is a helmet liner using that fabu pattern, Gusseted Helmet Liner from TwinSet Designs.  I’m sure your familiar with it.  (By the way, when I created my project on Ravelry for this, I became your 200th project.  Do I get a prize?  Oh wait, I already got one — that lovely Columbia roving and fun, fun gifts from China.  I am particularly partial to the finger flashlight.  Thanks!) I’m making this for a buddy who deploys in a few weeks. I found out he still only has the government issue crappy acrylic helmet liner and asked him if he’d like a good one. He was thrilled when I said I’d make him one.  I’m making great progress, but am not thrilled with the stretchiness of my cast on — believe I will finish the helmet liner and then try to pick up stitches near the cast on, pick the cast on out and then bind off using Jeny’s Surprisingly Stretchy Cast Off.  Also, instead of doing a provisional cast on for the resumption of knitting in the round after the neckstand, I used two circs as the base and did a figure eight cast on to yield two lines of live stitches — one line oriented up and the other down. It worked great. When I go back to do the ribbing around the face opening I’ll simply pick up the stitches on the sides of the neck stand and be in business.

The next one will be a shawl for my friend Ann.  You may recall that I designed Ann’s Cap for her when she first came down with ovarian cancer.  She’s been in remission for a few years now, but her last scan showed that it’s back.  Surgery is Monday.  I’d like to be able to bring this shawl to her sometime week after next.   The pattern, from Wrapped in Comfort is perfect — named Bigfoot, I’m naming this project Ann’s Big Heart.  Her feet aren’t that big, but boy her heart is!  (I have been meaning to knit from Alison’s book for a while, but was not able to lay my hands on it.  It showed up a few weeks ago when I unpacked the last boxes from the move.) I’m doing it in Socrates — a yarn that has a very warm, very soft feel to it.

Finally, I decided to join in on a KAL on the Knitting Pipeline boards.  Quince and Company picked up a pattern that Paula designed and it is lovely, called Piper’s Journey (click through to see a preview on their site).  I’m not a Piper, but I’ve so enjoyed her podcast and being a member of the Ravelry group, so I couldn’t say no.  Mine’s called Pipeliner’s Journey.  It will, however, have to wait till I finish the other priority projects.  As it’s not yet available (it should go on sale within the week), I may finish them up just in time.  I’m making mine in Quince and Company Chickadee in the glacier colorway.

Spinning continues too…am through the 4 oz. braid of silk and merino and I have a question.  What do you do when you can’t find the end of your single?  Mine somehow disappeared after it broke during the spinning process and now I fear surgery will be the only way to recover it.  As I’d like to ply next weekend, your advice will be valued!

Love, Jan

Dear Ellen,

I’m surely having fun with my spinning wheel.  I’ve now got two lovely skeins of my own handspun worsted weight corriedale.  (I need to double check the WPIs, that’s an eyeball estimate.)  They are both from fiber from Desigknit — such gorgeous hews I loved watching the fiber turn into singles and then into the 3-ply yarn.   I’ve got ideas for them — I’m thinking a brioche stitch hat, maybe something like Nancy Marchant’s Delft’s Blauw.  It’s pretty sweet and I own the book — Knitting Brioche.  And I’m hoping I’ll have enough left for some simple mitts.  We’ll see.  In any case it will have to wait.  I have THREE sweaters on the needles right now.  Yep, three.

The first is the Ori-Mommy sweater that I’m co-knitting with Marie.  My part is now up to 57.5 inches long…about 14.5 inches to go.  She was making good progress on hers too, so we should have a sweater in the not terribly distant future.  Believe it or not, but I have really enjoyed working on this.  It’s basically K1P1 ribbing all the way.  Maybe I like it because I can drink and knit without worrying about forgetting the pattern.  Maybe it is the zen quality of the rhythm of switching back and forth between knits and pearls which I do find quite soothing.

The second one is called Manly.  I’m very pleased to be working on this one.  You see I have been eager to knit for Dale for sometime and he finally wants a sweater.  He did say he hoped it would be  a manly one though. So here we go — bulky wool in an almost olive drab…almost. It is really lovely with bronze and gold fibers that give it a nice heathery look. Brownstone is the perfect pattern, but I’ll be making it longer and adding some short rows in the back of the body to make sure it doesn’t creep up in back. He just hates that.

Finally, I’ve been eager to do some selfish knitting and this sweater I’m calling Fooling Around is the ticket.  It’s knit in Zealana Kauri Fingering, oh so soft with 60% New Zealand Merino, 30% possum and  10% silk.  The swatch bloomed beautifully and I know this will be very lightweight, but very snug at the same time.  The pattern is Pam Power’s Devonshire and has a beautiful lace inset in the back and along the edgest. I am so loving this knit and I never thought I’d want to knit a sweater in such a fine weight yarn.  Perhaps this will warm me up to try to start my Bohus.  Don’t hold your breath though — that sweater may have to marinate in stash for a while longer.

I’ve got some other fibery ideas for the coming year.  Remember that fungus?  It’s now drying on top of Allen’s Mini.  Sometime this spring I’m going to give a shot at using it as a dye base to see if I can’t get some oyster mushroom yarn out of it.  More to come on that one!

To wrap up last year I knit this little guy to guard my computer.  The kit to make him was in my holiday loot from Dale…my own knitted ninja.  Haiii-YA!!!

And finally, a quick report on 55 in 52.  I’m now down to 47 in 48.  I believe I can credit the fact that I’m preparing healthy options on the weekends so they’re ready to scarf down when I come home from work exhausted.  Yummy!

Hope your 2012 is going well!  Love, Jan

Dear Ellen,

It seems like we take turns hitting slowdowns in our web posting.  This time it was my turn.  I am barely caught up with my personal e-mail much less anything extra.  I think the new spinning wheel may be to blame.  As you can see, I have now produced some plied product.  This is DesignKnit fiber — a beautiful colorway in 100% corriedale.  I am satisfied with it, but not overwhelmed.  I do know I will get better. 

And it looks far better than it did!  This is how it appeared before I re-plied it.  Classic newbie error — I plied in the same direction as I spun.  To make it better, I sent it back through the wheel in the opposite direction, unplying and then replying each section as I went.  I also think it would have benefited from my not trying to 3-ply as my first wheel plying experience.

The singles weren’t that bad, but they were victims of two things –

1. I overspin.  I try not too, but I do.  I can go for short stretches where I manage to keep my feet from pumping away like crazy, but it doesn’t last…yet.  As a result my singles have lots of energy.
2. Erica had warned me that this fiber might have some felty bits in it and offered to refund my money.  I examined it (at the time) and couldn’t see anything I thought was felty.  When I actually opened the braid and got into it, I understood what she meant.  It does have a few felty bits.  I consider it a great way to learn and wouldn’t have it any other way.

I’ve also been busy with the farm…especially the wandering about admiring nature.  Here is our fungus tree with a new addition.  It is cool how absolutely round that hole is!  We have very accurate woodpeckers here.  And below is a shot of geese flying south for the remainder of winter.  I love listening to them call to each other and imagine the guy in the back is letting the guy in front know that he’s keeping up.  Either that or the guy in front is calling for someone else to spell him so he can take advantage of some drafting for a bit.  Look closely and you can see how hard they are flapping their wings!

All of Saturday was pretty much consumed by the Pennsylvania State Farm Show — the largest farm show in the country!

 We don’t just do princess torsos in butter…we do a whole cow…okay, calf.

There are many sheep…some in very cool outfits.

There are rabbits of many colors and varieties…though these will look pretty much alike on the dinner plate.  (Sorry, K & J, but these are the same breed your mom and I used to raise!)

Dale found a combine he wanted.  At least he wanted to go for a ride in it.

We decided to let sleeping hogs lie.

The youthful intensity of those entered in the poultry event was fun to watch.

I particularly appreciated the “stare ‘em in the eyeballs” method of inspiring greatness.  (No chickens were harmed during this competion despite the eery similarity to the way our special operations forces have been reputed to have killed goats.)

Finally, no good farm show could be without…alpacas.  I made several new friends — both four legged and two legged.  And came away with some beautiful rovings. 

Dale sized up the competition in the fiber arts and baking categories and says we can take them.  I can hardly wait.

Love, Jan

P.S. If you were wondering about the title of this post — that’s a goal of losing 55 pounds this year.  I want to be healthy for retirement!  Five down, fifty to go, so now I’m at 50 in 50!  I’m still 53 though.

Dear Jan,

Believe it or not, I’m looking forward to Monday, if only to finally wear a sweater that has been knit for months but only yesterday got buttons added.  Here we have Hazelnuss, from the Cirilia Rose pattern of Nuss and knit of Blackstone Tweed.  It took me about 9.6 skeins on size 7 needles.

The knitting was done back in May, but finding the right buttons and then finally getting them sewn on took much longer, mostly because I wasn’t sure how to handle stabilizing the front edge.   The final approach I took included a very narrow satin ribbon sewed along the inner edge of the lace rib that runs up the front, backing buttons to stabilize the actual buttons on that soft edge, and running that same ribbon around the neck.  With the latter move I was able to control a slight tendency of the edge to curl out, too.

Something else I’m looking forward to is the arrival of the fleeces I dropped with Zeilinger’s while at Rhinbeck.  They won’t be coming for many Mondays, but I did reserve a sample of each.  I found some time this last week to play with the CorriedaleX which Erica is sharing with me.  I used mini-combs to create a very soft and fluffy  top, then spun up some very fine singles.  Chain-plying gave me a very fluffy but dk weight yarn.  I may swatch some more - what would a 5-ply look like? - but this would be a very nice sweater yarn, indeed!

In other fiber news, this last week I received the gift of some of Rising Moon Farm’s new yarn crop in return for a small favor.  Catherine is far too generous, but I am far too thrilled with the yarn to refuse.  You, too, can get your hands on some of this when she gets it listed on their website for sale. (Hah! I just checked their website and see that you have already bought some!)

Yesterday I played assistant at one of Gale’s photo shoots.  I won’t divulge any details, as that is Gale and collaborator’s privilege, but it was my privilege to get to hold reflectors, tape back curtains, etc as the brains of the operation posed models and props.

Standing around holding a piece of foam core may not sound glamorous, but it did come with fringe benefits.  I met one of the cutest dogs around - Rowan reminded me so much of Judit.  He was totally sweet.

Another benefit was that in just watching what Gale does for a full day, I learned a ton.  Lighting, modeling, attention to detail and more, not the least of which is that it really is winter in Minnesota and the light (especially when it comes through falling snow) is cool in temperature and fades fast.

Not that the kiddens couldn’t have taught me that, too.  It is cleary time to snuggle in with sister, and even if someone annoys you by taking your picture, you can just go back to sleep afterwards.

But not until you go to work on Monday and show off your new sweater.

I hope your Monday brings you pleasure in some way, too.

Cheers,

Ellen