The Knitting Pirate

I’m in the middle of the heel flap of the Jaywalker, and had to take a break, so I’m stretching my fingers out and typing a little. For some reason, I didn’t want to start the heel. I think it was because I did my best to get the stripes to line up, but eventually came to the realization that I would be two rows off no matter what. Either the second sock leg will be two rows short, or the stripes on the foot will be offset by two rows. Eventually I decided that I would rather have my sock legs be the same length, and started the heel… only to stop two rows later and daydream about a pattern for the next sock.

This is silly – the next sock is going to be the second Pomatomus of the pair. Then I thought, “but I’m almost done with the Stripey Striped Scarf, and that will leave me with two projects I can only work on at home – Pomatomus and the Ostrich Plumes scarf. I’m going to need a simple traveling project.” Well, simple doesn’t require much daydreaming, does it? I think I’m going to do a ribbed (4×1) sock in some of the Trekking XXL which Janis gave me for my birthday. That oughta be simple enough to travel with.

This weekend I upgraded my WordPress installation and added a new feature – a JavaScript lightbox effect. Try clicking on a picture. Isn’t that neat? If you’re the type who likes pictures to open up in their own tabs/windows instead of getting the animated effect, you can still right-click > open in new window, or middle-click if you use Firefox and enjoy that tab thing. Middle-click may work in IE7 as well.

Also this weekend I mentioned to Pirate-Husband that, other than socks, I’m running out of things I really want to knit for myself. Kinda. I want to make the Shedir hat (link to pdf), and some purple-and-green armwarmers to go with my green-and-purple scarf, and a pair of fingerless glove-convertible mittens. He said that I should feel free to knit him a sweater. A cabled sweater. A big warm gansey, in fact, is what he has in mind for himself. I laughed. If anyone’s getting a hand-knit sweater around here, it’s me – but other than baby sweaters, I’m not sure I’m interested in making one. It seems like a lot of work… who knows? Once I say “oh, I’m not interested in that,” it’s almost a sure thing that at some point in the future, I’ll be interested.

First, I unrolled everything and laid it all out on the futon. Pirate-Husband came in at this point and said “Oh, pretty!” I took that as a good sign, because I’d been about to stop after that small accomplishment. Bravely I took my spindle in hand… then realized that I needed my hands to get some fiber, and put it down again. Really, this would be so much easier with more hands.

Then, I pulled the orange and magenta off one section of roving and spun it. Some blue got in there; I wasn’t being too careful. I thought if it was the pure orange, it would be too bright on its own. I may try to be more careful about that for the rest of it – and there’s an awful lot left to go. At one point I think I must have put too much twist in or pulled it too tightly, because it snapped, but I recovered by floofling up the snapped end and just going on from there. If I have to toss a few tangled bits, such is life.

On one hand, I think it looks a lot nicer without the orange. On the other, it’s quite dark with only the green to lighten it. The blue and purple are very deep colors. I’ll probably like it better when it’s plied together. And if I don’t, that’s okay too. This is a learning process. (Thing I learned: You don’t get much yarn spun in an hour.)

For the past hour or so I have been spinning up the orange bits (mostly) of the roving that I bought at the MD Sheep and Wool Festival back in May. When it gets to be daylight again I’ll take a picture of my progress – there is just no way I can get a good shot at this hour of night. The roving has seven million colors in it (okay, five) and four of those five go together very nicely. There’s blue, purple, magenta-ish, green… and bright orange. So I’m experimenting by pulling out the magenta and orange and spinning them together first. Then I’ll spin the other colors. Since there’s probably half as much orange as other colors, I’m thinking a three-ply kinda thing might work out well. I know that means I’ll get less total yardage, but I’m also hoping it might even out some of the slubby spots.

Conclusions I have reached from this evening’s exercise:

1. Draft first, then spin.
2. Drop spindles are slow.
3. I want a spinning wheel.
4. I cannot have a spinning wheel until I have a house to put it in.
• Note to self: Buy house.
5. A third and fourth hand would be incredibly useful.

Questions I have accumulated:

1. When the spindle is full (or not spinning so well anymore) what do I do with the singles? I guess I can wind them into tiny little balls.
2. The single is not nearly long enough to be useful. Does plying take care of this, or will I be stuck with lots of very short skeins of yarn?
3. What if I just *wanted* a single? Is this where I’d really need a wheel instead of a spindle? Good thing I don’t really want a single out of this, right? Yeah.
4. What the hell have I gotten myself into?

Way too much fun, I tells ya. Way too much fun.

I finally got back to SnB last night for the first time in a while. Seeing my fellow knitters at Borders last week reminded me of how much fun we have when we all get together! So after work I took a nap and was well-rested for the evening of yarniness. And then I spent more time talking than knitting! I brought the Stripey Striped Scarf with me and probably only knit eight rows on it. But it was worth it – I had a great time!

There was some talk about starting up theme nights. The first theme is next week; it’s going to be a “Show and Tell” evening in which we bring FOs and talk about the pattern. Someone mentioned wanting to make a So-Called Scarf out of either Manos or Malabrigo, I forget, so I’m going to bring mine (and the matching hat) to show. I think I’ll also bring the armwarmers! Hm, and maybe some yarn deserves showing off as well.

We also discussed doing a dyeing night, if we can get a volunteer to host it, and I’d like to have a spinning night as well.

Speaking of spinning, I’m considering that the green wool might be best if I spun it into something fine, lace- or fingering-weight, and then made a shawl of it. I want to make it into something that will show it off near my face, but I already have two green scarves, and I don’t need another hat. What I *don’t* have is a shawl…

Here we have the by-now-infamous stripey striped scarf, hurtling towards completion. I may have already mentioned that there’s 12-15 inches of scarf left to knit. It was up in the 90s yesterday (that’s ‘hot’, for you Canadians) so it’s nowhere near time to be wearing warm wool scarves… still, I’m looking forward to having it done. At the same time, I will miss the fun of seeing what colors come next and how they play out against each other. Maybe I’ll have to do something stripy again soon.

As my wrists allow, I’ve been working on carding the green roving. I thought it would never end, but I finished off the last of it after taking this picture. Pirate-Husband helped some, which surprised me a little, but he said he found it to be relaxing and meditative. Maybe I can get him to card for me in the future? I took a cardboard box, lined it with a black plastic bag, and put all the rolags in it. It’s full to the top, so it’s a good thing I’m out of wool that needs to be carded! Next up is, of course, the Eight Pounds of Alpaca – but I think I’m going to hold off on carding that until I’ve spun some of what I’ve already got. First, the roving from MD Sheep & Wool. I think that would be the best to practice on. Then, the green stuff… and THEN the alpaca.

There in the sidebar, thanks to Casey over at Ravelry, is now a neat little thingie (yes, that’s a technical term, ‘thingie’) which shows my current WIPs and their progress. It also links back to the project page on Ravelry, but unless you have an account, you won’t be able to see that yet.

I gotta say, even though the site is still in beta, I’m absolutely loving it. There’s an incredible feel of community over there. Eleven people have queued up the armwarmers pattern. It’s so cool that I’m able to see that! I can’t wait for people to start knitting it so I can see the different projects.

Last night, between re-installing my printer (don’t ask) and poking at the html and css on the blog, I put another few inches onto the Stripey Striped Scarf. It’s got about another 12 or 15 inches, and then it will be DONE! I’m sure I can get quite a bit of it done at SnB tomorrow night. And then… then I can start something new again! Whee!

For once I was incredibly glad that I go to work so early. Leaving at 3:30 meant that I was #21 in line to see the Yarn Harlot at Borders! We had a great time waiting, knitting, showing off projects, gushing over each new piece that was pulled out for show. Finally we were called up to get our line number tickets. I bought her newest book, hopped over to the cashier to pay for it, and was back in time to sit with people from SnB in the third row! (There may have been a stop at the cafe counter to get an asiago cheese-filled pretzel.)

The Harlot spoke for almost two hours. She was great! Eventually Daniel, the Borders guy running the evening, started looking anxious and she went upstairs to sign books. Daniel went with her to take pictures and got this great one of some women from SnB with the Harlot. From the left – Susan, Marie, the Harlot (holding my Jaywalkers) and me (holding the Traveling Sock).

What a fantastic evening! Not only because I love going to book signings for great authors, but because of the feeling of one-ness and cameraderie that completely filled the bookstore. I met some people from Ravelry. I got a Moo MiniCard from one knitter and I’m considering getting some for myself to promote the blog… but I don’t know if I should get them, or regular sized business cards. I’ve missed going to SnB, and I want to get back into it. The people in this hobby are just amazing.

I thought about this for a while and decided that the Highwayman pattern really needed some kind of included copyright information. So I put this on there. Since I don’t plan to make and sell armwarmers, I have no problem if anyone else does – it doesn’t take money away from me. However, it’s important to give me credit for the design. Here’s the copyright notice I came up with:

Important Copyright Information:
This pattern is © 2007 The Knitting Pirate. You may make copies for your own personal use, but you may not sell copies of the pattern. You may sell the armwarmers you make provided that credit is given to the Knitting Pirate for the design. If you have any questions about what you can or can’t do with this pattern, please feel free to contact the Knitting Pirate.

I wonder why most pattern designers don’t want people selling objects made from their pattern?

Thursday night I saw the Yarn Harlot at Borders. As soon as I pull the pictures off my camera, I’ll post them with a recap of the evening. It was fantastic!

Pirate-Husband asked me to design “manly black armwarmers” for him to wear while riding, and explained that he needed something to close the gap between his leather jacket and his gloves. Cables were the first thing that came to mind. He liked them so much that I made a pair for myself as well! These are just the thing for scenic motorcycle rides in the country – or blustery fall days in the city. Made of 100% wool, they are warm without being too bulky, and fit tightly to help keep the wind out.

SIZE: S [L] (shown in size S)
FINISHED MEASUREMENTS: To fit an arm that’s 6 [7.5] inches around at widest point of forearm. Negative ease is included in the pattern.
YARN: Patricia Roberts Lambswool [100% lambswool; 50g/168 yards;] charcoal gray; 1 skein or Filatura Di Crosa Zarina Extrafine Merino [100% merino; 50g/181 yards;] colour 1490: blue; 1 skein or any other sport-DK weight yarn to get gauge.
AND ALSO:

• 1 set(s) US #3/3.25mm double-point needles
• Cable needle
• Tapestry needle
• Round marker

GAUGE: 30 sts/42 rows = 4″ in stockinette stitch

Download the Highwayman Armwarmer Pattern – .pdf format

Highwayman page on Ravelry.com

Important Copyright Information:
This pattern is © 2007 The Knitting Pirate. You may make copies for your own personal use, but you may not sell copies of the pattern. You may sell the armwarmers you make provided that credit is given to the Knitting Pirate for the design. If you have any questions about what you can or can’t do with this pattern, please feel free to contact the Knitting Pirate.

Some more pictures:

It is too dark now to take pictures and have any color accuracy, so you’re just going to have to take my word for it…

I wound up the next (fifth) ball, the one with the beginning that closely matches the end of the knotted (third) ball. The outside, which is now the end, is nicely purple. While I had the ball-winder going, and since I’m so close to needing it anyway, I wound up the last (sixth) ball. Amazingly, its beginning end also matches the end of the knotted (third) ball!

The nicely purple end of the fifth ball goes fairly well with the nicely purple end of the fourth ball… so I’m going to re-wind the fifth ball so that the purple end is now the purple beginning. I can’t believe how well this is working out, considering how randomly I picked these balls of yarn!

I proofread this before posting to make sure I had all the balls of yarn right. Hopefully it’s not too confusing, and you can follow along. I’ll try to get color-accurate pictures when there’s some daylight!