A Bluestocking Knits

Miscellanea

Armistice Day

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11th November 2005

These are some of the photographs at The American Memory Collection with a keyword search of "knitting". I wonder if the ladies were part of a war effort project, so the photos seemed a fitting part of a Veterans’ Day remembrance, from the home front perspective.

[Women knitting, as they are sitting outdoors on chairs set in a row]. Chicago, 1917. DN-0068503, Chicago Daily News negatives collection, Chicago Historical Society.

[Women knitting, as they are sitting outdoors on wooden chairs]. Chicago, 1917. DN-0068504, Chicago Daily News negatives collection, Chicago Historical Society.

[Miss Sarah Farewell sitting in a chair outdoors, knitting]. Chicago, 1917 DN-0068362, Chicago Daily News negatives collection, Chicago Historical Society.

[Ethel Forgan sitting in a director’s chair on a brick patio, knitting with Miss Sarah Farewell, partially obscured].DN-0068395, Chicago Daily News negatives collection, Chicago Historical Society.
“Show and Tell Friday”

Mug

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Bluestocking

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11th November 2005

Show and Tell Friday requests our favorite cup or mug —
“Booking Through Thursday”, Books and Reading, Movies and Television

Booking Through Thursday: Movies From Books

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10th November 2005
This week’s Booking Through Thursday has a slight twist on last week’s theme:
1. What book (or books) would you like to see made into a movie? Why? Just picking something out of the air, so to speak — because I noticed it on the shelf yesterday — A Company of Swans by Eva Ibbotson, one of my favorite novelists and not as widely-known as she should be. Wit, interesting characters, romance, complicated plotlines that nevertheless come across as completely believable — good stuff. With its ballet theme and Victorian setting, a movie of the story would be lovely. Also fun might be Georgette Heyer’s Friday’s Child or Hilary McKay’s The Exiles….
2. What book (or books) would you definitely not want made into a movie? Well, I still have strong reservations about the upcoming Narnia movie, but will reserve judgement until I see it. I can’t really think of something that I would really kick at, as of course it completely depends on the screenplay, director, etc. etc. All three of the books I mentioned above are not terribly "serious" books, which probably makes a difference, as — "dying is easy, comedy is hard" notwithstanding — I think it’s easier to translate a lighter story to the screen, as weight and seriousness all too often get merely ponderous and boring. Those with a lot of internal dialogue or stream-of-consciousness tend to lose a lot, as well. (I am perfectly willing to be proven wrong, of course!)
Knitting

Halfway

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9th November 2005

Every time that David goes on one of these business trips, I feel an increasing respect for single parents. It is not something that I would like to attempt on a regular basis. We are now halfway through this trip, and it’s been hectic, to say the least. A sampling —

— Potty training. Still. Enough said.

— When the milkman brought our delivery at the beginning of the week, three of the six cartons had a bottom corner bashed in. I didn’t have enough large containers to decant it, so our milk is in various Tupperware boxes in the fridge. I kept getting distracted from hosing off the porch ("Mommy!!"), so I’m afraid the puddle is still there, bar a watering-can rinse when I actually did remember to water the houseplants yesterday.

— The phone has been ringing off the hook with special-election recordings, including one from The Big Guy himself. Thank heavens it’s over now.

— I spent probably the most panicked fifteen minutes of my life at Laura’s school the other day, when I turned around in the crush outside the kindergarten classrooms after school and Julia was gone. I looked in the most obvious places, then the not-so-obvious ones, then the mom I’d been talking with (about sex offenders, unfortunately) started looking with me, in ever-larger circles around the spot I’d last seen Julia, and fifteen minutes later had at least three other moms, two teachers, and a veritable army of kids looking. By that time, of course, the worst possible things were going through my mind. I don’t usually panic easily, but this was awfully close — so many people were milling about, anyone could have snatched her and been a mile away already. The utter relief I felt when I saw Laura’s teacher coming up the sidewalk with Julia howling in her arms was indescribable. (She’d just wandered off on her own, apparently, all of the way to the corner. Didn’t want to tell me what she’d done, so I think she knew she’d worried us.)

— Laura then came down with some kind of bug, up half the night coughing, then throwing up the next day, possibly from coughing so hard. She lay on the couch literally all day, grey shadows under her eyes, watching "Barney" and "Sesame Street" listlessly.

— The house is a mess. It seems like the more housework I do, the more there is to do, which goes against all the laws of physics I’ve ever heard of.

But knitting, that’s what I was supposed to be talking about. The only good thing about Laura being sick is that since she wants me to sit with her most of the time, I’m getting an unexpected amount of knitting done. I am working on a Christmas project, so won’t reveal details, except that I am learning something new with it, Meg Swansen’s "jogless jog" solution to the problem of that little hiccup at color changes in the round (here’s a step-by-step description from Judy Gibson). This is a handy little trick, almost like magic. The first few times I tried it looked more than a little obvious, but it is settling in nicely. It seems to be inspired by the slip-stitch effect, which raises and stretches a single stitch to cover two rows, but here in the jogless jog does essentially the same thing without appearing to do so. The new color becomes the old color, and the old stitch disguises the new one. Ta-da!
Uncategorized

Show and Tell, um, Saturday

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5th November 2005

I was going to start doing the Show and Tell Friday project, which this week is about addictions, but this,

was as far as I got, then an hour later I found myself sitting on the floor with an empty teacup and dreaming about the photographs in Andrew Bush’s Bonnettstown: A House in Ireland….

I thought I’d borrow an idea from Suse of Pea Soup and do a little interactive blogging (i.e., please post a comment with your answer to today’s question). What is the last piece of knitting you worked on before putting it down to read knitting blogs?

I’ll start —

the glacially-progressing but always-satisfying Ostrich Plume blanket.
“Booking Through Thursday”, Books and Reading, Movies and Television

Booking Through Thursday: Books Into Movies

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3rd November 2005
The Booking Through Thursday question for this week are about books that have been made into movies.
1. When you think of books that have been made into movies, what one comes to mind first? Most obviously, for me, since it is relatively recent, is "The Lord of the Rings" cycle.
2. Did the movie really capture the feeling of the book? These three movies were pretty far from my mental images of the books, which were based, after umpteen years of rereadings, more on Tolkien’s own illustrations, and to be honest were a lot cleaner! I mean as in dirt, physical grubbiness. I had a few quibbles with the movie — for example, as impressed as I was with Viggo Mortensen as Aragorn, my mental image of the character was actually much more like Sean Bean — and I feel wistful about my own "version" of the story being replaced by Peter Jackson’s, but on the whole I enjoy the movies very much. (I think my main disappointment is the loss of all but one of Tolkien’s songs.)
3. What about other movies from books? Which movies do you feel really captured (or if you prefer, didn’t capture) the feeling of the books they were based on? I thought that the Kevin Sullivan production of "Anne of Green Gables" — one of my favorite books ever — was just about perfect. I remember being astonished at the scene where Marilla first takes Anne upstairs to her new bedroom, and it was exactly the way I had pictured the room to myself. I still can’t watch Disney’s "Mary Poppins" in comfort, even though I usually love Julie Andrews — the Disneyfied version is so utterly wrong, so twee and saccharine, and so different from the "real" Mary Poppins (how I wish that Jean Marsh could have been cast, with a more faithful screenplay…). I had never read any of Patrick O’Brian’s Aubrey/Maturin novels until after I saw "Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World" — after reading over half of the twenty-volume series, I am still very pleased and impressed with the movie, which despite compressing (and even inventing) a lot still captures the feeling and tone of the books very well. So there are three different ones: the "Anne" movie got the book right and was faithful, "Mary Poppins" just didn’t work (for me, obviously a bit of a minority), and "Master and Commander" while not sticking much to the book, still got it right.
About the Bluestocking

Joyous Knitting Meme

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1st November 2005

(The ever-delightful Joy tagged me for this meme. Play if you want, dear Reader, with no pressure!)

What is your all-time favorite yarn to knit with? I don’t know if I really have a favorite yet. One of the reasons for my starting a knitting blog was to try new things, new yarns and patterns and techniques and inspirations. That said, I really did enjoy my projects with Jaeger Extrafine Merino and Rowan Calmer, and suspect that Rowan Wool Cotton is not too far away in my future.

Your favorite needles? Wooden or bamboo, so far. Haven’t tried Addis yet. I like the sound the wooden ones make, a nostalgic little tick-tick. I had a wonderful pair of rosewood circulars a few years back, a beautiful reddish-golden-brown wood, so smooth and warm to the touch. Laura, who was about one then, was fascinating by my knitting and used to tug at it as the needles moved, and as she grabbed hold of the plastic center, one of the needles snapped in my hand. I tried gluing and sanding it, but of course it wouldn’t hold. I recently splurged on a replacement, but they’re just not as good this time, I don’t know why. Sorry, a little "Citizen Kane" moment there — "Rose-wood!"

The worst thing you’ve ever knit? I don’t even remember! I’ve had my share of howlers, to be sure — too-long sleeves, weird shaping, poor color or fiber choice. I usually just rip ’em out, or if I can’t bear to look at something, it goes into the donation box.

Your favorite knit pattern? I rarely knit the same thing twice, except for dishcloths, and I refuse to nominate a dishcloth as my favorite knitting pattern. I have especially fond memories of a few recent knits — Kate Gilbert’s Clapotis, and Nancy Bush’s Truly Tasha’s Shawl and Ene’s Scarf from Scarf Style.

Most valuable knitting technique? Possibly the humble Kitchener stitch, a.k.a. grafting.

Best knit book or magazine? I subscribed to Vogue Knitting for a long time, until I came to the conclusion that there were a lot more things I didn’t want to knit in it than things I did, so I switched to Interweave Knits, in the early part of the Melanie Falick years, and I like it a lot. A large percentage of my knitting books library is from the days when I had pots of money to spend on myself, so that I have a good collection of older Rowan/Kaffe Fassett books, Kim Hargreaves, etc. etc. and not many new ones. I still like almost all of the patterns in Marion Foale’s Classic Knitwear. Probably the one that I use the most is a reference book, Montse Stanley’s Knitter’s Handbook.

Your favorite knitalong? I don’t think I’ve done enough of these to justify an answer, as I’ve been happy with all of them. The Scarfstyle and Gathering of Lace-along ones are especially interesting due to the number of projects available and the unlimited time!

Your favorite knitblogs? I’ve just revised my posted list a bit to add a few, though I usually read a number of others via links from my links, as well. It’s so easy to get distracted, but I kind of like that, sort of like walking around at a party and chatting with old friends and meeting some new ones. I am so impressed that there is such a variety of knitbloggers out there — my own list includes people from all over the US (some natives, some not), from the UK, Canada, Scandinavia, Australia, and Hong Kong, female and male, some "classic" pattern-lovers, some adventurous, some very fast knitters with new projects every week, some plugging away until they have one wonderful thing to show.

Your favorite knitwear designer? This is a tough question. Like with clothes, knitwear designers often have a wide variety of designs, some that I would wear and some that I would not. I tend to like the simpler things, almost always the more "timeless" designs, and am hardly ever trendy. I think that Elizabeth Zimmermann fits this description (and often her daughter Meg Swansen, too), and the less-fussy Kim Hargreaves and Debbie Bliss designs too. I’ve also really enjoyed the two Nancy Bush things I’ve done. Kaffe Fassett is my wild card — judging by most of my projects, you wouldn’t think I’d be interested, but he blows my mind.

The knit item you wear the most? For old favorites and sheer durability, probably these,

a riff on the simplest Kaffe Fassett "Stripes" pattern in a double-knitted scarf, and

a variation on Martha Waterman’s Cat’s Paw Square Shawl from Traditional Knitted Lace Shawls, with only the Old Shale border.
Sweaters and Cardigans

Sunday Morning

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30th October 2005

David left for Hong Kong again this morning, so I find this photo especially bittersweet.

Two weeks at least, probably three. It doesn’t get any easier with practice, I must say.

I had a bit of a sniffle by myself while the girls were distracted with their Halloween party candy, then Laura asked me, "Why are you dressing all up in your Handsome Sweetie-Pie Vest?" I had to laugh. Should I call Meg Swansen and let her know the Ribwarmer has been renamed?

I find that the collar looks pretty good standing up, but even better folded down as a shawl collar.

And here in the always-risky over-the-shoulder-into-the-bathroom-mirror shot,

Note to self, more yoga, I can’t take a picture of my own back yet!
Miscellanea

Autumn Color

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30th October 2005

We don’t get much visual evidence of autumn around here, which makes me appreciate these gorgeous liquidambar trees even more — this one is across the street from Laura’s school.
Sweaters and Cardigans

Thoughts on the “Ribwarmer”

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28th October 2005

Finished the Ribwarmer this afternoon — a pleasant, fairly uncomplicated knit. The first side (front and back sides knitted in one piece) took me two days of unhurried knitting, so it would have been a lot quicker if this week hadn’t been busy with other things. I did graft the shoulder seams,

having already started knitting side two straight off of the provisional cast-on of side one, so essentially I worked it all in one piece. I think I’ll spot-block (is that a word?) the front edges, as they are rather poochy at the short rows! This is a one-size-fits-all pattern, designed I suspect for warmth rather than beauty, although the short row corners and overall design are clever and appealing. I love the way that the center back pieces meet at little curved corners at the bottom. I might wish that the shoulder was a bit shorter, so that it ended higher up on my own shoulder, but my choice of yarn was rather heavier than the original, so that might be part of the reason.

The Puppy wool is very nice, although it felts pretty quickly even as it’s being knitted. The colors are beautiful, the wool itself is pleasantly soft, and it comes in center-pull balls (so thoughtful).

A no-nonsense photograph, as we’re off to the Harvest Festival at school —