Jon's Knit Blog

November 15, Here I Come!

So there are two good things about November 15. First off, it will only be two days before my birthday! And second of all, that's the release date of the new Knit.1. And I have it from a very reliable source that my blog will be mentioned! So how cool is that?

Although today is an exciting day here at Jon's Knit Blog, too. Why? Well, I do expect that we will have our 50,000th hit today! And that's pretty darn exciting. Can you imagine, 50,000 times that someone looked at your website? Wow!

In other news, I've been working my ass off out here in San Francisco. I've been having fun, but barely knitting at all. I've been reading a couple patterns in the Dale book I bought last week with Rachael at Imagiknits. But I haven't had the time to actually break out the wool. What a shame, no?

I did finally make the time to upload a few photos to my camera, though!

Rachael and Kira pretend that ArtFibers is Zauberflote's home...

Zauberflote goes out to lunch (a picture taken by Rachael, no less!)

And that's it. There's a photo of Rachael going nuts for the Sale Yarn at Artfibers but for some strange reason, my camera chose that moment to not be friends with its autofocus feature, so that's one that will remain in the depths of digital purgatory for now.

Anyhow, work is at "crunch time" and there's a good chance I won't be able to blog again any time soon. So here's wishing you a fun Halloween, and extra points to anyone who knit their kid a Halloween costume.

This Postman Doesn't Ring At All

So I've been getting all your kind comments. You're too nice, I must say! And I'm so glad to hear that you love Zauberflote. Just wait til you see some of the other stuff we've got in the works for you here at Jon's Knit Blog.

The sad news, though, is that I have been having trouble with outgoing mail, so replying to your comments has been rather tough.

I wanted to address one in particular right now, though. Jess asked if a steek would be worthwhile in a single color piece and if the stripes will show on the finished product for Zauberflote.

The second part is easier to answer. In a word, no. The steeks, after being cut and trimmed, will be folded over and cross-stitched in place. After the button band and sleeve stitches get picked up, the steeks seem to actually want to go into place like that. And since you pick up the stitches for the sleeves and the bands on the "edge" stitch of the steek, which is always worked in the darker color, this is very much not a glaring point on the finished product.

As to whether a steek would be worthwhile on a solid color project, the answer that it depends. On what, you ask? Well, first and foremost on the kind of yarn you are using. Shetland wool is very sticky, so the steek basically keeps itself intact. Dale yarns are not as sticky and must sewn before they're even cut in order to not fall apart. Some really smooth yarns wouldn't do well at all with a steek. And yarn weight is a factor, too. With a heavier weight yarn, a steek could get especially bulky: remember that you'll essentially have, over a short portion of the sweater, a double layer.

I hope that makes sense, and I hope that any other stranding knitters will feel free to share their experience in the comments, too.

A Haiku

So I met one of the coolest knitbloggers in all the land on Saturday. We laughed. We drank. I bought Dale and she bought some Malabrigo. We also bought lots of other things that we shall not talk about until we have time to get our cameras hooked up to our computers.

I will tell you, though, that we co-wrote a haiku. About a towel.

Dessicating cloth
Hanging on the brass lamppost
Keeps me feeling dry.

At least, I think that was the last line. Stay tuned for photos!

The Other Problem

So... Um... my room has no TV. And the radio doesn't work well. It gets three stations, one of which is NPR that I'm not in the mood for, and one of which is Polka. And the other doesn't have a good conncetion. So I'm trying the web-based radio stuff, but the station I found is one that plays "Boring" classical music. But I'm too lazy to go and find a "good" one.

At least I know I get to go to Artfibers on Saturday! Stay tuned for photos!

Oh, and by the way: Today started at 7:00am. It's 10:30pm and I'm still not done. I took a dinner break for about two hours but I have more work to do. Yay. No, really. Yay.

The Problem

The only problem with being in San Francisco (aside from the 11 hour work days and the fact that my hotel room doesn't have TV, but don't ask about that) is that I didn't get to go to Rhinebeck.

Wah! But I get to go to Artfibers soon. Hooray!

The Only Bridge That's A Real Gone Bridge

Makes you think about Judy Garland singing, no? (And don't forget that the trolleys cable cars go "Clang Clang Clang" too!)

That's the view from the top floor or the roof of the building where I'm working. Sorry I am not sure which view it is. They're both, clearly, very high up.

And here's another view from the same height:

Makes you think vertigo-y thoughts, no? Well, that's not nearly as bad as this little cantilevered balcony I tried to walk out onto this afternoon. My mild agoraphobia really got the best of me. I just could not walk out onto that balcony. Good thing I wasn't trying to pose a sock for the photos out there, as I can assure you that it would have leapt out of my hands to certain doom.

Anyhow, SF is keeping me very busy so far. I will confess that I've knit two rows on Zauberflote (while watching the "Sports Night" DVDs I brought with me), and I also walked by Artfibers. After they had closed for the evening. That was sad, except for my wallet, and for the space in my luggage for when I go home.

Trippin'

Well, I wound up six balls of yarn so that I have some yarn to knit while I'm in San Francisco the next few weeks. I'm not sure how much time I'll have to knit, but I want to make sure that I have yarn to knit when I do. And, of course, I haven't had time to figure out what a good "travel" project to take with me. So Die Zauberflote is goin' in the suitcase.

All 63 rows of her.

So if we're lucky, I'll have a lot more to show when I get back to New York. And I expect that we'll be even luckier, and we'll get to see photos of her growing in San Fran. Maybe even a photo with a SF knit blogger friend...

Stay tuned, who knows what will happen when Jon's Knit Blog goes West Coast!

Not a Complete Waste of Blogospheredom

I finished row five of the second repeat! I also finished a draft of a training manual, a supplies list, and I survived a weekend with too many relatives in town.

So hopefully I will have enough time for regular blogging for much of this coming week; as for now, though, I think it's bedtime.

Thanks to that anonymous camera commenter, wherever he or she is... this photo came out quite nicely, at least in terms of focus and color, don't you think?

Sorry Charlie

I'm slammed with work right now. If I'm not physically there, I have a "homework" project relating to my upcoming trip to SF. (Hi, Rachael!).

And my parents just got into town and will be here until Sunday.

So if I do have any spare time the next few days, you can bet that I'll be sitting on the sofa knitting rather than sitting in the computer chair blogging. Don't hate me, ok?

Honestly

Do you know how hard it is to blog when you can't find your cellphone but you know it's withing 5 feet of you?

A Note (La! La!) on the Comments

Sorry, I'm just not in the mood to hyperlink. If you want links, go to the comments and see there...

Anyhow, Laura wants to try Fair Isle knitting, and she thought that maybe a 8" afghan square would be a good first project to try.

And Helen suggested that a scarf made from squares would be a good idea.

I beg to differ. And this being my blog, I can!

I'm going to side with Margaret, whose first FI project, like mine, was a hat.

Here's why a hat is a better FI project than a afghan square. It's round. Fair Isle, and all stranded knitting, is easier to knit in the round, because you're always going to be knitting, and you're always going to be carrying your un-used strand along the back. If you start to purl, you have to carry everything along the front of the knitting, and having two strands of yarn, one not in use, between you and the knitting, gets to be a pain. Although the worst part is when you have to knit stranded garter stitch or ribbing in the flat, because then you have to bring your unused yarn from the front to the back, and you have to switch it at every color change. And if you're going to knit it right, you have to make sure that that you move them around in a consistent fashion.

So I recommend a hat.

(Laura and I have been emailing but I thought the rest of you might be interested in our chats. I specifically advised her that I personally like the "King Harald Hat" from Ann Feitelson's Fair Isle book. I'm actually planning to knit it again. I bought extra yarn from the *>'s to have to do this with...)

In general, the most important comment I can give you about stranded knitting is, you cannot strand and knit tightly. The best judge of if your tension is doing ok is how your stitches move across the needle. Pull the work across (on the part you've most recently been knitting - the left side of the needle in your right hand) and let the stitches "relax" as much as they can on the needle. You're looking for absolutely even spacing between the stitches - particularly between the stitches with color changes. If you've pulled tight, you're going to have puckering. If you've not pulled enough, your sweater may gap, or you may have really loose strands across the back which can get caught on stuff. Any other stranded knitting devotees care to contribute their $0.02 worth?

The other advice I gave Laura, which I'd give to any knitter who is new to stranded knitting: DO NOT try to change the colors called for in the pattern. Fair Isle is about color balance as much as it is about the geometry of the pattern. If you choose random new colors, you run a risk of making something UGLY. Knit a few things in the patterns as called for. They're finite elements; the designers know what they're doing and they know this will look good (assuming you choose a good designer.) They've tested lots of color combos and chosen ones that look work. (Note that if you're doing a Norwegian (Dale-type) pattern, which is stranded knitting but not fair isle though there is a relationship... you run a lesser risk if you avoid this rule, they use color in a very different way there.)

And to the person who commented anonymously about the photo information, thank you. Although I thought it rather odd that you commented anonymously. I would have loved to send you a personal thank you email. Oh well! I'll be trying that out soon.

And to all a good night (and a happy Sunday tomorrow, too!) And thanks to everyone for commenting! I love hearing from you.