Italia Filati

Filati is how you say yarn in Italian. I know this because in the last week I've been to yarn stores in Siene and Florence. (Woo-hoo!) Look for the full report with photos when I get back to the USA.

Yes, I did buy yarn, but not enough.

So How Am I Going to Do This?

I've decided to make fingerless mitts for my Minnesota nieces for Christmas. It seems that fingerless mitts are a hot fashion statement this year. I messaged the elder niece on Facebook and asked for current favorite colors: red and orange.

The mitts need to fill several requirements.
1. Warm for the Minnesota winter.
2. Machine washable - a biggie.
3. Bright and colorful - got a leg up on that with red and orange.
4. Unique, yet not in an Aunt Ethyl ruffled underwear sort of a way.
5. Relatively quick and easy to knit.

Numbers 1, 2, 3 and 5 can all be covered in one fell swoop. Superwash worsted weight wool, variegated for interest.

The red was pretty easy:
Cascade 220 Superwash Paints in colorway 9958 (such an evocative color name.)

I think a simple big cable down the back and we're cooking with gas. I can sound like Aunt Ethyl even if I'm trying to not knit like her.

But try to find a nice, bright, orange worsted.

Ha!

I finally ended up deciding to combine two yarns, Cascade 220 Superwash Sport colorway 822, two 136 yard skeins, and Knit One Crochet Too Crock o' Dye sock yarn in #250, variegated oranges, one 416 yard skein; held together to knit doubled.

One thing I really prefer to do when knitting pairs is knit both pieces simultaneously on one circular needle. That way they're pretty sure to come out the same.

Geeze, I thought, ain't this gunna be fun, knitting with two skeins of orange sport yarn and one skein of variegated sock yarn, pulled from both ends. The possibilities for tangles would be endless.

Fortunately, in my case, laziness is the mother of invention, and when I realized I was going to have to ball all three skeins anyway, I decided to try to pair up my strands early on.

The Cascade and Knit One Crochet Too skeins were almost identical in circumference once I got them unwrapped, so I placed the sock yarn on my swift first, then stacked the first sport skein on top, making sure that both would unwind in the same direction and start at about the same place.

Know what? It worked! I now have two skeins of doubled yarn all ready to knit with.

Let's hope that my offerings, unlike Aunt Ethyl's ruffled undergarments, are kid-cool enough not to end up living out their lives in the back of a dresser drawer. That's requirement item number 4, by the way. The one I still have to make sure I cover.

What I Did on My Vacation

I didn't go to Disneyland. I didn't go to Hawaii. I went to the cabin in Idaho and spent a good bit of time there knitting. And knit on the eight+ hour drives each way too.

I finally finished the bunny slippers! Yay! Hurray!

Their story is: He's a country bunny, come to the city to visit, and she's a city bun who's no better than she should be. Let's hope he doesn't lose his tail. (Wink, wink, nudge, nudge.)

For a good friend who's undergoing chemotherapy, I knit two hats. The russet colored one is knit of Elsebeth Lavold Cool Wool, 50% wool, 50% cotton. Very nice. Soft. It's intended to be worn purl side out, so it's smooth on her sensitive scalp, as a sleeping cap. Since socks knit with the smooth stockinet side in on the sole are called "princess sole", I named this hat the "Princess in Disguise Bed Cap."

The other one is just for fun, knit from Crystal Palace Splash, 100% polyester. I call it the "Ditzy Blonde Cap."

And, just to keep things even (heads and toes, don't yah know), I knit a pair of bed socks out of Patons Shetland Chunky Tweeds, 75% acrylic, 25% wool, machine wash & dry - I know the habits of the person who's getting these, they've gotta be indestructible.

I thought I was selecting an elegant pattern. It looked elegant in the sock book. Of course, when knit with chunky brown yarn instead of delicate, pale saffron, sock yarn... What can I say? Something was lacking in the translation. The "lace" looks like Tootsie Rolls appliqued to the socks. So I decided to call them the Tootsie Roll Sweet Dreams Bed Socks.

Does that make it sound like the end result was on purpose? (I hope.)

P.S. Yes, I do name all of my projects. I want them to feel important.

Choices, Choices

I'm headed off to Idaho in the morning - way, way too early in the morning. The trip does involve long stretches of sitting in the car, however, so I'm trying to decide what knitting projects to take with me.

Hmmm...

Chemo cap? Bed sox? Lace?

I'd better hurry as the Engineer has decided we need to leave at 4:00 a.m.

Is it any wonder that one of his many nicknames is, "my Insane Travel Agent"?

Back in nine days.

Sophisticated Circular Needle Storage

My friend, GuiGirl, who has taken up knitting, asked me how I store my circular needles. I said I'd send her a picture. I'm sure she's expecting something very elegant.

Here it is GuiGirl.

Yep. you guessed right in one. It's a gallon zip lock bag. If I could be bothered to take the time, I would write the size and length of each needle that I generally keep in my fancy storage container on it with a Sharpie, but instead I use a tape measurer and one of those little ruler thingies with holes in it to measure the circs when I need to select one.

Hey, I never claimed I was efficient.

Then I got extravagant and ordered a complete set of Knit Picks Options Harmony Wood interchangeable needles. I love 'em! They're just right for me most of the time; smoother than bamboo, but not so slippery as Addi Turbos.

The Knit Picks set came in a plastic case with the needles elasticed to a card and the cables in little cellophane envelopes that fit into a plastic wallet. There are sleeves on both sides inside the plastic case for the needle tips.

Not being a huge fan of plastic (other than zip lock bags), I bought a fabric needle case at Tuesday Morning for $2.99 on clearance, mostly because I like the blue print fabric. I numbered the needle sleeves in Sharpie and tucked the needles into them. Now I don't have to measure them every time. That's nice. I fold the fabric case in half because just the tips are a whole lot shorter than 14 inch needles. If I ever get around to it, I think I will put a couple of elastic bands with Velcro fasteners in the unused top half, lable them with the length of the cables and clip the cables into the same case.

When I get around to it.



As an added benefit, the last little needle sleeve works well to hold the Knit Picks tightening key.

So that's my system.

Except for the needles that I have scattered other places around the house.

Darned if I know where some of them are.

The Big Tink - Step by Step

#1. Knit over to where the mistake is and put a stitch holder on your needle so you don't lose good stitches as you work on your repair.

#2. Drop the necessary stitches.
I dropped one full 12 stitch repeat to make sure I didn't make any mistakes following my pattern. Do this one or two stitches at a time - carefully is the byword here.

Since this is lace, I made sure to drop back to a purl row, that way I knew I had the right number of stitches and they were all the same. Dropping back to a knit row would have meant coping with yarn overs and knit togethers - why do that if you don't have to? The green locking stitch marker neatly holds the strands I've unravelled. It keeps the strands from tangling and me from using the wrong strand to knit with.

#3. Place the dropped stitches on a dpn one by one as you unravel them.
I've read that you should put the dropped stitches on a dpn that's a size or two smaller than the original needle. I don't agree with this as it boogers up my tension, so I use the same size. It makes it a little tougher to do the last couple of stitches in the group, but I think it looks better in the end. If you have trouble picking up the stitches with the working size needle, use a smaller one, then transfer them.

#4. Put a stitch holder on the needle you haven't gotten to yet so those stitches are secure as well.
The only loose stitches should be the ones you've dropped on purpose. (Since I was knitting this on a circular needle, I just pulled the two sides of the needle through so the stitches were on the cable instead of the needle - I'm kinda lazy.)

#5. Knit.
Carefully select the correct strand of yarn by seeing which is closest to the dpn your stitches are on. Take that one strand out of the locking stitch marker and using another dpn knit it as per your pattern. I use my pinky to control the tension until there is too little yarn to grip, then I pinch it between index finger and thumb.


#6. Purl.
I purl back to try to keep my technique as similar to the original knitting as possible. Purling back is also a good idea because your tension might be different at the beginning of a row where you have more yarn to work with than at the end of the row when the yarn is tight. Working both ways will help even this out a bit. If you hate purling, it is possible to knit the purl rows too by not turning your work and always starting at the right hand side since the work in on dpn's.

#7. Tah-dah!
When you have completed all of your reknitting, just take the stitch holder off your right hand needle, knit the stitches off the dpn, then move on to the left needle.

Your repair probably won't look identical to your original knitting, but massage it a bit both while it's dry and when it's blocking, and nobody besides yourself will ever be able to tell. (Unless, of course, you point it out to another knitter, who will say, "Oh, yeah, I see," but be impressed nonetheless.)

The Big Tink

I'm knitting on a deadline. You know what that means... Big Time Screw-ups. I was eight rows past the boo-boo before I realized I'd made it.

Evil Language!

The pattern has a twelve stitch repeat, so I dropped the whole repeat that I'd slaughtered down eight rows and stuck the stitches on a dpn. I'm going to wait until it's light tomorrow to try to reknit so I can photograph and blog the joyous experience.

Cross fingers for me.