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by Kelley on May 25, 2010
We are heading into the third week of renovation chaos in the office. Thankfully my office space is shaping up nicely and I’ve been able to be productive all day! What a nice change! The problem is that Xena is not at all comfortable with boxes in hallways, strange men walking around pushing big, heavy carts and people in new spaces! When she does find someone in a “normal” space, she demands attention. Kate offered some love and comfort. When all else fails, she jumps into her bag – the ultimate comfort! < |
Category Archives: Inspiration
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by Kelley on May 25, 2010
As modern knitters we are blessed with a potentially mind-boggling array of new methods for knitting. For centuries knitters used Double Pointed Needles (DPNs) for knitting small circumference items like sleeves, sweater necks, mittens, etc. But, with the advent of circular needles, knitting with two circular needles became another method. When Socks Soar on Circular Needles came out, we had quite the civil war in the building. I, for one, completely converted to knitting with two circulars. Then, Bev Galeskas wrote The Magic Loop and I embraced that method. I prefer to think of myself as an early adopter rather than fickle. Since then we (knitters) have seen dozens of new books focusing on using one, or all three methods to knit socks. Here is where the confusion begins. “How do I convert a pattern that is written for DPNs so that I can knit using the Magic Loop Method.” Or, “I much prefer knitting ... |
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by Knit Picks Staff on May 25, 2010
Hi Everyone! Have you all listened to parts 1 and 2 of Miss Eiderdown’s Stocking holiday story? When I listened to the story, I was inspired to knit a special Christmas stocking of my own. We released a Miss Eiderdown’s Stocking pattern, knit with Gloss HW, and I designed duplicate stitch charts so you can add a design after you finish your stocking. There are charts for a snowman, a snowflake, and an evergreen tree (with falling snow). Can you tell I was inspired by the snowy Christmas we had in the Pacific Northwest last year? It’s also easy to add your own design. Write your name across the top. Or find a neat Fair Isle or cross stitch chart and duplicate stitch that onto your design. Or add duplicate stitch to any of your existing knitted projects. Duplicate stitch is an easy was to add colorwork to your knitting without using stranded ... |
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by Alison on May 25, 2010
Ready for Part 2 of the holiday radio play Miss Eiderdown’s Stocking? Here are the links to the files – you can right click and select “Save Link As” in order to download each part. Part One (in case you missed it) Part Two (available now!) < |
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by Kelley on May 25, 2010
Actually it arrived on Monday but our office renovation has left me so exhausted at the end of the day that I couldn’t do anything other than read and rest every evening. This morning I not only woke up ready to bond with my new little friend but I was determined to learn how to “Navajo Ply on the Fly”! More about that later. Let’s start with the comfortable feeling that came back amazingly quickly! Remember that my “crushed” spindle was a Golding Aromatherapy Spindle. I loved it but I decided that I wanted to replace it with a Golding Celtic Sheep spindle. The same size and pretty much the same weight so I shouldn’t have any trouble starting back up with my sock yarn spinning. Love, love, love Golding Spindles!! And, I am so grateful to Abby Franquemont for my finally truly appreciating the joys of spindling. Look at me!! All ... |
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by Kelley on May 25, 2010
We are painting and re-carpeting one entire floor of our building. One section each weekend spread over a month. On top of that, we are moving departments around as well. That means that nothing will settle back down until the middle of January. What chaos! And then there is my “interesting” new office. Down near Marketing and Knit Picks. Lots of energy and enthusiasm! It was meant to be a conference room so I will need to pick out some furniture, etc. Then I saw this and couldn’t resist snapping a photo! Little knit creatures that aren’t quite “finished”. ... |
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by Stacey on May 25, 2010
I’ve been busy working on Christmas gifts – and those recipients, as much as I love them, tend to nose around my blog posts & flickr page so I haven’t been able to show off what I’ve done. But my youngest nephew is a December baby and when I saw ran across a certain pattern, I had to make it for him. That’s both of my nephews in the shot actually – birthday boy is 5, the other is 7. It’s a new adorable pattern – the Deep Blue Sea Shark Mittens. My nephew is obsessed with sharks – he loves to tell me all about them & what they eat – in fact, we had an enjoyable Thanksgiving, watching the Mythbuster’s shark episode together. They look so sad off of the hands though. I used Swish Bulky in Squirrel Heather for the body & a double ... |
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by Alison on May 25, 2010
We have a special treat for Knit Picks podcast listeners this week! The folks over at Boxer Press Audio have created a knitting-themed holiday radio play, and we’ve added it to the podcast feed. It’ll be in two parts, and Part One will go live today, with Part Two going live next Friday. The story is called Miss Eiderdown’s Stocking. Kelley’s really into listening to audio books while knitting, and we thought that you would all enjoy a little extra listening material while you’re finishing up all of your gift knitting. Here are the links to the files – you can right click and select “Save Link As” in order to download each part. Part One (available right now!) Part Two (available December 11th, 2009) We also have a free stocking pattern inspired by the Eiderdown story. It’s knit in Gloss HW, and Kate designed some cute duplicate stitch charts so you can embellish ... |
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by Kelley on May 25, 2010
I have been impatiently waiting for Abby’s book to come out and it is a treasure!! The life changing lesson I learned from Respect the Spindle is that spindling is even more portable than a small knitting project! I had often heard spindlers say that they, “spindle every day rather than spinning at a wheel once a month”. It seemed to make sense but I had never had anyone explain it as clearly as Abby. First, Abby has the most credibility of anyone I can imagine. As a child, she grew up in Peru. She explains that little girls in Peru take their spindles EVERYWHERE! It’s part of their social life and source of entertainment and competition. That’s why Abby is so comfortable having a spindle with her all of the time. I decided to embrace the spindle on our trip to Mexico. Abby points out that ... |
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by Knit Picks Staff on May 25, 2010
I am knitting an enormous wool blanket. It is almost halfway finished. I have no cold tolerance. I’m the one wearing a giant puffy coat when everyone else is wearing a light jacket. When I’m riding my bicycle in the cold, I’m completely covered with my coat and knitwear, except for my glasses peeking out between the cowl over my nose and my hat. So when I moved to the Pacific Northwest from southern California, I had a little trouble adjusting to winters here. I wanted to make a really warm wool blanket to keep on my bed in the winter. I was inspired by Jared Flood’s version of Elizabeth Zimmermann’s Knitted Garter Stitch Blanket in Sheepsdown, originally published in The Opinionated Knitter. My version is going to fit my queen size bed, so I cast on more stitches than what was used in the original pattern. I’m also knitting ... |
