I’ll be gone for the next two weeks but Myria will be keeping things up for me here on the blog-front.  She will write the two Wednesday “And Now For Something Completely Different posts and I will leave two tutorial posts for her to post on Fridays.

I will resume bloging on March 29th.  Since I won’t be here, I will wish everyone a Happy Spring now!

This is a simple trick that produces a neat and attractive finish on a selvedge edge.  All you have to do is slip the first stitch of every row purl-wise and knit the last stitch of every row.

That’s it!

Hold your yarn to the front of the work.

Take the right needle under the yarn and insert it into the first stitch on the left needle as though you were going to purl that stitch.  Slip the stitch to the right needle without working it.

If the row is a knit row, bring the yarn to the back of the work and proceed to knit as usual.  If the row is a purl row, simply leave the yarn at the front of the work and purl away.  Remember - even on a purl row, the last stitch must be knitted in order for the chain to come out right.

This is nice on scarves and stoles.  Some feel that it makes picking up stitches easier.  I haven’t tried seaming a chained selvedge so I’m not sure how well that would work.  I’ll find out though since I worked the edges of the Kimono sweater this way :)

Have a great weekend!

My Wolves

One Sunday afternoon, about 15 years ago, I visited a shop whose products were aimed at various alternative religious beliefs - mainly Wicca, Pagan and Native American.  I saw many lovely pieces of artwork there, but the one that made the biggest impression was of a young brave.  It was winter and he was alone.  Snow covered the ground and the rocks and his small fire, though bright, was obviously doing little to provide warmth.  He leaped through the smoke above the blaze and it was a wolf that emerged on the other side.

Driving home, I was thinking about this image when my skin began to prickle.  I could feel my bones beginning to shift, my skin thickening and beginning to grow fur, my fingers shrinking into pads to fit the paws my hands were turning into.  Even my vision was changing.  Though I wasn’t afraid, I did wonder how I was going to keep control of the car if this went much further…

...and then it stopped.  Everything went back to normal and I drove home with no further incident - just another Sunday driver out enjoying the sun and mild weather.

Wolves are fascinating creatures.  They are tremendous survivors, devoted mates (most wolves mate for life), intelligent, playful and affectionate as well as cunning and occasionally ferocious in defense of self or family.  However, they fight only as a last resort, usually depending on posture and eye contact for dominance.  Contrary to popular belief they are rather shy and not inclined to be particularly aggressive.

In the western world, wolves are popularly represented as evil - creatures of Satan.  This stems from western European lore and mythology and goes back as far as the ancient Greeks, Romulus and Remus not withstanding.

In the Native American mythos, wolves are perceived differently.  While their cunning and strength is acknowledged, wolves are also credited with the ability to teach and to find pathways.  They are symbolic of loyalty and community as well as intelligence and independence.  Japanese folklore also treats the wolf kindly, seeing it as protective and benign.

All over the world, wolves have been hunted almost to extinction.  In the US, conservation and breeding programs have had some success in growing wolf populations but other parts of the world have not been so fortunate.  The Honshu and Ezo wolves of Japan have been believed to be extinct since the early part of the 20th century and Great Britain’s wolves have been gone for over 400 years.

The more I read and learned about wolves, the more I realized that I had been mis-informed.  These animals were nothing like what I had picked up from my culture.  Certainly they were carnivores and predators, but many animals that we don’t consider “bad” are.  Wolves were not evil and certainly not Satanic (to no one’s surprise, I’ve also developed a fondness for bats :).  They do not run around, jaws snapping and fangs dripping blood, seeking to run down and destroy what is innocent and good.

The Red Wolf , native to the American southeast, is making something of a comeback.  In the 1970s, the remnant of the population were captured for a breeding program to try and forestall extinction.  Only a few of the wolves met the required standards, but the effort was successful - to a certain extent.  While some have been released into the wild, their numbers are still very low and I’m not sure there’s enough of a gene pool left to insure healthy survival.

The Gray Wolf is in relatively good shape - at least in the US.  Hunted to near extinction by the 1930s, it is finally beginning to approach stable population numbers. It’s status has been changed from “endangered” to “threatened” and some feel that it’s beginning to be a problem again.  There are minor variations of the Gray all over the world and this animal had, at one time, the widest distribution of any mammal except for humans.  The Mexican Gray, like the Red, went through a capture and breeding process and is beginning to re-establish itself in the southwest.

There is one other wolf - the Ethiopian or Abyssinian wolf which, until recently, was thought to be a type of jackal.  DNA research proved it to be a wolf and, sadly, it is also critically endangered.

That Sunday afternoon was my introduction to Wolf.  I knew little about wolves at the time, hadn’t studied them - had never even seen one.  I wasn’t tired, ill or psychologically impaired and I have never been given to that type of imaginative flight.  I don’t know how or why it happened.

I do know that the following years were more productive for me than any point before in my life.  I grew and changed and learned.  Perhaps all it was, was my tired psyche cluing me in that things were going to change around here!  LOL!  That’s it - it was all a coincidence.

ACK!

After getting used to the rising temperatures and seeing some of the spring flowers beginning to rise out of the earth - what have I gotten out of bed to the last two days?

SNOW!  It was snowing yesterday morning and again this morning!

Not much, to be fair, and the temps aren’t plummeting, but still…  One of the things I find most annoying about winter is having to clean my car off.  Oh well…  I guess it can’t go on for too much longer :)

I’m almost finished with the stole, but am not quite there yet so I won’t bore you with another picture of it.

Instead, I’ll bore you with another squirrel picture :)

We get such a boot out of our animals - both the ones indoors and the ones outdoors!

I’m trying to think about what to do after the stole and the sweater are finished.  Completing the fuzzy winter set is a possibility, I guess.  My leanings are towards a shawl - but counter to that is that I don’t want to start another big project right away.  Maybe work out the sock thing?  That might be useful.  Ryan over at Mossy Cottage is working on felted clogs and they look awesome!  I maybe could try that too.  Slippers would be nice!  As usual, lots of ideas are buzzing and swilrling around in my head, but nothing is settling in.  Maybe, if I can put enough pennies together, I’ll pick up Folk Bags as there are several things in it that I like.

Or maybe I’ll just fart around on my own for a while :)  It isn’t always useful (though sometimes it is) to see what you can pull out of your own head - but it’s always fun!

I went through my UFOs this morning and you know what?  There weren’t nearly as many as I thought there were.  There is only one small item (though there are a few large items), the blue and scarlet fuzzy scarf (Yikes! I’ve got to finish this by Thursday!!) which is still in the car as that’s my KIP piece right now.  The fingerless mitts have gone the way of the frog pond.  I discovered a mistake quite a lot of rows back and got this hopelessly snarled when I tried to rip

.  I’m sure you’ve all noticed that I frequently have more ideas than patience :)  Chances are there won’t be another mitt project this winter because things are warming up here and the cold fingers that inspired the project are (I hope) a thing of the past for this season.  Likewise the fuzzy hat, scarf and gloves I wanted to make for myself.  Actually, that project does stand a chance as I really would like that set and I can put it away for next winter - at which point I will probably want to try the fingerless mitts again too :)

I started this long before I even had the yarn for the Kimono and it was kinda based on the same idea.  I had thought that since I had all this green yarn (a failed afghan project for Dad - he loves green) I might as well play with it.  It’s lain on the shelf under the coffee table for months now and I’m still not sure what to do with it.  I doubt very much that I want to continue with this piece, but when I think about frogging it…well…somehow it doesn’t seem right.  I guess it will go back on the shelf to age some more until I can figure out what this yarn actually wants to be!

This is still definitely a go but has languished in its bag for a while now while the Kimono, various small gift-type projects, and the stole took precedence.  I love the yarn and I love what this somewhat shapeless piece of knitting is becoming - no chance of it being frogged.  It probably won’t get a lot of work for a while because it’s getting heavy and warm to work on.  As spring begins to shake out its skirts in New England, the poncho becomes a less attractive project to work on.  But the weather won’t always be warm and I would like to have this done so that I can actually wear it next fall.

Yes, I’m sitting here feeling embarrassed and guilty for getting so bored with this project.  It’s coming with me on my next trip and I hope to finish it up then.  I am looking forward to having this sweater to wear, but I don’t think I’ll be tackling anything else like it for quite some time.  Easy - yes!  Nice yarn - Indeed!  Cool finished project - Indubitably!  Interesting to work - Bleah….  However, I’m determined to finish this thing even if it means I have to give up reading before bed and use this as a sedative instead :)

This should be done in the next couple of days - maybe even by tonight if my arm holds out.  I want this for the trip (I’m leaving next Monday) and am sufficiently motivated to make sure that it gets finished in time.  I may have to block it on the ship (wouldn’t that be interesting!) but by God the knitting will be complete!

I’m heading out next week for another cruise with my father - a simple trans-Atlantic crossing from Florida to Portugal.  This will be the last trip for quite a while (my decision).  I have loved the opportunity to travel and experience life on board a luxury ship but, basically, I’m a homebody.  I enjoy the food and the wine on the ships, not to mention the entertainment.  But I miss Myria dreadfully.  I miss our cats.  I miss you folks and the blogging.  And no matter how perfect things are on vacation, I can’t seem to relax effectively anywhere but home.  So I’m looking forward to this; it’s a new line to me and it will be interesting to see how it compares to the other ships I’ve been on.  But I’m also looking forward to it being over.  This will be the third cruise since last September (at my Dad’s encouragement and request) and that’s enough.

More than enough :)

I am going to set up tutorial posts for the two Fridays that I’ll be gone and Myria will post on Wednesdays for the “And Now For Something Completely Different” entries. 

Happy Monday everyone!

I know a lot of people think bobbles are kinda frou-frouy.  They take up a fair amount of yarn and they’re a pain in the butt besides.  But, judiciously placed, bobbles can add real textural interest (as in an Aran sweater) and they can be easy and fun as well.

This is my favorite technique for the little fellas. *

When you get to the stitch were you want to place the bobble, do a double-increase.  Here, a [K1, YO, K1] all in one stitch is used.  This bobble is just three stitches wide but you can use as many YO, K1s as you like to make as big a bobble as you want.

Turn work and purl these three stitches.  Knitting backwards is a real time-saver here, but turning and purling works just fine :)  Then turn the work back to the front side.  Insert the right needle from front to back into the second stitch on the left needle.  Lift it up and over the first stich and let it drop off.  Do the same with the next stitch back on the left needle.  You have one stitch left.  Knit into the back of this stitch.

When you’re working back along the wrong side row, you can also purl the bobble stitch through the back.  It isn’t absolutely necessary but there are a couple of reasons to consider it.  First, it virtually guarantees that your bobble will never “drift” to the back of the material.  The double twist (from knitting the bobble through the back on the front and then purling it through the back on the back) also serves to give the bobble a bit more height and definition.

This is an adaptable technique.  The demo was made over three stitches, but you can use as many sitches as you like or can handle.  You can also work more rows to increase the vertical size of the bobble.

The top row are 3-stitch bobbles, worked over two rows.  The second row are 5-stitch bobbles - also worked over two rows.  Notice they have a slightly flatted appearance.  Another couple of rows here would have rounded the shape more.  The bottom bobble was done over seven stitches and 5 rows, but, as an experiment, I did a 3-stitch bobble in the center of it.

So I guess this one is more like a booble :) 

Experiment - play with the number of stitches and rows and see what you come up with!

Have a nice weekend, everyone!

*Note: I re-wrote this somewhat over the weekend as the original post seemed murky to me.  I want this to be helpful, not confusing!

We’re better than halfway home here and this stole is more and more appealing to me as I go along.  The finished piece will be about 19” wide and around 66” long.

I hadn’t thought I would like bobbles; I’m just not a bobble kind of gal - but these are different.  Unless you’re very close to the stole, they’re difficult to see.  It’s a perceptional shift - pick up the garment and you can certainly feel them :)  But from any distance at all, they disappear.  Very cool!

It occurs to me that small bobbles could be used to incorporate a simple Braille message into a piece of work - “I love you”, “Be warm” or “Nana went to England and all I got was this bumpy scarf”...

Happy Thursday, all!