Yarns in the Pipeline?

Best Quote I Heard All Day
"Start thinking outside the box"--one of my many corporate bosses

So, apropos to last week post, I have come to an epiphany about the so-called knitting world.

Are You a PC or Apple Knitter?
Therein lies the rub. Knitting, due to the enormous popularity of the craft, has become a corporate nightmare, as I see it. Once a craft that attracted people who were individualistic, since 1997, when the KnitList became the refuge of many KnitDweebs and knitting started to take off, knitting has become "big business" propelled by the yarn companies and magazines.

In other words, the knitting "world" is now the fucking craft paradigm, pardon the jargon.

Anyone who remembers when Knitter's Magazine still made a connection with its readers, when Interweave Knits was edited by people who understood the individualistic nature of the craft, when yarn company ads were less like an insurance company commercial and more like an ad in your local paper, remembers that knitting was and still can be a personal, expressive craft.

Yes, knitting has joined corporate America.  Hence the rise of the knitting celebs, along with ghastly knitting jargon. I never have, never will use the following:

• Knitterati
• Knitterly
• KIP
• SEX
• SABLE
• Tink
• Frog
• The word "ewe" in any form of idiotic pun

God help us all, there's even a book on knitting jargon--"The Secret Language of Knitters."
This is why I will always be an indie. Knitting does not define me. I define it for myself.

Tour de Fleece
As you know, if you're a Tontant Weader, groups and me don't generally equate, with the exception of my beloved skanks at Stix-n-Stitches, Sheila and I having been separated at birth, and my occasional appearance on Ravelry.

This year, because I have more fucking time on my hands than ever before, I've decided to join Team Peleton on Ravelry. Why not? I spin every day anyhoo. This week, though, I've been rushing to get the Black Bunny Fibers Bluefaced Leicester/silk of the Joy to free it up for TDF.

This was fun to spin, another entry in my project to spin various weights. I used two different colorways, both with that amazing yellow. Carol, I don't know how the fuck you got that yellow but I love it!

Now, I have some Chasing Rainbows bombyx silk top in the Pansies colorway that's been percolating in the fiber stash for several years. Laceweight is calling.

Got four ounces of this stuff that I'll attempt to spin during the three-week TDF period. For those of you who are interested, it starts on Saturday, July 3 and continues until the end of the Tour de France. Check out the group on Ravelry. I'll post my progress here as well as on Ravelry.

Shut Your Sockhole
Recently, I read in some knitting rag that you can't avoid holes in cuff-down heel gussets. Bullshit. I've got my own little tricks that make for a nice gusset join with no holes whatsoever.

This is the Punk Princess's teeny foot doing a preliminary modeling for one of my Fiberality Stoopid TV Knitting sock designs. She gets to keep all the socks, too. Liz is the only one in the family with small feet. The rest of us wimmens have humongous dogs.

I did take a shot of the gusset so that you can see WTF I'm talking about.

If you're interested, I'll write about how I do my gussets next week. Ah, fuck it, even if you aren't interested, I'll write about it. Holeless gussets are rare and handy, dontcha know.

Have a great 4th, skanks!

Noodling Wid Needles

Best Quote I Heard All Day
Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up.--Pablo Picasso

I don't see myself as an artist. However, I do see myself as childlike. I still love cartoons, still love "Alice in Wonderland" and "Through the Looking Glass", rock 'n' roll, and doofy, whimsical anything. (Yes, I'm hot to see Tim Burton's version of "Alice" on March 5.) 


I've been charting, knitting, fiddling with color and texture, and letting the childish shit that circulates in my bipolar brain go into my design notebook. I'm actually very orderly about taking notes and writing/editing directions as I go along. My experience as a tech writer and editor is enormously helpful when writing knitting directions.


Freebie for You Lovely Fools
I decided to test-drive one of my patterns by offering it for free here, by next week most likely. This is not an original design but plain vanilla heavy socks that I've made for family and friends using Jarbo Garn Raggi sock yarn.

 

I took advantage of our loathsome snow as a backdrop for the photo. I froze my ass off.

The pattern is sized for women and men. I may at some point do some kiddy sizing if the demand is there. In any case, you'll get something for nothing and get a look at Fiberality Design directions formatting. The reason I don't submit to magazines is this: I can add Designer Notes, do larger size charts, and add my sense of humor to an otherwise straitlaced pattern. Not to mention accuracy.

Stash Trash

Talk about being pissed off, though. In my stash, I had enough Jawoll to make the Nudge Nudge socks, the black and pink lace, which I've renamed Jezebel socks (yeah, I watched the movie last week and decided that Bette Davis would have worn the socks to the ball). I finished the prototype sock, wrote the directions, and then went to check the yardage online. SHIT. The shocking pink has been discontinued. FUCK.

So off I went to find some plain sock yarn. Guess what, kids. It's not easy to find. I finally went to KnitPicks and lo! They have plenty of colors, including shocking pink, in their Palette fingering weight yarn. The Stroll sock yarn didn't offer me enough selection, although I generally prefer a 70% wool/30% nylon blend for socks. Fuck it. I may submit these to the KnitPicks Independent Designer Partnership Program, although I'm more inclined to submit it to Patternfish.com.  Here's a not-so-wonderful picture of the unblocked sock.

  

Obviously, the photo for the published pattern will be much clearer and will be modeled. It's rather hard to see the diagonal lace pattern and the lace cuff doesn't show too well. Here's a lousy closeup.

 

It's sitting on its blocking bowl. Anyhoo, once I redo the design, you'll see better pictures.

 

Blogger Sucks

Well, they sent me an e-mail last week, informing me that they will no longer support FTP bloggers. What this means, to the uninformed, is that the 5% of us who use Blogger to publish to our own domain will have to migrate all our files over to Blogger.  No more www.knittingcurmudgeon.com by March 26th. So I'm waiting for them to send me migration directions.

In some respects, working directly on Blogger will make it easier for me. I won't need to do as much coding, I'll be able to use widgets, and I suppose there are more features available. I'll keep you posted. If nothing else, knittingcurmudgeon.com will have a redirection page for a long time.

New (and Old) Books Be Bountiful

I increased my library again by buying Selbuvotter, Biography of a Knitting Tradition, by Terri Shea. 

 

 

An unbelievable book! Not only is it extremely well written and interesting but the traditional designs are striking and challenging. Plus, Terri self-published this book and did a damned fine job, too. This is the kind of book that's worth adding to your library if you are a serious knitter. If you're not, there are plenty of dopey books out there. This is quality.

Besides the republication of She-Whose-Name-Cannot-Be-Mentioned's Book of Fair Isle Knitting, another must-have if you are into colorwork, I was so please to see Susanna Lewis's Knitting Lace republished too.

 

This is the original cover, as opposed to Book of Fair Isle Knitting, which has a new cover.

Back in the 80s, I worked with Susanna when I was the knitting editor of MacKnit, a glossy, over-the-top mag for machine knitters. Susanna was then working on the book, which is based on a Victorian lace sampler owned by the Brooklyn Museum. Susanna was and is an amazing technician, although she has been involved with Sasha dolls for a number of years, selling them and knitting for them, and no longer designs for knitting magazines. This is the only book she ever wrote about handknitting, but her handknitting designs were published early on in Knitter's.

Susanna and I did a machine knitting workshop together back in 1985, and she stayed with me for several days. She's a wonderful person, has a decent sense of humor, and inspired me to further my knitting education, although I no longer machine knit. I'm rather sorry we lost touch--I spoke to her about four years ago and she had moved from Brooklyn to a town in upstate New York, not terribly far up but in the country. I've been so fortunate to have met so many great knitting people. My greatest regret is not having met EZ or Meg. In any case, add this one to your library too. 

Maybe I'll make a point of calling her. I'd love to see her again.

Back on Ravelry

Now that I'm unemployed, I've had the time to revisit Ravelry. Working means sacrificing certain activities, and that was one of them. I had not visited the site since August 2008 and it's so improved. It will be good to check out the groups to which I belong and be able to connect with readers who are on my friend list. So glad that some of you have connected with me on FaceBook too.

Did You Know?

The German word for cellphone is Handy. Is that rare or what? Ich habe mein Handy immer dabei.

Redundancy Rules!

Best Quote I Heard All Day
Unemployment is capitalism's way of getting you to plant a garden. --Orson Scott Card

That's right, gang. I'm out of work. Well, out of a job but certainly never out of work.

Fiberality Designs
This is now my reality. Fiberality. I've been developing several designs over the past few months, figuring that I would design, write, and teach once I retired in a few years. Given the current economy, that may have come to fulmination.

My contract was not renewed. Ask me if I give a shit. Honestly, I wasn't terribly happy with the job--the people there weren't any I ever cared to bother with, other than very casually. Plus, the company never took full advantage of my skills, training and graphic design. Frankly, corporate America is what it is. A cesspool, mostly. Filled with gawd-awful jargon and poor English, combined with severely inflated egos.

Check this out.
This is a nifty ribbed slip-stitch pattern in Classic Elite Moorland that I've used in Jeremiah's Scarf and Hat set. And then there's Crayon Madness, a lace scarf and mitts set made from Mini Mochi. Today's design is Naughty Nudge Nudge socks, black ruffle and shocking pink lace. Next will be a reworking of Jerry's Aran sweater design, done in Louet Gems Merino. More to come. My brain is cooking.

I'm enjoying the directions writing too. Far more satisfying technical writing than what I had been doing. These won't be your mother's boring directions, I promise. I plan to publish my stuff on Patternfish, as well as selling it on my Fiberality web site, which I'm in the process of developing.

If you're not familiar with Patternfish, go have a look-see. It's an excellent place. More than 4,000 patterns, so you're bound to find something. And designers you know and love, like Veronique Avery, Beth Brown-Reinsel, my pals Kristin Nicholas and Carol Sulcoski, Candace Eisner Strick, and lots more. The search engine is outstanding.

Stix Sessions
Will be teaching at friend Sheila's yarn shop, Stix-n-Stitches. A finishing class, a knitting clinic, a beginner spindling class, to start. I'd love to teach some kids, too. When I was in the shop this past Saturday, I met two young girls, sisters, around 8 and 11, who attend a Waldorf school. The 8-year-old was walking and knitting away on her scarf. Amazing kid. She was zipping right through the garter stitch, using some pretty hand-dyed worsted weight. Her sister knits socks. Whoa.

Obligatory Knitting Shit
Well, I've sort of organized my workroom now that I'm completely out of PA, thank God. Just putting away 200+ knitting, spinning, and weaving books was a gigunda pain in the ass. I need to update LibraryThing because I have added considerably to the list.

Nice to see that She-Whose-Name-Cannot-Be-Spoken's Fair Isle book has been reprinted. Along with Sweaters from Camp and Ann Feitelson's The Art of Fair Isle Knitting, it's a must-have if you're interested in doing this.

It's sad that we'll never see the other books reprinted. My favorite, Stillwater, goes for $128 on eBay, Pacific Coast Highway for $199. In the Hebrides goes for $199 too.

Anyway, enough said. Time to get back to work. The most rare and handy thing I've ever found to do. And Happy New Year, by the way. I'll be posting a lot more, looks like.