Sock it to ‘em

A few weeks ago, I mused on whether or not I could wear leggings and Mary Jane shoes with handknitted socks without ending up looking slightly mad, and everyone here assured me that it would be perfectly fine, particularly if I was meeting knitters. Given that the weather remains a bit on the chilly side for shoes and bare feet and I have really had more than enough of boots and that I was off to the Purlescence open day where I would be surrounded by knitters I decided to give it a try.

Shawl – Brandywine
Cardigan – Cinnamon Girl
Top – Uniqlo
Skirt – Next
Leggings – M&S
Socks – Vellamo
Shoes – Greenshoes

I think it worked, and I’m particularly pleased with the way the Fair Isle bands on the feet of the socks just show above the tops of the shoes.

The Purlescence open day was good too, and I managed to get the three small skeins of Voluptuous I wanted to go with my two large ones for a Chickadee. It was lucky that I had arranged to go with a friend, though, as that meant that when I got in my car (which I think I last drove in early March) and it didn’t start* we could change plans so she came and picked me up rather than vice versa as we’d planned and I still got to go!

*A flat battery is always a possibility when I don’t use my car at all in the week and only do so occasionally at the weekends, and I suspect the fact that for a lot of the last couple of months leaving the house at weekends at all was more than I was capable of hasn’t really helped matters.

Fair Isle weekend

I haven’t had a chance to do any sewing this weekend, as I’ve spent most of the two days at a Fair Isle workshop run by Susan Crawford at Darn It and Stitch. I’d signed up like a shot when this was announced, as I’ve been wanting to improve my Fair Isle skills and having taken a finishing class with Susan a few years ago I knew that she was a really good teacher and I was likely to get a lot out of the workshop.

I certainly wasn’t disappointed. Inevitably, there was a wide range of skill levels between the nine of us who’d signed up; some people were completely unfamiliar with working in the round, and while there was another continental knitter there I was the only person already familiar with both continental and English-style knitting, which gave me an advantage when it came to working two-handed. (Talking to the others there, I have come to the conclusion that I’m just an experimental sort of a knitter; some people are happy to find a way of doing things and stick to it, whereas my reaction to hearing about a different method is to think that I’ll give that a try, in case it turns out to be better than the one I was using. Which is how I started off as a standard English-style knitter and am currently a continental combination knitter.)

We spent the first day talking about how to hold the yarn, casting on and working a flat swatch (which I found interesting, as I’m not sure I would have dared to attempt colourwork with purl rows before!) and then choosing main and peerie patterns and working out colour selections for the larger sample we were working on today. (I took the opportunity to use up some of my sock yarn leftovers!)

At 11am today I had a little bit of ribbing; by 4pm I’d knitted this much:

The course also covered steeking, although there wasn’t quite time for everyone to try it (I haven’t steeked mine yet, as I want to finish the second repeat of my peerie pattern and make it symmetrical first) so Susan demonstrated on one person’s swatch:

I suspect I won’t get round to steeking my sample until next weekend, but I think I’ll be able to remember until I get to put it into practice!

I really enjoyed having the chance to play with colours. I love colour, and someone actually told me last week that I was the most colourful person they knew, but Fair Isle is colourful even by my standards, and I was a bit worried that my combination of yellowy-orange, bright blue, bright pink and pale pink would end up looking like an explosion in a paint factory, even with a dark grey to tone it down. I needn’t have worried, I really liked the way it looks!

Now I really want to try a proper Fair Isle project, though I don’t know what and I really do have enough things on the needles for now!

Yesterday’s news

I didn’t post yesterday, because I went to London again. This time it was for work (I was attending a conference on tax) although I also managed to fit in coffee with one friend at Paddington before she started work and I headed on to the conference, lunch with another friend who works in the same building the conference was held in, and a trip to Loop and Ray Stitch afterwards where I met up with two more friends and had a chat with a third who was working in Loop. It ended up feeling like a bit of a holiday, but it was also a rather long day (I left the house at 6am and didn’t get home until after 9pm) and even though I had managed to nip outside and take a photo of my outfit at quarter to six in the morning I really didn’t feel like posting when I got home.

I had spent quite a while planning out what I was going to wear. It was a work thing, so I wanted to look smart, but it was also London, so needed to be comfortable. And as I was meeting knitters there obviously had to be something handknitted in there. (Someone did helpfully point out on Twitter that she thought ‘smart, comfy and includes handknits’ pretty much described all my work outfits, but this had to be more so on every count.) Also, the forecast suggested that it was going to be warm and I didn’t want to end up sweltering or having to negotiate packed Tubes carrying armfuls of discarded layers.

Obviously, in the end I just went for the three-quarter-sleeves, opaque tights and shawl formula that’s been working so well for me lately.

Shawl – Citron
Dress – Mary Portas
Tights – M&S
Shoes – Arche

I am now considerably closer to feeling that these shoes really were worth the money, because they stood up wonderfully to a day in London. My feet were sore by the end of the day, but that was only to be expected after a day that involved a lot of standing and walking; the shoes didn’t rub, didn’t fall off and felt soft and cushioned and comfortable, but unlike most of the other shoes I have that I might choose to wear to London they also looked smart and professional and not clumpy and more casual. Now as long as they don’t end up wearing out ridiculously quickly I think I may have found my perfect brand of shoes, price or no price!

What I wore to London in the end

I did try shoes over socks and leggings, but wasn’t keen on how it looked. The main problem was really that the only shoes I have that fit over handknitted socks are red, and the socks I wore today are the same bright pink as my skirt, and really didn’t work with the shoes. And I couldn’t be bothered to try to find a pair of socks that worked with the shoes and the skirt, so I wore boots instead. It wasn’t really that warm, though it was gloriously sunny, so that was fine; ankle boots might have been better but as there are only about two weeks of every year when ankle boots are a better option than either knee-high boots or shoes I don’t own any.

Shawl – Juliana
Shawl pin – Purlescence
Top – Dorothy Perkins
Skirt – made from a Clothkits kit
Leggings – eBay
Boots – Duo

Anyway, I had a lovely day out and got lots of knitting done – I have now finished the lace section of my Bigger On The Inside shawl and am on the final pattern repeat of the foot of the second Betula sock. And we went to Liberty where I got to stroke the fabric and dream of the day when I’m good enough at sewing to feel able to try to make something out of fabric that costs £22 a metre…

Glove love

I finished the red Podster Gloves I started last weekend on Friday. Gloves really are amazingly quick to knit!

I took the opportunity to tweak a few things I wasn’t so happy with in my stripy pair. I made the thumbs longer because the thumb flap on the stripy pair gapes a bit when the thumbs are closed, and knitted the ribbing for the mitten flap flat before picking up stitches for the other side; I sewed the sides of the ribbing down at the end so the flap comes a bit further down over my palm and because the ribbing folds over when the flaps are back they stay in place better. I also did plain stocking stitch for the fingers as I thought the ribbing looked a bit sloppy on the stripy pair.

This weekend was the annual gathering of the Yarn Yard Ravelry group in York. This year, rather than having a swap with named partners, anyone who wanted to join in was asked to bring a handmade gift and a label with their name on, and names were matched to parcels at random. Somehow this worked out perfectly; everyone I spoke to seemed to have ended up with a present that was absolutely perfect for them. I’d sewed a drawstring project bag, which I completely failed to take any pictures of before wrapping it up, and I was a little worried because the lining and drawstrings were very pink, but it ended up going to a person who really likes pink. And in return I found myself the delighted owner of the purple sparkly Glasgow School Mitts I’d been admiring on Roobeedoo‘s blog.

(The colour is better in the picture on her blog.)

The weekend also involved the traditional p/hop swap (where I got rid of a large bag of yarn I was never going to knit, and returned with two large pieces of fabric), cake, giant naans, and lots of laughter and chatting and knitting and catching up with old and new friends. Oh, and quite a lot of weather, too: after a fairly clear drive up on Friday, this was the view from our hotel room window yesterday morning:

And this was the view this morning, which was something of a relief given the prospect of the drive home:

Ramblings about knitting

I’m back at work today after a lovely weekend at the Glasgow School of Yarn. I completely failed to take any pictures but Antje has put loads up on Facebook (you don’t need a Facebook account to view them).

I managed to keep my spending fairly restrained and mostly resisted the urge to buy random skeins of sock and lace yarn just because they were beautiful (I love beautiful yarn, but I do have rather a lot).

Two skeins of Skein Queen Voluptuous (DK weight, 200g skeins so probably enough for a jumper), some Ripples Crafts 4-ply silk (because that was just too beautiful to resist), some hot chocolate onna stick, a mug (which is now adorning my desk in the office) and three balls of Jamieson and Smith to knit a fair isle Kindle cover, because I did a Fair Isle workshop with the lovely Liz Lovick which has inspired me with the confidence that I can tackle a colourwork project.

I’ve also got quite a lot of knitting done over the last couple of weeks, including knitting almost the whole of a pair of Podster Gloves over the weekend. Pictures will have to wait until this coming weekend, though, as it’s already got to the time of year when I’m not home in daylight during the week.

After I’d finished the gloves on the train home yesterday I tried to cast on for an Ishbel as the next in my A-Z of shawls. I’ve been meaning to knit an Ishbel since the pattern came out in January 2009; it was what inspired me to start knitting shawls in the first place. I bought a skein of yarn in mother-of-pearl colours from Skein Queen at a launch event for Ysolda’s second Whimsical Little Knits collection in November 2009 which has been earmarked for Ishbel ever since then. And yet, when I finally got round to casting on, I just wasn’t feeling the love; I went wrong within ten rows, and then when I tried a second time I went wrong almost straight away. And I’m honestly not sure I want another small triangular shawl with a stocking stitch centre and lace edging; these days I like shawls that I can wear as wraps with my work dresses, or more casual scarf-shawls in interesting shapes, textures and colour combinations. I fear that Ishbel’s time has passed without my realising it, and I in the A to Z may well end up being Isaura; I’m finding myself strangely drawn to the idea of using some tangerine-coloured BFL/silk laceweight from The Yarn Yard for it. And meanwhile, I have cast on some emergency socks (toe-up, vanilla, using the leftover yarn from the Podsters with contrast heels and toes to make the main yarn go further).

Hypernova’s day out

Today Hypernova and I went to London to meet up with some other knitters at Lord’s.

Shawl – Hypernova
Tunic – Monsoon
T-shirt – Gap
Jeans – M&S
Boots – Duo

Unfortunately the weather ruled out the MCC Ladies’ end-of-season friendly game which we’d gathered to see Judy playing in, so after spending an hour or so knitting in the bar at the Cricket Academy we decamped to the cafe at the V&A and spent a pleasant afternoon there. All in all, a lovely way to spend a Sunday, and it was nice to have a chance to wear Hypernova in appreciative company! I also discovered that it’s not actually that difficult to get a coat over it, and got a chance to make sure that my new Duo boots (replacements for the broken-zipped Timberlands) are both comfortable enough to wear all day and waterproof enough to handle the fifteen-minute walk from the station to the bus stop in heavy rain (you’d think this would go without saying, but I’ve had more than one pair of boots this wasn’t true for in my time!).

Fibre East

Having seethed quietly with jealousy at the blog posts and tweets about Wonderwool and Woolfest (neither of which is really feasible for me without at least an overnight stay) earlier this year, I was determined not to miss Fibre East, given that it’s only about 60 miles from me. So yesterday morning I set off, despite the rain and warnings of dire conditions on the roads (I was very pleased to hear that the A45 was closed due to flooding near Northampton just before setting out, as I had been planning on going that way but went via Milton Keynes instead), taking Laura and Irene from the Archers Listeners group on Ravelry along with me. We arrived at about midday and although the site was quite muddy a good time was had by all. (On the subject of mud, I had planned to wear hiking boots, but chucked my wellies in the car as well, and was jolly glad I had done as just walking to the top of the car park was enough to convince me to go back and change into them – in places there were ankle-deep puddles so it was nice not to have to worry!)

I’m terrible at blogging about events, because I never remember to take pictures, but there were three large marquees full of stalls, as well as a catering tent doing a roaring trade in bacon butties, tea, coffee, jacket potatoes, cake and more, some smaller tents with sellers of looms and spinning wheels, sheep-shearing demonstrations and places to sit and chat, try out spinning and help to stuff cushions for Woolsack. It all seemed very well-organised; the squelchiness underfoot was unfortunate but generally didn’t seem to be dampening spirits, and obviously the weather was somewhat outside the organisers’ control!

For me, the best thing about knitting shows is the chance to socialise and catch up with people I normally only manage to interact with on Ravelry or Twitter, and yesterday was no exception; I saw Jane running the p/hop stall, Sarah and Anna, Joy, Debbie and Heather all had stalls, and there were plenty of other friends wandering around, including several other members of the Archers Listeners group. We had failed to arrange a time and place to meet, but we had at least agreed to make badges that would allow us to recognise each other:

It was also particularly nice to catch up with Sarah Abroad, who I talk to on Twitter a lot but had only ever met in person once before, at the Bothered Owl Christmas party the year before last.

It’s funny; I’m definitely very much an introvert, but I love knitting events and bounce around waving at people and introducing myself to people I’ve only met online with cheerful abandon, while Laura, who I always think of as being far more of a social person than I am, often says she feels shy and nervous of approaching people. I suppose the thing is that while spending time with people (even lovely people, and while I don’t buy into the ‘knitters are all lovely!’ meme – knitters are people, just like others, and some are lovely and some aren’t – I do know lots of lovely knitters and there’s a lot to be said for the pleasure of interacting with people who you have a major passion in common with rather than people you struggle to find anything to talk about) is definitely something that takes energy from me rather than renewing it (yesterday was fantastic, but did leave me feeling pretty drained), ‘introverted’ isn’t thre same thing as ‘shy’ and while I used to be terribly shy it’s one of the childhood difficulties that shaped who I am but has ended up leaving me in adult life. And I rather like having my chance to be bouncy and Tiggerish and feel like I’m surrounded by friends

Of course, even though socialising in the main point, I did make some purchases (though I actually managed not to spend all the money I had with me, because I was trying very hard not to come home with even more random skeins of sockweight and laceweight yarn that were really quite similar to all the other random skeins of sockweight and laceweight yarn in my craft room):

From left to right, a kit to make Anna‘s Greenwitch gloves (because not only are both the gloves and the Yarnscape yarn beautiful, I absolutely adore Susan Cooper’s Dark Is Rising sequence which inspired the pattern), a skein of Skein Queen Delectable (merino/silk laceweight), because the colourway was just too lovely to resist, some Artisan Yarns linen laceweight because I want to see how it will knit up (it feels a bit like very fine, staggeringly expensive string, but I’m assured it softens up with washing and handling!) and a skein of sock yarn from Boo’s Attic, just because I loved the colours.

I thought it was a great day out, and am definitely hoping to go again next year!

A day out with my knitting

Theatre trip

I struggled slightly to come up with an answer last week when people at work asked me what I was doing at the weekend. “Well, I’m going to London to meet some knitters from the internet who are also fans of The Archers and go and see the chap who played Nigel Pargeter in a play” is the kind of thing that is almost guaranteed to get you funny looks from people who have never seen the attraction of the goings-on in Ambridge and think people off the internet are liable to be a bit weird, even if not necessarily axe-murderers.

However, that’s exactly what I did do yesterday. After Nigel Pargeter’s untimely demise (falling from the roof of his stately home while trying to remove a banner), someone pointed out that the actor who played him, Graham Seed, was appearing in a revival of Emlyn Williams’ 1950 play Accolade and suggested we should all go. In the end seven of us (plus one husband) made it down to London yesterday and met for a pub lunch before going on to the theatre:

The play was at the Finborough Theatre, a tiny place above the Finborough Wine Cafe; I wasn’t surprised that the whole run had sold out when I realised that the theatre only had a seating capacity of about 60. The play is set in the central character’s study and it did feel rather as though we were sitting at the edge of the room eavesdropping.

Accolade is the story of a writer, Will Trenting, who writes acclaimed novels of low life which, at the start of the play, have just won him a knighthood. However, Will’s outwardly respectable appearance hides the fact that much of his work is drawn from real life; with the full knowledge and consent of his wife he maintains a bedsit in Rotherhithe and occasionally spends weekends there hosting ‘dirty parties’ – orgies, more or less. It transpires that at the last of these parties he had sex with someone who he took to be a woman in her early twenties, but who was in fact a girl of fourteen; he is visited by a man claiming to be the girl’s father (although there is no proof of this), a failed writer who bears a grudge against Trenting for a harsh dismissal of an unsolicited manuscript some years earlier, who first tries to blackmail him and then reports the incident to the police. The play ends with Trenting released on bail after being charged with having sex with a minor, the adulation of the crowd turned to hatred.

It struck me that this may be the first time I’ve gone to see a play without knowing the plot in advance (we go to the theatre quite a lot, but it’s usually Shakespeare); at any rate I was pleasantly surprised to find that what I had thought might be rather a harrowing story of a man losing everything as a result of his indiscretions was actually a rather sweet and uplifting story about a man facing adversity with the support of his loyal and loving family and friends. The acting was superb; I found myself completely caught up in the story. I’m not at all surprised the production has received glowing reviews.

Afterwards we ambushed Graham Seed in the bar and presented him with a card to thank him for his years as Nigel; I think we were all a bit star-struck and didn’t say nearly enough about how much we’d enjoyed the play. He was very nice and dealt admirably with being ambushed by a group of women who told him they were knitters from the internet who used to listen to the Archers, and he even consented to having his photo taken with us.

After which we thought we should make ourselves scarce and headed back to the Tube. It was a lovely day out!
(Photos in this post courtesy of Knitdaisies, aka Daisydaisydaisy on Ravelry.)