Slipping Along

Slipped stitches have always seemed a little bit magic to me. It's rather amazing how so many (and such varied) pattern stitches can be based on such a minimalist maneuver - slipping a stitch from the left needle to the right needle without doing anything else to it at all. I'm thinking about working up a tutorial on the basics and the possibilities. But before that can happen, I will need some swatches for examples, so I have started on the first.



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Monday was sock mending day. This picture demonstrates why I don't usually do a classic darn. Its not very pretty, though it will serve the purpose (cover and hold together the gaping hole under the heel). I'm not sure why I attempted it, except maybe to see if this time I could do it neatly. As it turns out, I could not.

This next pair, however, hadn't developed an actual hole. The yarn had worn so thin that I was afraid to put it through the wash, but it was still in place. So I was able to use Swiss Darning (aka Duplicate Stitch) for a very unobtrusive mend. The socks are semi-felted, somewhat matted and pilled from many washings, but (partly because of the felting) toasty, toasy warm. So I'm glad I can keep them going.




(BTW this is the Not Really Cable sock pattern, which you can have for yourself if you scroll down the sidebar to the "free stuff" section)

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And on a completely unrelated note: sometimes there are obstructions to making up the bed.



He will probably stay there, a contented lump, until the sun is well over the yardarm.

Wallpaper for Kmkat

She asked everyone to share, so here's mine.



What? You're not surprised?

I thought I was going to use that for yarn, but....

There is actually a book for sale titled "Never Too Old to Knit: Beautiful Basics for Baby Boomers." Well, get out of the way. There's going to be a stampede of Fifty-Something women trying to get their hands on if. "Oh thank God! You mean I'm not too doddering to learn a basic handcraft? At my age? Oh I have to get a copy right now!"

Who is doing the marketing on this one? I envision a twenty-something editor (beg the goddess not a woman) who thinks like this:
1) Hip young women buy knitting books 2) Baby Boomers are not hip young women 3) therefore Baby Boomers will not buy knitting books unless we put it right in the title that they really aren't too f*****g old. I won't even try to list the ways this logic and this title are wrong.

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Well, now that I've got that off my chest, I did a swatch with the grey alpaca for the Tiger scarf. It's lovely yarn, but the pattern didn't show off well. So I picked some yarn from the stash. This is an older version of Paton's Kroy, from back in the day when it had a full 85% wool and was a touch more loosely twisted than the current version.

The color on my monitor looks a bit dark. In real life it's a very pretty dark lavender or light bluish-purple heather.



I think I will take it with me to the Yarns Ewe-nited group tonight. It is not conversational knitting, but these women are mostly natural fiber handspinners and I just can't bring myself to show up with my acrylic garter stitch. Besides, once supper is over it's OK to work and not talk. The one's who aren't spinning tend to bring complicated knitting, too. They understand.

A good gift

The love of language is the love of truth, and this brings one into conflict with authority, since power employs deceit and is so fond if it--Rexroth said: "The accepted official version of most anything is most likely false...all authority is based on fraud."--but the love of language is a fundamental connection to our fellows and is the basis of true civility. -Garrison Keillor, Good Poems

This book was another favorite Christmas gift. For one thing, the introduction is one of the most sensible discussions of poetry I have read in a long time. For the other, it has a lot of good poems, and most of them are new to me. I would like to copy out many of them here. I also genuinely respect the concept of copyright. So go buy the book. Or check it out of the library.




When the weather is at zero, you can't beat the spot behind the basement door. But he's missing a lovely day.



view from back door - no kittie prints





The second half of "Tiger, Tiger" is almost complete. Then the grafting.... I've done plenty of sock toes, so I'm hoping it won't be a big deal (though the way this project has seemed to be jinxed, who knows). I still haven't decided whether to add an edging - think I'll block it before I make up my mind.

Yogurt

I meant to do that