Knitting Lace to Unlock the Brain

Sometimes I think I'm weird.

When I'm stressed, and hurting, and cranky as all get out, I knit lace. Yes, doing a garter stitch scarf would be easier, and doing rows and rows of stockinette would leave less room for error, but lace is what it takes to put me back at piece with the world.

Knitting lace gives me time to think, and time to not think. There's something about reading a chart, and looking at the controlled chaos that makes me think, "OK. I can do this. You knit, and yarnover, and knit-two-together, and slip slip knit, and it all works out right in the end." And then the next row, there's nothing but purling (save for the three knit stitches to make the border on each edge).

It's soothing. It makes sense. And it gives me control when it feels like the world is taking all control away from me. If I can knit lace, I can survive. 

This is what I made the last time I was hurting, and needed lace to rebuild. I had started it before the very painful end of a relationship, and used it to help me through those next few weeks. Doing lace helped me think about what I was losing, what had happened to that relationship, and how pain could create such a beautiful, beautiful work of art.  

When I started using this shawl to work through Life, this is what I posted on Facebook:

Lace is a funny thing. It's hard sometimes, and sometimes it takes some work. And sometimes you want to rip it out, throw it on the ground and stomp on it. But when you're done, it's really quite beautiful.

What I am working on now will not be the Thing for February. Instead, I'm knitting it as a gift for a friend who is getting married soon. When I finished the Healing Shawl, she liked it, but wanted a bigger one. So she bought the pink yarn, and I'm knitting it.

Unlike the last lace shawl, this one is not being knit to help me heal through a time of grief. Instead, it's going to help me realize that although life can be hard, and it may be hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel, that the light is there. if faith is believing in things when common sense tells you not to, and hope is the bit of common sense that helps you see your faith through... then lace is the conduit to help you make that journey to feeling whole again.

And life, like knitting lace, is just a series of knots and smooth passages, and a pattern that in the end leads to one beautiful work of art.

Lady in... atom red?

The zipper color calls it "atom red", and I'm not necessarily inclined to disagree.

I knew the fabric was red, obviously, when I bought it. What I didn't remember, however, was it being quite that shade of red. Or being that shiny.

So there we have it. February's sewing Thing. The OMG Atom Red thing. Which I guess is appropriate for a girl who is fascinated/obsessed with Cold War propaganda, and sort of thinks that nuclear war and epidemics would be cool on a bizarre crisis communications level.

February's Thing is Simplicity 2550. Not only is it sewing from stash materials for the fabric, but the pattern has also been in the stash for a while.

I bought it on a craft weekend two years ago, and to be honest, now I'm not sure what I was thinking at the time. I don't even particularly like Simplicity patterns anymore, mostly because the patterns aren't easy to follow, the layout for fabric isn't the greatest, and because it isn't lined. And on this one in particular, I'm not quite pleased that it didn't say on the outside of the envelope that Bodice B was cut on the bias. I wouldn't have picked this fabric to go with the pattern if I had known that, although I'm fortunate that it still works with the fabric.

It's an easy enough project to sew. I was able to cut it out and sew most of it within an evening/night, and it seems to fit well. I've got the zipper pinned in, so now just need to baste and sew that, and then hem the dress and the sleeves. I don't know that I'll get it done tonight, or this upcoming weekend, but next weekend for sure. (This upcoming weekend is craft weekend, but I'd rather take knitting and cross stitching as projects!)

But it's just so... well, atom red. It sort of reminds me of a show choir dress, and that's not quite what I was thinking of when I started sewing it. I know I liked the fabric when I bought it, or else I wouldn't have bought it, but it's so bright.

Which brings us to the problem here. I had bought the dress pattern and the fabric to wear for a work dress. But now, because it's so RED and it's so shiny, I'm just not sure. And I don't quite work in an environment where we do bright colors. Most of my wardrobe is black, grey, blue, and deeper colors -- and the brighter colors in pinks and purples only come out during the summer. Wearing a bright red dress for everyday wear just strikes me as bizarre.

Can I still get away with wearing it in a corporate environment? What accessories could be paired with it to tone it down a bit?

No, I never talk about knitting.

Someone on Ravelry linked to this, and um, well. Yeah. Totally impossible to relate to. Really.

I'd never talk about knitting. Or say any of these things. Ever. Really.

What's up with socks?

I'm not quite sure what it is about socks that makes them seem magical to the uninitiated. Or, rather, what makes the knitter of socks seems magical and talented to those who don't knit socks.

Over the past weekend, when I was in Washington, I worked fairly diligently on a sock. I cast on on the bus on the way to DC, and by the time I got to Frederick, Maryland, had half of a cuff done. By the time I'd gotten to DC, I had enough of a tube done that while it could be mistaken for many things, it wasn't unthinkable for it to be considered a sock.

A sock is really great for this kind of trip, especially when one is single and is spending time in restaurants and places where you need to do something while waiting for food or other people, but you don't want to read.

What surprised me about the sock this time, though, is the amount of attention it attracted from other people. A hostess at the restaurant where I had brunch Sunday morning looked over as I was knitting, and asked if I was knitting or crocheting. Her mother crocheted, she said, and she'd wanted to learn how to knit, and wondered if I could show her. I happily obliged, and she commented that I must be really good at it "since you're doing fancy stuff like socks."

I was awfully pleased with myself after getting that compliment, but shrugged it off mostly, figuring that the young woman didn't knit, and thus thought that anything beyond a simple garter stitch scarf would be fancy.

What intrigued me more was the bus trip back to Pittsburgh. Unlike the trip to DC, this bus was packed, and I had to share a seat the entire time. The young woman next to me was likewise interested in the sock; she was a knitter, and had gotten stuck on her first sweater and hadn't done anything in a while because she got frustrated that it took so long.

The woman also was intrigued because she had heard of people doing Magic Loop, but had never tried it or seen it done. Soon enough, though, she went back to studying, and I went back to the sock.

When we got to Pittsburgh, she very innocently asked if I had finished the sock. I laughed, and explained that no, I hadn't, but I was at the point of working on the heel flap, and hoped to turn the heel soon. She shook her head, and said that they took so much work, and after all of that, she couldn't imagine actually wearing a handknit sock because of all the time that went into them.

True to my word, though, I did finish the heel flap, and turned the heel Tuesday night.

Now it's actually resembling a sock:



It looks like a sock! Really!


So what is it about socks? Aside from picking up the stitches on the heel and gusset, I find it easier than most projects because there's relatively little shaping, and it's predominantly knit stitch the whole time. Not all that much different from a garter stitch scarf, except for that whole circular knitting thing.

Why do nonknitters find them so magical?

Pro Tip: Don't Knit Angry

You would have thought I'd learned my lesson by now.

When in doubt, and I'm angry about something, I should put down the knitting needles and walk away. Or sit and play Bejeweled. Or sit and do something that doesn't require attention and precision, and all of the other things that tend to fly out the window when you're ticked off.

Friday afternoon, I was angry. I was irked. I was irritated. And I wanted to knit a sock. I really should have stopped myself there.

I'd started said sock Thursday night, in preparation for my trip to DC on Saturday and Sunday. I'd make some decent progress. Only four rows, but enough that I could see there was progress being made, and, most importantly, the round was not twisted.

Note the use of the word "was".

Somehow, within five minutes of picking up the sock to knit on Friday during my lunch break, I'd managed to twist it. I still don't quite know how it happened. I noticed that the cables were knotted when I picked up the sock, and I decided that to unknot them, I needed to flip them. I think that's when I somehow turned it, and knit into the finished side instead.

Go ahead. Laugh. I'd be laughing if it hadn't happened to me.

The only solution was to rip it out. I guess I could have tinked back, and undone what I'd done, but honestly, I wasn't sure how, and I thought it would be more frustrating to do that.

I guess this was better than what I'd done the last time I'd knit angry.

After a "discussion" with my ex-boyfriend (still the boyfriend, at the time), he went out for a run and I picked up my knitting -- a baby blanket. I was so flustered and frustrated over the discussion and not knowing what to think or feel besides HURT, that I just picked it up and started knitting.

I didn't stop to think about what I was doing, or that maybe knitting a detailed pattern wasn't the greatest idea at the time. So instead, I picked it up, started at the row I thought I had left off on, and started knitting. Turned out I was two rows off. And didn't realize it until I had knit for five rows. On a fairly large baby blanket.

30 minutes of angry knitting led to three hours of slowily unknitting.

Someday I will learn.

Finally Finishing the Blueberry Pie Socks. Maybe.

My goal for this weekend is to turn this

Into this

I have suffered from a bad case of Second Sock Syndrome on this project. I started these socks Sept. 17, according to my Ravelry project page. I think – although I can’t recall clearly – that I finished the first sock within one or two weeks.

And then it proceeded to sit in my car. And sit. And sit some more.

I don’t have a good explanation for why these have not gotten finished, and why I haven’t started the second one.

But I’ll have a lot of knitting time on my hands this weekend, and I need a project that’s small enough to stuff in a purse and take with me. I can’t guarantee that the socks will get done, but I’m hoping that I’ll be able to get enough done to have a burst of motivation to finally finish the pair. (The first one fits beautifully, for what it's worth.)

I don’t want this to be the knitted Thing for February, though. I also have a sweater that’s been sitting around in various states of completion since Nov. 8. I’ve got one sleeve done, one sleeve left to go, and then a collar to do. I’d really like the sweater to be the knitted Thing.

Accountability Time: January Stash Purchases

One of the goals in starting to craft down the stash was that I’d spend less money on fabric and yarn, and thus save money, and be able to buy a house in 18 months.

insert nervous laughter here

Even though you can tell the girl to not buy yarn or fabric, but that doesn’t always happen. There are sales, and there are OMG MUST HAVE buys, and there are pretties and shinies that one thinks might be a good treat at the yarn shop at the end of a long, long day.

But, not buying more fabric or yarn without using it is the goal for 2012, and thus I must at least attempt to be good. I figure if I put the cold hard truth up here, it’ll at least be staring me in the face.

January totals: $39

$8	Buttons at Joann
$31	Fabric, a pattern, a zipper, and lining fabric at Joann

 

All in all, I’m not sure how I feel about this. On one hand, I could have made do with the buttons that I’d initially bought for the dress. But I didn’t particularly like those buttons, and I wasn’t convinced that they really worked with the fabric I was using (I’d already attempted this dress once in a plain grey wool jersey, and it was a massive fail). But I could have been better about not going for the buttons that were $2 each.

Oops.

And then there was the fabric, pattern, zipper, and lining. I don’t quite call that an oops, because it was a good deal.

So I’ll start February fresh. Goal for this month: under $20. I know I’ll need a zipper for the dress I want to sew for this month, and I’m hoping to snag that Vogue pattern when it goes on sale on Friday, but I’m really hoping there’s nothing beyond this.

I know that’ll mean I can’t hit up my favorite bead shop in Dupont Circle this month, or go to a yarn shop when I head to New York later in the month, but it’ll be worth it. In 18 months, I’ll have a house with a real craft room, and hopefully less stash to move when I move.