rant, rave & squaredance: needles

wacky, or just whack?

Fri, 29 Aug 2003 20:44:28 GMT

Sally Melville's The Knitting Experience: Book 2: The Purl Stitch, which hasn't even been published yet, is ranked 284 at Amazon.com. Think about that--it's pretty amazing. I was impressed that Folk Bags was at 4,316--not in the five digits, after all, and also not yet released. Umm, purling is just knitting backwards, or am I missing something here? I hate purling, personally.

finally some progress

Mon, 18 Aug 2003 05:21:19 GMT

I finished gypsy's sleeves tonight--all that's left is blocking and sewing, which I may wait on since I think I want to knit smooch before the summer's over, and there's plenty of weather-time left for wearing gypsy, plus I'm still working on phil(dar) and the mod coat. I never have this much stuff going at once--never!

I'm thinking a blocking board might be a nice thing to have, to replace my usual folded towels on the floor. This would make a good birthday gift, or perhaps a gift for someone if she gets into one of the top two library science schools in the country. (Hint, sweetie...) Of course, the latter one is a big if, but the birthday will probably happen. I'm not counting my chickens. I never count my chickens--they keep hopping around and it's hard to tell them apart. (Well, I guess that would be after they've hatched, which mixes up the saying, but whatever. I'm obviously metaphorically troubled these days.)

I'm still a needle jockey

Wed, 13 Aug 2003 21:10:10 GMT

Betwixt and between my trials with the IO and the ULP, and studying for the GRE (would they hurry up with my scores so I can send in my application, already?), I have managed to relax with some yarn and some books. The book update will have to wait, but here's the yarnage.

the new new yoga

Sat, 26 Jul 2003 20:55:49 GMT

The other day I read (in that bastion of fact, Self magazine) that beading is the new knitting--which, as you may recall, was the new yoga. So now beading is the new yoga. But I was a beader before I was a knitter, and I've been doing yoga all along, and I can tell ya one thing: the equivalencies are gettin' pretty dicey, here.

mad mod and flashy gypsies

Sat, 19 Jul 2003 20:20:29 GMT

The Mod coat has been a thorn in my side ever since I started it. Once I finally figured out the problem with the pattern, I'd be zooming along and realize that, hey!, I picked up/dropped a stitch here, so ribbit ribbit...thing is, I never managed to find out where the slippage came from, and the pattern never got messed up. I've finally made up all the stuff I'd frogged, plus a little--nothing like running in place for a couple of weeks--so late, late Weds. night, even though it was really just *too* late, I cast on the cardigan fronts for gypsy. Now I'm just zooming along on gypsy; I'd like to finish the fronts in a week, which I think is doable, then back to Mod for a week, then gypsy's sleeves and making her up.

I guess I won't finish Mod by the end of the summer, as I'd planned. Alas: the best-laid plans & all. I've never had as many problem with a project as I've had with this one, so I guess it's just my time. Plus, there's the Phildar summer top knit-along, whenever Alison decides to kick that off, and that'll set me back even more. But that sweater will be awfully useful in the sultry fall around here...

There is something going on that's going to keep me from spending as much time on my knitting for a little while, but I can't tell you yet...

what happened was...

Sun, 06 Jul 2003 18:50:25 GMT

That's the name of a movie, too, but more to the point, let me say that gauge wasn't the problem, and I feel stoopid for thinking it could be. Really stupid. Because that doesn't even make any sense. The real culprit: either a poorly-written pattern, or I can't read. Since I've always done pretty well on those verbal ability tests, I think it's the pattern. (Plus, sometimes there are things that can be read two ways, and you can read one of these things over and over and it's still the same to you, and then one time, boom!, you read it again and it reads differently. But maybe no-one else ever has this experience. The phenomenon is similar to that picture of a vase that is also a picture of two people in profile, if you look at the "negative space." Anyway, that's what I'm sayin'.)

I went down two needle sizes, and no luck. So I looked at the back of the next issue of Interweave to see if I could find anything in the "Oops!" section, and no dice. I decided to try swatching again, instead of knitting across the whole piece, which was taking to long (duh), and when I did the first two rows I realized I hadn't offset them correctly. Bingo! That was the problem: the pattern rows weren't lined up correctly, so they were making a vague pattern (which is why I thought it had to do with gauge), but not the right one.

This is how the instructions are written:

Work 1 (2,2,3,3,2) st(s) in St st, beg with Row 1 (of the pattern), work center 96 (101, 106, 111, 116, 126) sts according to diagonal pattern, work remaining 1 (1,2,2,3,1) st(s) in St st. Work through 4 rows of diagonal pattern 5 times.

What I read was "Work the extra stitches on the beginning and end of Row 1, work the other rows as written," because I figured that maybe the offset worked out to be the same, and the pattern notes said that, if you don't have enough sts left at the end of a row for a complete pattern repeat, just knit in St st. I guess I am just plagued by my own stupidity.

This is how I would've written it:

For pattern rows 1 & 3, work 1(etc...) st(s) in St st, work center 96 (etc...) st(s) in diagonal pattern, work remaining 1 (etc...) st(s) in St st. Purl all stitches in pattern rows 2 & 4. Work through four rows of diagonal pattern five times.

Alternatively, they could've been very annoyingly specific: Instructions for R1, for R2, for R3, for R4, repeat five times.

Frankly, I don't want to be forced to work very, very hard to read patterns.

All the while I was figuring this out, I was watching the Planet of the Apes marathon on AMC. Now that I have seen all five (who knew there were so many--I thought there were only four), I suppose I can die a fulfilled woman. Later, I was told I sounded like a Planet of the Apes geek when I said this about Bill Frist: "Someone should send him to the Planet of the Apes to be dissected by Zira, see how he likes it." After all, the man gives a whole new meaning to "curiosity killed the cat." What gall, to adopt animals from the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to animals, and then to take them home and torture them. This is why potential applicants get screened these days, I suppose. And yes, I did sound like a geek, but after watching four movies in less than 24 hours (I've seen the first one before), what d'you expect?

The best thing about the last three offerings in the Apes series is: no Charlton Heston. There's only so much I can take of that man parading around in a loincloth, and that's not much at all. Roddy McDowall, however, is in all of them--he plays his Cornelius, and then he plays Cornelius's son, Caesar. Recycling!

take time to save time

Sat, 05 Jul 2003 18:17:13 GMT

By making a swatch, as they always say on the Classic Elite patterns. My ass! My Mod coat is not going well. The pattern of the stitches isn't coming out at all, which is very mysterious to me. So I went down a needle size; still no luck. I'm going to go down one more size, see how that works. Normally, I'm a very loose knitter, but I was going through a kind of tight phase, I think, when I did the initial swatches for this project. And swatch I did: three of them. And I've ripped out the beginnings of this coat I-don't-know-how-many times trying to fix it. (Initially, the problem was with the many methods of M1, but now that I've settled that matter, it must be gauge.) So I'm just trying the different needle sizes on what I already have cast on, and I'll start all over once I get what I need. I do think I'll scream, though--I've never, ever had such problems with a project, and this is a big project, too. Oh, woe is me.

This is the second time this year that my swatch has been completely useless for my project--it's as if I got caught in some kind of gauge warp between one thing and the other.

I am very amused that a Chinese artists has festooned the image of Rudy Giuliani with elephant dung. I can't think of a more deserving recipient.

yarnly fiendish

Wed, 02 Jul 2003 19:13:04 GMT

I finished gypsy's back on Monday night, and now I'm working on Becky's swatch (and learning the bizarre ways of bobbles). I should spend a week working on my Mod coat, in any case, plus I'm waiting for a longer set of addis so I can do both of gypsy's front pieces at once. They're coming from Elann.com, because I tossed them onto an order of yarn (and because the LYS didn't have anything but the 16", which I have &j ust feel will be crampier than I'd like for doing the sleeves and fronts) that I certainly didn't need, but felt compelled to buy. As I told Carolyn, I'm feeling very yarnwhorish of late--normally, I'm not so acquisitive, unless I'm prospecting for a project; I'm usually satisfied just to look. But after I looked through hundreds of pages on ebay without finding anything (apparently, hand-dyed boucle yarn is very popular from the selling end, and who wants to buy just three balls of some kind of cool Italian ribbon yarn? what are ya gonna be able to do with that?), I went to Elann, and lo and behold, I found yarn that is exactly the same as Classic Elite's Flash, same colorways and all, also made in Brazil--Circulo Venezia (Elann won't let you link to anything directly, otherwise I'd be helpful and do so)--for $2.20/skein. I really love working with the Flash, and love the colors, so I had to buy some more. (Color: Tropic Waters.) In fact, I'm using Flash for Becky's swatch, in a color I love buy could never wear, just because I wanted to use more of it. I've gotten a little fiendish about it. I don't know what else I'll make--another sweater, or a couple of tanks, perhaps--but the price is right, esp. since such small skeins means a lot of 'em are needed for any project.

Thanks to Tropical Depression Bill, it's pretty dark around here today. Dark like the depths of my need for yarn. Mwahahaha!

finally, a little something to show

Wed, 25 Jun 2003 20:31:14 GMT

A very little something. This is the back of my Flash cardigan, which I'm going to call "gypsy," since the color name is "gypsy green." I'd like to finish the back this week, but I'm probably being optimistic. My fingers are being so slow, lately--I don't know what the deal is. They're making me very unhappy.

log in a bog blog

Sat, 21 Jun 2003 19:14:12 GMT

The month is almost over and all I've made is one lousy hat. (And I do mean lousy. I still haven't gotten around to blocking it. I just can't face it, I suppose.) Everyone else is zooming along on cute little tanks and sweaters, and I'm nowhere, in knitting and dissertating. June has turned out to be full of mucky unproductive bogginess. Feh.

Haven't done much reading, either. It's almost as if June hasn't existed for me. Maybe I should go back to bed now.

Interesting fact: you know the old saying about how it always rains when you wash your car (of course, it's always your car, because people get their cars washed every day and it doesn't rain every day...well, it almost does, here, lately, but I digress)? The same holds true for bathing the dog, I've noticed. The vet told me to give Sam a bath every week now, and when I gave him one on Weds., sure enough, it started to rain afterwards, so the clean dog started smelling like wet dog right off.

pretty pretty yarnkitty

Fri, 20 Jun 2003 21:22:42 GMT

Today the project and newsletter for my Rowan International "membership" (subscription) came in the mail. The project is for a really ugly Kaffe Fassett pillow, but the yarns themselves are lovely, and I think they'll make a wonderful striped bag (there's not enough of any one color to do anything more).

I wanted to take a picture of the yarns in the sun, because the colors look better that way, so I evicted Seymour from his sunny spot & physically restrained him while I tried to take the picture. Sara took matters into her own paws and plopped down, exacting revenge for all of cat-kind. Lesson: don't move cats out of their sunbeams.

That's the fabric for the back of the pillow, which is actually a nicer orange than it came out in the picture. I could line the putative purse with this fabric, because I really like the color. On top is the very cute and useful tape measure K. brought back from Toronto for me. It has a little lock and everything. Of course, it is metric, but instructions usually come both ways. Plus, I can put my folding scissors on the chain, and I'll have an easier time finding them than just looking for that wisp of grey yarn. (He also brought back some books, which I'm saving to read because I know I'll just rip through them, and some of my favorite bagels (muesli). His fam. is up there.)

how the abacus works

Fri, 20 Jun 2003 19:30:15 GMT

The pinkish beads represent fives, and the greens represent ones. Every time you complete a row, you move one green bead from the center to the outer ring. When you've got four green beads on the outer ring, and you've finished your fifth row, you slide a pink bead to the outer ring and put the green beads back on the inner ring, then start sliding the green beads out with your next rows, etc. So the abacus goes up to twenty.

you can count on it!

Fri, 20 Jun 2003 01:06:57 GMT

I was over at Wendyknits! today and noticed that there's a great deal of dissatisfaction with row counters out there. I used to share y'all's pain, until I got the Knitter's Abacus, from Mary Snyder Design. Since Wendy seems interested, I thought I'd post a picture of mine (with the link)--arrayed atop the swatch for my Flash cardigan. (The back of that thing would probably be done if I'd started on it, instead of the Mod coat, last weekend. grump.) You get to pick your own bead colors. Sure, it's more expensive than a plastic counter, but nicer to use and it looks like jewelry. (I like not having to put down my knitting to pick up a counter and click it, or fuss with turning something. I pin the abacus to my knitting and just slide the bead.)

can you my darling, can you picture this?

Tue, 17 Jun 2003 20:39:58 GMT

I had my picture taken for my passport last night, and more than doves are gonna cry, I'll tell you that much.

This is my first passport. I've been all over the U.S., but never anywhere else aside from Canada, and used to be all you needed was a driver's license to get in there. But since I go up there a couple of times a year to see K.'s family, I might as well pick up the p-port so I don't have to drag around my birth certificate, which proclaims "I'm a loser! I never go anywhere!" Actually, I'm just poor. Not really poor--going to Seattle poor, as opposed to flying over the Atlantic or Pacific unpoor. (I have a theory about people who go overseas and people who don't, and how attainable it feels for them, and that it has to do with whether it's a regular thing to do in their families--and in my family, we went on vacation in Canada, and when I was really young, we went to Detroit a couple of times, although I'm not really sure why. I'm not the backpacking, hostel-ing type, either.)

Anywhoo, both K. and I had our pictures taken at Kinko's, because his p-port expires momentarily. This was a really tiny, cramped Kinko's, freezing cold, with this driving, wordless techno music playing; think Run, Lola, Run.

No decent pictures have been taken of me since about 1992, if that recently. This is one of the banes of my mother's existence: I'm her only child, and every time I'm home she tries to take my picture--and every time, it's a disaster. My eyes often do this weird thing, going in two directions, which the optometrist says is impossible, but I have it on film. This makes me look either a.) retarded, or b.) like a frightened horse about to bolt. Candid shots, posed shots, it matters not; all come out looking unfortunate.

Needless to say, I didn't have high hopes.

I never know what to do with my mouth. I look like an idiot when I try to smile (you know, if I'm not being sincere), and far too grim otherwise, so just before the flash went off I tried to moderate my mouth. I also have a large mouth, like P.J. Harvey large, it sort of dominates my face, and this is without makeup.

So, the unveiling. "Hey, I look like I've done lots of heroin!" I actually said this. There's absolutely no color in my face, except for the dark, sunken eye sockets. The sad thing is, it's not just the picture--I am incredibly pale.

K: Well, it'll get you into Amsterdam.
Me: Let me in! My arms are itching!

The kid at Kinko's who is ringing us up repeats that last bit under his breath, chuckling.

Me: Maybe they'll expedite my application for medical reasons once they see this picture.

This also cracks the kid up.

You're probably thinking to yourself, "it can't be that bad." Oh, but it is. The only saving grace is that I didn't blink. I'm generally all blinky in my mom's pictures.

I could tell the "authorities" that I must go to Zurich or Switzerland for a "rest cure," and I need the passport right away...Or, as I'd joked to K. before we even had them taken, they'd take one look at the picture and find me so homely and sickly looking that they'd express the passport to me, figuring travel might be the only solace one such as myself could have in life.

Then we went home, and I'm all ready to watch the rest of 25th Hour (which I highly recommend, by the way) and beat that Mod coat into shape. But it refused to be beaten. So I think that maybe I'm doing my M1 in the wrong direction, and I rip out and try the other direction. Then I go back to the original direction. You know, I made three swatches for this thing less than a month ago, yet somehow I'm suddenly completely incapable of reproducing the pattern. There are three ways to M1; is it asking so much for the patterns to specify which method to use?

So I go back to my swatches and take one apart, and I'd used the third kind of M1, and somehow forgotten about that one since. So it probably wasn't yarn twist at all that was causing me problems before. (Oh, and there's this, too: untwisting the yarn made it rather unstable, so it broke in the midst of all of my knitting and frogging.) I felt stupid and pissed and determined to rectify this, even though it was 12:30am at that point & I had to be at work early for a meeting, so I decided to start over with an all-new skein of yarn.

I go into my stash room, which stashes not just my stash, but also everything else I can't find a place for, and find that one of the cats (and I have a good idea which one) has peed in a shoebox, so I get rid of that & fire up our new Bissell ProHeat upright steamer, which we brought home last week for just such occasions. (And no, her box wasn't dirty--I'd cleaned it a few hours before. She was just being cruel.) I considered waiting until the next day, but hey, I was in a shitty mood already, so why not?

Manic depression runs in my family. I don't have it, but this late-night steamcleaning made me think about the stories my dad told of my great-grandmother staying up all night baking for absolutely no reason, which was the tip-off to everyone that she was about to have another of her little, um, bouts.

After that, I decided to just read, and get back to the yarn tomorrow. You know, I could've just switched to my Flash cardigan for a little relief, but nooooo, I wouldn't make things easy on myself like that, I had to keep going with the orange Modstrosity until I was thoroughly frustrated and angry at it.

And Donna Tartt tries much too hard to be a Southern Gothic writer. Not that it's awful, but I'm just sayin'.

let's do the untwist

Mon, 16 Jun 2003 19:50:55 GMT

Last night I unraveled and untwisted my eight rows of Mod coat. Unravel...untwist...unravel...untwist. It was great fun and quite time-consuming. I can't wait until I've knitted up to the "virgin" part of the skein, so I can break the flow of my knitting untwisting that bit by bit, too.

Then--then--I had all sorts of trouble getting cast on and started again. Even though I counted my stitches repeatedly, when I got to my pattern row, I had the wrong number. Then, when I cast on again, I kept getting differing stitch counts, so I had to go through that half-a-dozen times. After that, something went cattywampus in the first pattern row, so I had to rip it out and do it again, and then in the second pattern row I thought it was coming out incorrectly, so I frogged bit by bit, until I realized that it was just fine and I was, quite simply, going crazy.

At this point it was pretty late at night, but I was damned if I wasn't going to make some sort of headway on that thing.

(insert expression of frustration here)

Sun, 15 Jun 2003 18:07:17 GMT

Last night I was so excited because I finished the swatch for my Flash cardigan and cast on for my Mod coat, so I finally felt like I was making some progress after the Bucket o' Pain (which needs to be blocked, but it's rayon, and I'm just not up to it). (Plus I've been having migraines all week, whine whine, poor me, but it cuts into my time to be productive with anything.) So after about eight rows, I look at the beginnings of my coat and the pattern looks all wonky. I realized that this is because the Lamb's Pride had so much twist in it that it screwed up the pattern, and that I'd have to start all over again.

I feel like a towhee. A towhee is a bird that looks a lot like a robin, but blacker and redder, and with a white stomach. Towhees move about by taking two hops forward and one back when they're searching for food. It's pretty funny to watch. They're also quite noisy about it.

erin go blah

Fri, 13 Jun 2003 03:12:14 GMT

I just finished my Bucket o' Chic, after a lot of frogging and tweaking, and I have to say...I look like a leprechaun. At least it's over (except for weaving in the ends.) I don't know why this was so painful, but it was, and now I'm free to cast on for my mod coat and my Flash sweater.

knitter's magazine, again

Wed, 11 Jun 2003 19:02:19 GMT

I just need to say that I hate the columns (in every issue) by the person whose initials are L.P. For one thing, she's so smug. For another, she says the same basic thing every time, i.e., my store is so great, it brings people together, and therefore I am so great. Well, I don't think her store is so great, and I've never found it to be as homey and welcoming as she claims. And putting together three balls of red, white & blue yarn for a patriotic beginner's scarf is savvy marketing, not tapping into a deep need for being at home, yadda yadda. Also not so original. Thanks. I needed to get that off of my chest.

strike!

Mon, 09 Jun 2003 15:56:19 GMT

This is my new knitting bag for travel. It's so awesome-looking, I feel compelled to brag. I saw it at Target.com when I was searching for something else, and a few days later I sealed the deal (after figuring out it's not sold at the bricks-and-mortar stores). Real leather, two compartments separated by a zippered compartment, with a zippered pocket inside. And it's hot-looking, if I do say so myself. Easy on the wallet, too.

hats, bears, and dresses

Sat, 07 Jun 2003 19:33:25 GMT

After locking my keys in my car today while I was at the salon (thankfully, K. was home and was kind enough to bring a spare key)...

I went to the yarn store to pick up the last skein of Flash and perused the new Knitter's, expecting to be horrified. Despite some griping I've seen around the net, I liked this issue better than any of the others I've seen. There's a slipdress that's quite cute, some neat hats, and "origami bears"--stuff I'd actually make. Normally, I only buy that magazine if one of their technical articles seems useful, like the one about short-row shaping in last winter's issue.

Of all the U.S. knitting mags, I prefer Interweave Knits--I manage to find several things in each issue that I'm dying to make. Plus, I like the look and layout of the magazine; I think having entire patterns directly next to the photos makes sense, as opposed to in the back of the mag, like Vogue, or all over the place, like Knitter's. I looked at Cast-On a few weeks ago and it was horribly gaudy, full of things I couldn't imagine wanting to wear, except for this one really cute dress; the dress, however, was only patterned for a size small on a knitting machine, and although I could alter it, why encourage them by giving them my money?

Yesssss, I'm sure you were all just waiting with baited breath for this exegesis on knitting magazines.

which would you choose?

Fri, 06 Jun 2003 22:18:16 GMT

Say you're looking at two different knitting-type treats, and each has its own virtues, and they both cost about the same. Which would you choose?

Would you choose the one that sends you four different types of yarn, in ten-yard skeins, every month for a year? In addition to the yarn you'd get a newsletter and 19 electronic vouchers worth $2.50 each, but those are only usable on orders of $25+, expiration date not given. (elann.com, knitable sample skeins subscription)

Or, would you become part of the Rowan Knitting Circle? Pretty books, a free project with yarn and everything (although I wouldn't make that pillow--I'd poach the yarn for something else), a newsletter and free patterns are in the offing here.

The elann.com deal has the thrill of lots of new yarn on a monthly basis, but it's not enough to really do anything with, and I doubt I'd use all of the vouchers--after all, I've yet to order anything from them. As for their newsletters, who knows what those are like? Getting something every month is cool, though. On the other hand, I don't always like all of the stuff in the Rowan magazines (anything by Kaffe Fassett and I'm outta there), but for the same money it seems the magazines would be more lasting and useful than lots of disparate types of yarn.

So I'm taking a little poll.

I'm so proud of my little old self

Fri, 06 Jun 2003 19:38:08 GMT

Last night I was starting on phase two of my Bucket o' Chic when I realized that my circular needles were too long to knit the hat in the round--I have size threes in two lengths, long and longer, and no dpns, from making that skirt last summer. Then I had a wee brainstorm: if socks can soar on two circular needles, why not my hat? (Of course, I didn't have this revelation immediately--first I went through a bunch of mental sniping about "why aren't there any late-night yarn stores?" and such.) I've never read the book, but I did see someone using two circular needles on a sock (I wasn't really watching--I just saw two circular needles, and a sock), which is why I'm pleased that my brain was able to figure it out easily. Sometimes, when I'm turning objects around in my head, I get all turned around. Best of all: I don't have to buy another circular size three or a new set of dpns.

birthday bag update

Wed, 04 Jun 2003 18:21:26 GMT

I dropped a note to Janet Scanlon at www.knitkit.com, the author of the pattern I used for the B.B., because I figured out it was either a problem with the gauge or with the directions for the number of stitches to cast on. The dimensions for the unfelted bag were supposed to be 16"w x 18"h, but with a gauge of 3sts/inch and 40sts cast on, ya don't get 16"...(gee, this sounds familiar). So, this was her kind reply. (I also asked her about the "boot" at the bottom from doubling the yarn there, which is what the blocking is all about. I actually did block, but apparently not enough. I was afraid I'd stretch it too much. I'm going to look for something big and rectangular and do it again, now.):

    Boy, I'm glad you sent your note. I thought someone said something about
this a few days ago on the phone but it must have gone right over my head. It was a
very casual aside in the conversation and I wracked my brain afterwards
trying to fill in the gaps. This fills in the gaps! Thank you.
    The published gauge certainly is wrong. It was my fault . The gauge
should be 2 1/2 sts/inch instead of 3.
    Blocking helps shape the body of the bag to match the base. I block my
Carried Away bags so the body is the same width as the base and the edge seam runs vertically from the base. This is doubly important when the base
is knit with two strands. This helps avoid the "boot" that your photo shows.
    Blocking would require a chapter of it's own when done as I do it... My
husband has very strong hands and he stretches the wet felt and FORCES it
over a USPS Priority box covered with a plastic bag. He works it for almost
an hour before he is happy with the blocking... He is "Mr. BlockHead". I can
stretch and block the bags too but I manipulate the fabric for a longer
time... I poke and fuss with it the whole time it's drying.
    I'm making a point about blocking because Mr. BlockHead was walking by a
few minutes ago and glanced at the screen. He said "Nice! It will look great
when it's blocked". He likes fabric that is thoroughly felted like yours. My
versions of Carried Away are more loosely felted.
    I'll send a copy of this to Barbara Albright, author of Simple Knits.
She can get the correction into the publishers hands.
    Again, thanks for your note and the heads up. It's a pleasure making
patterns for such a wide audience and agony when something like this
happens.

Regards
from The Oregon Coast,
Janet Scanlon
janet@knitkit.com

So, I'm thinking: maybe I should become an editor of knitting patterns instead of a "regular" editor...

bad, bad me

Wed, 04 Jun 2003 17:45:06 GMT

I had yarn left from The Bag, and could only return it for credit, so what else could I do but buy enough of this other yarn I've had my eye on? It's Classic Elite Flash, in Gypsy Green; I've had a pattern for this particular cardigan for ages, and I've just been waiting for the right yarn to come along. (This looks like solid green, but it's actually a green and off-white marled cotton.)

the road to good intentions is littered with dicey patterns (okay, that doesn't even make sense)

Mon, 02 Jun 2003 20:21:10 GMT

O, gather 'round, ye knitters, and read the about the felt, and the eyelash yarn, and the endless I-cord, in The Saga of L.'s Birthday Bag.