Fiberfiend is currently blogging on her attempt to knit an almost authentic Bohus sweater.

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

How I Spent My Summer Vacation



It's been a most interesting summer; the long list of things I expected to get done has languished from neglect, and a whole new adventure opened up before me. And I have only myself to blame....

You see, it all started with my friend Alpaca Joe. As you recall, I visited his alpaca ranch earlier this year, and helped with the shearing of his herd. My reward was an alpaca fleece of my very own, to do with as I pleased, and the blanket from Llarry, the guard llama. I have chronicled my experience with Ace's cria fleece.

And now for the rest of the story:

During shearing day I was overwhelmed with the amount of fiber generated by Alpaca Joe's small herd. As I inexpertly skirted the fleece, and gathered the prime blanket fiber and rolled it into storage bags, and took seconds which are leg and neck fibers and put them into other bags, I muttered over and over to myself, "what are you going to do with all this stuff?"

At the end of the day, covered in sweat and dirt and alpaca spit, happily exhausted, I asked that question of Alpaca Joe. "Joe, you're a busy guy. You can only spin so much of this fiber. The animals are shorn every year. What do you do with it all?" His response floored me. "It piles up in the barn."

I went home with that answer playing over and over in my head. I dreamed of alpaca fleece piled up and up and up until it burst out of the barn. I imagined myself rolling around in a bed of soft soft soft huacaya fiber. And then it came to me. What Alpaca Joe desperately needed was a way to sell his alpaca fleece to the many handspinners like myself who could appreciate its fibery goodness. An online store! So I emailed Joe with my brainstorm; why didn't he open an Etsy store and sell the fruits of his labor?

"But I'm swamped as it is," he told me. "I can't possibly manage a store in addition to the ranch, my day job, and a little spinning time of my own. It's a great idea, but I just can't do it."

And before I could stop it, my mouth opened up and "But I can. And I work for fiber" came out.

So that's how www.alpacajoe.etsy.com came about. Joe puts up the fiber, and I put up the work. It's been a lot more work than I originally anticipated, but it's been a lot more fun, too. The Etsy store sells luxury fibers raw, as roving, as batts and as yarn. The intro says:

Alpaca Joe is the place to find fiber at its finest. Though the emphasis is on the beloved alpaca, you will find luxury fiber of every sort; cashmere, angora, silk, various breeds of rare wool, bamboo, cotton, tencel, mohair and more may grace these pages from time to time, almost always from local sources. Alpaca Joe is dedicated to providing an exceptional experience for the fiber enthusiast, be he or she spinner, knitter, felter, weaver or fashion afficionado, beginner or advanced.

Take a moment and visit the site. You'll see how I spent my summer!

Sunday, June 14, 2009

Ace of Hearts



Ace is one of Alpaca Joe's youngest alpacas. This year was his first shearing, and he handled it quite well. Since I was skirting, I had the opportunity to bury my hands in the ultra softness that is a yearling fleece. I've heard that the softest fiber an animal will ever have is the one it is born with; from there, maturity adds coarseness. Ace was bred to have a fine fleece, with good crimp. And his color is lovely; soft apricot, like an early morning cloud.

Very few hand spinners ever have the chance to spin a cria fleece (that's what a baby alpaca is called, cria, pronounced "kree-uh"). It's not that they are rare, it's that they are made of velcro, and every piece of hay or stray or debris that the animal has ever come in contact with is part of them. It's as if the young alpaca first rolled in glue and then rolled around in a feed bin. Unlike older animals, where the vm can be combed out, trying to comb debris out of the tips of cria fiber just spreads it around, contaminating the rest of the fleece. Processing mills won't take cria fleece, and most breeders won't try to sell it to spinners since it's all but impossible to clean.

But nothing compares for fineness. A well bred, young alpaca has a micron count that rivals cashmere, but with a longer staple length that makes it so much easier to spin. So what's a spinner, who covets that quality, but hates the vm, to do?

Why, trim the lock tips, of course. See that box next the the pile of locks? Those are the very tips of the locks, carefully removed from the fleece with very small, very sharp scissors. The majority of vegetation that was plastered to the outside of Ace came off with them, making the rest of the picking, if not easy, at least possible.



I took handfulls of the fluff, put them in my clothes dryer, and tumbled them on air fluff to shake out any loose vegetation. It worked much better than I had hoped, and a lot of sand and dirt and chaff was caught in the filter. Then I washed it, rinsed it, let it air dry just a little, and tumbled it in the dryer again.

And this is what the cleaned stuff looks like. Can't wait to start spinning. Ace has stolen my heart.
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Saturday, June 6, 2009

Alpaca Joe



I met "Alpaca Joe"* a few years back at a spinning class. It wasn't surprising to me that an alpaca rancher would want to learn to spin; with all the silky fiber at your disposal, how could you not. What was surprising was that "Joe" was, well, a guy, and I have met so few male spinners that they must be very few and far between. During the class, as Joe revealed his avocation as an alpaca breeder, I commented on how very cool it would be to visit an alpaca ranch. To my delight, Joe extended an invite to visit at my leisure. I thought it might seem impolite to ask if I could just follow him home, so I waited an acceptable few days to ask if I could "drop by." Turns out that "dropping by" was an 80 mile ride each way up into the mountains. Joe and his small herd live on a parcel of land nestled high up where the spring comes a month later than it does in the valley. Joe kept not only alpaca, but a good sized garden and an impressive variety of chickens. For a girl from the suburbs, it wasn't just interesting. It was lovely.

Now, let me digress for just a moment. I learned to spin on alpaca fiber. My knitting preference has always been alpaca, and when I decided to learn to spin it was so that I could fondle the soft fluffy fiber in a more elemental way. My fascination with all things alpaca precluded hearing the voices that said that alpaca was a fussy fiber, best left for a spinner with a healthy dose of experience. My innate love for the stuff was in no way diminished during the learning curve. So a chance to see my favorite fiber on the hoof was not something I could pass up.

I've made several visits since then, and with each visit I learn a little more about these amazing creatures. Last year my husband and I volunteered to help on shearing day, but our timing was off and we didn't manage to get there. But this year there was nothing that could keep me from being part of the annual ritual and dance that separates the fiber from the animal.

And it was something.

Shearing starts early in the day; 8 a.m. in this case, while the air is still cool. I didn't know that shearing would be hot and dirty work. (Well, I expected dirty, having watched alpacas in their native habitat roll around in the dirt whenever possible. But I forgot that under all that fleece is a very warmblooded critter.) I've seen sheep sheared, and it's very physical. Usually the shearer (a truly underappreciated vocation) handles the sheep himself. Alpaca, though not really big, are taller and more gangly than most sheep, and more than a handful for one person. So the shearer binds the animal's hands and feet and, with help, the animal is stretched out with it's feet in front and in back. The shearer has no trouble running the clipper over the animal to remove the pelt.


Belly fur, too coarse and matted to be of use, is sent to the compost heap. Then the prime blanket is carefully removed from the animals back and sides and set aside to be skirted. The upper legs and neck are trimmed and set aside as "seconds." Finally, any additional areas, such as the face, tail and lower legs, are trimmed. It takes several people, dancing around one another, to efficiently shear alpacas and their larger cousins, llamas. But the whole thing, if well coordinated, takes less than 15 minutes. A handful of us sheared 18 alpacas and three llamas in just about five hours.

Once shorn, alpacas appear to be slightly embarrassed by their significantly smaller size, But they are certainly cooler without the fur coat!

When alpaca are sheared, it is usual for their hooves to be trimmed and their teeth to be filed down so that they don't hurt each other if they fight. Though not painful, sometimes the animals jerk or pull away. Ever been to the dentist and had a little "pink in the sink" when you were done? Same thing happens from time to time during shearing. This is Doc, and it isn't near as bad as it looks. He complained for five minutes and then seamed unaffected. By the way, his "before" picture is the first one at the top of the page. Doesn't look the same, does he?



At the end of the day, (well, it was only midday, but you know what I mean) I was exhausted, and I had the easiest of jobs! I was assigned to the skirting table, which means I helped remove the blanket as it was clipped, carried it to the skirting table, separated as much guard hair, 2nd clips and debris as possible in the 10 minutes it took to finish clipping that animal and get the next one set to clip, and bag up the fleece and move it to temporary storage. (And my apologies to whoever must prepare the fleece for processing. I promise to do better next time.)

All in all it was a fascinating experience. In payment for my labor (and that of my husband) Alpaca Joe allowed me to pick a fleece for my very own. He also gave me the blanket from Larry, the Guard Llama. Last year I would have picked the fleece based on color; this year, because I was more experienced, I picked based on the fineness of the fleece, and Ace's blanket came home with me. Next time I'll share with you the pros and cons of choosing fleece from the first shearing of a one year old alpaca.

*Names have been changed to protect the innocent.

Thursday, May 7, 2009

A Year of Lace

One of the things I love most about knitting is that, no matter how much you know, there's still so much more to learn about. I remember the year I decided to really figure out fair isle; I must have knit three or four man sized multi-colored pullovers one after the other. I love watching the patterns develop row by row by row. There's a real rhythm in two color knitting, a chant specific to each row and its colors that moves me to a Zen place (one-one-two, three-one-three, two-two-two.) It's very hypnotic, and one of the reasons I knit.

And learning to strand with a color in each hand, which makes a beautiful, fluid fabric, was a great accomplishment to me

But that was then, and this is now. This is The Year Of Lace.

I don't know why lace has taken over my knitting preferences lately, but it seems like every new project I pick up is lace based. It started at the beginning of the year with the Brenda Cardigan, and lace has followed into just about every project I've chosen since with rare exception. Some of my projects have been true lace weight lace, the yarn as thin as cobwebs. Some have been knit of quite heavy yarn, the lace weighty and substantial. And others have been a little of both.

Of the four classes I took while at Stitches South, two were about lace. And actually, since each of those two were full day classes, they are each the equivalent of two regular classes, so I guess you could say I took seven classes and four of them were about lace. But I digress.

The first of the Stitches lace classes was about freeform lace, run by Myra Wood. I've taken other classes by Myra over the years, and she's a hoot. Freeform lace and I, however, are not a good match; the concept is that you can knit lace that is not, by it's very lack of design, symmetrical. Being the daughter, sister, and wife of engineers (and a closet obsessive compulsive) I find this somewhat disturbing. A yarnover with no attached k2tog is bad enough, but freeform lace asks one to accept many many instances of unpaired holes in the fabric. I tried, really I did, to "go with the flow" but I'm just not that kind of girl. (Well, my knitting's not "that type" of knitting.) I spent hours in that class with lace weight merino on size 5 needles, making random holes in a 5" wide strip of knitting. It was frothy. It was ethereal. It was random. My brain takes delight in recognizable patterns. The minute I got that swatch home I pulled out the needle and frogged. Thanks, Myra, for the attempt to shove me out of my comfort zone. Sorry I couldn't oblige.

The second class was on Shetland Shawls. I wasn't familiar with Shetland shawls when I signed up for the class, which is why I signed up for it. The instructor, a lovely woman named Joan Shrouder, was knowledgeable and well prepared and a great knitter. She knew her shawls. What I came to understand is that Shetland shawls are based on garter stitch. Both EZ and Jared Flood have a deep love and respect for garter stitch; not so I. I just don't like the way it looks. Garter stitch always looks a little juvenile. I know it's fast. I know it's easy. I just haven't found a way to appreciate it's deep simplicity. I loved learning how Shetlands are made. I loved learning how to build a square shawl from the middle and add the borders and edgings in one piece. I just wish it hadn't all been garter stitch. So I guess Estonian lace is more my style.....

Monday, May 4, 2009

Buffalo Girls Won't You Come Home


Stitches South was everything I had hoped and then some. The classes were very good, the instructors learned and effective, and the other knitters were a marvelous resource. But the Market! Ahh, the Market. The vendors were friendly, well stocked and very helpful. The big surprise was the amount of spinning fiber I found; in booth after booth were braids or bumps or bags of fibery goodness. So many, so beautiful, that it hurt my heart to know how much of it couldn't come home with me. (After all, Stitches is supposed to be about the knitting and the yarn, right?) I did bring home a little bit of fiber in addition to the yarn stash expansion (which, vast as it was before I went to Atlanta, is significantly bigger now....)

There was fiber everywhere; Miss Babs Handyed had beautiful handdyed rovings, and there was raw pycazz to be had at another booth. Carolina Homespun had everything from merino/silk blends, rare breed rovings, quivit (which was almost as expensive as raw gold) and bison fiber. No joke, the undercoat from american buffalo, in fluffy one ounce bags, calling my name. Call it fate, call it kismit, but I had taken my Louet Victoria along just in case. As it turns out, just in case I found some buffalo fuzz. What could I do? I was helpless in the face of the inevitable. An ounce of Buffalo Girls fiber was mine! As soon as class was over that afternoon I hurried back to the hotel room and began to spin. A fine, lofty, soft laceweight thread emerged from the cloud I held in my hand and I was happy. At least, I was happy until I ran out of fuzz about two hours later. Two hundred yards of single ply lace just wouldn't do. I needed to feel that je ne c'est pas of silky softness sliding through my fingers as I spun just a little longer.

So I went back the next day and bought another ounce. And spun another two hundred yards. And then I plyed them together.

Wish I'd take a photo, because once plyed, I finished the yarn as suggested on the card that came with the fiber. What started as a decidedly lace weight two ply didn't end that way after a hot bath and a severe beating; the yarn bloomed. And bloomed. And once dried bloomed some more. My 400 yards of singles lace was mostly 200 yards of 2 ply fingering by the time all was said and done. Which really wasn't quite enough yardidge for the Buffalo Girls Shawl I had planned. But it was lovely, lovely yarn.

The Rest Of The Story: Once we arrived home after Stitches, I found the April installment of my fiber club waiting for me. It was several ounces of Shetland wool in several colors, including a medium brown that, while not the exact shade of the spun bison, was close enough to make a lovely border . Another 200 yards of 2 ply almost-fingering later, and the yarn requirements of my Buffalo Girls Shawl were met.

Production notes: The Buffalo Girl Shawl is an adaptation of the Vernal Equinox Shawl by Ryhmä Lankakomeron. Size US 9 knitting needles and portions of the first several clues from the KAL were knit until I ran out of handspun. About 29" from center back to lower edge. I think it's beautiful.

Saturday, April 18, 2009

Keep Me in Stitches

Next week I'll be attending Stitches South for the first time. Well, not the first time I've been to a Stitches event, but the first time there's been a Stitches South. (Say Hallelujah.) I attended Stitches East for six years in Atlantic City and Baltimore when I lived in Maryland. By happy happenstance I managed to attend a Stitches West in Santa Clara one year as well. Each one was Knitter's Heaven, and when DH and I moved to Florida I couldn't justify a plane trip and a hotel (not to mention the stash expansion) just to learn more ways to knit and purl, as it were.

But Atlanta, well, that's close enough to drive. So off we go.

My experiences at Stitches are probably different than many, maybe most, attendees; for one, I've always gone alone. (No knitting buddies to distract me from my mission.) I have yet to attend the fashion show or the award dinner (more an issue of time than interest, however.) And I have taken classes all day, every day that I attended. (Yes, I come home brain dead every time. And I love it.)

I pretty much taught myself to knit back in the 70's. As proud as I have always been of my skills, I have to admit that I made rookie mistakes for many many years; stupid things like not getting gauge (and then being surprised that the article didn't fit!) or substituting an inappropriate yarn totally unsuitable for the project. Stitches helped change all that. Slowly, certainly, but my skills have been so very much improved by Stitches classes and the marvelous instructors that I can't begin to know what came from me and what came from them.

A random, and partial, list of things I learned at Stitches:

I can knit backwards. Sounds like a little thing, but it has made a real difference on small projects.

All my fair isle knitting is done with a color in each hand with floats one stitch wide. The resulting fabric is as beautiful inside as out. And this was learned at The Philosopher's Wool booth in the Stitches Market, demonstrated by no less than Ann Bourgeois herself. (You can see her teach the technique on their website here.)

My oldest grandson has a pair of authentic twin-knitted booties I made in a Stitches class. I will never make another pair (the technique stretched my capabilities to their limits) but the experience and knowlege gained was wonderful.

I know at least 15 cast-ons and matching cast-offs (and regularly use at least four of them.)

Did you know that there are "rules" about how cables move? There is a logic to which part goes under and which part goes over, and how they interconnect. And I learned that at Stitches.

How many ways can you shape a waistline? Many more than you would think, and each has a different function if you want to design a sweater or top.

I can knit a lace top and have the shaping for the armholes turn out as mirror images of one another. Just when and how to omit a yarn over or use a left- or right-leaning decrease is now in my repertoire.

I'm sure there are a dozen more things I learned at Stitches that are buried at the back of my brain. But like college was more about learning how to think than what to think, Stitches is more about learning how knitting works than about what to knit.

What more could you ask?

A Rose by Any Other Name

This is the current state of my Hemlock Blanket, design by Jared Flood. The yarn is Caron's Simply Soft Paints in the Sticks and Stone colorway; very masculine. I decided to knit it in an acrylic yarn for my grandson-to-be; for some reason, my kids don't want to hand wash baby things. Go figure. The colorway is quite nice; in fact, it's as nice as many an indie-dyed skein I've knitted. The problem is that it's acrylic. Not that I have anything against acrylic yarns, except that they shed, pill and look generally crappy in pretty short order, and I can see a little of that already happening in the center of the blanket I haven't knit with acrylics for many a year, but I remember this being the problem with acrylics back in their heyday. I had hoped man made fibers had advanced more, apparently, than they have. But it may be yarn specific; I knit the Baby Surprise Jacket below for the same grandson in a Vanna's Choice print that is surprisingly cushy, lofty and smooth.

I remember making a top-down pullover six or seven years ago out of Lion Brand Homespun. The sweater wasn't finished before it started to look like monkey fur. So answer me this: if yarn can be spun from bamboo, corn, milk byproducts, soy and petroleum (you do know that's where many "man made" fibers come from, right?) why can't we come up with manufactured yarns that don't fuzz?
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Monday, March 16, 2009

I Get By with a Little Help



I like knitting lace - most of my recent knits have been lace. I'm not much of a Knit Along girl, though, but I thought I'd give it a try, so I joined the Ravelry KAL for the Vernal Equinox Shawl, and this is the result. I have made shawls in the past, but always rectangular ones, never a triangle or semicircular.

The interaction of other participants was new to me; I live in an area where I don't know any other crafters, and have become kind of a Lone Knitter, if you know what I mean. No one else to look at my work as it progresses, no one else to oohhh and aahhhh over the intricate pattern or the subtlty of my ssk left leaning decrease, no one to recognize the beauty of my Wollmeise. I don't get a whole lot of feedback, as it were, except from DH who, bless his heart, would praise a garter knit scarf on par with this lovely shawl if I knit it. So when another knitter complimented my finished Vernal Equinox I was first surprised, then pleased, then, in an odd way, felt a little exposed. I mean, no one who knows anything about the craft has ever looked at my work before. No one who could tell if I screwed up the pattern in row 189 has ever had the opportunity to point that out to me. All of a sudden my own standard for what's "good enough" seems a little low (and I'm known as something of a perfectionist.)

Being part of a larger community could be both a good and a bad thing........



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It's a Compromise



The third version of the sleeves is where I'm going to stop. The cap sleeves didn't work and the 3/4 sleeves made me look square. So just-to-the-elbows it is. All in all I like the look, and the cashmere is light as can be. So now we're off to other things.....

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Wednesday, March 11, 2009

What's New?





I'm working on the second version of the sleeves for the Cathedral Cardigan and it looks like I'll be starting on the third version at any moment; I just can't seem to find the right fit. But that doesn't mean I haven't been busy. I finished my car project - my very first Baby Surprise Jacket (I've been an EZ fan forever; hard to believe I have several little ones to knit for and have never made a BSJ!) and the Vernal Equinox KAL shawl; isn't it lovely?

Working on these projects simultaneously had me thinking about the concept of monogamous knitting. I've heard that there are knitters who have many many projects going on at the same time; they put one down and pick up another like changing clothes. I have read about projects that sit unattended for weeks, months, even years at a time, waiting for their turn to come back into favor with their maker.

But I'm not like that. I have a real need to finish things. There are no bags with half knitted sweaters buried in the back of my closet. There are no socks missing a mate. I have no avoidance issues with sewing up and finishing.

Now, I do have more than one knitting project going at the same time; there's always one in the car that I work on when my DH is driving; there's one on the sofa where I knit when I sit with my family and watch TV; there's one in process on my knitting machine and there's one I'm designing. And there's no cross-over; the car project never sees the one on the sofa, the sofa project doesn't go for rides, and the design project, well, she's just a little special, like a new baby. And when each project is finished, another new project takes its place. Each project is like a child, and I stay with each until it's off the needles and ready to leave the house.

It's not exactly monogamy, but it's close.
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Thursday, March 5, 2009

In Appreciation of Designers



I wonder sometimes how the professional designers do it. I've read some of their blogs and listened to some of their podcasts and I still don't really get it. How do they come up with something new and make it work? Since I "design" only for myself and things I want to wear, I suppose the process is different, but I'm still curious. My "process" goes something like this: 1)see something in a magazine, on a tv show, or in a dream that I like; 2)get a picture in my head of what it would look like on me; 3)modify the picture in my head until the item looks good on me (sometimes the process comes to a shrieking halt right here, since I am never going to look good in the tight-under-the-bust, deep-decolletage, short-puffy-sleeve articles so popular right now); then try to figure out how to make it. Though I am usually a "project", not a "process" kind of knitter, when I'm trying to come up with a pattern I can focus on the techniques to get me where I want to go. I don't mind frogging something that doesn't work and trying again until it does (however, I once read where Meg Swansen knitted the sleeve for a sweater she was designing seven times before she got what she wanted. I'm not that focused! BTW, the photo is one of Meg's designs.) My only problem seems to be that I don't anticipate finishings as well as I should; the facings and buttonbands, hems vs ribbing, and so on. It might help, I suppose, if I could sketch the design before I try to knit it, but I have no ability whatsoever to draw to scale or with perspective. I can see it in my head but can't put it on paper.

So when I see great knitwear designs I stand in awe. The brains of designers must just be bigger than mine. Or their gene makeup is different.

My mother had the crafty gene; I'm sure that's where I got it. She had trained as a seamstress, and made us wonderful matching outfits every Easter for years and years. I didn't realize it until after her passing, but she tatted and sewed and crocheted and did macrame and was a pretty decent cook. She didn't knit, though; I had to learn that on my own. But she had a way of looking at complicated techniques in sewing and making them seem easy. I bet if she had wanted to design knitwear she would have been another Elizabeth Zimmerman type. If only she had passed that ability on to me.

In my next life I want to be Connie Chang Chinchio or Norah Gaughan. Or Meg! It's probably sacrilege to want to be EZ, isn't it? One can only hope......
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Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Sleeve Whisperer Wanted


While Iwas waiting for the sleeves to tell me what they want to be, the neckline and button bands made themselves known to me. I only wish they'd been clearer sooner; I would have knit them as part of the body. If anyone speaks "sleeve" I'd love to know what I'm supposed to do next. Suggesstions welcome.
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Saturday, February 28, 2009

Can You Hear Me?

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Sometimes the easiest designs aren't. Easy, I mean; this little cardigan has a mind of its own. I tried to put a waist-cinching band of ribbing below the armhole shaping (which would have been less waist-cinching and more umpire/baby doll shaping, but you know what I mean) but it was just, I don't know, wrong. I knit the ribbing with the same needle size as the body and it looked large and sloppy. I frogged, and tried again with a size smaller needle. Still looked out of place. So I went back to the stockinette and everyone was happy.

Sometimes you just have to listen to the design. I'm waiting for the sleeves to tell me what they want to look like.

P.S. Those dangly things in front are stitch holders. The front has a U shaped neckline, and they're holding the stitches that form the base of the U. Just thought you'd like to know.

Saturday, February 21, 2009

progress



Please note: photo updated after computer meltdown.

I've been working on a number of projects lately; I'm trying to finish a queen sized quilt, working on the design for my family's Christmas sweater for next year, the latest clue for the Vernal Equinox shawl, and this Cathedral cardigan. The bottom half of the newest design is done. You are looking at just over 12 inches of soft cashmere lace. The lower half has been divided at the armholes for two fronts and a back. The top half will be all stockinette, with an intricate button band. The set in sleeves will echo the lace pattern of the bottom and will be either elbow or 3/4 length. I'm only sorry that the photo doesn't show the true color of the yarn; it's much more a grass green, very saturated, not the pale sage-y color above. Stay tuned!
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Monday, February 16, 2009

Cathedral cardigan




I've started the cashmere Cathedral Cardigan with a lace edge reminiscent of a pattern I saw on a pillow cover. It reminds me of the leaded glass windows in an old cathedral. The lace is about 9" long and will be the lower edge of a bottom up cropped cardigan. I'm thinking I'll add an intricate button band from one of Nicky Epstein's books, and leave the body in plain stockinette for contrast. Elbow length or maybe 3/4 sleeves. Hmmmm...........

Another View





Do we all hate the way we look in photos? Wanted to post a full view of the Brenda Cardigan on a live model. See, even my "medium" is almost a large..........

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Thursday, February 12, 2009

The Muse




As I look at options for the lace cashmere sweater I hope to design, I came across this pillow pattern and fell in love. The dark blue center panel should be perfect for the bottom edge of the new design. The green laceweight yarn is the cashmere, double stranded, that I have begun swatching. Stay tuned.