Mandy Moore's Blog, page 100
March 13, 2012
Spinning Tuesdays: The Original Fractal Spinning, Spinning Tornadoes.
A few Knittyspin readers have pointed out that I forgot to include an attribution to the original source on fractal spinning in Alex Tinsley's article, Fractal Spinning in our Winter 2011B issue.
The original article and first use of the term fractal spinning occurred in the Summer 2007 issue of Spin Off , The Fractal Stripe by Janel Laidman. Not only is Janel the mother of Fractal Spinning, but she can make any painted roving or top bend to her will. You can buy a digital download of all of the 2007 and 2008 issues of Spin Off here.
It was an oversight, I apologize to Janel for not catching it and give great thanks to the readers who noticed and let me know.
What's on my wheel:
I've been spinning around Jacey Boggs' most excellent book, Spin Art, for the SpinDoctor Spin Art SAL.
I played with spinning Tornadoes this week. Here's one I really like.
I took this:
Tornado fixin's
Some Spunky Eclectic merino, a 2-ply silk, Kid Silk Haze and two sparkly threads.
What I love about spinning textured or art yarns is that it makes me really pay attention, since I'm spinning with motions I'd never use otherwise. With Tornado spinning you loosely apply the 3 or 4 extra yarns/threads at a 90 degree angle to a stripping down roving or top while adding twist.
Finding the balance between twist and pull in was maddening in the best possible way. I kind of like the frustration of learning some thing new. Anything the breaks me out of my usual spinning style, makes me a better spinner.
Here's the finished yarn:
Tornado
Tornado, a little closer
What are you spinning this week?
March 9, 2012
Godzilla Ridge?
Best project ever?
Godzilla is a giant lizard, yes?
I am rather a fan of the Lizard Ridge blanket. It's the FO I'd save from a house fire. As a rabid lover of Noro, I believe it's a masterwork, using 24 different colorways of my beloved Kureyon.
And remember I said that I hadn't figured out what to do with that bag of Noro Hitsuji, the new-ish bulky weight Noro yarn?
Well, thanks to Jennifer at The Purple Purl, I think I found the answer: a Godzilla Ridge!
If you work the Lizard Ridge square pattern almost exactly as written (skipping the very first and very last rows of the square, as the yardage is a bit tight) on 8mm needles with the Hitsuji, you get a square that is about 18 inches across. (If worked in the yarn as written, the squares are 10 inches across.)
6 squares will make a blanket that is 36 inches wide and 54 inches long, not that much smaller than the original 42 x 64 inch 24-square version.
Genius!
Love!
March 7, 2012
WWW: 2 Million Strong; Woolly Festivals; Celebrity Knitter Alert; Tanis Winner
More of us every day!
Millions of congratulations to our friends at Ravelry, who have just hit 2,000,000 users.
A thought-provoking piece on the Guardian. The author ponders knitting as a way to 'escape from the crushing relationship' she had with retail clothes shopping.
Sheepy fun for all
Planning ahead: the details of British Wool Weekend 2012 have just been announced. Held September 1st & 2nd in Harrogate, Yorkshire, it promises to be an excellent weekend celebrating all things woolly.
Of course, if you're on this side of the Atlantic, the Dutchess County Sheep & Wool Festival (a.k.a Rhinebeck) is held October 20 & 21st.
Have you seen the Knitter's Reader's Choice poll on About.com? Vote for your favorite knitting website, needles, designer, yarn company, and your favorite book published in 2011.
Worth a visit, in person or virtually.
One of my favorite knitting websites is the Victoria & Albert Museum Knitting collection. The site is remarkably extensive, featuring wonderful photographs of fabulous items in their knitting collection, interviews and articles. Some of the items date back to the 16th century (and a couple even earlier than that).
Celebrity knitter alert: Catherine Zeta Jones is one of us!
Congratulations to Julie V. in Missouri, she won the Tanis Fiber Arts Velvet Morning Giveaway! A huge thank you to Tanis for providing this generous prize.
March 6, 2012
Spinning Tuesdays: Color Blending Fail?
I've been spinning, but not a lot. I finished a 2-ply, color blending experiment with some Yarn Hollow roving.
2 colors of Yarn Hollow roving blended on one bobbin
After I spun the second bobbin I was sure the resulting yarn would look really crappy, too contrasty, just like I don't like. I almost pulled the yarn off of the bobbins and gave up on it.
These don't look blended at all
I will admit I had problems spinning these rovings they were more compacted than usual and really didn't want to draft together. I'm sure my spinning clouded my judgement because look at the resulting yarn
Blended just fine
It looks blended, not too contrasty at all. I'm glad I didn't give up.
I plied some Bricolage Studios handpulled roving with sparkly thread. I love the sparkly it cuts through the meatiness of the single. I got the super sparkly thread from Threadart.
I can't get a good photo of it from a distance, but here's a close up
Sparkly!
The new SpinDoctor Podcast is up. Sasha and I report from Madrona, we are excited and silly.
What are you spinning this week?
March 1, 2012
Velvet Morning Contest!
Oh yes, it's time for everyone's favorite type of giveaway at Knitty, a yarn pack for a sweater!
This issue we have a yarn pack for the beautiful Velvet Morning cardigan
Velvet Morning - blue colorway
Tanis from Tanis Fiber Arts has generously donated a yarn pack for one lucky reader. Prize value: $171-304 CAD.
The usual rules apply for our giveaway:
Leave a comment on this post before midnight, eastern time, on Monday, March 5, 2012.
1 comment will be chosen at random to answer a skill testing question.
If he/she answers correctly, they will win our prize! Good luck, everyone!
Velvet Morning - sand colorway
February 29, 2012
WWW: Knitting on boats, at SXSW and the Oscars
A great way to spend a summer's day
Looking forward to summer here in North America: knitting cruises off the north eastern coast of the US! A company based in Maine is offering special knitting cruises, complete with instruction from Bill Huntington, owner of Hope Spinnery, and author Margaret Radcliffe.
Ms. Okey, publisher and knitterly goddess
Friend of Knitty, publisher Shannon Okey is speaking next month at South by Southwest in Austin, Texas.
Her presentation "Knitting a Long Tail in Niche Publishing" discusses the vision and the business model of her Cooperative Press publishing company. Shannon will be talking about ways to increase creators' revenue and buck the established publishing system, in light of larger publishers' reluctance to take a chance on "niche" content.
Adorable!
Hand knit hats go to the Oscars! Knitter Sheri Hall of Minnesota, of Oops I Knit it Again! has had 100 of her hand-knit "Oscar the Slouch" hats included in swag bags for celebrities and at the Academy Awards. Listen right to the end of the video at the link above: it tells you how much Sheri is out of pocket for the opportunity to put her work in the hands of the glitterati. Wow.
A new play in Montreal, Annette (Une fin du monde en une nanoseconde) is using knitting and yarn as both props and metaphors. Although nominally about hockey – yarn balls are used in the place of hockey pucks – key moments in the play revolve around the role of knitting in the main character's life. It begins with Annette running out of yarn, and jumping on her bicycle to get more… More information about the play and the creator, in French.
Nike announced last week their newest athletic shoe design: the Flyknit. The shoe uses state of the art knitting machines to knit the upper of the shoe in a single piece, for a light and seamless fit. Fascinating info about the design and uses of industrial knitting!
Indie dyer, Space Cadet Creations, offers a free downloadable PDF booklet on the topic of knitting and crocheting with hand-dyed yarns. A very useful little guide to different types of dyes and variegation and how they look worked up.
Miss Manners answers a question about the etiquette of knitting in public and how to handle nosy questions from the muggles.
February 28, 2012
Spinning Tuesdays: My Madrona Haul and What I'm Going to Do with It
I didn't damage my wallet too badly at the Madrona marketplace and I tried to be mindful about what I bought.
My delight was finding vendors that I'd never known about and seeing vendors in person that I've only shopped on line.
My first stop was The Artful Ewe. Before you look, know that they don't sell their batts on line.
I bought three gorgeous batts
Artful Ewe luxury fiber batt
This batt has baby alpaca, silk, cashmere, merino and BFL. After I bought it, I carried this batt around telling people to touch it. I'm thinking a fine-ish worsted spun to make something that touches my skin, a cowl or scarf or something.
Artful Ewe mixed wool batt - light blue
The light and dark blue batts have a mixture of wools and mohair.
Artful Ewe mixed wool batt - dark blue
I want to use them together for a shawl.
Dark blue yak roving
I found yak roving at the Artful Ewe too. I bought some for Amy because it's on her list of 'can spins'.
Jenkins Turkish Delight
I had one thing on my shopping list – a Jenkins Turkish Delight spindle. I fell in love with this one – it's Oregon Myrtle and weighs 17gms. I bought it from Carolina Homespun.
Next I shopped at a favorite fiber dyer that I've never seen in person, Woolgatherings.
Woolgatherings mixed BFL
I love Kate's color sense and frankly I resisted buying one of everything in her booth. Instead I bought two braids of the same colorway, because I love the intense light blue and orange together.
I have no idea what I'll do with these. Maybe I have something that will go with it in my stash and will turn it into a vest or cardigan.
I bought a little yarn too, some Goth Socks and some Brooklyn Tweed Loft. I thought I was done. Except Saturday I was taking a last pass through the market and some fiber caught me. I petted, yet managed to walk away.
But then I dreamed about it, so I had to go back. One last dash to the marketplace right before I got on my shuttle to the airport.
Huckleberry Knits
Two braids, one polwarth and one BFL from Huckleberry Knits. I love the colors and the fiber is crazy-well prepared. I want to draft them together, woolen and chubby.
That's it. I actually spent less than my budget, go figure.
I can't wait to dig in and start spinning.
February 27, 2012
Knitting Goals: Update
And Kate's Must Have Cardigan is done!
Very happy with the fit
Cabley goodness
A fun knit, and wasn't actually a lot of work when I was focused on it.
I'm in two minds about the length… It seemed very short, and I would have made it longer if I'd had more yarn. I bought the yarn so long ago that there was no hope of matching the dye lot. But now it's done, I'm very pleased with the length.
There is only one button on it for now, since I haven't found precisely the right buttons. I've got my heart set on those classic leather buttons…
The perfect buttons. Now to find them.
Jillian is knitting along on her third of six Knitty projects for the the year, Groove by Stephen West:
Groove in Madelinetosh DK
The first section is done! I love how the colors are playing out. The yarn is Madelinetosh DK in colors Clematis and Bark.
And Amy's almost ready for the decrease rows on her Lanesplitter.
February 25, 2012
Bonus: cutting the cord
We cut a lot of cords in knitting [I'm pushing the metaphor here a little...], but this post isn't about knitting. It's about what some of us do while we knit.
Watch TV.
I don't know about where you live, but where I live [Toronto, Canada], cable TV is expensive. I'm embarrassed to say that I was paying the ghastly sum of $130/month for cable — for all the basic channels, tons of stuff I never watched, but was packaged in with the movies + the actual HBO and movies. And that's about average up here. Until a week ago. We cancelled the whole shebang, and aren't looking back.
I have been talking to a lot of people about this lately, and some have already made the switch, some are thinking about it, and some don't even know where to begin. I'm not going to make this a long post with all the details, but instead will make this full of pithy links to get you on the right track, if you'd rather spend your money on yarn and needles instead of cable tv.
Some good articles and forums to get you started:
- Digital Home's Over The Air forum [for Canadian residents]
- TVFool's forum [US & Canada]
- check your own home's address to see what channels you might receive over the air [US & Canada]
- interesting thread for Canadians who want Netflix, Hulu, etc
Here's what we're watching:
- Netflix [available in the US and Canada] at $8/month
- free HD [digital] programming, pulled from the air with an antenna [see the links above for more information about how this works]
- many things on the network and cable chanel websites
Here's the equipment we chose:
- Apple TV [this provides access to Netflix, some sports networks, You Tube and any video, audio and pictures you have on your home computer]
- alternatives to Apple TV include Boxee, , and lots of other devices. More are being introduced all the time. The key is what services they offer access to, and if they have a web browser built in or not. [With a web browser in your device, you can watch the stuff the networks make available on the web, but without having to sit at your computer.] We initially wanted the Boxee, but the reviews everywhere said the hardware wasn't stable and needed rebooting daily, at least. We hear there's a new Boxee being released…worth watching for.
- this rooftop antenna [we tried an indoor antenna and found it almost as functional, but unsightly and a pain in the butt to have underfoot].
- our trusty 7-year-old Tivo Series 2 [the last Tivo model to work with antenna input, luckily!]. When I called to cancel the service [since we were cancelling cable, I didn't think we'd use it anymore], they offered us a $99/lifetime deal since our Tivo will work just fine with the antenna. We do love our Tivo, so we were happy they had an option for us.
- a Zinwell digital converter box [necessary if Tivo is to control the incoming channels in order to record it. Without the Tivo in the loop, we wouldn't have needed this.]
What we're missing:
- stuff on Food Network, Showtime, HBO…
and nothing else! We get all major networks, some weird channels that are antenna only [!] and more than enough to knit by. Much of the stuff we're missing will eventually be available on Netflix, or can be watched online. There are tons of series on Netflix that I am dying to watch, and it's all there for me to absorb at my own rate. I could probably spend a year alone in the Anime section!
Was the switch easy?
Nope. But it wasn't hard, either. It's just time consuming, researching your options and narrowing down choices. We've experimented with different converter boxes and antennas [though the rooftop antenna is a non-returnable item, so that one is gonna stay] until we got the best possible results.
The thing we miss most? The digital clock in our cable box…we have no other clock in the living room. Yeah, we can fix that.
I have barely covered the highlights here. I'd recommend you read the first two links and see if this sounds like it's for you, and then dive into the forums and do your research. Don't forget to check your postal or zip code for channel availability…no point in doing all this if you'll only get a channel or two. Good luck!
February 22, 2012
WWW: Elephants, Llamas and Paris Fashion
Because everything looks better in llama
Llama Font: I don't honestly think this needs any explanation or introduction. Just go, and say it in llama.
[image error]
Cee Cee, knitter extraordinaire
A great story from rural Kentucky: an 8-year-old girl is knitting elephants for the victims of the tornado that hit Joplin, Missouri last year. She and her family were unable to donate money to the Red Cross due to their own circumstances, but Cee Cee was moved enough by the stories of families of losing their homes that she wanted to show love and support in some way. So she did what could – she knitted. She knitted toy elephants to be given to children who have lost their homes. Knitters and others are donating money to the Red Cross for each elephant that Cee Cee has made. More info on Facebook.
Making a new yarn-bomber!
An arts group in Norcross, Georgia, is holding yarn-bombing workshops in preparation for a city-wide yarnbombing event to be held in March.
50 years of knitting: a video profile of Suzanne Hedderich Adams–LaLonde, a knitter in Sherrill, NY. A selection of her work – sweaters, scarves, mittens, socks, blankets and prayer shawls – is on display at the local library. So wonderful to see a knitter's work valued this way.
Bringing a smile.
Late last Sunday night, Yarnbombers decorated a group of trees in Hackney, London, with the objective of bringing a smile to faces on a dreary Monday morning. Mission accomplished, I would say!
'Sweaters with Swagger': A feature on the knitwear in the collections of Paris-based fashion designer Rick Owen and others. Fab stuff!
And although not strictly about knitting, a fascinating article about color, designers and color theory from Imprint magazine, featured on Salon. Even if you don't read the article, the images are fun and inspiring!
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