Knitting Zen

This blog has moved

2010-04-15T16:32:00.001-05:00

This blog is now located at http://knittingzen-willa.blogspot.com/. You will be automatically redirected in 30 seconds, or you may click here. For feed subscribers, please update your feed subscriptions to http://knittingzen-willa.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default.

2009-06-17T14:15:00.005-05:00

I had several balls of sock yarn listed at Ebay, but three of them didn't sell, and I thought I'd offer them here if anyone was interested. They were listed at $15.00; I would ask an additional $1.50 for shipping, so $16.50 for each. If you're interested, just email me and let me know which one you want, and I'll send you a Paypal invoice. If I have more than one request, it will be first-come, first-served. I'll let you know either way.

No. 1 - Regia Jubilee, Color 5472 ("India"), Dye Lot 53723. Hot pink, white, burgundy, tan. Made in Italy. 75% Superwash Wool, 25% Polyamide. Size 1-2 needles. 100 gram ball (420 meters).
This yarn was part of a limited edition set created for the 55th anniversary of Regia, and is no longer available.
$16.50 including S&H

No. 2 - Opal Rainforest III, Color 2030, Dye Lot 10. Off-white, denim-blue, gold, coral. Made in Germany. 75% Superwash Wool, 25% Polyamide. 8 stitches=1 inch on US Size 1 needles. 100 gram ball (425 meters).
$16.50 including S&H

No. 3 - Gedifra Socks Color, Color 4203, Dye Lot 10459. Pink, cream, turquoise, tan, pale yellow. Made in Germany. 75% Superwash Wool, 25% Polyamide. Size 1-2 needles. 100 gram ball (459 yards).
$16.50 including S&H

2009-06-17T00:02:00.000-05:00

Just posted about two dozen back issues of Knitter's and Vogue Knitting on Ebay.

2009-06-16T22:27:00.003-05:00

I just listed a bunch of old needlework magazines on Ebay: McCall's Needlework, Threads, Cross Stitch Magazine, Quilter's Newsletter.

And there are still a couple of balls of sock yarn, including a ball of Regia Special Edition "Jubilee," but the auctions end in about 15 hours!

Free Audio Book

2009-06-16T10:41:00.000-05:00

Free Audio book download of "Sweet Talk" by Susan Mallery from Lion Brand and Audible.

Sublime Stitching | This ain't your gramma's embroidery!

2009-05-08T08:14:00.000-05:00

These transfers make me want to embroider, something I haven't done for probably more than 20 years: Sublime Stitching.

I might have to order some . . .

2008-08-09T08:34:00.003-05:00

Noro Silk Garden is probably my favorite yarn ever, so I'm not sure why it took me so long to buy some Silk Garden Sock. In any event, I bought six skeins in a buying frenzy -- they came out with 8 colors, but I didn't buy the one that's all cream and tan, or the royal blue one. Anyway, I decided I'd bought too much, so I'm keeping the two colors I liked the most, and put the others on Ebay. They're a dollar or so cheaper than I paid for them, and about the same amount cheaper than the only other seller on Ebay.

2008-07-27T12:36:00.001-05:00

Today's time waster: photographing skeins of sock yarn and putting them up in my stash on Ravelry

I joined Ravelry a while ago, but had never done anything with it. Then yesterday I was putting up some Vera Bradley stuff on Ebay--something else I hadn't done in awhile--and was reminded of my "opal sock" saved search, and then for whatever reason, that reminded me of Ravelry, and I went there. And saw that they were having a "knitting olympics," and that intrigued me, so I went down in the basement to see what sock yarn I would pick if I was going to make a pair of Olympics socks, and that led to the photographing and listing extravaganza.

Right now I'm working on a sock that I started around the 4th of July so that I would have something to knit at the family reunion that weekend. I didn't end up knitting anything--my parents didn't want to stick around after lunch--but I'm about halfway through the first sock. I'd like to finish at least one before I start something else . . . maybe my "Olympic" knitting could be the second sock?

2008-01-09T17:19:00.001-06:00

Crocheted hamburgers, tv dinners, sardines . . . TOYS - a photoset on Flickr. Link from Slashfood

Knitted Kitty

2007-12-11T09:45:00.000-06:00

This is a really cute knitted kitty toy (a toy that's a kitty, not a toy for a kitty, I assume), and of course I would never buy this kind of thing as a kit -- would anyone pay $72 to the materials to knit a toy?? Even without the needles it would be over $60 just for the yarn and pattern book. I might buy the book, but if I were to make this, I'd definitely make it from scraps in my stash.

Yarn Market has Project Ideas for Toys - Wool Cotton Kitty Toy

2007-11-30T07:39:00.000-06:00

I went to the post office the other night to mail a package, and bought some stamps from the automated machine. I expected regular stamps, but got holiday stamps. Without my glasses, I couldn't really tell that they were anything other than pixelated holiday images, but it turns out that they're knitted holiday images.

From the USPS website:

For the 2007 holiday season, the U.S. Postal Service will issue Holiday Knits, four stamps featuring classic Christmas-time imagery designed and machine knitted by nationally known illustrator Nancy Stahl: There is a dignified stag; a snow-dappled evergreen tree; a perky snowman sporting a top hat; and a whimsical teddy bear.

2007-09-24T11:15:00.000-05:00

Briefly -- I put up about a dozen new sets of stitch markers in my Etsy shop. Most of them are semi-precious stones (Amazonite, Prase, Turquoise, Sugilite), with a few Czech glass items. I have a few more sets to photograph and post later in the week. See pictures of some of them in the left-hand column. More later.

Strange Horizons Fiction: The Leaving Sweater, by Ruth Nestvold

2007-09-05T10:50:00.000-05:00

Strange Horizons Fiction: The Leaving Sweater, by Ruth Nestvold:

The leaving sweater was made of scraps of leftover red wool�many different shades of red. And many different qualities of yarn, from mohair to raw silk to cotton and linen mixes. And many different stitches, from ribbed to open work to waterfall to butterfly. Although it had been a decade now, Vicky could still remember watching her mother make it as a present for Vicky's high school graduation�before she was to go away to college.

"I don't want to leave Rolynka," Vicky had said, her arms wrapped around her skinny legs as she watched the needles fly in her mother's hands and the strands of wool take shape.

2007-07-11T23:46:00.000-05:00

A t-shirt I found in Second Life:

2007-06-07T11:20:00.000-05:00

I love this:

Masquerade

and:
Knitta

Makes me want to knit a cozy for . . . something.

My friend Kurt sent the link to me, and he said, "I'm gonna walk outside some dy and see a telephone pole knitted up, aren't I?" Yup.

2007-03-15T07:40:00.000-05:00

Did I ever post this? I can't remember. I found it when cleaning out some files yesterday. It's a creation myth that I wrote.

Knitting the World

First Daughter was in a foul mood. She and her sisters had drawn straws, and she had gotten the short one. Consequently, she had been given the task of knitting the earth, and it was going very slowly. The stitches would not come easily; she seemed to knit and knit and knit, and never get anywhere. Miles of stitches. And the brown and green yarns were boring—yard after yard of greens and browns, endlessly spooling from the needles. She yawned. Why couldn't she have gotten to knit the sky, or the sea?

Second Daughter was knitting the sky. Stitches of blue silk flew from her needles, punctuated with fluffy tufts of cloud and the occasional jeweled bird. She laughed to herself as she duplicate-stitched a flock of geese into the fabric, creating tiny v-shapes with silvery gray thread on top of the blue sky.

Third Daughter was knitting the sea in pools of emerald and sapphire, spumes of foam rising from her clicking needles.

The Mother walked among them, fingering the cloth, occasionally correcting a stitch, pulling it straight, and stroking her daughters' smooth heads as they bent over their work. Second Daughter smiled into the sky, pulling a length of white wool from her workbasket and knitting it together with the sky blue silk to make a cloud. With sudden inspiration she selected a shiny silver yarn from her workbasket and began fashioning the lining for the cloud.

Third Daughter looked up as the mother approached, and leaned her head into her mother's hip. The Mother smiled down on her and fingered the fabric that was rolling off her needles. Third Daughter was working a cable into the fabric, creating an island in the center of a gleaming silver sea. Miles and miles of sea pooled around her, green and blue and silver; she looked up and, seeing Second Daughter knitting the sun into the sky with golden wool, she chose a lighter shade of gold and began to knit the sun's reflection into her sea.

First Daughter threw down her needles. "Why do I always get the boring jobs?" she asked. "Second Daughter and Third Daughter get the pretty blue and silver silks, and I get the boring, lumpy green and brown wool. It isn't fair!" The Mother walked toward her. "Why do you complain so?" she asked. "Every job is worthwhile. The sea is beautiful, and the sky is beautiful, but the earth is beautiful, too."

The Mother picked up the bolt of fabric that was First Daughter's knitting. The knitting was lumpy and bumpy, having been knit of roughly spun wool on heavy needles, so unlike the smooth silk of the sky and the sea. First Daughter tried, but she couldn't help comparing her knitting to her sisters'. "Can you fix it for me?" she asked her mother. "Will you?"

"It was your job to knit the earth, Daughter," the Mother said. "You have to do the job that is given to you, no one can do it for you."

"Then I quit!" said First Daughter, and flung her knitting down and flounced away. Without a hand to smooth it, the knitting lay where it fell, in lumps and bumps and piles, forming furrows and hills and valleys. And that is how the mountains were formed.

~ Willa Cline, February 23, 2006

2007-03-11T14:23:00.000-05:00

I spent this morning stocking my Etsy shop -- so much fun! I never know if I'll make any money doing something like this, but I always figure as long as I have fun doing it, it's win-win.

2007-03-04T09:21:00.000-06:00

I started a new sock yesterday, out of a limited edition Opal called "Regenbogen" (which is, as far as I can tell, the German word for "rainbow). I ordered it from Astrid's, in the Netherlands. I could hardly put it down yesterday, and was reminded that I love Opal above all other sock yarns. The Trekking (below) was very splitty (of course, I guess that's the result of the multi-ply, which also gives the ombre effect) and wasn't a lot of fun to knit.

I've also decided to make this pair a little longer in the leg than I usually do, just to see if I like it.

2007-03-03T11:28:00.000-06:00

I finally finished the first green/red/pink Trekking sock:

It's a little tight on me, and I'm not sure why. I made it exactly the way I've made all of the others; I think Trekking yarn may be a tiny bit smaller than the Opal I usually use. It fits, it's just that it exactly fits. Maybe when I wash it it will loosen up a little, they usually do.

2007-01-23T09:33:00.000-06:00

The yarn in the pictures below is Trekking XXL -- I think it's 107 (I don't have it with me). But looking at those pictures on my monitor at work, they really don't look like the true colors. I think I need to do some color correcting! This image shows the colors much better (from Astrid's Dutch Obsessions.

2007-01-23T08:00:00.000-06:00

I made a resolution to knit a sock a month, or 6 pair this year, but I'm not off to a very good start. Seems like every time I sit down, I'm working. But I have made a little progress:

We'll be on vacation in a couple of weeks, so I'm looking forward to lots of knitting time on the plane, waiting in airports, and beside the pool.

2007-01-01T17:18:00.000-06:00

Over in the left-hand column you'll see a new little ad block, offering a piece of sterling silver jewelry free, for only the cost of shipping and handling ($5.99). I saw this on another website, and checked it out, and ordered this sterling silver and garnet ring:

I just ordered it today, so obviously haven't received it yet, but I was impressed enough to set up an account so that I could put up the ad. Every fifteen minutes, the jewelry on offer changes--there are always four items available, so you can just wait until something comes up that you like. All of it looks pretty nice, lots of lovely stones. Garnets are one of my favorites.

2006-12-20T11:36:00.000-06:00

I thought this was a very interesting article about the correlation between knitting and magic(k), specifically the making of knots: Blogickal: Knitting Magick.

She talks about the book The Knitting Goddess, by Deborah Bergman, which I also have. I love the passage that was quoted here:

The invitation to knit usually doesn't arrive when we are feeling like everything in life has achieved a measure of Parisian fullness and balance and needs to get roughed up again. Not always, but more often, it seems to be in one of those ragged, odd moments of life - when we are feeling somehow at odds, in transition, at risk, out of sorts, or just plain awkward - when two needles and a skein of something intriguing manage to present themselves within arm's reach. A voice whispers in our ear. We pick up the rudimentary tools and fiber, put up with the fleeting added challenge of learning yet another new skill, and the next thing we know we are knitting our way through our transition, ordering our life into a new pattern while we also use our hands and needles to learn to pattern yarn. We counter one transition with another, and get through both, and then some.

I haven't been knitting very much lately. It's a very busy time of year, but I somehow need to find the time to sit down and knit a few rows; I think it would probably help to calm and center me.

And maybe try some knot magic.

2006-11-14T07:51:00.000-06:00

I was surprised to see a Berroco Free Pattern called Willa. Ugly sweater, though, unfortunately.

2006-10-20T22:16:00.000-05:00

Over the next few days I'm going to be posting some yarn for sale at eBay. Just trying to do a little de-stashing (to make room for new yarn, of course!). Check out my eBay page. All I have up there so far is a bag of Elann's Endless Summer Sonata in Angel Blue and a bag of Noro Shinano #1, but as soon as I can get some photos taken, I'll post some more.