Writing

I’ve recently discovered Tomorrow Museum, which helpfully describes itself “collection of images and speculative essays exploring how technology, science, and economics are affecting the fine arts” (helpful, as I find succinct definition entirely beyond me tonight). It is deeply interesting and engrossing, and so far every link is worth following. The most recent post, Caring for Your Online Introvert, especially resonates with me.

Project Gutenberg and Google Books are excellent resources for plenty of free books, but I recently found the Chawton House Library collection of early women’s writing, which features rare and little-known works “which explore such broad-ranging themes as satire, slavery, marriage, witchcraft and piracy [and] signal the rich texture and innovative character of women’s writing in the period 1600 to 1830″. I’m enjoying the preface to Romance Readers and Romance Writers: a Satirical Novel, in which the author gleefully exposes some of the awful writing in romances she dislikes.

Music

The Headphone Commute podcast (here’s the FeedBurner link) has been supplying me with sound for some months. My particular favourites are Intelligent Breakcore, Ruckspin – Ranking Studio mix, and Bop – Micromixes. If you are at all inquisitive about “electronica, glitch, idm, drum’n’bass, breakcore, dubstep, trip-hop, modern classical, post-rock, shoegaze, ambient, downtempo, experimental, abstract, minimal and everything in between” (thank you, about page) you should try one or more of these mixes.

Here’s a recent piece of spindle-spinning.

90 metres and 34g of 3-ply Masham yarn, chain-plied on a 34g Bosworth midi spindle.

Truth be told, although I have not lost my love of creating, my creations have not been working out very well lately. I think I am doomed to never be happy with something until I have knit it twice. This applies doubly to anything that I design myself, though I follow the advice of my design books with zeal and measure everything three times. The mistakes seem so obvious with hindsight, as mistakes are wont to seem. As such, I have a growing pile of things-to-be-unravelled. The silver lining in this paragraph of gloom is that knitting practically invites unravelling, and no harm is done (save to my knitter’s confidence, of course).

I’m playing it safe at the moment; I’m only slightly (ha!) modifying someone else’s design. It’s Fay by Kim Hargreaves, and although I’ve changed the yarn and the stitch pattern and therefore the stitch count and I’m not sure it’s the right size and I’m a little concerned that the waist shaping may turn out to be too severe… despite all that, I’m hopeful that it will all turn out well and that I won’t have to add this one to the pile, too.

I’ve got some catching-up to do as regards photography of projects – several months of catching-up, in fact. Let me begin with my most recently completed object, then: the Arabella lace shawl by Kristen Hanley Cardozo, which I enjoyed knitting so much that I whizzed through it in just five days.

All the project details are here (the link should be viewable by everyone). It’s a lovely pattern, well-written and, being modular, is completely customizable (not to mention the choice of two edgings).

I bought a whole pack of this yarn – Rowan 4 ply soft, now discontinued – and have been thinking of what to do with the remaining 7.5 balls. It’s just about the right temperature for a fingering weight wool cardigan (no jumpers; I get too hot in them unless it’s deep winter) so I’ve been dutifully making swatches of stitch patterns. For a while I got really stuck on lace patterns, but then I saw the second photo in this post from The Sartorialist and was immediately drawn to the garter stitch/stocking stitch diamonds on the gentleman’s jumper. So far, I envision a raglan-sleeved cardigan with a deep v-neck and (possibly?) short sleeves. Watch this space!

Just over a month ago I was spinning a beautiful braid of Wensleydale fibre from The Thylacine’s November fibre club, and I’m happy to say that I’ve finished. Being a longwool (and a Google image search will make the meaning of that term abundantly plain) it has a lovely sheen and a good deal of strength. It’s not as soft as a shorter fibre like merino, but it’s very hard-wearing. I haven’t the faintest idea what I’ll make with it, but am quite happy to admire the skeins for now.

Where I live it’s getting darker, colder and snowier—just the setting for curling up with a book and a hot drink. The brains behind the advertisements for Carte Noire (an instant coffee, two words which should never exist in the same sentence) think so too. They’ve got Dominic West, Greg Wise and Dan Stevens to sit and read book extracts of ten to fifteen minutes in length. If you can ignore the occasional soft-focus shots of coffee mugs and focus on a) the wonderful prose and b) the lovely men reading them, I think you’ll enjoy these little videos. I know I did. Here is the link; I recommend Dominic West’s reading of a certain infamous scene from Pride and Prejudice in particular.

It’s been months since I last showed you a finished knit (my change-ringing scarf was the last, back in February!), so it’s high time for a new one. I have, in fact, been knitting during these quiet months, but my knitting luck’s been quite out and I’ve ended up unravelling most of what I’ve made. It’s frustrating to have to do it, but it’s even worse to have useless clothing in one’s wardrobe. Over the past few days I’ve done a serious clear-out of said wardrobe, filling several bin-bags with the aforementioned useless clothing, which will go to charity shops, and will hopefully be useful to someone else. I now feel like I have a clean sartorial slate on which to build. I also have more space, which is even better.

But, all this industriousness aside, I promised a finished knit, so here is my version of Kelmscott.

Kelmscott by Carol Sunday
I used 5.5 balls of Cascade 220 in Silver Gray and 4.5mm needles.
My Ravelry project page

This is a perfect cardigan. I saw it in the Winter 2009 issue of Twist Collective and knew I had to make it as soon as possible. I knew I should consider the matter sanely, and did so for about five seconds before buying the pattern and moving swiftly on to yarn selection. The pattern calls for a light worsted weight angora/merino yarn, but it’s not available in the UK and I find angora too hot and ticklish. I swatched and settled for an old stalwart: Cascade 220, which I knew would make a warm, cosy garment that would also last.

I lengthened the body and sleeves to suit my longer torso, and added an extra button. I also worked a simple crocheted buttonband instead of the loops in the pattern as written (I tried them, but they gaped too much, and my covered buttons looked “blobular” according to a sibling). The lace on the collar and fronts involves patterning on both sides, which requires concentration, but since much of the rest is reverse stocking stitch, there was plenty of mindless knitting.

The result is everything I’d hoped for: warm and cosy but elegant and stylish. It’s great for the season, especially the chilly evenings we’ve been having, and I have no problem with outfit selection because I don’t really want to wear anything else! It’s a worthy addition to my newly minimised wardrobe.